Cassell’s Family Magazine Vol. 16 1890

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THE URIPESMAIDS. Ibl (S:re page 25.)

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CASSELL'S Family Magazine §C£ttsfa^aIe6. ,v ‘Z' ,, CASSELL & COMPANY, Limited: LONDON, PARIS ^ MELBOURNE. 1890. [all rights reserved.]

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^^ruicipal Contributor's to tbis S^olunif’ Author^. The Rev. SYDNEY A. ALEXANDER JAMES BAKER, F.R.G.S. The Rev. A. J. BAMFORD, B.A. MATTHIAS BARR. F. E. BEDDARD, M.A., F.R.S.E., F.Z.S. E. CROSSLEY. FREDERICK J. CROWEST. The Rev. j. H. DAVIES, M.A. P. H. DAVIS. J. R. EASTWOOD. KATE EYRE. LUCY FARMER. E. LONG FOX. HENRY FRITH. EVELYN EVERETT GREEN. EDWIN GOADBY. J. CUTHBERT HADDEN. J. BERWICK HARWOOD. The Rev. FREDERICK HASTINGS. F. MORELL HOLMES. ARABELLA M. HOPKINSON. Prof. F. EDWARD HULME, F.S.A. DAVID KER. The Rev. THOMAS KEYWORTH. FLORENCE M. KING. W.J. LACEY. The Rev. FREDERICK LANGBRIDGE, M.A. M. R. LIVERMORE. E. LOWE. HENRY MALPAS. CHARLOTTE M. MASON. T. MUNRO, C.E. j. FRANCIS WALLER, LL.D. A. G. PAYNE. FREDERIC E. WEATHERLY, M.A. GEORGE WEATHERLY. BEATRICE WHITBY. J. F. ROWBOTHAM. The Rev. J. T. BURTON-WOLLASTON. C. RAY WOODS. CojV(POgEF(g. ERSKINE ALLON. J. M. BENTLEY, Mus.D. J. W. ELLIOTT. The Rev. W. J. FOXELL, B.A., Mus.B. W. H. HUNT, Mus.D., L.Mus., T.C.L. BENEDETTO PALMIERI. The Rev. F. PEEL, B.Mus M. SCALE. ROBERT BARNES, R.W.S. ALLAN BARRAUD. GORDON BROWNE. G. H. SYDNEY COWELL. S. T. DADD. LUCIEN DAVIS. NORMAN P. DAVIES. J. FINNEMORE. E. H. FITCHEW. HARRY FURNISS. M. L. GOW, R.I. EMILY J. HARDING. PAUL HARDY. W. HATHERELL, R.I. ALICE HAVERS (The late). EVERARD HOPKINS. HAL. LUDLOW. A. FAIRFAX MUCKLEY. J. NASH, R.I. SIDNEY PAGET. WALTER PAGET. W. RAINEY. W. S. STACEY. J. F. SULLIVAN. PERCY TARRANT. JOHN WHITE, R.I. C. WILKINSON.

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About ’Buses . About Rounds and Catches . Accompanying, On the Art of ... Advisory Comm’ttee, The Uni¬ versal : A Proposal . Aerial Photography . After a Collision . Air-Lock, In an : An Underground Experience . American Farming for Women ... American Parliament, The . Amused ourselves during a Long Voyage, How we . Anatomy of Handwriting, An 144, Angela’s (Lady) Latest Lion Annuals in the Flower Garden {7 he Ga7'den in April) . Another Easy Continental Trip ... April Mood, An . Arab, Racing an : an Adventure in Syria . Arrivals, Some Recent, at “Zoo” . Art of Accompanying, On the ... Art of Cameo Cutting, The . Arts, Minor, The Revival of Artistic Aspect of Railways, The August, The Garden in . Autumn Gardening {The Garden i.L October") . PAGE 650 667 472 92 421 83 157 29 335 140 208 246 283 411 272 ... 748 311 472 744 173 12 561 660 Bad Language, What is ? . Beachy Head . Bertie, The Wrong . Best of Reasons, I he ( Music) . . . Bird that Soars, The {Music) Boating Song, A . 94, Boating Song, A {Music) . Botanical “Name- Words” . Boy, The Swiss . Bridesmaids, The . Broken Engagement, A . Bull’s-Eye, How Men Hit the ... '’Buses, About . Cameo Cutting, The Art of . Canons and Canon Singing, Con¬ cerning . Cardewe Manor, The Chronicles of (See under “ Chronicles ”) Career of Joseph Joachim, The ... Case, A Sad . Catches, About Round- and Chat on Good-Nature, A . Cheese Cookery, Some Digestible Forms of . Chit-Chat on Dress : What to 314 512 598 556 26 631 95 366 436 25 401 658 650 744 522 108 240 667 526 216 Wear 55, 119, 184, 241, 303, 632. 697, Child, Our Delicate . Chinese, The Mind-Reading of the Christabel, The Wooing of 544, 577> 673, Christmas Sketch, A (In a Guard’s Van) . . Chro.vicles of Cardewe Manor, The : — Miss Roxend ale’s Suitors . The Sacrifice of Mary Somerville Clarkes’ Cousin, The . Coins, Old and New . Collision, After a . Company, The Ship’s . “ Company, Two are ” . Competitions, New Story 122, 256, 704> Concerning Canons and Canon- Singing . Continental Trip, Another Easy... Cornish Cookery, A Gossip about Cousin, The Clarkes’ . Crooked Spine, A {A Family Doctor) . Curiosities of Musical Examina¬ tions . 752 408 250 705 118 Dale, A Yorkshire . December, The Garden in . Delicacies for the Winter Tea- Table . Dilapidations . Disciple of Mesmer, A : a Story of Hypnotism . Dishes, Savoury, for Spring . Doctor, Papers by a Family ; A Word about Invalid Diet ... “My Old Foe Again ! ” . “So Peevish and Irritable” ... A Friendly Talk about Hysteria Influenza Colds and Whooping Cough . A Most Unwelcome Guest Fruit as Food . A Crooked Spine . Double X Mystery, The . Dress, Chit-Chat on (What to Wear) 55,119,184,241,303, ^ 377. 437, 497, 559, 632. 697, Dwelling, Love Where is thy? ... Dwelling-House, The Story of the 268 57 17 16 662 281 46 81 15s 238 272 345 470 538 18 752 536 88 Evening, Morning and . ^274 Evergreens (The Garden in De¬ cember) . Examinations, Musical, Curiosities . 235 211 502 308 670 83 673 479 760 522 411 685 308 538 235 Fair, A Peep at a Russian . Family Doctor, Papers by a A Word about Invalid Diet ... “ My Old Foe Again ! ” . “ So Peevish and Irritable ” ... A Friendly Talk about Hys¬ teria . Influenza Colds and Whooping Cough . A Most Unwelcome Guest Fruit as Food . A Crooked Spine . Farming, American, for Women... Festive Fare . ••• Flowers, Wooing by . Flowers, Wooing by {Music) Food, Fruit as (A Family Doctor) “For Me !” . . “ For Me ! ” (Mttsic) . Friends, Mr. Smith and his . Friendly Talk about Hysteria, A {A Family Doctor) . Fruit as Food {A Fainily Doctor) Furniture, A Paper on (Colonel Rudderbuff’s Possessions) . 218 46 81 155 238 272 345 470 538 29 153 613 612 470 46 182 394 238 470 350 End of the Story, The . 718 Engagement, A Broken . 401 Engagement Ring, The . 347 Engagements, A Prime Minister’s 687 Garden, The : — January (Some Early Spring Flowers) . 79 February (More Early Spring Flowers) . 17 1 March (Spring and Early Sum¬ mer Flowers) . 236 April (Annuals in the Flower- Garden) . 283 . 339 June . 419 July . 495 August . 561 September . 596 October (Autumn Gardening) ... P60 November ... 732 December . 37 Gatherer, The: — About the Maories . 704 Address Cards, Natural . 637 Adjustable Telephone, An . 701 Advances in Electric Flighting . . . . 380 “ Adventures ofa Younger Son, The”. . 448 Aerated Water on Draught . 189 Aerophor, The . 755 Air, Pure, for the Greenhouse . . . . 703 Air-Propeller, A Silent . 318 Album, A Rotary . 253 Alloy, A Non-Magnetic . 383

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1 The Gatherer— Animals, Preservinc: Sea . Animals, Wild, as Pets . Another New Heat Indicator Artists, A Hand-Rest for . Asbestos Balloon, An . Atmospheric Dust . Audio-Telephone, The . Author of Parliamentary Government, The . Autographism . Automatic Fog-Signals . Back-Band for Harness, A New . . Bacteria and Plants . Bagpipe Burglar-Alarm, A . Balloon, An Asbestos . Balloons, Carrier Pigeons and Banana Fibre . . . . . . Barking Sands of Hawai, The Battery, A New Primary . Beams from Insects, Preserving . . Bedroom Fires, How to Keep up Bee and Forage Plant, A . Beetle, A Luminous . Before the Wedding— and Alter . . Bell, A Portable Electric . Bell Rock Fog-Signal, The . Belt, A Fire-Escape . Ben Nevis, St. Elmo’s Fire on . . Benzoline Motor, A Domestic Binder for Lantern Slides, A Bitumen Bombs . Black Silver Jewellery . Blower, An Electric . Boat, A Pioneering . Boats, Seamless . Boiler, An Instantaneous . Boiling Lakes . Bombs, Bitumen . Book about Russia, A . Book for Gardeners, A . Books^ of Reference, Two . Books* to be Studied, Two . Books Worth Reading . Book-Case, A Handy Revolving Boys and Girls, The "Growth of . . Breath Figures . Bridge, The Proposed Channel . . Brine and Sewage . Brougham Lighted by Electricity, A . . Burglar- Alarm, A Bagpipe . Butter, Preserving . By-Ways of Nature . Cabbage- Strainer, A . Cable, A Telephone . Cable, Whale v . Calculating Disc, A . Cap Wrench, A Handy . Capstan, An Electrical . Card Games, Two New . Cards, Natural Address . Cards, Some Christmas and New- Year Carrier Pigeons and Balloons Carrier Swallows . Celluvert . Channel Bridge, The Proposed . . Chaucer, Wyclif and . Cheques and Receipts, Unalterable . . Children, A New Treasure for . . Children, For the Protection of Rest¬ less . China Clay . Christmas and New-Year Cards, Some Christmas Presents . Cipher Type-Writer, A . Circulating Filter, A . Clay, China . Cleaner and Sheer, A Root . Cluster of Rainbows, A . Coal in Kent . Coal-Gas Detector, A . Coldness and Weather . Collapsing Crate, A . Colonies, Irrigation . Colours, Photographing . Colour-Printing on Metal . Colours, Testing Fast . Combined Spoon and Fork, A Commission, The Niagara . Compact Saucepans . Constant-Level Inkstand, A . Cost of Railway Travelling, The . . Cotton Plant Stalks, A Use for . . Crate, A Collapsing . Crockery, A New Handle for Cure^ for Hemorrhage, A Simple . . Cutting Stout Thread . Cuttle-Fish, A Gigantic . Cycle Road-Sketcher, A . • . . . . Index. 637 639 447 62 382 446 574 128 636 756 190 757 189 382 62 191 760 508 639 381 382 756 704 506 444 382 62 635 319 62 317 758 759 639 254 756 62 511 384 256 640 192 384 759 635 62 126 637 189 757 192 125 446 253 638 61 191 127 637 60 62 702 59 62 640 3^9 576 574 383 60 64 188 701 383 61 317 382 703 448 252 123 508 255 254 444 700 253 123 639 252 188 638 381 253 57^ PAGE The Gatherer— Damper for Stoves, A New . 574 Date Farm, A . 316 Density of Thunderclouds, The . . . . 637 Detector, A Coal-Gas . 703 Device, An Earthing . 509 Diamond, The Seat of the . 317 Diet, Dry Meat . 575 Disc. A Calculating . 638 Diving Dress, A New . 447 Domestic Benzolinr; Motor, A .. 635 Double- Note Siren, A . 60 Double-Wedged Photometer, A .. 317 Draught, Aerated Water on . 189 Dreams, A Study of . 509 Diess-Trunk, A New . 635 Drilling Square Holes . 702 Dry Meat Diet . 575 Dust, Atmospheric . . . . ' . 446 Earthing Device, An ^ . 509 Easel Peg, A Self-Locking . 572 Edible Flowers . 188 Edinburgh Exhibition, The . 316 Egg-Boiler, A New . 572 Eggs and Egg-Collecting . 384 Electric Bell, A Portable . 506 Electric Blower, An . 758 Electric Lamps, The Vacuum of . . . . 639 Electric Lighting, Advances in . . . . 380 Electric Range-Finder, An . 636 Electric Table-Lamp, An . 125 Electric Tramway, The Lineff . . . . 70J Electrical Capstan, An . 191 Electrical Tanning . 253 Electricity, A Brougham Lighted by.. 637 Electricity and Light . 187 Elephant, A Famous . 190 Elmo’s (St.) Fire on Ben Nevis .. .. 62 Engine-Room Telegraph, A New. . . . 255 Engli>hman, A Typical . 63 Epidemics;, The Spread of . 318 Etruscans, The Old . 254 Eucalyptia and Malaria . 252 Exercise, A Simple Mode of . 187 Exhibition, The Edinburgh . 316 Exhibitions, Two More International 125 Exploration of Palestine, The . . . . 192 Extending Ladders . 123 Eye-Tester, An . 700 Famous Elephant, A . 190 Farm, A Date . 316 Favourite in a New Dress, An Old . . 63 Ferns, Fragrant . 446 Fibre, Banana . 191 Figures, Breath . 635 Filter, A Circulating . 701 Filter, A Home-Made . 507 Fire on Ben Nevis, St. Elmo’s .. .. 62 Fires, Bedroom, How to Keep up . . 381 Fire-Escape, A New . 60 Fire-E.scape Belt, A . 382 Fire-Pails, New . 509 Fishes, The Speed of . 123 Flash-Lamp, A Simple . 506 Flexible Metal Tubes . 126 Flowers, Edible . , 188 Fog-Signal, The Bell Rock . 444 Fog-Signal, A Self-Acting . 125 Fog-Signals, Automatic . 756 Folding Furniture . 383 Foot, The Human . 508 For Lady Readers . 704 For the Protection of Restless Children 574 For Wives and Mothers . 348 Forage Plant, A Bee and . 382 Fork, A Combined Spoon and , . . . 444 Fossil Giant, A . 757 Four Kindred Games . 51 1 Fragrant Ferns . 446 Friend of Girls, A True . 128 Fruit, Tuna . 62 Furnace, A New Siemens . 191 Furniture, Folding . 383 Games for Children, Seven New.. .. 63 Games, Four Kindred . 511 Games, More New Parlour . 189 “ Games of Patience ” 448 Games, Two New Card . 127 Gardeners, A Book for . 384 Gas Cooker, A New . 255 Gas-Gun, A . 701 Gas-Regulator, A Safety . 702 Gasworks, Oxygen in . 447 Gentlemen, U.seful to . 575 Giant, A Fos‘-il . 757 Gigantic Cuttle-Fish, A . 253 (iirls, A True Friend of . 128 Good News for the Horses . 445 PAGE The Gatherer— Government, The Author of Parl amen- tary . 128 Grader, A New . 507 Grapnel, A Gripping . 572 Green Ray, The . 509 Greenhou.se, Pure Air tor the . . . . 703 Gripping Grapnel, A . 572 Grotto, A New . 189 Group of Novelties for Ladies, A . . 573 Growth of Boys and Girls, The . . . . 759 Gunpowder, A New Smokeless .. .. 125 Gymnastics of To-day, The . 319 Hammer, A Pneumatic . 252 Handicraft, Marks of . 319 Hand-Rest for Artists, A . 62 Handle for Crockery, A New . . . . 188 Handy Cap Wrench, A . 61 Handy Revolving Book-Case, A. . .. 384 Harmonics, A New Theory of .. .. 6^7 Harness, A New Back Band for . . . , 190 Hawai, The barking Sands of . . . . 760 Health of the Skin, The . 510 “ Healthy, Wealthy, and Wise”.. .. 448 Hearing, The Phonograph and .. .. 188 Heat Indicator, Another New .. .. 447 “ Hedgehog” Translormer, The . . . . 756 Hemorrhage, A Simple Cure for . . . . 038 Highland Torquay, A . 192 History for Young Readers . 703 Holes, Drilling Square . 702 Home Use, Novelties for . 124 Home-Made Filter, A . 507 Horses, Good News for the . 445 Household Novelties, A Pair of . . . . 700 “ Household Wrinkles ” . 255 How to Keep up Bedroom Fires. . . . 381 Human Foot, The . 508 Idiocy, Trepanning Lr . 758 Image, The Nampa . 188 Inclined Plane Railway, An . 447 Indicator, A Magazine . 444 Indicator, Heat, Another New .. .. 447 Indicators, Street . 252 “ Influenza Colds and Whooping Cough” 444 Ink Plant, An . 191 Inkstand, a Constant-Level . 123 Insects, Preserving Beams from .. .. 639 Instantaneous Boiler, An . 254 Insumgraph, The . .^ 572 International Exhibitions, Two More.. 125 Iron, Rustless . 318 Ironing Machine, An . 759 Irrigation Colonies . 123 Japanese Lacquer . . . . 380 Jewellery, Black Silver . 317 Jute, A Rival to . 639 Kent, Coal in . . 382 Kerosene and Spiders . . 758 Kettle, A Stove . 123 Kettle (Spirit) and Lamp, A New . . 447 Kneading Machine, A . 124 Kolatina . 507 Labels, Some New . 575 Lacquer, Japanese . 380 Ladders, Extending . 123 Ladies, A Group of Novelties for . . 573 Ladies, Some Novelties for . 61 Ladies, Two Novelties for . 316 Lady Readers, For . '704 Lakes, Boiling . . ^ . 756 Lamp, A New Spirit Kettle and . . . . 447 Lamp, A Petroleum Miner’s . 187 Lamps, The Vacuum of Electric . . . . 639 Lamp-Cleaner, A . 639 Lantern, A Photoramic . 254 Lantern Slides, A Binder for .. .. 319 Laughing Plant, A . 639 Lead, Tempering Steel in . 638 Lens, Sketching by . 702 Life-Saver, A Prompt . 638 Lifeboat, A New Steam . . .. .. .. 757 Light, Electricity and . 167 Light in the Sea . 191 Light, The Siemens-Violle Standard of 759 Lighthouse, A Piloting . 318 Lighting, Electric, Advances in . . . . 380 Lightning, Zig-zag . 446 Lightning-Guard, A New . 575 Lineff Electric Tramway, The . . . . 700 Lode of Uranium, A . 60 London, The Tower for . 636 London to Paris by Telephone . . . . 59 Luminous Beetle, A . 756 Machine, A Kneading . 124

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I NDEX. VI PAGE The Gatherer— Continued. Machine, A Sheep-Shearing . 189 Machine, A Thatching . 63 Machine, A Wood-Wool . . 382 Machine, An Ironing . 759 Magazine Indicator, A . 444 Magnetic Adhesion . 126 Malaria, Eucalyptia and . 252 Malaria Screens . 637 Maories, About the . 704 Marble, Oolite . 123 Marks of Handicraft . 319 McLeod’s Sunshine Recorder , . . . 755 Meat Diet, Dry . 575 Mechanical Reporter, A . 573 “ Meeting, Wimbledon,” at Home, A 384 Memory, Where is the? . 320 Metal, Colour-Printing on . 255 Metal Tubes, Flexible . 126 Microbes in the Soil . 190 Milk, Sterilised . 254 Miner’s Lamp, A Petroleum . 187 Mode of Exercise, A Simple . 187 Model Sundial, A . 640 More New Music . 511 More New Parlour Games . 189 Mothers. For Wives and . 384 Motor, A Domestic Benzoline . . . . 635 Motor, The 'I'esla . 639 Mucilage. A New . 316 Music, More New . 51 1 Music, New . 128 Music, New . 510 “ Music, The Story of” . 127 Musical Phantoms . 639 Mussels, Poisonous . 758 Nampa Image, The . 188 Nature, By-Ways of . 192 Natural Address Cards . 637 Natural Soap . . ^ . 5.^6 New and Old Stories . 703 New Back-Band for Harness, A. . . . 19J New Dress-Trunk, A . 635 New Diving-Dress, A . 447 New Damper for Stove ■, A . 574 New Egg-Boiler, A . 572 New Engine-Room Telegraph, A . . 255 New Fire-Escape, A . 60 New Fire-Pails . 509 N w Gas Cooker, A . 255 New Grader, A . 507 New Grotto, A . 189 New Handle for Crockerj^ A .. 188 New Lightning-Guard, A . 575 New Lipped Saucepan, A . 187 New Mucilage, A . 316 New Music . 128, 5x0 New Pavement, A . 702 New Primary Batterv, A . 508 New Reflecting Shade, A . 444 New Road Wheel, A . 576 New Siemens Furnace, A . 191 New Smoke Annihilator, A . 758 New Smokeless Gunpowder, A , . . . 125 New Spirit Kettle and Lamp, A . . . . 447 New Steam Lifeboat. A . . . . 757 New Steel Sleeper, A . 62 New Strainer, A . . . 576 New Street-Cleaner, A . 255 New Tea, A . . 508 New Theodolite, A . 638 New Theory of Harmonics, A . . . . 637 New Treasure for Children, A .. 576 New Volumes . . . . 127 New Well-Dish, A . 126 New Windmill, A . 61 New Year Cards, Some Christmas and 60 Niagara Commission, The . 700 Nickel Steel . 448 Niger, Mungo Park and the . 576 Night Sky, The . 125 Non-Magnetic Alloy, A . 383 Novelties, A Pair of Household . . . . 700 Novelties for Home U.se . 124 Novelties for Ladies, A Group of. . . . 573 Novelties for Ladies, Some . 61 Novelties lor Ladies, Two . 316 Nursery, A Sea-Weed . 380 Oil-Shell for Stormy Weather, An . . 638 Old Etruscans, The . 254 Old Favourite in a New Dress, An . . 63 Old Stories for Young Readers . . . . 64 “ One and All ” . ' 640 Oolite Marble . 123 Oxygen in Gasworks . 447 Pair of Household Novelties, A , Palestine, I'he Exploration of 700 192 The Gatherer— Coniintf^d. Paris by Telephone, London to . . Park, Mungo, and the Niger Parliamentary Government, Author of . Parlour Games, More New . . “Patience, Games of” . Pavement, A New . Perennial Pasture . Petroleum Miner’s Lamp, A . . Pets, Wild Animals as . Phantoms, Musical . Phonograph and Hearing, The . . Photometer, A Double- Wedged . . Photographing Colours . Photoramic Lantern, A . Pictures by Telegraph . Pigeons, Carrier, and Balloons Piloting Lighthouse, A . . Pioneering Boat, A . Plant, A Laughing . Plant, An Ink . Plant, Forage, A Bee and . . Plants, Bacteria and . Play, Something to Sing and Pneumatic Hammer, A . Pocket bun-Dial, A . Poisonous Mussels . . . . . . Polluted Wells, Testing . Polyphone, The . Porcelain Siphon-Head, A . . Portable Electric Bell, A Presents, Christmas . Preserving Beams from Insects . . Preserving Butter . Preserving Sea Animals . Primary Battery, A New Prompt Life-Saver, A . Proposed Channel Bridge, The . . Prose Reading . Protection of Restless Children, the . Public Libraries Movement, The. . Pulsion Telephone, The . Pure Air for the Greenhouse. . • • 59 • • 576 The 128 . . 189 .. 448 . . 7C2 .. 318 .. 187 .. 639 . . 6^9 .. 188 •• 317 . . 508 • • 254 .. 381 62 .. 318 .. 750 .. 639 .. 191 .. 382 •• 757 .. 127 252 .. 127 •• 758 .. 510 .. 758 . . 508 . . 506 .. 64 .. 639 •• 757 • • 637 . . 508 .. 638 62 . . 640 P’or •• 574 640 . . 190 •• 703 Radial Scale Thermometer, A .. .. 445 Railway, An Inclined Plane . 447 Railway Travelling, The Cost of . . 574 Railwaj’^ Writing-Desk, A . 189 Rainbows, A Cluster of . 317 Ramie for Silkworn>s . 758 Range-Finder, An Electric . 636 Ray, The Green . 509 Readers, For Lady . 704 Readers, History for Young . 703 Reading, Books Worth . 192 Reading, Prose . 640 Ready tor 1890 . 128 Receipts, Unalterable C heques and . . 319 Reference, Two Books of . 256 Reflecting Shade, A New . 444 Register, A Ihunderstorm . 635 Relay, A Tuning-Fork . 318 Reminding Watch, A . 316 “ Remus, Uncle,” Again . 256 Reporter, A Mechanical . 573 Resistances, Standard . 510 Restless Children, For the Protection of . 574 Revolving Book-Case, A Handy. . .. 384 Rival to Jute, A . 639 River, A Subterranean . 191 Rivers, Telegraphing Across . . . . 638 Road-Sketcher, A Cycle . 576 Rolled Screw-Nail, A . 190 Root Cleaner and Slicer, A . 61 Rotary Album, A . 253 Routes, Stanley’s . 256 Russia, A Book about . 511 Russian, Transliteration from the . . 446 Rustless Iron . 318 Safety Gas-Regulator, A . Sands, The Barking, of Hawai .. Saucepan, A New Lipped . Scale Thermometer, A Radial Screens, Malaria . bcrew-Nail, A Rolled . Sea, Light in the . Sea- Weed Nursery, A . Seamless Boats . Seat of the Diamond, The . Self-Acting Fog-Signal, A . Self-Closing Tap, A . Self-Locking Easel- Peg, A . Seven New Games for Children . . Sewage, Brine and . Shade, A New Reflecting . Sheep-Shearing Machine, A . Siemens Furnace, A New . 702 760 187 445 637 190 191 380 639 317 125 509 572 63 126 444 189 191 The Gatherer— Contiftticd. Siemens-Violle Standard of Light, The 7t;o Signal, Fog, The Bell Rock . 444 Silent Air-Propeller, A . 318 Silkworms, Ramie for . 758 Silver Jewellery, Black . 317 Simple Cure for Hemorrhage, A. . .. 638 Simple Flash-Lamp, A . 506 Simple Mode of Exercise, A . . . . 187 Sing and Play, Something to . . . . 127 Siphon-Head, A Porcelain . 508 Siren, A Double-Note . "60 Sisal- Hemp . 190 Sketching bv Lens . 702 Skin, The Health of the . 510 Sky, The Night . .. 125 Sleeper, A New Steel . 62 Slicer, A Root Cleaner and . 61 Slide'!, Lantern, A Binder for .. .. 319 Small Toe, The . 739 Smoke Annihilator, A New . 758 Smokele.ss Gunpowder, A New . . . . 125 Soap, Natural . 506 Soil, Microbes in the . 190 Some Christmas and New Year Cards 60 Some New Labels . 575 Some Novelties for Ladies . 61 Something to Sing and Play . 127 “ Son, The Adventures of a Younger” 448 Speed of Fishes, The . . 123 Spiders, Kerosene and . 758 Spirit Kettle and Lamp, A New.. .. 447 Spoon and Fork, A Combined . . . . 444 Spread of Epidemics, The . 318 Spring, A Submarine . 758 Square Holes, Drilling . 702 Stalks, A U.se for Cotton-Plant . . . . 639 Standard of Light, The Siemens-Violle 759 Standard Resisiances . 510 Stanley’s Routes . 256 “Star- Land” . 192 Steam Lifeboat. A New . 757 Steel in Lead, Tempering . 638 Steel, Nickel . 448 Steel Sleeper, A New . 62 Steel Trellis-Work . 756 Stereorama, A . 757 Sterilised Milk . . 254 Stevenson’s (Mr.) Latest Storj-- .. .. 63 Stories, New and Old . 703 Stories, Old, for Young Readers .. .. 64 Stormy Weather, An Oil-Shell for . . 638 “ Story of Music,. The” . 127 Stout Thread, Cutting . 381 Stove Kettle, A . 123 Stoves, A New Damper for . 574 Strainer, A New . 576 Street Indicators .. 252 Street-k leaner, A New . 255 Study of Dream.s, A . 509 Submarine Spring, A . 758 Subterranean River, A . 191 Sun-Dial, A Pocket . 127 Sun-Dial, A Model . 640 Sunshine Recorder, McLeod’s .. .. 753 Swallows. Carrier . . 702 Syphon Water-Meter, The . 187 Table Lamp, An Electric Tablet- Holder, A . Tannin in Tea . Tanning, Electrical . Tanning, Wattle- Bark for Tap, A Self-Closing . Tea, A New . Tea, Tannin in . Teach Now, What we . Telegraph, a New Engine-Room Telegraph, Pictures by . Telegraphing Across Rivers . . Te ephone. An Adjustable . . . . Telephone Cable, A . Telephone, London to Paris by . . Telephone, The Pulsion . Telescopic Tricycle, A . Telethermometer, The . Temperature, Underground . . Tempering Steel in Lead Tesla Motor, The . Testing Fast Colours . Testing Polluted Wells . Thatching Machine, A . Theodolite, A New . Theory of Harmonics, A New Thermometer, A Radial Scale I'hread, Cutting Stout . Thunder-Clouds, The Density of Thunderstorm Regi.ster, A . . Titanotherium. The . Toe, The Small.. .. . To-Day, The. Gymnastics of . . . . T25 510 253 253 383 509 508 253 510 255 381 638 701 446 59 190 59 575 190 63S 639 254 510 63 638 637 445 381 637 635 383 759 319

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Index. Vll PAGE The GATiiEKER—Conirfn/ed. Torquay, A Highland . 192 Touraco, The . 124 Tower for London, The . 636 Tramway, The Lineff Electric ^ . . . 700 Transformer, The “ Hedgehog” .. .. 756 Transliteration Irom th ; Russian. . . . 446 Travelling, The Cost of Railway . . . . 574 Treasure for Children, A New . . . . 576 Trellis-Work, Steel . 756 Trepanning for Idiocy . 758 Tricycle, A 'I'elescopic . 59 True Friend of Girl.-, A . 128 Tubes, Fle.\'ible iVIetal . 126 Tuna Fruit . 62 Tuning-Fork Relay, A . 318 Two Hooks of Reference . 256 Two Books to be Studied • • 640 Two More International Exhi'oitions . . 125 Two New Card Games . 127 Two Novelties for Ladies . 316 Type, A Vanishing . 702 Type-Writer, A Cypher . 188 Typical Englishman, A . . 63 Unalterable Cheques and Receipts . . 319 “Uncle Remus’ Again . 256 Underground Temperature . 190 Uranium, A Lode of . 60 Use for Cotton-Plant Stalks, A . . . . 639 Useful to Gentlemen . 575 Utilising the Waves . .. 19 1 Vacuum of Electric Lamps, The . . . . 639 Vanishing Type, A . . 702 Volumes, New . 127 Warp Weaver, A . 6d Watch, A Reminding . 316 Water, Aerated, on Draught .. .. 189 Water-Meter, The Syphon . 187 Wattle-Bark for Tanning . 383 Waves, Utilising the . 191 “ Wealthy, and Wise, Healthy” .. .. 448 Weather, Coldness and . 448 Wedding, Before the, and After . . . . 704 Well Dish, A New . 126 Wells, Testing Polluted . 510 Whale V. Cable . 253 What we Teach Now . . . . . . 510 Wheel, A New Road . 576 Where is the Memory? . 320 “Whooping Cough, Influenza Colds and” . 444 Wild Animals as Pets . 639 “ Wimbledon Meeting” at Home, A . . 384 Windmill, A New . 61 “ Wise, Healthy, Wealthy, and . . . 448 Wive^ and Mothers. For . 384 Wood-Wool Machine, A . 382 Wrench. A Handy Cap . 61 “ Wrinkles, Household ” 255 Writing Desk, A Railway . 189 Wyclif and Chaucer . 640 Young Readers, History for . 703 Young Readers, Old Stories for . . . . 64 “ Younger Son, The Adventures of a” 448 Zig-zag Lightning . 446 Gentle and True . 443 Gentle Streamlet {A/uih') . 306 Gesso Work . 106 Gift, My Strange . 562 Given Up, To be 32, 65, 159, 193, 288, 321, 424, 449 Good -Nature, A Chat on . 526 Gossip about Cornish Cookery, A 685 Guard's Van, Jn a: A Christmas Sketch . 1 18 Guest, A Most Unwelcome {A Family Doctor) . 345 Handwriting, An Anatomy of 144, 208 House, My Aunt’s . 608 How Men Hit the Bull’s-Eye ... 658 How Sounds are Made Visible ... 333 How we Amused ourselves during a Long Voyage . 140 Hysteria, A Friendly Talk about {A Family Doctor) . 238 r.\GE Ideas, Ninette’s . 44^ In a Guard’s Van : A Christmas Sketch . 118 In an Air-Lock : An Underground Experience . I57 In the Wild W’est . 48, no, 174 Influenza Colds and Whooping Cough {A Family Doctor) ... 272 Invalid Diet, A Word about {A Family Doctor) ... 46 “ Irritable, So Peevish and” {A Family Doctor) . I55 Joachim, Jos-eph, The Career of... 108 Joke, A Sorry . 37 ^ July, The Garden in . 495 June, The Garden in . 419 Kneller Hall, The Military School of Music . 5^9 Lady, My . ... 105 Ladies, A New Home Occupation for ... 656 Latest Lion, Lady Angela’s . 246 Length of Life, Some Facts about 593 Letters from the Planets . 285 Libraries, Two Little - Known London . 537 Life in a New Zealand Homestead 528 Life, Some Facts about Length of 593 Lord Chancellor s Work, The ... 479 Love, Where is thy Dwelling? ... 536 Love-Time of the Year, The ... 171 Man, The Patent-Protected . 606 Manoeuvres, Mrs. Montgomerie’s 691 Market-Day Story, A (Under Suspicion) . 147 May Garden, A . 339 Merchant Prince, The 474, 531, 627 Mesmer, A Disciple of : A Story of Plypnotism . 662 Military School of Music, The, Kneller Hall . 589 Mind- Reading of the Chinese, The 250 Minor Arts, The Revival of . 173 Mistress of the “ White House,” The . 76 Mistresses’ Union, The ; or, How we Solved the Servants’ Ques¬ tion . 39S Monograms . 363 Months, Pictures of the January . 117 February . 18 1 March.. . . ... 249 April . 320 May . 37b June . 405 July . 4S5 August . 571 September . 593 October . . ... 687 November . 755 December . 64 Mood, An April . 272 More Early Spring Flowers {The Garden in February) . 1 7 1 Morning and Evening . 274 Most Unwelcome Guest, A {A Family Doctor^ . Music : — The Bird that Soars . A Boating Song . “For Me!” . A Song without Words ... 244, Gentle Streamlet . On the Village Green . A wSong of Rest . The Best of Reasons . Wooing by Flowers . Reveries . The World’s Wanderers . Music, The Military School of, Kneller Hall 345 26 95 182 500 ;o6 348 406 556 612 654 734 589 of . 235 Mustard and Cress . 569 My Aunt’s Plouse . 608 My Lady . 105 “My Old Foe Again!” {A Family Doctor) . 81 My Strange Gift . 5^^ Mystery of the Sea, A (Never Cleared Up) . .. .. 274 Mystery, The Double X . 18 Mysteries, ^ome, of the Pacific ... 461 “ Name Words,” Botanical . 366 Nell’s Nobleman . 466 Never Cleared Up : a Mystery of the Sea . 274 “New Chum,” The Worries of a 602 New Home Occupation for Ladies, A . 656 New Story Competitions 122, 256, 704, 760 New Zealand Homestead, Li''e in . . ... 528 Ninette’s Ideas . ... 440 Nobleman, Nell’s . ... 466 North, A Wonder of the ... 44 November, The Garden in ... ... 732 Occupation, A New, for Ladies ... 656 Old and New Coins . 670 “Old Foe Again, My” {A Family Doctoi) . 81 On the Art of Accompanying ...472 On the Village Green (AZ/rj/^) ... 348 Organist, The . 75^ “ Other Tongues ” 729 Our Delicate Child . 408 Our Literary Prize Scheme . 64 Pacific, Some Mysteries of the ... 461 Parliament, The American . 335 Patent-Protected Man, The . 606 Patchwork — Past and Present ... 624 Peep at a Russian P'air, A . 218 “Peevish and Irritable, So” {A Family Doctor) . . 155 Photography, Aerial . 421 Pictures of the Months : — January . 117 February . 181 March . 249 April . 320 May . 376 June . 405 July . 485

Page 9

Vlll Index. • 571 • 593 . 6b7 755 64 204 285 464 35° 667 PAGE Pictures of the Months— CVw/. August September October November December Planets in 1890, The ... Planets, Letters from the .. Pocket-Handkerchief Work Possessions, Colonel Rudderbuff’s : A Paper on Furniture . Prime Minister’s Engagements, A Prifice of Wales Do, What does the . 299 Prince, The Merchant .. 474, 531, 627 Prize Scheme, uur Literary . 64 Public Life of Public Men, The: — What does the Prince of Wales Do ? . 299 The Lord Chancellor’s Work ... 479 A Prime Minister’s Engagements 687 Public Speakers, The Work of ... 206 Racing an Arab: An Adventure in Syria . 748 Railways, The Artistic Aspect of 12 Reasons, The Best of {Music) ... 556 Rest, A Song of {Music) . 406 Reveries {Music) . 654 Revival of Minor Arts, The . ... 173 Ridgeway - on - Sea, What Hap¬ pened at . 721 Ring, The Engagement ; . 347 Robes of State . 368 Rounds and Catches, About ... 667 Roxendale’s (Miss) • Suitors {The Chronicles of Carcinve Manor) ... 2 1 1 Rudderbuffs (Colonel) Posses¬ sions : A Paper on Furniture ... 350 Russian Fair, A Peep at a . 218 Sacrifice of Mary Somerville, The {The Chronicles of Cardeive Manor) . Sad Case, A . Savoury Dishes for Spring . . Savouiies, Some Summer . Sea, A Mystery of the (Never Cleared Up) . Sea, Treasures Under the . September, The Garden in . Servants’ Question, How we Solved the : The Mistresses’ Union, or Ship’s Company, The .. . Shopping in “ The States ” . Smith (Mr.) and his Friends “So Peevish and Irritable” {A Fajnily Doctor) . Some Digestible Forms of Cheese Cookery . 502 240 281 483 274 540 596 398 673 233 394 155 216 PAGE Some Early Spring Flowers {The Garden in /anuafy) . 79 Some Facts about Length of Life 593 Some Mysteries of the Pacific ... 461 Some Recent Arrivals at the “Zoo” . 31 1 Some Summer Savouries . 483 Somersetshire Superstitions . 719 Somerville, Mary, The Sacrifice of {7'he Chronicles ot Caideive Manor) . . 302 Song, A Boating . 94, 631 Song, A Boating {Mtisic) . 93 Song of Rest, A {Music) . 406 Song without Words, A {Music) c T 1 A ^44, 500 Sorry Joke, A . 371 Sounds are Made Visible, How ... 333 Sppkers, Public, The Work of . . . 206 Spine, A Crooked {A Family Doctor) . 3^3 Spring and Early Summer Flowers {The Garden in March) . 236 Spring, Savoury Dishes for . 281 “ States, The,” Shopping in ... 277 State, Robes of . 353 Story Competitions, New 122, 256, 704, 760 Story of the Dwelling-House, The 88 Story, The End of the . 718 Streamlet, Gentle {Music) . 306 Stronger Will, The i, 96, 129, 222, ^ 257, 352, 414 Success . 37 j Suitors, Miss Roxendale’s {The Chi onii les of Cardewe Manor) ... 2 1 1 Sunset, A Winter . 132 Superstitions, Somersetshire ... 719 Suspicion, Under : A Market-Day Story . 147 Swiss Boy, The . 436 Tea-Table, W^inter, Delicacies for the . 17 Thomas, The Ways and Whims of 622 To be Given Up ... 32, 65, 159, 193, 288, 321, 424, 440 “ Tongues, Other ” ..." . 729 Treasures Under the Sea . 340 True, Gentle and . 443 “Two are Company” . 47Q Two Little-Known London Li- . 537 Under Suspicion : A Market-Day Story . 147 Underground Experience, An : In an Air-Lock . 137 Union, The Mistresses’ : or, How we Solved the Servants’ Ques¬ tion . 398 TT • 1 • U n 1 versa! Ad visory Commi ttee, The : A Proposal . 92 Village Green, On the {Music) ... 348 Visible, How Sounds are Made ... 333 Voice in the W^oods, The . 341 Voyage, A Long, How we Amused ourselves duiing . 140 Wanderers, The World’s {Music) 734 Waterlow Park — Past and Present 715 Ways and Whims of Thomas, The . 622 What does the Prince of Wales Lo ? 299 What Happened at Ridgeway-oii- Sea . 721 What is Bad Language ? 314 What to W^ear : Chit-Chat on Dress 55, 119, 184, 241, 303, 377, «r„u- 4,?7> ,559. 632, 697, 752 White House, The Mistress of the . 76 W'hooping-Congh, Influenza Colds and {A Family Doct07‘) ... 272 Why? . ;; ii Wild West, In the . 48, no, 174 Will, The Stronger i, 96, 129, 222, w .0 .A 352, 414 Winter Sunset, A . 132 Winter Tea-Table, Delicacies for the . 17 Women, American Farming for ... 29 Womanlike 385, 486, 513, 614, 641, 736 Wonder of the North, A . 44 Woods, The Voice in the . 341 Wooing by Flowers {Music) ... 612 Wooing by Flowers . 613 Wooing of Christabel, The 544, 577, 673, 705 Word about Invalid Diet, A {A Family Doctor) . 46 W’ords, A Song without {Mttsic) 244, 5C0 W"ork, Gesso . 106 W^ork of Public Speakers, The ... 206 W^ork, Pocket-Handkerchief ... 464 Work, The Lord Chancellor’s ... 479 World’s Wanderers, The {Music) 734 Worries of a “ New Chum,” The 602 Wrong Bertie, The . 398 Yorkshire Dale, A... 268 ‘ Zoo,” Some Recent Arrivals at the . . . 31 1

Page 10

THE STRONGER WILL. By EVELYN EVERETT GREEN, Author of “Monica/’ &c. CHAPTER THE FIRST. INTRODUCTORY. My dear Florence, the thing is quite out oi the question.’^ The young lady thus addressed looked down with a provoking air of unconcern at the tapestry- work she held in her hands, and then, glancing up at the severe, frowning face of her interlocutor, she asked innocently — ‘‘Why so. Uncle Oliver.^ Is Marchwood too small ?” Mr. Cadwallader frowned impatiently. “ You talk like a child, Florence,” he said, with visible irritation of manner. “You talk as though the housing of a houseful of strangers were the merest detail in the world. You ought at your age to know better.” Florence’s eyebrows went up, and her lips curved to one of her provoking smiles ; but as she met the perplexed and troubled gaze of her guardian fixed upon her, with something of appeal underlying its frowning impatience, her face changed instantly, softening to an expression peculiarly sweet, despite its latent resolution. “Uncle Oliver,” she said, “does it not seem to you a very sad thing that your only siGter and her children should still be strangers to you after all these many, many years have passed by ? ” “That is more Felicia’s doing than mine,” he answered coldly. “More?” “Undoubtedly — if not in the first place, at least afterwards.” “ Stop,” said Florence, looking earnestly at him. I want to understand the circumstances thoroughly. You have never told me much about the quarrel with your only near relative, but I have heard things from one or another that have given me a pretty clear notion of the situation. May I tell you what I have learned about it ? ” Mr. Cadwallader made no reply. “You and your sister, being the only children of your parents, grew up unusually attached. Indeed, you were so much attached to her that you were bent upon her marrying Mr. Greville’s son, your most intimate friend, who was heir to the Hawkshold property, as you were to that of Marchwood. That match would, you thought, secure to you her constant presence in the immediate neighbourhood, and it was very advisable from a practical standpoint, and Mr. Greville was much in love with Felicia Cadwallader. And then she spoilt all by a run-away match with your tutor, Mr. Stanhope, giving lasting offence to her parents and her brother. The former cut her off with little more than the proverbial shilling ; the latter has never forgiven her. Am I right so far, Uncle Oliver?” “ In the main, so far as absolute facts go ; but there are things that no one can ever understand who did not live through those years. I do not wish to speak harshly of Felicia, but she did not behave well at that crisis of her life. She always had a strain of impulsive weakness in her character, and notwithstanding that she had been receiving Greville’s attentions almost from childhood, and was tacitly, if not actually, en-^ gaged to him, yet, when after a six months’ acquaint¬ ance with Stanhope (who had come to coach me in languages before a foreign tour I proposed to take) they fell desperately in love, she made a run-away match of it before anyone suspected in the least what had happened. My own impression has always been that the secrecy and final elopement were the work of Felicia. Stanhope was a very upright, honourable man — a very fine fellow, whom I liked much, and although poor, he was of good family, and had talents that might have made him, had he lived, a man of mark. He. would not, I believe, have scrupled to ask Miss Cadvyallader’s hand in marriage had she per¬ mitted the bold move. He knew nothing of the half engagement that bound her to Greville, and I always say it was Felicia’s doing that he acted as he did. 721

Page 11

2 The Stronger Will. Yet even grant that, his offence remains. He let himself be led into an act that I call distinctly dis¬ honourable. He made this run-avvay marriage, and if he expected his wife to be recognised by her own family after having been made Mrs. Stanhope under those circumstances, he very much mistook the stuff of which the Cadwalladers are made.’’ A little smile curved Florence’s lips at these words, but it passed as she said quietly — “ But he died so many, many years ago.” “ Yes, about twenty-five years ago now, after they had been married four years. He died, leaving her with an infant daughter only a few weeks old, and a boy not yet two. It was then that I (our parents had died in the interval) offered her a home at March- wood, which home she deliberately refused.” “ Perhaps it was natural then,” said Florence, thoughtfully, “since you had always declined to recognise her husband.” “ J renewed that offer a year and a half later,” con¬ tinued Mr. Cadwallader, “ when your father, Florence, my old school chum. Captain Tenant, came here from India after the Mutiny, ill from fever and wounds and a broken heart, his wife dead, and you, his only child, a little helpless mite not six months old. When he died in my house, and I resolved to adopt you as something more than my ward, I wrote to Felicia then — for I was not altogether unmindful of the claims of her and her children— and I offered her again a home at Marchwood, making it very plain that, if she accepted it, her children and my ward (in the event of my remaining single) would all be treated alike ; but I made it equally intelligible that if she still declined reconciliation, I should not renew' any overtures of the kind, and she must understand that Marchwood would be henceforth nothing to her or hers.” Florence had never before heard this statement so plainly made. Her colour rose a little as she asked — “ And her answer ? ” “ Was an explicit refusal.” “ Perhaps she thought then that the contingency of •your not marrying was very remote.” “ Possibly ; she said nothing as to the grounds on which she based her refusal, but she refused entirely and unequivocally. With much of weakness in her nature, Felicia always had an ingrained obstinacy about her — or had in old days : perhaps it is beaten ■out of her by now — and she seemed resolved to hug her grievance, and to play the martyr. Later on, when I discovered that she was on the eve of marriage with Dr. Freer, I understood her refusal better. Within two years of her first husband’s death she had found a successor for him, and the first intimation I had of the event was the notice in the Times^^ “ But you have helped her substantially since, I know — educated Dr. Freer’s eldest son, and corre¬ sponded cordially. Now that she is a second time •left a widow, why not do more ? ” “I have no objection to help Felicia, but March- •wood-^my dear Florence, you don’t know w'hat you ask wdien you suggest to an old man to change the whole current of his life. You and I have had Marchwood to ourselves for nearly a quarter of a century.” Florence’s grey eyes sparkled with a look of latent mischief. “A pompous way ot putting it. Uncle Oliver; and now, after this quarter of a century of ieU-d-ieie, don’t you think a new element might with advantage be introduced ? ” He looked at her half jealously. “You are not tired of Marchwood, Florence, or of me ? ” She would not answer, but her eyes, despite their mischievous light, shone with so much tenderness and love that the old man’s face softened to a smile. “ I had thought of settling her at Eastlands. It is a nice little property, and the present tenant’s lease will soon be out.” “ That would be an excellent plan ; and meantime you will have them here on a long visit, and learn to know them well. Uncle Oliver, confess that you ai^ relenting ! ” “ You forget one great difficulty, Florence.” “What is that. Uncle Oliver?” “If Felicia comes here, what is to become of th6 Stanhopes ? ” Florence looked at him questioningly. “ Will they not come too ? ” The old man’s face contracted suddenly. “ No ! ” he answered, with some irritation ; “ cer¬ tainly not.”' Then, after a moment’s pause, he added, “ At least Marchwood shall never be f/iezr home. I suppose they must be tolerated as visitors if their mother comes.” “ There are two Stanhopes, are there not ? ’’ asked Florence, feeling her way carefully. “ Yes ; the son must be six-and-twenty by this time. Of course he will be doing something for himself. The daughter is a year younger. Possibly she may marry soon. I suppose she may have to come with her mother for a time, till we can find some better place for her ; but the young fellow I will not have about. Marchwood is nothing to him, nor he to Marchwood. I will show him that plainly enough — insolent young puppy ! ” Florence did not smile at this unreasonable and apparently inconsequent outbreak of irritation. She traced to its source the train of thought that had raised Mr. CadwaKader’s sudden ire against the man who was his natural heir, but she knew him too well to attempt to argue with him, or even to appear to understand him too well. She knew perfectly that the Marchwood property, which was not entailed, was planned to descend to none of his sister’s children. If her bright colour deepened a very little, at least her voice was admirably under control. “ Of course young Mr. Stanhope will have his own profession by this time. Perhaps he would come with them on the first occasion, and get the ice all broken together. I dare say we shall hardly ever see him ; but it would scarcely be practicable to

Page 12

The Stronger Will. exclude him from the general amnesty. It would look perhaps rather too marked.” Mr. Cadvvallader’s brow was still sharply con¬ tracted. “Marked or not, Til not have him hanging about Marchwood, and giving himself airs here. He shan’t have the run of the house in any sense of the word. I’ll speak to Felicia about it: I’ll let him un¬ derstand my views.” “ I don’t expect you will require to do anything of the kind, Uncle Oliver,” answered Florence, laughing. “ People are not in the habit of taking undue advan¬ tage in yoiir house ! ” The grim face relaxed a little. Florence felt that enough had now been said, and she closed the inter¬ view by stepping out upon the terrace into the clear, cold, March sunshine. She had seen from the window the approach of a familiar figure, and in the garden she met a tall, fair-haired, broad-shouldered young man, who was evidently on terms of most familiar friendliness with her. “ I saw you coming, Edmund,” she said. “ I was just concluding a most important interview. You know what I have been plotting and scheming for all these weeks ? Well, I have ventured at last to make a definite proposition ; and if I know him as well as I think I do, my wiles will be triumphant at last. To-day I really do feel as if the thin end of the wedge were inserted.” Edmund laughed with her at that. “Poor Mr. Cadwallader ! If he only knew how you were plotting against his peace of mind ! ” “ He will know all in good time : a day of revela¬ tion will dawn on him at last.” Edmund looked very wise. “You know, according to all received precedent, you ought to make a match with the heir, and that would smooth away all difficulties ; but in the present case, I fear it would only add a worse complication.” “ True,” answered Florence gravely. “ I will keep the suggestion in mind, Edmund ; it does credit to your somewhat defective powers of diplomacy. Yet, as you say, I fear such a solution of the difficulty would hardly be soothing to Uncle Oliver.” “ No ; it would be adding insult to injury, or injury to insult,” answered Edmund, laughing. “ On the whole, I don’t think I should quite care to be in his shoes. I know exactly how Mr. Cadwallader will look at him, and how he will watch him about.” “ So do I— exactly. It may be difficile at first, but I mean to get the better of circumstances. And I shall look to you to help me all you can, Edmund, for Rudolf Stanhope is the heir of Marchwood, and I shall never rest content until he is received as such, and so acknowledged before the world,” CHAPTER THE SECOND. MRS. FREER’S FAMILY. A WEEK later a letter, bearing the postmark of “ Hawkhurst,” arrived amongst a number of others at a dull, respectable house in London, situated not far distant from the British Museum. The letter arrived at breakfast-time, and was opened by the mistress of the house, whose deep widow’s weeds proclaimed her recent loss. She read it with eager haste and close attention, her face flushing a little as she did so. Once or twice she raised her eyes and glanced almost, as it seemed, with depreca¬ tion, in the direction of her eldest son, who sat opposite to her at the foot of the table. Rudolf Stanhope was undoubtedly very good- looking, though there were critics who found fault with the sternness and inflexible determination of the expression of his face as detracting from its beauty. He had particularly fine eyes : very dark and piercing, overhung by a broad, massive brow. The eyebrows, which, like hair and moustache, were of a dark, rich brown, were very thick, and almost met, giving some¬ thing of a frowning look to the face even in repose. The features were good and regular and clearly cut, but the squareness of the jaw told its own tale of an iron will, whilst the whole face looked not un- frequently as if carved in flint. His figure was tall, upright, and muscular ; his manner was quiet and refined, yet slightly imperious. He had about him a look of power and intellect that often attracted notice, and although at present his position was only that of private and confidential secretary to Sir Arthur Morrison, M.P., yet he was a young man who was expected by his friends to rise, and who was determined not to disappoint them. His sister Violet, though in reality but one year his junior, looked very much younger than the brother she resembled. She had the same dark, expressive eyes, and regular, well-chiselled features ; but she was slightly built and somewhat fragile-looking, and the expression of her face was not at all like that of Rudolf. One could see at a glance what manner of man he was, but it would take a keener physiognomist to read the curious, somewhat enigmatic lines of the girl’s countenance. There was one vacant place at table; the remain¬ ing three were occupied by a school-boy of fifteen, and by a little boy and girl of ten and eight respec¬ tively. When Harry rose from table to start for school, Mrs. Freer made a sign to the little girl, who at once slipped from her chair, and led the younger brother away. Cuthbert was blind, having lost his sight four years before, after a sharp attack of fever. When the children were safely out of hearing, Mrs. Freer turned rather anxiously to her eldest son and said, with some hesitation of manner — “ I have heard from your Uncle Cadwallader.” I observed it was his handwriting,” answered Rudolf, with a slight yet significant hardening of his handsome face. “ What has he to say .? ” “It is a very kind letter,” answered Mrs. Freer, with something of deprecation in her manner. “You are prejudiced against your uncle, Rudolf. I am aware, ot course, that you have some cause ; but after all, that was over and done with long before you were old enough to remember anything, and he has always been a kind brother to me— since.”

Page 13

4 The Stronger Will. “ Since my father died, that is,” added Rudolf icily, ‘‘ but not before. He never acknowledged him. As if my father, were not every whit his equal — nay, his superior — in everything save wealth.” “ I know, Rudolf, I know. It is natural you should resent it ; but you cannot quite understand how things were. Oliver is. not the narrow-minded, purse-proud man you have always been determined to think him. And now, when without substantial help from him, I should not know where to turn, he offers me and mine a home for the present at Marchwood.” The veins on Rudolfs forehead swelled ; it seemed as if he would . have spoken with passion, but he checked himself, and said, with quiet, sarcastic in¬ flection — “ Why could he not afford you substantial help in some other way ? He ought to have made some arrangement by which you at least retained your own independence. I should decline such an offer with scorn.” “You would not if you were a mother with children depending upon you,” answered Mrs. Freer. “ It relieves me from the. burden of care and responsi¬ bility which is very, very hard when a woman is left to bear it alone. It will give to Violet and Cuthbert the country air they often pine for, and although you will lose your present home, you are a man, and well able to take care of yourself.” “ Oh, certainly. I am quite able to take care of myself, and my means will also permit of my making a home for Violet. I cannot suppose she will care to accept the hospitality of Mr. Cadwallader. She is a Stanhope, not a Freer.” Violet looked up at her brother with a curious gleam in her dark eyes. “ I am included, I see, in the invitation to March- wood,” she said clearly and decisively, “and to Marchwood I shall certainly go, and if you are wise you will do the same.” “ I ! ” said Rudolf, and then stopped, as if such a matter were beneath discussion. His face wore a look of haughty displeasure. When he spoke again it was on a fresh subject. “ What I cannot bear to think of,” he said, “ is the position you will have to occupy in that house. Mr. Cadwallader has neither wife nor child his sister then, if she lives under his roof, should of course occupy the place of hostess and mistress. But” glancing angrily at the letter his mother had handed to him— “that is not the place he offers to you. You and your children are only to be guests, whilst the position of lady of the manor is retained by that chit of a girl, who is neither kith nor kin of his, and has no claim of any kind upon him.” “ Miss Tenant is his ward and dearly loved adopted daughter,” answered Mrs. Freer. “We at least have no right to complain of her presence as mistress of his house. I had that position offered me once, and I declined it. You have always maintained that I did right.” Rudolf bit his lip. He could not contest the point with his mother. She spoke with undoubted Justice and moderation, and yet in his heart of hearts the young man felt that the position in Mr. Cadwallader’s house occupied by his ward was an insult and an injustice to his mother and her children. Rudolf was not mercenary in any sordid fashion. He had no love for money for its own sake, but he was ambitious, and in the life he was now living he began to understand what weight and influence attach to a man who has wealth or “ prospects ” at his back. He was aware, too, that he himself was looked upon in many quarters as Mr. Cadwallader’s heir. True^ the Marchwood property was not entailed, but then the present owner was a childless bachelor, and Rudolf Stanhope, a most promising young man, his natural successor. By anyone who knew anything at all about the family — and when there is a large landed property it is curious how many people do- know about it— Mrs. Freer’s eldest son was looked upon as indubitably the heir ; and despite his personal sense of antagonism towards his uncle, Rudolf felt that he ought to inherit the Cadwallader estate. Race instincts are strong in old families, and it went against every fibre of the young man’s nature to think that the old house should be alienated from those of the Cadwallader blood, and pass to an utter stranger,, whom chance had cast upon his uncle’s hands. For Rudolf, with all his pride and haughtiness,, possessed keener feelings and deeper affections than anyone knew. Quite apart from any personal advan¬ tage that might accrue to him, he would very gladly have been on friendly terms with his uncle, a welcome visitor at the old house, where his mother’s children ought surely to feel at home. But these feelings were kept so studiously in the back-ground that not even his mother or sister sus¬ pected their existence. He always spoke of Mr. Cadwallader with bitterness or studied coldness, and with absolute indifference of the ancestral home. He was too proud and too reserved to wish anybody to suspect his deeper feelings, and he was painfully aware of his rather difficult position as his uncle’s natural heir, yet without the least reasonable hope of ever succeeding to the inheritance. But he said not a word as to his feelings, and neither mother nor sister suspected them. They only saw the set hardness of the lines of his face as he pushed back his chair and walked silently from the room, and heard the bang of the front door which marked his exit from the house. Eyes and ears alike convinced them that there would be no relenting in that quarter. CHAPTER THE THIRD. STANHOPE AND FREER. That bang of the front door seemed to unloose Mrs. Freer’s tongue. She looked across at her daughter with a sigh. “ I am afraid that nothing will ever induce Rudolf to lay aside his rooted hostility to his uncle. “ We shall know that better,” said Violet quietly, “ when we get him to Marchwood.”

Page 14

The Stronger Will. When ! If, you mean. I greatly doubt if we shall ever persuade him to come.’’ “ He must come — he shall.” “ Ah, but Rudolf is so singularly determined - ” “ Then other people must be determined too.” “ I think you hardly understand your brother’s (nature, Violet.” “ On the contrary, it is because I understand it so well that I have such confidence. Has he ever yet failed in dutiful obedience to you ? ” No, never ; he is the best of sons.” 5 by the entrance of another member of the family, who had not so far put in an appearance. “ Late as usual, Vernon,” remarked Violet. “As usual,” he returned placidly. “Yes, coffee, please. Any news this morning ? ” “ Yes ; news from Marchwood.” The young man gave one quick glance at Violet, and then began leisurely to help himself. Vernon Freer often gave some perplexity to casual acquaintances, who knew that his mother had been twice married, and it was with difficulty that they “‘no!’ he ANSWEKED, with some irritation; ‘certainly not’” (jZ). 2). Just so ; and you may be sure he will do nothing at this juncture to grieve or harass you. Make a personal favour of this visit to Marchwood, and you will see that you will win the day.” Mrs. Freer went away upon her household duties with a less anxious look on her face, and Violet sat still deep in thought, her arms resting on the table. “ P'oolish, foolish Rudolf ! ” she said at length half aloud. “You would throw away your prospects, and •every chance of success, rather than make the sacri¬ fice of one fragment of that family pride, which shows liow "close akin you are to our proud uncle. But luckily for you there are those about you who can look after your interests better than you can yourself.” Violet’s meditation was interrupted at this point could be made to understand that he was a Freer and not a Stanhope. He was only three years younger than Violet, and was seven years older than his next brother, Harry. He looked decidedly more than his age, and his three years at Oxford had given him an ease and assurance of manner that few youths of his standing acquire. He was tall and well set up, and had a fair share of good looks. He did not possess Rudolfs physical or intellectual powers, nor his air of commanding determination ; yet the quiet face and composed manner had a meaning of their own, and there were those amongst the friends of the family, who had been krtown to opine that Vernon Freer was a man more likely to attain his object in life than his more impetuous half-brother, Rudolf Stanhope.

Page 15

6 The Stronger Will. “And what is the news from our uncle ? ” “ What mother half expected : an offer to give us all a home at Marchwood when this house is given up at Easter.” Vernon did not look up. He had no appearance of being greatly interested in the news. “ I presume the offer will be accepted ? ” “ Of course ; there is practically no alternative.” “You will go with them, I suppose “ Certainly ; why do you ask ? ” For one second the eyes of brother and sister met, and a quick glance passed between them, but neither read anything from the other. “ And what does Rudolf say to all this ? ” “ So far he has said very little.” “ How does he mean to act ? ” “That remains to be proved.” Vernon was silent for a while. It was Violet who asked the next question. “ How will this change affect you ? ” “It will suit me very well. I can read for ordina¬ tion as well at Marchwood as anywhere else. Per¬ sonally I am very glad that the old coolness should be a thing of the past, and that the breach should be healed. I owe a great deal to our uncle, and have often felt it on my mind to thank him personally for what he has done for me.” “ Ah, yes, to be sure ; he is your godfather, is he not ? Pie has paid for your education, of course. I had forgotten that.” “ I doubt if ever I should have got to Oxford with¬ out. I owe a great deal to our uncle. I am exceed- ingly glad of a chance to let him know this.’’ The conversation dropped at this point, but Vernon was absorbed in thought during this and many succeeding days. He showed no outward sign of abstraction, but his mind was ceaselessly at work. He knew that there was a comfortable family living in his uncle’s gift, and yet it was not entirely of the Rectory at Hawkhurst on which his thoughts ran during the days that followed Mr. Cadwallader’s invitation. VerAon knew more perhaps about the quarrel between his mother and his uncle than did any other member of the family, not even excepting Rudolf, and he certainly meditated much more upon it and its possible consequences than anyone else took the trouble to do. His musings began in time to take something of definite form. The more that Vernon studied the matter, the more did the notion of making himself popular at Marchwood appeal to him. After all, was there anything outrageous in his half-formed expecta¬ tions? He was, so to speak, one of three competi¬ tors. His elder brother, who was undoubtedly first by right of birth, had this most important disqualifica¬ tion, that he was the son of the man whose marriage with Miss Cadwallader had given such undying umbrage to her family. Miss Tenant, the second candidate, although spoken of as an adopted daughter, was not of the same race as her guardian, and the conservative instincts of the old man could be relied on to a certain extent to prevent the alienation of a fine family property. The idea that by putting himself forward he might be doing injury to another never occurred to him as an objection. His theory and practice were alike in favour of a sharp watch over personal interests. He had no sympathy with those who let opportunities slip for want of a little skill and tact, or on account of some scruple of pride or sentiment. “ Every man for himself” was his motto, whether he knew it or not. His chief anxiety lay in the uncertainty as to how Rudolf would comport himself in the coming crisis ; and so far Rudolf had maintained an absolute silence upon the subject. Vernon, however, gathered from one thing and another that his brother’s feelings towards Mr. Cadwallader had modified very little, if at all, and that he resented deeply the presence of Miss Tenant in his house, not as regards his own prospects, but with reference to his mother’s position there. This gave him a sort of hopeful confidence that his elder brother would continue to act in defiance of his best interests. As Rudolf was particularly reserved about himself- and his personal affairs, it was not an easy matter to discover what he intended doing when his family migrated to Marchwood, and Vernon found that if he meant to find this out he must do it by a direct question. He found a favourable opportunity of speaking to his brother at last, when he was assisting him to pack up his books, shortly before the general exodus was to take place. “ I suppose, Rudolf,” he remarked, in an absent- minded sort of way, “ that you will go straight to your own diggings when we go to Marchwood ?” “ What makes you think so?” he asked. “ I always fancied you disliked our Uncle Cad¬ wallader so much.” Rudolf turned away without answering, and looked down thoughtfully into the glowing fire. His brows were drawn together in a frown, yet it was rather a frown of perplexity than of annoyance. Vernon glanced at him sideways once or twice with that keen,, unyouth ful gaze of his which was hardly ever seen by anyone, although it not unfrequently lighted his eyes, and presently approaching slowly, he said, in a quietly sympathetic sort of way — “ You’re in rather an awkward position altogether,, Rudolf.” “ I believe you, my boy.” This admission encouraged Vernon to proceed. “Women never understand that kind of thing. I suppose mother and Violet don't see that there is any more difficulty about your accepting Uncle Cad¬ wallader’s hospitality than there is about our doing it — we F reers I mean ? ” “No, I don’t suppose they do ; or, at least, if they see the difficulty they ignore it.” “ Perhaps they are wise to do so.” “Very possibly they are.” Vernon looked up quickly, but the gloomy frown

Page 16

The Stronger Will. 7 upon Rudolfs brow encouraged him to proceed. ^‘You know, Rudolf,” he said, “ it might be an awfully good thing for you to make it up with the old man. I do think you should consider that aspect of the case. If I were you, fd just let the old grudge drop into the back-ground, and come with us to Marchwood, and see if the old boy won’t take a fancy to you. After all, you know, you are - ” “ I am nothing to him at all, Vernon ; and, what is more, I do not wish ever to be anything. I am a Stanhope, and he is a Cadwallader : that is enough. I do not suppose I shall ever set foot inside March- wood.” And with these words, very haughtily and decisively spoken, Rudolf swung himself from the room and banged the door behind him, leaving Vernon looking after him with an odd smile upon his face. Rudolf went upstairs to the top of the house, and opened a door into a room lighted only by a very bright fire. It looked warm and comfortable, almost cosy, in the red glow of the fire, and the welcome Rudolf received there made the warmth all the pleasanter. “ It’s brother ! ” cried a joyful little voice ; and there was a scramble up from the hearthrug, and a rush towards the new-comer. Rudolf lifted his little sister high in his strong arms, and her soft, dark curls swept over his face. “ Oh, brother, dear. I’m so glad you’ve come ! We’ve got such lots to talk to you about, and it’s getting quite late.” “ I am very busy, Pussy, but not too busy for one little chatter ; ” and sitting down in the big rocking- chair with Ethel still in his arms, and Cuthbert standing up close beside him, Rudolf resigned him¬ self to the will of the little pair. “Brother, dear,” began Ethel promptly, always first ready with her tongue, “ we want you to tell us all about Marchwood, please.” “ But I can’t do that. Pussy-cat, because I’ve never seen it.” “Never seen it! Oh, dear, I didn’t know that I A. fancied you would know all about it. Mother says your father lived there once.” “Yes, but not in my time.” “ Aren’t you in a great hurry to see it ? Brother, dear, why can’t you live there with us, as you do here? It will be so horrid when you are away ! Will you come every Sunday ? Do try ! Mother hoped so that you would.” “Not every Sunday, I think. Pussy.” “ Oh, but as many as ever you can ! Promise, brother. And how long will you be able to stay when we go down ? I suppose you’ll have an Easter holiday ? How long will it be ? ” “ I have leave of absence for three weeks, but I don’t know that I shall spend it at Marchwood.” But both children set up quite a tumult of dis¬ approval and pleading. They were certain that brother was only teasing them, but, of course, they could not let him go without exacting a promise that he would come down with them, and stay as long as ever he could. In the midst of the hubbub Mrs. Freer appeared, and soan took in the meaning of what was passing. “ I see I must join the children,” she said, laying her hand upon Rudolf’s head with rather significant pressure. “ Do be persuaded, my boy, for their sake, and for mine. I ask it as a favour, Rudolf ; and I do not often ask favours, as you know.” “Very well, mother,” answered Rudolf, rising, and speaking with something of effort, whilst Ethel still clung tightly about his neck. “ If you are bent upon it, it shall be so. I will go with you to Marchwood.” Ethel uttered a little shriek of delight, and began the kissing process again, but Rudolf was hardly as responsive as usual. He put her gently down, and walked across to the window, which commanded a view of the dusky street. In a moment of softened feeling, and under pressure of sudden impulse, he had spoken words by which he knew he must now abide, and he was not sure that he had not committed him¬ self unwisely before his mind was really made up. Vernon heard Rudolfs decision without betraying any annoyance or uttering a word of dissuasion nor did Violet, on her part, give vent to any outward demonstration of satisfaction. All she said to her brother on the subject was this — “ I think you are doing right. A meeting at some time or other is almost inevitable, and it may just as well be made first as last, and really with less awkwardness. It would never do for you not to see us and mother from time to time. She will want to consult you in the event of any proposition for the future from Uncle Cadwallader.” “ It would distress our mother if I did not go,” answered Rudolf ; “ otherwise I would gladly keep away. Vernon will be with you. I think he is quite as capable of advising you as I am.” “Vernon is undoubtedly developing,” answered Violet quietly ; “but I confess I should value your advice more than his.” “ I’m not certain that he wouldn’t make the better counsellor of the two. He’s certainly a much cooler hand than I can ever hope to be.” “ Possibly. I begin to feel sometimes that Vernon grows a little too cool. I prefer a little more life sometimes.” “ Vernon has a capital head-piece of his own,” said Rudolf, and the subject dropped. One further piece of intelligence relating to March- wood the brothers were destined to hear before their departure, and that from quite an unexpected quarter. Rudolf was accustomed to lunch at a restaurant in Piccadilly not far from the house of his employer. Sir Arthur Morrison. Vernon not unfreqnently joined his brother at that hour, and sometimes Hubert Morrison (the baronet’s son and nominally his assistant secretary too) would accompany his friend Stanhope, and the three would lunch together. Hubert Morrison was an idle young fellow, with a talent for spending money and shirking work. His father was beginning to despair of making him a politician, and often compared him and Stanhope

Page 17

8 The Stronger Will with a sigh of paternal mortification. Rudolfs talent, energy, and intellect were of no common order. His political insight and acumen were remarkable in many ways, and made his services of the very first importance. There were many who prophesied that the young secretary would soon find his way into Parliament, and rise to be a Cabinet Minister in time. No such prognostications for Hubert’s success were to know anything about him, and his face looked rather dark as he answered — “It was quite uncertain till a few days ago whether I went or not. I do not expect to remain long in any case.” “ I dare say we shall meet from time to time if you are there,” returned Hubert. “We shall be rather near neighbours, I fancy.” ever enunciated, and little enough did the young man care that this was so. He liked to take life easily, and never troubled his head over the extra load he was always throwing on Rudolf’s broad shoulders. “ So you are all migrating to March wood ! ” re¬ marked that young gentleman, as the three friends sat at their lunch together. “ How close you are, Stanhope ! You never breathed a word about it.’’ It was Vernon who had led to the subject by some casual remark. Rudolf never by any chance alluded to Mr. Cadwallader in the presence of anyone likely Vernon looked surprised. “ Where are you going then ? I didn’t know you knew anything'of March- wood or its surroundings.” “ I don’t, but I shall do soon. I am going to spend part of the Easter recess at a place called Hawkshold, owned by the Grevilles, the son being a friend of mine, recently made. I’m going to run down there almost at once. I dare say we shall brush up against each other.” ^ “ I dare say,” answered Vernon absently, but his thoughts were not with his words. He little knew

Page 18

The Stronger Will. 9 what a valuable ally he was one day to find in Hubert Morrison for the furtherance of a scheme slowly fermenting in his brain. CHAPTER THE FOURTH. MARCHWOOD. QUAINT old grey house, quadrangular in construction ; a perfect wilderness of gable-ends, oriel windows, and mould¬ ering stone carving, curtained with creepers of every description ; park, ter¬ raced garden, dense shrubberies, and ornamental parterres, all stam.ped with the same look of peaceful repose and antiquity — upon such a scene did Rudolfs eyes dwell as the carriage drew up before the door. He felt he was looking upon the inheritance which by natural succession should be his, yet to which he should ever be a stranger and an alien. The thought was more bitter than he had expected. At the portal stood a tall white-haired man, whom all knew instinctively to be Mr. Cadwallader. The old man advanced to the side of the carriage, and greeted his sister with a quiet warmth of sym¬ pathy and affection that satisfied Rudolfs jealous eyes. It was a difficult meeting for both, and Mrs. Freer had much trouble in maintaining her composure, but she managed to restrain her agitation, and to present her children, who were received somewhat in summary fashion, and all hurried through the odd irregular hall into the long low drawing-room, that made Mrs. Freer exclaim falteringly — “ Why, nothing is changed here ! It is as if I had never been away ! ” “ Changes aren’t much in my line, Felicia,” answered the old man rather grimly. “ What was good enough for my father I find good enough for me. So these are your chickens, are they ? What a crowd you are ! No mistaking which are the Stanhopes, but they have the Cadwallader eyes, at any rate.” Their uncle looked searchingly at Rudolf and Violet. The former returned the glance somewhat haughtily, the latter appeared quite unconscious of it. The situation was somewhat trying. The children were shy and timid, the elders ill at ease. Where was the lady of the house at this juncture ? asked Rudolf indignantly to himself. She, at least, should be upon the spot to make things more easy and pleasant. Had she been there, she might have been criticised for a want of delicacy ; but as she was not, her absence was resented as a mark of neglect. Mr. Cadwallader was glancing towards the door with a certain uneasiness, as if he too felt the want of some soothing presence. He had not, however, to wait long. In another moment the door was thrown open, and there advanced into the room a figure that looked as if it had stepped straight out of one of the frames of the old pictures that hung in the hall. The new-comer was a woman — a girl of four-and- twenty, yet giving an impression of greater age from her full commanding figure, and the perfect ease and self-possession of her manner and bearing. She was tall and straight as a poplar, with a figure that, without being stout, was yet cast in generous proportions, as well as those of great symmetry and grace. Her head was set commandingly upon her full white throat, and was crowned by heavy locks of invincibly curly hair (bright chestnut, with golden lights and rich dark shadows), which she wore in the neglige fashion one associates with portraits of Queen Henrietta Maria. Her dress was as picturesque and unusual as her coiffure— a long plain gown of sage- green, gathered up in an old silver girdle to keep it off the ground, with big sleeves puffed at the shoulder and elbow, and narrowing to a tight fit at the wrist, and a front of snowy cambric, laced across with thick silver cord. In her hand she carried a heavily plumed hat and a pair of gauntlet gloves, and at her side were two huge hounds. She looked for all the world like a pictured chatelaine of bygone days, only that no painter ever transferred to canvas so rich a bloom on lip or cheek, or such sunny brightness as that which shone in this girl’s dark grey eyes. Faultless in feature she might not be, but that she was endued with rare beauty of expression and colouring no one could attempt to deny. Mr. Cadwallader’s face brightened as she appeared. It seemed to him as if the sunshine entered with her ; indeed others fancied that an added gleam of bright¬ ness followed her into the room. There was no hurry in her movements as she laid down her hat and gloves, and advanced towards Mrs. Freer with outstretched hands, yet nothing could have expressed a more unaffected and cordial welcome than did her every gesture. “Dear Aunt Felicia!” she said, kissing her on both cheeks. “ I may call you that, may I not, as you are Uncle Oliver’s sister I am so pleased to see you. I have been so looking forward to your coming. Marchwood ought always to be full of life. It was never meant for solitude a deux. Now please make me known to my — my cousins,” with a charm¬ ing smile and air ot appeal. “ I know some of them already, I think. This little darling is to be our pet and our baby,” and the girl went suddenly down on her knees, and put her arms round little Ethel. “You little duck, won’t you kiss Cousin Florence, and promise to love her always ?” , Ethel lost all her shyness in delight at the irresistible sweetness of the beautiful lady. She put one arm about her neck, and with the other drew Cuthbert close to them. “This is Cuthbert,” she whispered softly. “Please love him too, because he’s blind.” A strong, warm arm was put round the boy at once, and though he could not see the tender, pitying glance bent upon him, he felt the kiss upon his brow, and caught the undertone of gentle sweetness in the merrily spoken words. “ Love him 1 to be sure I shall ! We must teach him to see everything without any eyes, and he shall have a dog of his very own, who will lead him about

Page 19

lO The Stronger Will. everywhere, and keep him out of mischief. We will couple them together, won’t we ? and send them about all over. He shall know his way about Marchwood as well as anybody in a week’s time, you see if he doesn’t.” And Cuthbert’s face smiled all over, as it a sun¬ beam had touched it, and he kept tight hold of the hand that closed over his so warmly. Then Miss Tenant rose to her feet, kissed Violet in sister-like fashion, spoke with easy brightness to Vernon and Harry, and finally turned towards Rudolf, who had stood a little apart all this while, looking on indeed with attention to all that passed, but not making the least attempt to join the little group about the hearth. He could not refuse the hand she held frankly out, but his greeting was studiously cold. He distrusted this woman, with her intense vitality and inexplicable fascination. He saw that she intended to carry all before her, and determined not to fall under the spell himself. He was quite certain that all this cordiality was but a part of the deep game she was playing. If, however, Rudolfs manner was cold and distant. Miss Tenant did not appear to notice it. She spoke to him in the same frank, easy way that she had employed to all the others, and his brief and cere¬ monious answers seemed in nowise to disconcert her. She gave no sign of observing them. But she had to turn away to pour out the tea, that the travellers welcomed gladly, and certainly no hostess ever comported herself with greater ease or self-possession in a position that was undoubtedly trying and difficult. All stiffness and awkwardness seemed to melt away before her. The constraint that had weighed upon all during the first moments of arrival had disappeared like a dream. Mr. Cad- wallader talked to his sister, and she to him, without any visible embarrassment, whilst Miss Tenant chatted to Violet, and plied the children with cream and cake, as if she had known them all her life. And when she led her visitors upstairs at length, and showed them the comfortable, old-fashioned rooms that had been made ready for them, and all the many arrangements that had been instituted with a view to their comfort, it seemed as if they had indeed found a home, and could settle down with a sense of restful well-being that some of them had never known before, and that brought back to Mrs. Freer the thoughts of what life had been like before she had known the meaning of sorrow or care. Coming to Marchwood was indeed coming home, to her, and if her present room was not the one she had occupied as a girl, she could find no fault with the commodious quarters allotted to her and her children — a suite of delightful old-fashioned rooms situated all together, and occupying one side of the quad¬ rangle. Old oriel windows, carved mantel-pieces and panels, tapestry hangings — everything that was quaint and picturesque seemed to be found in that strange old house, filling the children with wonder, and their mother with a sense of deep contentment. Careful hands had evidently been at work pre¬ paring all in readiness for the new-comers. There was a perfect wealth of lovely flowers in the rooms prepared for Mrs. Freer and Violet. In the children’s nurseries were toys of all descriptions, a great selection of brightly bound story-books, and quite a cupboard- full of cakes and bon-bons. The quarters arranged for Vernon and Harry displayed the same care and forethought. There were bats and balls, fishing-rods, riding-whips, and tennis-bats, as well as a library of books likely to be useful to Vernon. Even Rudolf’s probable tastes had not been forgotten, and although he could not be looked upon in the light of a resident, his room had been fitted up with just as much care as though he were a son of the house, and the little turret chamber next door, in the angle of the building, made the most delightful den for reading and smoking. As Rudolf stood at the open casement, gazing out over the fair expanse of woodland country, a strange sense of longingl came over him to call this sweet place “ home.” The air seemed to fill him with new life. He could fancy there was a welcome in the voices of song-bird and stream. He felt that he had seen this place in dreams, and had loved it when he was not an alien and an intruder, as at present, but a loved and trusted son of the house. It was only an idle fancy after all, and the young man smiled half sadly, half bitterly, at his own \veak- ness. He turned away from the window with a sigh, and found it in his heart to wish that Marchwood did not fascinate him so much. “ Brother, dear brother ! ” cried little Ethel, dashing in and springing into his arms. “ Isn’t this a lovely place ? Do come and see our nursery. I never knew any room could be half so pretty and sweet. Mother says it was her nursery when she was little. She has shown us such lovely cupboards and funny places in the wainscot. Oh, we shall be so happy here 1 It’s like coming straight to fairyland ! ” “Is it, Pussy? So much the better. Yes, yes, I’ll come ; don’t chatter your tongue quite out of your head. There’s plenty of time to get it all said and all seen. This is home to you now, you know, little one.” Dinner was served at eight at Marchwood in the old banqueting-hall — a beautiful Gothic chamber with great clustering pillars and a vaulted roof — which, together with the chapel of the same date, formed the oldest part of the building. To-night they were all to dine together — even the two children were to appear in honour of the occasion, as Miss Tenant had expressly said so. They ap¬ peared in the drawing-room very shortly before the appointed hour, to find Mr. Cadwallader and his ward alone, waiting as it were for their guests. The girl was all in snowy white, and looked more than ever as if she had stepped out of an old picture. She looked very lovely, but in an indescribable way. A sort of atmosphere of sunshine seemed to envelop her. It was impossible to picture that face with a frown upon it, and yet there was nothing of sameness or insipidity in the animated play of its e.xpression.

Page 20

Why ? Her two great hounds sat one on each side of her, like the two staunch protectors they were. There was no time for talk before the dinner was announced. Mr. Cadwallader gave his arm to his sister and led her away. Miss Tenant looked round with a smile, and said — “ We must follow without ceremony, I think,” and laying one hand on Violet’s arm and holding out the other to the children, she followed in the wake of the master of the house. But as the little procession reached the dining-hall, Mr. Cadwallader paused, taken by surprise at some¬ thing he saw, and he looked at his ward with a little frown, for he was a man of strongly conservative instincts, and was not fond of seeing anything changed about him. “ What does this mean, Florence ? ” he asked, with a touch of sharpness in his voice. But Florence appeared quite equal to the occasion. ‘‘What, Uncle Oliver? The round table do you mean ? Why, you know, we had to make a change with our large party, and I found this delightful old carved table stowed away in the loft, and thought it would be just the thing for us— so nice and old- fashioned and sociable— everybody able to see every¬ body else.” The round table was quite a picture with its floral decorations. Mr. Cadwallader never permitted any carving to be done at table ; he disliked the office of carver himself, and would not allow Florence to relieve him. Everything therefore was handed, and only the fruit and flowers graced the table itself ; and each day the decoration of the table was one of Florence’s favourite duties. Conversation could hardly be said to flow during that first dinner, but, thanks to Florence, there was no visible constraint upon the party. She encouraged the children to chatter ; talked to Harry about his future tutor, the Rector of Hawkshold, and the pupils who would be his companions in study ; asked questions of Vernon about his college life, and was pleased that Mr. Cadwallader seemed interested in the ready and easy way in which his nephew spoke. 1 1 Rudolf and Violet were very silent— the former, as it appeared, of set purpose, the latter from extreme fatigue. Violet looked, as indeed she felt, almost worn out with the strain of the past days, and as soon as the ladies left the table, Florence kindly suggested that she should go straight to her own room. Violet was glad enough to do this, but hardly pre¬ pared to be followed thither by Florence, who seemed to assume towards her as naturally as possible the air of a protecting elder sister. Violet was by no means sure that she did not resent this “ patronage,’' despite the gentle, graceful way in which it was offered ; but it was not her way to show her feelings readily, and in perfect silence she per¬ mitted attentions from which she felt unable to escape. Her silence was attributed to headache and fatigue, and Florence spoke very little herself as she dexter¬ ously performed her self-imposed office of lady’s maid ; but when she had seen her charge safely into bed, she stood for a moment looking down at her with a smile that was a curious compound of brightness and seriousness. “Are you going to let me be a sister, Violet ?” she asked. “ You know I never had that luxury before, and I have set my heart a little on it now. A sister’s love must be very sweet, I think.” But Violet’s face was irresponsive ; her half-closed eyes did not unveil themselves farther, nevertheless they were fi.xed with some watchfulness upon the white-robed figure beside her. “ I do not think mine would be,” she answered, in a low, languid tone. Florence stooped and kissed her. “ That shows how much or how little you know 1 But you are too tired to talk or think to-night. Good night, dearest ; sleep well, and wake up ready for the new life to-morrow. We shall understand each other better by-and-by.” “Yes,” murmured Violet, as Florence quietly vanished, “ I shall understand you better by-and-by. Whether I shall like you any better is quite another question ! ” END OF CHAPTER THE FOURTH. WHY? Or HERE’S a little rustic seat Just beneath the hill-top’s brow, ’Bowered with meadow-grasses sweet And with many a fragrant bough ; And, on sunny summer days. There a lassie oft I see, With a far-off dreamy gaze As of deep expectancy. Shall I tell you why she lingers ? This is why ! this is why ! Though she knows it not, she’s waiting For young Love to wander by ! Ere the summer’s colours pass Into autumn’s deeper hues. Ere the trees and flowers and grass Young-year strength and freshness lose, On that little rustic seat Lass and lad I’m sure to see. In companionship so sweet They’ve no eyes or thought for me ! Shall I tell you why ’tis so ? This is why ! this is why ! Love the master. Love the tyrant, He at length has wandered by ! G. W.

Page 21

12 THE ARTISTIC ASPECT OF RAILWAYS. HERE is so much talked by people of semi - artistic tastes about a railway being a blot on a land¬ scape, that to adopt the oppo¬ site position, and to say that it posi¬ tively improves it, seems a silly and defiant position, like asserting that Shakespeare is poor reading. When a man tells Professor Seeley that history is dull, the professor does not attempt to alter history, but the mind of his interlocutor : and when a man says that railways are beautiful, we conclude that there is a deep and radical deficiency in his artistic nature. Mr. Ruskin and his school are really to blame for the contemptuous way in which railways are spoken of. These philosophers found that the chimneys of smelting furnaces and iron foundries and great mills exercised a pernicious effect upon the sur¬ rounding country ; they dirtied streams and withered trees, and these manufactories being generally built of ugly materials and without any attempt to ornament construction, they somewhat hastily concluded that anything of a commercial nature was artistically revolting. We do not even agree with Mr. Ruskin and his school about these buildings themselves. A walk by night through a country of blast furnaces is one of the most exciting and impressive spectacles that an ordinary man can see : the high towers vomit¬ ing smoke and flame ; the mysterious underglow from hidden furnaces thrown on the streaming pillars of smoke, and the high wheels solemnly turning ; the gigantic tubular frameworks ; the mysterious shadow of the huge rods rising and falling with grave regu¬ larity behind the smoke-dried windows ; and the sounds from the endless din of wheels, the snort of the piston-rod, and the plunge of the great beams. We venture to say that if Dante could have been transplanted to such a scene as this, he would have erased much of his “ Inferno,” and set himself to reproduce what he had seen as faithfully as possible. Of course we do not go so far as to wish to intro¬ duce a railway wherever Nature is at her loveliest and wildest. Apart from all other considerations, the making of it is an ugly work ; the burrowings of that gigantic mole, the contractor, across a heathery moor or close to a clear mountain stream are far from beautiful. It is indeed strange what villainous colours can ‘‘be digged out of the bowels of the harmless earth,” especially if it is done more or less in a straight line. But, on the other hand, when your railway is once made, what is there to offend the eye ? Certainly not the geometrical line which it draws along the hill- bases. We find no such fault with a road ; and when Nature does the same thing herself by old raised beaches or flat-topped heights or river terraces, we make a great deal out of it and draw pictures in our guide-books. Certainly not the laden luggage-train with the puffing steam-horse in front, and the guard looking peacefully out from the balcony of his van, AN UNDERGROUND METROPOLITAN STATION [p I4).

Page 22

that rumbles along once or twice in the hours. Still less the string of coaches that runs merrily by, with all the unknown heads just outlined against the windows. It is not like the stage-coach, which stops at inn after inn all along the great moun¬ tain roads, and disgorges a string of turbulent pleasure- seekers, who have no intimacy, and do not seek to have any, with the heights that frown above them. But the unknown and unrecognised identities that flash past in the passenger trains — what is there about them to terrify or disgust ? They are merely a por¬ tion of the last great town being transferred to the next. They are like shadows on the wall, and fleeting past, lend a dash of human interest to a scene, without vulgarising it in the least. Even a dilatory branch line is an attractive feature in a landscape ; but the man who is not stirred to some emotion at the sight of a viam line sweeping through the country-side must be dead of soul indeed. Every true lover of the country knows what a thrill comes over him if he passes out of winding lanes on to some famous highway like Ermine Street or the Ickneild Way. He looks right and left and cannot but admire ; but what is a high-road to a railway ? It is so strong and straight, whether it runs through level cuttings among quiet fields and the edges of coverts, with bridge after bridge marking the old field roads, or tops a broad embankment which overlooks the water-meadows, half as high as the hedgerow elms, and higher than the red-tiled villages and the long roofs of granges or mills. It is true that our railway bridges and embank¬ ments have noi had time to grow venerable yet, but the time is coming. An earthwork is a stately thing. The emotion that we feel at the sight of such a work as the Devil’s Dyke at Newmarket, or the hill-terraces of Old Sarum, is pleasure not unmixed with awe. The trenches of a Roman camp, such as Caesar’s Camp near Bracknell or Brent Knoll, add an interest and a mystery to a hill that would be tame enough without them. The “close TO A CLEAR MOUNTAIN STREAM” (/. 12). fault of art is that it always hankers after the past ; it is apt to praise the added lustre of tradition and age as though it had been part of the intrinsic conception. Let us have a little prophetic courage about our railways, and own that they are majestic construc¬ tions, suggestive of vast power and myriad labour. If the time ever comes that the land is desolate, that civilisation draws away westward, as some think it is bound to do, we may be sure there will be no monument of our fallen greatness so tremendous as the vast hill-cuttings, the long embankments, the daring river bridges, and the huge tunnellings among the downs. The remnants of our race, decayed into savage hunters or meagre tillers of the soil, as they stumble painfully up the embankments or peer into the darkness of crumbling funnels, will have every justification for believing that the men of former days were wizards indeed, and that such work could hardly be of human origin. But if these iron roads are impressive by day, what are they by night ? We have seen the lava streams flow from Etna ; we have heard the stones whiz upward through the sulphur smoke of Vesuvius ; we have seen the avalanche fall with a sound of hushed thunder from the Eiger ; we have watched the green rollers of the Atlantic fall on Helston Bar— but we hesitate to affirm that any of these spectacles strike such an awe into the spirit as the sight of a night express thundering through a deserted station. There is a brute force, a gigantic horror about the operations of Nature when she is hard set on working off her humours ; while there is a familiarity about the works of man, a calculated result that we all under¬ stand, which takes away something from the hushed

Page 23

H The Artistic Aspect of Railways. bewilderment in which we stand to see Nature buffet- ing herself , and there is something' about the sense of personal insecurity that we cannot divest our¬ selves of, in the presence of these passion-fits, that appals us in a way that no human energies can. Still it is an awe-inspiring thing to stand on the silent plat¬ form, with only a lamp or two alight, and a belated porter moving about on his rounds, and to hear the dull murmur far off among the fields which heralds the approaching monster. On she comes, till every moment we believe that she must be at her loudest, and still the thunder grows, till at last the huge funnel flashes into the light with the roar and rattle of a hundred wheels, and the flash of the bright panels of the car¬ riage windows. Overhead the glare of the open fire - box lights up the volleying steam. We draw involuntarily back, but in an instant all is over and we can only see the triangle of red points swaying from side to side, and nar¬ rowing rapidly in the darkness. There are hun¬ dreds of magnifi¬ cent effects of all kinds which can be seen on rail¬ ways and no¬ where else : the view from the windows of a train as it draws near some terminus on a frosty night ; the glare of the great station ; the galaxy of lights, the dim forms of semaphores ; the rows of silent wagons — the only wonder is that no painter has ever arisen to depict them. Beauty! no, it is not exactly that ; but effectiveness and suggestive¬ ness, and the sense of human power and energy. Nowhere else are they found in equal proportions. Among a series of very striking little impressional sketches by a clever artist named Van Beers, exhibited a year or two ago, was one of remarkable power. It represented a dull sky, just at dusk— a tall embankment crossed the picture from side to side ; at one place the phantom forms of trees were indicated against the heavy air. On the embankment was a heavily laden baggage train, evidently moving very slowly, with a single point of intense light— a green lamp on the engine. The whole thing was weird and impressive to the highest degree. Talk of the ‘‘ funeral with plumes and lights ” passing down to Camelot ! The Lady of Shalott would have had far more difficulty in keeping her attention on the mirror if it had been a luggage train between Reading and Pano-- bourne. ^ When our artists get together and make an audience for themselves, as they have been lately doing, they talk with a dogmatism and a self-absorption to which the statements on most other platforms are elastic by com¬ parison. Onegen- 1 1 e m a n d i s- coursed about the urgent need which the public had for seeing beautiful build¬ ings and graceful statuary. Why will they overlook all the things that — if not exactly beautiful — arc solemn and awe¬ inspiring and im¬ pressive to a de- gree that no purely artistic creation can ever be ? A heavy London fog set¬ tling down on Ludgate Hill is a LINE IS AN ATTRAC- sigllt of SOUl-Stil'- iN A LANDSCAPE ” (/. 13). j-ing import to a man who has any sense of the beautiful at all. And we venture to affirm that the sight of trains entering and leaving an underground metropolitan station is, to a man of perceptive nature, calculated to touch those feelings which art labours so assiduously, and often so vainly, to affect. We do not want pictures such as Frith s “Start of the Scotch Mail” — -that is merely a study of humanity seen under its fussiest and most distress¬ ing aspect ; but we want studies of such things as the night and the stars, and the walls of the gigantic cuttings, and the monstrous rushing thing charged so securely with human lives, labouring along the iron roads from town to town. Such a picture would touch all of us, because it is the glorification of the familiar, the interpretation of common things ; and art must have a familiar basis if it is to have a general influence at all. Hitherto we have been dealing purely with the ob¬ jective view of the question— the picturesque and sentimental view of railways as a feature of landscape ; but their subjective usefulness from the artistic side is

Page 24

The Artistic Aspect of Railways. 15 fully as im¬ portant. A well - known author is justly contemptuous of the grovel¬ ling prejudices which debar many people ‘‘across a heathery moor"(^ 12). from confess¬ ing the plea¬ sure derivable from a railway journey. Surely it is no inconsiderable thing to have a lovely English pano¬ rama unrolling itself minute by minute through the glass panels at your elbow : never so fast as to be ob¬ scured, and never so slow as to forfeit the tantalising element which is so important in all true artistic plea¬ sure. It combines in this point the best features of both music and painting, just as you sit to hear an enchant¬ ing quartett of Bach’s, with the airy presences flitting so delicately from the strings, conscious that you must seize and enjoy the passing moment, that you may neither indulge foretaste nor retrospect, but devote your whole energies to the enjoyment of the instant. And so the landscape sweeps past the window, neither lingeiing nor yet making haste. Perhaps you are in¬ dulged for a few moments longer with the sight of a wooded hill, green and glowing in the summer air, or under the misty glories of autumn with the branches reddening beneath the sombre pines ; or you are sobered by the stately monotonous outline of distant shaven downs — by the farmhouse among the trees, the mansion winking drowsily through its sun-blinds with the lake flashing at its feet, the village church among the graves, the sportsman at the edge of the covert looking round for an instant to see you pass, the waves breaking at the foot of some sandstone pinnacle — all these little vignettes, that you are never allowed to dwell upon to satiety, are a perpetual delight ; as also to see them in such lazy comfort, and to feel the slight pressure of the book upon your knee, which tells that when you are tired of looking you may rest a while and be refreshed. All this is very unlike the weary fretted frame of mind with which even the hardiest traveller attacks a picture gallery, or even gazes at the scenery that he has undergone such discomfort to see. And then, too, a railway carriage is nearly the only place where you can see in perfect comfort every kind of atmospheric effect over a broad expanse of changing country. Seated at your ease, you may see the tall rain-column stalk up the steep valley, or the mist shroud the meadow- lands, or the fiery sun pierce through a frosty fog, or the snow lie deep over field and fen, casing the trees in crystallised silver, and accentuating cornice and gable up the village street. What pleasure in the world is there like that of leaving London in a raw cross-grained March day, suffering the accumulated horrors of a drizzly boisterous Channel passage, sleeping through the desolate sand-dunes on the Norman coast, to find Paris even more acidly repellent than London, and then snuggling into a sleeping-car, with the consciousness that you are paying for your uneasy sleep at the rate of about a penny a minute, and waking by Tarrascon or Avignon, to find yourself in the midst of a sunny spring day, with the Judas-trees flushing purple against the blue sky, the buttercups covering the fields with sheets of glossy gold, the roads actually tremulous with the coming heat, and the tall white houses drowsing under the shadow of grey spires ! The intoxication of such a transformation is one of those things that make life beautiful. Life is seen in its most spectacular and, therefore, in its most delightful aspect, from the windows of a railway train. The people are mere picturesque phantoms, created for your amusement and delight : people — what a joy it is to think of it ! — with whom one is never destined to have any personal relations at all. Tableaux ! that we may not mar their sweetness by any words. If you had speech with the farmer jogging along the roads, all that you would hear would be prophetic grumbling about the crops, or clumsy denunciations of misapprehended politicians ; but in the train you get all that is delightful of him without any drawback. There is the tramp, lighting his wayside fire, to whom you may not, even if you would, extend your weak charities, or feel remorseful because you have not done so ; the village children clambering on a gate ; the rector buying his morning paper at the little station where you stop for water — a man, perhaps, who, if you knew him, would wax warm over Queen Anne’s Bounty, and the inadequacies of the system of preferment. A man becomes an optimist, in spite of himself, behind the window of a railway carriage.

Page 25

i6 p ^ J^fl6(LOY«£WT, Tor OccupflTJOtt awd ewjoVw&WT HcPACuCeo aTp»oKKano y^ewx toRowe ; BuT,OfJCE ai^id ij3 Classic Wrcck, He STOOD f\ GhAKQED ArfD IDkStOaL CPveATDRE: HKd pou<^ht the Tear THftT Warf riiusT ChccK, WTtH REEW RE6iR€T »n EVERY PE ATOPIC. EjWlOURNED UPON THE pLATlNE lENJ Je Spake no )^op,e ; but every night, ^EY SAT, ABOUT YhE Mrum LlKGERS /^roRM THAT CLUTCHES IN *T8 FINGERS -ft MORTAPl BOARD ; AND LEFT AIKD RIGHT SHOOTHlN'inRpWEL SEEKS TO HIDE The MAP^S OFTiNiE’S DLLAPIDATION: Ifc^UT 6T1LLTM05E WRECKS, oK EVEPvY SIDE, f^EMAlK UHFiT FOP^ KABlTAriOH. r J.F.SulliVaN. i^midtheH^ardEns THPQNVITE U5. tRnd wept before the TOrch ofTTitus , And faintly sobbed by Saturn’s Shrine; r- iHIe stood DISCONSOLATE AND DUMB BOausoleu^^^ Iff’- f GRIEVED ENDS ESSME® T® CMEER SlS)<5i&ESTtlHa THUS flWeTMAT DlVESSlffiN ■^E IFiPE , TMS IPlil. , THS IFeSTI VS ©MP : LEweTM MSFAHUTtV 5P6KE V^EU TMERE^ To U«V1 TW£M S® 1 Ot A SlW T®’. ®H hfmr A SmTl ®P IBUSRIPAm T® LET TMESE PREMISES ©.ST SMTO 1 “Why, WHEN THE Party’s Lease expires This property- just calculate it- How /S HE GOING TO REINSTATE IT Accordikg as that lease Requires ? Some suit in Chahcerv mav Be The CAUSE OF ALLTHIS SAD POSITION •, But,anvhow,) Pine to see Such property inthis Condition ‘ ’

Page 26

^7 DELICACIES FOR THE WINTER TEA-TABLE. BY P. H. ^lETY is charming’’ — at least the old saying hath it thus — and as my writings on “ Sum¬ mer Tea - Table Delicacies ” proved so acceptable, I con¬ tinue the series by adding some seasonable articles when the days are colder, and the appe¬ tite demands something a little more substantial than in sum¬ mer. I diverge widely from the beaten track by including only those novelties which I do not think have ever been published previously, and as all of them have been tested by myself, it may be accepted that they are reliable, and the recipes may be followed with ^ confidence. I have only to repeat my request, which appeared in the June issue of Cassell’s Magazine, that those who would follow out my recipes will kindly do them the justice to use exactly the propor¬ tions given, and neither more nor less, because all the ingredients have been carefully adjusted with the object of preventing any failures. I lead off with a very old-fashioned article indeed, which I have reconstructed and improved almost beyond recognition, and if it is served warm with a nice sw^eet sauce, it will be quite a novelty to-day ; although, by-the-by, it may also be served cold with boiled custard, and I am certain will then be equally well appreciated. I will call it an Apple Mould. Commence by removing the peels and cores from some nice juicy apples, but do not cut up the fruit too small. Take the pieces of apple and put them into a stew-pan, with the peel of a fresh lemon and sufficient white sugar to suit the palate. Just cover them with water, stand them at the side of the fire, and then let them slowly simmer until they become a pulp. Re¬ move the stew-pan from the fire, and, after taking out the lemon-peel, beat the apple pulp until it is per¬ fectly smooth, when allow it to get cold. Now beat up two eggs until they froth, and amalgamate this with the apple pulp, and follow by the addition of two ounces of melted fresh butter and the same weight of stale crumbs of white bread. Whisk everything together until thoroughly mixed. Take a mould of any pattern, prepare the inside of it by smearing it with creamed butter, and dredge that over thickly with more bread-crumbs. Into this pour the apple mixture, sprinkle the top over very thickly with bread-crumbs once again, and then bake in a moderate oven. Turn it out of the mould care¬ fully, and serve either hot or cold, as directed above. If other spices or flavourings are approved, they may be added to the apple mixture when it is quite cold, and just before it is put into the mould. 722 DAVIS. I recently took a summer trip to the Continent, and in the course of my rambles stayed in Belgium for a few days. There I met the very best sample of novel gingerbread that I had ever come across, and after some investigation I evolved a recipe for it, which I now append : — Orange Gingerbread. ij lbs. flour ; 8 oz. treacle ; 6 oz. brown sugar; 4 oz. butter ; 4 oz. finely chopped candied orange- peel ; I oz. baking powder ; 2 eggs ; 10 or 12 drops aniseed flavouring. Method. — Sift the baking powder and flour together; make a bay in the centre, into which put the sugar and orange-peel ; add the treacle, and then melt the butter and pour that in. Add the slight flavouring of aniseed. Whisk the eggs, and pour them into the central hollow ; then mix all together in the bay, and work all up to a dough. Break it into small pieces, and place them in well-buttered pans. Sprinkle some caraway seeds over the tops, and bake in a warm oven. When baked, dredge some fine sugar over them, after having lightly brushed the tops with whipped whites of eggs. Germany has many peculiarities which, I think, might readily be introduced into the cuisine of this kingdom, and from amongst other varied toothsome delicacies of the Fatherland I select for my present paper a recipe of an original German New Year Cake. I lb. flour ; 12 oz. castor sugar ; 8 oz. butter ; 4 oz. sultanas (washed and dried) ; 4 oz. mixed drained candied peel (cut small) ; 5 eggs ; a small teaspoon¬ ful of essence of lemon. Method. — Beat the sugar and butter to a light cream in a warm pan. Whisk the eggs to a very light froth, and stir them into the cream. Add the essence of lemon, the sultanas, and peel, and then lightly stir in the flour. Turn the mixture into a baking tin which has been lined with buttered paper, and bake it in a moderate oven. When it has become partly cooled, cover the top and sides with a thin icing, made with fine castor sugar and hot water, and coloured pink with a little liquid cochineal. I add another German recipe, which I think will be welcomed at this time of the year, and I am certain it will prove itself to be a novelty of no mean order. Certainly it deserves attention, and the results of experiments which I have made with the recipe have been so highly satisfactory that the desire to include it is irresistible. Potato Buns. I lb. flour ; 8 oz. boiled potatoes (carefully peeled and mashed) ; 8 oz. castor sugar ; 8 oz. butter ; 6 oz.

Page 27

i8 The Double X Mystery. currants (picked, washed, and dried) ; i oz. dried yeast ; i egg ; half-pint of milk ; a pinch of salt. Method. — Rub the butter into the flour, and make a space in the centre. Add in the sugar and currants. Make half the milk lukewarm, and dissolve the yeast in it, and pour that into the bay. Stir the rest of the milk into the potatoes, and put that into the bay likewise. Beat the egg, and add that in also. Drop in a pinch of salt, stir all together, and mix everything up to a dough. Cover it over with a cloth, and let it lie for half an hour. Then break it into small pieces, mould them round, place them on buttered tins, and when they have swelled to twice their size, bake them in a sharp oven. While hot, wash them over with egg to glaze them. Having given a New Year cake, it naturally follows that a recipe for an inexpensive and easily made Christmas cake is in order, and I therefore append it, although I have simplified the recipe as far as possible, and that with the main idea of producing an excellent result at a moderate cost. I have only to ask that my readers will kindly use the proportions given, and not deviate from them in any way. Christmas Cake. ij lbs. flour ; i lb. castor sugar ; i lb. butter ; i lb. sultanas (washed and dried) ; T lb. currants (washed, picked, and dried) ; 12 oz. mixed drained candied peel (cut fine) ; 9 eggs ; fruit flavouring of any kind — lemon, orange, raspberry, pineapple. See. — quantity to taste. Method. — Proceed exactly as for “ German New Year Cake,” but remember that this cake will require more soaking in the oven. Try if it is done by the old method of pushing a thin splint of dry wood into the centre, and if that comes out dry the cake is done ; if wet, and the cake sticks to the splint, it requires more soaking. When it is covered with icing, stick a few small fancy sugar ornaments about it, and put some fancy frilled coloured papers round the sides. I conclude the present paper with a recipe for an article which has gained great favour in Switzerland and the north of Italy — say the Tyrol district — and I am satisfied that the result will commend itself to those who prefer to depart from the beaten track, and desire a thorough novelty for the tea-table. I have rarely met with any simple combination of ingredients which produces so excellent a result if carefully manipulated, and therefore I have every confidence in hinting that those who follow the recipe will be perfectly satisfied with the experiment. Chocolate Tea-Cakes. 8 oz. flour ; 6 oz. castor sugar ; 6 oz. butter ; 4 oz. ground chocolate ; 4 eggs ; half-teaspoonful vanilla flavouring. Method. — Beat the butter to a cream in a warm pan, add in the sugar, and beat both well. Whisk the eggs to a light froth, and stir them into the cream. Add a slight flavouring of vanilla, then lightly mix in the flour and chocolate. With a spoon drop the mixture on buttered flat tins, each cake the size of a large chestnut. Dust some fine sugar over them, and bake them in a warm oven. Note. — If chocolate is not available, the same result may be obtained by substituting for it two ounces of perfectly pure cocoa powder, and then adding two ounces of extra sugar and a dozen more drops of vanilla flavouring. Chocolate is only cocoa, sugar, and vanilla flavouring, and therefore can easily be produced. THE DOUBLE X MYSTERY. BY THOMAS KEYWORTH, AUTHOR OF “ MISTRESS JUNE,’^ ETC. CHAPTER THE FIRST. HIS was the brief notice which appeared in the Yof'kshire Mercury : — “ On the I2th inst., at High Scout, Ichabod William Sun¬ derland, aged 49. Australian papers, please copy.” It was among the DEATHS, and there could be no doubt about the meaning of it, even if the people who manifested most interest in the announcement had not known already that Ichabod William Sunderland was dead. But who was responsible for the request that Australian papers would copy the notice ? “ Sunderland had lived out there, and it was only natural that people in that part of the world should be informed of his decease,” was suggested. That was not the point. Who had asked the news¬ papers to insert it ? Half-a-crown was charged if there happened to be any addition to the simple statement of birth, marriage, or death. Who had paid the half- crown ? That was a puzzle. No inquiries among the kins¬ folk of the late Ichabod William elicited any satisfac¬ tory information. Ehud Sunderland declared that he was own cousin to Ichabod, but he did not pick up half-crowns on the road-side, and he was not likely to spend that amount for nothing. When he said so, the most sceptical mind would have been immediately convinced. Lemuel Walker informed everybody, what they knew already, that he had married Adah Sunderland, who was Ichabod’s second cousin, but he was never two-and-sixpence richer for any kinship with the dead man, and he was not intending to begin squandering his loose change at that time of life.

Page 28

The Double X Mystery. Hephzibah Crabtree was Ichabod’s aunt, and she was prepared to assure anybody that money was not made by playing at ducks and drakes with it. She had seen most of what was called Ichabod’s fortune put together, and she knew how it had been done. “ Small leaks will sink a ship,” she said, “and ships are not made to be sunk.” But still, there the notice was, and in all probability it had been paid for. No amount of axioms about taking care of the pence would explain the mystery. ‘‘Is an outsider meddling?” Ehud Sunderland asked, as if the thought had just struck him. But that had been in his mind all the time. Lemuel Walker began to show how improbable it was. He felt that the arguments were in his favour, and he had the impression that he was carrying con¬ viction to the others ; but, for all that, he had an un¬ easy feeling that some outsider had been at work. “ Sunderlands, and their kith and kin, are able to manage their own affairs,” said Aunt Crabtree. “It has come to something if the Yorkshire Mercmy is to ask Australia, and I cannot tell who besides, to stick their noses into our business.” Hephzibah Crabtree looked as if the greatest pleasure of life . at that moment would have been afforded by the sight of some wretched outsider, suffer¬ ing for presuming to express an opinion, or suggest a mode of action, in reference to what concerned nobody but the Sunderlands themselves. There were others present besides the three who have been mentioned, but they all agreed with what was said. The announcement in the paper was a aiiystery, and it was a shame. This informal meeting of kinsfolk took place at Water Edge, as the house where Hephzibah Crabtree lived was called. It was the day before the funeral, and uneasy thoughts had been started in many minds by the unauthorised and superfluous nature of the newspaper announcement. First one and then another had strolled towards Aunt Crabtree’s house, without any definite purpose, but with the vague idea that something might be said which was worth hearing. The district around was called Royd Hollow, and several mills could be seen, standing like intruders in the wild landscape. There were houses, too, old rambling places, with many gables and small windows, weather-worn and mossy ; besides clusters of cottages, where the mill “hands” lived. All the larger houses were occupied by families who were related to Ichabod Sunderland ; the mills were theirs also ; but the chief mill of all was at Crag’s Flight, and that had been owned by the late Ichabod. High Scout, where he lived and died, was in an exposed position on the summit of a hill. In Royd Hollow and the neighbourhood old- fashioned names prevailed, many of them being of Scripture origin. A stranger might be surprised at discovering so many Ehuds, Lemuels, Adahs, and Hephzi balls, but that would be set down to his ignor¬ ance. The natives resented any interference with local customs, and they were not pleased with the visitor who made disparaging remarks about their T9 climate. “ year at Royd Hollow,” said the visitor, “consists of eight months’ winter, and four months’ bad weather.” A remark of that kind was considered frivolous and presumptuous. Nobody hinted that it was not true. The visitor had been nearly half a century in the neighbourhood, but as he was not born there, he ranked only as a stranger, especially as he was known to be comparatively poor. Ichabod Sunderland’s fortune had been famous for three generations. First of all there was what the mill “hands” called “ Th’ Owd Maister.” His name was Ichabod Sunder¬ land, and he was often referred to by outsiders as the “ Original Ichabod.” He established a business at Royd Hollow, which was then a wild, thinly populated district, known in the neighbouring town of Hillfold as the dwelling-place of C[uarrymen and hand- loom weavers. Ichabod worked hard and long ; his “ hands ” worked hard and long. Children went to the mill almost as soon as they left the cradle. No time was wasted on education or amusement. Wages were low, and living was coarse. The people remained poor, but Ichabod made a fortune. He left several sons and daughters behind him ; but the eldest of them, Ichabod John, had a mind above partnerships, and he managed to buy out his brothers and sisters, on terms which were afterwards said to have been remarkably favourable to himself. In Ichabod John’s time the workpeople spoke regretfully of “ Th’ Owd Maister,” and they said among them¬ selves that he was “ noan a bad un.” Ichabod John’s children were delicate. Several of them died of chest disease, and when only one was left alive, the doctor said — “ If you don't want to bury that lad of yours, you must ship him off to Australia. Royd Hollow will kill him.” Ichabod William, the son referred to, was then a youth of eighteen. He was beginning to be useful in the business, and the father was not willing to spare him. “ He ought to be worth his keep in Australia,” said the wily doctor. “ That is a great wool country, and your son might make himself useful there.” That consideration settled the matter. Ichabod William sailed for Sydney. He remained in Australia twenty years, and returned to England fairly strong, a few months before his father died. Ichabod’s fortune became a proverbial expression ; but some poor people, who tried to console themselves in their poverty by reflecting on the unsatisfactoriness of wealth, shook their heads and said — “ There’s things money’ll not buy, and happiness may be one of ’em.” Ichabod William lived at High Scout, a lonely and sullen man. The business was carried on, but the pro¬ prietor went about as if life had no pleasure for him. “He knows he’ll dee young,” said some of the people. “ He’s noan right in his mind all th’ time,” said others, “ and badliness o’ that sort’s a deal worse than aches and pains.”

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20 The Double X Mystery. Ichabod William died at the age of forty-nine, and he was said to have left no will. His kinsfolk were jealous of each other in reference to money matters, but they were far more jealous of outsiders ; and yet, before the funeral, it began to be rumoured that some unauthorised person was inter¬ fering, by putting a notice in the newspaper, contain¬ ing the unnecessary words, “ Australian papers, please copy.” _ CHAPTER THE SECOND. If it had not been for funerals, life would hardly have been worth living at a place like Royd Hollow. Christenings and weddings counted for very little. A large proportion of the couples who were married went to Hillfold, and had the ceremony performed there, at the Old Church, quietly, and with only the necessary number of witnesses present. Baptism was associated with vaccination in the popular mind, and was toler¬ ated rather than appreciated. But funerals were events to be remembered. The poorest person became im¬ portant the moment there was a death in the family, and this importance lasted until another funeral eclipsed it, with new pageantry, and a fresh tea in the club-room of the “ Weavers’ Delight.” Social importance was rated to a great extent by the splendour of coffins and the number of mourners present upon those great occasions. “Th’ Owd Maister’s ” funeral was talked about by veterans who remembered it ; and young people felt themselves at a decided disadvantage through not having been born then. “ Th’ Owd Maister’s son,” most people could remember, and, therefore, the subject did not offer sufficient scope for those marvellous additions which at Royd Hollow passed muster for reminiscences. ‘‘Th’ Owd Maister’s grandson ” was to be buried ; the hearts of the people beat wildly with long-continued excitement. All the kinsfolk of the dead man were there, and the “hands,” of course. It was, indeed, a goodly sight. Weavers and spinners employed at other mills felt envious, and were ready to wonder when their masters intended to die. Before the funeral started, a whisper reached the chief mourners, and robbed the event of some advan¬ tage, as far as they were concerned. Ichabod had made a will ! Esau Booth and Isaac Wood had witnessed it. Furtive eyes were turned towards those two men, as opportunity presented itself, and the question arose, “ What does it mean ? ” Waxtape and Longbill, the Hillfold lawyers, had already communicated the fact that their respected client had, as far as they could speak to the point, died intestate. More than one of the Sunderlands had made inquiries. What did this mean ? More outside interference ? When the chief mourners returned to High Scout, they began at once to fathom this new and perplexing mystery. Mr. Longbill was present, and said that no will had been drawn up by his firm, and he was not aware that the deceased gentleman had ever expressed a desire to dispose of his property. “ He had a strange and unaccountable prejudice against it,” said Mr. Longbill, looking round, as if Ichabod William had been alone in that respect, though he knew quite well that three or four persons present were in the same position. Esau Booth and Isaac Wood were sent for. Esau was a clerk, and Isaac was the timekeeper at Crag’s Flight. When they entered the large dining-room at High Scout, they perceived at once that the persons present regarded them in no friendly spirit. Mn Longbill looked as a professional gentleman might be expected to look at the clumsiest of amateurs who had been discovered making blunders instead of minding their own business. Isaac was the spokesman, as he was the elder man. His story was straightforward, and it was confirmed by Esau. About six months previously, Ichabod Sunderland had told him to come up to High Scout, and bring Esau with him. He was not to mention the fact to anybody else, and then there would be no questions asked about the business. The two men went, as they were ordered, and their master talked about a variety of subjects. Just when they were about to leave, he remarked that he wanted them to witness his signature^ He took a , sheet of paper from a drawer, and said, “ This is my will.” Then he wrote his name in full, and the two men wrote theirs ; first Isaac, and Esau afterwards. “ Did Mr. Sunderland say anything about the pro¬ perty ? ” inquired the lawyer. “Not a word,” replied Isaac. “When we had wrote our names, th’ maister dried th’ ink, and then he turned th’ paper over, and he dipped his finger i' th’ ink-bottle, and he made a big ‘ O ’ with two little crosses i’ th’ middle, and he said, ‘ Better late than never.’ He gave me a shilling, and Esau a shilling, and he told us that if we mentioned a word to any¬ body about what we had done, he would sack us both.” “He made that ‘ O ’ with two crosses on the back of the paper he called his will ? ” said the lawyer. “ He did,” replied Isaac, looking at Esau, wha added, “ He did, as sure as we’re here.” “ Have you any idea what became of that paper ?’^ the lawyer asked. He would not call it a will. The two men knew nothing ; they had left the house at once, and their master had never mentioned the subject to them again. Search was made for the will, high and low ; but no trace of it could be found. The business was carried on under direction of the Court of Chancery ; but the opinion began to prevail that Ichabod had destroyed the document which he had prepared, and that the next of kin would have to take out letters of adminis¬ tration in the ordinary way. There had never been a subject of such intense interest during the memory of man. The nurse who attended the deceased during his last illness, had two or three times heard him mention his daughter. That was looked upon as conclusive proof of insanity, because everybody knew that Ichabod was a bachelor. If further proof had been wanting, it was provided by

Page 30

The Double X Mystery. 21 his housekeeper, who had heard him talk about shoot¬ ing all his relations with his grandfather’s blunder¬ buss. The antiquated weapon hung over the fire¬ place in the dining-room, and Ichabod had pointed to it and said, with a laugh, “ I will put something harder than lead into all the Sunderland tribe with that old gun. The greedy lot ! ” CHAPTER THE THIRD. It was October when Ichabod Sunderland died, and, during the long winter which followed, there was a growing feeling in Royd Hollow that bad blood would spring up among the dead man's kinsfolk, unless something were done soon to settle affairs, and divide the famous fortune. Amongst the people outside Royd Hollow who took an interest in the case, was the Rev. Ambrose Stirling. He was a middle-aged man, who had recently been appointed to the curacy at Warrenden, a village on the way to Hillfold. Mr. Stirling had spent a great part of his life in Australia, where he had been a clergyman in the bush. Nobody suspected it, but he was the person who put the obituary notice in the Yorkshh'e Mercwy^ and he had sent copies to the leading Australian newspapers, with a mark against that particular passage. What particular form of antagonism was required to constitute a proof of bad blood, nobody took the trouble to determine. Several persons had quarrelled, and several were what was popularly called at outs.” Very hard names had been bandied to and fro, and the worst of motives had been imputed ; but still, fear for what might happen held the ground, rather than concern about existing conditions. Towards the end of June there was fine weather, and the neighbourhood looked as if it knew nothing about those weary months of cold and rain which were usually associated with its name. Quite different was

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22 The Double X Mystery. it from a description of the place which a young lady at Putney read in the columns of the Australasian. She was in the drawing room of No. 15, Meister Road. This valley in winter, ’ she read, “ is like a slice cut from the Arctic regions and placed in the tem¬ perate zone. The roads are impassable, and travellers cross the fields in places which have been made bare by the fierce wind. What will be the condition of things when a thaw sets in, I scarcely like to con¬ jecture.” It was a long article, written by “An Occasional Correspondent.” No names were given, except that the scenes described were among the Yorkshire hills, and not far from Hillfold. “ Listen to this, mother,” the young lady said. Then she read the passage, and added — “ Does it not make you long to be there during this dreadfully hot weather t “ What paper is that ? ” the mother inquired. “An old number of the Australasian, which Richard brought last week.” She smiled and blushed when she mentioned Richard. Whoever Richard might be, it was safe to conjecture that he occupied a favoured place in the speaker’s heart. That portion of Putney where Meister Road is situated becomes very hot and close in summer. The houses are comparatively small, and the gardens are in keeping with them. Windows may be thrown open, but what is the use, if no breeze is forthcoming ? Mrs. Holdsworth and her daughter Ethel were Australians. They were used to hot weather ; but, like most people away from home, they declared that the inconveniences to which they had been accus¬ tomed were trifling compared with those which they discovered amongst strangers. The hottest day in England was nothing (judged by the thermometer) ; in Australia it would be called “ moderately warm ; ” but the oppressiveness, they, said, was terrible. It was Ethels birthday ; she was twenty-one. Her mother looked young, very young indeed, to be Ethel’s mother. Both of them were tall and slender, and they had the clear complexion which distinguishes many daughters of that Greater Britain beyond the Southern Sea. “It is very hot,” replied Mrs. Holdsworth ; “but I do not think the valley you were reading about would be a great improvement on Putney, especially during the thaw which the writer was afraid to contemplate. Our business in England will soon be finished, and then we shall have another opportunity to grumble at our own climate instead of blaming this.” “ Mothei-j” exclaimed Ethel, “ I am twenty-one now. Suppose you tell me all about our affairs. You have always said, ‘Wait until you are twenty-one.’ The time has come. Behold the hour and the woman ! ” A shadow seemed to cross the mother’s face as this request was made. “ Do not be in a hurry, Ethel,” she replied. “ I have nothing to tell which can add to your happiness. You really know all you need to know. My mother’s aunt left some property to my mother, and to me after her ; but my mother died several years before her aunt did ; and as my father was also dead, it was thought to be best that I should come here and attend to the affair myself.” “Yes, mother, I know all about that troublesome business,” Ethel said ; “ but you promised to tell me who my father was, and when he died.” “ Here is Richard,” the mother answered, with a look of relief. “Richard” was Richard Purvis, a young Australian who was pursuing his medical studies at Guy’s Hos¬ pital. He knew the Holdsworths in New South Wales, and the renewed acquaintance had led to an engagement between him and Ethel. He brought a birthday present with him, which effectually served tO’ drive away from Ethel’s mind the subject about which she had been troubling her mother. “ Shall we walk up to the heath ? ” Richard asked ;• “ there is sure to be a breeze there.” Mrs. Holdsworth would not go, but the young' people went. Whether they found a breeze or not,, they never remembered. “There is a strange piece of news in the Austral¬ asian which came to- day,”' Richard said. “You have, perhaps, noticed some articles describing a peculiar district among the Yorkshire hills ?” “Yes,” replied Ethel; “I was reading one just before you came.” “This last contribution,” Richard continued, “re¬ fers to a will which was made by a Mr. Ichabod Sunderland. The will cannot be found ; but the wit¬ nesses who saw the document signed say that Ichabod (what a name!) dipped his finger in the ink, and marked the back of the will with a large ‘ O ’ contain¬ ing two crosses. That was the mark which your grandfather always put on his cattle. It may be an accidental coincidence, but it is rather startling.” The lovers, however, had other subjects to occupy their attention, and it was not until Ethel and her mother were alone that night, and the events of the day were being reviewed, in the confidential manner which was customary with the two, that Richard’s communication was remembered. Mrs. Holdsworth was struck with what her daughter said, and asked for further particulars, but Ethel was not able to give them. “It is very strange,” the mother remarked, with agitation, “very strange ! Ethel, my child, I will tell you about your father. It is twenty-three years since I first saw him. I was then a girl of seventeen, and had just returned home from school at Sydney. William Holdsworth was looking for a suitable station, he said, and he stayed with us at Frazer’s Run several days. He came again and again. We fell in love with each other, and, after a brief courtship, were married at Harristown. My husband was away a great deal. He took a station two hundred miles from us, and as my parents were loth to let me go, I stayed with them until after you were born. Then came the year of dreadful drought, when nearly all my father’s stock perished, and he was ruined. Your father said he could get money at Melbourne to

Page 32

The Double X Mystery. extricate us from our difficulty. He went away, and from that day to this, I have neither seen him nor heard a word from him. We could not discover the station which he had mentioned, and he was not known at Melbourne, as far as we could learn. As my father said, he came from nowhere, he went to nowhere, but he left a daughter behind him.” “ You do not know, then, that my father is dead ? ” Ethel remarked, when her mother paused. “ No, my dear,” Mrs. Holdsworth answered sadly. That opinion began to prevail, and as we could not gather any information about him, we quietly assumed that it was true. We stayed on at Frazer’s Run, and my father and mother shortened their days by strug¬ gling to make up the losses which they had suffered in the drought year. You know they partly succeeded ; but I would rather have continued poor, if they might have been spared to us.” Why did grandfather mark his cattle in that peculiar manner ? ” Ethel asked. “ He had a fancy to do so,” the mother said. “ His name was Felix Oxley, so he took the initial of his surname, and inserted the two ‘x’s ’ in it.” The next day Richard Purvis received a note asking him to take all the back numbers of the 4-tcstralasian in his possession to Meister Road. CHAPTER THE FOURTH. Richard Purvis soon found himself engaged in a task which he thoroughly enjoyed. By comparing the back numbers of the Australasian with each other, he was able to assure himself of a few important facts in connection with what he called the “Double X Mystery.” Ichabod William Sunderland had made the missing will ; he had died at High Scout, and High Scout was not far from Hillfold. His death was reported in an Australian newspaper. There was a large fortune waiting for somebody, and there was a person in the neighbourhood of High Scout who was writing about the subject. “ There we are,” said Richard. “ We have materials enough to work up into a sensational novel. What I suggest is that we go to Hillfold, and see what can be learnt on the spot. A fellow at Guy’s has offered me a letter of introduction to Dr. Morton, who lives at Warrenden, which is near to Hillfold. We could soon satisfy ourselves whether that O double x was an eccentric freak or something more.” Mrs. Holdsworth was easily persuaded to consent. She and Ethel intended to visit Scotland during the summer, and it would be easy to call at Hillfold on the way. She scarcely knew what to expect as the result of her investigation, but there was a possibility that a long-enduring uncertainty might be removed. Richard left them at the Queen’s Hotel in Hillfold, while he went to seek Dr. Morton, whom he found ready to start on his daily round. He was a man of few words. “ Glad to do anything I can for you,” he said. “High Scout is three miles from here. I did not 23 know Sunderland. Morose sort of man, I believe. Our curate here takes a great interest in the business ; Rev. Ambrose Stirling. Been in Australia.” “ I knew a clergyman out there called Ambrose Stirling,” Richard exclaimed. “Same man, depend upon it,” replied the doctor; “ not been home very long. Give you a note to him.” The note was written, and Dr. Morton departed, urging Richard to make any use of him he liked. “ I should have to use him in his absence,” was the young man’s reflection. The curate’s house was easily found, and Richard recognised his old acquaintance. “ You conducted service several times at my brother’s station,” he said, shaking the clergyman heartily by the hand. “Purvis!” replied the other. “Purvis, of Wal- looloo ? 1 remember him quite well. And you were the boy called Dick ? ” The two were friends directly. When Mr. Stirling heard what business had takers- Richard to Warrenden, he acknowledged that he was. the “ Occasional Correspondent ” who had written to- the Australasian. “ When first I came to Warrenden,” he said, “ 1 learnt that Ichabod Sunderland was formerly settled in Australia, and I went to see him. I cannot say that he made me very welcome ; but he asked me a. number of questions, and the thought struck me thati he had something on his mind. He did not ask me- to call again. Hospitality is a precious thing in this neighbourhood, with some too precious to be used. I met him several times, and the conviction was strengthened within me that he had a secret which was troubling him. When he died, I took steps to- make the fact known out yonder. Afterwards, various circumstances came to my knowledge, which caused me to write a few letters to the Australasian, bearing on the subject. You say that the mark which Ichabod Sunderland made on the back of the will was Felix Oxley’s cattle brand ? ” “It was,” replied Richard. “ I saw it when I was at Frazer’s Run some years ago, and Mrs. Holdsworth confirms my recollection.” “William Holdsworth was her husband’s name ” the curate said. “ There have been some strange weddings out yonder. William Holdsworth might be Ichabod Sunderland. He mentioned his daughter several times before he died ; but that is set down to- his insanity, just like some foolish threat of his that he would shoot his relations with his grandfather’s blun¬ derbuss.” “ I should like to see the place,” Richard exclaimed,, “ so would Mrs. Holdsworth and her daughter. “ Drive up to-morrow,” replied Mr. Stirling. “ i should be happy to go with you. The old house¬ keeper is still at High Scout, and she is ready to believe that her master had a daughter somewhere.. She hopes he had, and that in some way the property will fall into that daughter’s hands. The housekeeper has a poor opinion of the Sunderlands at Royd Hollow,. She said to me, ‘ You hadn’t need tell ’em they cannot

Page 33

24 The Double X Mystery. serve God and Mammon.’ ‘Why not?’ I asked. ‘ Becos they’ll noan try,’ was her answer ; ‘ Mammon’s enough for them.’ She is a character, is that house¬ keeper.” On the following day the party drove to High Scout, and were permitted to see through the house. The furniture was old and heavy, and the rooms looked faded and dreary. “ That’s th’ owd maister’s blunderbuss,” said the housekeeper, pointing to the heavy, brass-mounted firearm, which was hung upon the wall. “ If th’ owd returned with the instrument, Richard placed it inside the barrel, gave it a few turns, and carefully drew out a large sheet of writing paper, which had been rolled together. When it was opened, an immense “ 0 ” was seen upon it, with two “x’s ” inside. “ That is the lost will,” Mr. Stirling said. “ Ichabod Sunderland might well talk about firing something harder than lead at his relations.” “ He talked a great deal about that there blunder¬ buss afore he deed — th’ night afore he deed, especi- “AN IMMENSE ‘O’ WAS SEEN UPON iT, WITH TWO ‘ X’S ’ INSIDE." maister’s grandson had done as he liked, he’d a made hoils into some’un afore he deed, that he would.” Richard Purvis took down the old weapon to examine it ; the flint lock and wide barrel amused him. “ A man might almost creep into this,” he remarked, with a laugh, inserting his walking-cane. “ Why, it is loaded ! ” “ It’s noan been loaded this fifty year,” said the housekeeper. Richard measured inside and outside ; then he declared that something was in the bottom of the barrel. “ There’s a stick i’ th’ kitchen,” replied the house¬ keeper, ‘‘ wi’ some’at like a corkscrew at th’ end on it, for drawing charges out o’ guns. I’ll fetch it.” Nobody spoke while she was absent. When she ally,” the astonished housekeeper gasped out ; “but I really thought he wor just cracked.” On the other side of the paper the will was written. It contained a statement to the effect that Ichabod William Sunderland had married Alice Oxley, of Frazer’s Run, near Harristown, in New South Wales. He had introduced himself by his second name, William, and his mother’s name, Holdsworth ; and in the name of William Holdsworth he had been known to his wife and her friends. After he had been mar¬ ried two years, his wife’s father was ruined. “ I had received a letter from my father,” the statement said, “ordering me to Western Australia. I knew that if he discovered that I had married a poor woman, he would never forgive me, so I resolved to clear out. I made an excuse for getting away, and I have never

Page 34

The Bridesmaids. ^5 seen my wife since. I have not been a happy man, and now I am near the end. I cannot forgive her for being poor when I thought she would be rich. It was a bitter disappointment.” The writer must have been one of those people who enjoy ‘‘ the luxury of blaming somebody else.” The statement that he was disappointed with his wife’s poverty had an absurd look about it. The excuses made were very lame and poor. Refer¬ ring to the assumed name, Ichabod said — “ When I went among strangers, I often passed myself off as William Holdsworth. After I was mar¬ ried, I perceived that I had put myself in an awkward position. I was sure to be found out sooner or later. The man who lies ought to pass on. To lie and lie again is tedious work, and risky. I will say this, if Alice had married again, I should not have blamed her, or made myself known ; but she is single yet, and at Frazer’s Run. Still poor, I am afraid, still poor ! ” Then, in a few words, everything was bequeathed to his daughter, Ethel, and she was appointed sole executrix ; but she was recommended to put her affairs into the hands of Messrs. Waxtape and Long- bill, solicitors, in the town of Hillfold. There was a postscript, in which the writer said that he had taken the precaution to discover that his daughter was still alive. He also said that he should tell nobody about the will until he was sure he could not recover ; then he would point out its resting- place. ‘‘ This’ll be worse than shooting to them Sunder- lands,” the housekeeper exclaimed, clapping her hands. “ Hurrah for th’ owd maister’s grandson ! Hurrah ! ” The business was put into the hands of the lawyers whom Ichabod mentioned in his will. Mr. Longbill said at once that the document was perfectly legal ; but the longer he lived, the more he was amazed at the absurd conduct of clients. The Sunderlands were reconciled immediately in the presence of what they called “ a dangerous out¬ sider.” But it was useless. No steps were taken to dispute Ethel’s claim, and she entered soon upon her unexpected patrimony. The Rev. Ambrose Stirling was not forgotten by the grateful heiress. He is no longer the curate of War- renden ; and there is a deep-rooted opinion at Royd Hollow that he was a spy, who assumed the clerical office that he might frustrate the schemes of Ichabod’s kinsfolk. Richard Purvis is not pursuing his medical studies. The last time he w^s seen he was spending his honey¬ moon in Switzerland. He was willing to remain there ; but Ethel said they must return to her mother in England, and face the responsibilities which had been laid upon them in connection with their new position. Ethel had done one thing which convinced the Sunderlands, the Crabtrees, and the Walkers that she inherited insanity from her father. She had, as soon as she was in a position to do it, made over half her possessions to her mother. “ To think one of us should come to this,” said Ehud. “Oh, dear!” “It is worse than Ichabod’s folly,” said Lemuel. “ Oh, dear 1 ” “ There is no name for it,” snapped out Hephzibah. “ Oh, dear I,” “ Did it before she was married ! ” added Ehud. “ If I had been Purvis, I wouldn’t have married her,” declared Lemuel. “ Men will marry anybody and anything now- a-days!” exclaimed Hephzibah. “It is enough to make some folk turn in their graves to think what has become of Ichabod Sunderland’s fortune !” THE BRIDESMAIDS. ^^HE bridesmaids, sisters of the bride, Are early on the wedding day ; And to the church, with joy and pride. They pass in sweet array. Now, from the open porch, they hear The rapid roll of carriage wheels ; And through the windows, soft and clear, A golden glory steals. A charming group, with eyes that smile In pleased expectancy, they wait, And whisper, clustered near the aisle. That Dorothy is late. “ Be quick I ” Kate bends and whispers low. And chooses Maud a blossom sweet, A lovely damask rose, to throw Before her sister’s feet. Kate, M ill i cent, and Ruth are tall. Pure types of gracious maidenhood. While Maud is only eight and small. Though growing fair and good. O happy bridesmaids, gay and fair. We seem to hear, while music swells. Throbbing, exulting, through the air. Your own sweet wedding bells 1 J. R. Eastwood,

Page 35

Accompt. Words and Music by J. M. Bentley, Mus.D. 1 1 • — 1 ^ ! 1' /> Hi ' # . d. d.. 1 u. ^ c "■ ■" r -||. “! II.- d ■ ^ (— f— The bird that soars on Z. iTZlS 1 1 • — 1 — - 1 1 fm ^ _ o rj _ 1 . f 1 J V'V 1 • 0 . _ ■ - 1 ,TT"| f 'la J The 1 V 1 “Ft ' ■ m 2 ' ] 1 , ' 9 # > 99 ' > K ^ . !n. in ', 1 .-99' 99. ' 1 1 1 1 1 1 \ fci ' \ d9 \ ' ^ 9.. ^ B • J • " ^ J ~i ^ (if ■, ^9 p- p ’ (5 t? '-i- = 1 U 1 1 1 TT^i p 7 / k \ \ 9 f • ' \ - ^-ry ^ 1 . • .Mr - d " ' t: - p - p - - ^ ! - i - 1~ ■ ^ ■ 9-^ , 1_ 1 .-J — ■• 9 9 ^ ‘ ■ n 9_ 1 n IN 1 1 \ ^ fK_ 1 .0 1 rrrP" fT - ^ — [— 1 - 1 d r r ^ ' ^ J ’ - 1 - V- 1- - — - — 1 — (_ _ 1 I : d (t itz: i 9 cj high-est wing Builds on the ground its low - ly nest, its low . ly nest, low ~iy , fy pr n — ^ _i _ 9 9 1 9 ^ I 1 ^ 9 0— 1 1 j 9 i 1 1 ! 9 . ^-9-0 9 if - - 1 - isas - bird that soars on tr Li - ^ ; - 0 - high-est wing Builds - ^ - Wsi - ^ on the ground its low-ly nest, its ' * 1 low -----. 1 ’ 1 ' r -9~r fr-ti - -— 1 ■ ^ i i 9 1 75r_^^ duCj^ ^ —4 — - S 9 — a«— 9 Z? _ i 1 _ 1 d d _ Zi -ft - M 0 1 THY 9 \ 1 1 S n ' 9 9 2 9 I , . 9 9 9 1 VF' ^ - "d — \^ri^ ^ 1 ^ ^ ^ 9 ? 9 J i _ 9 9 2 d d • 9-0 - ^ ! , ; • siacc. 9 ■ • L-. I 1 1 \ P* - 9—9^ - R— ! f fW-., p-'t ' i 9 1 \ 9 . 9 ! i ‘ 1 1 * 1 1 • jT t, - * ■ -- ' ■ pz^ 1 - 9 - ; i

Page 36

27 I And she that doth most sweet -ly sing, Sings . in 1

Page 37

28 p- rt==:*— ly nest, Builds.. 3 -O.;- ~i — ::=-t -rj — 3^- 5?^ , the ground, on . the ground, on _ -= IC 3 !!3i the low ly nest. ±:it!=SlJ Builds.. J- on . the ground, on., the i- §Si l=2:[r; jJjV

Page 38

29 f AMERICAN FARMING FOR WOMEN. | BY A LADY FARMER. - ^ a time when so much interest is felt in the opening of new employ¬ ments to women, it is possible that some in England may care to hear of the novel way in which a few women attempt to gain a liveli¬ hood in the Far West. It is true that they not infrequently fail. Moreover, the un¬ dertaking calls for pluck, endurance, and energy in no common degree ; but, on the other hand, it has a certain educational value, and offers to those rightly- constituted a good deal of enjoyment. Through¬ out some of the Western states and territories of America the United States Government still retains large sections of land. This land is open to settlers under certain conditions. Every American citizen is possessed of these land rights, each entitling him to i6o acres of Government land of varying quality. The ^ conditions under which the settler takes his claim or ' quarter section vary with each case. If his claim is a | pre-emption, a residence of six months and a payment of 5s. an acre is required. If it is a homestead, a ij residence of five years gives him the land for nothing. With a timber claim neither residence nor payment is | required, but a certain number of acres must be planted | with trees. Most of the country west of the Mississippi was settled under these conditions by enterprising men i from the Atlantic States, and now the children of these j early settlers are pu'^hing westwards to make homes for | themselves in the newer states and territories. Of late j years many of these homesteaders, as they are com¬ prehensively called, are women. The United States Government in bestowing land rights on American citizens made no distinction of sex. The majority

Page 39

American Farming for Women. 30 of these enterprising women who take up land accompany a farmer-brother or father, who manages their claim for them. Their life, therefore, differs but little from the ordinary life of women on a Western farm. Occasionally, however, a woman comes out by herself, prepared to rely wholly on her own wit and wisdom in the carrying out of her new undertaking. It is a noteworthy fact that many, and perhaps the most successful, of these inde¬ pendent \vomen are teachers. To such, worn out as they often are with the close confinement of the schoolroom, the unrestrained life of the frontier pos¬ sesses a great fascination. Their success is due, perhaps, to the patience and perseverance acquired in teaching ; also to the fact that the educated woman, possessed of greater resources, is less likely to become restless and dissatisfied than her uncultured sister. Perhaps after this general sketch a page from the life of a real settlement of teachers in a Western state may be of interest. A railway has recently been con¬ structed from Holdredge, Nebraska, to Cheyenne, Wyo¬ ming, across the north-eastern corner of Colorado. It is a branch of the Burlington and Missouri Railway — the line on which the great strike took place last winter. The opening of the new railway was followed this year by a rush of settlers into a part of Colorado heretofore occupied by only a few widely scattered ranches. In a short time mushroom towns sprang up where a few months before the range cattle were grazing. It should not be forgotten that in the West it is the railway that calls the towns into existence, and not vtce versa. The object of a new line is often to open up ” the country and bring in settlers. In one of the valleys of the charming rolling prairie that covers Northern Colorado, east of the Rocky Mountains and not far from the new railway, four young women, college graduates and teachers, settled this spring. The three homesteads and one pre¬ emption which they have taken up are adjoining. Already things have a home-like look. Each has a neat little wooden house, and two have stables. Ponies, a cow, a dog, and chickens lend life to the settlement. The gardens hold out a hope of fresh vegetables, but ground squirrels and jack rabbits are doing their best to render the hope vain. Already twenty-five acres of the virgin sod have been ploughed — “broken,” it is called here — and surrounded with a strong wire fence to keep off the range cattle. Five acres have been planted with potatoes, the best sod crop. For part of the work neighbouring settlers, anxious to earn a little money, have been employed, but part of it was done by the feminine homesteaders themselves. Cutting up potatoes for seed, and dropping them in the furrow^, is not the easiest or cleanest of work, but it is not wholly disagreeable, for it can all be done out of doors, and is not a tax on the nerves. While the gardens are being made and the crops put in there is enough, and more than enough, to do, but even when that work is over time does not hang heavy on the homesteaders’ hands. Household cares take time, for though life is planned on a very simple scale, the scantiness of materials to work with gives room for some planning and ingenuity. With no beef nearer than the “ round up,” and butter to be got only by a twelve-mile ride, while fruit is quite out of the question, it is not an easy matter to provide for the table. Then the cow and poultry must be cared for, and each pet broncho has learned to expect from his mistress attentions and “each has a neat little wooden house.'

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“the delight of a gallop over the wide prairie. caresses which at first he scarcely knew how to ap¬ preciate. A cow-horse — that is, a broncho, or horse caught wild off the range and broken to the saddle for a cow¬ boy’s use — is scarcely a model riding horse for a lady, but no other is so well adapted to this country. He does not need to be tied, but will always stand if the long bridle is thrown over his head so as to rest on the ground. Martingales are rarely used, and he is guided by simply drawing the reins across his neck in the direction in which he should turn. Generally he is broken to the lariat, and can be picketed out by the head or foot in genuine Indian fashion. No matter how dark the night or how great the speed, a broncho rarely gets a foot into a prairie dog or coyote hole ; and his skill in picking his way over a country thickly covered with cactus is marvellous to the beholder, and extremely unsettling to his rider. He is very clever at getting a living where the civilised horse will starve. In other respects too he is unlike the civilised horse, for often he does not eat oats, and shows a decided aversion to a stable. Although small in size, he has great endurance and is capable of a fair rate of speed. He is cheap, too : £S or ^lo should buy a good broncho. But all these desirable qualities are to some extent offset by the fact that he rarely appreciates good treatment, and is some¬ what uneven in his temper. A broncho without some bad trick is as rare as trees on the prairies. Never¬ theless, owning one adds greatly to the enjoyment of life on the plains. There are few things that can equal the delight of a gallop in the early evening over the wide prairie, with scarcely a barrier nearer than the Rocky Mountains standing out in splendid line against the western sky. It is unfortunately true that of trees there is a sad lack in this part of Colorado. Hardly the apology for one can be found nearer than the bluffs, which form the edge of a high table-land that begins a little south of the Wyoming line. Here, growing on the sides of the canons, can be found cedars and pines. But even these are fast disappearing under the ruthless axe of the settler. Early this spring the “schoolmarm settlement” — as the little colony of teachers is locally called — made an expedition to the blufts, accompanying a friend who was going with his ox-team for a load of wood. A nine miles’ ride in an ox-cart has its draw¬ backs, and the sun had set before the party reached the camping-place in a beautiful little canon, with high rocky walls and a grassy floor. A blaze was quickly started, and soon all were ready to turn in, that is, roll up in blankets and lie down beside the fire. For a time the inevitable dog smelt about in a way unpleasantly suggestive of rattlesnakes, but finally he too settled down, and became a comfortable pillow for his mistress’s head. No one slept very soundly,

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To BE Given up. 32 perhaps, for it was a novel experience to lie there, with the shy for a roof and the distant howling of wolves for a lullaby. It was rather cold, too. But the glorious sunrise, seen from the highest point of the bluffs, well repaid all for any discomforts of the night. Picnics are not very frequent, but then there is much to in¬ terest in the every-day life of the “settlement.” From their doors the teacher homesteaders can often watch the antelope bounding through the valley, or a grey wolf or coyote sneaking over the hill. Now and then comes an exciting but tiring day spent in the saddle, when the cow or a pony has stampeded in the night, and is to be found fifteen miles away perhaps. The prairie flowers too, so new and beautiful, are a great delight. During the flowering of the cactus the prairie seemed thickly studded with Marshal Niel roses. Then there is always tennis. No turf can make a better ground than the thick mat of buffalo grass. Moreover, there is the exciting possibility, when hunting a wandering ball, of finding it resting on the coils of an indignant rattlesnake. This last, how¬ ever, is rapidly disappearing from the country, in spite of the kindly consideration of the Indians, who always spared it, saying that the rattlesnake was the only snake that gave warning. Thus life in the “settlement ” has a novelty about it that is in itself a rest. Then, too, out on the frontier the burdens of society are reduced to a minimum, and the petty cares that infest civilisation seem less real. In the meantime civilisation is coming nearer. Last winter a station was built a few miles away. Now a town has been platted out and given a name. It already possesses two lumber yards, several shops, a livery stable, an hotel, and a newspaper, but no dramshop, owing to the rigidly enforced prohibition law of the county. After a while the mushroom town will have a “boom.” Then, perhaps, the land round about will rise in value, and the teacher homesteaders may hope to make a little money. In any case they will have gained a new lease of life, a rich fund of experiences, and 160 acres of land on which to raise potatoes. TO BE GIVEN UP. By KATE EYRE, Author of “For the Good- of the Family,” “A Step in the Dark,” &c. &c. CHAPTER THE FIRST. A MIDNIGHT ALARM. "'HE church clocks had [ just struck one a.m. on a warm moonlight night early in June, when a young English¬ man might have been seen to emerge from the Champs - Elys^es, and saunter across the Place (’e la Concorde. Notwithstanding the lateness of the hour, Paris still presented an animated scene, and, as the Englishman neared the obelisk of Luxor, he paused to look around him. Then he turned off to the left, and was soon leisurely making his way along the Rue du Faubourg St. Honore. Although it was so long past midnight, he was in no hurry. He had come to Paris for a brief holiday, but that holiday was now nearly over ; on the following, or rather the same day he intended returning to England. This last evening he had been spending with some friends in the Avenue d’Orsay. Having walked for about half a mile along the Rue St. Honors, he stopped in front of a small but highly respectable-looking English hotel, and rang the bell. The door opened almost immediately, having ap¬ parently achieved this feat by its own unaided efforts, for no one was behind it. The phenomenon, however, admitted of a very simple explanation. The door was connected, by means of a cord, with an apartment on the ground-floor, in which the concierge slept, an arrangement which enabled that hard- worked func¬ tionary to open it at any hour in the night without getting out of bed. The young man groped his way to a hall-table, on which a lantern was burning very dimly. Selecting a candle labelled with a number corresponding to that by which his bedroom was distinguished, he lighted it, and began ascending the polished-oak staircase. He went up rather slowly, partly because he did not wish to disturb those who had already retired to rest, and more particularly, perhaps, because he was unconsciously influenced by that sense of awe which makes men tread softly in a house full of sleeping people. He had just reached the “'troisieme etage,” when the oppressive stillness was broken by a piercing cry, which echoed along the silent corridors — a cry of human agony. He was an Englishman, one whose nerves were, as a rule, well under control ; neverthe¬ less he nearly dropped the candle he was carrying, as he clutched hold of the balustrade. He waited for a minute or two, but the cry was not repeated, nor could he decide the direction from whence it had proceeded. Hardly kneuving what to do, he at length slowly ascended the next flight, and had just gained the

Page 42

To EE Given up. 33 landing when he heard hurrying footsteps coming towards him. In another moment, a very young girl stood before him. She was clothed in a long, flowing, pale grey dressing-gown, and her hair fell far below her waist in There, hanging half out of bed, and struggling convulsively, was an old man. His fingers were closely clenched, his eyes inverted, so that only the whites of them could be seen, while foam, streaked with blood, was flowing from his mouth. MABYN WAS A LITTLE SURPRISED TO FIND A LETTER . . . ADDRESSED TO HER IN RALPH’S HANDWRITING" (/. 38). dark, wavy masses. Her face and lips were per¬ fectly colourless, while her luminous eyes were wild with terror. Startled as the young man was by this unlooked-for apparition, he felt^ rather than noticed, that the girl before him gave promise of great beauty. “ I trust nothing serious has happened - ” “ Oh, come this way, quick — quick ! ” She turned and swiftly retraced her steps, while the young man followed her into an adjacent bedroom. The girl wrung her hands in an agony of dread. “ Is he dying Oh, what shall I do.^ What ca^i I do ” The young man lifted up the convulsed form, and laid it flat down on the bed. ‘‘ He is in an epileptic fit. You must send for a doctor at once.^' ‘‘ But who will fetch one The young man turned towards the door as it intending to go himself. 723

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34 To BE Given up. “ Ohj don’t leave me ! I dare not be lefc alone with him.” “ Ring the bell, then ; pull it violently. Someone viust come.’’ The bell pealed loudly through the large, silent house. “Can’t you do anything for him?” and the girl raised her pleading, terror-stricken eyes to the stranger’s face. The young man knelt down by the bedside, and drawing out his handkerchief, knotted it several times, and then placed the tourniquet, thus formed, in the sick man’s mouth. “ That may prevent him from biting his tongue and lips.” The girl stood with the bell-rope in her hand, watching the struggling figure in mute agony. “ Ring again. Surely somebody must hear. Ring louder ; ring the house down.” And now the sound of skurrying footsteps was heard, and the proprietress of the hotel entered, fol¬ lowed, almost immediately, by the concierge, who hurried off to fetch a doctor, as soon as he discovered what was the matter. In a few minutes the room was filled with people, who had been frightened out of their beds by the violent and continuous pealing of the bell. But the worst was now over. The convulsions gradually abated ; the fingers unbent ; the eyes closed ; and by degrees the old man fell into a state of quiet insensibility. “ All danger is over, I think,” observed the young man. The re-action was too much for the young girl: Kneeling down by the side of the bed, she buried her face in the clothes and sobbed aloud. By the time the doctor arrived, the old man had recovered consciousness, but was in too exhausted a condition to raise his voice above a whisper. Those who had thronged the room, had now gone back to their beds, leaving the proprietress and the young man the only strangers present. The doctor felt the old man’s pulse, and lifted up one of his eyelids. “ Yes, he has had a sharp attack. But he will do very well now. Let him sleep on. I dare say he will wake up to-morrow morning not feeling much the worse for what he has gone through.” The girl’s eyes shone with joy. “ Oh, thank God, thank God ! ” she murmured. “ How did it come on ? Was he alone ? ” “ Yes ; I was in the next room asleep, and I heard a cry, such a terribly piercing cry it was. And then I rushed in to him.” “ Ah, I see, after his first sleep : the usual time. Well, you can’t do better than keep him quiet now. I wouldn’t advise much exertion to-morrow. Just see that he takes things quietly, and I don’t think you will have much cause for further anxiety. Epileptic fits are very alarming, but there is seldom much danger attending them unless they be of frequent recurrence. Good ni-^ht to you,” and having bowed to the proprietress, the doctor was about to quit the room, when the girl detained him. “ But I am not to leave him alone to-night ? Surely it would not be safe to do so.” “ There is not the slightest fear of another attack.” The girl looked unconvinced. “ Stay with him, if you like. It can do no harm.” “ Yes ; I shall stay.” “ Make yourself comfortable in an easy-chair, then, and try to get some sleep. You will be the invalid in the morning if you keep awake all night.” “ I will bring in a pillow and some wraps, and see that mademoiselle is comfortably settled,” put in the proprietress. “ Very well, then. I shall call to see how you both are in the morning,” and the doctor followed the proprietress out of the room, leaving the young man and the girl standing at opposite sides of the bed with the sleeping man between them. “ It will be dreary work for you sitting up all night. Won’t you be nervous?” “ Oh, no. I was dreadfully frightened just now ; it all came upon me so suddenly. But usually I am not nervous.” Then the young man felt that it was time for him to withdraw. “Is there anything more I can do for you ?” “ Thank you, no ; you have been very kind.” “ Good night, then.” “ Good night, and thank you — thank you so much.” “ I am afraid 1 was of but little service to you.” “ Oh, but indeed you were. I was so terribly frightened ; I had never seen anyone in a fit before,, and I had no idea what it was like. I don’t know what I should have done had I not heard you coming up the stairs.” “ It was a most distressing sight.” “ Dreadful — dreadful.” “ I hope you won’t feel any ill effects from the shock.” “ I don’t think I shall, thank you. I am very strong.” There was nothing for it but to go now. He would have liked to have said some word that should cheer and sustain her through her long vigil, but no such word came to his lips. She looked such a mere child, as she stood, with her dark, wavy hair falling about her shoulders, and her magnificent eyes raised so unhesitatingly to his. He thought he had never seen such speaking eyes before. He heard the proprietress returning along the cor¬ ridor. “ Once more, good night.” He glanced at her hand, half conscious of a wish that she would extend it ; but she only murmured, “ Good night,” in a voice that promised to be rich and full in the years to come. He paused outside the door to ask the proprietress a few questions. The old gentleman and the young lady had arrived the day before, he was told, but they had a private sitting-room, and did not appear at table d’hote. Nothing had been said as to the probable* duration of

Page 44

To BE Given up. their stay ; nor did the proprietress know in what relation they stood to each other, although she imagined them to be grandfather and granddaugh¬ ter. Their name, she believed, was Woodthorpe, but here again, she was not prepared to vouch for the accuracy of her information. ' With this the young man had to rest satisfied. Wishing the proprietress good night, he ascended the next flight of stairs, and gained his own room. He began preparing for the night in leisurely fashion, thinking much of the painful scene he had witnessed, and of the girl whose striking beauty had moved him so strangely. Although a very youno- man, he was not, generally speaking, susceptible to feminine charms. Now, he could hardly repress a smile as he found himself wondering how old the fair unknown might be, and under what circumstances she and her grandfather came to be in Paris together. That the girl herself must have spent some years in France, the fluency and purity with which she spoke the language, left but little room for doubt. His speculations were, however, cut short by a somewhat startling discovery ; he had lost his pocket- book. There was not very much in it : some memor¬ anda and letters of but little importance; a few visit¬ ing-cards ; the half of his return ticket to England • and a ten-pound note. The loss of the note was a serious matter, for without it he had not money enough to pay even his hotel-bill. That he had not lost his pocket-book out of doors he was certain, for he remembered having taken it out of his pocket when feeling for matches with which to light his candle on entering the hotel. He must then have dropped it either on the staircase, or else m the stranger’s bedroom. Weil, if he had dropped It on the staircase, it would be there now; unless, indeed, one of those who had hurried from their rooms to discover the cause of the unusual commotion, had chanced to pick it up. Candle m hand, he descended the staircase, going as far as the hall-table. Then, in returning, he walked along the corridor leading to the stranger’s room. Outside the door he paused to listen for a moment. He could distinctly hear the old man’s breathino- but no other sound reached him. It was, he thought very certain that he must have dragged out his pocket- book when possessing himself of his handkerchief in order to make a tourniquet to place in the sick man’s mouth. Well, he could not inquire about it now ■ it was simply out of the question to think of disturbing the girl at that hour. He would wait until the morn¬ ing, when he would tell the proprietress of his loss and she would make inquiries that would doubtless result in the recovery of the pocket-book. _ So thinking, he went back to his room, and lost no time in getting into bed. When he awoke in the morning, it was past ten o clock. For a moment, as the incidents of the previous night came crowding into his mind, he felt vexed with himself for having slept until such a late hour But there, it was a matter of no importance, he argued ; probably the fair unknown had found his 35 pocket-book, and had already taken steps to restore it to its rightful owner. As soon as his toilet was completed, he made for the coffee-room, intending to send word that he wished to speak to the proprietress. He had, however, the good fortune to encounter her on one of the landings. 'How is Mr. Woodthorpe this morning?’' he asked, after the customary salutations had been ex- changed. ^ I believe it is just as the doctor predicted, mon¬ sieur IS not much the worse for the attack. But both monsieur and mademoiselle have left here this hour and more.” “Left?” “ Yes. I took mademoiselle in a cup of coffee as soon as I was up, and with it a letter which had just come for her. The letter upset her very much, and she told me her mother had been taken ill suddenly Then she awoke monsieur, and explained matters to nm, and in less than half an hour they were both ready to start.” “ Did— did she— the young lady, 1 mean— say any¬ thing to you about a pocket-book 1 dropped in Mr. Woodthorpe’s room last night ? ” “A pocket-book, monsieur? But no. Has mon¬ sieur lost one ? ” The young man went on to explain that he certainly had lost one, and that he must have dropped it either' on the staircase, or else in Mr. Woodthorpe’s bed- room. The hotel servants were questioned, and Mr. Wood¬ thorpe’s room searched, hut no pocket-book was forthcoming. Monsieur must have dropped it out of doors, the proprietress maintained, and the youn<rman did not contradict the statement with as much ener^-v as his own conviction in the matter would have iusti- fied. ^ The reason of his reticence was that a horrible thought haunted him in connection with the affair What if the girl, in whom he had taken so deep an interest, had been playing a part all the time, and had allured him into her accomplice's room in order to rob him ? But whenever he was disposed to enter¬ tain this idea, he seemed to see the girl’s glorious eyes fixed on him ablaze with righteous indignation, until at last he felt that any explanation would be easier of credence than this. Still in whatever direction the solution to the mystery might lie, there was no doubt either as to the pocket-book having disappeared, or as to the incon¬ venience occasioned by its loss. So the young man was obliged to write to England for money, and then await Its arrival with all the patience he could com¬ mand. At length the remittance came, enabling him to cross over to England. For some time after his return, he continued to hope for tidings of his loss ; for he was almost certain that the pocket-book had contained his address in England ; but as day after day went by, and still he heard nothing, he did at length admit to himself that the whole affair would probably ever remain a m} £tcry,

Page 45

To BE Given up. 36 and that his wiser course would be to dismiss it from his mind. Thus three months passed away. Then the young man received a letter in a lady-like hand, signed Blanche Woodthorpe, in which it was btated that the writer had in her possession a pocket- book belonging to her correspondent, which she be¬ lieved he had lost while staying in an hotel in Paris ; and that she would have much pleasure in handing it over to him if he would kindly inform her of his present whereabouts. In reply, the young man stated that he should be in the i.eighbourhood of the address given in the letter at about two o'clock the following day, when, if agree¬ able to the lady, he would call on her. He certainly was in the neighbourhood on the day and at the hour named, because he had previously entered into a contract both with a railway company and a cab proprietor to convey him thither ; but it is doubtful if that was the exact meaning he intended his correspondent to attach to the phrase when he introduced it into his note. “ Is Miss Woodthorpe at home ?” The young man was standing at the door of a well- appointed house in a fashionable quarter of the town. “ Yes, sir.” Then the footman led the way to a library at the further end of a richly carpeted hall, across which he walked with as unconcerned an air as if no fair young creature, half woman, half child, had ever pressed down the velvet pile. Not so the young man. He associated every object on which his gaze fell with her presence ; for must they not all be familiar to her? Blanche Wood- thorpe— what a pretty name it was, and how well it suited her ! Then he threw himself into a chair in the library, keeping his eyes fixed on the door by which he felt she would enter. How would she be dressed ? Not in a long, pale grey flowing dressing-gown, with wavy, dark hair falling about her shoulders, and reaching far below her waist. Then he remembered that her letter had been written on mourning paper. In all probability she would wear a black dress ; and her hair ?— surely she would braid that, and coil it round her shapely head. But her eyes— Blanche’s eyes, and he murmured her name softly to himself— they at least would remain un¬ changed. The handle of the door turned, and he stood up. Yes, it was the door by which he had felt she would enter. He was conscious of a strange flutter¬ ing of the heart, and catching of the breath, symptoms with which he had never hitherto been troubled. Were they occasioned by the magnetic influence of her near presence, he wondered. Another moment, and a figure was advancing to¬ wards him with a smile of welcome on her lips ; a figure clothed in a black dress, with braided hair coiled round her head. But the dress clothed a woman of stately presence ; and the coiled hair was iron-grey. ‘‘ I_1 called to see Miss Woodthorpe.” The lady bowed. “ I am Miss Woodthorpe,” and she smiled in blissful unconsciousness of the gentle¬ man’s disappointment. She motioned him to a seat ; and he obeyed her gesture in silence : he seemed to have lost the power of ready speech. She explained to him how the pocket-book had fallen into Mr. Woodthorpe’s portmanteau; and how her niece, having assisted Mr. Woodthorpe to pack, had failed to discover that the pocket-book did not belong to her grandfather. The lady then spoke of Mr. Woodthorpe’s long illness and death, and the circumstances attending the ultimate discovery of the pocket-book. But only one word in this long explanation con¬ veyed any intelligible meaning to the young man’s mind : that one word was “ niece.” “ Did I understand you to say it was your niece who found it ? ” he asked. “ No ; my niece overlooked it when she packed her grandfather’s portmanteau for him. It was I who ultimately discovered it amongst my dear father s effects.” “The young lady who overlooked it was your niece, then ? ” “Yes; she was so harassed at the time by the news of her mother’s sudden illness, and the dread lest the hurried journey she and her grandfather were about to take might result in a repetition of the dis¬ tressing symptoms from which you saw Mr. Wbod- thorpe suffering, that really I can hardly wonder she overlooked it.” “ Is — is she quite well ? ” “Quite well, I thank you. She desired me to convey to you her thanks for your kindly aid ; and her regret that you should have been put to any in¬ convenience through her carelessness. “ Then she is not here at all ; not in this house, I mean ? ” “ My niece is now travelling on the Continent,” replied the lady in her stateliest manner. “ Permit me to hand you back your property.” The young man took the pocket-book with a mur¬ mured “Thank you.” It began to dawn on him that he was making himself ridiculous. “ May I beg of you to examine its contents.” With a great effort he pulled himself together suf¬ ficiently to make a pretence of doing as the lady had suggested. “ Thank you, it is quite all right. I am very much obliged to you for having taken the trouble to restore it to me.” “ I can only regret that I was not able to do so sooner.” The lady had risen when she handed the gentleman his pocket-book, and he had, of course, followed her example ; so that now he felt there was only one thing left for him to do : viz., to get himself out of the room with as much dignity as possible. “ The delay did not cause me the slightest incon¬ venience, Miss Woodthorpe,” he replied, with a far greater regard to politeness than veracity.

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37 “ HE HELD HER HANDS IN A FIRMER GRASP ” [p. 44). “You are very good to say so.” Then they bowed and wished each other good morning, and the gentleman did succeed in getting himself out of the room. “ What a stupid ass I made of myself, to be sure ! Another word, and she would have had me shown out,” was the gentleman’s first thought on gaining the street. That the adverse criticism was not wholly undeserved, few will deny ; but then the gentleman was very young, and the absent lady was very beauti¬ ful. Most people will, therefore, be more ready to forgive him for having blundered than for allowing regret for his awkwardness to take precedence of all expressions of disappointment at not having been gladdened by a sight of her whose charms had caused him to blunder. But although he was tardy in giving expression to his disappointment, it was none the less real and abiding. So the pocket-book was carefully preserved as a memento of her, whom he feared he should never meet again. And for some years he never did meet her CHAPTER THE SECOND. CLARE EASTABROOK. At the time our story opens Dursington had already established its claim to be considered an important place. It was situated about twenty miles from London, was a municipal borough and market-town, and could boast of a population of over ihiriy thousand.

Page 47

To BE Given up. 38 Although Dr. Littledale had been settled in Durs- ington for over a quarter of a century, and his practice had during that time steadily increased, he was still a comparatively poor man. That such was the case was, however, in some measure his own fault, for he was careless about money, and strangely indifferent to all that it can bring in its train. His own very qualified success did not, however, prevent h!m from wishing his eldest son to follow in his footsteps. With this end in view, Ralph Littledale became a medical student at one of the London hospitals. This arrangement obliged the young man to live in London during the week ; but he made a practice of coming to Dursington on the Saturday, and staying until the following Monday morning. As he came home so frequently, it was, of course, a rare event for him to write to any member of the family. His eldest sister, Mabyn, was therefore a little sur¬ prised one morning to find a letter on the breakfast- table addressed to her in Ralph’s handwriting. ‘‘ I do hope there’s nothing the matter,” observed Mrs. Littledale. Mabyn read her letter aloud. After three pages had been devoted to hospital gossip, the writer went on to say : “ I shall be home as usual on Saturday, and Philip Dacre will come with me. They’ve got scarlet-fever at Southfields, so I’ve asked him to stay over the Sunday with us.” Now, Philip Dacre was the son of Crawford Dacre, the manager of the Dursington Bank, a man whom Dr. Littledale was accustomed to pass in the Durs¬ ington streets with only a brief “ Good day.” The young men, however, met frequently in London, and were on very friendly terms. “ So they’ve got scarlet-fever at Southfields, have they ? I noticed Clifford going in there yesterday,” observed Dr. Littledale. “ I do hope Philip Dacre is not leading Ralph into extravagant habits,” sighed Mrs. Littledale. ‘‘They seem to be getting such very close friends.” “ Ralph must learn to make a stand for himself. He can’t always be wrapped up in cotton-wool,” replied the doctor. Truth to tell, Ralph had had but scanty experience of such wrapping up at his father’s hands. Then Dr. Littledale returned to his paper. “ I am sure Ralph has never given us any trouble,” remarked Mrs. Littledale apologetically. “ Now, you can’t say that he has, James.” But Dr. Littledale was too deeply interested in the parliamentary news to reply to his wife’s remark. All this time Mabyn had proceeded with her break¬ fast in silence. “ Dear, dear, I do hope Ralph won’t get extrava¬ gant ! ” reiterated the mother. “ Why are you so anxious about him, mamma ? ” asked Mabyn. “ I am afraid Philip Dacre is not a good companion for him. So much depends on a young man’s com¬ panions.” We shall have a better opportunity of judging now that we are likely to know Mr. Dacre.” “ Oh, my dear, anyone can see he is an extravagant young man. There is no need to know him to see that.” Mabyn buttered a piece of toast with much de¬ liberation. before replying. “ I don’t think a young man is necessarily extrava¬ gant because his clothes fit him, mamma,” she said at length. “But just see how the family live, flinging their money away right and left.” “ But perhaps they are liberally supplied with money. I have heard that Mrs. Dacre has private means.” Mrs. Littledale shook her head. “No good ever comes of waste, my dear.” Further remarks were cut short by Dr. Littledale rustling his paper very loudly — a signal for silence, as the rest of the family well knew. Then the remainder of the meal was eaten without another word being spoken. “ If you are coming with me, Mabyn, you had better be quick about getting your bonnet on. I ought to have started by now,” said the doctor. “Mamma, I shall come home on Friday,” said Mabyn, as she reappeared in the hall, equipped for a drive. Dr. Littledale was already standing by the gig, waiting to help his daughter in. “ But I thought, my dear, that you had arranged to stay till Saturday ? ” “ I don’t think I can spare the time,” replied Mabyn, having regard to the killing of a jfatted calf in honour of Ralph’s friend. “Well, dear, I shall be delighted to have you home again. But it does seem such a pity to cut your visit so short.” “ That will be all right, mamma.” And then Mabyn kissed her mother and a whole tribe of younger brothers and sisters, who had mustered in the hall to see her off. “ Do make haste, Mabyn,” said her father im¬ patiently. “ How you do dawdle, to be sure ! ” “ I am sorry to have kept you waiting, papa.” After a drive of ten miles, the gig drew up in front of a tastefully built house, surrounded by a well-kept garden. “ Here you are at last ! ” exclaimed a lady, as she came hastily forward, followed by a gentleman much older than herself. Then the gentleman advanced, and began helping Mabyn to alight ; while Dr. Littledale remained in the gig, and the lady went round to the other side to speak to him. “ How do you do. Uncle James ? ” “ Oh, I’m pretty well, 1 suppose, my dear. But there’s no need to ask you how you are, for I never saw you looking better in your life. I should soon have to put up my shutters if all the ladies were like you.” “ It’s just as well to tell me that, for if you were to prescribe for me, you know very well that I should

Page 48

To BE Given up. 39 never take your advice.” Then the lady let her hand rest caressingly on Dr. Littledale’s, and looked ujj smilingly into his face. Ah, my dear ! wait till you get a husband, and then you will have to learn to obey.” “ I mean to wait, Uncle James. I am in no hurry.” ^‘Waiting to fetch your price, eh.? If rumour is to be depended on, there have been plenty of bidders already.” The lady laughed. “ Men are just like sheep : where one leads, the rest will follow.” “The taste of the leader is, I think, to be ap¬ plauded,” said Dr. Littledale gallantly. “Now, that is very nice of you, Uncle James. But are you not going to get down ? ” “ No, my dear ; I can’t spare the time now.” “ Oh, come in for a minute,” said the little elderly gentleman, who had helped Mabyn to alight. “No, I can’t come in this morning, Nat; I’ve so many people to see to-day.” “ Well, how about Saturday .?” “ Mabyn says she wants me to fetch her on Friday.” “ Uncle James, you are to do nothing of the kind,” broke in the lady. “Yes, Clare, I must go on Friday, please. I will tell you why presently.” Then after the gentlemen had said a few words to each other, Dr. Littledale waved his hand to his daughter and half-niece, and drove off. Mr. Eastabrook, the little grey-haired gentleman, carried Mabyn’s portmanteau up the garden, leaving the two girls to follow. Miss Eastabrook ran back to the gate, to watch the gig out of sight. Again Dr. Littledale looked back, and this time he kissed his hand. “ How fond papa is of you, Clare ! ” remarked Mabyn, a little sadly. “ That is because I am not afraid of him,” answered Miss Eastabrook promptly. “ And because you are so handsome, and he is so proud of you.” “ I doubt if that has much to do with it.” Nevertheless, Miss Eastabrook was very handsome. A tall, graceful woman, with magnificent eyes and glorious hair. “ And now, Clare, for the news you said you were saving up for me.” “ Can’t you guess what it is ? Something is about to happen that will make me very happy : something I have longed for, for years.” “ Oh, Clare, is it — is it - ” “ Is it what, you little goose.?” is it about Mr. Charrington .?” “ Mr. Charrington ! And pray, do you think I have longed for Mr. Charrington for years ?” “ 1 think he has thus longed for you.” “That is a very different matter. No, it is not about Mr. Charrington, or Mr. Anybody-else. It is about The Fountains.” “Surely Sir Hubert Grierson is not going to leave.?” “Yes, he is. And he has let the house to papa.” Now, The Fountains was situated a short distance out of Dursington. Six years before, two terrible bereavements had befallen Clare Eastabrook ii„ quick succession ; she had lost both her mother and her grandfather. For some months after this double loss, Clare and her father had travelled about on the Con¬ tinent together, and then had come the question as to where they should fix their permanent abode. Clare had been warmly in favour of Dursington, for she wished to be near her half-uncle. Dr. Littledale, and his family. There had been a difficulty about finding suitable accommodation, however, which had ended in Mr. and Miss Eastabrook taking up their quarters in Foreborough. “ And when will you remove .? ” “ The house will be ready for us in September.” “ I suppose you will go there as soon as ever you have returned from the Continent.? Oh, Clare, I am pleased ! ” Then they fell to discussing their future plans, until at length Mabyn exclaimed — “ I too have some news ; but yours is so far more important that it has almost made me forget mine.” “ Oh, Mabyn, is it— is it— is it about Mr.— Mr.— ” laughed Miss Eastabrook, trying to mimic her half¬ cousin. “ Now, you know very well, Clare, that I haven't a Mr. Charrington, or a Mr. Anybody-else, so that my' news cannot possibly be of that nature.” “ Pray accept my warmest congratulations. Mr. Anybody-elses are, I assure you, great bothers. So then, in trying to guess your news I must remember that it is in no way connected with a Mr. Anybody- at-all .? ” “ I didn’t say that, Clare.” “Then it has to do with a Mr. Somebody-or-other .? Really, Mabyn, you are getting very mysterious.” “ I only meant that the news concerning the gentle¬ man is not of a sentimental nature.” “And who may the gentleman be.? ” “ Philip Dacre. They have scarlet-fever at South- fields, so Ralph is going to bring Mr. Dacre home with him on Saturday to stay over Sunday.” “ Is that why you are going to run away from me on Friday .? ” “Yes. Ralph will be vexed if I do not see that everything is in apple-pie order for his friend.” “ Perhaps, Mabyn, your news may after all turn out to be about a Mr.— Mr.— ” laughed Miss Eastabrook. “ Clare, don’t be so utterly ridiculous. It is much more likely that you will be singled out as a special object of attraction, since you are coming to The Fountains.” “ I don’t see that.” “As if anyone would look at me when you were present ! ” “ That’s nonsense. We present so striking a con¬ trast that the man who admired the one would disap¬ prove entirely of the other. We shall never be rivals.” “ 1 hope not.” “ Hope not ! Why, of course not. I would never allure any woman’s lover away from her, if I had the misfortune to love him ever so fondly, least of all

Page 49

40 To BE Given up. yours, Mabyn. I should hate myself if I could be guilty of such meanness.” “ What nonsense we are both talking ! ” laughed Mabyn. “There is papa beckoning to us from the window. Let us go in, dear,” replied Miss Eastabrook. CHAPTER THE THIRD. PHILIP DACRE. On the day Philip Dacre was expected, Mabyn put on a spotless muslin dress, tastefully ornamented with bows of bright-coloured ribbon. Ralph, she felt, would like to see her looking nice. And very nice, in truth, did she look : a sister of whom a brother might well be proud. “There they are!” exclaimed both Mabyn and Mrs. Littledale in the same breath. Then the two ladies went out into the hall, as they were wont to do when Ralph came home. Mrs. Littledale embraced her son with her wonted warmth. But when Ralph turned to greet Mabyn, she, being keenly alive to the presence of a stranger, merely extended her hand in welcome. Then Ralph introduced Philip Dacre. Afterwards, when Mabyn tried to recall every incident of that memorable evening, she could never succeed in realising that Philip Dacre had appeared to her in the guise of an ordinary human being. That, in those first moments, his eyes could only have seemed blue, and nothing more ; his features regular, his voice manly, and his step firm, common sense emphatically asserted. It was, however, only common sense that did make any such assertion ; memory firmly declined to corroborate the statement. When the dinner-bell sounded, and Ralph brought his friend into the dining-room, Mabyn was still put¬ ting the finishing touches to the flowers on the table. Philip Dacre was in evening dress, and Mabyn, as she glanced at his faultless attire, did admit to her¬ self that he did not bear the stamp of a man to whom small economies w'ould come easily. “Any¬ one has only to look at him to see that he is extravagant,” Mrs. Littledale had declared ; and Mabyn had replied that a man need not necessarily be extravagant because his clothes fit him. Never¬ theless, now that she was seated opposite to Philip Dacre, Mabyn could not but feel that there was some¬ thing about the man which did suggest the free use of cash : a something for which his tailor was in no w'ay responsible : a wmrd let slip here and there of club life ; a passing allusion to bachelors’ dinners ; a far- reaching acquaintanceship with fashionable amuse¬ ments and entertainments ; and, above all, a perfect ease of manner, and a wide knowledge of the w'orld and its ways. Let it not be thought for a moment that he boasted. Philip Dacre, whatever his faults may have been, was emphatically a gentleman. If he had dined in a labourer’s cottage, he would have managed to put the labourer and his wife at ease, and would have given no intentional hint that he was accustomed to better things. None the less quickly, however, would the labourer have discovered that his guest was one to whose share fell the good things of this world. There was something so fascinating about the man. Even Dr. Littledale thawed in the warmth and pleasantness of Philip’s smile ; and before the dinner was over he had surprised his family and astonished himself by becoming quite genial. And while the doctor became affable, and Ralph could with difficulty keep his pride in his new friend within decorous limits, Mrs. Littledale’s uneasiness grew apace. To her mind, fascination of manner necessarily implied laxity of principle. As for Mabyn, she had hardly spoken at all ; never unless in reply to a direct question. Once or twice Ralph looked across at her, wishing she would brighten up, and wondering what made her so glum. But Philip, as he stole a glance at her now and again, marvelled how it was that he had never dis¬ covered, on the rare occasions when he had met her in the Dursington streets and lanes, how bright and pretty her auburn hair was, and how soft was the bloom on her cheeks. “ What do you think of him. May ? Isn’t he an awfully jolly fellow ? ” It was the morning after Philip Dacre’s arrival, and the brother and sister were standing together in the garden. Had it not been that Ralph’s eager eyes were fixed on her, Mabyn would have sought refuge in silence, for in truth she knew not how to reply. No, she cer¬ tainly could not have put into words what she thought of Philip Dacre, for she had been content merely to feel his presence. “ He seems very nice,” she said at length. “‘Oh, he’s no end of a good fellow. But how quiet you were last night at dinner I ” “ Was I ?” “ Yes ; I was h^f afraid you didn't like him.” “ Perhaps I was a little tired after the Herculean labour of preparing for his reception.” “ I’m awfully obliged to you for having made things so comfortable. I shouldn’t have liked Dacre to have seen the place at sixes and sevens.” “ I don’t think the house is ever untidy, Ralph.” “ I don’t mean that exactly. But Dacre goes to such tip-top houses.” Mabyn looked a trifle grave. How homely must Grange House and its appointments, herself included, appear to one accustomed to such fashionable society ! “I do hope he is not making you extravagant, Ralph.” “ Well, I like that ! How’s a fellow to be extrava¬ gant on what the governor allows me, I should like to know ? ” “ I mean that I hope he is not giving you a taste for extravagant pleasures.” “You needn’t make yourself unhappy about that. Dacre looks after me like a grandmother.” At that moment the gentleman, who was declared to have taken this grandmaternal responsibility upon

Page 50

To BE Given up. himself, came strolling across the lawn, and a few minutes afterwards the trio went in to breakfast. Again Mabyn was the most silent of the party. But if her lips did not move, her eyes sparkled and her cheeks glowed : a mode of expression which men sometimes find very satisfactory in a woman. When first Mrs. Littledale had wished Philip good morning, she had observed that he looked well and seemed cheerful ; and she had been much comforted by this circumstance. Fast men, she reflected, were never fit to be seen early in the day. But as the break¬ fast proceeded, her former uneasiness returned in full force. There must, she felt, be something very wrong with a young man who could bring himself to talk to Dr. Littledale with such perfect sajig-froid. The very ease with which Philip carved a game pie, never pausing in what he was saying, as he in¬ serted the knife into its juicy depths, was sugges¬ tive of fast living and outstanding accounts. If she could only snatch her poor boy away from this bane¬ ful influence 1— snatch him away in such a manner that he should be unconscious of the operation. Thinking in this wise, she came to the conclusion that something must be done ; and after a time, she de¬ cided that this something should take the form of an appeal to Philip Dacre himself. Surely he would let his prey escape if he could be made to understand how grievous was the injury he was inflicting on him. He was such a very big spider and Ralph was such a very small fly, that he would surely abstain from rendering his parlour alluring if the matter were only put before him in a proper light. So reasoned Mrs. Littledale, and in thinking of her son as a small fly, she meant no disparagement to him ; rather did she view him thus because it helped to increase her faith in the efficacy of that appeal which she had now de¬ cided must be made. But who should undertake the task? And then Mrs. Littledale’s thoughts flew to Mabyn. Was she not the most suitable person to make the attempt? But would Mabyn see the necessity for prompt action with that clearness of vision which had commended it to Mrs. Littledale’s judgment ? Anyhow, it would do no harm to sound her on the subject. Mabyn was getting ready for church when Mrs. Littledale tapped at her door. “ May I come in, dear ? I wanted to know whether you thought the custard should be baked or boiled ? ” asked Mrs. Littledale, discreetly opening the conver¬ sation on the comparatively undebatable subject of domestic management. Mabyn gave her opinion in favour of boiled custard, while she still continued the careful adjustment of her bonnet-strings. Mrs. Littledale sank into a chair by the open window. ‘‘ What a pretty view one gets of the gar¬ den from here, to be sure!” she remarked. Philip and Ralph were pacing the lawn together, and could be seen from where Mrs. Littledale was sitting. “ Yes,” replied Mabyn rather absently. Then she proceeded with her toilet in silence. “ How taken up Ralph seems to be with Philip Dacre 1” said Mrs. Littledale at length. 4^ Yes ; they appear to get on very well together.” “And yet Philip Dacre is a great deal older than Ralph.” “ Six years.” “Not more than that? Well, Ralph, poor fellow, looks little more than a boy, and Mr. Dacre is such a thorough man of the world.” Mabyn went over to the other side of the room to fetch her gloves without replying to her mother’s remark. “ It seems so unnatural to me for them to be so- friendly together,” continued the elder lady. “ Does it, mamma ?” . “Well now, my dear, doesn’t it seem strange to you ? ” “ 1 don’t know that I have thought of it.” “ Whatever companion can Ralph be to a man like Philip Dacre?” “Why do you speak of ‘a man like Philip Dacre,^ mamma ? In what particular does he differ from other men ? ” “ Oh, my dear, you must see the difference for your¬ self.” “ He is gentlemanly and well-informed, and appears to have mixed with cultured people, certainly.” “ But I don’t mean that at all, Mabyn. He is so- so— I hardly know how to express it, but I am sure he is extravagant and worldly ; not a desirable com¬ panion for Ralph in any way.” “ Mamma, what has he done amiss that we should condemn him ? ” “ I don’t wish to condemn him, only I should feel easier if he and Ralph were not so much together.” There was a slight pause. Mabyn buttoned her gloves in silence, while Mrs. Littledale looked at her appealingly. “ Good-bye, mamma.” “ Oh, are you going ?” “ Yes ; I shall be late for church if 1 don’t start at once.” “ Wait a minute, Mabyn. I want to speak to you.” “ Well, mamma ? ” “Couldn’t you say something to Mr. Dacre— just give him a slight hint, you know — that Ralph ought to be studying hard, and that all interruptions are likely to stand in the way of his advancement ? ” “ Mr. Dacre must know that Ralph is reading up* for the final.” “Yes ; but couldn’t you just give a hint that Ralph has only a small allowance, and that he ought to be very careful not to exceed it ? ” “ I don’t quite see how I could interfere between Ralph and his friend ; and as for giving hints, if any¬ thing unpleasant has to be said, I would rather put it quite plainly.” “ There need be nothing unpleasant about it, my dear. You know very well, Mabyn, how angry your father would be if Ralph got into debt, or anything dreadful of that sort were to happen.” “ I am sorry to disappoint you, mamma, but I don’t think I can do anything.”

Page 51

42 To DE Given up. “ Well, think it over, my dear ; promise me that you will think it over.’^ “Yes, I will promise to think it over, if you like, mamma,” replied Mabyn reluctantly. “And now I really must go, or the service will have commenced.” Then Mabyn kissed her mother, and this time she did succeed in effecting her escape. Although the girl had so boldly taken Philip’s part she was much nearer to her mother’s way of thinking than her words and manner implied. She did wonder why such a man as Philip Dacre should have singled out Ralph for a companion ; and in trying to account for their friendship, she laid rather too much stress on the circumstance of their having been thrown together, and not nearly enough on the possibility of a man who had seen much of the world, finding serene en¬ joyment in the companionship of one who was only on the threshold of life. For much that Mrs. Little- dale had said of Philip Dacre was true. He was a man accustomed to mix in good society : one who had learned to regard as comparatively worthless coins those shillings and sixpences of which it was so necessary that Ralph should be especially solicitous. But when Mrs. Littledale had pronounced Philip worldly, Mabyn had then boldy taken his part, feel¬ ing that that which was being said of him was too damaging to be allowed to pass unchallenged, except it were spoken under the impulse of absolute proof. Later on in the day Mabyn did find herself alone with Philip Dacre. She and her two little sisters had been to the Sunday school, and then, as they were leturning home, they recognised Ralph and Philip Dacre coming towards them. At first the whole party kept together. Then the little ones began gathering wild roses ; and Ralph’s long arms being in constant requisition to reach the high branches, Philip and Mabyn were soon walking on together, in front of the others. “ It is awfully good of you all to take me in as you are doing, Miss Littledale,” observed Philip. “ We are all sorry that the necessity should have arisen,” replied Mabyn, thinking only of the little boy lying ill at Southfields. “ I cannot say that I altogether regret it, seeing that had it not been for Harry’s illness I might never have been introduced to you — all.” The last word was added almost as if it were an after-thought. “ I only meant that we were sorry he should suffer. Of course we are pleased that it has given us an opportunity of knowing you,” said Mabyn politely. “ Poor little chap ! Dr. Clifford, however, assures us he is getting on well. But does it not seem strange to you that, after having lived in the same town all our lives, you and I should owe our introduction to each other to a mere accident.?” He spoke of him¬ self and Mabyn exclusively now, making no longer any pretence of feeling an equal interest in the other members of the family. “Yes,” said Mabyn simply. Philip’s remark had naturally reminded her of what a short time she had known him : barely twenty-four hours. Yet, short as it was, she was aware that it had been long enough to work some subtle change in herself. That the change had actually taken place was an undeniable fact, although she would have been puzzled to have described its character. The most definable thing about it seemed almost to partake of a deeper sense of completeness in her life. But she was recalled from dreamland by Philip’s voice. “You will come to Southfields as soon as it is safe for you to do so? My sisters will be so pleased to know you. But they will call and ask you them¬ selves.” “ We shall be pleased to see them.” “ I can’t help regretting all the years we might have known each other. But we must make up for lost time : that is, if you will allow us to do so.” “ I shall be pleased to know you all ; 1 go out so little.” “Are you dull, then ? ” asked Philip eagerly, wish¬ ing she would look up. He had caught only one glimpse of her eyes since he had been walking beside her, but that glimpse had more than come up to his expectations. “No, not dull ; only unused to society.” “ I like to hear you say that. I can’t bear society women. They are so artificial ; they weigh their words with such nicety, never giving expression to a thought or feeling unless they think it will tell to their advantage. They are like florists, who wire their flowers so that every blossom may occupy a prominent position, instead of tying them together in rich pro¬ fusion, as do those who gather them for love. One may talk to such women for years and never get any nearer to knowing them. It is so refreshing to be with one who will now and again let one get a glimpse of her real self. Those are the women who make men wish to grow better.” Poor Mabyn ! All such weighing would to her have been an utter impossibility. As she thought, so did she speak, or else she spoke not at all. And yet such weighing is a woman’s natural armour. CHAPTER THE FOURTH. AN INTERRUPTED INTERVIEW. By the time Philip and Mabyn reached Grange House, much had passed between them having reference to Ralph and his prospects. Philip had discovered that his companion liked to discuss the subject, or rather to listen while he discussed it, and he was just in the humour to find pleasure in gratifying her. But although Mabyn had spoken with greater freedom about Ralph than she had ventured to do on any other subject, there was nothing in what she said to indicate to Philip that he was having a word of caution addressed to him. On the contrary, at the end of their interview he laboured under the pleasing delusion that Miss Littledale’s anxiety respecting her brother was considerably allayed by the re-assuring know'ledge that he had in Philip a friend who was so much older, and presumably, therefore, so much

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To BE Given up. 43 wiser, than himself. In fact, so pleasant had Philip found the conversation that when the next morning Dr. Littledale pressed him to come down again with Ralph the following Saturday, he gladly accepted the invitation. “ It would be foolhardy for you to go to Southfields yet awhile. If you keep away at all — as in my opinion you are very wise to do — you should do the thing thoroughly. It is no use going back there just when the infection is at its worst,” said Dr. Littledale, with all the conscious dignity which attaches to professional knowledge. “ You can always come here as long as it is any convenience to you to do so. You needn’t fear that you will be putting us out of our way. We never make any difference for anybody,” added the doctor, with a burst of hospitable warmth that greatly as¬ tonished the rest of the family. Thus it came to pass that Philip Dacre became a very frequent visitor to Grange House. PI is presence, however, still continued to cause Mrs. Littledale great uneasiness ; but it was an uneasiness that she could induce no other member of the family to share. It was strange that she should have been so keenly alive to a possible danger threatening one of her child¬ ren, and so blind to a very real danger overshadowing another. For had she known how changed was Mabyn’s life by the advent of Ralph’s friend, she would have considered that her daughter was menaced by a very real danger indeed. The match-making mother is a favourite subject for the novelist’s pen, but it is doubtful if in real life she exists in larger numbers than does the match-objecting mother. At any rate, Mrs. Littledale belonged to the latter class ; for there was nothing that well-meaning woman dreaded more than that Mabyn should exhibit the slightest desire to have a home of her own. Perhaps Mrs. Littledale was thrown off her guard by Mabyn’s manner, for the girl was ever unusually silent in Philip’s presence, and in his absence she seldom spoke of him. But, unless all recollections of her girlish days had faded from Mrs. Littledale’s mind, she should have known that these were not re-assuring signs. Or, on the other hand, she may have thought that Philip Dacre was not the kind of man to be attracted by ordinary domestic sweetness, such as Mabyn possessed ; and she may, perhaps, have credited her daughter with the wisdom of steeling her heart against one who would not be grateful for its tenderness. As for Mabyn herself, she was not at that time conscious of being influenced by any fixed purpose. She neither hoped anything nor dreaded anything. She was light-hearted and happy all the week, looking forward to his coming. In his presence she felt a great unreasoning joy ; and she kept silence, lest she should lessen the consciousness of this joy. She was never particularly anxious that he should talk to her, but she liked to listen to the tones of his voice : they soothed her ; they spoke to her of the possibility of a life with nobler aims and more elevating sur¬ roundings. Her better nature seemed so much the stronger when she was with him. So she would sit mum in his presence, drinking in his every word ; not looking at him much — for her chief delight was to picture his face, and then now and again to steal a glance at him, to see how near her ideal was like unto the original. Poor Mabyn ! And then, when all danger of infection was said to be over, Julia and Sophy Dacre did call at Grange House, bringing a warmly worded message from their mother, who was, they stated, not well enough to leave home. Mrs. Littledale and Mabyn returned the call in due course. But after a time it came to be recognised on both sides that the friendship between the two families was to be kept up by the younger members only. The Dacre girls were not long in discovering that they pleased Philip by frequently inviting Mabyn to Southfields ; nor was he slow to avail himself of the increased facilities for enjoying Mabyn’s society which the extensive garden surrounding the house afforded. They were wandering together in the shady paths of this garden on an evening about three months after the date of their first meeting. The following day Philip was to start for the Con¬ tinent. He was going there on business in connection with the firm of which he was junior partner ; but it was generally understood that he was to set about the business in a way that should not exclude all pos¬ sibility of pleasure. He would probably be away about two months. He was telling Mabyn of his plans, and she was listening with that intense interest in all that concerned him which must ever be so gratifying to a man’s vanity. Then Sophy Dacre came running up to them, de¬ claring it was getting dark, and that Mabyn would catch cold if she stayed out any longer. So they all three returned to the drawing-room, which was, as usual, well filled with visitors. But Mabyn hardly noticed the presence of anyone but Philip. Was he not going away for two long months.? Would they renew their pleasant, friendly intercourse after his return at just the same point where it had been discontinued .? Mabyn hardly dared to hope so. And so she sat on dreaming — dreaming, until at length Ralph declared it was time for her to don her outdoor apparel. And then came the moment for saying farewell. Philip took her hand in his strong grasp, and kept it there for a moment or two, while he let his eyes gaze into hers. But his words to her were only those of an ordinary leave-taking, for there were many others present. And yet she was foolish enough to feel absurdly disappointed, even while her reason told her that more would, under the circumstances, have been simply ridiculous. But she could not shake off the sense of disappointment. To part thus, after all those wander¬ ings in shady paths ! She was up betimes in the morning, and out in the garden, as was her usual practice. But how different everything looked from what it had on those happy

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44 A Wonder of the North. mornings when she knew that before nightfall she would be in his presence ! “ Miss Littledale ! He was standing leaning over the gate : the man whose absence had cast a gloom over everything. “ Oh, Mr. Dacre ! ” She ran swiftly to him, her face wreathed with smiles, and her eyes bright with joy. Neither spoke for a moment, but his hands had sought hers, and his eyes were more eloquent than words. “ Why have you come ? ” she asked at length, and her voice trembled as she put the question. “To say good-bye.^’ “ Did we not say it last night ? “ How could we when a dozen eyes were on us P’’ She smiled at him shyly, but said nothing. “ Would such a good-bye have satisfied you ? Could you have been content to part with a mere handshake ? Oh, Mabyn ! ’’ “ I was not content.” The words came at length hesitatingly, but every syllable fell distinctly on his ear. He held her hands in a firmer grasp. “ Look up, Mabyn. Mabyn, you must let me read all that your eyes have to tell me. Mabyn, my - ” But a heavy footstep was heard on the gravel path¬ way, and, with a startled cry, Mabyn drew away her hands. END OF CHAPTER THE FOURTH. A WONDER OF THE NOR'FH. SOUTH CANTILEVER, FORTH BRIDGE. {From a Photograph by A. A, Inglis, Eduiboroitgh.) EXT summer, if all goes well, the London tourist will be able to bowl along from King’s Cross on a direct line of rail for Perth and the Highlands. At present, if he does not wish to “ leave the metals” and resort to the ferry¬ boat, he must take the “ west coast route,” by way of Glasgow and Stirling. But when the Forth Bridge is completed he will not require to go so far out of his way. After touching at Edinburgh, he will dart across the estuary of the Forth through the middle of a mighty framework of steel, resembling to the mind’s eye the stranded skeleton of some huge leviathan or antediluvian monster. Passing by Kinross, with its romantic prison of the ill-fated Mary Queen of Scots, he will thread the windings of Glenfarg, and thus arrive at Perth Junction an hour before he would have done so by the more westerly route. It is to compete with the Caledonian Railway Com¬ pany of the west, for the north of Scotland traffic, that the North British Railway Company, with an admira¬ ble spirit of enterprise, have undertaken the colossal task of bridging, not only the Frith of Forth, but also the Frith of Tay. The first Tay Bridge was, as most of us remember, carried away in a hurricane, but undeterred by this catastrophe, the directors of the company have superseded it by another of more solid workmanship. The engineer of this second work, Sir John Fowler, was likewise chosen as the designer of the more important viaduct over the Forth, and the same contractors, Messrs. Tancred, Arrol, and Com¬ pany, were selected for its construction.

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A Wonder of the North. 45 The site of the Forth Bridge is at a point some miles north-west of Edinburgh, where the estuary of the river is narrowed by a promontory on the north shore, and broken in mid-stream by a small and rocky island, called Inch Garvie. It is close beside the two villages of North and South Queensferry, both well known to Scottish history. Readers of the ^‘Antiquary” will recollect the Hawes Inn, where Monkbarns foregathered with young Mr. Lovel, as <hey waited for the tide to turn, in order that they might cross the ferry. Mr. Louis Stevenson has also shown his interest in this hostel by making it the scene of David Balfour’s disappearance in “ Kid¬ napped ” ; but both of these characters would be greatly astonished were they to step out of the inn door now, and see the gigantic webs of steel which tower over the bed of the river, and fairly dwarf the landscape. The Antiquary indeed might perhaps suggest that it was “ very like a whale ” of a most prodigious breed, but he would probably decline to believe it was a bridge. At this point the river is about a mile in width, having high banks on either side, and a bed of trap rock overlaid with a stiff boulder clay, almost as hard as a stone. The two channels formed by Inch Garvie are nearly 200 feet deep, and, owing to tne difficulty of building foundations. Sir John Fowler and Mr. Baker conceived the bold design of traversing the water-way by two immense girders of great span. Inch Garvie would support their central pier, and two other piers could be founded on the bed of the river by means of iron caissons filled with concrete. Each of the spans would be 1,710 feet in width, and at both the banks the line could be carried on a series of granite piers supporting iron girders of the ordinary type. The great width of the spans led them to adopt the device of building enormous cantilevers of steel resting on the granite piers of the tideway, and carry¬ ing short connecting girders to bridge the gaps between them. Our general view of the bridge, as it now stands, will serve to explain this design, and it will be remarked ^hat the huge cantilevers rising from the piers are being built outwards from the centre without any scafifo.ding, by balancing the work on both sides of the supporting foundations. As each side progresses at the same pace there is no fear of the cantilever, however massive, toppling over. The total height of a cantilever above the water is about 360 feet, and the rails which run through the heart of it are 150 feet above the high-water level, so that ships of the largest size can pass up the river at the middle of the arching span, where the straight girders connect the extremities of the cantilevers. The total length of the viaduct, including the terminal THE FORTH BRIDGE. {From a Photograph by G. IV. Wilson, Aberdeen.)

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46 A Word about Invalid Diet, girders, is about if miles. The superstructure is composed of Siemens-Martin steel, of which over 50,000 tons have been required, and the piers in the river are nearly fifty feet in diameter at the top above high-water mark, and faced with grey granite. It is a curious thing to see this gigantic structure slowly developing in the air as if it were a living growth. For the hydraulic riveters make no din, and the size of the cantilevers is so vast that the workmen and their machines appear like midgets far aloft. Two or three thousand men are engaged on the work, but they are scarcely to be seen or heard. They are lost in the airy wilderness of steel, like rooks amongst the branches of a tall elm-tree. The reader will be able to judge of the dimensions of the structure by comparing the cantilevers with more familiar objects, such as the trees of the shore. the lighthouse on the end of the Ferry Pier, or the cranes employed on the summit. As a Grenadier Guard is to a new-born babe, so is the Forth Bridge to the Britannia Bridge of Stephenson. There is no greater monument of the “iron age,” for the Eififel Tower is a mere gilded toy in comparison. Fortunately we have every prospect of its safe completion, since it has stood the test of several very high gales, and with the connecting girders in position, the strength of the whole must be very much increased. A considerable number cf deaths by accident have taken place amongst the workmen, but these have been owing to their own carelessness and disobedience of orders, rather than to any fault in the arrangements of the contractors, and the successful execution of the work is largely owing to Mr. Arrol. Most likely the great viaduct will be formally opened towards the end of this J. Munro. FOR ME. HEN I would see The fairest stars that shine at night, I gaze upon thine eye’s soft light, And stars shine there for me. When I would hear The music of all nightingales, I listen to the soft love-tales Thou whisperest in mine ear. When I would know What flowers have the sweetest grace, I look upon thy beauteous face. And straightway roses blow. And so, for me, Thou star and flow’r and music art, And there is nothing that my heart Desires, not found in thee. J. T. Burton Wollaston. A WORD ABOUT INVALID DIET. BY A FAMILY DOCTOR. fact — and who shall dare to doubt it ? — that pure blood is made by food, and not by physic, the subject of my paper to¬ day needs to be prefaced by no apology. Although, however, it is more especially ad¬ dressed to the invalid, whether chronic or otherwise, and to the convalescent, “ those who are whole ” may gain a few useful hints therefrom. Let me remind the reader at the commencement that the food we eat is meant to nourish the body that those who eat for the pleasure of eating, too often over-eat ; that it is not the amount actually swallowed, but that which is digested which must be called nutri¬ tion ; that one of the evils of eating more than sufficient is to set up fermentation in the stomach and other portions of the digestive canal, causing acidity, eructations, painful flatulence, and sometimes diarrhoea ; that the nutrition of the system is thus very much interfered with, and good digestion ren¬ dered impossible; that the body takes days to get over an error in diet of the sort 1 refer to ; that if this is harmful to those in health, it is doubly so to the delicate invalid, and that even those whose digestions are extra-strong suffer from over-eating in the long run, for instead of the food going to harden the muscles, and inure the body against cold and illness, it is stored up in the shape of clogging and unwhole¬ some adipose tissue, and both muscles and nerves are weakened instead of being strengthened. Now let me give one caution to those who may be acting as amateur nurses to sick or invalid friends or relations. The doctor will invariably lay down rules as to diet. You are to obey these unhesitatingly and to the very letter. The patient may fancy this or fancy that, but you must exercise denial even to sternness. Our tastes during health are safe guides to us, as a rule, in the choice of food ; our palates were given to us for a purpose ; but nurses must remember that in sickness the tastes become changed — often depraved, if I may use the expression ; many and many a

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47 A Word about Invalid Diet. precious life is lost every day from the errors in diet during sickness. “Let the doctor say what he pleases/’ says the amateur nurse ; “ anything my brother fancies cannot hurt him. He shan’t be kept on slops ; he shall have a tender juicy morsel of grilled steak.” And he has the grilled steak, and his sister — the nurse — sits by him, smiling, while he eats it. “ What a pleasure it is,” she says, “ to see you pick a bit, dear ! It will put strength in you, and you’ll soon be your old self again.” But lo ! that night the fever returns with redoubled force, the cheeks are flushed, the eyes glitter and look anxious, the arms are tossed over the coverlet. The doctor comes, and goes away looking grave. He comes earlier next day than usual. This shows his anxiety, and he has a little interview with the patient’s nearest relatives. The sister’s eyes are red when she returns to the bedroom. Need I continue this all too common story.? Hardly. Suffice it to say that in a week or two there is an empty arm-chair in the brother’s study, and an air of desolateness about the place. His books are put away, and his pipes ; he will come no more again. The reader will note that in the above paragraph I have said “ amateur nurse,” for, of course, no trained nurse would be guilty of disobeying the doctor’s orders in the matter of diet. Well, as regards the health value of invalid diet, the same rules hold good as in the diet of those who are strong : that is, the elements of the food are the same. From the food that the invalid eats the blood is supplied, and from the blood the tissues are built up. We must have fuel food and tissue food, and also the salts necessary for keeping the body up to the mark. These are usually found in the food eaten : namely, lime, potash, iron, and soda. If the heat of the body gets below par, debility and collapse are the result ; if above par, we are wasted and consumed by fever. In grains, in bread, rice, arrowroot, tapioca, peas, beans, sago, &c., we have what are called hydro¬ carbons, which serve to keep up the bodily heat. In vegetables, such as turnips, beet, carrots, parsnips, &c., we have hydro-carbons in the shape of sugar : in ripe fruits also, and in the vegetable substance stored by bees, and called honey. Next we have the hydron-carbon fat. We have this in the animal tissues we eat ; in the cereals also, such as Indian corn and oatmeal, and in nuts. Then we have what I call tissue foods, which supply the waste that is constantly ^oing on in our frames. These are albuminoids, and we find them in both animal and vegetable foods. Eggs of all kinds supply tissue food ; so do mutton, beef, veal, lamb, pork, fowl, and game. Fish supplies them, though there is more water in the muscles of fishes, and therefore a larger proportion has to be eaten. It should be borne in mind that all kinds of fish are not equally digestible, and that fish requires extra care in cooking. From wheat, oatmeal, maize, barley, &c., we also get the albuminoids in abundance. Now, in the choice of food for the invalid, when one has no doctor handy to act as guide and mentor, it is to be remembered, (i) That invalid diet must be chosen from those materials, whether animal, vegetable, or both combined, that are most easily digested ; (2) That such food must be nutritious ; (3) That the most care¬ ful cooking is required to render it fit for the weakened invalid stomach. I will now give a few hints about different articles of food, premising that these are gleaned from personal experience. Beef. — When this can be eaten, it will be found not only very nutritious, but easily digested. The draw¬ back is, as a rule, bad cooking. A morsel of tender grilled steak or a somewhat under-done cut from a joint is best. The meat must have been kept long enough to make it tender — most tender. Beef Tea. — It is a good stimulant, and lies easily on the stomach. Take it with a morsel of toast. Mutto7i and La7nb. — Both must be tender and well cooked. Mutton broth, with barley and a few vegetables in it, is very wholesome. But I would have the in¬ valid whose illness is chronic to take as little slop food as possible. Veal and Po7'k. — Do not be prevailed upon to touch either if you are delicate. Fowl and Rabbit.— are fairly good ; so is fowl or rabbit broth with rice, or preferably barley. But I am of opinion that neither fowl nor rabbit is so easily digested nor so nutritious as most people imagine. The cut from the breast of a large fowl is the best part for the invalid, and I should allow him just the tiniest morsel of well-done curled bacon, but not much .‘^auce, and certainly no stuffing : for cooks have dif¬ ferent ideas about the proper ingredients for stuffing, so the invalid is on the safe side who leaves it all alone. Turkey is excellent. Duck is passable. Goose must be eaten with caution. Sage and onions I Ugh! Give sage and onions to the farmer or hunts¬ man, but the invalid is the sage who leaves sage on one side. Nearly all sorts of game— venison perhaps excepted — form good and easily digested food for the invalid, only the cooking must be correct, and it should have been kept just long enough to render it tender, but not a day over. Fish. — I have already said that bulk for bulk it is not so nutritious as meat. Fish is apt to create acidity. The best sorts are the white fish ; all oily fish should be forbidden. The skin of fish is apt to disagree, albeit it is most tasty. Shell-fish, with the exception of oysters, should be avoided. A very few shrimps do good at times, and create an appetite. Fggs. — They should be new-laid and lightly boiled. A new-laid raw egg swallowed whole — if this can be done — is best. It digests by degrees, and lies well on the stomach. Poached eggs suit well. They should, of course, be served upon toast. Custard with a little nutmeg — not much of this — is very valuable. Omelettes, whether plain or savoury, are good as breakfast dishes, but require great care in cooking.

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In the Wild West. 48 Puddings of various sorts — bread, rice, tapioca, or rizine— are all good. The most ridiculous thing about the eating of puddings is this : after one has had a good and sufficient dinner, on come the puddings. And people really think they can always find a place for pudding. A more laughable error in diet it is im¬ possible to imagine. But for that matter there is but little laughing in it for him who makes the mistake, for that pudding is generally the last straw that breaks the camel’s back. Beware of pudding after meat, therefore. Milk, in whatever way it can be taken, is excellent, light, and nutritious. Bread should be toasted. It ought to be stale, and the whole-meal loaf is king of loaves. Would I give an invalid cheese ? Start not when I answer “Yes.” Just the tiniest morsel if he fancies it, befo7'e^ not after, a meal. Oatmeal porridge is good for breakfast, if not too long boiled, and if thick enough. For drink we have weak tea, cocoatina, whey, buttermilk, soda-w^ater and milk, lime-juice cordial with lemonade— this last is excellent in rheumatism — lime-juice and soda-water, and toast and water. I re¬ fuse to recommend either wine or beer. Invalids should study variety in their meals, and abjure “ twice-laids.” Everything should be not only nicely cooked, but prettily placed upon the table. Time should be taken over a meal, and it ought not to be forgotten that mastication is the first process of digestion. I have not said much about fruit, by the way, but if ripe, most fruits are very good indeed, and should invariably take a place in the scale of diet for the invalid. IN THE WILD WEST. A STORY OF ADVENTURE. BY J. BERWICK HARWOOD, AUTHOR OF “ PAUL KNOX, PITMAN, “what the coral reefs gave me,’' etc. CHAPTER THE FIRST. WAS married in the quaint village church of I Landlord, one of those quiet nooks in old- .l&jif world Dorsetshire where change and pro- - gress are more talked of than felt. And, as had been previously arranged, a month after our wedding I was on the high seas with my young wife. Edith, who was the youngest daughter of kind, stu¬ dious Dr. Bromley — one of those country practitioners who would have more patients but for the physician’s prefix to their names — and had a little money of her own (a thousand pounds or so) inherited from her mother, and which was settled so as to become her portion when she married. With this slender capital it was our plan to settle in America, the rather that I had served my time in the office of a celebrated firm of civil engineers, and had, also, some know¬ ledge of agriculture. “ Surely,” said Dr. Bromley, who was sanguine for a man of his years and his profession, “ Surely, Pres¬ cott, with two such strings to your bow as engineer and as farmer, in a new country like the United States you are certain to succeed.” I thought so too, and Edith was of the same opinion, and would, I am sure, have cheerfully faced with me a much less inviting prospect than that which lay before us. As for myself, William Prescott by name, I was simply the only son of a former rector of the parish in which Dr. Bromley practised, and who had been able to give me nothing beyond the sound education on which I partly relied for success to the west of the Atlantic. We did not linger long, Edith and I, in New York, but started at once on what an enthusiastic fellow - traveller designated as the track of the setting sun. It was in Chicago, at the table d’hote of our huge hotel, that I became casually acquainted with Mr. Julius Caesar Frost, editor and proprietor of the Ban7ter of Freedom newspaper, published in Jackson, the capital of Missouri. I had come to Chicago, hoping to find employment in the grain-growing Prairie States, but Mr. Frost was kind enough to give him¬ self considerable trouble to convince me that the Prairie States were a mistake.

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49 I’ll put you up to the ropes, Mr. Prescott,” he said earnestly, and more than once, such was his anxiety to serve a stranger, “since it is impossible for a iDorn Britisher to sift, at first landing, the gold from the dross, so to speak, in a colossal country like our own. Prairie States, indeed ! Just spend a day or two on a Hoosier’s farm, out in Illinois, or Indiana, or Ohio, and see if it is the kind of life you’d care for ! A shadeless plain, as flat as the existence of those who dwell upon it, and grow wheat and Indian corn, and burn their maize in the hard winters, for lack of other fuel, to keep the wooden farmhouse warm and them from freezing, and sell their wheat according to prices settled in the Chicago ring, to go off to Europe. No, no ! There are fairer regions and better careers in America than to tie yourself to plough and flail in Iowa or Minnesota. Beside the ‘mad Missouri,’ whence I hail, we can grow costlier crops than mere corn. Our madder, flax, and tobacco are equal to anything Virginia can show. Cotton succeeds, too, besides our hops, and our wool, and our dye-stuffs, and the cattle and hogs we send south.” I took a fancy to Mr. Julius Csesar Frost, who was a talkative man, of pleasing manners and glib address, that contrasted with the awkwardness and silent gloom which characterised many of those natives of the “ Hoosier ” States with whom I came in contact. And it appeared that the liking was mutual, for pre¬ sently Mr. Frost proposed to me to become his partner and sub-editor in the management of the B aimer of Freedom^ and proved to me, by documents and account- books which he happened to have brought with him 724

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50 In the Wild West. when called by business to Chicago, that I could not better invest my spare cash than by buying a share in so thriving a concern. There was evidence enough, in print and in figures, that the Ba7iner of Freedoiti was a paper of large circulation and provincial re¬ nown, and 1 began to think myself lucky in having conciliated the goodwill of its sole proprietor. Some discussion there was, of course, between my bride and myself, before deciding on so momentous a subject as the choice of our future home. But I found Edith disposed to think well of a residence in Jeffer¬ son City. Mrs. Frost, a handsome and fashionably dressed woman, with, I fancied, a careworn look about her dark eyes, which was perhaps attributable to delicate health and sensitive nerves, had talked much to my young wife while I was conversing with her husband, and had drawn quite a rose-coloured picture of Jefferson, its climate, its comforts, its scenery, and its society, which appeared to combine the chivalric deportment of the South with the cultivation of the more highly educated North. There was also some debate before the bargain was struck. But Mr. Frost — although, as he frankly told me, he had expected a higher price when first he made the offer of a partner¬ ship — was too magnanimous to withdraw it, and it was agreed that for five hundred pounds of Edith’s tiny fortune and my own services as sub-editor, I was to receive one-third of the net profits. It’s you I want, sir, not your cash,” confidentially remarked my classically named principal, as we all tra¬ velled together by rail towards Jefferson. “ You don’t suppose, Mr. Prescott, that a mere handful of dollars like that proved the temptation to a man like me to take an associate into the office where I have hitherto l eigned alone. But the fact is that we want new blood in Missouri journalism. There will be a freshness, a savour, as it were, of the Old Country, in what you write for our columns, which will invigorate our style and help us to whip that hateful thing, the^;^;/J, into the cocked hat of Lethe.” Perhaps Mr. Frost became conscious here of the confusion in his rnetaphors, for he merely pressed my hand as he added, “ I predict a great future for your editorials, sir,” and then became an abstracted gazer at the landscape. I smiled to find the provincial strife between rival newspapers to which we are accustomed at home carried on more vigorously on the other side of the Atlantic, and resolved, so far as I was concerned, that the passages of arms between ourselves and our opponents should be carried on as courteously as might be. I am afraid that Edith was a little disappointed at first when she compared the Jefferson of reality with the almost ideal city which Mrs. Frost had described. But our new friends, at any rate, were very helpful and good-natured in assisting us to settle, and by the time that the deed of partnership was signed, and the five hundred pounds transferred from my keeping to that of Mr. Frost, we found ourselves the occupants of a prettily furnished little house in a good situation, and with a shady avenue of large trees waving their rustling boughs whenever the wind swept freely along the hot and dusty street. I speedily found, however, that my notion of im¬ parting a gentle character to the contest between the Ban7ie7' of Freedo77i and the f efferso7i Argus was fallacious. It absolutely took my breath away to read the vehement abuse with which the rival print was pleased to assail me, so soon as my connection with Mr. Frost’s paper became a known fact, but before I had penned a single paragraph. ‘‘ Frost’s worthless associate”; “the fellow Prescott, who is trying to sneak into American journalism ” ; “ the British ruffian and vile adventurer, who,” &c., &c. : such were a. few of the milder sugar-plums with which I was pelted. And then there came mysterious sentences about Mr. Frost’s supposed desire to gloss over what was called his own pitiful pusillanimity by the pre¬ sence of a swashbuckler from the Old World. Frost, who was a veteran in such wordy warfare^ shrugged his shoulders when I spoke te him. “ Don’t mind them,” he said, “and they’ll give up annoying you presently, just as the mosquitoes leave those alone that are seasoned to the climate. Only you had better be careful never to let your wife see an Argus, if you can keep the pesky thing out of her eyesight, for ladies are apt to take these stabs seri¬ ously, though to us they are pin - pricks, not worth wincing at.” A fuller explanation came from an acquaintance I made, a certain Captain Bates, an old man who had been famous as a buffalo-hunter and fighter against Indians in his youth, and in, the more unsettled days of the State, but whom I found chatty and com¬ municative, and whose natural shrewdness supple¬ mented a narrow education. “You see, mister, they are speaking to Bunkum^ these Argus chaps, when they fling mud at you, who never did them an ill turn. What they’re thinking of is the sale of their paper among the farmers out country way, who mostly pay subscriptions in produce^ and had a hankering for the Ba7i7ier^ as the oldest newspaper, before Frost showed the white feather and ruined its popularity.” “ Ruined its popularity ! ” I exclaimed, in some astonishment. “ Why, yes, ’ replied the old frontiersman, as with his penknife he shaped himself a new quid out of plug tobacco. “You can’t, Mr. Prescott, being a Britisher^ understand what popularity means with us here in Missouri. There was a man I knew that shot his neighbour’s black bull in broad day, before twenty witnesses, and when damages were claimed, and the judge pronounced that the case was clear, the jury wouldn’t give a verdict for more than fifty cents, because the bull was unpopular! So has Frost got to be with the farmers. They do like a man of spirit^ they do, and if it wasn't for Nash and young Jabez Ellis, the horse - reporter, the Ban7ier wouldn’t be respected at all in these parts.” Further inquiries elicited the fact that journalists in Missouri, at that time, were expected to be as ready with the pistol as with the pen, and that our paper

Page 60

In the Wild West. had suffered sorely in repute and circulation ever since its editor-in-chief had flinched from accepting a challenge, collectively issued by the staff of the Argtis^ to a free fight. Some of the contributors, and notably Mr. Ellis, the horse-reporter, a young man whose pale face and high riding-boots 1 had occasionally seen in the printing-house, had met the Argits men in the main street of Jefferson, and there had been an exchange of hard words and pistol-shots, until the Sheriff, or the Mayor, had arrived with a repeating rifle, and threatened to “pick off’’ the members of both literary factions unless they desisted from firing revolvers and breaking shop windovvs. But the balance of victory was held to incline to the chal¬ lengers, while the blame of defeat in the almost bloodless contest was laid at the door of Mr. Frost. “ Call him Julius Caesar if you please, but there’s nothing of the gamecock about Frost,” declared old Captain Bates, who was an authority on questions of personal prowess ; “ and I think, mister, he counts on you to face the enemy for him. A Britisher, you see, mostly has the fame of being ready to fight.” This was not agreeable intelligence. I am not, I hope, less ready to confront danger in a good cause than the majority of my countrymen, but these skirmishes between rival parties of journalists seemed wanton and barbarous to me. I resolved, therefore, to abstain, as far as possible, from provocation or from taking offence, and it was with reluctance that I con¬ sented to carry a revolver when I went abroad. This, however, on the part of a sub-editor of one of the belligerent periodicals was, I was assured both by Captain Bates and by our leader-writer, Mr. Napoleon Nash, a precaution which it would be madness to neglect. “ When it’s known that a chap has his pistol handy, and he looks as if he could shoot straight in case of need, as you do, Mr. Prescott,” remarked the last- named of my advisers, “he’s not so likely to be insulted as if he went unarmed. And Frost’s plan isn’t as good, though a lady A, by Western etiquette, held to be a stopper to those who want a muss with those they don’t like. You may have noticed, sir, that our boss is hardly ever to be seen in the streets without his wife.” My great anxiety just then was, as I remember, to keep all tliese alarming rumours from reaching Edith’s ears. Poor thing ! she would never have known an easy moment had her apprehensions for my safety been once aroused. As for myself, I had heard enough of these affrays to be aware how much of bluster and of noise there usually was in proportion to the actual amount of damage done. Once, when alone, and in a retired part of the town, I chanced to meet the two most redoubted champions of the hostile paper face to face. But nothing more tragical oc¬ curred than that the Argus sub-editor and duellist avowed— Hiram Wax, Esq., as he loved to be called— lifted his tall hat with American solemnity, and ejacu¬ lated stiffly, “ Good morning, sir ! ” as Hector of Troy might have done in passing Achilles or Ajax. But none the less was I bespattered with hard words, 51 penned, I was assured by Mr. Wax himself, in the very next issue of his paper, and I began to think there might be pleasanter careers than that on which I had embarked. Also, Mr. Frost himself rather disappointed me. He seemed a much less satisfactory person, somehow, in Jefferson than when first he made my acquaintance at Chicago. He had grown more silent too, I fancied, after I had been some months at Jefferson, and was quite unlike the glib, talkative newspaper proprietor whose promises had allured me to Mis¬ souri ; while Mrs. Frost’s anxious eyes became as dark and deep-set as caves of gloom and care, and all hospitality and merrymaking, of which there had been some at the first, came to a dead stop. Clearly there was something wrong. Things, as I gathered, were not going prosperously for the Banner of Freedom. Subscribers, so far as I could see, were deserting us, and subscriptions in arrear. It was im¬ possible, however, to verify the state of affairs, since Mr. Frost, from early habit, kept the books closely to himself, while as to anything like an explanation, he was as slippery as an eel. All I knew was that I had not as yet received a dollar out of my third share of the net profits, and that it was impossible to find out whether there were any profits at all. And at last came a morning when, on entering the Ba7i7ier offices, I found a scene of confusion — printers with bare arms and paper caps invading the editorial sanctum, cupboards and drawers ramsacked, books and papers littering the tables and floor, and two or three of the staff with blank faces, looking at one another, while a German compositor, with tears in his watery blue eyes, was angrily haranguing about “schwindlers,” and howling for the six weeks’ wages that were his due. “What is all this What is the matter?” I asked. “The matter, sir,” answered Jabez Ellis, the horse- reporter, who was whittling a desk with his bowie- knife, viciously. “The matter is that Julius Cccsar Frost, the mean skunk! has gone off, and left us in the lurch. This old Ba7iner.^ it seems, was a concern rotten to the core ; but that’s no excuse for such a sneaking, madder-dyed villain as Frost. Anyhow, he has vamoosed with the cash-box, sloped for Texas, or Frisco, or somewhere, and left only debts behind. I, for one, have lost five months of my salary. But I’m right down sorry for you, Mr. Prescott, as the only married man among us — for Mrs. Frost, of course, is off with her husband — and you are left responsible, I fear, for the liabilities of the firm.” CHAPTER THE SECOND. “ Edith, my love, I fear that we are ruined 1” I said, when I took back the bad news with me to our own abode, and I hid my face with my hands, and almost sobbed aloud when I had said the words, not for my own sake, but because, by my over-confidence in my own worldly wisdom, I had brought the dear girl to the verge of poverty in a strange land. But Edith, when she learned the truth, bore up

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52 “VKXED THE SOUL OF THE SLEEPY LIBRARIAN” [p. 54). nobly, and did her best to comfort me. She would not listen to a word of my self-reproach, but insisted that I had acted for the best, and that she, too, had fully put faith in the attractive representations by which the Frosts had entrapped us into parting with the larger portion of our tiny capital. “ Well, well, my darling,” I said, with an effort to laugh it off at last, ‘‘ I suppose I am not the only successor of Moses Primrose who has been gulled with green spectacles since Goldsmith wrote. But what on earth are we to do 1 ” My own line, of course, was civil engineering, and I did feel pretty confident that, if anyone would give me a bridge to build or a road to lay out, I could acquit myself creditably. Only Jefferson did not seem to be quite the place for such tasks to abound. There were local surveyors and architects, not, so far as I knew, overburthened with business ; but my best chance seemed to seek a place as assistant to one of them. “And I was thinking, dear,” pursued Edith very seriously, “ that I could give music lessons.” ‘‘ I hope, my love, that there will be no necessity for that,” was my reply. Edith was an excellent musician, but I did not at first feel pleased with the idea that ny wife should teach the piano to the children of residents in Jefferson City. But we both agreed that no prejudice due to our earlier education or habits must be allowed to prevent us from doing our best to keep poverty at bay. And we thought, too, that it would be kinder for the present not to let good old Dr. Bromley know the full extent of our late misfortune. We had better, we thought, climb a little way up Fortune’s ladder again before we should reveal to our well-wishers in England how complete had been the break-down of my earliest efforts in the New World. I did not find my own position, with reference to that foundering concern, the Banner^ a very onerous or painful one. The creditors, clamorous and wrathful with Mr. Julius Caesar Frost, were just and con¬ siderate enough to accept my frank statement of facts, and to be content with such sacrifices as I had it in my power to make. Our furniture was for the most part sold, and its price, with a few hundred dollars more of Edith’s little fortune, went to atone for the financial misdeeds of my too specious partner ; while my wife and I exchanged our house for a cottage in the suburbs of the town, and I was formally pronounced to be free from debt. But still the awkward question. What was to be done ? remained unanswered, and all the assurances of sympathy which we received from those who knew our story did not serve to teach us how to face the world anew. I had to renounce my opposition to my wife’s first proposal for contributing to the common weal; 1

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In the Wild West. 53 and Edith did give music lessons, but her pupils were few. As for myself, it was only now and then that I could .find anything, however poorly remunerated, to do. I tried to sell some coloured sketches taken in the neighbourhood, but quickly discovered that Jeffer¬ son contained no amateurs ready to purchase. As a portrait-painter I met with better success, and a dozen or so of staring or smirking likenesses of not¬ able citizens, their wives and children, brought in a few dollars, after deducting the cost of frames and colours. And for a month 1 drew designs for tombs and monuments, to be carried out in stone or marble by Mr. Ephraim Hucks, purveyor of such mortuary wares to the Upper Ten, as he himself somewhat boastfully assured me, of the city. But the contributions which I forwarded to magazines in New York and Boston uniformly came back to me by post as unsuitable, while no Jefferson surveyor or architect wanted ad¬ ditional assistance in his professional duties. ‘‘ I could get you appointed as a rider to the Pony Express^^ said Captain Bates, who continued to be friendly when we met ; “ but I’m afraid your wife, poor young lady, would never be quite comfortable that your hair was on your head if you w'ere to be away across the prairies for weeks and weeks together. And Joe Moon — you remember Joe ? — was killed and scalped by Cheyennes, or Blackfeet, last month, out at Blue Creek, on his road. That sort of work is perhaps best for bachelors, though I admit that you stick to your saddle as 1 never thought a Britisher could do.” The reason for this somewhat dubious compliment on the part of the old buffalo-hunter was that I was not above earning a little money, at that crisis, by acting as rough rider to Enoch Harris, the local horse- dealer, who bought strings of half-broken mustangs, that had been stolen by, or from, the Indians on the frontier, and w'ho liked to have what he called the “ fiery edge ” of the temper of these imperfectly tamed steeds taken off before sending them on for sale in the South. Edith, though she knew from old Dorset¬ shire reminiscences that I was a practised horseman, was somewhat nervous on my account when I left her for what Mr. Harris called his “corral,” and which was a stockaded enclosure several acres in extent. But these were tremors that I could afford to laugh at. The duties of a solitary carrier of mail -bags on the plains .would not have been as handsomely rewarded as at that period they were, had they not been of the sort which insurance companies describe as doubly dangerous. What was to be done? We were not penniless, and had the resource which to some disappointed emigrants is denied : of returning home to become a burthen on our relations’ hands, and to try for a fresh start in England. But I shrank from going back to proclaim myself a failure, and Edith felt more than half ashamed at the idea of being so easily conquered by fortune. Should we move on to the westward, to.sorne of those wild and rugged regions where food was, any rate, easily to be earned by the labour of strong young limbs like mine, and where, to the lucky or the long-headed, competence often succeeded to a year or two of roughing it in a log shanty ? Had I been alone in the world I should not have been deterred from venturing into the silver-mining coun¬ tries, even by the ugly stories that came so frequently to my. ears. Everybody does not succumb to fever or the scalping-knife, to “ tenrod ” whiskey, or the pistol- shots of brawlers in a frontier bar. But Edith was too tenderly nurtured to be taken amongst border bullies and hostile savages ; nor was a log hut a fit substitute for the cheerful home that she had left for my sake. . Boldly to cross the Rocky Mountains — no trilling undertaking at the time of which I write — and settle in California, with its almond groves and peach orchards, its vineyards and its exhilarating climate, and “champagne” air, seemed to offer a brighter prospect. There appeared to be chances there that in Missouri I did not perceive to exist, if all tales were true regarding that wonderful El Dorado of the ex¬ treme West, which attracted so ceaseless a stream of migration to' the slopes bordering on the Pacific. “Go farther, and fare worse ! ” growled out my habitual oracle, -old Captain Bates, the frontiersman, when 1 consulted him on the propriety of such a flitting. “ Hevn’t.you been long enough among us, Mr. Pres¬ cott, to note the weakness of my countrymen ir. believing that out West — it’s always been West, evei since I was a stripling^there’s buffler hump ready roasted, let alone sweetcake and venison collops, and mush and. milk, for nothing ? California, sir, is just a lottery. The prizes are smart ones, I allow, and make a noise in the world, but there’s a powerful heap of blanks that no one cares to talk of. Being on this side of the Rockies, if 1 were you. I'd stop.” The veteran did not, however, limit his sympathy to bare advice, for it was thanks to his recommenda¬ tion that I was selected to direct the repairs of a farmhouse, twenty miles off, which was tumbling to ruin ; and although my services as architect w'ere mainly rewarded with a load of pork and meal, I gained a reputation for good and cheap work, which procured me occasional employment in the district adjacent to Jefferson. Still, although such expedients enabled us to tide over the winter months, I felt a natural uneasiness as to our future. Edith could not for ever go on giving music lessons at half-a-dollar each, while I picked up a precarious livelihood by riding Mr. Harris’s wild horses, or now and then building a barn for some up-country settler. 1 had still a hankering for that tempting California, of which I continued to hear much from those who had visited it, and where I could not but fancy that a better open¬ ing could be found than any which seemed within my reach in the somewhat impoverished regions of Mis¬ souri. And there is no saying whether my wife and myself .might not soon have risked our little all upon the venture, had not a parcel which reached us from England brought about a complete revolution in my ideas. • The parcel was from Edith’s old home, and con¬ tained presents from her father and sisters, and,

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54 In the Wild West. among other things, carefully packed, a quantity of silkworms’ eggs. “ If you can get mulberry-leaves for them where you are living,” wrote Grace Bromley, the eldest of the doctor’s daughters, “ I dare say you will find the silkworms an amusement to you while William is from home.” I'lie girls and their father were quite in the dark as to our straitened means, and the heavy disappoint¬ ment which Mr. Frost’s defalcations and flight had occasioned, for the tone of the letters we sent across the Atlantic was always cheerful, and, indeed, hope had never quite died out in our hearts. But my sister- in-law little knew that what she had recommended to Edith for the employment of a leisure hour had served with me as the starting-point for a new train of ideas. Mulberry-leaves ! As it so happened, the mulberry- tree, and especially the white variety of the plant, introduced by the French, long ago, at New Orleans and up the Missisippi river, was very common at Jefferson. I knew of twenty gardens that contained numbets of such trees, grown mostly for the sake of shade or ornament, so that the favourite diet of the silkworm would not be far to seek. I said nothing, at first, to Edith, beyond a word as to the careful pre¬ servation of the eggs, for 1 did not wish to raise false hopes in her mind, though my own thoughts were busy in constructing day-dreams for the future. There is a tolerable public library, not much visited, in the city of Jefferson, and into its shady precincts I dived, and vexed the soul of the sleepy old librarian by hunting up every available volume that treated of silk or silkworms, and making such notes as 1 thought would be of ultimate benefit, should I carry out the scheme on which my brains were busy. I wrote, too, to my former good-natured colleagues, Nash and Jabez Ellis, both of whom were doing fairly well as journalists at New Orleans and in Cincinnati, asking them to inquire, on my behalf, the market price of raw silk, and the probable demand for such a com¬ modity, if supplied. Favourable answers, in due course, reached me from both my former fellow-contributors to the Banner of F^'eedoni, Silk goods, of qualities and patterns suited to the Creole taste, were, Mr. Nash informed me, still made in New Orleans, and were preferred by the planters’ wives and daughters to the modernised pro¬ ductions of the Lyons looms. And although Porko- polis does not number a silk-mill among its industries, Jabez Ellis, the horse-reporter, was confidently assured by the drummers or commercial travellers of northern firms that in New England and Pennsylvania the manufacturers would be glad to purchase raw material at a lower price than that now charged for the foreign silk imported, and which was liable to a weighty Custom House impost. No silk, so far as my inform¬ ants were aware, was now produced in any part of the United States, though a small quantity was supposed to be smuggled across the Mexican frontier. All the rest, either from Italy, China, or the Levant, came by sea, and, of course, paid toll to the Federal Government. In the State of Georgia, some years earlier, a feeble attempt had been made to rear silkworms for com¬ mercial purposes, but this had been given up on account of the mortality among the worms and the lack of proper labour and superintendence. “ At any rate, Edith, if we were to try it, we should have the field to ourselves, if that be an advantage,” said I, when at last I ventured to broach the subject of silk culture as a mode of escape from our difficul¬ ties to my wife. “To be sure we should, Willie dear,” responded Edith quite eagerly, “ and I should like it all the better because it would not cause you to be away from home for days at a time, as those tiresome farmhouse repairs do. And with the advantage of our silk being duty free, we could make it answer, could we not ? I, for one, would be very careful of the silkworms, and make them into regular pets.” It was not for fear of opposition on Edith’s part to my new idea that I had waited to mature the scheme before I mentioned it. The dear girl was only too ready to see things as I saw them, and she came heartily into my plan for converting our cottage — which had a garden and a cool verandah, in the half Spanish style which settlers from the South had introduced — into a nursery for the first silkworms to be reared at a profit, as we hoped, in North America. It was as yet too early for the mulberry-leaves to be obtainable, but by planting plenty of lettuces, which silkworms devour with an avidity as great as that of rabbits for similar fare, we could save time and have our cocoons earlier in the market. Our garden, building land not being very dear in the suburbs of the capital of Missouri, was, for the size of the house, a large one. As yet it had only been brightened by some blossoming shrubs, and by the flowers that in that climate start into life almost uncared for ; but now it was needful to dig and delve, and weed, and arrange beds for the lettuces that were to be the first sustenance of the silkworms. Then there was the care necessary for the incuba¬ tion of the eggs, which must be hatched neither too early nor too late, and by means of a graduated warmth. In the meantime, there was plenty to do besides lettuce-growing. “You see, darling,” I explained to my wife, “silk¬ worms must have cages, as birds must, and it would be ruinous, in the present condition of our finances, to order from an ironmonger the ready-made dwellings which will be needed for their reception. Whereas, I can put wire-work together almost as neatly, and quite as firmly, as if I had been apprenticed to a bell-hanger, and so I shall be able to get the future habitations of our crawl¬ ing pets ready at a quarter of what would otherwise be charged for them. The verandah will be the very place for them by day, and at night we can move them into one of the unused rooms, where I can secure the admission of air by sliding panes, while a rough sun¬ shade of lath and canvas will keep the morning rays from the cages. Whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing well, especially when we hope to make a living by it.” My wife agreed with me in this, and we prepared cheerfully for the success of our scheme. END OF CHAPTER THE SECOND.

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55 WHAT TO WEAR IN DECEMBER, CHIT-CHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR PARIS AND LONDON CORRESPONDENTS. I.— FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. December, inmost minds, is intimately associated with Christmas, and even in our matter-of-fact day, when indifference is far too much the sen¬ timent of the hour, warmth, brightness, and general home cosiness are deemed concomi¬ tants of the festive sea¬ son. But this winter month is cold and often pitiless, and it behoves us to pro¬ vide warm gowns and cloaks. The mantle that heads our chapter will cer¬ tainly come the head of comfortable and elegant. It is made of rich Velours du Nord, which is a sort of go - between of plush and velvet : firmer than plush, and not so easily spoilt, but not quite so close and soft as velvet, the pile being longer. At the back it fits the figure closely, being pleated at the waist, so that ample space is given for drapery. The back of the skirt is only ornamented with a slight scrollwork, the full glory of the em¬ broidery appearing at the side, where three rich Vandykes in a conventional Etruscan design are embroidered in fine silk cord to match. There is no sleeve, but the mantle is cut to fit the shoulder, where it is raised and full ; the place for the arm being em¬ broidered to below the length of the elbow. There is a fur trimming down the front, as well as a rich combination of the embroi¬ dery on either side, tapering to a point. The sketch below shows another shape in the same rich class of mantle, viz., Velours du Nord embroidered in cord. This is cut as a long rounded cape, with ends, and is bordered not with fur but with heavy che¬ nille fringe, which borders the cape, encircles the neck, and goes down the centre of the front. The ends are themselves long, but they are further lengthened by a thick, handsome fringe of unusual depth. A cape of such a length as the one in the picture is new, or rather a revival of an old style, and it has this great element of com¬ fort — that the arms are covered to the wrists and yet free and unconfined. Sealskin is much worn this winter, and has been brought out in many new shapes. There is a useful cape, straight at the back, high on the shoulder, with ends reaching well down towards the feet ; trimmed round the neck with a beaver tippet, ending in a point at the waist. Another most stylish shape has long hanging sleeves, bordered with fine fringe, composed of elongated drops ; it has also the stole ends and an upstanding Elizabethan collar at the neck. The ordinary jacket fitting at the back and loose in front, is by no means the only fashionable kind. Some are fitted to the figure ; indeed, it is more the fashion that they should almost fit. The fronts are elongated to a depth of half a yard, diminishing to about six inches in width. There is a waistcoat of seal and revers of beaver. Some are double- breasted, and have a beaver, otter, Astrakhan, or J^ersian lamb roll collar. Some of the capes are pointed back and front ; others open to show a golden otter vest ; and tippets become small capes, with %

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What to Wear in December Stole or boa ends, for the long boa is always worn. The loose paletot in seal has gone out, and its place has been taken by close-fitting coats completely covering the dress, sometimes made with coat-sleeves and wide gauntlet cuffs, at other times with sleeves so long that they hang to the edge of the coat. Sometimes such coats are double - breasted, with two pointed levers at the throat. Dresses this winter are brighter and more stylish than they have been for years. Pari- siennes do not recognise the existence of a dress- improver, and skirts are small, indeed quite guiltless of drapery ; they are nearly all made of plain and checked— often tartan — woollen. The dress in our sketch has, you see, the front in check, and some appearance of folds is brought about by the material being drawn up in a couple of pleats towards the waist ; the rest of the gown is of grey vicuna ; slight lines of black mingle in the check. The skirt is fully gathered at the back of the waist, and there is a wide panel pleat on either side, with diagonal pocket flaps ; these are finished off with snail buttons, introduced also on the cuffs and the flap pockets of the jacket bodice. This bodice is in plain material, fastening only with one button, and having revers. The vest is check, but to it a plain basque is appended, falling in two points in front. Eiffel is one of the new colours this winter, and has found such favour in Paris, that even the gloves are made in it. It is a brownish terra-cotta, and owes its name to the famous tower, which is painted in the exact tint. Pastilles, viz., gra¬ duated spots in black on this colour, are seen on many new dresses. An all - round skirt drawn up on one side to show a simulated velvet petticoat of the shade, is a fashionable style. Black velvet sleeves would appear in the bodice, standing up very high, and these are often accom¬ panied by a velvet belt shaped to the figure, and cut on either edge in points or battlements. A novel way of making sleeves in Paris is to fasten them with a tiny row of buttons inside the arm ; they are generally tight from the elbow, but the upper portion frequently forms a puff, which as often as not is of a different material from the lower portion. Rows of ribbon velvet are used round skirts, and V-sliaped trimmings of a contrasting stuff on the back and front of bodices. Indeed, the dominant idea in many of the best-made French gowns just now is a close- fitting coat slashed down the centre, back, and front, showing an under- dress. This will be better under¬ stood by a description. A velvet skirt and V-shaped vest, back and front ; over this a light grey cloth forms the sleeves and two half-fronts which fall over the velvet that appears again on the cuffs. The idea requires to be well carried out, and then is extremely stylish. Leather galons, worked and cut so that gold and silver embroidered net fills up the interstices, are the most fashionable trimming for the time being. THE INVITATION. II.— FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. Our picture shows two useful styles of dress, one for morning and one for evening ; for high bodices are comfortable worn on cold nights, and they may be made dressy with a little trouble. The morning gown shows a very composite bodice. The dress is made in two tones of heliotrope, and is embroidered with double bands of laurel-leaves, revived from the Empire period. The vest, of the lighter shade, is invisibly fastened, and shows the embroidery that this is crossing, folds of the same tone disappearing’ in a belt which encircles the waist only in front. The re.st of the bodice is cut straight at the waist and is of the darker tone ; it has wide revers bordered with gra¬ duated pleats of the lighter shade, which form a part of the handkerchief drapery used at the top of the darker- toned sleeves in lieu of epaulettes. The laurel-leaf embroidered cuff is of the light shade also, so is the wide front to the skirt draped in easy folds towards the waist, and bordered with the embroidery. The back is quite plain, of the darker tone, and fully gathered at the back. This style is so universal that dress¬ makers are sorely puzzled how to make any diversity. The collar is a deep cross-cut band of embroidery.

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The Garden in December. 57 The evening gown is of the new blue-pink shade, for the tones of a few years back are returning to us. The front of the skirt is striped with white lace lap- peting, which has the pattern outlined with cord. The rest of the full skirt is drawn back in front as though the sides had been turned inside out. The bodice describes a point back and front, and opens on either side, with a revers graduating to a point towards the waist and forming a wide roll collar at the back. The front is made of white embroidered lace, as are the cuffs and collar-band, and the tw^o sides of the bodice are kept together by a broad pink band. The top of the sleeve is draped with a crossing band caught up in the centre. There is a novelty or two in the cut of smart under¬ linen which are worth knowing. It is frequently cut a V Empire with very short waists, or after the Incroyable style with V-shaped collars and jabots, most becoming to stout figures. Coloured silk hand¬ kerchiefs, embroidered at the edge and made to match the gowns, are worn often in the evening and are dressy. Beaver is used on many woollen gowns this year, edging side panels and forming vests. Furriers have of late brought out a fur tippet with a beaver vest com¬ bined, which is just the thing for wearing with open jackets, giving them the necessary warmth and pro¬ tecting the vital organs of the body. In draping gowns, when they are draped, which is but little, a new mode of starting from the base and working up¬ wards has been introduced. This is chiefly applied to the fronts of dresses, where triple folds are started down on the left side, and crossing the front, terminate at the waist on the left. The hats are very flat and very quaint, but are raised by the trimming. Tomato-coloured velvet is employed for many of them, and one of the favourite shapes shelters the face well with a projecting brim, which shades to a mere nothing at the back. Stih wings are now more often placed at the back than in the front. Zouave jackets of any kind of embroidery, oi sometimes of lace, appear on the bodices, and the em¬ broidery or the lace is introduced in the accompanying hat, for toques are worn often, and most comfortable wear they always prove. The new velvet calf, which is leather with all the smooth surface of velvet, is applied to the crowns of hats. This in a light brown has been converted into stylish toques with poppy-coloured trimming. Bonnets are infinitesimal, and the shapes distinctly new. They often have arched fronts and peaked corners. Brims turn upward, or project for¬ ward. The Marie Stuart form has come in again on a new basis. Plush bonnets have bands of figured fris4 chenille, and felts are much worn. The double crown is a French idea, which finds a home here, and the crimped crowns are gathered as it were beneath a central button, just as Hood described the German students’ caps in “Up the Rhine.” Ostrich-feather coronets are worn on the best bonnets, and a great deal of jet is laid on ; cardinal and tomato velvet cloth is much embroidered for bonnets. The heaviest jet coronets are mounted on a metal founda¬ tion after the form of those worn at the time when Josephine’s was the dominant female influence. The tarpaulin hats trimmed with black tulle seem inconsistent, for the material is best suited to nautical wear. Sailor hats have, however, been brought out tightly covered with cashmere, and also with cloth to match the dress. The grizzly hat is a capital inven¬ tion for hard wear ; it is a sort of felt with upstanding hairs, uncrushable, and unharmed by rain. THE GARDEN IN DECEMBER. EVERGREENS. F there is one month in the year more than another in which lovers of horti¬ culture delight to turn their attention to the subject of evergreens, it is this month of December, in which the vast majority of our garden plants are never green. The tenacity with which we cling to our holly and mistletoe just now is only equal to the tenacity with which another hardy old evergreen— the ivy — clings to the venerable old trunk of the oak that can remember Elizabeth, the Henrys, and the Edwards. Not unsuitably, then, shall we select this month in which to give a few hints as to the cultivation of our more; popular and favourite evergreens. And natu¬ rally, with Christmas in anticipation, the holly must come first on our list. And with regard to the forma¬ tion of a shrubbery in general, let us give here one caution against the disastrous but too frequent habit of planting too closely. Our object should only be this : that when a shrub or tree has attained its full and natural size it should be seen to the best advantage possible ; but if in the formation of a new garden or shrubbery our plants are put in too closely together, before they are much more than half their full size they are running into one another, destroying one another, spoiling all the effect of our garden ; and finally, perhaps at an unfortunate time of the year, we are compelled to take some up, and in so doing per¬ haps sacrifice them altogether. Hollies, again, should never have the shears near them ; a careless gardener will sometimes clip them, but this- should never be allowed : only the knife should be used, and that some time during February. Some little difference of opinion appears to exist as to the best time for moving hollies. Popularly we ,all of us know that the

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The Garden in December. 58 which we distinguish a popular member of its family. The holly likes a light and dry soil, so that, in plant¬ ing it, it is a good plan to mix some sand with the broken-up earth. It lives to a great age, Pliny, indeed, mentioning one hundreds of years old. Another popular evergreen just now also greatly in favour for church and domestic decoration is the ivy, and “ a rare old plant is the ivy green.” One good old-fashioned use of the ivy is to train it on our lawn to conceal the bald patches of bare soil immediately surrounding the base of trees, on which we find no¬ thing else will grow. Sometimes we put a seat all round a large tree, but still there is the surrounding patch or circle of earth — a muddy puddle in wet weather, and a dreary, dusty waste in a drought. Now ivy is, perhaps, the only known plant that will survive under these circumstances — indeed, it will actually flourish. Plant your ivy at some distance from the trunk of your tree — indeed, upon the green grass itself — and train it to grow towards the tree; very soon the unsightly barren soil will be covered, and a very pic¬ turesque contrast it is with the surrounding green of the lawn. Now, here again we shall not attempt to name the variety of hardy evergreen ivy climbers, or of the greenhouse and stove shrubs of the same. The ordinary ivy likes a deep rich soil, and a lighter com¬ post is required for the rarer or more tender species. Ivy, again, is of great use to us for concealing ugly places — dead trees, walls, &c. But some care should be taken as to how far it should be allowed to run along a roof. Its power of pene¬ tration is almost irresistible. It will easily lift up your tiles and slates on the roof, and thus admit wet. The writer only too well remembers having nearly to re-roof an old country house kitchen, over which some ivy had run, and which eventually had to be removed entirely. In thorough contrast again with the holly are the yew and the pine. Now, as the pinus tribe in general is utterly beyond all management by pruning, at¬ tention should be paid to its tilHmate growth when you choose any variety of it for planting, as also to the space you will be able to afford it. And another caution we must here note when speaking of the planting of shrubs and trees that afterwards attain a large or tall growth, and that is we must take care when planting them that they will not hide afterwards any other shrubs or plants that we are interested in. For this rea¬ son we generally, then, plant our pines at the very outside border of our land. We can only afford to notice very gene¬ rally a few other evergreens, without enlarging much upon the properties of any. The common laurel and the Por¬ tugal laurel are both fast growers, and when it has attained any age the Por¬ tugal laurel will not very well admit of autumn months are most recommended as those in which shrubberies should be formed or any changes made in the garden, and this is perhaps, generally speaking, correct ; but it has been thought that spring, or about the middle of April, is the time best adapted for the removal or planting of the holly ; and it is universally admitted that the best time for the removal of any plant is the period when it is most at rest. Now, the holly sheds its leaves in the early summer, making its growth also about the same time — that is, in May and June. It would, therefore, be most at rest in the early part of April, and its foliage some ten months old. Now, by moving the holly about that time you accelerate the fall of its leaf, and in some two months afterwards it is covered with new wood. None of us value the little insignificant bloom of the holly, but we prize it mostly this month for its brilliant scar¬ let or for its lemon - coloured berries, and for the varieties of its foliage ; in¬ deed, the ‘‘ va¬ riegated holly ” is the name by GATHERING THE SPOILS.

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The Gatherer. 59 removal. Box, again, we are all of us familiar with ; it can be clipped into any shape, is very hardy, and can readily be moved ; but as a border round our gardens we ought to remember that it affords a won¬ derful shelter — especially when thick and shrubby — for all those garden pests, such as slugs and snails, and other vermin. Indeed, upon careful examination of your border box, you will find that it almost affords the advantage of a trap for garden vermin, which can thus be the more readily despatched. In the flower garden, beds — if no bulbs or spring flowers are in — may be well trenched ; or where on account of your bulbs you cannot do this, plunge be¬ tween your bulbs a few pots of bright .evergreens, such as hardy heaths, aucuba, berberis, and others. This enlivens your garden. A little protection may be ne¬ cessary in severe frost to tulips or any delicate subjects under ground. In the greenhouse be on your guard as much or more against damp than against cold. No row of plants should be too crowded. In the rose garden see that the standards are well secured to their sticks, because of the gales. In the kitchen garden wheel manure in frosty and hard weather, preparatory to a good trenching a little later on. THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars respecting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge himself to notice every article or work submitted. _ A Telescopic Tricycle. The tricycle which we illus¬ trate in our woodcut is pro¬ vided with a telescopic axle, which allows the two hind wheels to approach each other, thus enabling the user to take his machine easily through a nar¬ row doorway. To this end each half of the axle can be screwed up into an outer tube, to any desirable extent. The positions of the wheels are fixed by a catch. The dotted lines show the machine brought into a narrow compass. Celluvert. This new material resembles a stiff, highly glazed cardboard, and it can be filed, planed, or otherwise shaped like wood. It can be made either rigid or flexible, and obtained in sheets, tubes, or rods. Being but slightly affected by acids or alkalies, and having besides a great tensile strength, and a high resistance to electricity, it is likely to prove useful in a variety of ways, when it becomes better known. London to Paris by Telephone. At a recent meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, Mr. W. H. Preece, F.R.S., gave an interesting account of some experiments which had been made by the Post Office with a view to establish telephonic communication between Lon¬ don and Paris. News is now sent by telephone between Paris, Brussels, and Marseilles. There is no theoretical reason why one should not be able to speak across the Channel, for the submarine cable from Dover to Calais is only 21 miles long, and induction is therefore not powerful enough to destroy the vocal currents. The entire distance is 275 miles by wire,

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6o The Gatherer. namely, 74 miles of overhead wire from London to Dover, the cable across the Straits, and 180 miles of overhead wire from Calais to Paris. By making a circuit from Worcester through London to Baldock, on the Great Northern line, Mr. Preece had imitated the conditions of the London to Paris line, and the results were such as to put an end to any doubts of the practicability of telephonic communication between the British and the French capitals. A Lode of Uranium. A century ago the metal uranium was discovered by Klaproth, who isolated it from the yellow oxide called pitch-blende. It has hitherto remained a rare metal, its market price being ^2,400 per ton. Its salts are used industrially, especially the sesquioxide, which imparts a greenish-yellow tinge to glass. Quite recently a con¬ tinuous lode of sesquioxide ore, containing from 12 to 30 per cent, of the metal, was discovered in the Union Mine, Grampound Road, Cornwall. This is the first lode which has yet been found in the world, and it is expected that uranium will now be used as a substitute for gold in electro-plating, as with copper and platinum it forms two gold-like alloys. It may also be used for electrical purposes, as it possesses a peculiarly high resistance to the passage of the currrent. A New Fire-Escape. The fire-escape which we illustrate is so simple in its action as to require little explanation. It consists of a metal plate through which a rope is passed, and which is capable of sliding down the rope when it is weighted. A chair or “stirrup” for the person escaping from the building is attached to the plate by belting, as shown. The rope is, of course, fastened to the burning building, and the person, taking his place in the “ stirrup,” can slip down the rope to the ground ; the friction acting as a brake to prevent a too rapid descent. More than one trip can be made by run¬ ning the slider back to its original position on the rope. A Warp-Weaver. At a recent meeting of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers; Mr. Arthur Paget read a paper on an interesting weaving machine of his invention. The weaver makes a great variety of cloths without the employment of a weft, that is to say, the web is prepared from the warp only. Shawls so fine as to pass through a finger-ring, as well as coarse towels, can be made by the weaver without any difficulty. A Double-Note Siren. At the Paris Exhibition an in¬ teresting double-toned siren or fog signal, working by compressed air, was shown by a well-known fpreign firm of engineers. The apparatus is illustrated herewith, and consists essentially of a bronze cylinder re¬ volving rapidly within a fixed cylin¬ der. Both of these are perforated with slots, and the compressed air in traversing the slots, and being cut off as the inner cylinder revolves, gives rise to a musical note of great intensity. The issue of air and its pressure are regulated, by simple means, so as to vary the sounds emitted. The apparatus shown is intended for a French harbour. Sirens of compressed air are, generally speaking, pre¬ ferable to those working by steam, because they can always be avail¬ able for use, and the air-compress¬ ing machinery may be stationed distance. Some Christmas and New Year Cards. Gloves, fans, flower-pots, well-worn boots and babies’ shoes, bandboxes, and even tea-cosies and boxing- gloves, all have been pressed into service to afford novel designs for the Christmas and New Year cards published by Messrs. Hildesheimer & F aulkner. The fans are beautifully embossed ; the boots and the bandboxes open to reveal quaint designs and verses ; the flower-pots hide timid little chickens, and the tea- cosies shelter not only a tea-pot but a little dog or a kitten. Cards in less novel forms are made equally beautiful by excellent reproductions of the work of our late lamented friend Mr. Ernest Wilson (whose draw¬ ings in our own pages must be familiar to all readers of the Magazine, and whose tragic death must be fresh in their memory), and other artists of equal merit. All alike are good, and it is difficult to make selection from so many beautiful works. “ The Shepherd’s Daffo¬ dil,” by Michael Drayton, is coupled with other similar poems in a very tasteful little volume, charmingly at a considerable

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The Gatherer. 6t illustrated by Mr. Tom Lloyd, R.W.S., and Mr. Ernest Wilson, while Mr. W. Langley supplies the illustrations to another book devoted to “ In the Harbour,’' by the ever-popular Mr. G. R. Sims. “ Gems from Ireland " is a selection of poems accompanied by a series of very beautiful sketches of Irish scenery by Miss Marian Croft. A smaller booklet is given up to Lever’s Widow Malone," illustrated by Mr. Yeend King, and others such as “ Little Bell " are addressed more par¬ ticularly to children, whom they are sure to please. Messrs. Von Portheim & Co. have sent us a series of booklets, containing sketches of “Sea," “River,” “ Mountain," and “ Country ” respectively, tastefully illustrated both in colour and monochrome, and accom¬ panied by selected and original verses. The “ Pilot " is another booklet in the same style, and issued by the same publishers, but it is wholly given up to a single story, prettily told in verse by Mr. E. Nesbit. The “ Flower" and “Leaf" series, also published by Messrs. Von Portheim, consist of booklets stamped in the shape of the flowers or leaves whose names they bear, and unfolding to show pretty verses and coloured illus¬ trations. The idea is a good one, well executed. The cards issued by Messrs. Marion & Co. display much originality of design, notably in the case of a folding card whose face is nearly covered by a stamped ivy-leaf that may be lifted to show a pretty view beneath it. Another card is quaintly folded to half conceal a delicately hand-painted spray of honeysuckle, while in others beautifully embossed sprigs of mistletoe, and clasped hands, are accompanied by well-chosen motto- greetings. A Handy Cap Wrench. The annexed engraving shows a new cap wrench for the wheels of vehicles, and the mode of using it. With this appliance farmers are able to unscrew various sizes of caps by adjusting its grip, and thus the need of having several wrenches to suit different wheels is avoided. Some Novelties for Ladies. A new suspender for china, when used for decora¬ tive purposes, has recently been patented. The novelty consists in the use of a strong elastic band, which passes through the rings of two hooks that clutch the plate, or other object, on either side, and are held in position by the tension of the elastic. An¬ other ring is so fitted to the band behind the plate as to serve for attaching it to the nail in the wall. Passing from the drawing-room to the kitchen, we may notice in this connection that a new form of preserved milk has lately been introduced into this country, the milk being reduced by a chemical process to a powder, which is capable of easy trans¬ formation into a liquid form by the addition of a little boiling water. The advantages of this preparation are obvious, and will perhaps be appreciated even more in a further development of the method, in which choco¬ late is also added, when all that is necessary to make a good cup of chocolate is to treat a given quantity of the powder with boiling water. In the nursery another novelty which has lately been brought before us will perhaps be equally welcome. It consists of a feeding tray, for the use of little children at table. The tray is large enough to accommodate a child’s plate, together with his cup and spoon, and it is so shaped that over the bevel of the table there projects for about an inch and a half a trough running the whole length of the tray, and calculated to catch any droppings from the spoon, which might . otherwise injure the child’s clothes or the carpet, A New Windmill. In a recent Gatherer we gave an account of a new wind motor, and our attention has since been called to another, which has been brought out at Penrith. In this also the shaft is vertical, and has four arms fitted to its top, each with a sail or float attached in such a manner as to open when coming round against the wind, and shut in the other position. The mill requires no adjusting to face the wind, no matter what direction it blows in, and the power is taken direct from the upright shaft. A Root Cleaner and Slicer. The implement which we illustrate is designed to clean, or slice, or pulp roots for live stock on farms. It consists of an open drum of wrought-iron, into which the roots are thrown, and as it revolves the dirt is cleaned away by the tubers rubbing on each

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62 The Gatpierer. other. The roots are then delivered into a slicing frame provided with a cutting barrel, and there sliced up. By changing the knives the slices can be regu¬ lated in size. Moreover, the cutting barrel can be removed and another one substituted, which pulps the roots. Thus the machine not only cleans but slices and pulps the turnips as required. A Hand-Rest for Artists. Our figure illustrates a new rest for the hand of artists and art-students, devised by Mr. Satchwell. It is made of oak, walnut, or ebony, according to price, and fitted with nickel-silver. The rest is twenty-four inches long, and slides easily up and down the drawing-board or canvas. By its aid, an artist can work over any part of the board without touching the canvas or paper. St. Elmo’s Fire on Ben Nevis. St. Elmo’s Fire is a natural discharge of electricity from points on the surface of the earth, as the masts and rigging of ships, the foliage of pine-trees, and the crests of mountains. It has been frequently observed on the chimneys’ lightning-rod, and anemometers above the roof of the observatory on the top of Ben ^ Nevis. If the observer stands on the roof, his hair, hat, pencil, and so forth, are found also to glow with the auroral fire. If he raises his stick aloft, the end is pointed with flame. Beyond a slight tingling sensa¬ tion in his head and hands, he suffers no annoyance. There is a feeble hissing heard during these displays, which are sometime^ very pretty; and the stormy character of the w'eather, with squally winds and clouds of snow-drift, rather heightens than diminishes the weird effect. Bitumen Bombs. A curious phenomenon is reported by the United States Consul at Maracaibo, in Venezuela. Near the Rio de Oro, at the base of the Sierra of the Colombian frontier, there is a horizontal cavern, which from time to time ejects huge globules of bitumen, that explode like bomb-shells with considerable noise ; and the pitch, forming a black glacier, runs into a kind of pool or lake near the river -bank. The territory, bounded by the rivers Zulia and Catatumbo and the Cordillera, is rich in deposits and flows of asphalte and petroleum. At a distance of about seven kilometres from the confluence of the Tara and Sardinete there is a sand-mound from 25 to 30 feet high, and having an area of 8,000 square feet, on the surface of which are many little holes or vents which eject petroleum and hot water, with a noise like steamers “ blowing off.” The place is called “ Infernito,” and for a distance round the soil is impregnated with petro¬ leum. Carrier Pigeons and Balloons. According to the Novoe Vremya of Russia, the carrier pigeon has been put to a singular use in carry- ing photographs taken from a balloon to their homes on the ground below. The first trial was made from the cupola of the Cathedral of Isaac, St. Peters¬ burg, and the subject photographed w^as the Winter Palace. The plates were packed in envelopes im¬ pervious to light, and tied to the feet of the pigeons, which carried them to their station at Voekovo. A New Steel Sleeper. The railway sleeper which we illustrate is made of pressed steel, with convex corrugations in the middle to prevent it from buckling. The “ chairs,” c, c, are also strengthened with corrugations at the back. A section of the rails, R, R, is shown mounted in these chairs. The sleepers are rivetless, which is an advantage, and as they are light and portable, they appear well adapted for lines in the colonies where timber is scarce. Tuna Fruit. The fruit of the opuntia, or tuna, a Mexican cactus, is now spreading into the Southern United States and being improved by cultivation. The plant requires little care, and thrives on almost any soil, while at the same time it will endure a considerable degree of cold. The prickles are removed from the fruit, and the pulp exposed. Its flavour resembles that of a water-melon spiced with strawberry, and it forms an agreeable adjunct to the breakfast-table. The Proposed Channel Bridge. At a recent meeting of the Iron and Steel Institute, held in Paris, M. Henri Schneider read a paper on a proposed bridge across the Channel between Folke¬ stone and Cape Grisnez — the shallowest part of the water, which is there not over 30 fathoms deep. The total length of the viaduct would be 24^ miles ;

Page 72

The Gatherer. it would comprise a million tons of steel, cost 34 millions of pounds, and be finished in ten years. The piers would be constructed of solid masonry up to above the high-water level, and a steel column, 130 to 140 feet high, would rise above them to support the main girders of the bridge. The mast-room for ships would be 177 feet. Simple, iinlatticed, trussed girders would be adopted, and the “permanent way” for the trains would be 236 feet above low-water level. The greatest width of the bridge would be over 82 feet. Sir John Fowler, the engineer of the Forth Bridge, is connected with the project, which, however, is still “ a castle in the air.” A Thatching Machine. A machine for covering stacks of hay or corn with thatch, as soon as the stack is built, has been successfully introduced, and as it can be worked by labourers and rapidly performs its duties, it proves a great convenience to farmers. Fig. i shows one of the machines engaged in making the rolls of thatch, and Fig. 2 illustrates how these are applied to cover a stack. A machine of this description, driven by FIG. 2. hand, is capable of producing from 200 to 1,000 square feet of thatching per hour, depending upon the length of the straw, grass, or rushes which are employed. 1 63 According to one account, three stacks can be covered in this way as quickly as one by the older method. Seven New Games for Children. New card games for children that do not involve constant shouting on the part of the players are always acceptable, so we are glad to welcome a set of cards designed by Mr. F. J. Cross, with which no less than seven new games may be played. “ Quick, Tell ! ” and “ Pretty Pairs ” are capable of being played by even very little children, and “ Kit the Counter might help them in learning to count quickly and correctly. “ J ovial J oiners ” and “ Busy Little Builders ’’ ought to amuse older children, or those who are no longer to be classed under that head. There is a fund of amusement for the long evenings of the holi¬ days in this original set of cards, which is published by Messrs. Dean & Co. under the title of “ Quick, Tell ! ” Mr. Stevenson’s Latest Story. To say that a story is by Mr. R. L. Stevenson, is synonymous with saying that it is full of incident, but the “ Master of Ballantrae” (Cassell) is something more than this. The incident is fresh, and the characters singularly strong. The cunning of the master, the sufferings of his brother, and the honest fidelity of MacKellar, are all cleverly brought out in the course of the story, whose scene is mainly laid in the ancestral Scotch home of the master’s father. Lord Durrisdeer. To give an inkling of the plot would be to spoil the story for our readers, but we cannot help referring with a word of admiration to the very powerful, though somewhat ghastly, scene with which the book closes ; a scene which, for keen dramatic interest, we have rarely seen equalled. A Typical Englishman. This is what John Davis, the navigator, undoubtedly was, as all will say who read Mr. Markham’s bio¬ graphy of him, with which Messrs. G. Philip & Son have inaugurated their series on “The World’s Great Explorers.” The book is admirably calculated, not only to give us the salient points in the hero’s life, but also to show us exactly what his work amounted to, and how much those who have come after him have benefited by and improved upon it. The work is one that we should like to see in the hands of all right-thinking boys. An Old Favourite in a New Dress. In many respects the wittiest, perhaps the “Jack¬ daw of Rheims ” is also the most popular of the “Ingoldsby Legends.” Small wonder, then, that it has been selected for special illustration by Lucius Rossi, who has provided us with a series of illustrations that are worthy of the matchless humour of the poem. Almost every line of the poem finds an illustration in this work ; and as the illustrations are reproduced in monochrome, it ought to form a most acceptable Christmas gift. The quality of the reproduction re¬ flects great credit on the publishers, Messrs. Raphael Tuck & Sons. This same beauty of reproduction

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64 Pictures of the Months. characterises the varied Christmas and New Year cards issued by this firm. The foremost place must be given to the copies of world-famed pictures by the old masters, such as Correggio’s ‘‘ Nativity,” from Dresden, and the Sistine Raphael. Novelty of design is shown in the shape of hat-boxes, yule logs, cheeses, and even birds, all of which open to reveal dainty and appropriate verses and wishes. Framed pictures, too, whose miniature mouldings and mounts are perfect in every detail, and the ever-popular bells and horse¬ shoes are pressed into the service with excellent results. Mr. G. R. Sims’s pretty verses on ‘‘ Sweet Devonshire ” are tastefully presented in a daintily covered little booklet, that finds a companion work in Mr. Sidney Morris’s “ A Yule of Cheer.” All tastes and all pockets are to be suited from Messrs. Raphael Tuck’s bountiful stores. Old Stories for Young Readers. Under the title of “The Blue Fairy Book” (Long¬ mans), Mr. Andrew Lang has collected the most popular of the old fairy tales, which were the delight of children of former years. It is pleasant to meet again, and in such an attractive form, the friends of our nursery days ; and we cannot do better, now that we have the opportunity of doing so, than pass on to our successors these old-world fairy tales that seemed so real to us in the years that are gone. Christmas Presents. Soon all the world will be buying Christmas presents and choosing seasonable mementoes and greetings. And it does not seem that the old difficulty of selection will be any less than in former years. Messrs. Eyre & Spottiswoode have issued a number of colour books and booklets, very suitable for such a purpose, and among them we must assign the place of honour to the Edition de luxe of “ The Jackdaw of Rheims,” a veritable masterpiece of humorous art, whose pages are exquisitely designed. The illustrations are by Mr. Ernest M. Jessop, whose carefully detailed work is admirably displayed on the broad pages of the book, that render it suitable for a present that shall long survive to remind the recipient of its donor. The next place must undoubtedly be given to the dainty little volume of “ Children’s Prayers,” illustrated by Miss Jane M. Dealy and Mr. F. M. Marriott. Space would fail us to describe all the beautiful little booklets, most of them addressed specially to young readers, but the same careful work and beauty of design will be found in all. More lasting and valuable presents are the Bibles for which the Queen’s printers are justly famed, and which for excellence of workmanship, in every detail, we have never seen surpassed. A more useful or more valuable Bible than the tastefully bound “ Variorum Teacher’s Bible,” or one better fitted to give a teacher substantial aid, we cannot imagine. The India paper edition of this work is a marvel of com¬ pactness. _ OUR LITERARY PRIZE SCHEME. Full particulars of our Literary Prize Scheme will be announced m our next number. PICTURES OF THE MONTHS.

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6 0 TO BE GIVEN UP. By KATE EYRE, Author of "For the Good of the Family,’’ “A Step in the Dark,” &c. &c. CHAPTER THE FIFTH. THE IMPENETRABLE DULNESS OF RALPH LITTLEDALE. ULLOA, Dacre ! is that you ? sang out Ralph, as he came boldly down the garden path. Although Mabyn’s hands were now no longer clasped in Philip’s, and she was standing several paces from the gate over which he was leaning, her heightened colour and downcast eyes would have afforded sufficient indica¬ tion of what had oc¬ curred to any person less unobservant than Ralph. Ralph, however, neither saw nor suspected anything unusual. But then the idea that Philip might seriously admire his sister had never entered his head. Of course Mabyn was a dear girl, sweet-looking, good, and lovable. Doubtless she would have a lover some day, and a lucky fellow he would be, too ; but that she should win the love of a man like Philip Dacre was a triumph for which Ralph was totally unprepared. Philip was accustomed to move in such good society; and when a man can gather hot-house flowers, one hardly expects to see him pluck a wayside blossom, however sweet its perfume may be. And so Ralph joined Philip and Mabyn, little dream¬ ing that by so doing he was preventing his friend from plucking the wayside blossom, which he would have been so overjoyed to see him wear. “What in the name of all that’s wonderful has brought you over here at this hour ? ” asked the un¬ conscious youth. “ 1 came to wish your sister good-bye,” replied Philip boldly. But even that hint was not broad enough to have the desired effect. “ How soon do you start ? ” “ In about a couple of hours.” Then there was a pause, during which Philip glanced at Mabyn. Wild thoughts of asking Ralph to make himself scarce did cross his mind, but Mabyn was already looking so very uncomfortable that he feared to further embarrass her. “Won’t you come in?” asked Ralph, opening the gate. “ Thanks, old fellow.” “ Of course, you’ll stop to breakfast?” “No, I think not. I must be off in a minute or two.” Then he again glanced at Mabyn. Oh, the im¬ penetrable dulness of Ralph, not to have read the meaning of those glances ! “ What an awfully lucky fellow you are to be going abroad ! Don’t I wish I were you?” “ Oh, I don’t know,” replied Philip nonchalantly. Should he, or should he not, tell Ralph that his room would at that moment be far preferable to his com¬ pany ? Here Mabyn took the matter into her own hands. Murmuring something about the children’s breakfast, she hurriedly asked Philip to excuse her, and held out her hand to bid him adieu. “ Since you won’t stay to breakfast, Mr. Dacre, good-bye.” He took her hand in his, and looked tenderly into her eyes. “You will think of me sometimes while I am away?” “Yes, oh, yes!” She hesitated a moment, then with her disengaged hand she drew a rose from her belt, and held it out shyly towards him. He took it and raised it to his lips. “ It shall go with me everywhere, as will the memory of the fair donor,” She smiled up at him, with the tears shining in her eyes. Then she ran into the house. Up to that morning, Mabyn had never thought of the possibility of Philip Dacre asking her to be his wife ; for she, too, had shared the idea that the scent of wayside flowers would not satisfy his fastidious taste. The present had been to her so full of sweet contentment that she had not dared to look into the future. But now all that was changed. He loved her : there could be no doubt of that. Had he not taken her hands in his ? And had he not called her Mabyn — once — twice — three times ? And how eager had been his manner, and how pleading his eyes 1 Yes, yes, he loved her, he loved her ; and, greatest happi¬ ness of all, she might allow herself to love him. And then she gave full vent to her pent-up tenderness for the man, hugging herself for very joy as she dwelt on all that the future would bring her. For it never occurred to Mabyn to doubt that Philip would ask her to be his wife as soon as he should return to England. Only two months ! It was so short a time, and would pass so quickly. And then her secret was so very precious to her. She could not bring herself to share it even with her half-cousin, Clare Eastabrook, dearly as she loved her. No; not although by her silence she was guilty of intentionally conveying a false impression. It was conveyed on the day when Mr. Eastabrook and his daughter took up their quarters at The Fountains. Already Philip had been gone a month. “ And how is everybody ? ” asked Miss Eastabrook. The two girls were sitting together over afternoon tea. Miss Eastabrook having at length got tired oi 725

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66 To BE Given up. going from room to room to praise and criticise the arrangements. “ Everybody is, I believe, quite well, and intends calling on you in the course of a day or two.” ‘‘ Oh, dear ! ” Now, Clare, you know you like society.” “In moderation.” “ Your coming is, I assure you, causing much ex¬ citement in Dursington. The fame of the beautiful, talented, and rich Miss Eastabrook has been noised abroad very freely.” “Which adjective is generally put first ?” “ That which relates to the mighty dollar, I fancy.” “ Ah ! I thought so.” “ But that is because they have never seen you.” “ Long may they pine for the privilege !” “ This day month you will be hand in glove with the whole parish.” “ I doubt it.” “ Wait and see.” “ That reminds me ; did Mr. Dacre’s visit pass oft satisfactorily ? If you remember, you ran away from me in order to help in the preparation of the fatted calf. Was he worth the sacrifice.^” “How modest of you to imply that running away from you was a sacrifice ! ” “Don’t prevaricate, Mab. Was Mr. Dacre worth the sacrifice — I repeat the word — you made on his behalf?” “ I think he was.” “In what way did he prove his worthiness?” “ By making himself agreeable.” “ You found him agreeable, then ? ” “ Very.” “Mabsy, come, confess: did he turn out to be a Mr. — Mr. — Mr. — ? You know that we agreed he was to do so.” “ I do not remember that I was a party to any such agreement.” “ Mabsy, Mabsy ! I always thought you had such a good memory.” “ I fear you are mistaken : that is, if the proof depends on my recalling the circumstance of which you speak.” “ In order to be brief, I will confine my question to asking if Ralph’s friend is a Mr. — Mr. — Mr. — , with¬ out insisting on your admission as to our having agreed he was to appear in that character.” “ Ralph’s friend is Ralph’s friend.” “And not Ralph’s sister’s admirer?” For a moment Mabyn hesitated. Should she tell Clare of that interrupted interview? Hitherto she had never had a ghost of a secret from her cousin ; but *now she could not bring herself to speak of that which lay so near to her heart. And then, after all, what had she to tell ? A few words had been spoken whilst her hands were held fast, and the man’s voice had been eager and his eyes pleading. It had meant a great deal to her, but would it sound much in the telling were she to respond to Clare’s invitation to confess? Moreover, Clare’s mood was so playful, and the subject so sacred. Would there not be something incongruous in laying bare her heart’s most cherished secret at such a moment? “ Clare, how ridiculous you are ! ” she exclaimed at length, trying to laugh in a natural manner. Foolish Mabyn ! she had let her opportunity slip by. How often afterwards did she not regret it? “ I want you to enlarge on Mr. Dacre’s character¬ istics. My own are, I fancy, already known to me,” replied Miss Eastabrook. “ It is said that we never know ourselves,” remarked Mabyn sagely, hoping thereby to draw Clare away from the subject under discussion. But Clare was not to be managed so easily. “Tell me, Mab, does this most agreeable gentleman repeat his visits to Grange House?” “ He did repeat them.” “And has now discontinued doing so ?” “ Yes.” “ Has he ceased to be Ralph’s friend ?” “ Not that I am aware of.” “ In what direction, then, must I look for the solu¬ tion to the mystery ? ” “ There is no mystery to be solved.” “ A gentleman whose chief characteristic is his agreeableness visits repeatedly a house where there is a fair, young - ” “ Clare, do be quiet ! ” “ Put me in full possession of all the facts of the case, and I will ask no more questions.” “ Mr. Dacre has gone to Paris on business.” “And will Dursington know him no more ?” “ He returns in a month’s time.” “ And there will be a renewal of his visits and his agreeableness ? ” “ Why do you confine your questions to one member of the family only? Julia and Sophy Dacre are going to call on you. Mrs. Dacre is an invalid.” “Are they nice.^ — the family, I mean.” “ I like Mrs. Dacre very much, and I am getting quite fond of Sophy. I haven’t quite made up my mind yet about Mr. Dacre and Julia.” “ Which is a charitable way of saying you don’t like them ? ” “ Clare, Sophy Dacre has a lover. He isn’t exactly installed in that character, still I think he must be described in that way. Now, who do you think it is?” “ Not Ralph, surely ! ” “ Oh, dear, no. I don’t believe Ralph ever thinks of girls at all.” “That is a delusion under which many sisters labour respecting their brothers.” “ But you are not trying to guess, Clare.” “Mabsy, my dear, I exhausted my every idea on the subject when I mentioned Ralph’s name.” “ Sophy’s lover is your Mr. Charrington’s brother.” “ Edward Charrington ? ” “ Yes ; or Ted, as Sophy calls him.” “ I wish it had been the other brother. I wish it had been Fred.” “ Clare, will you never care for Fred yourself?’’ “ Never — never — never ! The man simply bores me

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To BE Given up. to death. I could endure him better if he would only amuse me. He does nothing but stare at me, and agree with every word I say.” “There must be times, then, when he is prepared to go great lengths.” “ He’s a simpleton ! And now, I suppose, I shall see more of him than ev^er. Oh, dear ! Oh, dear ! I shall be glad when my twenties are well over, and people have ceased to bother me.” “ By that time you will have made your choice — for better or for worse.” “Not necessarily. I am happy — very happv — as I am.” “ But a time must come when your happiness will be centred in someone,” insisted Mabyn, drawing this conclusion from her own newly acquired wisdom. “Nonsense, Mabsy ! Don’t you get hold of any such ridiculous ideas.” “ But it isn’t nonsense, Clare. It is the soundest of sound sense.” \ “ Well, I will promise you one thing, little cousin : the person in whom I centre my future happiness will noC be Fred Charrington. In fact, I feel certain that I have never yet seen that most fortunate of individuals.” Would that it had been so ! CHAPTER THE SIXTH. THE GARDEN-PARTY AT SOUTHFIELDS. It was Sophy Dacre’s twenty-first birthday, and a large garden-party was to be given at Southfields in honour of the event. That so important an occasion must be marked by some sort of jollification the Dacres had been unani¬ mous in declaring, but as to the most suitable form for the festivities to take there had been much dis¬ cussion. Mrs. Dacre had been strongly in favour of waiting until after Philip’s return, and then hearing what he had to suggest, seeing that he was expected home almost daily. But Sophy, although she greatly de¬ plored her eldest brother’s absence, was very anxious that her birthday should be kept on the right date. The stifling heat rendered all indoor amusements out of the question. The choice, therefore, rested between a picnic and a garden-party ; and after the respective advantages of the two forms of entertainment had been weighed with great nicety by the family in full conclave, a decision was arrived at in favour of the latter. One of the chief objections which had been urged against a garden-party was that it must necessarily be such a very short entertainment. The guests could not possibly be asked to come before three o’clock, nor could they be expected to remain long after six. Light refreshments are all very well in their way, but one cannot ask people to subsist on such meagre fare for more than three or four hours at a stretch. And then, if the guests were to leave at so early an hour, what a dull evening would the inmates of Southfields spend ! And yet, commodious as was Mr. Dacre’s 67 residence, its resources would certainly prove in¬ adequate to the demand were all those who were expected to grace the afternoon party to remain to dinner. In the face of such a dismal prospect, a compromise was ultimately effected. The bulk of the guests should be allowed to depart early, while a favoured few should be invited to stay on for a social evening. Amongst the “favoured few” were Mr. and Miss Eastabrook, Mr. Frederick and Mr. Edward Char¬ rington, Miss Littledale, and Mr. Ralph Littledale. Sophy’s birthday fell on a Saturday, so that Ralph could accept the invitation. On the all-important day Mabyn was dressed betimes, and then, having partaken of an early and very light luncheon, she started for Southfields. She was not looking forward to the affair with any great amount of pleasure. She was naturally rather shy, and then she did not know much of the people she was likely to meet. If Philip had been at home it would have been very different. Of course he would have had to go among the guests, and the time he could devote to her must necessarily have been short, but still there would have been the joy of his near presence ; the tones of his voice would have reached her from time to time, and slie would have been blissfully happy. Mabyn had arranged to be at Southfields fully an hour before the other guests were expected, so that she might help with the preparations. When she arrived, she found that her presence was urgently needed. The Dacres had a way of leaving everything till the last moment. The boys were putting up tennis-nets and marking the courts, while Mr. Dacre and his youngest daughter, were gathering flowers. “ Ah ! how do you do. Miss Littledale ? ” said the master of the house, recognising Mabyn as she came across the lawn. “ I am afraid you have had a hot walk.” Mabyn admitted that it was rather warm, and then she bent down to kiss Mabel Dacre. “ Sophy ought to have sent the carriage for you. The horses are only eating their heads off in the stables. Sophy ” — and here Mr. Dacre raised his voice — “why didn’t you send the carriage for Miss Little¬ dale.?” “ Oh, here you are ! ” exclaimed Sophy, as she ap- peared at the entrance of a tent which had been erected for refreshments. “Do come in here, Mabyn ; there is such a lot to be done yet.” Mabyn complied with the request, not being sorry to escape from Mr. Dacre, whose patronage was some¬ times a little hard to bear. “ Will you help me to arrange the flowers, Mabyn ? I don’t believe we shall ever be done in time.” “ Where is J alia ? ” “ Oh, she says she is helping mamma to dress,” said Sophy rather impatiently. “She always makes helping mamma an excuse for getting out of the way when there is anything to be done.” Then Mabyn began her task in earnest. There

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68 To BE Given up. was far too much to be done to waste time in talking. Presently Mr. Dacre came in, his arms heaped up with flowers. “ Here you are, Miss Littledale ; use them as freely as you like. There are plenty more where these came from.^’ “ Thank you, Mr. Dacre.” “Just look at these geraniums ! Are they not fine enough to take a prize ? Has your father anything to equal them in his garden ? ” “ Oh, dear, no ! “ Ah, I thought not ! Doesn’t take much pride in his garden, I suppose? Well, I must say, I like to keep my place decent.” “It always looks very nice,” said Mabyn politely. “Well, ril just go and cut a few more. You can do with another dozen or so of roses, eh ? Here, Mabel, bring the basket this way.” Then Mabyn proceeded with her task in silence, while Sophy superintended the servants who were laying the tables. “ Can I be of any assistance, Sophy ? ” asked a jovial voice, while its owner, a fine, good-humoured looking young fellow, appeared at the entrance to the tent. “ I wish you would go into the conservatory, Ted, and cut some more maidenhair fern. I don’t believe Miss Littledale has half enough,” replied Sophy, without turning her head. It was very evident that the voice was familiar to her. “ Right you are ! ” replied the voice, and its owner immediately disappeared. “ I didn’t know Mr. Charrington was here,” re¬ marked Mabyn. “ Oh, he’s been helping the boys. Didn’t you see him as you came across the lawn ? ” “ I didn’t notice him. Is his brother here yet?” “ No ; he’ll come later on.” The servants had now left the tent. “ Let me help you,” said Sophy, coming up to Mabyn. “ It’s all done now except the flowers. How pretty you are making them look ! ” Mabyn looked pleased. “ I am glad you like them, dear.” “ I’m dying to talk to you, Mabyn ! I’ve such a piece of news !” “ Really?” “Julia is engaged to be married. Mr. Dudson spoke to papa last evening, and Julia has been mea¬ sured for her ring. She’ll be Lady Dudson, after all ! ” “ I hope she will be happy,” said Mabyn, with quiet seriousness. The early mention of Julia’s future title jarred on her ears. “ I don’t fancy Julia would ever be very happy under any circumstances ; she’s such a grumbler. But it’s a splendid match for her, isn’t it ? ” “ I suppose it is— that is, if she really cares for Mr. Dudson.” “ What a sentimental little piece of goods you are, to be sure ! You have never appeared in this cha¬ racter before.” “ Have I not?” “But, Mabyn, seriously, do you think it matters so very much whether people care — really care, you know — for each other ? ” “ I think it is just everything,” answered Mabyn, with shining eyes. “ I believe love to be the main¬ spring of the only real happiness in life. Of course, I know there are other good things for the possession of which we ought to be thankful ; but they, at the most, will bring only contentment.” “ Why, Mabyn, I shall begin to think you are in love yourself, if you go on like this,” replied Sophy, half awed by Mabyn’s unwonted vehemence. “ You asked me what I thought about such things, and I have told you. That is all.” “ But, Mabyn, where is the good of us women getting such ideas ? We must take what is offered us, or else go without.” “ Let us go without, then,” said Mabyn stoutly. “ Love in its highest, truest sense may not come to us — it comes, as we all know, to very few — but not one of us need render its coming absolutely impossible by hastily entering into a loveless marriage.” “ I had no idea you held such strong views on the subject.” “ I do not speak more strongly than I feel. I firmly believe that loveless marriages are the cause of nearly all the unhappiness in this world. It is not only the principal actors who suffer ; it is one of the sins that are visited upon the children unto the third and fourth generation. Go into a home where the parents have never loved each other, and then you will see how little it merits that sacred name.” “Then you do not think Julia is to be congra¬ tulated ? ” “ I know nothing about it. How can I tell what her sentiments towards Mr. Dudson may be ? I am merely laying down a general principle, and not pre¬ suming to apply it to a particular case.” “ Well, Mabyn, when I marry for position, I shall not come to you to congratulate me,” and Sophy laughed a little uneasily. “ Dear Sophy, I trust you may never do such a thing. You are far too nice for so terrible a fate.” “ Will that be enough ? ” asked Mr. Charrington, re¬ turning with the maidenhair fern. “ Thank you, Ted ; that will do very nicely,” replied Sophy, speaking with much more gentleness than was her wont. “ Miss Littledale has been giving me such a lecture ! ” “ How do you do. Miss Littledale ? May I inquire the subject of the lecture ?” “ It is a grave matter to discuss just now, Mr. Charrington, and I am afraid that I have already said rather too much.” “ Have I your permission. Miss Littledale, to ask Sophy to tell me all about it later on ?” “ Sophy can tell you what she likes, of course.” “ I don’t know that I shall tell you anything about it, Ted, for I am sure you would side with Miss Littledale.” “ Yes, Mr. Charrington, I think you would,” assented Mabyn quietly.

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To BE Given up. “ I believe you had Ted in your mind all the time you were lecturing me, Mabyn.’’ Then Mr. Charrington declared himself consumed with a burning curiosity, and was preparing to insist upon a further explanation, when Mr. Dacre brought in the roses he had promised Mabyn. 69 but never before had he banished him from his daughter’s side in so marked a manner. Ted hesitated a moment. “ The nets have been up some time, sir ; but I’ll see if Tm wanted,” he said at length. “ Stop a moment, Ted,” exclaimed Sophy, and she ‘‘Here you are, Miss Littledale. Now you can set to work to some purpose. There is nothing like having good material to your hand.” “ Thank you, Mr. Dacre. They are exquisite.” “ Hulloa, Charrington! I think I heard one of the boys calling out for you a moment ago. They want you to help with the tennis-nets, I expect.” That Mr. Dacre did not approve of Ted Charring- ton’s attentions to Sophy was very generally known, darted out of the tent after him. “ I want to speak to you.” “ Well, what is it, dear.? I don’t want to lose much time in making myself scarce, after so broad a hint.” “ Ted, will you undertake to arrange the tennis-sets ? Papa will be here and there and everywhere, and Harry is not old enough to do it. If there is no one by to look after things, the same people will keep the courts all the afternoon.”

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70 To BE Given up. “Are you, too, going to enter into the conspiracy to banish rne ? “ Ted ! As if I should do such a thing ! You know I would much rather you were dancing attendance on me. But on an occasion like this one must see to the comfort of one's guests : and if there is no one in charge of the courts, half the people who want to play won’t get a chance. Trn awfully sorry papa spoke as he did just now. I can't think what has come over him lately ; he never used to interfere between you and me. Now you will do as I ask you, won’t you?” and then she put- her hand caressingly on his arm, and looked up smilingly into his face. Need it be said that he promised to do as she wished ? Then Sophy returned to the tent. “ There, let me help you to dispose of the roses, and then we had better run away and wash our hands as quickly as ever we can The people will begin to arrive in a few minutes now,” she said to Mabyn. “ What had you to say to Ted Charrington of such signal importance, Sophy?” asked Mr. Dacre. Sophy hesitated. Her father, she felt, had no right to ask her such a question. Mr. Dacre looked very seriously annoyed. “ I should hardly have thought my daughter could have had anything to say to this young man which she • would object to her father hearing.” “ I merely asked him to look after the tennis-players, papa. Somebody is wanted to see that the same people don’t keep the courts the whole afternoon,” Sophy explained in a conciliatory tone. It would never do to put Mr. Dacre out of temper just as the guests were expected. “ A capital idea ! ” exclaimed Mr. Dacre, his good humour returning in full force. “ I should never have thought of it myself.” “ Papa thinks the arrangement will keep Ted away from me all the afternoon,” thought Sophy, a little bitterly. And then she was conscious of feeling very kindly towards her old playfellow. “Poor dear Ted ! It’s a piiy he hasn’t a little more money.” As the two girls ran towards the house, they came across Mrs. Dacre and her eldest daughter, Julia. “ I am seeing that dear mamma is comfortably settled,” said Julia, as she stood holding some light wraps, while a servant was arranging an invalid’s chair in a shady position. “How do you do, Mabyn?” she added languidly. “ I am afraid I have not a dis¬ engaged hand to offer you.” There was much of self- consciousness in Julia’s tone, as of one who should say, “ See, / am looking after the comfort of the helpless, while you are merely seeking your own pleasure.” “ Pray don’t trouble,” said Mabyn quickly, alluding to the hand difficulty. “ How are you feeling to-day, Mrs. Dacre ? ” “ Better, dear, much better. It is such lovely weather, isn’t it?” “ I hope the excitement of seeing so many people wont tire you too much,” said Mabyn, with much solicitude. Of all the Dacres, always of course ex¬ cepting Philip, the mother was the one to whom Mabyn’s heart went out most spontaneously. But then Mrs. Dacre was in feature very like her eldest son ; moreover, she was much given to talking about him : two sure passports to Mabyn’s good graces. Julia was dressed in the height of fashion, and there was about her an air of languid elegance, which she appeared to cultivate. But her thin lips, and a certain hard expression that one caught occasioiiully in her really fine eyes, suggested the possibility that there might be times when she would be anything but languid. “Yes; the future Sir Bevan Dudson will have a handsome bride,” thought Mabyn. “ But if I were a man, I would rather marry Sophy twenty times over.” “Have I not to congratulate you, Julia?” added Mabyn aloud, feeling that she ought to say something, and yet not quite knowing what would be appropriate, under the circumstances. She and Julia had never fraternised. “ Oh, thanks ; you are very kind,” replied the bride- elect, in a tone that forbade any further allusion to the subject. “ I suppose Mr. Dudson will be here this after¬ noon?” said Mabyn, as the two girls passed into the house. “ Trust Julia for trotting him out. She pretends to take it all very coolly, just as if a future baronet were no more than her due ; all the same, she’s awfully proud of having bagged her bird.” “She is very handsome.” “Yes, everyone says how handsome she is,” replied Sophy, with a touch of sisterly pride. “ She was the handsomest girl in Dursington until Miss Eastabrook came.” “ You think Miss Eastabrook handsomer?” asked Mabyn, her eyes sparkling with pleasure at this praise of her cousin. “ I don’t know that she is handsomer exactly. 1 doubt if her features are really as perfect as Julia’s. But she is far, far more beautiful. She has such mag¬ nificent eyes ; her very soul seems to speak through them.” “ Dear Clare I ” murmured Mabyn, almost under her breath. “ How fond you are of her, Mabyn !” said Sophy softly. “ Indeed, indeed I am ! There is no one like Clare ! ” After this the guests began to arrive, and Mabyn was soon feeling, as she had half feared she would, rather dull. Sophy ran up to her now and again to whisper some interesting piece of news into her ear, but she, of course, could not devote too much time to one guest. “I wish Clare would come! How late she is!” thought Mabyn over and over again. Then she selected a seat from whence she could see a small section of the road along which Mr. and Miss Eastabrook must drive. “ There they are ! ” exclaimed Mabyn at length, as she espied a pair of Shetland ponies coming along at a brisk trot.

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To BE Given up. 71 A few more rhoments, and Miss Eastabrook was entering the garden, leaning on her father’s arm. “ Why, you look tired already, Mabsy,” exclaimed Clare, as Mabyn ran up to her. “What have you been doing to yourself ? ” “ Oh, I’m so pleased to see you and Uncle Nat ! I’ve been feeling so lonely ! ” Miss Eastabrook slipped her hand through Mabyn’s arm. “ We shall both be happy enough now we are together, dear.” “ Oh, Clare, how nice you look ! I’m so glad you are wearing white. Nothing else suits you one-half as well,” whispered Mabyn; “ And your hair, too ! How lovely it is ! ” and Mabyn raised her eyes to Miss Eastabrook’s massive coils of dusky hair. Miss Eastabrook smiled calmly. She was far too accustomed to flattery for it to make the slightest im¬ pression on her. Not that Mabyn’s heartfelt admira¬ tion should have been so designated. There were no more dull moments for Mabyn now. True, the men flocked to Miss Eastabrook’s side, as her cousin had known they would do ; but, neverthe¬ less, Clare succeeded in keeping Mabyn by her, letting her numerous admirers see plainly that if anyone was in the way. it was certainly not Miss Littledale. And now that Mabyn no longer felt she was making herself conspicuous by appearing lonely, she was able to look about her. Mr. Dudson had come and was evidently under¬ going the treatment Sophy had prophesied for him : that of being trotted out Juua was still languid, moving about with much -studied grace ; but Mabyn fancied that she kept her lover well under her con¬ trolling eye, and that that eye became more vigilant whenever the young man glanced towards Miss Easta¬ brook. On the whole, he bore his position well, but still Mabyn fell to wondering if he would not have extracted more enjoyment out of the gathering had he not come to it in the character of Miss Dacre’s fianci. Of course it was exceedingly well-mannered of Julia to keep within view the whole afternoon. In her position, as eldest daughter of the house, it would, without doubt, have been bad form for her to have exhibited the slightest desire to wander off alone with her lover ; still, in a lady so recently engaged, such devotion to duty was, to say the least of it, rather remarkable. But the guest in whom Mabyn felt the most interest was a Mr. Nightingale. And yet the gentle¬ man was not possessed of any inherent qualities cal¬ culated to attract her. To Mabyn he appeared to be well advanced in years, although his actual age was probably not much over fifty, but he was corpulent and bald, and gave indications of suffering greatly from the heat. He had, moreover, acquired an un¬ pleasant habit of mopping his head and face with a red silk handkerchief. It was, however, the very marked homage which Mr. Dacre paid this gentle¬ man, and the persistent way in which he forced himself on Sophy, that first attracted Mabyn’s atten¬ tion. “Why, he is old enough to be her father. Surely it could not have been on his account that Mr. Dacre snubbed poor Ted Charrington so un¬ mercifully this afterqoon No man could ever wish his daughter to marry such a horrid creature as that !” soliloquised Mabyn. And then, from thinking of Ted Charrington, Mabyn’s thoughts turned to his brother Fred. He had come in almost immediately after Miss Easta¬ brook, and had hardly taken his eyes off her the whole afternoon. “ If he wants Clare, he is going the wrong way to get her. She will never care for a man who only stares at her and says nothing. I don’t believe he’s a simpleton, either ; it is just that her beauty dazes him. If he could only pluck up courage to hold his own, he might stand some chance ; for after all, he’s a fine-looking man, and a gentleman to boot.” At that moment Mabyn's reflections were cut short by the appearance of Sophy, who came running across the lawn, beckoning to her in a state of the wildest excitement. “ Mabyn, Mabyn, come here ! I want you. I’ve something to tell you— something very important.” Mabyn joined Sophy, and the two girls stood together for a few minutes. Sophy was talking volubly, but Mabyn said hardly a word. Her colour had risen, however, and her eyes were very bright. Then Mabyn returned, and slipped quietly into her seat by her cousin’s side. Three or four men were talking to Miss Eastabrook, who was, as usual, at no loss to amuse her listeners. A mock battle of words was being carried on, and, notwithstanding the numbers arraigned against her, Miss Eastabrook was getting decidedly the best of the argument, when she suddenly awoke to the fact that Mabyn had hardly spoken for the last half-hour. “Why, Mab, how quiet you are all at once !” she exclaimed, her conscience pricking her for having, as she fancied, neglected her cousin. And then the men knew that they would no longer enjoy Miss Eastabrook’s undivided attention. They were already beginning to feel a little jealous of Miss Littledale ; Miss Eastabrook made such a ridiculous fuss over her And they did not believe in feminine friendships. Men seldom do. Mabyn turned a very happy face towards her cousin. “ Was I quiet ? I wasn’t aware of it.” “ Of course you were quiet, you little mouse. Come, let us walk about a little. I am tired of sitting still.” “ What was the nature of the mysterious communi¬ cation Sophy Dacre made to you.^ Or mustn’t I ask?” inquired Miss Eastabrook later on. “ It wasn’t mysterious ; and you may ask. Philip is expected home at nine o’clock this evening. He telegraphed to Sophy from Dover to say he should be able to offer his congratulations to her in person on her twenty-first birthday.” “ How very thoughtful of him ! A young man who can be so considerate to his sister is certainly worthy of having a fatted calf killed on his behalf. Yes, I have made up my mind to like Philip Dacre.”

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72 To BE Given up. CHAPTER THE SEVENTH. PHILIP’S RETURN. Mabyn did her best to conceal the intense joy she felt at the prospect of seeing Philip that evening. It was, however, her maidenly instinct rather than her As the “ favoured few ” were mostly young people, no inclination had been evinced to linger longer than was absolutely necessary in the dining-room, and by half-past eight the drawing-room at Southfields was filled with guests. It was still light, and the evening “PHILIP SPRANG TO HIS FEET” (/. 74). judgment which induced her to hide her delight. P'ully believing, as she did, not only that Philip loved her, but that he would lose no time in declaring his love, she was not prepared to admit the existence of any adequate reason for attempting to disguise her attachment to him. Nevertheless, she felt unac¬ countably shy ; and so, instead of giving any outward expression to her happiness, she only grew very quiet as the hour at which Philip was expected, approached. being an exceptionally warm one, the three French windows leading to the garden were left unfastened, and those who wished to enjoy the fresh air were at liberty to go in and out at will. Miss Eastabrook was one of those who always liked to be out of doors as much as possible. She had in¬ vited her cousin to accompany her into the garden, but for once Mabyn had refused — alleging as her reason that she was going to sit near Mrs. Dacre and talk to her.

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To BE Given up. 73 Poor Mabyn ! she didn’t mean to be deceitful, but she wanted to catch the first tones of Philip’s voice ; and how could she explain that to Miss Eastabrook? Another half-hour, and he would be due. So she seated herself near Mrs. Dacre’s couch, and waited with what patience she could for the blissful moment when Philip should enter the room. Mrs. Dacre was looking terribly tired, the excitement of the afternoon having been rather too much for her. She had, however, energy enough left to dwell on her delight at the prospect of so soon seeing her favourite son, and to expatiate at great length on his manifold virtues. In Miss Littledale she found a patient listener. The girl thought Mrs. Dacre a most interest¬ ing woman, and was well content to listen to her as long as ever she cared to talk, merely putting an occasional “Yes” or “No,” whenever those mono¬ syllables seemed to be required. And then at last he came. Although it was getting dusk, the lamps were not yet lighted, so that she could not see his features distinctly. But the outline of his form, in its manly proportions, was discernible ; and she could catch the tones of that well-remembered voice. Her heart beat wildly, so wildly that under the cover of the friendly darkness she placed her hand against her side to still its throbbings. He did not notice her at first. She was glad, for her voice was not sufficiently under control to have re¬ plied to his greeting. She seemed to be watching him through a mist of happiness. Sophy was hanging about his arm, and even Julia had put aside her languor as she welcomed him. Then his father advanced, and the two men shook hands. But Mabyn fancied there was not much cordiality between them. “ Is that you, mother dear, in the corner ? ” he asked as he came towards Mrs. Dacre’s couch. “ Hulloa, Dudson ! how are you, old fellow ?” he ex¬ claimed, as, in crossing the room, he recognised his sister’s fiance. But his greeting was rather off-hand, and the lover replied to it with cold indifference. Philip had never appeared very keenly alive to the ad¬ vantages of the Dudson- Dacre alliance. Then he bent down and kissed Mrs. Dacre very tenderly. “Are you better, dearest.^” he asked, with much solicitude in his tone. “ Yes, yes, Philip ; I am always better when you come home. How are you, my dear, dear boy ” “ All right, mother dear,” and he kissed her again : the tall, stalwart son, of whom the mother was so proud. Then at last he saw her. “Ah, Miss Littledale, is that you?” He took her hand, and she allowed it to rest in his palm as he ex¬ pressed his pleasure at seeing her. “ I thought I should probably find you here.” Then he had thought of her, and she was not mistaken. “Did you have a pleasant journey?” she asked softly. “Well, no, I can’t say it was particularly pleasant ; but the pleasure of being home again makes up foi all that. And the doctor and Mrs. Littledale, are they well ? ” All this time he had been holding Mabyn’s hand ; but now, as she replied that her parents were quite well, she drew it gently away, fearing that its detention would call for remark, although it was already so dark that this was a fear she need not have entertained. Meanwhile Miss Eastabrook had wandered round the garden with first one, and then another, until at length she found herself alone with Mr. Frederick Charrington. She would have made for the house as soon as she realised that they were alone together, had he not shown much firmness in preventing the carrying out of this intention. He had waited his opportunity so long that he was determined he would not let her escape him now. Mabyn had been right ; Fred Charrington was no simpleton, although Miss Easta¬ brook had been ready enough to pronounce him one. “ Miss Eastabrook, I have something I wish to say to you. Will you spare me a few minutes ?” “ No, Mr. Charrington, you cannot have anything to say to me — nothing, at least, that would not be better left unsaid.” She did not mean to be rude to him ; she only wished to save him pain, and herself annoyance. “ Pardon me, but until you know what 1 have to say I must be the better judge of whether or not it ought to be said.” He walked beside her, proudly erect. Glancing at him for a moment, it did just occur to her that hitherto she might possibly have been mistaken in the cha¬ racter of the man. “As you will, Mr. Charrington; but mind, I have warned you that in keeping silence you would best serve your own interests.” “ 1 think otherwise. Miss Eastabrook, I love you. I have loved you ever - ” “ That certainly should never have been said. Mr. Charrington, for your sake and for mine, say no more.” “ Kindly hear me to the end. I love you with all the intensity of which I am capable. I love you so dearly that I doubt if you can form the dimmest con¬ ception of what my love for you is. But I am not telling you this because I hope to hear you say that you love me in return - ” “ I certainly do not do that.” “ - For I know quite well that I am utterly in¬ different to you,” he continued, not in the least heeding her interruption. “ I have told you this because, now that you know what my feelings towards you are, you will perhaps permit me to ask you a question which is to me of paramount importance. Do you love anyone else ? ” “ Mr. Charrington, you have no right to ask me such a question. It is neither gentlemanly nor generous.” “ No, Miss Eastabrook, I have no right to ask you such a question ; but I will not admit that my conduct in doing so is either ungentlemanly or ungenerous.

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74 To BE Given up. And if you refuse to answer the question, I shall have no just cause of complaint against you - ” “ Most assuredly you will not/' “ - - Nevertheless, if you can answer it without doing violence to your feelings, I think you ought to do so.” Miss Eastabrook was conscious of a sense of grow¬ ing respect for the man. He had declared his love without cringing, and that, in Miss Eastabrook’s eyes, was an achievement worthy of admiration. And then he had said nothing about her wealth. “ Not for one moment will I admit your right to ask me such a question - ” ‘‘ 1 have never claimed it as a right.” “ - Nevertheless, I will answer it. I have never loved anyone in the way in which you mean. I do not think my heart is capable of such love.” “ Then, Miss Eastabrook, since your heart is free, wull you, whenever you chance to think of me, try to bear in mind that which I have said to you this evening ?” “Why should I try ? It would benefit neither you nor me.” “Pardon me, but I do not agree with you there. I am not going to whine at your feet, and tell you 1 cannot live without you. I love you far too dearly for that. I love you so well that I do not even covet your hand without your heart, were it possible for the one gift not to accompany the other. But loving you as I do, and knowing that your heart is free, I am not without hope. I cannot believe that a love so enduring as mine can be perfectly powerless to win a response, if only time and opportunity be given it. It may be so, but I cannot bring myself to believe it. So I want you just to bear it in mind. Miss Eastabrook, that every day, and every hour of the day, I am yearning for you ; that no matter where I am, or what I am doing, your existence is always the first great reality to me. And I should like you to know that my love for you is making life to me better worth the living ; if that hope of which I have spoken to you should never blossom into life, still I can never regret that I love you. My love must always be to me a source of strength, if not of joy.” “ It can never blossom into life, Mr. Charrington.” “ Be it so, then ; I shall not complain.” And this was the man of whom Miss Eastabrook had complained that he was always ready to agree with every word she said : that, in short, he had no will of his own — no strength of purpose. Miss Eastabrook thought very differently of him now. He had come to her and literally forced her to listen to what he had to say. And he had said that which was not easy in the saying without the loss of one iota of personal dignity. The most successful wooer could not have walked by her side with a prouder bearing. And then, the calm way in which he had ignored her wealth ! Others had come to her, some of whom were doubtless sincere, but never a one who had not been at the pains of explaining to her that her well-filled coffers were devoid of all attraction. And yet, although Fred Charrington was the elder brother, and therefore far belter oil than Ted, 3opf‘y’s lover, still he was a comparatively poor m^n : one who might well be suspected of singling Miss Eastabrook out from mer¬ cenary motives. Nevertheless, he had not thought it worth his while to defend himself against such a charge. “May I go in now, Mr. Charrington.?” asked Miss Eastabrook almost meekly. Then she returned to the house, entering the drawing-room through one of the open French windows. The lamps were lighted now, and their rays fell on her tall, stately figure as she came forward. Not¬ withstanding her apparent calmness, her interview with Mr. Charrington had agitated her a little. Few women could have listened unmoved to a declaration of love expressed with so much determination. It had caused her face to become a trifle paler than usual, making her hair show up darker by contrast, while her large luminous eyes were somewhat troubled. She advanced into the room slowly, for the light dazzled her, and her soft white silk dress fell about her in graceful folds. Philip Dacre was seated near to his mother’s couch, and very near to Mabyn’s chair. He was relating an amusing incident in connection with his journey. The invalid was laughing gently, and letting her gaze rest lovingly on the son of whom she was so justly proud. As for Mabyn, she was sitting by very quietly, drink¬ ing in every word that fell from Philip’s lips ; but a happy smile played round her mouth, and her eyes were shining with a great joy. Suddenly Philip sprang to his feet. The white figure with the dark hair and the luminous eyes was advancing towards him. He started. Again he was in that hotel in the Rue St. Honore : again he heard that piercing cry of human agony echoing along the silent corridors : again he stood face to face with that white-clothed figure with the dark hair and terror-stricken eyes. Yet seven years had passed since that memorable night. “ It is ! Yes, it is, it is ! It must be ! ” he gasped. CH.-\PTER THE EIGHTH. A DOUBLE LOSS. Miss Eastabrook stood quite still as Philip Dacre came eagerly towards her, while a startled, puzzled expression spread over her face. “Surely I am speaking to Miss Woodthorpe ? I cannot be mistaken.” “ Your face — yes, I seem to remember your face — but my name is not Woodthorpe. That was my mother’s maiden name.” Julia Dacre came forward and introduced Miss Eastabrook. “ Did I not meet you seven years ago in an hotel in the Rue St. Honore, Paris?” asked Philip, still feeling convinced that he now saw before him the face which had for so long been ever present to him, although he was puzzled by the difference in the name.

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To BE Given up. 75 “ In Paris seven years ago ? Ah ! I remember you now. It was on the night when my grandfather was taken ill so suddenly. You were very kind, and did all you could to help me in my distress. I am glad to have an opportunity of thanking you.” Then she put her hand in his, and smiled on him very graciously. “ And to think we have really met at last, after all these years ! ” exclaimed Philip, with much fervour. “ 1 always felt that the time would come when we should again cross each other’s paths.” He spoke with such heart-felt earnestness, that her eyes fell before his gaze. But still she did not look displeased. Then there was a slight pause. Questions were being asked on all sides respecting this strange meeting, but the two who were principally concerned kept silence. “And the most astonishing part of it is that we have been living within ten miles of each other almost ever since that night,” said Philip at length. He had, of course, often heard of Miss Eastabrook of Fore¬ borough. Then followed a few words of explanation respect¬ ing the difference of name which had at first so puzzled him. “ When I learnt that your grandfather’s name was Woodthorpe, 1 immediately jumped to the conclusion that yours must be the same. What an ass I was, to be sure ! " “You are keeping Miss Eastabrook standing all this time, Philip,” put in Mr. Dacre reprovingly. “A thousand pardons. Miss Eastabrook! I must crave forgiveness on the score of not having yet re¬ covered from the surprise of meeting you.” Then he handed her a chair, and seated himself beside her. He took possession of her, so thoroughly as a matter of course. Had he not waited seven years for her, as Jacob waited for Rachel ? and had he not, therefore, a right to feel that she did in some special sense belong to him ? Was his long faithfulness to the memory of a girl’s face which he had seen but for a few minutes to count for nothing? And in the first great joy of meeting her, he forgot there ever had been a time when he was in danger of forgetting that face. He had stayed at the same hotel again during his last visit to Paris, and he hastened to tell her so. But he did not add how much being on the identical spot where he had met her had reminded him of her presence ; nor did he dwell on the regularity with which he had haunted the Rue de Rivoli every after¬ noon, hoping, amongst the fashionable throng, to catch a glimpse of her face. He did not tell her all this — not in words, at least. But his eyes expressed much that his lips left unsaid. Then a word or two was said about the pocket- book : just enough to give Philip an opportunity of explaining to Miss Eastabrooic how he had called himself to claim it, and how surprised he had been when he was received by her aunt instead of herself. He was careful to use the word “ surprised,” but never¬ theless he allowed his tone to convey some intima¬ tion of the bitter disappointment he had experienced. She laughed a little at the story, but still she seemed gratified. “Do you know. Miss Eastabrook, I should have recognised your voice anywhere, even if your face had changed ? It is so rich and full for a woman’s voice.’" “ Masculine, my detractors pronounce it.” “ Masculine 1 I can’t think how people can admire those tinkling little trebles that so many women pipe with.” Mabyn had a soprano voice. Presently they were at the piano together. Miss Eastabrook was a finished musician, while Philip Dacre. was no mean performer. “Will you play me this, Miss Eastabrook?” he asked, handing her a copy of Raff’s Cavatina. She was to play for his sole benefit, and he alone was to listen to her. Such was the meaning which his words seemed to convey — perhaps intentionally. But then, although they were in a crowded drawing-room, he felt as much alone with her as if they were the only two on a trackless moor-— he and the woman for whom he had waited seven long years. “ Yes, I will play it with pleasure, if you can manage the accompaniment, Mr. Dacre,” she replied, as she began tuning her violin. “Yes, I think I can get through it.” And then they commenced. Miss Eastabrook played magnificently ; and the company listened spell-bound. Seldom indeed did they hear such a marvellous performance. The violin was no longer an instrument of wood and catgut, but a being with a soul : one that spoke in passionate utter¬ ances : that at one moment declaimed in voice of thunder, while at the next it wailed in sorrow and distress. Then others came forward to perform ; and Philip and Miss Eastabrook retired. But still he continued at her side. “ Won’t Miss Littledale favour us ? ” somebody sug¬ gested, after a short pause. “Ah, yes. Miss Littledale: you sing, of course. We shall be very exacting in the demands we make on you now, seeing we have let you escape all this time.” It was the first time Philip had addressed anyone but Miss Eastabrook since she had entered the room. And now it seemed to cost him some effort, as if he could not bring his mind to bear on that which was going on around him. “No, I cannot sing to-night ; my throat is dry.” These, too, were the first words Mabyn had spoken since the meeting between Philip and Clare. To her own ear they sounded horribly hoarse, though she had tried her hardest to speak in her natural voice. “Are you not well, dear?” asked Mrs. Dacre anxiously. “ Why, no ; how pale you are ! And your hand, why, it is quite cold 1 You are trembling, too.” “ Indeed — indeed, Mrs. Dacre, I am perfectly well,” urged Mabyn, in an agony of fear lest Philip should divine the cause of her distress.

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76 The Mistress of the “White House.” But he was hardly heeding her ; his gaze was again fixed on Miss Eastabrook. Philip, I wish you would fetch Miss Littledale something to throw over her shoulders. I am sure she has taken a chill.” Philip rose to do his mother’s bidding, but resumed his seat next to Miss Eastabrook when Sophy offered to go for a shawl, declaring her brother would not know where to find one. “There, dear, wrap that well round you,” said Sophy, handing Mabyn a fleecy-white cloud. “What is the matter.?” asked Miss Eastabrook, crossing over to where her cousin was sitting. “There is nothing the matter, Clare,” replied Mabyn almost petulantly. “Do leave me alone, please.” Poor child ! She wanted to cry out in her distress. If only she were alone in her own little room ! Would the evening never, never come to an end.? She looked across at Ralph. Should she say she had a head-ache, and ask him to take her home ? But no ; it seemed to her fevered imagination that everyone would know why she had found the atmosphere of the Southfields drawing-room insufferable. “ Are you sure there is nothing I can do for you. Miss Littledale.?” asked Philip, who had followed Miss Eastabrook across the room. “ Thank you, no ; I am perfectly well.” At that moment someone begged Miss Eastabrook to play again, and she and Philip returned to the piano. Several had now gathered round Mrs. Dacre’s couch, and so, while the performance was going on, Mabyn succeeded in effecting her escape. Unobserved she passed out of one of the French windows. 1 hen she stood on the verandah, looking at^ although not seeing, the view around her in the quiet, sad moonlight, while the rustling of the leaves sounded like a dirge to the bright hopes which had of late made her so light-hearted. And as she stood the forced smile which she had worn for the last hour faded from her face, giving place to an expression of mute agony. Already she knew her fate— knew it, and resented it. “ Oh ! not that, not that ! ” she cried in her distress. “Anything but that. How can I bear it? To lose them both. And it will go on for ever and ever. I shall have to watch their happiness day after day, and year after year, while I feel that I have passed out of both their lives. I must smile and con¬ gratulate them, while my heart is breaking. Shall I ever have the strength to hide my anguish .? I might have known it would be so. And yet it is so hard, so hard ! She is worthy of him, and I never was. How grand she looked as she came towards him ! Would he be the man he is if he did not love her, my beautiful Clare — the Clare of whom I have been so proud .? And she will love him too ; I can see how her heart inclines to him already. How could I ever have been so foolish as to imagine he could care for a little insignificant thing like me? ‘ Mabyn, Mabyn, look up, Mabyn ; I want to read all that your eyes have to tell me.’ Ah ! he will never think of those words again. They meant nothing— nothing. He has done me no harm in uttering them. I should have loved him just the same if those words had never been spoken. They only fanned the flame a little ; my heart had gone out to him long, long before It is my own folly, not his inconstancy, that is causing me this terrible pain. Just a few sweet words, accompanied by an eloquent glance or two. Do not men utter, and girls listen, to some such words over and over again, and no harm IS done? I have been so eager to give my heart away. Do I not deserve to find the gift unappreciated .? And I am only twenty. Perhaps I may live to be eighty — sixty years, sixty years— how can I bear it?” and in her terrible distress Mabyn failed to realise that the pain would diminish as the years glided by, until at length it would become only a sad memory of the past “That it should be her! I think I could have borne it better if it had been a stranger ; but Clare, mine own familiar friend : she whom I have loved so dearly, so dearly. Oh ! it is cruel, cruel, cruel !” She wrung her hands in agony, striving to keep back hzr hot angry tears. She started. A shadow fell across the verandah. Then she looked up, to find she was not alone. There, at a few yards’ distance, was the tall figure of a man coming towards her. END OF CHAPTER THE EIGHTH. THE MISTRESS OF THE “WHITE HOUSE.” BY AN ANGLO-AMERICAN. SEW people appreciate the extent to which the wife of the President of the United States is burdened with duties of an official or - semi-official character. Most people were disposed, after Mrs. Cleveland’s marriage, to regard her as a very fortunate young lady, elevated suddenly to a position comparable only to that of a reigning sovereign, and one where she would have no severer duties to perform than to dress well, look her best, and entertain pleasant company. The reality was far different ; and if it was a matter of some surprise that a young girl, whose social experiences since leaving school had been comparatively limited, should have undertaken and fulfilled so acceptably the purely social requirements of her position, it certainly was no less surprising that she should have acquitted herself equally well of the semi-official duties referred to, which are far more onerous than is generally supposed. During the greater part of the yean the President’s

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77 THE WHITE HOUSE. {JFrom a pJioiograph by C. M. Bell, Washington^) wife cannot be said to have any time at her own dis¬ posal after twelve o’clock in the day ; and it may be safely assumed that domestic and family matters, however much she may be relieved of the former, must keep the morning hours fairly well employed. After that hour she may be truly said to be as much a servant of the public as her distinguished husband. In European countries, no doubt the same may be said of the ruler’s wife, but the public to which she belongs is very different and less exacting than that to which an American President’s wife is amenable. The public with which the wife of a European ruler comes in contact, consists principally of the high social circle standing next to royalty, and, besides that, includes only a few distinguished personages or high officials ; and even then her relations with that comparatively narrow circle are hedged about with a certain formality, and kept strictly within certain prescribed, well-defined, and universally recognised limits. An army of officials — from sentries and police, to equerries and gold-sticks— on public occasions pre¬ serve the person of royalty from anything like rude contact with the crowds whom its presence attracts. The case is very different in America. In the first place, the limits of official life in this democratic country are far more comprehensive than in Europe, and everyone invited to White House entertainments has to be received by the President or his wife, or by both, as the case may be ; and even in formal public receptions the absurd hand¬ shake canpot be omitted without offence. Receptions to senators and representatives, to the army and navy, to members of the Cabinet, to the diplomats and other high officials, and to the judiciary, are frequent, and include in the aggregate an enormous number of people. But besides these more ceremonious receptions, that are usually held in the evenings, and the state and semi-public dinners which are of frequent occurrence, and at which the President’s wife, unlike the Queen, for instance, must be present from the re¬ ception of the first to the speeding of the last guest, there are innumerable receptions of a less formal, but far more public and more wearing character. Wash¬ ington is a great place for those frequent conventions annually held by the thousand-and-one societies and organisations— political and religious, philanthropic and commercial, social and literary — for which the United States are famous. All of these expect to be received in a body by the President of the United States ; and in those cases, by no means infrequent, where women are included among the delegates, by the President’s wife also. A committee is appointed, and, accompanied by some senators or other Congressmen, waits on the President and begs to be informed when it would suit him or himself and lady, as the case may be, to receive the delegates to the National Horticultural Convention, or to the American Society of Pharmaceutists, or to the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, or what¬ ever the society may be ; and the President having named the hour and the day, the delegates duly ap¬ pear, are introduced, and severally shake hands. Then there are the weekly or tri- weekly public re¬ ceptions, when “ all the world and his wife ” may

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The Mistress of the “White House." 78 present themselves at the White House, and be re¬ ceived with the same formalities. Every second day — that is, every day e.xcept Sundays and Cabinet days — the President descends to the east room, and from I to 2 p.m. shakes hands with everyone that pre¬ sents himself or herself. The butcher, the baker, the candlestick-maker,” the visiting stranger from the rural districts, the resident “cullud” folks — all are ushered past in single file, and with each individual the President shakes hands. So with the President’s wife, who for two hours every Saturday afternoon holds court — or, rather, a levee — in the same fashion ; and as an evidence of the dexterity with which con¬ stant practice enables the chief participant in this semi-barbarous custom to dispose of the hand-shaking multitude, it may be stated that on one Saturday towards the close of Mr. Cleveland’s Presidential term, Mrs. Cleveland “received” in this way seven thousand persons between 3 and 6, she having, with her usual good - nature, extended the time of the reception one hour beyond the prescribed limit, rather than disappoint the great crowd of expe^ant visitors still awaiting the cherished honour. Public re¬ ceptions are also occasionally held in the evening, from which the crowds who have the temerity to attend them emerge almost as though from a rough- and-tumble fight, limp and bedraggled, torn and tumbled. At these evening receptions the President and his wife receive together. Mr. Cleveland was wont, after the hand-shaking had proceeded an hour or two, on these occasions to insist upon his wife standing back MRS. HARRLSON. i^From a photograph by M, IV, //. Potters, Indianapolis^} or sitting down while he continued the laborious pro¬ cess as long as the surging crowds continued to present themselves. After this account of the physical qualifications re¬ quisite for suitably filling the high office of President’s wife, our readers will not be surprised to learn that by dint of the excessive hand-shaking imposed upon her, Mrs. Cleveland’s right hand became so enlarged that her gloves have now to be made to order, the right-hand glove being larger than the left. To a less extent the wives of the Cabinet Ministers have similar duties to perform. They almost all hold weekly afternoon receptions, at which the great public is privileged to present itself, shake hands, and adjourn to a refreshment-room, to indulge in hasty participation of sandwiches, cake, punch, tea, and often more costly viands, amid the attractions of brilliantly lighted rooms, e.xtravagantly decorated with flowers,^ and filled with the harmonies of an orchestra concealed in some bower of palms or other exotic plants. “ Card ” receptions, both at the White House and at the residences of Cabinet Ministers, are supposed to be confined to those who are invited; but this is a rule as often honoured in the breach as in the observance, and a “ card ” reception for which 500 cards have been issued has been attended by 700 guests. This sort of imposition seems to be both expected and uncomplain¬ ingly borne by the victims. Mrs. Cleveland had the honours and the onerous duties of mistress of the White House thrust upon her at an age when all excitement is more or less pleasur¬ able. To youth, even an incessant round of duties may thus be, not only endurable, but even enjoyable. With Mrs. Harrison, who succeeded her last March, the case is quite different. A lady of mature years, already a grandmother, and one who has lived. for many years a comparatively placid life in the quiet city of Indianapolis, she, it is said, at the very outset of her reign contemplated with undisguised dread the painfully wearing nature of her public duties. She even ventured several suggestions tending towards their reasonable modification. Indeed, it was hinted, soon after President Harrison assumed his high office, that the public receptions were to be less frequent, and that the hand-shaking was to be dispensed with en¬ tirely ; but among a certain class of people, and by a number of the public journals, this course was bitterly criticised ; and so for some years more the American people will, no doubt, continue to countenance pro¬ ceedings which weigh heavily upon the time and strength of their Chief E.xecutive and his consort, and they will have the satisfaction of knowing that the President’s right arm and hand are periodically so disabled that he cannot even sign a State paper, and that on certain occasions the President’s wife has well- nigh fainted from sheer exhaustion. .Abuses, however, are apt to work their own cure, and in course of time we shall outgrow this sort of rudimentary stage, and realise that we do not elect our President to his high office for the purpose of sacrificing its dignity and his * The flowers at one of Mrs. Whitney’s receptions (wife of the Secre- t.ary of the Navy) last winter cost $3,500, or

Page 88

Some Early Spring Flowers. 79 own time and strength to the silly curiosity of a tuft¬ hunting crowd. The White House — or, more properly speaking, the Executive Mansion, for that is its proper title — the home over which the President’s wife, for the time being, is called upon to preside, is a beautiful, large, roomy mansion. It is very pleasantly situated in the midst of charming grounds extending from Pennsyl¬ vania Avenue on the north to the Potomac on the south. Though large and roomy, as we have said, it is not very commodious, considering how many of the rooms, including the celebrated east room, are devoted to public uses, and, indeed, are open to the public for hours daily, being, consequently, unavailable to the President’s family. Some rooms on the second floor in the east wing— five, if I remember rightly — are utilised as Executive offices, Cabinet room, &c. ; so, as a mat¬ ter of fact, that portion of the mansion which may be regarded as the President’s private residence includes little more than the west half of the second floor. People who are familiar with the White House realise its inadequate accommodation, while, on the other hand, Americans generally pooh-pooh the idea that an American citizen is not amply provided for with a mansion containing two dozen rooms, quite forgetting that, for all practical purposes, one-half of the number are devoted to the use of the public, or occupied as Executive offices. During the regime of President Arthur, who was a man of fine taste, the decorations and furniture of the mansion were for the most part renewed, and very greatly improved ; and to-day the entire house, inside and out, presents what our American cousins designate as a truly *• elegant” appearance. In one respect the mistress of the White House is, doubtless, an object of envy to her sisters the country over. Attached to the west end of the house, and opening off the private stairway, are spacious and well -tended conservatories, whence floral treasures MRS. CLEVELAND. {From a photograph ty C. M. Bell, Washington^ and exotic shrubs find their way constantly to the parlours and dining-room of the mansion. The marine band also are always at her disposal on the occa¬ sion of public entertainments, and, besides providing excellent music, present a very fine appearance in their handsome uniform, of which the, to me, most noticeable feature was that the coat was red, though in both branches of the United States service the uniform colour is blue. SOME EARLY SPRING FLOWERS. (THE GARDEN IN JANUARY.) FTER all, there are per¬ haps few flowers that delight us so much as those whose bloom we associate with the early spring and sometimes even with the depth of winter, in which we Flowers at all times are of beauty and a joy for ever ; yet in July we look for them everywhere : in our gardens and windows, and on our table, and in¬ deed their absence would then asto¬ nish us more than their presence. now are. a thing But it is not so in January, for upon entering a supper- room — it may be at one of our Christmas gatherings — a few flowers that are made the most of in the centre of the table at once call forth general admiration, not, perhaps, so much because they are flowers with which probably everyone in the room is familiar, but because it is January^ and for the time it looks as if we had succeeded in driving away winter altogether. Now among our early spring flowers must certainly be named the cineraria ; and when we have what is popularly known as “a forward garden ’’—which very often means little more than one well cared for — our cineraria will be showing for bloom by the middle of this month, if not actually in flower. A few words, then, as to their general culture and treatment will be

Page 89

8o Some Early Spring Flowers. very opportune. And following the usual method, we will notice the two ways of rearing them, that is by seed and by cuttings. First, then, as to the seedlings. Now the cineraria likes a rich, light, and porous soil, and equal pro¬ portions of peat, loam, and thoroughly decomposed manure will suit it admirably, with the usual addition, however, of a little sand. In the month of May, then, and in the ordinary shallow pan or pot, sow the seed, giving it only a light covering, but kept fairly moist. As soon as they are up, place them in a frame, or in any place where they can readily be shaded from a too powerful sun. When some three or four leaves have developed themselves, that is, when mahipulation becomes practicable, set them out singly in sixty-sized pots, taking care to use an exactly similar compost as that you made use of when sowing the month previously. You can then place your pots either along a plank in a frame, or, as by the middle of June there will be ample room in the greenhouse, your seedlings can have a shelf devoted to them ; but still, as we are now talking of June operations, any dry and airy situation in the open air will suit them, still using a plank to stand your pots upon and keeping your young seedlings fairly moist, but not soaked, with your watering- pot. Now as so many of our seed¬ lings, in nearly every class of flower, turn out failures, it is not well to grow them large until you are able to form some estimate of their merits ; and moreover any great number of seedlings which will want housing all through a winter, in addition to the cuttings and our favourite stock of plants, will cer¬ tainly cramp us very much for room. If, however, you find that your seedlings, in July or there¬ abouts, are getting pot - bound, they should be shifted into the next-sized pots. In September the usual housing of course takes place, when see that not your cineraria only but all your plants stand on a thoroughly dry bottom. Any other foundation tends to throw up damp exhalations, which are frequ-ently an evil more serious to avoid than frost. Finally, as the early spring comes on, you will readily judge what are worth keep¬ ing by the appearance of the bloom. Any that show very small bloom with narrow petals might as well be at once destroyed. And next as to the propagation of our cineraria by cuttings. After the bloom has perfected itself, and, in fact, de¬ cayed away, cut down the stem of your plant, stir up the surface soil in the pot, and throw it away, replacing it, of course, with fresh but similar com¬ post, filling up your pot quite to the very brim with the new soil ; then after a gentle watering you can place the pots in a frame, or failing that, if it is favourable weather, find them a dry and sheltered spot in the open garden, always as before taking care that your pots stand not on the soil, or even on gravel, but on a plank or slate. In a few weeks’ time you will notice some side shoots from your plant, some rooted and some with scarcely any root These last are those that you must first make use of. Take them carefully off and strip them of the two or three bottom leaves, and afterwards plant them out in pots singly — or, if you have many of them, in pans — in compost identical with that in which the parent plant has been RE-POTTING.

Page 90

My Old Foe Again. 8i growing. Have, as usual, some sand for surface soil, and over the whole place a bell-glass, pressing its edge into the soil. Until your cuttings have struck, the glass should always be kept down, but wiped dry inside. Watering must, of course, be given. But better still than the bell-glass would be the use of a discarded frame, in which some little bottom heat yet remains : this will certainly hasten the striking of your cuttings in these pans. But the side shoots that already have roots to them you can at once pot off in the ‘‘sixty’’ pots, and they can be treated just as your seedlings that have been newly potted pff. Their growth in a few weeks will at once indicate that they have struck. Anyone who has paid even a limited attention to the culture of the cineraria, must have found out how terribly attractive they are to the green fly and the red spider. A good fumigation with tobacco is the only remedy for the green fly. The atmosphere of your greenhouse must as speedily as possible be transformed by tobacco-burning into the appearance of a London fog, and if you go the next morning into your greenhouse you will find the enemy lying quietly dead on the surface of the soil of each pot. Red spiders, however, are better disposed of by sulphur-dusting. A greenhouse that is kept free from damp will be the least liable to the attacks of the green fly. Of course, in the selection of cineraria, notice each year where the bloom is the finest, and only from those plants should you take cuttings or save the seed. Indiscriminate action in the garden always involves a loss. Our general garden directions must have reference first to an uninteresting but most important sub¬ ject, and that is manure. This, in fact, is the very food supply of our garden, and we shall neg¬ lect it at our peril. A prolonged January frost will give us plenty of opportunity for manure-wheeling. But it is more of the preservation of decayed matter in general, which serves as a most valuable manure, that we intended to speak : and, indeed, it could readily be made the subject of a paper by itself, so important a one is it. A large fire in the middle of the garden, giving forth unsavoury odours, is often de¬ stroying much that we ought to utilise for a manure. But more must be said of this on another occasion. MY OLD FOE AGAIN. BY A FAMILY DOCTOR. NHAPPILY for the inhabitants of these “ Isles of the Mist,” the names of chest complaints form a long and dismal roll in every book devoted to the study of me¬ dical science. In this brief paper I do not propose to mention even a tithe of these, but merely give hints, that may be useful in teaching my readers how to avoid some of those most prevalent during the winter months. I must at present, however, leave Consumption out of count. Chronic Bronchitis, sometimes called Winter Cough, naturally takes first rank, owing to the extreme fre¬ quency with which cases are met. Few there are, perhaps, who have passed the age of forty that do not suffer from the complaint occasionally, while in some it occurs winter after winter, or spring-time after spring-time. The most hopeless feature about these cases rests in the fact that, owing to thickening of the mucous membrane, each attack leaves the sufferer more subject to another. The ordinary symptoms of chronic bronchitis are, unfortunately, only too well known— the hacking, rending, or the loose but troublesome cough, with large expectoration of mucus, the difficulty of breath¬ ing, especially on exertion or first thing in the morning, and the generally lowered state of health. Exercise, indeed, will often bring on the cough in fits, lasting long, weary, distressing minutes. Thus, through all the livelong winter the sufferer may be bad one week and better the next. The difficulty of breathing may come on at night, and this fact makes the complaint doubly painful. How often do we not hear such patients exclaim— “ Oh, what a pained and weary night I have passed ! Almost better I had not lain down at all.” They look jaded and weak in the morning, too, are seldom breakfast-eaters, or if they do manage to force something down, it is only after dallying with the . matutinal cup of coffee or tea. Not being fitted for any great strain of exertion, their business life is, -of course, greatly interfered with ; they thus feel languid, and often wTetched enough, in all conscience: The complaint may follow an acute attack, but it is more 726

Page 91

82 My Old Foe Again. frequently, I believe, brought on by exposure to the weather. Men who have led, whether by choice or the reverse, active outdoor lives, braving the elements, storm or sunshine, and. at all hours, are liable to it after a certain age. The man who boasts that he can defy wet and cold, who never wears a top coat, and permits his damp clothes to dry on his back, is almost certain to go to the wall one day. IS chronic bronchitis a dangerous ailment? The question may well be asked, seeing that we can point to so many truly old people who are martyrs to it, and yet manage to move about in summer, at all events, looking fairly hale and hearty. Hale and hearty, for this reason— there is very little wasting, even in winter, caused by this form of bronchitis. Well, then, the complaint is more indirectly than directly dangerous ; for though it may not often kill, it leads to diseases that do kill. There is a very much aggravated form of the disease to which some old people are subject, and which therefore gets the name of senile catarrh. In these cases all the symptoms are violently increased— especially the amount of expectoration, and the dis¬ tressing difficulty in breathing. Extreme debility soon comes on, and this very often leads to collapse, which may prove fatal. As this terrible form of the disorder is nearly always due to neglect of treatment of the milder sort, it ought to be a caution to those who suffer from winter cough not to under-rate the strength of the enemy. There are many other forms of chronic bronchitis, such as the plastic, in which mattery casts of the bron¬ chial tubes or more solid portions are brought up. There is difficulty in breathing, a drier t ough, and often some blood. We have also rheumatic bronchitis, and gouty as well, and what may be called alcoholic bronchitis, an ailment only of topers. The purely medicinal treatment of chronic bronchitis may well be left in the hands of the family physician : so much depends on the age and constitution of the sufferer ; besides, the trouble may depend on various causes. One form of treatment, however, is so simple, and yet, as a rule, so effective in removing the distress caused by the difficulty of breathing and consequent want of rest, that I must not refrain from referring to it. It is nothing more than the bringing into the immediate contact of the ailing air-tubes, the spray or atoms of drugs that soothe and heal. The spraying apparatus has probably saved many a life in ships at sea, and in islands beyond the reach of immediate medical aid. It is on precisely the same principle as those two glass tubes, united at right angles hp to hp, sold in every chemist’s shop for the purpose of dis¬ tributing the spray of perfume throughout a room. Indeed, I have seen those used when the better form could not be obtained. There are a multitude of medicinal remedies useful enough, but the best is probably ipecacuanha wine diluted with two parts of tepid water. The inhalation bottle, or rather the nozzle of the tube, is within about a foot and a half, or even one foot, of the inhaler. The spray should be well drawn in ; if coughing ensues, the liquid may be weakened, but the tendency to cough will soon cease, and if the inhalations are used twice a day, benefit will soon be evident. Any chemist can give directions how to use the regular spray-producers. The inhalation of steam alone often affords much relief during attacks. But to be able to ward off attacks is better far than to cure them. This will hardly be effected by the constant use of medicine, cordials, stimulants, &c., which I am never tired of deprecating. Nor by too much coddling indoors, for no man or woman can have a hardy chest who does uot breathe pure air. This is as essential as food, if not more so. Nor by a too warm temperature in the bedroom, which ought to be about 6o° Fahr. all night, and kept uniform by a judicious banking of the fire. Nor by too great a weight or pressure of bed-clothing, which is always prejudicial indirectly, if not directly, by weakening the system. Nor by wearing a great abundance of cloth¬ ing out of doors, which also weakens not only the chest, but the whole system. Daily exercise of a pleasant but non-fatiguing kind is imperative. The sufferer should not be too much afraid of the weather, but be protected against it. Light warm clothing de¬ fends one against the cold, a light waterproofs should be worn, but only when rain falls, while as for dry powdery snow it hardly signifies. Sunshine should be courted. Gentle exercise taken in the sun and out of a draught cannot be too highly recommended. Avoidance of chills should be studied. If carriage exercise be taken, it should not be on a day when a high wind blows against the person. The only bad effects of night air lie in its being colder and generally damper than that of day. A sudden change fiom a warm room to a cold one, if one stands about in it, very often gives a disagreeable chill, or coming out of heated apartments into the air of night without being well wrapped up. Weak-chested people would do well not to take the morning tub cold, but tepid. There is a plan of bath I have recommended to many, and which is very beneficial in securing that action of skin so necessary. But, indeed, it is an Irish bull to call it a bath, foi it consists in simply well rubbing the body every morn¬ ing with dry rough towels. I have recommended also the rubbing of the chest with a saturated solution of the ordinary sea-salt of the shops, and the wearing of a light chest-protector. The strength of the weak-chested should be kept up to par, but not beyond it. Any'’ approach to gross¬ ness or over-fulness of blood is favourable to a retuin of the cough as the secretions become vitiated. Milk is a good thing ; a small cupful in the morning before getting up will do good, but I cannot approve of adding any rum to it. Plain, easily digested food is the best : the meat should be tender, or it will not be easily assimilated ; fish and game in season. Vichy-water with meals occasionally does good, or lemonade and lime-juice. As regards residence in so-called health resorts, one’s own medical man must, of course^, be consulted :

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After a Collision. SO much depends on the nature of the case. A relax¬ ing climate may suit some, such as Underclifif, Isle of Wight, or Penzance, or Hastings, while other people would do better in cheerful old Brighton, or in some part of the Riviera. Yet, after, all said and done, the majority of weak-chested people will be as well at home among friends and relations, and this for many reasons. Sufferers from what is called Bro7tchial Asthma are perhaps more to be pitied. It is not generally known that this is purely a nervous disease, the fits or paroxysms being brought on by a variety of different causes, which produce contraction of the muscular fibres of the bronchial tubes. It may be but one symptom of chronic bronchitis and of many other ailments, or it may proceed from a disordered state of the nerves. This last fact should never be lost sight of by the sufferer himself, as it ought to tend to the regulation of his mode of living. The asthmatic, too, may take heart of grace from the fact that he is probably a healthy man in every other respect except simply the asthma. This is bad enough, certainly, but, again, it hardly ever destroys life, terrible though the fits may be, and cure is now and then — I hardly dare say more — possible. The causation of the ailment in question is some¬ 83 what obscure, but it is well that sufferers should have some knowledge of the things that actually produce the fits themselves, so that they may be avoided, i. The air of certain towns or places will, so that relief should be sometimes sought for in a change. 2. Cold air, dust, and vegetable irritants from fields, or even gardens. 3. The emotions, if too much excited. 4, Worry of mind. 5. Excess in eating or drinking. 6. Certain articles of diet of an indigestible kind, such as salmon, plaice, fried soles, pork or sausages, tough meat of any kind, pickles and cheese, especially if such food be taken late at night. As to the treatment during the fit, the patient will very likely have chosen his own remedy for this. I need only say that chloro¬ form and ether succeed sometimes, but are dangerous. Strong coffee does well in others. Nitre paper fumes are harmless, and often effectual ; then there are- Joy’s cigarettes. During the intervals the greatest attention should be paid to the general health. The same advice given to those suffering from Chronic Bronchitis as to hygiene, &c., may be taken by the Asthmatic. Spirits should be avoided. I mention this be¬ cause I know that a great many sufferers fly to them for relief. They assuredly do infinite injury in the end. AFTER A COLLISION. BY ARABELLA M. HOPKINSON, AUTHOR OF “a WOMAN’S STRENGTH,” “ THE PROBATION OF DOROTHY TRAVERS,” ETC. ETC. ^ I O, don’t shrug your shoulders, George ; just listen to this. For this one really does sound likely, and there is no doubt that w^e must do something, or we shall be obliged to take Charlie aw'ay from school. So don’t interrupt until I have read to the end, and then can mention all your objections.” Thus adjured, my husband put on his most resigned and irritating expression of counten¬ ance, listening, with the air of a martyr, as I read out to him an advertisement from the Morning Post. ‘‘ Wanted for a young lady, suffering from a mental shock ’’—here he raised his eyes from the contempla¬ tion of the table-cloth, and pursing his lips together, emitted a long low whistle — ‘‘ suffering from a mental shock,” I reiterated, “ a quiet refined home in a secluded part of England, where she may enjoy pure air and home comforts. Country vicarage preferred. Liberal terms for a suitable offer.— Apply to S. W., care of Messrs. Beal and Brown, Lincoln’s Inn.” “ Well, my dear? ” “ But, George, dear ! don’t you see that we are the very people ? Are we not quiet and refined ? and is not this a secluded country vicarage ? Is not our air purity itself, and are we not terribly in w^ant of liberal terms ? Oh, George ! don’t look unutterable things.” “ Mary,” he answered solemnly, “ this is, at the very least, the fiftieth advertisement you have read out to me within the last month. I have answered twenty-five of them, and they have all come to nothing. We are all that you say we are, but there are hundreds of other quiet secluded vicarages, whose inmates will apply for the care of this lady.” “ But, George ! ” I cried, seeing that he was about to disappear from my ken, ‘‘ is it not worth trying ? After all, it is only one stamp, and — ” He interrupted me, quite roughly for him. “Do as you please,” he said. “ Answer every ad¬ vertisement in the paper, if you like, but remember, you might keep Charlie at school with the stamps you waste;” and with that he vanished into his study, shutting the door ostentatiously, and turning the key in the lock. Now, my husband is both a good and a clever man, but he has not that tenacity of purpose that some great author, I forget who, has justly ascribed to the weaker sex, and of which I possess my full share. I was determined to keep Charlie, my only boy, at school, but how to do so, when our living had fallen to less than a quarter of its original value, was a pro¬ blem that could only be solved, to my mind, by a close study of the advertisement sheets of the daily and weekly papers.

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84 After a Day succeeded day, and there came no answer to my letter, and 1 thought mournfully that it was only sharing the fate of the other twenty-five. At last, one afternoon when I had given up all hope, as I was returning from the school, I saw a vehicle stopping at our door, which I at once recognised as the “ Castle ” fly from Safford, our six-mile-distant town. My heart gave a great bound, for a stately, somewhat disagree¬ able-looking man, who instinct told me was S. W., was stepping out of it, and asking ot my maid if Mrs. Herbert were at home. I am Mrs. Herbert,” I said, advancing towards him. “ Won’t you come in?” He accepted my invitation, and I ushered him into my drawing-room, which, thanks to masses of spring flowers, was looking its prettiest. He gazed around him approvingly, then seating himself by my side — “ You answered my advertisement, I think,” he said abruptly. “ I answered one to S. W.,” I responded. “ I am S. W.,” he said— “ Sandford Western.” “ Indeed,” I replied, for at the moment I could think of nothing else to say. “ You are looking for a quiet home - ” I continued. “Yes,” he interrupted me, “for my daughter. She is suffering from a great mental shock. The young man to whom she was engaged to be married was drowned the other day in the Calaby'ia — you remem¬ ber— collision between two steamers in the Channel ?’’ “Yes, indeed. What a terrible thing it was ! My husband had a brother on board, who was rescued when on the point of drowning.” “ Well, she cannot get over it at all. She does not gnash her teeth, and tear her hair — I almost wish she would — but she sits all day, silent as a statue, staring at vacancy, and doing nothing — absolutely nothing. It is impossible to keep her at home ; it is too trying for my wife and the other girls, besides which, the doctors prescribe change and perfect quiet, in order that her nerves may recover their tone. Have you a family ? ” I explained to him that I had only two children — Charlie, aged eleven, usually at school, and Effie, who was two ; after which, I begged leave to summon my husband to the conference. It is needless to go into the discussion that ensued between the two gentlemen — for Mr. Western was a gentleman, although not a very courteous one. Suffice it to say that after duly inspecting our house and domain, and satisfying himself that we should make his daughter comfortable, he departed, having delivered himself of the oracular sentence that he thought we should do, but that he would write in a day or two. He was as good as his word. Two days later we received a letter from him, saying that he had quite made up his mind to send his daughter to us, feeling perfect confidence in our suitability for the charge, but that he begged that we would never, on any account, mention the Calabria or the collision to her, but do our best to make her forget both. A week after the receipt of this letter, George and I Collision. were welcoming Miss Western to the vicarage, and as she stepped from the fly, and my eyes encountered her stony, despairing face, I suddenly realised for the first time all that I was undertaking. What if she were really out of her mind, as George had suggested ? However, I put the thought away from me as soon as conceived. Had not my husband fully probed Mr. 'Western on this point, and been more than satisfied with his answers ? and had not this poor girl suffered enough to give her that Medusa-like expression of countenance that time and our peaceful home would surely dispel ? And whilst I was revolving all this in my mind, George was giving our guest such a warm, genial welcome, that it recalled me to my duties as hostess, and made me ashamed that for a moment I should have forgotten them. But I need not have concerned myself. Miss Western seemed alike indifferent to warmth or coldness ; once or twice she said “ Thank you,” mechanically, as we led her into the drawing¬ room, and gave her tea after her long journey ; but after that she relapsed into silence, gazing out of her mournful eyes — beautiful eyes they were — into vacancy, and only answering “Yes” and “No ’’when absolutely compelled to do so. Not even the entrance of Effie, looking her sweetest in an affectation of shyness, had any effect in rousing her. At last, that afternoon and evening, interminable as they seemed, came to an end, to be succeeded by another and another, until by the time a week, which was to us as long as a month, had gone by, George and I had grown accustomed to our silent guest, and my fears as to the unsoundness of her mind were quite allayed. She was very gentle and docile, a gentleness and docility proceeding from absolute indifference, but on one point she was obstinate : we could not persuade her to do anything. She would sit for hours in the window-seat in the drawing-room, her pretty hands lying idly in her lap, gazing on nothing in particular, so still and immovable that she might have been a statue, instead of a creature of flesh and blood. Her father had sent her pony-carriage with her, although he would not allow her to have a maid. “ Far better be obliged to do for herself,” he had said with sound common sense ; “ she must employ herself then for a few minutes every day.” So every afternoon the smart little trap would come round to the door, and she and I would go for a drive together, I acting as Jehu, she mute and indifferent by my side. In this way we visited many and many a picturesque spot in our lovely neighbourhood, many an outlying .farmhouse or cottage, many a sick or sorrowful parishioner ; but, however beautiful nature might appear, however sad the tale of suffering I had to relate, they alike failed to kindle one spark of response or vitality in Miss Western. “ I do not believe she is a bit better, George,” 1 said one warm June evening, when she had been with us more than a month, as he and I walked up and down the terrace together, and we could see Miss Western’s profile clearly outlined and perfectly

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After a Collision. immovable against the drawing-room window blind. There she sits just as she did the first day she came here. It is very discouraging.” Patience, Mary. After all, a month is not a very long time, and the work of healing may be going on, 85 results might be. Of course this is only conjecture on my part.” ‘‘ At any rate, I will try,’’ I said. ‘‘ You must go to work very gently and cautiously,’’ he answered ; and with that our colloquy ended, for "SHE BURST INTO A PASSION OF TEARS” {p. 88). although we cannot see any results at present. I sometimes wonder whether it might not be as well, in spite of Mr. Western’s prohibition, for you to mention her sorrow to her, to speak of the Calabria, and tell -her that Fred was on board, and thus lead her on to poui out her story to you. I have an idea that there is a something m the background, beyond the bare fact of \\^x fiance having lost his life, and that if one could get at that something^ there is no knowing what the Miss Western came gliding out on the terrace, siientiy walking up and down by our side like some black ghost. And, indeed, the poor girl was something like a ghost ; so thin was she that her black garments hung on her like sacks. “ Her heart is breaking,” I thought to myself. “ It is ridiculous to go on like this. Something must be done, and the sooner I get her to open her heart to me, the better.”

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86 After a Collision. But in point of fact this was very difficult. A con¬ versation with Miss Western was well-nigh an im¬ possibility. I had always flattered myself that I could find something to say to the most taciturn person, but my talents failed me with Clare Western. Her ab¬ solute indifference to every topic was a most effective stopper to anything like converse, and latterly I had ^ given up the attempt, and she and I would sit to¬ gether in unbroken silence. To-day, however, I was going to try a fresh tack, and feeling somewhat nervous, I invited Clare to come and sit with me under the chestnut-tree on the lawn, whilst I lengthened and altered Effie’s last year’s summer frocks for the coming hot weather. As a matter of form, I handed one of them to Clare. She usually went to the length of don¬ ning a thimble, and threading a needle, after which, with her hands resting on the work, she would resume her usual occupation of staring at vacancy, putting in, perhaps, one stitch in the course of an hour. This morning it seemed to me that her hands looked more transparent than ever. If some steps were not taken, and that without loss of time, this poor child would assuredly slip through our fingers before we knew where we were. In desperation I cleared my throat and began. “ Clare,” I said, “did I tell you Mr. Herbert had a letter from his brother this morning ? ” Silence. “ He talks of coming home very soon now, for, although Italy is exquisite, it is intolerably hot.” Silence. “ Do you hear me, Clare ? ” “Yes.” “Why don’t you answer me, then, dear.^” “ I beg your pardon. I have nothing to say.” “ I dare say you did not even know that Mr. Herbert had a brother ?” No answer. “ Clare, dear, I asked you a question.” ‘‘Did you? I am so sorry. I did not hear you.” “No ; I thought you did not. I was telling you about Mr. Herbert’s brother. He is a soldier, and was all through the Soudan campaign. I think,” I continued, making a rusti at the subject, “ that you would be interested in him, for he was on board the Calabria the day of that dreadful collision last October.” My shot had gone home at last. Clare turned her mournful eyes to mine, whilst a slight shiver ran through her from head to foot. “The Calabria?"^ she said, in dreary accents ; then suddenly, her face flashing angrily, “ Why do you speak of it to me ? ” she said. “ Do you want to break my heart ? ” This was certainly an improvement. “ No, darling,” I answered, taking her hand. “ I want to prevent your heart from breaking, by per¬ suading you to talk of your grief and trouble to me, instead of keeping it all to yourself.” She shook her head. “ What is the good of talking ? ” she asked. “ He is dead. Talking will not bring him back, and I must bear my punishment as best I can.” “ Your punishment, Clare ? ” “ Yes. Is it not a punishment that all day and all night I see his dear dead face, with the waves washing over it, looking at me from the bottom of the sea, and telling me I killed him ?” I gazed at her in real alarm. Were my worst fears about to be realised ? Surely this wa^ an hallucination, a certain sign of madness. “ Clare, dear,” I said gently, “ what do you mean ? The man you loved was drowned in the collision between the Calabria and the Count diOrsay. You were in England at the time.” “ I know all that,” she answered ; “ yet I killed him.” My heart stood still for a minute. Clare’s face had lost its impassibility, and her eye was flashing rest¬ lessly. Was she indeed going mad? I put my hand on her arm, and drew her towards me. “ Won’t you tell me all about it from beginning to end ? ” I said soothingly. “ Perhaps I could comfort you a little bit.” “No one can comfort me,” she said, so drearily that it made me shudder. “ I killed him.” “ But don’t you think Mr. Herbert could, if you were to talk to him about it ? ” In her impassive way she was very fond of George. “If he knew all, he would not speak to me. He is such a good man, whilst I - ” The gesture of abhorrence of herself with which she concluded the sentence was terrible to see. My heart sank, but I spoke cheerfully. “ Come, Clare,” I said, “ I know you are talking wildly. What you say is, on the face of it, untrue. You have brooded and brooded over your trouble until it has warped your mind. It would do you good to talk it all out.” “Nothing can ever do me good,” she said, “and how can I talk of it ? If you had killed someone, would you speak of it ? ” I saw that it was quite useless to argue with her — that, in fact, it only made her worse, so I changed the conversation, almost pleased to see her, after a while, resume her normal impassibility. Better that than this terrible delusion ! When I related our conversation to George, he looked very grave ; but he took a more hopeful view of the case than I did. “ I don’t think hers is altogether a delusion,” he said. “I am inclined to believe that there is some admixture of truth in it, and she will never be better until she has poured out her heart to someone. If she is allowed to keep her sorrow to herself, it will prey on her mind until she really does go mad.” “Then, George, you must see what you can do. You have influence with her.” “ I will,” he said ; and he kept his word. It was about ten days later that he told me he had discovered the real truth of the matter. He had in¬ vited Clare to take a walk with him, and having entered on the subject of the accident, a pj'opos ot

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After a Collision. Fred’s coming to stay with us, had gradually, but with infinite trouble, drawn from her the whole history of her sorrow, and the meaning of the strange words she had used to me. It seemed that about twelve months ago, during the London season, she had become engaged to a young man in the Artillery, a Mr. Berners. She was passionately attached to him, and was otherwise glad of the prospect of being married, as she was not happy at home. She had a stepmother, and half-brothers and sisters, but was a favourite with no one on account of her bad temper, which made her cling all the more fondly to her future husband. Her father, however, who did not care about the marriage at all, would not allow it to come off until Mr. Berners had obtained some appointment for which he was trying. Whether it were the fret of the delay, or merely that Clare had really a bad tem¬ per, she and her fiance had several disputes during the months that ensued : lovers’ quarrels, to be made up again with every demonstration of devotion, yet weakening to affection, as such quarrels always are. So it went on until October, when the Western family arrived at Dover from the Continent, remaining there for three weeks, previous to settling down for the winter in London. Here Clare saw Mr. Berners frequently, for he was quartered at Shorn cliffe, and here took place a quarrel between him and her which was to alter the complexion of her whole life. She became vei*y jealous of a cousin of Mr. Berners, who was at Folkestone at the time, and to whom she imagined, whether rightly or wrongly, he paid undue attention. She reproached him with it ; he lost his temper; bitter and angry words ensued, until it finished up with her telling him she never wished to see his face again. That was on the evening of Octo¬ ber 30th. Violently offended, the young man left her at once, took his passage on board the Calabria^ that was just starting for Calais, and, as we know, perished in the collision between his steamer and the Cou7it d'Orsay. Her hasty wish was literally fulfilled ; she never did see his face again. So this was poor Clare’s story ; and a terribly sad one it was too. No wonder that she looked miserable ; small wonder, perhaps, that she insisted that she had killed the man she loved. In all probability, her words had driven him — equally angry with herself— to take his sudden passage in the Calabria^ possibly only to give her a fright, for he had taken no luggage with him, but nevertheless with fatal consequences. Poor, poor Clare ! She was certainly, however, the better for revealing her story to George. He had given her all the com¬ fort he could, and it struck me, when we assembled at dinner, that her eyes had already lost something of their despairing expression. This may have been fancy, but it was not fancy that once or twice during the meal she actually hazarded a remark, and even asked when Fred was coming. After this she became more attached than ever to George, in her silent fashion, accompanying him now and then on his village rounds, and oh ! won¬ der of wonders, volunteering one morning, when he 87 was very much pressed for time, to do some accounts for him. So the days sped on until the time came for Fred’s arrival. Now. Fred was a soldier; the youngest, the hero, and the best-looking of the Herbert family, and popular with everyone who ran against him. He had been through the Soudan campaign, had been in¬ valided home, and had been spending the winter in Italy in order to recruit his health. Latterly he had been staying in London for a week or two, and was coming now to pay us a flying visit before rejoining his regiment and buckling to work once more. He arrived one afternoon in July at Safford, and George met him at the station, giving him, on the six- mile drive home, a short sketch of our guest and her story, which seemed to interest him greatly. He brought new life to the vicarage, a breath from the outer world. Fresh from Italy and London, he was indeed an agreeable change after poor, silent Clare ; and so she herself seemed to think, for, although she maintained her usual mournful silence throughout dinner-time, she kept her great, dark eyes fixed on Fred from the beginning to the end of the meal, whilst he on his part seemed equally interested in her. After dinner I proposed that he and she should adjourn to the garden for a while, for George was due at a meeting in the village, and I had to go and sit with Effie whilst nurse was at her supper. In this way the two were left alone together, as I had wished they might be, for it would give Clare the opportunity, if she desired it, of asking Fred about his experiences on board the Calabria. What was my dismay then when half an hour later I came downstairs to find Fred alone in the garden, smoking a solitary cigar ! “ All right, Mary,” he said, ‘‘ she is only just gone indoors. You will find her a different creature to¬ morrow.” “ My dear Fred, are you a magician ? What do you mean?” “Well, you know George told me all about her — that is to say, as much as he thought good for me to know — to-day as we drove from Safford, and it struck me at once that she might fit my letter.” “ Your letter ? This is Greek to me.” “ Oh, ah ! Of course, you don’t know what I mean, for I don’t think I ever mentioned it to you. You remember that at the time of the collision of the Calabria I was saved from a watery grave by being hauled into a fishing-smack, when, on recovering my senses, I found sticking to my coat a piece of wet paper, evidently a part of a letter. It was, however, so blurred and soaked with water that it was as much as I could do to decipher it ; but at last I managed to make out that it was from a gentleman to a lady, and moreover of an interesting nature, being some¬ thing in the style of the advertisements in the agony columns in the newspapers. The writer began by saying that he was thoroughly ashamed of himself, that he had behaved like a brute to his own beloved darling ; that he had arrived at this conclusion whilst on a run across the Channel to Calais, from which he should return the next day, when he would at once

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88 The Story of the Dwelling-House. come and entreat her forgiveness. Here the letter came to an abrupt conclusion, no doubt owing to the collision, and as it commenced ^ My own sweet love,’ and was minus a signature, it was impossible to make out the writer or the person to whom written. I kept it, nevertheless, placing it inside my pocket-book, and there it has been ever since, until to-day George’s ac¬ count of Miss Western reminded me of its existence. As good luck would have it, after you went up to Effie this evening. Miss Western gave me a lead by asking— “‘You were on the Calabria the night of the col¬ lision, weren’t you 1 ’ “ On that hint 1 spake. I could not say that I re¬ membered having seen Mr. Berners, but I mentioned my letter, saying how I had shown it to everyone who had been on board the Calabria that I had met with, and with her permission I would show it to her. She acquiesced at once, and I thereupon produced it. The effect on her was magical. No sooner had she scanned the handwriting than she burst into a passion of tears, put both her hands into mine, and then, clasping the precious document, flew into the house with it. That was about ten minutes ago. Am I not right .? Won’t she be a different creature to-morrow .? “Oh, Fred, dear Fred ! how delightful! You have cured her, I feel sure.” “ I say, Mary, don’t run away in such a hurry. I wonder if you and old George have found out how very pretty she is.” But I did not stop to listen to him. I ran to Clare’s room. “Clare, dear, let me in,” I cried. The door was thrown open, and there stood Clare, a perfectly transformed creature. Her eyes were red with weeping, but the stony despair had melted out of them, to be replaced by a sweet, tender smile that was reflected round her mouth. “ Oh, Mrs. Herbert I ” she cried incoherently. “ He forgave me. He sent m^ a message— a letter. Oh ! such a letter. Ah, my dear, my dear ! I do not feel now as if I had killed him,” and with that Clare threw her arms round my neck and gave me at least half a dozen hearty kisses, before once more bursting into a flood of blessed, health-giving tears. ***** Three years and a half have passed away since that July evening, and Fred and Clare have been man and wife now for a year. Only the other day Fred assured me that he did not know what Clare’s temper may have been formerly, but that since he had married her he had found her the sweetest-tempered woman he had ever met with, “and considering that we have been travelling and roughing it together for six months,” he wound up by saying, “ I ought to know.” THE STORY OF THE DWELLING-HOUSE. BY EDWIN GOADBY. common abodes have a wonderful hi s to ry, carrying us back to the dawn of time. The wander¬ ing tent- dweller is struck dumb with asto¬ nishment in any ROMAN PORTICO. huge city, and the city-born traveller marvels when he sees the auls, or tent-villages, of the Kirghis. The city has its fixed houses, its long lines of streets, its tramping people, its noisy wheel-traffic. The nomads of the Oxus move their auls from place to place at certain periods, and the desert-paths are their unresounding streets, the wells and pastures their centres of attraction. No¬ madic life begets a movable residence ; the fixed residence implies the higher state— food and labour close at hand, a settled social life, the cultivation of the arts. The tent is thus the primitive dwelling. It was made of the skins of wild animals, or of the animals of the flocks fed by the nomads, or of branches of trees in lands covered with wood. In nearly all countries of the world the earliest buildings are cone-shaped or round. The square tent is a great advance, wherever it be found, and it invariably leads to the square building, be it of timber or of stone, or of sun- dried or fire-dried brick. In Arabia large tents are called baiton or houses. The tent of the Red Indian does not materially differ from the tent of the Central Asian tribes, and the kraal of the South African savage is built on much the same lines as were the huts of the poor under the huge palaces of Thebes, and the stone bee-hive dwellings of the Pelasgians and the ancient Britons. The round corn-stacks of the northern parts of these islands preserve for us the type of the ancient dwelling-house ; and when we build round summer¬ houses in our garden, for pleasure, we unconsciously revert to the style of structure our ruder ancestors erected, as a necessity, to shelter them from the elements. The quadrangular hay-stack, which is more

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The Story of the Dwelling-House. 89 inside, length common in Southern England, is a type of the house that succeeded the cone tent and hut, the forerunner of our more modern dwelling. The bee - hive house is found in the Hebrides, in Wales, and in Ire¬ land. It suggests its origin dis¬ tinctly enough. The round house of Arran is a fine specimen of pre- Christian times : walls four feet thick, doorway three feet high, narrowing nineteen feet, height eight feet. The Pelasgian hut was a compound of stones and wood and thatch roof¬ ing. The half-underground dwelling is a variation of the more primitive form. Tartar dwellings in the Merv oasis are still underground, as are some of the houses of Central Armenia. The “ weems ” of Scot¬ land are very much of this character. The flat roofs of the East are remnants of this semi-subterranean building. People sat on their housetops to gossip, as they still do on a summer’s evening in Armenia. The permanent residence begins with the half¬ nomads, as we see amongst the Yomuds. There is an enclosure, with its inner wall as the line from which the rude structure projects. The next stage is to build a wooden house of one room, large enough for the family. This one room appears in all countries, east¬ ward and westward. In the East it is an enclosure, with separate divisions about it, and open to the sky in the centre. In the West it is covered over and used in common. The fixed residence was affected by occupation as Louvke Old- House STOCK well as surroundings. Caves sheltered the hunters of wild beasts. Nottingham, with its sandstone, was in the midst of a densely wooded district, and the old British name for it was “ the City of Caves.” There were also caves by the seashore for the fisher-folk The lake-dwellers were also fisher-folk, and there is a resemblance in their dwellings, whether we find their remains in Italy, Switzerland, Sweden, or Ireland. They were built upon piles, and some were round, like the primitive hut, whilst others were quad¬ rangular. The Irish people call these dwellings cran- noges ; and some of them were occupied until quite modern times : Crannough Macknavin, in County Galway, being destroyed by the English in 1610. Without entangling the reader in the thickets of an architectural controversy, it may be as well to say that early houses establish the fact that, in most countries, timber structures, if at all elaborate, usually preceded stone, leaving behind them a distinct record of the fact. Even where stone was abundant and masonry was freely employed, we get imitations of wood or of reeds. The stone columns resembled the wooden posts, and squareness follows in doorways, windows, and roofs. In China, the transition from the tent to the dwell¬ ing-house has been stereotyped, but in the main it is the square tent, not the round one. The porticoes are of wood, and the eave-plates rest on struts of curved timber to imitate the forked post of a tree. Chinese architecture, indeed, is interest¬ ing, as fixing for us the same stage of the dwelling-house, with climatic variations, that we see still in Sweden and Norway, where wood dwellings are the rule outside the towns. The charming watering-place of Sodertilge, in Sweden, shows of what grace and lightness wooden houses are capable, without the colour and fantastic adornments common in China. The single-room dwelling was com¬ mon with the poor long after it had

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90 The Story of the Dwelling-House. been modified in the better-built houses, just as single-storey buildings still remain with us, al¬ though they have ceased to be common. To-day we see timber-framed houses, with overhanging upper storeys, side by side with modern mansions, as in Saxon times their huts and halls were side by side with Roman houses, which were called by terms to signify their age. The division of the single room was probably accomplished, in the first instance, by skins, hang¬ ing on wooden posts, to form an apartment of privacy, and for the women of the household. The early Saxon chiefs and kings lived in one room with their retainers, and slept there. The fire was made in the centre, and the more familiar re¬ tainers, or “ hearth-companions,” as the Saxons called them, sat and slept with their over-lords about the fire. To this origin have been traced the Counts of the Palace of the Frankish sovereigns. The poor also sat and slept round the fire in their humbler dwellings, and we owe our familiar phrases, “ the family circle,” “ the social circle,” a “ circle of acquaintances,” to this custom. At present we are at a period of half-circles. Westminster Hall and the College Halls of the English Universities are sur¬ vivals of the older English hall. Solomon’s house “of the forest of Lebanon” (i Kings vii. 2) was about the size of Westminster Hall. The next stage was the construction of a special chamber for privacy, called the solar. This was at the end of the hall, and above the cellar. The Romans called the chief room the aula.^ the Saxons called it X\\Q heall. Halls are often mentioned in “Domesday Book” as attached to manors, from which the use of the term hall, to signify the chief mansion in a place, undoubtedly arose. But, as commerce increased, retainers diminished, old customs lost their force, and domestic life encroached upon the public life of the rich. Bed-chambers were provided, the solar was enlarged into the withdrawing-room, and the main hall was reduced in size and subordinated to the group. The plain-timbered roof of an old hall is well seen in the hall of Courtenay, Berkshire, of the fourteenth century, as its rapidly growing competitor may be found figured on a seal of 1273, showing a two-storeyed house, with bed-chambers above. Many of our country mansions retain the main hall as the centre of the building, and sometimes it has been left intact at the side. The single hall was often approached by a flight of steps, and steps also led up from it to the solar, or private apartment. The street-projecting steps are of Roman origin. Roman houses had steps and a portico, beneath which a great man’s clients or dependents used to wait. The effect of Roman architecture upon the English dwelling-house is visible in the pillared porch and steps, and the steps projecting on to the pavement, common in the older English towms, even when the porch had been abandoned as unsuited to ordinary dwellings. As the Roman oediles com¬ pelled the removal of the steps and porches as ob¬ structions, so modern public bodies have had to insist upon the contraction of these awkward features. Up to the thirteenth century, however, external staircases to the upper rooms were the rule. The manor-house of 1273, already referred to, had evidently an internal staircase. We need not trouble ourselves with the combination structures of wood and rubble, wood and brick, and wood and stone — they are all transitional types ; nor yet with Gothic buildings or half-fprtified houses. Building in storeys is not English. But the early builders in wood must have had an idea of it, be¬ cause the Sagas picture Thor’s house as consist¬ ing of 540 floors ! Old French chateaux were only two-roomed, and more than one family in a house was unknown until the sixteenth century. The houseless folk lodged in hostelries, chapters, and convents, where hired rooms could be had. The “flat” system is foreign. The teim “ English quarter,” in many Continental towns, is given to houses each of which contains a single family. Modern storeys are said to have originated in Venice, where ground was scarce, and the great mansions were first seen. They passed westward through France to England, but at what precise time is unknown. The Venetian mansion had its great hall abov'e tlie main entrance, with the usual por¬ traits, memorials, and buffets. This floor was called the piano 7iobile. It H now known as L

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91 The Story of tfie Dwelling-House. the appartamento signorille^ as visitors know by the price usually asked for it. The Scotch have derived the “ flat system, now so increasing amongst us, from the French. The plan of building houses in wings is Italian. It is necessary to return to the great hall. When the fire was on an open hearth in the centre, the smoke had to escape as best it could. Louvers, or louvres, were provided in the roof, a kind of pinnacle still seen in Westminster Hall. Only the finer build¬ ings were so accommodated, however, and probably the Louvre in Paris owes its name to its handsome smoke- turrets. Most pri¬ vate houses had these louvres until the beginning of the fifteenth century. Chaucer, speaking of a widow, says, “Full sooty was her house and eke her hall.” The fireplace and the chimney were of Norman inven¬ tion. The Roman houses did not have them in 1368, for there is an account of a Prince of Padua taking a mason from Padua to make a chimney at his inn, “because in the city of Rome they did not then use chimneys, and all lighted the fire in the middle of the house on the floor.” King John’s house at Sholing, near Southampton, had a fine Norman fireplace, dating from 1130 ; there was also one in Rochester Castle of the same date ; a third in a vaulted building in Simnel Street, South¬ ampton ; and a fourth at Netley Abbey, 1233. Chim¬ ney-stacks came in with bricks, and before the hall had its fireplace it was built in the solar. The roofs of houses were originally built either dome-shaped or with the false arch, produced by narrowing-up slabs of stone or timber. Thatch and reeds were common until the seventeenth century where tiles could not be made or slates were unknown. The “ roof-tree ” was exposed, blackened with smoke, and usually built of English oak. Ceilings were not common in the thirteenth' century, though they became richly ornamented in the fifteenth. The oldest form of ceilure was to cover the brick, timber, and stone walls of rooms. Arras was not used in England for any other purpose than dividing a large room into other rooms until after the advent and comparative disuse of wainscoting, which was common in the better houses at the beginning of the fifteenth cen¬ tury. At the end of the thirteenth or beginning oi the fourteenth century, although glass had long been used for palaces and churches, the ordinary dwelling-house had wooden shutters for its win¬ dows, or lattices, or iron bars. The floors had been strewn with rushes in winter, and grass in summer. Pine branches for door-mats are still used in Norway. The carpet is Eastern : it is a remnant of tent life. On the Oxus, Mac Gahan has said, “ Each family has a different pattern which is handed down from genera¬ tion to generation as a heirloom with¬ out undergoing the slightest change. The colours are principally red and white, interspersed with small patches of green and brown, and are really very pretty as well as durable.” Scottish tribal plaids no doubt represent a not unlike connec¬ tion with their family life. The first carpets that came to England were introduced by Eleanor of Castile and the Spanish Embassy. Floor¬ ing tiles came from Flanders, and in Henry VIIL’s time were called Flaundrestyll. The dwelling-house, in fine, is a quotation from many centuries. It is silent history, and its signifi¬ cance needs interpretation. To Englishmen it speaks, through the interpreter, of British, Roman, Saxon, Norman, and Eastern elements. It is a record of the invasions we have suffered, of our kinship with far Eastern races, of our increasing needs, of our growth in domesticity, wealth, and comfort. A round lock-up in a country village — now very rare — carries us back to British houses; and though we have no princely Roman villas left, we have only to look around to note everywhere the effects the Romans have left behind them. The Saxon halls are not uncommon ; Norman castles remain ; jur home life is a witness of our far Eastern descent. The poet sings what is as true of the tent as it is of the house of timber or of stone — “ Be it ever so humble, There’s no place like home.”

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92 THE UNIVERSAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE: A PROPOSAL. BY EDWARD IREN.EUS STEVENSON. OR some little time I have been considering the pro¬ priety of organising a new society, quite unlimited as to membership, and to which persons of both sexes, nearly all ages, and, so far as at present I discern, all na¬ tionalities are eligible. I do not know that this society will accomplish more effi¬ caciously the work within its province, when so or¬ ganised, than the individuals likely to fill its ranks manage to do now, in their separate capacities and according to the marked gifts some of them display — gifts wherein they so rejoice and exalt their horns. The main object of incorporation, after all, would be the mere pleasure and the eminent satisfaction that people feel in knowing that they are in quite con¬ genial company. This society I propose to call the General Advisory Committee of the Eastern and Western Hemispheres ; no initiation fees, no annual dues, no officers, no meetings, no anything but — existence. Colonel Lorenzo Randolph would be the first person I would select as a kind of king-pin for the frame-work of the committee ; and as the easiest way of letting any interested readers know whether they ought to come into the association, or have any friends and (especially) relatives who certainly ought to do so, will be by illustrative types, Colonel Randolph may stand first, for comparisons. He is a near neighbour of mine ; sixty years of age, with a fine property, a healthy family, and an unwearied bass voice in speaking. He can always tell you exactly how a thing ought to be done. He never fails to do so, out of the sheer richness of his un¬ doubted experience and his kindness of heart and distress of mind, lest you can’t get along and through with what you have on hand in the most facile manner. He doesn’t wait for you to ask his advice. The Colonel Randolphs of the world never do. You happen to mention on the piazza of an evening that you are going to Augusta, Maine, on Wednesday. “Aha!” exclaims Colonel Randolph, “and how do you intend to go ? ” Diffidently, but determined to adhere to your carefully arranged travel-scheme, you unfold it. “ H’m — well, you could do that,” replies the colonel ; “ but, my dear man, what a poor route you have made out! So it seems to me. Now don’t you see how much better it will be for you to - ?” and out they come in full perspicuity, the notions of that member of the Advisory Committee ; and on you listen, in patient indifference or annoyance. The colonel’s suggestions are thoroughly good and practical — you don’t dispute that. But you didn’t ask for them, and you don’t care about them ; and it is an unmitigated nuisance to have your fixed scheme a little confused by his dismissal of it for another, when it is, after all, but a slight choice between them ; and, moreover, to have to spend one half-hour in civilly making him see that you propose to take your own course and journey — even if you seem, by his energetic denunciation, to take your life in your hand at the same time. You become a little warm and ill-tempered, or very silent ; and the colonel, you are pretty sure, thinks you singularly thick-headed and obstinate. But it is not on journeys only that this good old star of an Advisory Committee will cast his light. If it is laying a drain-pipe in your garden, after due counsel with the best plumbers in town ; painting your carriage -house ; adjusting your political views (of course), and so on ad infinitum^ out comes Colonel Randolph’s well-packed store of knowledge, and his “ Well, it seems to me, it would be a good planj Smith, to — ” or his, “ Well, do you know, it strikes me that you are taking just the least handy way to — ” until one swears to never mention a project to his old friend until it has become a fait accompli — the piazza built, the journey made, the piano bought, the school for the boys selected — or else that one will, like the wicked, do one’s works by night, when the colonel snores instead of watching opportunities to prove himself a model Advisory Committee member. If you were in real doubt, and needed the sugges¬ tions of experience, or had not a grain of taste or prudence yourself in this or that contingency, one would not object to the kindness of the Colonel Randolphs of the world. Indeed, one would seek it. and sometimes does, gratefully. But it is nearly always most positive and voluble on trifles, and on pre-determined, pre-established devices and plans. Oh, ye Colonel Randolphs ! wherefore will ye so scatter your good seed on stony ground, which nevertheless will bring forth *a crop that suits us So much better than — you or yours ? But if this Advisory Committee attention is so disagreeable from an old and “ privileged ” friend? it is naturally a good deal less enjoyable, and a severer strain on the patience of paterfamilias or anybody else, when the member is a relative — a relative just distant enough not to be told in plain words to mind his or her own business. Immediate kith and kin are often highly eligible to the com¬ mittee ; but a good deal of allowance may be made for them. Now, second-cousin Jane Brevoort is simply a woman born and trained to such com¬ mittee membership. She is fifty-odd years old. She visits all the family connections. She is rich. She has seen much of life and the world. She is simply overrunning with generosity, quick temper, good sense, and experience. One cannot trim a bonnet, dismiss a maid, change the furnace, set out for a

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The Universal Advisory Committee : a Proposal. 93 round of calls, leave home for the summer months, but what second-cousin Jane Brevoort is in the thick of the discussion, laying down, in fairly amiable posi¬ tiveness, over and over, her views and experiences, combating this point, and fairly perspiring to bring one nearer to seeing that which she advances. Or else, by her long and admirably expressed letters to you and anybody, in the family chair she is found expressing her notions of the unwisdom of the whole affair, and the strange short-sight of the Smiths as to their pleasantest and best interests. To be sure, everyone else among the relatives and friends consulted, on the whole, or altogether, thinks you do perfectly sensibly and right. Circumstances prove it. It makes no difference ; you will never hear the last of second-cousin Jane’s “way” as long as the topic it was urged about recurs. Sometimes it is only a sly sneer from her well-chiselled lips ; but you understand that her judgment upon the point, like “ our flag ” in the patriotic song, is “ still there.” She has never been able to see why one chooses to do «ns suits himself or herself, and not as suits second- cousin Jane Brevoort. She advances in years, but her spirit is still keen. She will advise, advise, advise, till the last week of her life. Her brothers and sisters grew up under her dominancy. Some never could revolt from it, in their affection and increasing timor¬ ousness of a good, square self-assertion. It is too late now. The younger generation merely smile, or pshaw, or frown, and go their ways and avoid dis¬ closing their little plans or great ones with second- cousin Jane. Second-cousin Jane’s gifts for an Ad¬ visory Committee Membership have cost her more in the way of love and companionship and con- dence than she suspects. If there were to be offlcers in the mighty committee, I am sure I should canvass for a vice-presidency for second-cousin Jane Brevoort. Tom Blaikie is a good fellow, well in the early twenties, but he is very eligible. One cannot ask Tom into the tennis club, the winter’s germans, the book club, but what, presently, there is an atmosphere of dissatisfaction with the smoothly running present course of things, and changes are suddenly mooted and factions formed ; and Tom's perceptive acute¬ ness is at the bottom of all the trouble. Nobody asked Tom’s counsel, but he uttered it, and others listened and stirred up warfare in uue time. Tom, my dear fellow, your place is in the ranks of the Advisory Committee ! Linda Morrison, of the Shakespeare Class, the Sunday School Library Board, the Amateur Comedy Society — you, with your ever- ready little suggestions, so positively maintained, so rarely invited, your Advisory Committee niche ought not to be long deprived of your graceful figure and calm, regular face. Mrs. Parker ! Dr. Bangs ! Judge Gray! Aunt Mary! Uncle Levi Jones! — ah, if you only knew how appropriate will be your nomina¬ tions for membership in this notable and universal organisation ! I say “ universal,” for though all the world be no longer of one language and one speech, human nature is very like throughout the globe, and I am sure that Hussein Ali buying camels for his journey to Bassorah, Quong Ling meditating his marriage settlement in Pekin society, Akalulu picking out a new nose-ring in a Congo village — you are all oppressed by the power of the Advisory Committee in its individual representation. Of course, . it may be urged that in this little ex¬ pression of dissent from the works and ways of any persons likely to adorn such a unique association as the committee, one may be accused and mocked for wishing to uphold universal obstinacy, blindness to one’s best interests, intolerance of sound judg¬ ment and experience, and unselfish and disinterested advice. Not so ! Far be it from this humble projec¬ tor of the committee to thus assert such a blunder. The Advisory Committee usually advises in matters carefully pre-determined with the best lights— other than theirs — and suited to exigencies that often they know nothing of, and cannot, with convenience or propriety, be instructed in. The latter predicament is especially frequent, but they cannot take time to remember it. They are too often Ishmaels ; their counsel clashes with every other accepted one. They see but part of the cause. They would alter results out of all proportion. The impropriety of officers in the committee will be understood when one considers that with so many brilliant and self-sacrificing and clear-headed persons, the choice would be altogether embarrassing. And, more than that, if a dispute arose as to the manage¬ ment of this estimable society in a single point, the opinions advanced would be so various and so stub¬ bornly maintained that there would be, at once, a general and terrific and prolonged sort of free-fight, that would inevitably end in the utter breaking-up of so sagacious a fraternity and sorosis. Any persons desiring to unite with such an associa¬ tion, or those admitting to the possession of friends and relatives that they wish to commend to its ranks, may address themselves to “ The American Branch of the Advisory Committee (Unlimited),” in care of this publication.

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94 A BOATING SONG. ENTLY o’er the rippling waters, Slowly glides our boat along, And the woodland sloping meadows Echo faintly to our song. Slowly glide we, ever onward, ’Neath the pale moon’s trembling light, And the nightingale's sweet singing Softly breaks the hush of night. Resting on our oars we listen To the changeful songster’s note, O ! what sweet contentment greets us From that tiny singer’s throat. Once again our oars are dipping In the moonlit crystal stream ; As we float through light and shadow. Life but seems a pleasant dream. Shadows cast by wooded hill-tops Throw their dark shade o’er our way. But beyond is silvery gladness, Sweeter far than light of day. O ! the ripple of the waters Greets us as we float along. And aga^in the hill-side echoes To the melody of song. Harold Hartley.

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95 Boatins ^otis» mrds by Harold Hartley. (See f age ^ ^ Elliott. 'Hi- - — vi — ! Is I H >-] M ^ — 1 ~q •It ^ ^ 1 r* ! s ■ J T’ — ai> i - . j. » #> — -t h - tJ / _l And the wood-land slop - ing inea- dows Q—ft - 1 - W - 1 - - ! - - : - E - cho faint - ly to our song. Slow - ly glide we 1 2 ^ - - li — d - ^ zzj— j---l— q - - ' — 1 i 1 1 1 & tr k — ^ — si w w si —si - -J ^ — si — I— SI - SI - St - r- 1 — S ,9 . Lmg J S S- S - - L K -9- ^ - — s i r u ^ - - w w r-p 1 — a - fc — ' - 1 - 1 nr - — r — s r s jj-^ ! ! piJ L J 1 — ! — i - r — 1 — ! — - r p ^ ■ J n9 r ■ ■ ■ J . 1 — 1 - H - * S rr 1 ^ ?"%T- s s ^ ^ ^ _ _ - — - — I - ^ - r -ft _ ^ — 9 - r r T .A S It. ; ^ • ^ ^ f— — SE — A. d p ^ — — p — If s — P: — . - W w \ i ^ — it - ^ W ^ ^ - V t .-— h h^r— i . i ■■ L3i I 1 9 ~ ^ W p. 1 - - - r - r - ^ [- IT ev - er on - ward, ’Neath the pale moon’s trembling light, And the night - in - gale’s sweet sing - ing 0 *. _ I _.s _ 1 N K _ 1 i ! _ J _ - 1 - ^ .. ( ^ ^ J _ 1 _ ; - 1 - — » - ^ - 1-— t- H T -1 i . I 4 ^ m id sHE si Zd — T :aJ ! \ — U rr — d I— 2 “i [ [ ^ ^ - K — ^ - 2 - ^ ^ - r* 1 V } C • si 9_ 9_ s 9 s C )- 1 r — -y — 1 » -ms - 1 - n s ' « sn z J. - - 1 - L. 4^-5.. H - T"^ n P 1 js . 9 ! ^ ! r ^ ■ J L 1 -ft— 3 - ri^ > J ^ J P_ Lr! L B ^ • it S S* 9~>, 1 1 ^r- 1 ] ^ ^ ^ , 1 ^ s! 1 i' d L - - - ^ . — - - ^ —

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96 THE STRONGER WILL. By EVELYN EVERETT GREEN, Author of “Monica,” &c. CHAPTER THE FIFTH. THE LADY OF THE MANOR. N her return to the draw¬ ing-room, after a brief visit to the sleeping children in the nursery, Florence found that the ice had begun to melt somewhat. Mr. Cadwallader was in his accustomed chair, with his sister beside him, and the look of constraint on her face had almost vanished. It was Vernon, however, who appeared to be doing the greatest amount of the talking, and doing it with some success. Florence had so far hardly spoken to Rudolf, but she was not in the least daunted by his sombre air ; indeed, the reserve and aloofness of the two Stanhopes interested her more than the ready good-will of the Freers. She approached him without hesitation. “Are you admiring our garden by moonlight.? It is just the best time for seeing it if you would like to come out.’’ Florence caught up a light wrap and threw it round her shoulders, gathering up her flowing draperies as she stepped out upon the terrace. “Is it not a sweet night? There is nothing like moonlight for a hoary old house like this. Where shall I take you first .? — round the gardens, or down the dark avenue where the family ghost walks?” “ You have a ghost, then ? ” “ You have one — oh, yes, of course. Could there be an old house like this without ? Yes, I will take you to the haunted walk. It is just the witching hour of night in which to see the place.” The moonlight lay brooding peacefully upon the sleeping lands and the placid water. The spell of night was upon the grey old house. Rudolf was afraid a spell was falling upon him, yet he could not choose but follow. She led the way along the south and east terraces towards the spot where the Gothic chapel stood out from the main block of building, a lovely little relic of mediaeval days, whose delicate tracery of arch and window at once drew eulogiums from Rudolf’s lips. “Yes, is it not lovely? You will see it to-morrow at prayer-time. It has an exquisite old window to the east — the rest, alas ! are but modern imitations, but it is all harmonious and beautiful. Uncle Oliver reads prayers there every morning, and as many of the outdoor men as can leave their work come, and their wives too, very often. There is a separate door for them, and I think they like to come. Sometimes in very bad weather, when the roads are so heavy that the people can’t get to church, we have a sort of Sunday service for the tenants. I do so like the old family feeling that is kept alive here.” Florence stood in silent thought for a few moments, and then roused herself with a little laugh. “ This is the haunted walk,” she said, and moved a few steps over the dewy grass. Rudolf followed her, and found himself at the end of a long solemn avenue of yew-trees, big stately yews that grew so close and so thick that only a few faint moonbeams penetrated into the dim majestic aisle. It seemed to stretch away into infinite distance, and in the faint glimmering light looked very grand and rather awful. “Surely you do not walk here alone at night?” remarked Rudolf, with a little laugh. “ It is an eerie place for a lonely promenade.” “ I like to come sometimes,” answered Florence, who was looking down the dark avenue. “There is a quaint ruined building at the end. Nobody knows quite what it was, but it was supposed to have been a sort of home for a few monks, who took the services in the chapel in bygone days, when this house was a great place.” “ And the monks still haunt the walk, do they ?” “ So they say, and go continually backwards and forwards to the chapel.” “ One could fancy a good many things in such a spot,” said Rudolf, with a smile. “ Come, Miss Tenant, you ought not to stand any longer with your feet in the long grass.” Florence laughed a little as she turned away. “ The odd thing is that the grass never does grow long in the avenue,” she said. “ Some people say it is the yew-trees that check its growth, but, of course, the favourite tradition is that it is the perpetual walk¬ ing to and fro of the old monks that keeps it close. Any way, it never does grow tall, and I am a believer in the old monks. I love those quaint old sayings and superstitions that linger about ancient places.” ' “ So do I,” answered Rudolf, with more of interest than he had yet spoken. “ Tell me some more, if there are any.” “ Any ? I should think there w^ere indeed. I could tell them by the hour.” And so she led him on from place to place, with a story for this spot, a quaint distich for that, a reminiscence of bygone days for the other, until Rudolf felt the spell of the old house wrapping 'him round and round. When they returned to the house it was to find Mrs. Freer already departed, and Mr. Cadwallader waiting for his ward with a little impatience. He never could be quite hap)py if Florence were long out of his sight. “ Uncle Oliver,” she said, when they were alone

Page 106

97 The Stronger Wii.i,. together, ‘‘you behaved beautifully, and 1 am very much obliged to you.” Mr. Cadwallader drew his brows together, but could not forbear to smile at the same time. “Well, madam, you have got your own way at last— as usual — and have filled the house with a rabble you have set your heart upon a thing I can never bear to say you nay. But time only can decide the issue.” “ And time will decide it in my favour, I know,” an¬ swered Florence, with gay confidence, adding, after a pause, with something of the old pleading tone : “ she “he encountered the children returning with FLORENCE” (j>. 98). of people. And now you’ve got them, what are you going to do with them ? And how long will you be in finding out that you have made a grand mistake ? ” “ Now, Uncle Oliver, be good and speak the truth from your heart. You do not really think it will turn out a mistake ? You are not sorry that you did it.?” “ No, my lady, 1 am not sorry — I did not expect to repent within the first twenty-four hours. Perhaps I may never repent at all — there is no knowing ; but it is a risk. It was your fancy, you know, and when is your nearest relative, uncle, your only sister. Surely it is right that the reconciliation should be hearty and complete.” “ Well, is it not? Have I not opened my house to them ? You have got your own way there, and have brought them all here. What more would you have ? ” Florence looked up with her bright smile. “Did I say I wanted more ? ” “ You looked it, madam.” “ Your eyes are too keen. Uncle Oliver. No. I have 727

Page 107

98 The Stronger Will. no more to ask — only that you always remember that she is your only sister, your nearest kinswoman, and a widow.” “ Now look here, Florence,” said Mr. Cadwallader, with a little testiness of manner : ‘‘ I don’t quite know what you are driving at, or if you are driving at any¬ thing ; but understand, once and for all, that I won’t be made a fool of. You know quite well upon what conditions I consented to ask your aunt to make this house her home, and I won’t be coaxed or cajoled into infringing any of these conditions. You are the mistress of Marchwood, and its mistress you shall remain. Of course I saw through that farce of a round table and its ‘ seats of honour.’ I dare say it is very pretty and graceful in you not to wish to pose too much as one who takes precedence of my sister, but I am master here, and I like to see you at the head of my table in the good old orthodox fashion, and OU4* guests at the side. I shan’t interfere in this instance, but don’t let us have any more of this tampering with facts. You are the mistress of my house, and I will not permit anyone to take your place — no, not in the veriest trifle.” Florence stood up beside him, putting her beautiful white arms about his neck. “Dear Uncle Oliver,” she said very tenderly, “the place I value is the one I hold so near your heart. All the rest may go so long as I keep that ; and I know very well, after all these years of love and con¬ fidence, that no one can dispossess me there.” “ My darling ! ” he said softly, “ my darling ! ” And then she kissed him, and left him with a soft “good¬ night.” The first day at Marchwood began for Rudolf with a solitary walk in the dewy park. He had slept but brokenly during the night, and had been haunted by shifting dreams, in which Florence Tenant was always the central figure. He could hardly rid himself of the sense of her presence even out in the open air, with the songs of skylark and cuckoo in the air, and the scent of the spring pervading all ; but he breathed more freely away from the house, and a sort of ex¬ hilaration came over him as he strode along. The sound of the chapel bell recalled him presently, and not far from the door of the little Gothic building he encountered the children, returning with Florence from an enchanting inspection of the home farm. Ethel had so much to tell him of all she had seen that nobody else could hope to get a word in edge¬ wise, and Florence only smiled her morning greeting as she led the way into the chapel, and went straight to the organ, which responded to her touch in a way that showed her to be a born musician. After breakfast Mr. Cadwallader went to his study ; Mrs. Freer returned to Violet, who was still unwell and too weary to rise. Vernon and Harry started to explore the grounds together — an expedition of more interest to the former ; and Florence, after a visit to the invalid upstairs, prepared to go about her daily round. Passing through the hall after her consultation with 'die cook, she saw Rudolf lounging rather aimlessly about on the terrace outside. This silent, stem-faced young man interested her, and she had a dim instinctive notion that his feelings towards herself were in all probability those of distrust, if not of enmity. Florence Tenant was no child and no dreamer. She was perfectly well aware that, as matters at present stood, she occupied the position of Mr. Cad- wallader’s heir — that a will had long ago been drawn up, leaving to her the Marchwood property, together with the bulk of her guardian’s fortune. She knew also that Mr. Cadwallader was a man of strong will and great determination, but that his love of justice and right was very great also. She knew that her in¬ fluence was powerful, and that it was hard indeed for him to refuse her anything upon which she had set her heart. This knowledge it was which gave her confidence to believe that when the time was ripe, and the way had been carefully prepared, she should be able to persuade her guardian that his proposed course of action was an injustice to his own kindred, and a source of real distress to her, and induce him to act as hifc fathers had done before him, and keep a fine old property in the family to which it had belonged for so many generations. Florence had confidence in that and in herself, and she had already achieved a pre¬ liminary triumph in the establishment of Mrs. Freer and her family at Marchwood ; and she could not but take a mischievous pleasure in Rudolfs coldness towards herself. Like all thoroughly healthy people, she was blessed with a keen sense of humour, and she delighted in the mental pictures she was certain were drawn of herself in this haughty young man’s mind, and could not altogether resist the inclination to play the part of lady of the Manor with even more than her wonted animation for his delectation and disgust. So she pressed him into the service, and constituted him her companion upon her morning ride round the estate. Rudolf, who delighted in the sensation of feeling a good horse under him, could not but enjoy the gallop over the grassy park, and the sense of ex¬ hilaration induced by the breeze, the sunshine, and the pleasure of exercise. Florence looked superbly handsome mounted on her great glossy chestnut, her eyes alight with animation, her cheeks aglow, and her hair tossed about in pic¬ turesque confusion beneath her plumed riding-cap —for even in the saddle her dress retained its charac¬ teristic quaintness. Florence had her own end in view when she asked for Rudolfs company. She was eager that he should love the old place that she was bent on securing for him. She wanted to interest him in the life that went on there, in the many phases of existence that it contained. She wanted the people to know him, to like him, and to come gradually to welcome the thought that he would some day be the master. To-day, however, all that was done, so far as the young man could see, was that he was shown in a very unequivocal fashion how firmly seated was this Queenly girl upon the liule throne she occupied. He

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The Stronger Will. 99 'watched the faces 6f those who addressed her and those whom she addressed, and there was no need to tell him that they all loved her. No need to ask now who was lady of the Manor. If there had been any doubt on his mind before, that morning ride would have dissipated it. But the fascination of the place dominated him increasingly. The loyalty of the people to their superiors, the old-fashioned good-will and community of interest that was so marked a feature on the Cad- wallader estate, struck him more and more. He watched Florence with a sort of envy, not because she would one day be rich and independent, but because she had grown up among the people and had won their hearts, and had learned to love them with a real and individual love that nothing but the habit of years can give. But for a miserable misunderstanding, he too might have been their friend, known and loved from childhood, as she had been. He sighed im¬ patiently at the thought, but not for worlds would he have attempted to speak of his feelings. He felt his position to be one of peculiar difficulty. Vernon was standing at the hall door as the riders drew rein there, and he gave a quick look at his brother before assisting Florence to alight. He was by no means dissatisfied at the expression of Rudolfs face. He very well knew that stern, haughty look ; it was very plain that neither Marchwood nor its mistress was proving attractive to him. “ I have been showing your brother something of our place and its people,” said Florence, a dancing light in her eyes, “ but I cannot get him to admire anything.” CHAPTER THE SIXTH. A PASSAGE AT ARMS. Edmund Greville was not long in finding his way to Marchwood, or in making acquaintance with the new-comers there. His visit, paid on an early day, Avas repeated very frequently. Florence watched him with some amusement, and •soon came to the conclusion that Violet’s dark eyes had a good deal to do with this attraction, and that there was for him a decided fascination in her quiet 'reserve of manner and somewhat enigmatic fashion of accepting his homage. It was not easy to guess at Violet’s feelings, but Florence fancied that she was not quite indifferent to the attentions of the blue-eyed, sunny-haired Edmund, with his manly air and bear¬ ing, and his boyish gaiety of heart. “ Poor Uncle Oliver ! ” said Florence sometimes to herself. It was well known to her and to many others that a match between herself and Edmund had long been arranged between Mr. Cadwallader and Mr. Greville, upon which their hearts were greatly set. The Hawks- hold and Marchwood properties adjoined each other, though the houses were nearly three miles apart. The young people had been brought up together, apart from the rest of the world, so that a marriage between them was looked upon as a natural and almost hievitable sequence. All this had been made very plain to Rudolf and Vernon too by Mr. Cadwallader, as they sat over their dessert together one evening after the ladies had retired. The old man thought it best that his nephews should clearly understand the position of affairs at the outset, and without any undue emphasis or any ap¬ pearance of effort, he managed to make his meaning perfectly clear. Rudolf’s pride rose up in arms at once as he observed the drift of his uncle’s remarks. He con¬ trolled all outward manifestations of anger, but he felt, nevertheless, deeply affronted. He wished he had never come to Marchwood at all, if it was only to receive insult and to be regarded with suspicion. He had forced himself to this reconciliation in violation of many of his deepest feelings, and already, before a week had passed, he had to listen to words like these : to find himself regarded in the light of an heiress-hunter, whom it was necessary to warn, lest he should presume too much upon his position, and to see what the world might think of his residence beneath his uncle’s roof even as a guest. Rudolf was, of course, needlessly sensitive, as most proud men are ; nevertheless he was not mistaken in thinking that Mr. Cadwallader wished to put him on his guard, and to warn hitn that Florence was not, and never could be, for him. But it was scarcely to be wondered at that the young man in his hurt pride came rather near to a quarrel with Florence, in his determination to avoid even the appearance of paying court to her. The occasion was on one of Edmund’s visits, when, to leave him and Violet to themselves, Florence had taken Rudolf and the children to see some new farm stock. Is there any chance of that child’s ever recovering his sight ? ” asked Florence, glancing compassionately at Cuthbert. “ He tells me he can distinguish light from darkness, and sunshine from shadow. Some¬ times I fancy he walks with more confidence than would be possible if he were totally blind. Is there any possibility of a recovery ? ” “I hope there may be. It has been all along a curious case, more on the nerves than any organic disease, I believe. The fresh air and open-air life he leads here ought to be all in his favour.” I hope so. I think Marchwood is very healthy. I hope both Violet and Cuthbert will get quite strong here.” ‘‘ I hope so. I am sure they have every chance ; and the boy is so happy, it must do him good.” “ Dear little fellow, he is so beautifully patient ! He never complains, though he must so long to see the things we all talk about.” “Yes, he is always like that. He never seems to fret a bit, but it is sadly against him. He can get no regular education, and will be very much at a dis¬ advantage in after-life, if ever he gets back his sight.” “ He is very well grounded in Latin grammar,” said Florence. “ He tells me that is your doing.” ‘ “Yes, I tried to supplement our mother’s efforts

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lOO The Stronger Will. by a little Latin and algebra. He is very quick to grasp information, and has a very retentive memory, but I do not know on what principles his education will be carried on now.” “ 1 want to leach the children, at any rate in part, if Aunt Felicia will let me,’’ said Florence. “ You ! ” “ Yes ; do you think I am not competent ? ” with a saucy smile. “ I was thinking you had far too much on your hands already.” “ Oh, no ; I have plenty of spare time, I assure you, and I have always had a mania for teaching, and nobody upon whom to exercise it. You know Uncle Oliver educated me like a boy, and taught me Latin and Greek and mathematics himself. I should like above everything to teach little Cuthbert. I am going to talk to Aunt Felicia about it as soon as we begin to settle down to a steady routine. I believe in system and regularity, and like to do everything by clock¬ work, and let lessons be lessons, and play be play.” “ That is the best way with children, undoubtedly,” answered Rudolf, “ but I do not myself believe in home education.” “ I do,” answered Florence, laughing, “ because I was educated at home, you see, and of course I can see no faults in myself. But seriously, would you rather Ethel and Cuthbert had a governess ? I do not want to interfere in any way, only they told me they had never had one before.” “ No, they never have had. It was considered a needless expense, Cuthbert being blind and Ethel 50 young. But pray do not ask me to settle such a question. All such decisions rest now with you and Mr. Cadwallader.” Florence looked at him steadily for a moment, and then said, with unusual gravity — “ Cousin Rudolf, you are very proud and unyielding. It seems as if you were determined not to be friends with us. You hold aloof in a sort of undefined way, and separate yourself from us and our interests. I know you have some cause for complaint. I am quite aware of slights and difficulties in the past, but I trust and believe that all that is over now. Will you not try to forget and forgive ? ” She turned as she spoke and faced him, her beauti¬ ful grey eyes full upon his, her whole attitude express¬ ing a peculiar dignity and sweetness ; and just because she was so beautiful, because he felt the fascination of her noble nature exercising more and more power over him, Rudolf drew himself up, and calling his pride to his aid, resolved not to be dominated by the power of a fair and gracious woman, whose very beauty and charm were standing in the way of justice and right. I am not aware, Miss Tenant,” he answered, “ that there is anything to forgive. As for forgetting, that matter unluckily is beyond cur own powers of control. We are greatly indebted — or should be — to Mr. Cadwallader for his hospitality. I fail entirely to understand the drift of your remarks.” She still remained motionless, looking him full in the face. Excuse me, Cousin Rudolf, I think you understand me perfectly.” He bowed, a little ironical smile curving his lips. “If you think that, it is useless for me to protest further.” Still no wavering of the frank grey eyes. “ Then you will not be friends ?” “ When did I ever say that.^” “ Your actions have said it often during these past days. Your looks and your words say it very plainly now.” Still, there was no yielding of the set lines of the stern, handsome face. Rudolf braced himself up with all the determination he possessed. Nothing should induce him to put himself in the very false position of a favourite or a hanger-on at M archwood, for the world to point at as a man trying to turn matters to his own advantage, and patch up a quarrel in order to reap personal gain. Neither should anyone, after what had occurred, be able to accuse him of trying to better his position by paying court of any kind to the young mistress of this fair domain. The more he felt the power and the charm that Florence was wont to exercise upon people, the more he was determined to withstand and conquer it. He should not have to be told twice that she was not for him. “What do you wish me to say?” he asked, with courtly coldness. “ I fail to see what cause of com¬ plaint you have against me. I have expressed myself as muoh indebted to Mr. Cadwallader for his hospi¬ tality towards us. I am also grateful to you for the same thing. If I have seemed backward in express¬ ing gratitude I can only tender a humble apology, and beg you to accept my thanks now.” Florence looked at him, an expression of dis¬ appointment clouding the brightness of her face. “ It is not your thanks I want,” she said. “You must know that quite well. It is ungenerous to speak so. Cousin Rudolf.” “ If I have offended, I ask your pardon. What is it you do want, may I ask ” “ Your friendship— the sense that you are a kinsman and belong to us ; your love for Marchwood, and the knowledge that you accept it as a home as much as the others do. Why should you be more of an alien than they ?” “ Simply because my position is entirely different. M.y home is in London, where my work is. I have been pleased and interested to visit Marchwood, but to view it in the light of a home would be simply an absurdity.*’ “ But - ” “ Excuseme, Miss Tenant, there is no ‘ but’ in the matter. My duties and engagements will preclude me from any but occasional visits to this place. As soon as the summer session begins I am busy from morning to night, and I hope, as I grow in years and experience, to be more and more engaged. To you, who have always lived in this place, it no doubt seems to be the centre of the world, but, of course, I cannot share your enthusiasm. I can only be interested in it as an outsider, and if I appear a Vandal or a

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The Stronger Will. lOI Goth, why, I cannot help it. An out¬ sider I am, and always shall be. I am quite alive to your kindness and cour¬ tesy in trying to bring me into the inner circle of the life of the place, but it is useless for me to attempt to enter it. I have my own interests and pursuits in the more stirring life of the political world, and there my home is and always will be. Marchwood is a pleasant place in which to spend a week or two after a spell of work, but to live here, were it wished ever so — which it never will be — would be an absolute impossibility.” He spoke with a sort of stern rapidity habitual to him when at all excited. His dark eyes glowed, his head was held up with dignity ; he looked very handsome, very ha«/ghty, and very unyielding. Florence, however, was in nowise crushed by the visible determination he evinced not to be moved for a moment from the position he had taken up. She only looked fearlessly up at him, and said — “ Then for the present you shall only be a visitor, Mr. Stanhope, but perhaps thefe will come a time when you will not despise Marchwood as much as you profess to do now.” And with one of her peculiar radiant smiles she turned and left him, answer¬ ing an impatient call from the children, and Rudolf turned on his heel and walked off in an opposite direction. It was strange that his prevailing “ i' thought after this passage of arms should be — “ If only she were not mistress of Marchwood and an heiress, that is the woman whom I believe I should try to win for my wife. But as matters now stand, there is no danger of my falling into that snare. I know my place too well.” CHAPTER THE SEVENTH. FAREWELLS. ‘‘Brother dear, you will soon come and see us again ? “ I don’t know, Pussy. I may not have a holiday again for a long time.” “ But Sundays ? ” “ Marchwood is too far away for me to come over for that one day.” Ethel’s big brown eyes were raised wonderingly to his grave face. “Brother,” she asked rather solemnly, “don’t you like being here ” “ Oh, yes, little one, it is pleasant enough. I like to think of your all being so happy and so well looked after, but I have my own work to do elsewhere, and it is no use my pretending that this place is my home, too.” S BEAMS FELL UPON THE BRIGHT HEAD OF FLORENCE TENANT ” (/. 102). Ethel’s eyes were gravely pathetic. “ But it is home now, brother, indeed it is. Cousin Florence said so.” “ For you, Pussy ; not for me.” “ Cousin Florence meant for you, too.” “ Oh, no, she didn’t, little one ; Cousin Florence knows a great deal better than that.” Children’s instincts are peculiarly fine. Ethel caught an intonation in Rudolf’s voice that he had not in the least expected her to hear, and of which he was hardly aware himself. She looked up at him, her glance expressing grave wonderment. “ You don’t like Cousin Florence half so much as she likes you,” she said reproachfully. Rudolf was conscious of a momentary feeling of embarrassment, that he turned off by a short laugh. “ Cousin Florence likes you very much,” pursued the child, still intent on her own thoughts. “ She wants you to come very often. She told me so. She said I was to coax you, and get you to promise. Please do promise, brother.” The little face, framed in its curly brown hair, was very pleading and loving. The little figure in the long white night-dress nestled up very close to the big brother sitting on the edge of the bed. It was half-

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102 The Stronger Will. past nine, Rudolfs last dinner at Marchwood was over, and he had come up, according to a promise exacted by the little sister, to see her in bed, and to have ‘‘one little last talk.” Ethel occupied a very warm spot in his heart, and when her curly head rested on his shoulder, and her little warm hands clasped themselves so lovingly round his, he felt that he should miss his little sisters clinging love more keenly than he had been at all aware of. It was another tie binding him to Marchwood — to the place from which his judgment told him he ought to sever himself as completely as possible. “ You haven^t promised,’’ repeated Ethel wistfully. “ 1 can’t promise anything. Pussy, because I do not know how I may be situated. I may be asked to go abroad in the summer with Sir Arthur, and of course an invitation like that is not one I could well decline. I have my way to make in the world, you know, and I must do all I can to get on. I cannot afford many pleasant weeks of idling in a sleepy place like this ; I have lots of things to consider which you are too little to understand. But Violet or mother shall bring you sometimes to London to see me, and we will have fine times together there. Will that satisfy you, little one ? Then wipe away those tears, and give me a kiss that isn’t all salt. There, that is better. Now go to sleep, and dream about the good times we will have when you come to invade my bachelor diggings ! ” So Ethel, who was in fact quite tired with watching and talking, fell asleep almost at once with a smile upon her lips, and Rudolf, after stooping once more to kiss her, went slowly away. He did not feel disposed to seek the drawing-room, where in all probability he should find Mr. Cadwal- lader and his ward. Mrs. Freer and Violet generally retired about ten, and Rudolf more often than not walked for a time about the garden after they had gone, leaving Vernon in possession of the field. His brother was popular with his uncle, but he himself often felt that his presence was not wanted. Moreover, on this particular evening he was the more averse to meet¬ ing his uncle on account of certain words that had passed between them after dinner that evening. Mr. Cadwallader had, with a certain appearance ot embarrassment, thrown out hints to the effect that he would be willing to settle an allowance upon his nephew, if such a settlement would be useful and agreeable to him. Rudolfs pride had risen up in arms at once. He was in no need of money. His salary was liberal, and his tastes were inexpensive and simple. In no case would he have felt himself justified in accepting pecuniary assistance ; but to have it offered by Mr. Cadwallader as a sort of salve for an uneasy conscience (for such did it seem to the young man) was something little short of a deliberate affront ; and although he had spoken with quiet moderation, as to a relative and his host, his manner had plainly shown the state of his feelings, and Mr. Cadwallader had been made aware that the family pride and detennination, at any rate, could be carried on to the descendants in the female line. He was not altogether displeased by this discovery^ but he had spoken with some sharpness, and Rudolf had left the table feeling it was very well that his- visit to Marchwood was nearly over. Almost unconsciously he turned his steps in the direction of the yew-tree walk, whither Florence had conducted him upon the evening of his first arrival at Marchwood. He paced the black avenue slowly, wrapped in thought ; not heeding, in his absorption, its blackness and dense gloom. As he neared the ruin at the farther end, his foot caught against a block of stone, and he nearly tripped over it. Warned by this that it was hardly safe to proceed farther in such pitchy darkness, he seated himself upon the stone, and rested his head upon his hands in deep thought. He thought of little Ethel’s words, and of the- feelings they had awakened within him. He thought of his uncle, of Florence, of all the impressions lately received — or rather, he did not think at all, but sat in a sort of passive state, whilst all kinds of ideas jumbled themselves together in his mind. All at once he became aware that the silence of that still place was broken. Faintly at first, as if from a distance, yet swelling and increasing in volume,, came a strain of sweet music ; and with the music (or so it seemed to him) the tread of feet tramping solemnly towards him. He remembered where he was then, and the quaint tradition of the place, and for a moment his heart beat thick and fast, and he was conscious that he trembled. But shaking off his superstitious terror, he rose to his- feet, and satisfied himself that the sound as of foot¬ steps was nothing but the rising wind swaying the heavy boughs of the yew-trees. The music, however,, still continued, though it did not appear to advance. Rudolf walked back through the avenue, and as he moved he heard more and more distinctly the sweet sound that had first awakened him from his trance. As he approached, he became aware that it was- someone playing the organ in the little chapel, and he smiled at his former fears. Yet the music was very sweet, and music in such a. place, and at night, might well produce a curious effect upon a mind such as Rudolf’s, stirred as it had been, by so many conflicting feelings. He tried the little door by which the labourers entered the place, found it yielded to his touch, and he slipped noiselessly into- the deep shadows of that dim, quiet place. The only light was that of a single lamp over the organ, and its beams fell upon the bright head of Florence Tenant, who sat at the instrument, the outline of her noble face and figure being thrown into- strong relief against the dusky background of the hoary old walls. With her aureole of chestnut hair and her robes of spotless white, she made a picture that many an old master would have loved to stud}^ for a Saint Cecilia. Rudolf sat down on an empty bench, and gazed at her. At that moment he forgot that he had ever distrusted her. Mr. Cadwallader was standing watching her too, as he supplied the organ with air ; the half- smile was-

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The Stronger Will, 103 on his face which it often wore when it was turned towards his dearly loved adopted child. The young man caught the expression upon it, and it told its own tale, and one that did not surprise him. “ Sing, Florence,” said Mr. Cadwallader presently. Rudolf had never heard Florence sing before, yet the beauty and richness of her voice did not surprise him. He sat quite still, his head resting on his hand, not looking now, only listening. Was this his farewell to Marchwood ? He felt that it was time indeed that he should go. He had given way once in coming ; he must not do so again. If he valued his peace of mind he must never look on that house or its mistress again. He meant to steal away unseen, as he had come, but he could not move until the music had ceased, and then when he laid his hand upon the lock of the heavy door it grated on its hinges, and Mr. Cadwal¬ lader called out to know who was there. Rudolf advanced with some reluctance. “You!” remarked his uncle, “you coming in by the ghost’s door, that we never trouble to lock 1 You are bolder than most of the people about. How came you there ? ” “ I was wandering about the grounds, and the sound of the organ attracted me.” “ You hoped to see the ghostly monks, I suppose.^” said Florence, laughing lightly, for she saw that some constraint hung over both, and that Rudolf was not best pleased at having been discovered. “What a disappointment only to find Uncle Oliver and me! You must hope for better luck next time.” “Next time !” echoed Rudolf beneath his breath, with a bitterness at heart for which he could not iccount. Did Florence hear it ? They had now reached the cloistered walk, where the moonlight lay peacefully sleeping : a still, lovely place, apart from the turmoil of the world: typical of Marchwood, Rudolf thought, and of the spirit that reigned there. His heart ached strangely as he looked round him. Why had he been so foolish, so unguarded, as to let himself love this place, in which he could never have part or lot ? Why did he so hate to feel that after the morrow he should see it no more ? He was glad that Florence did not go in at once, that she paced round the moonlit walk, her arm linked in her guardian’s, and that she evidently expected him to do the same. Anything was welcome that seemed to give him a moment more of Marchwood and of her presence there. Mr. Cadwallader had often been irritated with Rudolf, to-night as much as at any previous time ; but he had always felt what might be designated as a “sneaking liking” for him ; and now that he was going away so soon, he felt more disposed to be gracious. “ Well, Rudolf,” he said, “ I am glad we have made acquaintance at last. I wish you well in your career, and shall hope to see you an M.P. before long, setting the Thames on fire, and otherwise making yourself valuable to your party. I know what the life of a political man is like, and how little he can command his time ; but when you want a few days’ rest, or feel disposed for a week of country life, you have only got to let me know. Your room at March- wood will always be ready for you, and your mother and brothers and sisters will always give you a wel¬ come, I am sure.” Rudolf was a few seconds in answering, and then his words sounded very formal. “ You are exceedingly kind to say so, sir.” It was no answer to the open invitation that Mr. Cadwallader had felt himself decidedly magnanimous in tendering, and again he felt somewhat irritated. He was a proud man himself, and did not care to be out-Heroded by his own nephew on his own parti¬ cular ground. He spoke the next words somewhat sharply : “ Which is another way of saying, I suppose, that you do not intend to come again — that you have had enough of us ? ” Rudolf made no answer. His face, as Florence noticed, looked pale in the moonlight. “ Good night,” he said abruptly, holding out his hand. “Good night, Miss Tenant. I am exceedingly obliged to you for your very kind hospitality. I may not have a chance of saying so to-morrow.” The next moment he was gone, Florence looking after him rather wistfully. “A very peculiar young man,” said Mr. Cadwal¬ lader. “ I do not much think 1 shall ask him again to Marchwood.” “ And I hardly think,” answered Florence regret¬ fully, “ that he will come if you do.” CHAPTER THE EIGHTH. AT HAWKSHOLD. Edmund Greville and Hubert Morrison were lounging about together in a somewhat desultory fashion along the wide paved terrace walk that flanked the house on the east side, where the great hall door stood with its double flight of steps. It was drawing near the luncheon-hour, and a party from Marchwood was momentarily expected. “ What kind of people are they ? ” Hubert was ask¬ ing. “ Stanhope is so close, one can get nothing out of him. Mr. Cadwallader was in Parliament once, long ago, wasn’t he? You know him intimately, I suppose ? ” “ Oh, yes ; have known him all my life.” “ He’s not married, is he ? ” “ No.” “ And young Stanhope is his heir. Rather a piece of luck for him. It’s a fine property, isn’t it.? ” “ Very ; but there’s no entail, you know. He can do what he likes with it.” Hubert looked at him with idle curiosity. “Well, there has been something of a family estrangement, and Mr. Cadwallader is barely ac¬ quainted with Rudolf Stanhope,” added Edmund. “ So I rather gathered from the way he always speaks — or, to be more accurate, does not speak — of

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104 The Stronger Will. Ms uncle and the place. How comes that about A family quarrel ? ” Edmund was not fond of gossiping about other i people’s affairs, but he hardly saw his way out of the difficulty. “Mr. Cadwallader did not approve of Mrs. Freer’s marriage with her first husband. There was a cool¬ ness for a time, I believe, and afterwards circum¬ stances kept them apart a good deal. However, they are all at liome enough at March wood now, and to talk of a quarrel seems absurd.” Hubert nodded his head sagely. “ I see ; I grasp the situation. Peace has been made, but Stanhope is still partially under a cloud. I was certain from his manner that he and Mr. Cad¬ wallader were not bosom friends.” The carriage from M archwood was just now round¬ ing the bend of the drive, and Hubert turned to look at its occupants with a good deal of interest. It was Florence’s Stanhope phaeton, and she her¬ self was driving, as usual. Her mastery of a pair of spirited horses was a study in itself, and one not likely to be lost upon a young man. Hubert, who had never troubled himself to wonder what manner of woman Miss Tenant might be, gazed at her with a sense of sudden fascination. When she smiled upon him at the moment of introduction, and frankly held out her hand, he bent over it with an involuntary homage that was a surprise even to himself. “ My guardian knew your father a little, many years ago,” she said: “that establishes you as a friend at once, you know. No, Mr. Cadwallader will not be here to-day. He remained with Mrs. Freer, who hardly feels equal to visiting yet, even with old friends. You will see him some day soon at Marchwood, I hope. You know Vernon Freer, I see ; possibly Miss Stanhope may not be quite a stranger.” “ I have seen Miss Stanhope before,” answered Hubert, “ but I do not think I have had the pleasure of an introduction.” And then there was a move indoors, and a general introduction of the new-comers to Mr. and Mrs. Greville. Violet, quite unconscious that she was desired to make a favourable impression in this house, was quiet and unconcerned as usual, very reserved and re¬ fined in manner and bearing, yet with a certain look of power that a close observer could not fail to note. She did not quite understand Edmund’s manner to-day. There was an empressevient in the way in which he led her up to his mother which he could not avoid, little as he wished it to be remarked, and he watched the greeting that passed between the two with an eagerness that only Florence, however, had eyes to notice. Nothing could have been more felicitous than the impression mutually produced by the two thus brought together. Mrs. Greville, in her lonely, gentle, refined old age, was altogether a revelation to Violet, whose past life had not brought her into any sort of associa¬ tion with anyone in the least like the white-haired, delicate-featured mistress of Hawkshold. When she looked into the clear eyes and serene face of this new acquaintance, something in her heart told her, with a quick throb of gladness, that here she should find one whom she could trust — one of whom she could make a friend did circumstances but give her the chance. Mrs. Greville, on her side, was pleased and attracted, Violet was beautiful in an unobtrusive fashion, and if lacking in Florence’s brilliancy and bloom, possessed qualities both of mind and body that gave a charm to her presence whenever she chose to exert them. As she sat beside her hostess, answering questions as to her past life and recent loss, gently and tactfully put by one whose age entitled her to some expressions of sympathy, Violet felt her natural reseiwe melt away and she talked with a freedom, and therefore with an ease and grace, that was a pleasure to her listener, and that filled Edmund with delighted admiration. He had felt sure that his mother’s sound discrimination and innate sweetness would at once discover the merits and win the heart of the girl he had learned to idolise upon so brief an acquaintance ; but it was none the less delightful to see the success of the meeting, and he almost resented the break-up of the party that was the necessary consequence following upon the announcement of luncheon. But happily as the visit turned out throughout — for the afternoon was as successful as the forenoon — Edmund could not feel quite at ease, for he knew his parents had set their hearts on his marrying Florence Tenant, and might really grieve over his love for Violet, much as they might personally like her. So, as Florence had ever been his best friend, and as he believed she knew full well how the land lay, he made an excuse the very next day for going across to con¬ sult her. His comings and goings at Marchwood were never questioned ; he was almost a son of the house there already, and he never seemed to weary of his fre¬ quent visits ; so that when Florence met him alone in the garden with an anxious, somewhat pre- occu¬ pied look upon his face, she saw at once that he had something on his mind, and was not surprised at his abrupt commencement. “ I say, Florence, I’ve got a confession to make to you ! ” “ Have you, Edmund ? ” “ Yes. I expect I shall get into an awful scrape ; but it must come sooner or later.” “ Have you been getting into debt ? ” asked Flo¬ rence. Edmund shook his head. “No, it isn’t that. I’ve • been a very good boy, and lived within my allowance. It’s something else.” “ Perhaps you have been falling in love t ” sug¬ gested Florence lightly ; but by the way the young man’s colour rose she saw she had touched a tender chord, and she added, with quick sympathy, “ 1 did not mean to tease you, Edmund. Tell me all about it. You know you have always a friend in me.” “Yes, I know,” he answered heartily. “You have always been like a sister to me, Florence. Indeed, I

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“MY LADY.’ (Sec f* 105.)

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My Lady. fancy I* tell you a great deal more about myself than I should tell most sisters. You see things are rather complicated here. I don’t know what line to take with my father ; but don’t you think he must love her ? ” “ But you have not told me her name yet,” said Florence, trying to look innocent. ‘‘Oh, I thought you knew. I thought you must have seen ever since I saw her — Miss Stanhope, of course. I think she’s the sv/eetest woman in all the world.” Florence’s eyes expressed a great deal of sympathy, but a little mischief lurked in their depths. ‘■‘ You have lost your heart very quickly,” she said. “ I know I have,” he answered. “ I know it’s much too soon to speak. She can’t possibly care for me yet — perhaps she never will— and I don’t mean to say a word till we know one another a great deal better ; but I don’t like going on in any way deceiving mj poor old dad. He is always urging me to bring a wife home to the old house, and when I let drop the other day that I wished for nothing better, he was so delighted. And now I don’t know what to do or say next. I’m awfully afraid I shall grieve him so much. Of course, we both know what his heart is set on.” Florence’s lips curved to her most bewitching smile. Her eyes met his, and both laughed. “ And I know you wouldn’t have me if I wanted it ever so,” said Edmund. “Not at any price, my boy,” answered Florence, with a delicious candour. And you wouldn’t have me any the more.” “My father half worships you. He will never understand why it is Violet I want for my wife. I suppose it would not be quite honourable to say that you refused me long ago ? Practically, you have, you know.” “ Practically, I have not, because you never wanted me,” answered Florence, with her bright smile. “ No, Edmund, do not let us try to shirk a difficulty by the least little bit of subterfuge or deceit. You know I have just the same difficulty to contend with that you 105 have. My uncle is quite as much set upon our marry¬ ing one another as your father is.” “ I know ; but he cannot blame j/ou; but my father will have no mercy on me.” “We will not let that be,” answered Florence. “ Time does its own work very well if it is left alone to a great extent. I am on your side. I will do all I can to prepare your way.” “ I know you will. You are always the best friend a fellow could have. I’m glad I’ve told you every¬ thing. You will help me, will you not ? ” “ Of course I will. Most women are born match¬ makers. I am sure my talents in that line are only lying dormant for want of victims. I shall begin upon • you.” Her eyes were dancing with the light of laughter peculiarly infectious. Edmund laughed too, although he was very much in earnest. “ How much does Violet know of this ? ” “ Oh, nothing at all. You see, she has only known me such a short time. I could not expect her to care the least bit about me yet,” answered Edmund, who was a very modest youth. “ If you will let me come over often and see more of her, by-and-by I hope I may win a little of her love ; but, of course, it is all very uncertain ; ” and Edmund sighed, feeling that his star was very far away and unapproachable. “‘ Faint heart never won fair lady !’” quoted Flo¬ rence merrily. “ Come to Marchwood as often as ever you like. I will see that you have opportunities. Violet is not at all easy to know, and she does not'like me ; but that is no reason at all why she should not like you.” “ Not like you? How can she help it?” “ Very easily. She is loyal to her brother’s cause, and I am the designing woman standing between him and his rights.” And then Florence and Edmund looked into each other’s eyes, and both broke into a hearty peal of laughter. END OF CHAPTER THE EIGHTH. MY HEN sunshine wakes the sleeping lands. Below the terrace steps she stands. And instantly, when first she stirs. Flock round her feathered pensioners. And oh 1 she is so fair to see, I too her pensioner must be, And humbly wait but for a smile. To make me happy for a while ! LADY. Yet afterwards when she has gone, ’Tis just as though no sun had shone. And in the darkness of despair I grope, and find no comfort there. For she is as some bright, bright star. That I must gaze at from afar. And .know it never can be mine. However graciously it shine ! G. W.

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BORDER IN GESSO WORK, FOR PIANO, ETC. GESSO AVORK. IT would almost seem as if we irt England have yet much to learn about the arts practised in other countries. Al¬ though gesso work is well known in the art world, and there are many examples belonging to collec¬ tors here — the han¬ diwork of great masters of ages past — I believe I am right in saying there are many persons who have no con¬ ception of its beauty, some even who are ignorant of its very nature. It is beyond my present purpose, however, to dwell on the old treasures of g-esso diiroj the me¬ dallions with sacred subjects in high or low relief, interest¬ ing as they most undoubtedly are. My intention is simply to introduce gesso work as an art which is altogether charming when applied as a decoration for articles of present-day use. Its adaptability to interior house decoration is practically unlimited, whilst for the beautifying of small objects for bazaars, which forms the staple work of many a woman’s life, it seems to me, in these days, it cannot be surpassed. And it is a novelty here as yet, a fact that in itself carries all before it. I can best liken it, I fancy, to an ivory carving in high or low relief laid on a wooden surface. The decoration is tinted with colours, or silvered or gilded, in parts or entirely. The surface on which the deco¬ ration is executed is stained, polished, or lacquered. In the latter case so many tints are available that great variation of effects is obtainable. To Mr. Walter Crane belongs the honour of bring¬ ing it prominently before the notice of the English in its modern guise of usefulness. He says of it, “ The art is capable of endless development and variation.’^ And he is right. The decoration can be carried out in styles too numerous to mention severally. Workers will discover for themselves a hundred different ways of treating the decoration and surface. For instance,, a gesso decoration can be partly gilt and partly painted on panel of stained or polished wood. Again, the gesso work may be flat, then the tinting becomes of the first importance. A surface of green lacquer may be beautifully ornamented with a slightly modelled design silvered and gilded. Yet again the gesso decoration may be gilded and lacquered. When figure subjects are carried out in gesso, the elaboration of the design becomes such as a great artist would not disdain to occupy his time upon. The figures should be exquisitely modelled, the colouring harmonious, and the background may be enriched with set patterns incised and gilded. It would be entering into another branch of the work to describe the casts in gesso which are so beau¬ tiful when created by a master-mind and master- hand. The casts also are silvered and lacquered, and the results are exquisite. But for simple decorations modelling with the brush is all-sufficient. I will now give my readers some practical informa¬ tion on the subject of gesso work, and I feel sure that having once started they will not readily give up the pursuit, for as they proceed they will find avenues for the display of originality opening up that they cannot choose but enter. A failure or two will only incite them to renewed endeavours. This is no mere pastime of which they will easily tire, but true art work, and DESIGN FOR CABINET DOOR.

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Gesso Work. the enjoyment of following it will increase the more they learn of its possibilities. Fine Italian plaster of Paris is the foundation of gesso ; this is mixed with glue and reduced to the con¬ sistency of cream with water. There is, however, a “ composition for gesso work,” and I certainly advise my readers who are commencing to avail themselves of the preparation ; it will lighten their toil consider¬ ably. The materials are in two separate bottles, and the white powder has to be mixed with the composi¬ tion in proper proportions. A brush is used in apply¬ ing the gesso, which may be laid flat or modelled with 107 for overmantel for description. The design —a leafy scroll — is carried out on an emerald ground, with set pattern of conventionalised roses slightly raised from the surface. First sketch the design on paper eighteen, inches square. Now all over the background draw the small set pattern of roses, leaving half a rose here and a quarter one there, close up to the scroll, so- as to give the impression that the latter is laid over them. The sketch being finished, get a panel of wood eighteen inches square. Give this a coat of gesso- and model the set pattern, raising the flowers about the sixteenth of an inch above the ground. Then modeli PANEL FOR OVERMANTEL. (Scale, one-fourtJi.) a fine brush as the artist chooses. After the gesso is laid on it is sized, and is then ready for tinting, silver¬ ing, or gilding. Metallic colours form pleasing backgrounds for gesso work. A good effect is secured by shading the background — say from gold to green, or from light blue to dark blue, and so on. The metallic colours are sold in bottles ready prepared by the same firm that supplies the ‘‘composition for gesso work,” the Society of Artists, 53, Bond Street, W. I think I can best help my readers by describing minutely the execution of a piece of work from com¬ mencement to completion, but it must be remembered this is only one manner of proceeding. It shall be a rather elaborate piece, but not too difficult for a be¬ ginner to manage well. I select the illustrated panel the scroll, using the palette knife for laying on the gesso in the parts that are to be in the highest relief^ and continue the modelling with the brush. Keep the idea of the cast before you while doing the scroll ; in fact it might be a help to copy a simple cast in gesso- for practice. Let the gesso set, which it will do in about half an hour. Now the panel is ready for tinting with metallic colours, gilding and silv^ering. Perhaps I should say here that gold and silver are sold with the colours, but some artists may choose to use gold-leaf, or to have a background silvered and to tint that with the lacquers ; but this is a hint to the more advanced. Students just beginning should keep to the metallic colours, they can easily make other experiments when they have accustomed themselves to the work. Novr

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io8 The Career of Joseph Joachim. to continue the panel. Give the whole of the gesso a coat of size, the colours can be applied then with greater ease. Gild the set rose pattern entirely. Then silver the scroll, and touch it up here and there with colour in the indented parts to bring out the forms. Next cover the flat surface of the background with emerald metallic colour. Now the panel is quite com¬ pleted, no sizing or varnishing is necessary. But you may wish to get a certain effect of brightness, say on the gold set pattern, or on the background, or on both. In this case cover the portions you wish to be brighter with first a coat of size, then one of varnish. To return for a moment to the silvered background. Mr. Walter Crane advised me, in a letter he wrote to me on the subject of gesso work, to follow this method. As he is a high authority on the subject, I repeat the sug¬ gestion for the benefit of my readers. He says : “ If you want a colour effect in lacquer it is better to have the work silvered^ with leaf, and then tint it with the coloured lacquers.” To secure greater relief cotton wool is occasionally employed ; this is dipped in the preparation, then laid on the design where required, and modelled. The character of the design naturally varies accord¬ ing to the style of the article to be decorated. Flowers, insects, dragons, figures are one and all admirable for the work. As far as possible, it is best in learning any fresh method of decoration to keep to the subjects over which we have already obtained a mastery. Not, for instance, to attempt a figure in gesso unless we can draw one thoroughly well and understand anatomy. Beginners often increase the difficulties in their path by attempting subjects beyond their powers. -To most amateurs it comes easier to represent flowers than figures, and in a hundred instances to one they will be every whit as pleasing and as well adapted for such gesso work as amateurs will be able to accomplish well at first starting. A few suggestions concerning the articles that can be enriched w'ith gesso, and the designs suitable for their decoration, will be useful. It is well to begin on something small, as if failure results no regret need be felt about waste of materials and time. Panels for cabinet doors, and for doors of bracket cupboards, look well ornamented in this style, with a light centre group of flowers ; on the framework there should be a pretty conventional border. Small pieces of furniture, such as occasional chairs and tables, music cabinets, work-tables, writing-tables, overmantels, etag^res, fire¬ screens, will all be enhanced in beauty and rendered more valuable when embellished with gesso designs artistically executed. Gesso work is so thoroughly effective for decora¬ tions of rooms, in the way of friezes and panels, that there is little doubt that the work will ere long become most popular. Those who delight in surrounding themselves with things beautiful will not fail in ac¬ knowledging the power a competent gesso worker possesses to beautify the woodwork of a room by in¬ troducing panels with conventional floral devices. Mr. Walter Crane has shown already its perfect adapt¬ ability to frieze decoration in his panels “ St. George and the Dragon.” Much of the success must necessarily depend on the designs and their arrangement. The overcrowding of flowers is fatal to the realisation of a good effect. Decorations, if they are to be of any value, must show well at a distance, and a multiplicity of objects in a design is certain to defeat this end, which an artist should always keep in view. ^ Crossley. THE CAREER OF JOSEPH JOACHIM. 0 lovers of music in England no name is better known than that of Joseph Joachim, the greatest vio¬ linist of recent times. Since his first appearance in London in 1844, his visits have been one of the regular features of musical life, not only in the metropolis, but in most of the leading towns throughout the country. His continued suc¬ cess as a solo and quartet player is, indeed — extending as it does over a period of more than forty years — probably without a parallel in the history of musical art. Since the Monday Popular Concerts were started in 1859, he has been , the principal violinist at these excellent entertain¬ ments, which have perhaps “ done more than any other musical institution in England towards popu¬ larising that highest branch of the art — classical chamber-music.” To him especially the warmest thanks of musical amateurs are due for his early and cordial championship of the best works of some modern composers, notably those of Brahms and Dvorak ; and it should be remembered also that he has been mainly the means of bringing about the debuts of several other artists of merit now well known in the musical world. Thus, not only is Herr Joachim entitled to be placed in the front rank of living musicians, but he is also entitled to praise for the valuable services he has rendered during more than forty years by fostering in the country the highest branch of musical talent and art. An outline of the career of one who is so celebrated and who has done so much can hardly fail to be of interest to many readers.

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109 'I'he Career of Joseph Joachim. Joseph Joachim was born in the little village of Kittsee, near Pressburg, on the 28th of June, 1831. At a very early age he began to show proofs of his musical ability, and having already received some lessons from the leader of the opera band at Pesth, he played in a duet in public when only in his seventh year. In 1838 he was sent to Vienna to study under Boehm, the professor of the violin at the Conserva- torium. The prominent features of Boehm’s own playing are said to have been breadth of tone and thorough musical style, and these features he seems to have trans¬ mitted to all his pupils : certainly he did so to Joachim. About the time of which we write Leipzig was, under the powerful influence of Mendelssohn, at the zenith of its musical re¬ putation, and no doubt this was what led the young violinist thither in 1843. In one of her letters Fanny Mendels¬ sohn speaks of the ar¬ rival of “a delightful little Hungarian, Joachim, who, though only a boy of twelve, is such a clever violinist that David can teach him nothing more, and such a sensible boy that he travelled here alone, and lives by himself in the Rhenish Hotel, all of which seems quite natural and proper.” The “ sensible boy ” had already proved him¬ self an accomplished player, and it was not long before he made his first appearance in Leipzig, at a concert of Madame Viardot’s, playing a Rondo of De Beriot’s, and being honoured in having Mendelssohn as accom¬ panist. From the first the great composer had taken a warm interest in the young violinist, and it was through him that Joachim was introduced to the critical audiences at the Gewandhaus, where Men¬ delssohn at this time conducted. The leader of the Gewandhaus orchestra was Ferdinand David, for whom the composer of Elijah wrote his celebrated Violin Concerto. He had been a pupil of Spohr, and was in every sense a true artist. Under him Joachim continued his studies for several years, perfecting most of those classical works for his instrument which from then till now have formed the staple of his ri’hf’rtoh'e. At the same time his general education was not forgotten, and it may be said with truth that Joachim’s character both as a man and a musician was moulded for life during these early years at Leipzig. As one of his own countrymen has said, ‘‘ he already evinced that thorough uprightness, that firmness of character and earnestness of purpose, and that intense dislike of all that is superficial or untrue in art, which have made him not only an artist of the first rank, but, in a sense, a great moral power in the musical life of our days.” Joachim remained at Leipzig till 1850, but some years before this he had entered on the career of a virtuoso. It was in 1844, as already indicated, that he ap¬ peared for the first time in this country. The ambition of every artist in those days was to secure an engagement from the Philharmonic Society, but no one be¬ lieved that a boy of four¬ teen would meet with consideration from the directors of that conser¬ vative body. There was, however, no question as to Joachim’s ability, and, on the strong recom¬ mendation of Mendels¬ sohn, the matter of his youth was waived, and he was engaged to play at the fifth concert of the season, on May 27th. The solo he chose for the occasion was Beeth¬ oven’s Concerto, and he played it, according to the historian of the Society — Mr. George Hogarth — in a man¬ ner which astonished and delighted the audience, and justified the splendid reputation which, even at that early age, he had achieved throughout Europe.” While he was in London at this time, he appeared also at several of the weekly concerts given by the genial John Ella. In his ‘‘Musical Sketches, Abroad and at Home,” Ella tells with pride of his having “ mustered a notable assembly of musical lions to hear the youthful violinist in Beethoven’s Posthumous Quartet in B flat. “Royalty and no¬ bility crowded my room,” says the author, “ but the most illustrious of the company comprised Men¬ delssohn, Moscheles, Dragonetti, Ernst, Lablache, Offenbach, Benedict, Thalberg, Sainton, Sir George Smart, Sir Henry Bishop, and Costa. The next morning Mendelssohn called to thank me for the very HERR JOACHIM.

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X lO In the Wild West. great interest I had taken in the success of his protege^ and for the notices which I had published of his playing.” After this Joachim repeated his visits to England at intervals till 1862, and since that date he has, we believe, been with us every year. In 1849 the post of leader of the Grand Duke’s band at Weimar became vacant, and Joachim being offered the appointment, accepted it. The revolutionary tendencies of the Weimar school were not, however, •to his liking, and his stay in the town was of short duration. To the new German school, as represented by Richard Wagner, Joachim has always had a strong .antipathy, but how far this may be owing to original bias, or to the moulding influences of Mendelssohn, ■cannot be said. In 1854 he went to Hanover as Con¬ ductor of Concerts and Solo-violinist to the King, and while here (in 1863) he married Amalia Weiss, the celebrated contralto singer. Since 1868 his per¬ manent residence has been in Berlin, where he fills ithe honoured post of head of the Royal High School for Music. Here he is surrounded by a host of pupils, to whom, “ with a disinterestedness beyond praise, he imparts the results of his experience, and into whom he instils that spirit of manly and unselfish •devotion to art which, in conjunction with his great natural gifts, really contains the secret of his long- continued success.” His pupils, so far as he could ■exercise control over them, have all gone forth to the world not mere executants, but educated m.usicians, inspired with his own sincerity of artistic purpose. As if the admiration of the musical world and ’the gratitude of his students were not enough, Herr Joachim has been the recipient of numerous marks of distinction from almost every quarter of the globe. •Only in July last the University of Glasgow conferred on him the highest honour it could bestow — the ■degree of LL.D. — while in 1877 the University of Cambridge created him one of her Doctors of Music, honoris causa. In addition to these, he has received orders of knighthood from German and several other sovereign princes. As has been remarked by one who •enjoys his friendship, “ No artist ever sought less after such things, no artist better deserved them.” Proofs of appreciation more tangible have not been wanting, and these have been shown in various forms. The great player’s most prized possessions consist of four valuable Stradivarius violins, and one of these, costing 1,000, was presented to him by a number of his English admirers. As a composer, Joachim is entitled to honourable mention. His most important and most popular work is the Hungarian Concerto, for violin and orchestra, described as “ a creation of real grandeur, built up in noble symphonic power, which will hold its place in the first rank of masterpieces for the violin.” His published works amount to fourteen Opus numbers, and several compositions are still in MS. His style is modelled on that of Schumann — grave and melan¬ cholic, earnest in purpose, and ever aiming at the loftiest ideal. It is not easy to say exactly in what respect Joachim is unapproached as a violinist. Listening critically to other players we find, however, that on some side their art is less than perfect. “ One yields to excite¬ ment ; another lacks power of tone ; another leaves the imagination something to supply in rieky feats of bowing and fingering. Joachim, though he sometimes seems to surpass himself, never falls away from a style of general power and finish that is the nearest approximation to perfection we know, furnishing, in fact, the ideal by which others are judged.” Not a few of our greatest performers are remembered chiefly as having turned themselves and their instruments aside to the showy purposes of virtuosity. Paganini dwells in the memory not as an artist, but as a merely dexterous manipulator of the bow and strings, and Ole Bull and Wieniawski were both credited with the desire for public applause rather than for the realisa¬ tion of an artistic ideal. The name of Joseph Joachim is, however, likely to go down to posterity as that of a musician who began his career in the best society, shunned the eccentricities of mere virtuosity, and to the close of his life — for we may be sure he will not now depart from his original methods — looked upon his technique not as an end, but as a means to be used exclusively for the best interpretation of the best music. J. CuTHBERT Hadden. % IN THE WILD WEST. A STORY OF ADVENTURE. BY J. BERWICK HARWOOD, AUTHOR OF “ PAUL KNOX, PITMAN,” “WHAT THE CORAL REEFS GAVE ME,” ETC. CHAPTER THE THIRD. f^l^JHE eggs were hatched successfully. The tiny silkworms — more resembling, in their first stage, short pieces of black thread than anything else — had been heedfully placed on the fresh, crisp lettuce-leaves, of which we had an abundant supply, and lodged in the long and airy cages on which I had for some time been busy, and which were ready for their reception be¬ fore the first of the tiny creatures chipped the shell. They took kindly to their food and to the quarters that had been prepared for them, and seemed, as is the wont of their species when in health, to do little but eat and grow — the latter almost visibly. So far, so good. It was necessary, however, to keep the wolf from the door, as well as to fatten and care for our new guests, in attending to whose welfare Edith proved herself indefatigable. She and I had no assistance, at first, in the task of providing for the silkworms ; for our only servant. Black Sophy, a fat, good-humoured girl, with a fatal tendency to drop

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In the Wild West 1 1 1 all brittle objects on the kitchen floor, was the very last person who could have been trusted where such fragile creatures were concerned. But I could not always stay at home, even to attend to the lettuces, which were now as numerous in onr •garden as if we lived exclusively on salads, and some¬ times opportunities of earning a few dollars had been Jost while I was at work in the indispensable pre¬ parations for our new industry. In my capacity of bread-winner, then, 1 again sallied forth in search of ;such employment as could be found. How strange, I remember, used to be the transition from our rshady verandah, where 1 was helping Edith, feather in hand, tenderly to brush the dainty little worms — they were milk-white now, and growing apace — from the half-consumed leaves to the fresh ones from the garden, to the noisy and sun-baked corral ■of Mr. Harris, the horse-dealer, full of neighing, snorting steeds, some of which, lately in the possession •of the Indians, detested the very sight of a white man, and needed much gentle firmness before they could be pronounced fit to ride or drive. ‘‘Well done, Britisher!” I have known Enoch Harris to exclaim, as I rode back triumphant, patting the heat-stained neck of a mustang, that for the first ihalf-hour had reared and flung, screaming with rage at the failure of its efforts to shake me off its back, and was now obedient to the rein and voice. “ Well done ! I say ; and I wouldn’t mind a peep at the old •country myself, if there are many of your sort, Mr. Prescott, You certainly do hit it off with the horse beasts, as if you had. done nothing else than ridb nags in the rough all your life, squire.” But it was not always that there were mustangs to break in, and then I was thankful when my other patron, Ephraim Hucks, ofthe stone-cutting establish¬ ment, would give me an order to design something ,iew and elegant in the way of monuments to be •erected in memory of moneyed citizens. By book¬ keeping for one or two store-owners whose arith¬ metic was not on a par with their practical shrewd¬ ness in their own branch of retail trade, by taking portraits whenever I could get the chance, and by assisting in the much - needed task of compiling a catalogue for the town library, I did manage to keep free of debt, and to struggle on. Still, ready money was a desideratum that it was worth almost any trouble to procure, and I recollect how pleased I was when a message reached me — through Captain Bates — to the effect that a rich farmer, living nearly thirty miles off, and who had heard of my reputation as a civil engineer, wanted •an estimate of the expense of a bridge across what he ■called “ the creek,” but which really was some name¬ less affluent of the Missouri ; and the swollen state of which, after rain, was a serious hindrance to his brisk traffic in swine, grain, cattle, and poultry, with the towns bordering on the river. “ Lycurgus Parsons is a good sort,” said the aged buffalo-hunter. “Be frank with him, and'let him have his bridge as cheap as it can be made to last, and he won’t grudge you a hundred dollars, hard cash, for your trouble. It would be one while before he’d try to come to terms with a regular Jefferson surveyor, like sly old J. T. Robinson, who never can be pinned to any statement, but with you it will be different. He’ll be glad to see you over at Ithaca, if you can ride over and sleep a night or two.” I did ride over to this classically named farm, a large and lonely dwelling in the prairie land to the westward, having borrowed a horse and saddle-bags from my friendly employer, Enoch Harris. Edith saw me depart without any apprehension, for I was often called away on similar errands, though I had never as yet gone quite so far afield as Ithaca, which, as I have said, was divided by ten leagues of swamp and prairie from the city. The road or track, however, was quite easy to find, and I reached the farm with¬ out difficulty, but only to share in the tribulations of its inhabitants. “ If you don’t fancy a muss, Britisher, and that a muss with which you have nothing to do,” said the well-meaning but excited old farmer, “ you’ll just turn in your tracks and ride back to Jefferson. P’raps I sound inhospitable,” he added, “but I some think you’d better take some corn-bread and meat, and a glass of Monongohela, on your horse, and then go back. Pd go myself, but that would be to make the game too easy for the scoundrels that are coming to burn us out of house and home.” “ If you are in trouble, Mr. Parsons,” said I, as I dismounted, “ I, for one, shall be glad to lend my help. It’s a duty, in these wild regions, that honest men, I think, owe one another.” The tall, gaunt settler gripped my hand between his own toil-hardened fingers. “ I like you, mister I” he said emphatically. “You are a good lad, I see, as a friend of old Titus P. Bates may well be. Well, give your bridle to the black boy there, little Jem, and you are welcome, though we’re not overly cheerful here, with my old woman in hysterics, and the girls crying along with her, and all the white hired men run off, except Irish Mike and Hans the Dutchman. But come in, sir ; and you, Juno, get something to eat and drink for the stranger, d’ye hear. I won’t tell you what’s up till you’ve broken bread under my roof, now you are here.” When I had finished my meal, Lycurgus Parsons spoke — “ It’s that wretched rascal, that Daly — ye’ve heard of Captain Daly and his band of horse-thieves ? They happened in on us last night, while the boys and I were away buying mules at Lafayette, and they scared the women, and the men too, for that matter, for no one had the gumption to show fight when they broke into the yard and toted off my two best waggon-teams, the greys and the roans — worth three thousand dollars, the eight of them, if they’re worth a cent. Then, when we came home and heard it all, my son Jehu, he’s kinder riled, and being a fire-and-tow youngster, off he rides, at daybreak, on the trail of the thieves : he and Irish Mike and Dutch Hans ; and about noon he comes up with some of the gang near Eagle Bluff, and takes back the grey horses, for the roans had been

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I 12 In the Wild West. hurried on ahead, and shoots two of the villains that stole them — one white man and one Injun. But Captain Daly rode off without a scratch ; and since then has the impudence to send me word that if I want to save all our scalps, and the place fron^ being burned right through, I must just give Jehu up when the robbers call round for him.” ‘‘ Give your son up ? I hardly understand,” said I. “ Dare say not, but this is it, mister,” rejoined my host : “ Daly’s lieutenant in the gang is a half-breed, Wild Cat by name, the tallest man, they say, in all M issouri, and a desperate fellow, who was a captain of dog-soldiers out West, and has joined Daly with the few Cheyennes that he’s got left. The white thief Jehu shot was a no-account man, but the redskin, as luck would have it, was a cousin or a brother of Wild Cat’s, and he and Daly have vowed vengeance, and mean it. Now, I can’t give up Jehu.” Of course not,” I answered. “If I did,” said the farmer drily, “these pesky Injuns would just set their squaws to skin him alive, aye, and put fire under his feet, as I’ve known them do to some of our colour, Britisher. Yet we can hardly beat the whole gang, now that the hired men have stampeded. Why, Mr. Prescott, even if* you help us, we shall only pull five triggers, all told.” I inquired the probable strength of the enemy, and also whether there was no way of summoning rescuers from Jefferson or elsewhere. Lycurgus Parsons shook his head. “ I’ve sent off little Josh, my youngest, who is a spry boy of thirteen, on the fleetest of the mustangs, to gallop to the Fort, and ask that soldiers may be sent ; but it’s a long ride, and the colonel and the troops may be away when Josh gets there. I only hope it will be sundown before we see or hear anything of Daly and his band — some sixteen, I guess, when their muster is made up. If they come after dark, well have the night quiet, most likely ; and that will give the soldiers more time.” Seeing my look of surprise, the farmer ex¬ plained that Captain Daly, if he arrived late, would probably defer an actual assault till day¬ break, on account of the superstitious repug¬ nance of his Indian allies to a night skirmish. Such, too, was the opinion of Jehu, the eldest son, a lathy, dark-haired young fellow of nine¬ teen, who presently rode in from what he called “scouting” on the prairie, and who was accom¬ panied by the German and the Irishman, who had alone remained faithful to their menaced master. “ Expect they’re waiting to get the whole lot together,” said Jehu. “Dawn to-morrow will be the ticklish time, I kinder think.” It was not until 1 found myself active among the rest in barricading the doors and the lower windows, in securing with beams and empty casks, hastily filled with rubbish, the gates of the stock-yard, and in preparing arms and ammunition to resist the threatened attack, that I remembered Edith alone at home. How the dear girl would have trembled for her husband had she been aware of my present position, as one of a beleaguered garrison ! Still, it was too late to with¬ draw, nor could I well have acted otherwise than I had done in remaining to share the perils of the household under whose roof I was an invited guest. The sun went redly down over the prairie, and the wan moonlight shed its pale lustre over the landscape, when the heavy trampling of many horses reached our ears, and the long-expected enemy appeared — an imposing cavalcade ; but the bulk of the hostile force halted at a distance from the house, and only three horsemen rode up to the door. One of these, I was told, was Captain Daly, a black-bearded ruffian in Mexican sombrero and striped mantle ; the second, who bore a spear with a white rag fluttering from it as a flag of truce, was an Indian in his war-paint ; while the third, by his gigantic height and sinister aspect, 1 conjectured to be the dreaded half-breed. Wild Cat himself. Daly, in loud bullying tones, and with a volley of oaths, demanded if “ the young scamp, Jehu Parsons,” was to be given up, along with the grey horse team, and what cash was in the house ; and when such surrender was refused, broke out into an outburst of hideous threats and imprecations, and rode away, shaking his clenched fist at the windows where we stood. An anxious, miserable night we spent ; and I, for one, began to long for the dawn, that should put an end to our suspense. Of course we had to keep watch from the upper windows, and dared not close an eye, since, rarely as an Indian attack is made during the darkness, it was possible that the foe might seek to

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In the Wild West. Steal upon us unawares. Of the horse-thieves, white or red, we saw nothing. Lycurgus Parsons made sure they had ensconced themselves behind a grove of trees and brushwood be¬ tween the house and the creek, where they could tether their steeds and kindle their bivouac fire, while await¬ ing the daybreak. At last I felt upon my cheek, through the open window by which I was posted, the chill that precedes the dawn ; and presently there seemed to creep through the blackness a pale and sickly light, and as I looked up impatiently, the eastern sky became of pearly grey, faintly tinged with pink. At any moment, now, the struggle might begin. We were five, each with rifle and revolver, and three of us — my host, his son, and myself — were provided with shot¬ guns also, so that the fire from above might be as heavy and sustained as possible. The farmer’s two daughters, spirited as girls in the backwoods learn to be, undertook to re-load our pieces for us, to save time ; while two of the black boys, bolder than the rest, were to hand the ammunition, of which there was no lack, as it was required. The other coloured servants, heartily frightened, muttered to one another, or sang hymns in an undertone. Suddenly a dozen flashes and reports from the guns of ambushed marksmen, who; had crawled to within rifle-range among the bushes and long grass, and the crash and clatter of broken glass, were followed by a fierce yelping cry, like that of hungry wolves ; ^^3 then up sprang the lurking enemy, with brandished weapons and furious gestures, and a rush was made towards the house. The fight began in real earnest, and the inces¬ sant bang, bang of the firearms, the whoops and yells of the assailants, and the shrieks and clamours of the terrified black servants, made up a din that was deafening. Captain Daly’s sombrero and gaudy Mexican attire were dimly visible through the smoke, but the giant figure of Wild Cat, as with his heavy tomahawk he strove to batter his way through the planks of the outer door, was more conspicuous, while others of the gang flung firebrands on the shingled roof, or tossed blazing bundles of wild flax through the shattered windows, to distract our attention. Then Jehu Parsons received a wound above the knee, from which the blood flowed fast, till I checked it with an improvised tourniquet: and Hans and Mike were both hurt, but not severely. The girls, with white, set faces, behaved very courageously under fire, and we had never to wait for our arms to be re-loaded as we poured buckshot and rifle-balls on the besiegers. It was getting to be quite light by this, and I could see that six or seven of the enemy lay on the grass motionless. But we were few and wearied, and the door below seemed to be yielding to the weighty strokes of Wild Cat’s axe and the blows of his yelling followers. Suddenly I thought I heard, far ofif on the prairie, the dull beat of horse-hoofs. Could it be, I thought “three horsemen rode up to the door” (a 112). 728

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In the Wild West. 114 to myself, that the long -looked -for rescue was at hand ? Wild Cat, too, seemed as if he heard it, for he paused, tossed back his streaming hair, and appeared to listen. Then again his axe smote the door, and it gave way partially, and the robbers set up a shout of triumph. Now or never was the time. I snatched the rifle that had been just re-loaded, levelled it, and fired. Wild Cat, with a snarling cry like that of a wounded panther, reeled and dropped, while his associates uttered a roar of wrath and dismay, and recoiled from the broken door. “ Gallantly done. Squire Prescott ! ” gasped out Jehu at my side. “ Wild Cat is — Ah ! have a care, sir, now,” he added, as, with an expression on his hand¬ some dark face that a demon might have envied. Wild Cat struggled up from the ground, gained his knee, and took deliberate aim at me with a revolver that he had drawn from his belt. His first shot whizzed harm¬ lessly past me, but at the second flash a circlet of fire seemed to glow with blinding light before my dazzled eyes, my limbs were benumbed, a deathly faintness crept over me, and I remember no more. CHAPTER THE FOURTH. When I recovered my senses, I found that I was lying on a bed in a room of which the windows had been closed and darkened, while six or eight candles, neatly arranged, were burning on the tables and the walnut-wood bureau near me. At the foot of the bed were two or three female figures, and I could hear the sound of suppressed sobs. Beside me, with bared heads, stood Lycurgus Parsons and a middle-aged officer in the simple uniform of the United States army. In the windows were Jehu Parsons and a lad of thirteen, the younger brother, probably, who had been sent off to crave succour from the Fort, with the two hired men, Hans and Mike, the latter of whom had his arm in a sling. The farmer was the first to speak. ‘‘Pm right-down sorry, major,” he said mourn¬ fully. “If he’d been a son of my own, it could scarcely have cut nearer to my heart ; and Pd give, yes, half of all I’ve got in the world, to see him alive again, poor chap ! And he with a young wife, too, waiting for him to come back to her in Jefferson City.” “A sad business, truly, Mr. Parsons,” said the officer, looking at me as I lay ; “ the rather that it seems very much, from what you tell me, through his courageous conduct that I have to congratulate you on the escape of your own household from a dreadful fate.” They thought me dead, then. That much I had made out. But when I tried to stir and speak, my limbs seemed paralysed, and my tongue clove to the roof of my mouth, while my head ached strangely with a dull, throbbing pain. Again I made an effort, and succeeded so far as to raise one hand to my head, while I murmured feebly — “ What is — what has - ” “Hello! he’s alive!” exclaimed Jehu Parsons as he limped forward, and there was a scream from the women at the other end of the room ; and I think I must again have fainted, for all grew dark. Nothing, when presently I rallied from the swoon, could exceed the delight of those around me, or the genuine* kindness with which I was treated. Had I been really raised from the dead, their astonishment and their joy could scarcely have been greater. They gave me cordials, propped up my head with pillows, and bathed my throbbing brow with cold water, and gradually I seemed to recover strength and to be fitter to converse. “ A narrow escape, sir, you have had,” remarked the major, who had some practical knowledge of surgery, after an examination of the bruise above my ear, “ but one not quite without precedent, according to my own experience of prairie warfare. That fellow Wild Cat was a daring desperado, and, mortally hurt as he was, endeavoured to keep up the fight even after my arrival with the soldiers.” “ Ay, but his mates had got kinder skeared — what’s left of them,” said Jehu Parsons, who seemed, but for his lameness and the pallor of his cheek, to be none the worse for the flesh wound he had received. “Nine killed and three wounded and taken does make a gap in their muster-roll, I calculate. We’ll not hear much of Captain Daly after this, and honest folks may keep their horses out afield without fear of having every hoof skedaddled off to sell Texas way.” And so it was. One of the most formidable gangs in all the wild West had been utterly broken up by the affray at Ithaca, and if any of Daly’s moss-troopers still followed the fortunes of that craven fugitive, at any rate the State of Missouri was thenceforth freed from their presence. As for myself, I recovered so rapidly as to be able, with the support of a friendly arm, to rise from the bed on which I had been -laid, and to go down to the usual living-room of the family, opening on one hand into the best parlour, with its trim carpet and unused glistening furniture, and on the other into the spacious kitchens, now full of soldiers eating and drinking, or paying heed to their arms and accoutrements, soiled in the recent march and skirmish. I was myself anxious to be gone, dreading, as I did, that some exaggerated account of what had happened should come to Edith’s ears ; but this idea was stoutly combated, both by Lycurgus Parsons and by the good- natured major in command of the troops. “ In your Weak state, sir, and under a burning sun like this,” he said earnestly, “to ride to Jefferson would be to tempt what you have hitherto, it seems, been fortunate enough to escape : a smart bout of the Missouri fever. We are going back to the Fort, whence we came, and it may be some time before this morning’s work is talked of in the capital of the State, and has a chance of being mentioned to Mrs. Prescott. A day or two of quiet, and you may your¬ self convey to her the intelligence of your own safety.” “ And don’t forget, squire, that I want you to build a bridge over my creek, close here,” suggested the farmer, with the solemn chuckle that was his nearest

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In the Wild West. approach to a laugh. “Mustn’t part with my surveyor, must I, now, till he is well enough to look at the water, and make a sketch of the concern that is to span it?” I could but yield to this well-meant advice, and stay for a time where I was ; and never, I may say, was a guest more welcome than I found myself in that honest-hearted household. About noon the soldiers mounted and set forth on their toilsome homeward march across the prairie, taking with them the three sullen-faced prisoners, two whites and an Indian, tied neck and heels, and fastened on the backs of strayed horses that had belonged to some of their own party. The other marauders had either accompanied Captain Daly in his flight, or else slept soundly by Wild Cat’s side beneath the turf. The military seemed to me, so far as I could per¬ ceive, to regard the recent event in the light of a wel¬ come relief from the monotony of their usual life in the Fort. “If you could only imagine, sir, how bored we get,” said the younger officer, as he smoked a cigar in my company under the shade of one of the huge cotton¬ wood trees, “you’d really pity us as we kick our heels day by day, with nothing to care for but the burnish of our buttons and sword-hilts, and no distraction be¬ yond the well-thumbed books that we get to know by heart.” The farmhouse had now no need of a garrison, although the shattered windows, the broken door, and the bullet-marks in the walls and furniture, as well as the wounds of some of the defenders, testified that the morning’s strife had been sharp and serious. The black servants rejoiced, after the demonstrative fashion of their race, in the triumph of the good cause. It was a treat to hear the merry laughter of the women, and to see how they displayed their shining teeth in the broadest of smiles, as they went about the house working under their mistress’s orders at the task of putting things in order ; while the negro lads, I am sure, honestly believed that they had taken an active part in bringing about the discomfiture of the routed enemy. “ Whipped ’em, after all, massa, didn’t we ? ” was the gleefully confidential remark of more than one ebony-skinned Sam or sable Jupiter during the three days that I spent beneath that hospitable roof. And I could but laughingly assent, although I knew that the speaker was probably cowering in a corner, or singing hymns dolefully in concert with his fellows, when Wild Cat and his fierce allies were doing all they could to break in upon us with fire and sword. At any rate, the blacks had been true to their master, and had not shared in the disgraceful panic of the majority of the white hirelings in the farmer’s pay. The bridge over the creek, which had been the cause of my presence at Ithaca, was not neglected. The whole Parsons family accompanied me to the side of the stream, the easiest fords of which were pointed out, by way of facilitating my labours. Some¬ what to the surprise of my amateur advisers, I chose a place where the water ran deep and swift between 115 high banks, and where the creek was at its narrowest, the rather that a tiny islet of soapstone, gnawed and honeycombed by the wash of the stream, still rose above the turbid surface. I made a rapid sketch of what I conceived the future bridge should be. “It seems to me, Mr. Parsons,” said I, “ that with two arches and one pier in solid masonry, the thing might be done here, with the advantage of yonder islet for the site of the central support. It will prove cheaper to bring cut stone and timber ready shaped from Jefferson than to have recourse to the quarry which I noticed yesterday sheltered the robbers’ camp. And, if you please, I will make a rough calculation of the probable expense.” I did so on the instant, having been careful, before starting from the city, to post myself up as to the exact cost of labour and materials, and the result was that Lycurgus Parsons clapped his heavy hand approvingly upon my shoulder. “ Done with you, Mr. Prescott ! ” he said, while my sketch was handed about to be admired by the others. “Not, mind you, that I want to peg you down to a strict bargain. Pm not that mean ; but I do like to hear a chap speak out fair and above-board ; and that’s not common with an architect in these parts. I’ll have the bridge, if it can be made for what you tell me, or thereabouts ; but I’d rather have risked my beasts and my corn in fording after a flood, as I’ve done many’s the day, sooner than I’d have been taken in by a mealy-mouthed humbug such as the last Jefferson surveyor that happened out upon us here.” It was agreed, then, that the bridge was to be built, and that I was to superintend its construction ; and on the following day I returned to Jefferson, mounted on the mustang borrowed from the horse-dealer, and riding beside the waggon to which the fine grey horses had been harnessed, and which was now loaded with maize and pickled pork — Hans the German, with his meerschaum dangling from his bearded lips, being the driver, while Jehu, on a piebald Indian pony, cantered at my side. “’Tain’t often,” remarked the eldest of the farmer’s sons, “Dad sends a load to Jefferson itself. Most often, it’s only to Troy or to Prattsville, both of which are on the river, where steamers call.” And I verily believe that the distant city had on this occasion been selected instead of a nearer market purely that Jehu, at parting, might thrust into my hand a little roll of greenbacks, which he positively insisted on forcing upon my acceptance : “ for the bridge,” as he said. “But if it is for the bridge,” rejoined I, looking irresolutely at the bank notes, “ you know I have not earned them yet.” To this Jehu demurred. The bridge, he said, was as good as made, once I had made my sketch and the plan had been approved of. Father had bidden him to leave the notes with me, and the sooner I dropped in again at Ithaca to work them out, the better pleased would all who dwelt there be. Having enunciated this, the young backwoodsman nodded hastily, and rode briskly off after Hans and the waggon.

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In the Wild West. 1 16 I took back my borrowed steed to the horse-dealer^s corral, and walked home to tell Edith of the events of the last few days. I made as light as I could of the peril I had escaped, and descanted more on the unsophisticated kindness of my newly made friends than on the ferocity of Wild Cat and his savage auxiliaries ; but my wife was able, somehow, to read between the lines, and she kissed me and wept over me, and insisted that such a hero as her dear, dear Willie had never been, at least in these degenerate days. “ But if you had been killed, my darling — I must have died too,” said Edith, as she clung to me. “ I want you, husband, to promise that you will never leave me again.” “To engage in a border fight — if 1 can keep clear of such for the future, as I hope to do, I willingly make the promise,” was my half - laughing re¬ sponse, as I told Edith to be of good cheer, since such a foray as that of Captain Daly and his myrmidons was not likely to recur. “ But now let me see the silkworms. I never forgot them — or, I assure you, her who was tend¬ ing them — while I was out at the farmhouse with the Grecian name yon¬ der.” The silkworms, I was glad to find, were thriving, and the mulberry-leaves were brought in with due punctuality. However, I was not left to en¬ joy the quiet of my home without reference to the past. Jehu Parsons had spread through Jefferson the news of what had happened, and the major at the Fort also had sent in his official report. I was sent for by the Governor of the State, and publicly complimented and thanked for what I had done towards delivering Missouri from so dangerous a gang as that which had just been broken up ; while old Captain Bates, the buffalo - hunter, was by no means the only eminent citizen who called at our cottage, and confirmed Edith^s prejudice as to my heroism by lauding my conduct to the skies ; and even the Aretes newspaper bespattered my name with praise, as formerly with abuse. “Two things are clear,” said, I laughing, as Edith and I brushed our plump silkworms, with heedful care, from the stale leaves to the fresh ones : “ that our pets here are getting on admirably, and that I must not disappoint my good friends at Ithaca of their bridge over the creek, the rather that I have been paid beforehand for my services.” And it was true that the roll of notes which Jehu had thrust into my reluctant grasp was to the full amount of the hundred dollars named by Captain Bates as my remuneration of the allotted task. It takes time, however, especially in a somewhat backward part of the country like Missouri, to pre¬ pare cut stone of the exact dimen¬ sions needed, and to get ready -sea¬ soned woodwork and iron clamps and girders; so that the silkworms reached a critical stage in their exist¬ ence before I had to fulfil my pledge to Mr. Parsons. Edith was quite alarmed at first, when the little creatures seemed to sicken, and lost their appetites, and grew lethargic and solitary, instead of continuing to be cheerful and gre¬ garious lovers of good living. But soon each worm began to spin its silken shroud, and was presently lost to sight in a close-drawn yellow web, while we had to be in readiness to reap the fruits of their labour. I had had some light little wheels, in white wood, made and mounted, and Edith and I were ere long engaged, almost from daylight to dark, in the delicate operation of winding off the silk from the cocoons. Much care, especially in so dry a climate, was requisite to avoid the snapping of the fine natural thread, and the toil was fatiguing, from its monotony. But there was no one else to whom we could entrust the performance of such a duty ; though Black Sophy, who had a negress’s usual good- natured wish to spare trouble to * a white employer, repeatedly volunteered her assistance. It was an anxious undertaking, that garnering in of our silken harvest, but with patience and plodding industry we got through it. And next came the time when each “my wife was able, somehow, to read between the lines.”

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Pictures of the Months. chrysalis tenant of a cocoon had expanded into a moth, whose mission it was to lay eggs, and so provide for the growth of a future generation of silk¬ worms. The silk was carefully packed, and duly forwarded to the addresses notified to me in previous corre¬ spondence by Ellis and Nash, my former colleagues in the literary work of the defunct Banner of Freedom. The moths laid their eggs, as is the wont of moths, in the artificially darkened retreat which had been pro¬ vided for that purpose ; and the seed, as it is tech¬ nically styled, was most heedfully and jealously set aside to await the proper season for hatching. Then I was at liberty to attend to the bridge over the creek at Ithaca. The two strongest of the waggons were sent over, one drawn by six steers, and the other by the team of roan horses, wdiich had been, it seems, recognised and re-captured by the military from some skulking Indian accomplices of Daly’s gang of horse- thieves in a distant part of the district, to bring out the materials and the workmen ; while Jehu, with a led horse intended for my use, rode across the plain to fetch me. It was with much trepidation that Edith saw me depart, although she was partially comforted by Jehu’s assurance that the prairie was now as safe as Broad¬ way in New York, and that the sheriff’s office was all but a sinecure since Captain Daly and his out¬ II7 laws had “ made tracks ” for some more lawless region. The bridge was built quickly and solidly, and so much to the satisfaction of Lycurgus Parsons, that he insisted on adding another fifty dollars to my remu¬ neration as its designer, and on cramming every avail able corner in the light “ spider ” waggon in which he sent me back to Jefferson, on the conclusion of the task, with hams and flitches, bags of meal and kegs of preserved apples and peaches, cheese and chickens, as a trifling present from Ithaca. But I had been perhaps too rash in exposing myself day after day to hot sun and drenching rain, which in that latitude falls at some seasons with a violence worthy of the tropics. At any rate, when I returned home I ex¬ perienced a sensation of headache and languor which I attributed to fatigue alone, but which gradually got worse, and before long I was glad to stagger to my bed and lie down. Before midnight I was delirious, and a doctor had to be called in. One glance at my •flushed face was enough. ‘Mt’s our Missouri fever, ma’am,” said Dr. Jeffreys to my frightened wife. “ They must have it before they get acclimatised, strangers from the North who come to settle here ; but don’t be alarmed, I beg of you. Britisher or New Englander, he’s young and strong, and I can pull him through.” END OF CHAPTER THE FOURTH. PICTURES OF THE MONTHS.

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ii8 IN A GUARD’S VAN : A CHRISTMAS SKETCH. OSE who deem that rail¬ ways have nothing of ro¬ mance about them cannot have had much experience of the work of a guard thereon, nor can they have any idea of the suggest¬ iveness of the contents of a guard’s van in and just before the holiday week of the year. That vehicle is usually varied in its contents, but before Christmas the variety becomes bewildering. In ordinary weeks lieavy articles of luggage alternate with the parcels of daily newspapers, and the occasional hamper of the Parcels Post is flanked by a couple of hounds ; an un¬ wieldy piece of machinery, sent so hurriedly, points to breakage of part of locomotive or engine ; and the huge milk-cans perform their daily journey in the van. But as Christmas draws near the ‘’parcel traffic” deve¬ lops alarming proportions : widens in its area, increases in its kind ; and every station, from the huge metro¬ politan terminus to the smallest station on the little valley-branch, contributes to and receives from the overflowing contents of that then popular portion of the train. There are parcels proper, of all shapes and sizes ; there are evergreens, plants ; there are ducks and geese, alive and dead ; hares and rabbits obtrude their presence ; and crates, hampers, jars, and baskets crowd the van. It is, indeed, a veritable postman^s delivery bag — the parcels becoming the letters, and the stations the houses. Starting from the junction, there is a varied load to begin the journey, and the guard has a task of no little difficulty in the arrangement of these “parcels ” for readily shooting out at the respective stations. A huge tree for some Christmas gathering fills one corner of the van, and obtrudes its boughs into the high seat whence the guard dominates the brake ; hampers of evident mistletoe are tightly packed in another corner, and a few hares repose in dead rest thereon. A scent of apples indicates the contents of a basket ; another parcel has its cover-corner torn, and there peeps out the suggestive Christmas cake that tells of a present from provident mother to distant daughter. And then the eye loses itself in a mass of countless parcels, hampers, and packages, as varied in contents as in colour, and in dimensions as in destination, but all indicating clearly the kindly thought and the observance of a custom that grows, and that has greatest honour in the observance. The toy for a child will not survive the holiday parties, but the pleasure is an enduring memory that passes not away. As the brake checks the speed, and the train ultimately stops, the guard has opened the van doors, and has ready the many parcels for a small suburban station, the two or three neck-labelled turkeys that he had ranged near the door, and then he raises the wicker box of the Parcels Post and shoves it quickly on the trolley. And thus, from station to station, leaving and receiving, the guard’s van does its work. It is a Christmas carrier, for the ordinary work that it does is overshadowed by that vaster traffic which the guard looks on with an amusement that lightens the labour, and which the porters at the stations regard with undisguised glee. It is a pleasant sight, too : the pictures of the stations, with their platforms banked with snow, eaves snow-tinted, and the plants snow-sprinkled : with unaccustomed life about even the smallest, the passengers muffled from the cold, the busy porters, the panting engine, and the country over which a slight snowfall spreads a thin mantle, marked and scored by hedges, roads with the dark ruts of many wheels. The air is keen, purer, more invigo¬ rating ; passengers have put off some of the work- a-day trouble ; and the mission of the guard’s van is to aid in that evanescent emancipation. So, on its frequent journey the guard’s van brings with it the savour of kindly remembrance. It serves alike the rich and the poor ; it brings to the one the “ polar marvels and a feast of wonders from the west and east,” that are to enrich and decorate the mag- nificent fir that a distant plantation SOMETHING FOR THE OLD FOLKS.

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119 AT A COUNTKY STATION. holiday times — of the poor, by the quaintly wrapped little package that is the contribution of son or daugh¬ ter to the old home. There are indications of varied positions of recipients in the carriage that waits, in the little spring-cart that is in the station-yard. and in the more homely group still that from the platform watch the parcels thrown from the van. It is in such circumstances that our railways become romantic, and that the guard’s van does picturesque service. WHAT TO WEAR IN THE NEW YEAR. CHIT-GHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR LONDON AND PARIS CORRESPONDENTS. I.— FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. Bonnets, small as they are, are really to cover the head in 1890, and it would be better if they more often replaced the hats which are the general wear in town and country, and are adopted by most women. For matrons over forty, they need to be chosen with more care than is always bestowed on them, conse¬ quently their wearers in un¬ suitable hats look ten years older than their actual age, which is not by any means their desire. Strings carried beneath the chin, as in our model in the initial letter, soften the outline of the face and are really more juvenile-looking than hats. This particular model is made in terra-cotta velvet, the front overshadowed with gold lace, which, like so many laces of all kinds, is in Vandykes. Above the face there are a few upstanding bows, and that is all the trimming. The shape is arranged for wearing wdth the hair dressed low down, which is without doubt the style of the immediate future ; and the backs of dresses and collars will once more fare badly. Still it is not at all unbecoming to most English faces. This class of bonnet is particularly adapted for making up in materials to match dresses ; and many gowns trimmed with silk embroidery have the back of the crown entirely composed of this work ; the front of the bonnet only is made of the plainer fabric, set off by any trim¬ ming desired. Black wings are still much to the fore. They show to advantage with the fashionable terra¬ cotta tones which are certainly dominant this winter. Women are often shrewd, clever, practical, and persevering, and yet they do not always bring com¬ mon sense to bear on fashions, or else I think the open-crowned hats would not have found favour as

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120 What to Wear in the New Year. arranged in simulated box-pleats, with black velvet peeping between them. There are flap pockets on each hip, and a revers under the fastening ; the collar takes the form of a triple cape. The sleeves are of the revived shape that used to be called the “ Pagoda.'^ Cloaks are always difficult to get to suit both town and country wear, and the various requirements of our many-sided lives, but the one selected for illustration as nearly meets all wants as it conveniently can. It is made in a thick serviceable cloth, with a soft fluffy lining, and is bordered with fine cord embroidery, the new rope gimp carried down the centre. There are no sleeves, but from beneath the shoulder-cape is an opening for the arms. To the cape is attached a stole trimming on each side, coming below the mantle, fringed and braided, and made to form triple points like a flap pocket, placed upright just below the cape. It is a garment that would be as well suited to a London drawing-room as to a country walk. Children of tender years wear small paletots made in fleecy lamb’s-wool of cream tone, with drab-coloured devices scattered here and there, matching in tone the fur with which the capes and cuffs are edged ; a muff to match is slung from the neck with cord. A white fur has been brought out recently which positively improves with washing ; it is sold by the yard, and cuffs, muffs, and collars can be also had in it. Washing blanket cloth is another new material which will be much appreciated in the nursery ; it looks like snow, and makes the prettiest hats and bonnets for little people, showing off their young faces to perfection. Woollen garments for night as well as day wear seem to gain ground in popular estima¬ tion, and a new woollen fabric for nursery sleeping-gowns has the merit of being soft, warm, light, and inexpensive. The newest form of tea-gown is the Greek, which has a flowing back, the front cut in one length from neck to heel, and caught up with a couple of buttons on the left side, so that it drapes in graceful folds across the waist. Such gowns are gene¬ rally made in soft woollen material bor¬ dered with fur or braid, mostly gold or silver, and have the merit of being suited to resting, and are in no way robes de luxe. Nearly all such gowns have Wat¬ teau backs, not the ordinary pleated Watteau, but a species of gathered imitation ; and the last idea is an open side piece coming over this centre pleat. It serves to preserve the graceful flow of the skirt which is so much desired. Zouave jackets are the particular fashion of the moment, and all the more costly dresses would appear to be trimmed to simulate them, handsome guipure and laces being specially prepared to applique on to bodices. Plain velvet thus cut and laid over woollen materials they do in the winter. I have just seen one with three twisted rolls of velvet in three distinct colourings round the brim, the top entirely open, though over¬ shadowed by bows and feathers. If the aim desired were to catch cold, neuralgia, and other miseries, nothing could achieve it more effectually. Most of the new hats when provided with crowns have them cleft or indented. They look quaint and curious untrimmed, but afterwards the peculiarity hardly shows. Felts and cloth-covered shapes are well worn, the brims wide in front and shallow at the back, and a curious mode is to surround the flat crown with ostrich-plumes, the tips turning towards the crown, giving an effect like the old-fashioned hearse adornments. Children are wearing either large picture hats or small caps and toques, like that displayed by the child in the illustration. This particular shape is light, becoming, and comfortable, and, as often as not, is made with a tasselled point like the caps worn by draymen. Close- fitting garments for out of doors are much the fashion. In the first place but little of the frock is seen, which is often a convenience, and in the next the limbs are free, and hoops, skipping-ropes, and various healthful exercises can be safely indulged in. This coat is made in a thick diagonal grey or plain cloth, the skirt being “WHERE ARE YOUR SKATES?”

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W'HAT TO Wear in the New Year. I2I is most fashionable, and for tea-gowns such jackets are caught together with gold crescents and other ornaments. A very long buckle is another novelty ; it is worn with full fronts, and keeps them well in form. The newest petticoats this winter are made in thin silk or shot silk ; lined, quilted, and bordered with flounces, they are light and very warm. II. — FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. Tartans and checks have been adopted by Frenchwomen con amore, and bordered fabrics are adapted to both. No lady is seen with the slightest attempt at a dress-im¬ prover. Indeed, people coming from Eng¬ land with these excrescences look so unlike the rest of the world that they render them¬ selves at once remarkable. But French dresses are not as “lanky,” to use an old- fashioned and expressive term, as some I have seen made in England. Parisian dress¬ makers allow themselves more variety of dra¬ pery, and do not universally adopt the house¬ maid skirt as they seem to be doing across the Channel. The check dress in the picture is so draped across the front that the border is visi¬ ble. There are box-pleats at the side, and the border is made in the simplest habit fashion. This is, however, hidden by the jacket, which is cut after a favourite Paris model. It is made in a thick ribbed black or drab cloth, opening at the neck with lapels secured by a metal clasp, from which start a couple of revers, which widen towards the edge of the jacket ; it does not fasten again, but the interstices are filled in with a lighter shade of material, mounted in three pleats on each side. These require skilful treatment, and then are most graceful. The sleeve has a wider turn-back cuff than we have been using of late, and the top of the sleeve is heightened by a short upper one, slashed up the centre ; this, the cuffs, and all the revers are bordered with fine braiding, which appears on the flap pockets, for no French garment would seem to be now complete without braiding. You will see how much ornament is used on the hand¬ some cloak worn by the other dainty figure. It would be difficult to find a more graceful mantle, and the fine cord braiding appears on the rounded yoke in front (from which the fulness of the bodice springs), on the pointed belt, which confines this at the waist, on the side revers, and on the front pieces at the hem. Light terra-cotta cloth is the material, and it is trimmed with silver fox, which encircles the neck, borders the revers, and constitutes the epaulettes. This cloak is fitted to the waist at the back, and the side revers form the sleeve-pieces, though there are no positive sleeves. The hat is an exact and faithful representation of a favourite Parisian headgear, made of the same cloth, very broad in the brim in front, and covered with as many feathers as in old days would have sufficed for half a dozen hats. WATCHING. Bonnets, as worn by the companion figure, are as small as the hats are large ; but few English faces after the first blush of youth can wear the large hats, and even then they look more piquant in the tricorn shape, while a Parisian of almost any age looks her best in such picturesque head-coverings. There is one point on which French manufacturers may be safely relied upon, namely, that the colours of their flannel stockings and their woollen goods will surely stand. The make of the cheaper stockings is often not as good as those of British manufacture, but they rarely, if ever, discolour. Hence, French flannel petticoats are largely imported to England. They are to be had in all colours, prettily scalloped and trimmed with lace at the edge. Many coloured flannel night-gowns trimmed with lace journey across the Channel to meet the craze of the moment for per¬ petually wearing wool, which seems to have bitten the dwellers in Albion. While on the subject of lingerie, I wish to bring to your notice the so-called “ guimpes,” worn principally by French and American children. They are made in lace and muslin, or of the same material as any frock, made with a low bodice, and are merely a loose under-shirt, high to the neck, with

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122 New Story Competition. long sleeves put in first, the low bodice over them, thus transforming it into a high one, and admitting of tlie addition of warm raiment beneath, if necessary. They save many colds, and do not look like a makeshift. Empire fashions still prevail for morning and even¬ ing wear. A white and gold brocade gown in this style, made by one of our leading houses, had a front breadth of Marechal Kiel peau de sole, trimmed with garlands and Marechal Niel roses plentifully besprinkled over bodice and skirt. Evening gowns in these materials are fringed often with small blooms over the entire front breadth. Even thus late in the season, too, hats are so covered with floral blooms that the crown is concealed. Surprise gowns have hitherto been made in such bright, light colourings, tiiat even the more modest outside seemed to say, ‘‘ Mind ! only suited for smart occasions”; but the other day I came across one that I had no idea was intended for a double purpose. A light make of black cloth, the back of the skirt plain and full, the front with the sides crossing just in the centre ; a loose double-breasted cloth jacket, with no trimming. By simply undoing two hooks on the side of the skirt, and hooking the side pieces over the back of the skirt, a draped front of silk brocade on a black ground was discovered, the turn-back sides lined with the same. The jacket opened and turned back also to show an under-bodice of the silk and revers. There was, accordingly, really a combination of a useful cloth dress and a gown suited for table d'hote or smarter occasion, a most admirable addition to a travelling outfit where economy in luggage is a consideration. NEW STORY COMPETITION. OPEN TO ALL READERS OF CASSELL'S MAGAZINE. IN announcing the details of a New Story Competition the Editor trusts that it may prove as successful as its predecessors. Of course, all competitors cannot be successful, so far as winning a prize is con¬ cerned, but it is open to all to secure such a measure of success as will stimulate to further endeavour and higher effort, and thus pave the way for crowning victories in the years to come. The Editor hopes that this new competition may prove the open door through which hitherto untried writers may pass to acceptance and success. In every previous story competition the pjize has fallen to a writer hitherto un¬ known to the Editor, but who is now among the regular contributors to the Magazine. Each story will be judged on Its own merits alone, without regard to whether it is the work of a prentice hand, or that of an experienced author. So let none of our readers stand aside — as we are led to believe that some did in former competitions — for fear that any other practice should prevail. The prize will be awarded to the best story which complies in every respect with the regulations of the competition. These regulations are few and simple, but the Editor would direct the special attention of intending competitors to them, as in formcr competitions many otherwise eligible works have been disqualified through neglect on the part of their authors of one or more of them. A Prize of Eighty Pounds is offered for the best and most suitable original story of domestic interest, of a length to occupy about eighty pages of this Magazine, and to be divided into eight parts of equal length (/.^., ten pages each. About i,ooo words go to a page of this Magazine). A Prize of Sixty Pounds is also offered for the second best story of the same length. Each story must be accompanied by a short outline (about 500 words in length) of the plot of the story, together with a brief resume of the contents of each of the eight portions, showing the progress of the story. The following are the regulations under which these prizes are offered : — I. Every reader of the Magazine (not being an ordinary contributor to its pages) is eligible to enter the competition. 2. The Editor cannot undertake to answer inquiries having reference to the treatment of the stories in detail. The particulars given are snjfficiefit for the purposes of the competition ^ and the rest is left to the judgment and discretion of the competitors. 3. All communications regarding the stories must be sent with the MS.^. No subsequent communications (except under Rule 7) can receive any consideration. The award of the judges will be publ shed in the Magazine as soon after the close of the competition as possible, and no information respecting the award will be given to any competitor before this publication. 4. Each MS. must have inscribed on it, or otherwise securely attached to it, the name and postal address of the author, together with a declaration that the work is original and entirely the sendees cnvn, to be signed by the author and countersigned by some other trustworthy person, i.e., a magistrate, minister of religion, or householder, with the postal address in both cases. 5. The copyright of the prize work, or works, will become the property of the proprietors of this Magazine. 6. Should the two best stories be, in the opinion of the judges, of equal merit, the prizes maybe divided between their authors at the discretion of the Editor. Either, or both, of the prizes may be withheld in the event of no story being thoughi by the judges to be worthy of distinction. 7. All packets containing MSS. should be prepaid. The Editor will not be liable for loss or miscarriage of any work. Unsuccessful competitors may have their MSS. returned to them at their own risk, upon application to the Editor, after iht publication of the award. Any such application must be accompanied by stamps to defray the cost of carriage. 8. All MSS. must reach the Editor on or before July ist, 1890, and should be addressed — The Editor of Cassell’s Magazine, La Belle Sauvage, London, E.C., and must have the words “Story Competition” in the top left-hand corner of the label or wrapper.

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I 123 THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars respecting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge himself to notice every article or work submitted. _ _ A kettle to which a little stove can be attached at will is illus¬ trated here¬ with. The kettle has a concavity in the bottom, into which the convex spirit lamp, seen beneath, fits when not in use, and draws out (as shown) when required to boil the kettle. Owing to the enlarged heating surface the kettle boils very quickly, and hence is useful for tourists or emigrants. Oolite Marble. Soft oolitic limestone, or limestone with spherical granules, is now hardened into marble by treatment with a certain chemical solution, which gives to the stone a thick, strong skin, about half an inch deep, capable of a fine polish. Soft oolite can thus be worked into any form, and hardened afterwards. The marble becomes impervious to damp and atmospheric influences. The Speed of Fishes. The fast fishes, according to Professor G. B. Goode, are of pointed build with close-lying fins, and are frequently predacious. Food fishes, on the other hand, are often slow, and easily caught, but are correspondingly prolific. The actual speed of fishes is not as yet well known ; but as dolphins have been observed to swim round and round a steamer going at full speed, their pace is estimated at twenty miles an hour or more. The Spanish mackerel is one of the fastest of the food fishes. Its body is conical, and smooth as metal, while in its motion it cuts the water like a yacht. Irrigation Colonies. Two irrigation colonies have been started on the river Murray, in South Australia and Victoria. The soil and climate of these regions are both good, but the rain-fall is deficient ; and this has been supple¬ mented by irrigation works, drawing supplies of water from the river. The water is raised to a height of eighty feet by steam-power ; and the forests of the district supply the fuel. The crops will be, in the main, of garden produce, such as fruit, melons, and the like. The engineers of the works have already A Stove Kettle. established an irrigation colony in California, which has now 2,500 settlers. There is a thriving town upon it, with churches, banks, hotels, and schools, while outside the town the orange-groves and vine¬ yards are smiling with flowers and fruit. The Aus¬ tralian colonies at Mildura and Renmark are at a considerable distance from large towns ; but in a few years there will be a railway all the way. Extending Ladders. Ladders capable of extending telescopically from 20 feet to 36^ feet, or any intermediate height, have recently been introduced. These ladders have been adopted in the British Museum for getting at the specimens. A Constant-Lp''el Inkstand. The “Isobath” inkstand, which keeps the ink at a constant level for the dip, will be understood from Fig. I, which is a section through the apparatus. In the reservoir is a float, so poised as to sink on one side as the ink is used, and thus maintain the level in the outer well, at the side into which the pen is dipped. The reservoir contains about -5- of a pint of ink, and being closed up pre¬ vents dust from getting to the latter, as well as excessive evaporation. That petty trouble of writers, an ill-fed pen, is avoided by this de¬ vice, which is turned out in a great variety of pat¬ terns, one of which is shown in Fig. 2. fig. 2. J

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1 24 The Gatherer. A Kneading Machine. FIG. I. A kneading and mixing machine for making dough is illustrated in the accompanying figures. It is capable of kneading the dough to any degree of stiff¬ ness, whether it be required for bread or cakes. Fig. i represents it in position for kneading, and Fig. 2 as tilted up for the discharge of the dough. It con¬ sists mainly of an iron trough. A, into which the flour and water are placed, and two revolving blades, D D, of angular sliape, mounted on axles, which by suitable toothed gearing revolve at dissimilar speeds. These axles are drawn either way by belts on the pulleys C C^. A hand-wheel, H, beside the pulleys, serves to stop or regulate the motions of the blades. The tilting is performed by means of the lever E, which is worked by the foot, and the counterweights P P. The machines are strongly made, and will stand consider¬ able rough usage. Novelties for Home Use. All who have experienced the difficulty of providing for the lighting of an invalid's room, where illumination is often required suddenly and for a few minutes only, will be glad to hear of a new apparatus named the Aurora,” that has been devised to meet their wants. It consists of a specially designed stop-cock, that is screwed on to the gas-fitting immediately below the burner, and connected by cords, running through staples easily driven into the walls of the room, with the bed-side. The stop-cock is so made that the supply of gas is never absolutely cut off, and so the light may be raised and lowered at will by merely pulling one or other of the handles attached to the ends of the cords. Another appliance for the sick-room is an ingenious arrangement for fixing to the neck or stop¬ per of bottles containing poisonous medicines. To the clip that fastens this little device to the bottle is secured a tiny bell, waving freely on the end of a loosely coiled spring, and which serves to warn the attendant, who may take it up in the dark, of the dangerous nature of the bottle’s contents. But, while quite sufficient to answer this useful purpose, the tremulous tinkle is not strong enough to disturb a patient. Perfumes are now being made up in a new form— ammoniated, so that when first applied to the handkerchief they possess all the reviving qualities of ammoniated salts. After the ammonia has evapo¬ rated, which it does very rapidly, the perfume remains. Ladies who suffer from headaches will be glad to hear of this refreshing and attractive novelty. Passing to the quarters of those who are, happily, not in need of either of the preceding novel¬ ties, we may call the attention of smokers to a new pipe called the “ Roll-call,” in which a roll of absorbent paper is coiled in the stem, with the object of drinking up the noxious juice, and so guarding the smoker from one of the greatest dangers attending the use of tobacco. Chess-players, and particularly lovers of problems, will welcome a new pocket-board invented by an old devotee of the game, Mr. Livesey. The principal novelty in this new pocket convenience is in the men, which are made of stamped metal, and hinged above the pins by means of which they are held in position on each square, in holes provided for that purpose. For playing in railway trains and under similar circumstances, the fact that these readily port¬ able pieces actually stand up from the board in which they are carried, is a great gain. As, without taking them from their places, all the pieces in use may be folded down flat, to admit of the board’s being closed, this device seems admirably adapted for the working out of problems. A KNEADING M.ACHINE. — FIG. 2. The Touraco. The crimson feathers of the touraco or plantain- eater of Africa are said to be coloured by a red pig¬ ment which washes out, and hence the bird conceals himself under thick foliage during rain. The fact has been doubted ; but Professor Church, of the Royal Agricultural College, extracted a red colouring matter from the feathers, to which he gave the name of tura- cine, and which was found to contain copper. Quite recently, Mr. F. E. Beddard, prorector of the Zoo¬ logical Society, obtained a pink solution from the

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The Gatherer. 125 feathers of a dead touraco, by steeping them in ordinary tap-water. There are a number of these interesting birds now at the Zoological Gardens in London. A Cabbage-Strainer. By means of the simple device shown, in our en¬ graving, the water from boiled cabbages can be quickly strained away, and the vegetable pressed into a compact and ornamental shape for the table. A New Smokeless Gunpowder. Captain Noble, of Els wick, has, it is stated, suc¬ ceeded in preparing a really smokeless gunpowder. The material is greyish in colour, and in the shape of cords or threads. Its constitution is not made public, but its smokeless character is well attested, and the bullets can be seen to strike the target. The Night Sky. A chart of the heavens containing some twenty million stars up to the fourteenth magnitude is now in course of preparation, and will be finished in three or four years. The work is, of course, international — a large number of observatories having combined to do it. Part of the expense will no doubt be redeemed by the sale of the star maps, which will have an historical value for posterity, since the aspect of the heavens is slowly changing with the course of time. A Self-acting Fog-Signal. According to the regulation a going vessel in a fog must sound either a horn or a whistle once every two minutes. If a vessel is at anchor she must ring a bell once in the same period. In order to effect this automatically, an ingenious electrical contrivance has recently been introduced which not only con¬ trols the blowing of a steam-whistle or fog-horn when the ship is moving, and the ringing of an electric bell when she is at anchor, but also makes a register of every sound, on a band of travelling paper kept under lock and key, so that in the event of any dispute as to the signalling the record can be consulted. The register is, in fact, an automatic log-book of the fog- signals. The apparatus consists essentially of three parts : a switch to enable the self-acting signals to be started when the ship is going, or when she is at rest ; an electro-magnetic device, actuated by the current from a small battery, for working the whistle or horn, and ringing the electric fog-bell ; and, lastly, the registering apparatus, which is formed of a wide band of paper, graduated according to time, and moving by clockwork, so that when a signal is sounded, the current which controls it registers the fact on the paper by puncturing a hole in it. This is done by the agency of a small electro-magnet, which forces a needle-point into the paper as the latter passes slowly under it. Of course, the self-acting apparatus can be eliminated at will by means of the switch, and the signals sounded whenever the navigating officer wishes by simply pressing the push-buttons provided. In this case the electric current still effects the sig¬ nalling, but not automatically. Obviously, this ar¬ rangement is very convenient, since it allows the attention of the navigator to be free and untrammelled. So many collisions occur during the winter fogs, that there is evidently something imperfect in our present system of voluntary signalling, and an auto¬ matic apparatus is well deserving of attention. Two More International Exhibitions. The opening of the Forth Bridge is to be celebrated by an International Exhibition of electrical and general engineering in Edinburgh. Ground has been secured at Merchistoun — a convenient site— and the works are now in progress. The Glasgow Exhibition was a con¬ spicuous success, and there is every reason to believe that the Edinburgh one will not be far behind, though it will probably be laid out on a smaller scale. High¬ land games and other sports will form the outdoor attractions of the Exhibition. In the Emperor Gar¬ dens at Cologne a Domestic Exhibition of an inter¬ national character has already been opened. It will comprise everything useful in the home, and will doubtless be visited by many English tourists passing through the city. In addition to apparatus and de¬ vices of a mechanical kind, foods, drinks, clothing, furniture, the fine arts, and games are among the subjects to be represented. An Electric Table-Lamp. The new battery invented to propel the Renard- Krebs dirigible balloon is now applied to domestic lighting. It is constructed of a platinised silver foil

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126 The Gatherer. bent into the form of a tube, which contains a zinc rod inside. The zinc is the positive, and the silver the negative element of the cell. They are both immersed in a solution of chromic, hydrochloric, and sulphuric acids, the whole being held in a glass vessel. Our illustration represents a table-lamp of 25 candle- power, fed by seven Renard cells joined in series, and capable of giving a current of four amperes at eleven volts for five to eight hours, that is to say, for one sup¬ ply of the solution. The battery is contained in the base of the lamp, and the whole thing weighs about thirty-five pounds. In order to remove the spent solution, which is capable of use as a disinfectant, the upper part with the lamp is removed, and the liquid forced out by means of a collapsing aspirator. Flexible Metal Tubes. A flexible metal tube capable of conveying water, steam, and gas, has recently been introduced into the United Kingdom from France and Belgium. It can be made to bear a severe pressure without bursting, and at the same time weighs no more than india-rub¬ ber tubing. The engravings show two sections of the tubing as it is constructed. A strip of metal, which can be either brass, bronze, gun-metal, or galvanised steel, is fed through rollers which bend it into an S or ‘Mouble-channel ’’ pattern. It is then wound on a mandrel so that the edges interlock as shown. A strip of india-rubber, asbestos, whip-cord, or cat-gut is laid in the bend to secure a good tight joint. The right-hand figure represents a pipe made to withstand high pressures, say from ten to a thousand pounds per square inch. The left-hand figure represents a pipe of more compact frame, designed for low pressures, and having two strips of the jointing material. This latter form is suitable for a suction hose. For light pressures the lengths of piping so made are coupled together by solid “ unions ” into which the ends are screwed and soldered. For heavier pressures the pipes are joined in a “ nipple ” and carefully packed with asbestos. The pipes are made in sizes from J inch in diameter to four inches or upwards, and' they have been well tested in practice. Brine and Sewage. On the 1 8th of September last, at Wimbledon Sewage Farm, the amines process for disposing of the sludge of sewage was publicly tried. It consists in mixing amine salts with lime and blending this with the sewage. At Wimbledon the amine salts \vere obtained by mixing lime with herring brine. The lime is decomposed by the brine, yielding a solu¬ ble gas, which the inventor, Mr. Hugo Wollheim, calls aminol. This gaseous reagent is a powerful disinfectant, destroying all microbes capable of pro¬ ducing disease. The disinfecting mixture is mingled with the sewage as it issues from the sewers, and, by the action of the lime, there is a tendency for the suspended matters to subside, whilst the putrid odour of the sewage gives place to the briny smell of the reagent. The sewage is then allowed to flow into settling-tanks, where the solids subside and the water is run off. The sludge is collected, pressed, and formed into blocks. The water and sludge are both innocuous, and may be used for agricultural purposes, the one as a liquid, the other as a solid fertiliser. Magnetic Adhesion. When a piece of iron is attracted to a magnet it is inclined to stick there, and adhere to the poles of the magnet as if it were attached by some invisible mucilage. This magnetic adhesion has recently been applied to increasing the grip of the iron wheels of a railway carriage on the rails while ascending a steep incline. A dynamo and engine on the locomotive were caused to generate a current, which was made to magnetise the tires of the rear driving wheels. By attracting the rails, the effect was the same as if sand had been strewed on the latter to increase the grip of the wheels. These experiments were carried out on the Trackville line, in America, at a point which rises 185 feet in the mile. It is stated that the train com¬ pleted the ascent in twenty- eight minutes, whereas without the aid of magnetism it would have taken fifty- five minutes. It is to be hoped that the experiments will be pursued, because the device, if properly ap¬ plied, may be useful in obviating the services of an extra engine on wet inclines. While upon this sub¬ ject we may mention that it is also proposed to dis¬ pense with ‘‘fiddles” on the tables of ships in stormy weather, by attaching an iron disc to the bottoms of dishes, and attracting them through the boards by electro-magnets under the table. The suggestion is ingenious, but whether it will be realised on a general scale is quite another matter. A New Well-Dish. Our engraving shows a dish in which the well, D, for the gravy is separated from the receptacle. A, for the meat by a bridge or partition perforated with three holes, C B c. By this device the meat is prevented from splashing into the gravy during the carving. The bridge is curved so as to hold the meat in its place, while the holes allow the gravy to reach the well.

Page 137

The Gatherer. 127 A Pocket Sun-Dial. Portable sun-dials, consisting of metal rings, carried in the pocket like a watch, were made and sold in Sheffield during the last century, when watches were FIG. I. FIG. 2. expensive. Fig. i represents one of these devices, which was held vertical by the chain, and turned towards the sun, so that a ray of light piercing the small hole seen on the middle of the ring between M and O would fall on the opposite scale inside and mark the hour. It did so by the altitude of the sun in the heavens, instead of by the shadow cast, as in the ordinary sun-dial. Of course, the higher the sun the later it was in the forenoon, and the earlier in the afternoon : hence the hours are marked so as to run down from five to twelve o’clock (noon), and up again to seven at night, as shown. Since the position of the sun varies with the month, the hole had to be shifted from month to month ; and so it was cut in a sliding ring which could be moved round to bring it opposite the month, as marked on the outside with its initial. Thus, starting from the lower J (January), the letters run up to J (June), and then descend to D (December). These old sun-dials are probably scarce, but can be constructed by amateurs, out of either brass or Bris¬ tol board, as in Fig. 2, where several layers of card¬ board are used to impart stiffness. A small plummet can be added inside the ring to secure verticality. Two New Card Games. “ Military Manoeuvres” and “The House that Jack Built” are the titles that Messrs. Hamilton, Hills &: Co. have given to some new round games that they have just published. While they are quite within the grasp of children, there is plenty of amusement to be drnwn from these original games by those of larger growth. During the holiday season they ought to prove very useful. The same publishers have sent us some new Christmas and New Year’s Cards, admirably entitled “ Unique,” in which the ideas are strikingly fresh and taking. They reach us too late for detailed notice, but all who love novelty should see among them the Mexican Feather Cards. “The Story of Music.” In his “Story of Music” (Longmans), Mr. W. J. Henderson gives on the whole a very fair, though somewhat meagre, outline of the course of musical art in the Christian Era ; w^e wish, however, he had ac¬ corded a better recognition to English art and artists, and had provided an index to the contents of the volume. Possibly “ The Story ” was not intended for serious study, and may profitably wile away an hour or two as an ordinarily readable book. New Volumes. The second volume of the revised “ Popular Edu¬ cator,” which has just been issued by Messrs. Cassell, carries on the course of instruction inaugurated by its predecessor. The lessons in drawing and music are especially good in this issue, while those in languages and shorthand are also very practical. No family should be without the volumes of this work. The third volume of “ Cassell’s Illustrated History of England ” covers the eventful period from the Great Rebellion to the fall of Monmouth. Mr. Railton’s charming pictures of historical scenes, as in the two former volumes, give an added value to this edition. The powerful figure drawings by the Messrs. Paget and Mr. Blair Leighton, too, should prove a useful acquisition to any teacher of English history, where pictorial aid will often serve to impress the actual circumstances of the storied incident on the student’s mind. Something to Sing and Play. Mr. Erskine Allon’s music is good, solid, and clear, though often, perhaps from over-elaboration, his work is more interesting to read than attractive to hear. This is ihe impression left upon us by his “ Second Sonata in G minor,” which has just been published by the London Music Publishing Co., though even in this Sonata the fourth movement may probably be taken as an exceptional piece of work. The same publishers have just issued a useful collection of original and selected part songs arranged by Mr. Frank Swift, under the title of “The Garland of Gems.” The col¬ lection ought to prove useful to teachers and for home use. Of “Two Songs” composed by our con¬ tributor, Mr. R. E. Bryson, and issued by the London Music Publishing Co., the second, “ The Storm Wind,” is quite a gem. From Messrs. Hutchings & Co. we have received a very good song entitled “ Voices of the Air,” which is a fairly attractive setting (for either a contralto or mezzo voice), by Mr. J. L. Roeckel, of words by Mr. Clifton Bingham ; and an effective ballade for pianoforte, by Ignace Gibsone, “ The Two Voices.” This latter is an easy piece Vv'ith a well-written canta- bile melody. The banjo is becoming so popular as a drawing-room instrument, that we are glad to welcome from Mr. Alphonse Carey the “ Popular Banjo Album,” which contains a goodly number of suitable and well- arranged pieces both for solo and concerted perform¬ ances. A good violin solo from the same publishers is E. Polonaski’s “Romance sans Paroles.” It would be difficult to find a better or more helpful “Pianoforte Primer” than a new one which has just been issued by Mr. Carey.

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128 The Gatherer. Ready for 1890. On the threshold of the New Year, we must throw aside the diaries for 1889, and make way for their successors. In the diaries published for the Letts’s Diaries Co. by Messrs. Cassell, all tastes and require¬ ments are met. Clergymen are provided with a handy tablet-diary, and housekeepers with one specially de¬ signed to facilitate the keeping of their accounts. The Gentleman’s Diary, and its companion for ladies, are marvels of careful compilation and admirable arrange¬ ment to meet the needs of their patrons. Down to the tiny waistcoat pocket remembrancer and the handy little card-case almanack, all the diaries in this series, whatever be their size, are to be commended for their thoughtful contrivance and splendid finish. Just as we go to press we have received from the Oxford University Press a new “Finger” Prayer Book which would serve admirably as a New Year’s gift. It is issued in two editions, one complete and the other somewhat shortened by the omission of all matter not used every Sunday. The print is clear and readable, despite the diminutive pages, which are only 37} inches in length by one inch in breadth. Even the complete edition is only ^ inch in thickness, while the abridged form is, of course, still more com¬ pact. For ladies a chatelaine fitting for this little booklet may be had. The Author of Parliamentary Government. At last the first of the biographies which Mr. John Morley promised to contribute to the series of “ Twelve English Statesmen,” which he is editing for Messrs. Macmillan, is before us. It was worth waiting for, however, and sets the salient points in Sir Robert Walpole’s long public career in their true light. As to many of the acts for which Walpole has long been blamed by historians and politicians, Mr. Morley makes no pretence of whitewashing his hero. He con¬ tents himself with pointing out the vast difference there is between the position of an English Minister in the first half of the eighteenth century, and that of one in the latter half of the nineteenth. How much of our present form of Government, notably in the working of the Cabinet and Parliamentary control, we owe to the genius of Walpole, Mr. Morley makes evident ; and the services he rendered in this direc¬ tion, and at a period when the reigning dynasty was much less securely seated on the throne than most of us realise, may well be set against other sides of his policy, whose issue proved to be disastrous and lasting complications, at once irritating to our neighbours and expensive to ourselves. The view which Mr. Morley takes of Walpole’s character is lot, perhaps, that generally accepted, but it is an eminently just one. His remarks upon Walpole’s influence on our Cabinet system, coming from one who has himself occupied a seat in the Cabinet, are very interesting, and no passages of the work are of greater value than those that show the turn which Walpole gave the tendency towards Parlia¬ mentary Government. A True Friend of Girls. Such, undoubtedly, was Louisa May Alcott, the author of “ Little Women,” whose memoir by Ednah D. Cheney (Sampson Low & Co.) has just been issued. The story of the popular author’s life-struggle is largely told in the words of her own journals, which she revised in her later years. And some of these revisions of hers are among the most interesting passages in the volume. Miss Alcott’s stories owed not a little of their strength to the fact that her cha¬ racters were taken, to a large extent, from her home circle, and from among the friends she left so little all her life through. We dare not begin quoting the work, for it would be difficult to know when or where to stop. But we cordially recommend all girl-readers to turn to it, and learn for themselves the life-story of one who has been so good a friend to them. New Music. Of new songs and pianoforte pieces there seems to be an abundance just now. Among the latest is Mr. Hugh Lyndon’s setting of words by William Pritchard, entitled “ In the Twilight ” (Pritchard & Co.), which is a pretty little song, with a refrain in the popular waltz rhythm. In pianoforte music from the same publishers we notice an unpretentious “ Melody,” by Charles T. Corke, that would prove especially useful to young stu¬ dents for reading purposes ; and a really pretty gavotte byMr.Percy M. H ewitt, entitled “Gretchen.” The same publishers have also issued “ The Engadine ” gavotte, for violin and piano, by Henry Morley, which pre¬ sents but very moderate difficulty. Messrs. Ascher- berg & Co. have just issued a book of “ Six Songs,” composed by Frances Allitsen, which are at once clever, musicianly, and original ; and a new ballad of Mr. F. E. Weatherly’s, set by Mr. J. L. Roeckel. “John’s Wife,” as it is called, is just the sort of song that is sure to be liked. “ Love’s Reverie,” in which Mr. Edward Oxenford writes the words, and Mr. K. Kreuz the music, is another song with the waltz refrain, and a very catching melody. A bright and singable little serenade is “ Espanita,” set by Antonio L. Mora ; while of “ Only Bubbles,” the words of which are by Mr. Arthur Chapman, it is enough to say that it is set by Mr. A. H. Behrend, the composer of “Auntie.” Mr. Henry Martingale’s pirate song, “ The Vampire,” which is issued by the same pub¬ lishers, is one of the last songs set by the late Michael Watson, and goes w^ell, with a good swinging chorus. Messrs. Ascherberg have also sent us a careful tran¬ scription for the violin, with piano accompaniment, of Sydney Smith’s song “For You.” Another good rollicking song for a bass voice is “ The Good Pilot,” in which Mr. J. Austin Cameron has set words by Lionel Langleigh. This song, which is issued by Messrs. Duff & Stewart, has the merit of not present¬ ing any serious difficulties. The same publishers have sent us “Two Melodies” for the piano, by A. Buhl, and “ Three Characteristic Pieces,” also for the piano, by W. Millward, all of which we can commend to the attention of teachers, for the use of young per¬ formers.

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129 THE STRONGER WILL. By EVELYN EVERETT GREEN, Author of “Monica,” &c. CHAPTER THE NINTH. FLORENCE’S PICNIC. QUEEN^S weather, Miss Tenant.”. “ Of course. I al¬ ways command that for any undertaking of mine ! “And what a charming old place to enjoy it in ! I did not know you had any such treasure of antiquity in these parts. It is an exquisite old ruin.” “ So it is ; and if Ed¬ mund had had any proper notion of doing the honours of his native place, he should have showed it to you before. However, we will make up for lost time now. I will be your cicerone myself ; I know its ‘ points ’ by heart.” “ Then I did well to wait for to-day,” said Hubert gallantly. “ I have no great faith in Greville as a guide to antiquities.” Florence cast a quick look round her, to see that her party was properly disposed. The children were running about hand-in-hand, Ethel leading the little boy and descanting rapturously on the beauty of all around them. Mr. Cadwallader and Mr. Greville were pacing slowly up and down in a shady alley, enjoying a discussion of some kind. Vernon, book in hand, appeared to be studying the ruins with intelligent in¬ terest, whilst Edmund had already disappeared with Violet into some of the cloistered recesses with which the place abounded. As for Hubert, he had eyes and ears for nobody but Florence. He followed her like a veritable shadow. Whether she did the honours of the place for him, or romped with the children, or teased Mr. Cadwallader, and laughed with and at him over reminiscences of past days, he was always at her side, adapting himself to her mood, and finding new charms in her with each change that circumstances brought. At the merry mid-day meal something that was said roused little Ethel to the consciousness that young Mr. Morrison knew Rudolf, and had seen him quite lately. In a moment she was full of eager inquiries about him ; and it seemed to Hubert (who observed it with a pang of jealousy) that Florence was interested in the subject, and aided the child’s endeavours to elicit as many facts as possible about young Stanhope’s plan of life. Hubert, however, was generous enough to speak in high terms of the abilities of his father’s secretary. “ Oh, he’s an uncommonly clever fellow. He is thought well of by many people. He ought to get into Parliament ; there’s not a doubt of that. He can speak very well, and is precious clever at discriminating and 729 exposing a fallacy or sophistry. People say that if he were once returned to the House he would soon make his way upward — be a Cabinet minister before so very long, and perhaps end as Premier ; who knows ? ” Vernon laughed, and Florence glanced across at Mr. Cadwallader, who appeared to be listening with some interest. Possibly Hubert had an inkling of some by-play ; or was it possible that Vernon had dropped a hint to him ? He and Vernon had been a good deal together during the past days, and they might have exchanged confidences of some kind. At any rate, the next re¬ mark was distinctly less happy. “ You see, it is natural that a man with prospects like Stanhope’s should look to rise in the world. It would be odd if he did not.” Mr. Cadwallader’s brow contracted sharply. “ Prospects ! And pray, what prospects does that young man give out that he has ?” There was rather an awkward silence. Hubert grew red, and glanced round uneasily ; Vernon tried to create a diversion by clattering plates and pulling Ethel’s hair ; whilst Florence, after a very short pause, broke in gaily by saying — “ Why, of course he has the prospect of being re¬ turned as our member, if our present candidate should retire, and he could afford to stand. I should dearly love to get some friend or relative into the House. I should feel then as if I helped to rule the kingdom. Uncle Oliver, I’ve never quite forgiven you for being too lazy to represent our constituency ! ” But though Mr. Cadwallader smiled at her, his face was still a little grim. “ If that young fellow is posing before his London friends as heir of Marchwood, he will find himself in the wrong box one of these days,” he said to his old friend in an undertone, as the two moved away together. “ I suppose it is hard to give up hopes of a fine property,” said Mr. Greville. “ No doubt the sight of Marchwood has roused new longings. It is quite natural it should.” “ Yes, I always did think it a mistake to have him here at all ; but Florence was bent on including the whole party.” “Florence is very generous,” said Mr. Greville thoughtfully. “ I only hope he, or somebody else, may not some day impose upon her generosity.” Mr. Cadwallader looked quickly at his friend as if half startled, but nothing farther passed between them on the subject. Mr. Greville, who was not a strong man, nor accus¬ tomed to entertainments of this kind, ordered his carriage early in the afternoon and drove away. Vernon joined his uncle, and whilst appearing to try and explain away young Morrison’s awkward speech about Rudolf and his “prospects,” contrived

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The Stronger Will. 130 to impress firmly upon Mr. Cadwallader’s mind the fact that the elder brother was making capital out of the expectations he professed to entertain of possible succession to Marchwood. That matter accomplished to his satisfaction, the astute youth turned the conversation to Florence, and sang her praises in a way that always pleased the guardian, finally remarking carelessly — “ Marchwood would hardly be the same place with¬ out her.” “No indeed, my boy.” “ How terribly she would be missed in all quarters if she were to marry ! ” Mr. Cadwallader smiled a little. “That would depend to some extent upon whom she married.” “Would it? I should have fancied not. A woman never is the same after she is married, everybody says that. I should think you must feel awfully glad that she and young Greville have never taken it into their heads to fall in love.” Vernon spoke these words with an admirable appear¬ ance of ingenuousness. He had rehearsed them so many times that he felt certain he could bring them out with every appearance of simplicity. He succeeded to the utmost of his expectations, and he was not dis¬ appointed in the effect they produced upon his com¬ panion. Mr. Cadwallader started visibly. “ Florence and Edmund have always been fond of each other,” he remarked presently. “ Of course I have always known that they may some day wish to marry, and I should not attempt to stand in the way of their happiness.” “No, I am sure you would not,” answered Vernon warmly ; “ you are so kind to everybody, and so fond of Miss Tenant. But as you cannot want to lose her, you must be glad to see the danger safely averted.” Vernon looked up with such smiling confidence and good faith, that his uncle was puzzled and a little disturbed. “ I do not understand you. What danger is averted ? ” “ Why, the danger of losing Miss Tenant, to be sure.” “How?” “ Why, because so long as Greville remained unmarried, you must always have felt a danger, but now - ” Vernon smiled again, and Mr. Cadwallader looked sharply at him, and asked — “ Well, what now ? He has not been married since yesterday, I presume?” “ Oh, no, he is not married^ “ Then what do you mean, boy ? Speak out ! I hate a mystery and a rigmarole.” “Why, sir,” answered Vernon, looking up with an admirable imitation of genuine surprise. “ surely you have seen that he has been falling in love with Violet ever since we came ? Every day I expect to hear that they are engaged.” Mr. Cadwallader remained perfectly silent. This danger had never struck him for a moment. It seemed to him absolutely impossible that any man in his senses could so much as look at another woman when Florence was by. He could not understand it, and yet a cold chill seemed struck at his heart. “ I think you are mistaken,” he said quietly. “ Not I,” answered the lad, with a light laugh. “ You ask Miss Tenant.” Mr. Cadwallader turned upon him almost angrily. “ You may be quite certain that Florence knows nothing whatever about it.” Vernon actually laughed aloud. “ Miss Tenant know nothing about it ! Why, sir, you must be joking. She has been aiding and abetting with all her might from the very first. One might fairly call it a match of her own making. Do you think that clever Miss Tenant would fail to see things that are plain even to me ? ” “ Miss Tenant would have informed me long ago had any such matter come to her notice,” answered Mr. Cadwallader coldly. “ We understand each other perfectly, and I have implicit confidence in her can¬ dour and frankness. Let us drop the subject ; it is distasteful to me. I am certain you are entirely mis¬ taken. If what you suppose has been going on, Florence would have been the first person to enlighten me. You do not know her as I do.” Mr. Cadwallader walked away with a good deal of subdued irritation in his manner. Vernon stood looking after him with a smile upon his face. “ Well, Miss Tenant, I think I have put a spoke in your wheel, at any rate,” he said half aloud. “It seems to me that it will not be so very difficult after all to feather my own nest pretty well. Rudolf is certainly out of the running, and Miss Tenant is not half as clever as I thought at first, though she is not an adversary to be despised. I stand third in succession, and in some ways my position is least assailable.” As for Mr. Cadwallader, he felt in anything but a pleasant frame of mind, and began heartily to wish that he had never opened his doors to a “ rabble of people ” who seemed bent on thwarting his pet pro¬ jects. and stirring up all kinds of unwelcome thoughts and feelings. But then he said to himself that he did not believe a word of what he had just heard. Vernon was but a youth, he might easily be deceived ; but Florence knew how much he was building upon this scheme, and she would never deceive him. But his eyes were destined to be speedily and ruthlessly opened. He was pacing along in a secluded part of the ruin, flanked by high crumbling walls on either side, when he was aware of a sort of scrambling sound overhead, like something slipping or sliding, and then a startled, frightened cry — “Oh, Edmund ! Help me ! I am falling!” Mr. Cadwallader looked quickly up, and saw, to his great horror, his niece, Violet, clinging desperately to a strong bough of ivy, which seemed disposed to bend outward with her weight. She had evidently stepped upon a loose stone on the wall, and lost her balance and slipped down. If help did not quickly

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The Stronger Will. come, it seemed as if nothing could save her from a heavy fall of some twenty or thirty feet. But next moment came the welcome sound of a man’s voice. “ Hold on ! I am coming. Just one moment more, my darling. I will come. Trust me.” Mr. Cadwallader had placed himself just below the spot where Violet hung, as it were, suspended, ready, in case the worst happened, to break the fall as far as possible ; but in another moment sounds from above told him that help had come ; and in a few more seconds he heard the unmistakable sound of a kiss repeated more than once. My darling : my own sweet Violet ! Why did you go there without me.^” “ 1 did not know it was dangerous. I saw some moss I wanted. How pale you are, Edmund ! Have I frightened you ? ” “ 1 should think you had ! Violet, can you not see how unfit you are to take care of yourself ? Can you not make up your mind to give me the right to take care of you always “I think you have taken that right without any giving;” and if the words were cool, the tender tremor in the voice belied all idea of coldness. “Yet I want to hear you say the words. Violet, dearest Violet, 1 know I ought to have waited longer, but I do love you so very dearly. Can you not - ” That was all Mr. Cadwallader heard. He had been creeping cautiously out of ear-shot ever since the brief dialogue began, but he had been unable to avoid hearing thus far, not desiring his close proximity to the lovers to become known. There was a touch of bitter sarcasm in his smile as he went onwards, muttering to himself below his breath — “ ‘ Can you not - ’ Oh, yes, my boy, you will find she can, and that quickly enough too. You are a rich man, or will be, with a fine property in reversion ; and the Stanhopes all know how to value the good things of this world ! Well, well ; young folks will be young folks, but what that boy has done with his eyes it puzzles me to discover. Violet is a pretty, quiet little girl, I do not doubt, but to look at her whilst Florence is by — that’s a thing I never shall understand.” Mr. Cadwallader was unusually silent that night. He hardly opened his lips at the dinner-table, and he had little more to say when he joined the ladies after¬ wards in the drawing-room. Florence observed this, as she observed everything, but she held her peace, knowing well what a dislike he had to anything of a fuss. When, however, they were left alone together, she came and put her arms about his neck, bending her head over his till her soft curls swept his brow. “ Uncle Oliver,” she said coaxingly, “there is some¬ thing the matter with you to-night, and I want to know what it is.” For the first time in his life there was no response to her caress. Florence was keenly conscious of this, though she did ‘not move her arms away. ^31 “ Tell me,” she said softly. “ I am afraid you know without any telling.” “ What do 1 know ? ” “ That I have been trusting you — and you have becK deceiving me.” She stood up as he spoke those words, and came and knelt down before him, clasping her hands upon his knee, and gazing straight up at him with a frank, sweet trust and truthfulness in her beautiful eyes. “ No, Uncle Oliver ; no. Look at me, and tell me if you think I could ever deceive you.” He did look, and his heart began to melt. “ Florence,” he said, “tell me one thing : have you been keeping a secret from me ? ” Her brightest smile played over her face : that arch, sunny smile that from her very babyhood had been one of her greatest powers. She laid her finger upon her lips. “ Uncle Oliver, it was not my secret — you would not have me betray other people’s ? ” “ I would have you be frank with me always,” he said. “ I trust you entirely. I expect a little con¬ fidence in you.” She took his hand and kissed it. “And you have it. Uncle Oliver. I hate keeping anything back from you, but I do have secrets con¬ fided to me sometimes : that is the penalty of being such a universal favourite, you know ; ” and the witch¬ ing smile played over her face once more. “ Tell me, what is it you have seen ? What have you discovered that has so shaken your faith in me ? ” He could not resist the appeal in her eyes and voice. He took her face between his hands, and kissed her on brow and lips. “ I do not think anything could really shake that, Florence, but I have been grieved and disturbed to¬ day. What is this I hear about Violet Stanhope and young Greville ? It seems as if these Stanhopes were born to be a blight upon all my most cherished plans.” Florence’s face lighted up with one of her inimitable looks of laughing gravity. “ Ah, Uncle Oliver ! You see what comes of being so inveterate a match-maker ! There is always a Nemesis somewhere in the background. You are very kind and good and clever, but people will not let you marry them after your own ideas, you see. It is very tiresome of them, and very unreasonable ; but they do show a marked preference for selecting their own husbands and wives ! ” There was a sort of wistful appeal mingling with this playfulness — that was not lost upon Mr. Cadwallader. He lo l ed at her rather sadly as he said — “ Do not jest upon it, Florence : it is no laughing matter with me. You know I had set my heart upon your marrying Edmund Greville.” “ No, Uncle Oliver,” she answered, “ I do not think that. What you have always set your heart upon is securing my happiness by every means in your power, both in the present and in the future.” His face softened. He did not contradict her, but he looked questioningly at her as if he would heai: more. She read the unspoken question iu his eyes.

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The Stronger Will. 132 “Yes, Uncle Oliver, and you have secured it. You have been to nrie more than I can express, ever since I was left a little helpless mite to your care. You have made me so happy that I often say to myself, I never have known a real sorrow or trouble yet. I do not think any life could be more bright and sunny than mine has been. Only you have done one thing. Uncle Oliver, that you did not quite reckon upon. You have spoilt me for ever being satisfied with anybody for a husband.” He could not but smile back as he asked — “ What do you mean ? ” “ I mean just what I say. You have so long been my ideal of all that is noble and high-minded, and generous and chivalrous, that until I find your match I shall not be able to dream of marrying ; and although I do not wish to make you vain, Uncle Oliver, and have done my best always to avoid informing you of your many perfections, still I cannot hide from you any longer the fact that 1 am afraid there are very few men like you to be found in the world. There are men, to be sure, who seem very nice upon the surface, but they do not improve upon acquaintance — go a little deeper, and they are utterly unsatisfactory. But with you it is just the reverse. On the top, I will not say that you are faultless, or even particularly attractive ; but — ” and here Florence lifted her face towards his, and laid it down against his shoulder — “ when one has lived for twenty years with you, as I have done, and has learned to know you through and through— then indeed the wonder would be if anything would induce that one ever to leave you. Uncle Oliver, you are not so tired of me that you want me to marry and leave you } ” He put his arms about her and held her close to him. “ No, my darling, no, no ; you know that as well as I do. It is partly my fear of losing you that has made me so anxious for you to marry Edmund. If you did that, I should know that you would never really leave me or Marchwood. It would be a way of keeping you near me always.” “And if I keep near you always, even without Edmund, will not that satisfy you ?” “ Ah, yes ! but I cannot feel safe. Some day you may fall in love, and leave me quite alone.” “ I promise you I will never do that,” answered Florence, looking straight into his eyes, her own full of love and trust. “ I will promise never to marry with¬ out your full and free consent, and never to leave you alone in your old age for any cause whatever. Will that satisfy you ? Is it not better to have me on those terms than on any others ? ” “ My darling ! ” he answered tenderly, adding, after a pause, “ But, Florence, have you no love for Edmund after all these years ? I have watched you ; I thought it must come in time.” “ It never would have come. We love each other, indeed, but not in that way. It is the same with us both ; we entirely understand each other.” “You never told me this before.” “No, I did not much think you would believe it ; but I hoped in time you would come to see it for your¬ self. Now, Uncle Oliver, try and be resigned. Tell me” — and she drew herself a little away, looking at him with her arch smile — do you think Edmund is good enough for me ? ” “ No, I don’t,” he answered quickly, and she stopped him by laying her hand upon his lips. “There, that will do. You have said enough. You have defrauded yourself of the right to a single more word of repining. You do not think him good enough for me — it is impossible, therefore, that you can wish me to marry him ; so now we think exactly alike, and can give our minds to making other people happy: which you know you love to do.” “ What people ? ” asked Mr. Cadwallader sharply. “ Why, Edmund and Violet, to be sure,” answered Florence, with the prettiest little air of surprise. “You know we must do all we can to use our influence with Mr. Greville to make the course of their love run as smoothly as possible.” “ U pon my word, madam, you ask rather much,” cried Mr. Cadwallader, his breath pretty well taken away by the audacity of his ward, who had calmly overturned his pet scheme, and was now calling him to be an abettor in its hopeless destruction. “ To be sure I do. Uncle Oliver, because you always give me so much, and ‘much would have more,’ as everybody knows. Now that you see how little suited Edmund and I are to one another, you will be de¬ lighted to help to win him a wife after his own hearty like Violet. We shall look to you to smooth matters down with Mr. Greville. He is fond of Violet already^ and loves his son too well to wish to stand in the way of his happiness. When you have a talk with him, Uncle Oliver, and put things before him in your own kind convincing way, I am sure he will see that it is all turning out for the best. It would be too silly if he went on thinking it a nice thing to marry two people who have not the least wish to be anything but very good friends. You can show him that so very well^ because you have so often told him the same thing when he has tried to persuade you to marry. You have told me so again and again ; haven’t you now ? Mr. Cadwallader was obliged to laugh. “ Florence, Florence,” he said, “ you are a sad little witch. I shall soon have no will left to call my own. Where has that boy put his eyes to? To think that he should have known you all his life, and then go and fall in love with Violet Stanhope ! ” “Yes, just think of it,” answered Florence. “You see how hopelessly inferior he must be ! He is stamped at once. Perhaps, poor fellow, he wanted just a little bit of his own way, and knew he should never get it with me. And now, as we have safely disposed of him, you must make up your mind to be good, and smile upon the young lovers, and have your tyrant saddled upon you at Marchwood without hope of release. Poor Uncle Oliver ! No wonder you were so anxious to get me married ! ” She stood up before him now, her bright hair in some disorder from his caresses, her eyes full of loving, laughing light. In her strong and graceful youth and beauty she looked a visible embodiment of all that was gracious and noble and womanly, and

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The Stronger Will. 133 Mr. Cadwallader’s eye rested upon her with peculiar pleasure and pride. “ Ah, Florence ! ” he said, drawing a long breath, ■“there are two sides to every question. I do not think you will ever meet a man fit to be your hus¬ band ; in which case you will remain mistress of Marchwood in perpetuity.” She smikd ; for one moment a shadow swept over her face, and she seemed for a moment to hesitate. Of course, Mr. Greville was disappointed, but then he felt from the first moment that it was useless for him to protest, or to attempt to hold out when his friend Cadwallader had given way. Moreover, he felt a good deal of love towards Violet, and Florence’s witchery was successfully brought to bear upon his most vulnerable points. Edmund was very dear to him, and the lad’s happiness not to be lightly regarded Violet was Mr. Cadwallader’s niece ; the marriage But the look upon Mr. Cadwallader’s face checked the words that had almost sprung to her lips, and she held them resolutely back. “ So long as you want me here. Uncle Oliver, I never shall be anything else,” she said ; and then she stooped over him once more, clasped her arms about his neck, kissed him, and was gone. Had Vernon witnessed the parting that night be¬ tween Mr. Cadwallader and Florence, he would not have felt that much success had attended his effort to sow discord between them. CHAPTER THE TENTH. HUBERT MORRISON. After that exchange of confidence between Florence and her guardian, the course of true love between Edmund and Violet ran smoothlv enough. would secure a union between the two houses, though not a junction of the two properties : and beneath the magic of Florence’s persuasive words, it was wonder¬ ful how much there seemed to be to recommend this marriage. As Mr. Cadwallader had felt a sort of scornful contempt for Edmund’s bad taste in preferring Violet above Florence, so in a more modified form did Mr. Greville feel surprise at the unqualified manner in which Florence had expressed herself to Mr. Cad¬ wallader about the impossibility of loving his son. It seemed to him that there must be some other reason at work in her mind, and one day, when dis¬ cussing the matter with his old friend, he said sud¬ denly — “ I suppose, Cadwallader, that there can be no prior attachment in her mind ? ” “ Impossible ! ”

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'34 The Stronger Will. “ Well, yes, I suppose so ; but the idea came into my head.” “ Quite impossible. Why, there is nobody else in the field, for one thing.” “ Not unless you count young Stanhope. I always saw a danger there.” Mr. Cadwallader^s face clouded. “ I have said that that danger will be averted. 1 do not intend him to come to Marchwood again.” Mr. Greville looked thoughtful. “ As you please, Cadwallader, as you please ; but after all, it was no fault of this young man’s. It has all come a little hardly upon him.” “ Possibly ; but I cannot help that. Florence is as my own child. I cannot look upon any claim of kinship as of more weight than her dutiful devotion to me for the past twenty years.” Certainly not, certainly not ; it merely occurred to me as possible that (Edmund being out of the question) you might like to give those two the chance of coming together. Of course it is not in the least likely anything would come of it, still - ” “ Say no more — say no more ; it offends me — it goes against me. I have every wish to be just and to act uprightly, but there are some feelings I cannot conquer. I could put up with a good deal, but not with a marriage between Florence and a Stanhope. I do not intend them to meet again. Kindly say no more of this to me, Greville ; it is a peculiarly dis¬ tasteful subject.” “ Certainly, I will say no more. I am sorry I ever alluded to it.” Mr. Cadwallader’s irritation towards the name of Stanhope did not, however, extend itself to Violet. He was very kind to her, even though she had helped to thwart his favourite plan, and she grew to like him better every day, and understood more and more his true kindness of heart. Perhaps he felt that by being very generous and fatherly towards the sister, he was making some amends for his harshness towards the brother. He had not the least wish to be unjust towards Rudolf. He often felt compunction at ignor¬ ing him as he did ; but the fear lest Florence should be won by this handsome nephew of his had taken firm hold of him, and he could not rid himself either of the idea or of the repugnance it aroused in him. But no one was as yet aware of this. Rudolf had not, it is true, been asked again to Marchwood, but then, he had no leisure at command Just now. Mrs. Freer had not suggested his coming again, and Florence knew her guardian well enough to feel very doubtful how such a proposal would be received. Florence felt a little secret indignation at the way in which Hubert Morrison continued to extend his “few days’ holiday,” and linger about Hawkshold and Marchwood. She knew, by what she heard from the children and Mrs. Freer, that Sir Arthur’s son was supposed to share the work of the private secre¬ tary, and to relieve Rudolf at all very busy seasons of the year ; yet here he was, idling away his time in a purposeless manner, while the summer session was in full swing, and his coadjutor so full of work that he had barely time to write brief letters to his mother or sisters. Edmund, though hospitable and friendly, was no very intimate friend ; and now that he had his own affairs to engross him, it stood to reason that he could not care so very much for Hubert’s extended visit. Indeed, the young man was more at Marchwood than at Hawkshold, and Florence began to tire of seeing him so constantly about the place, albeit he always made himself very agreeable. She disliked idleness, especially in men, and she felt that in this particular case it was almost unpardonable. Florence was nothing if not frank, and her frank speeches were so blended with a gracious sweetness of manner that they never sounded blunt, although the words themselves might look so written down in cold blood. When Hubert was remarking one day how greatly he was enjoying his visit to the neighbourhood, she answered, with one of her kindling glances — “ Oh, yes, this is a capital holiday place, where hard- worked people can get a little pleasant relaxation ; but I should have thought you had had about enough of it by this time.” “ Enough ! I do not feel as if I ever should have had enough. Are you tired of Marchwood, Miss Tenant ? ” “ I ? Oh, no ! My work lies here ; I am busy from morning till night ; but your work lies elsewhere, and I wonder sometimes that you are content to remain in idleness so long.” “ My work “Yes ; and I am sure there must be plenty to do. Rudolf Stanhope seems working hard from morning till night in your father’s service.” Hubert’s brows drew themselves a little together. “ Has he been complaining?” “ Oh, no. I should not think that was at all his way. He seems to like hard work.” “ He does ; he has a passion for it. He is also very ambitious. I am afraid I am not.” “ That is rather a pity, is it not ? ” “ I don’t know. Do you think so ?” “ I like to see a man thoroughly in earnest over his work. His ambition to do well and to succeed must almost inevitably accompany an enthusiasm for his calling, whatever that calling may be.” Again a little Jealous pang shot through Hubert. It seemed to him that Florence was describing Rudolf Stanhope, and holding him up, as it were, as a model to him. “ I could be ambitious too,” he said in a low voice, “ if I dared to hope for success.” She turned her clear gaze upon him. “ And why should you not hope ? ” A Joyful light leapt into his eyes. He was so- deeply in love himself, so entirely engrossed by the dominant idea, that it was impossible for him to realise how utterly unaware she was of the feelings stirring within him. “ Do you say that to me ? ” “ Certainly I do. I believe that a man can always

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The Stronger Will. t35 achieve success by honest and steady application, or gain an object in view by never losing sight of it, and working unremittingly to gain it.” His face fell a little as he heard this calm rejoinder* He could have wished that her manner was a little less frank and friendly ; but then, she was certainly not like other women, and it was not possible that she could be quite unconscious of the wealth of de¬ votion in his heart. ‘‘ If you bid me go to my work, Miss Tenant, I will do so to-morrow.” “ I have no right to bid ; but I do think that it is time you did so.’’ “ And if I obey, may I some day hope to claim my reward at your hands ? ” “ Reward.?” she questioned, smiling. “ Ay : a welcome from you when next I shall present myself at Marchwood.” “Oh, yes, you shall certainly have that,” answered Florence, with her sunny smile ; but she was hardly prepared for his next action, which was to take her hand and carry it to his lips. But the next instant he was striding rapidly away, and after a few moments of sudden surprise, she turned back to the house, smiling. “ Tiresome boy ! I had no idea what he was driving at. Well, at any rate, hard work will be his best cure, and will soon drive the nonsense out of his head. I have no notion of having Rudolf driven to death while he is philandering down here. Rudolf is worth half a dozen of him. I wonder if Uncle Oliver will ever come to understand his worth ? I doubt if he will be per¬ suaded to ask him here at all this summer. But I will do my best. Those two are so very much alike, they ought to understand and appreciate one another.” * * * * # Rudolf, hard at work in the library of Sir Arthur Morrison’s house, looked up with a slightly jaded air as Hubert walked leisurely into the room, and after a brief greeting threw himself into a comfortable leather- covered chair. “ Whew 1 how hot it is ! The pavements are like molten lead. You certainly have the best of it here. Stanhope, in this cool retreat of yours. Well, I sup¬ pose you want the latest news from Marchwood ? I was there two days ago.” Rudolf looked up, and pushed his papers away. “ How are they all ? I hear good reports. I suppose they are all flourishing.” “Apparently so. Your sister looks wonderfully stronger. Her engagement has worked a marvellous change for the better in her.” “ That engagement surprised me a good deal.” “ Rather sudden, eh .? ” “ Well, certainly it was that ; but I was thinking of something else.” When two young men spend as much time together as Rudolf and Hubert had done for many years, a good deal of unreserve as to their private affairs grows up between them almost of necessity, although there may be little real intimacy of thought ; and so it was nothing strange that they should speak in that open way ot Violet’s recent engagement. “ I suppose you allude to that proposed marriage of young Greville with Miss Tenant ?” “ Yes, I understood there was an engagement.” “ No ; it never amounted to that. Greville told me all about it. It was a family arrangement desired by the heads of both houses, but not ratified by the parties themselves. At the same time, I fancy the match might have been successfully made up if ‘ metal more attractive’ had not come in the way of both - ” Hubert stopped suddenly with an air of pulling himself up short, adding, rather lamely, “ that is, of Edmund Greville.” A quick flush rose in Rudolf’s face, and as quickly subsided ; but it was seen and mentally noted by Hubert. There was silence for a few moments, and then Stanhope asked, with an air of elaborate care¬ lessness, “ Did you mean to imply that Miss Tenant also had found a lover more to her liking ? ” “ I — I — oh, no, I did not mean to imply that. I— what did I say to put the idea into your head ? ” Rudolf, who had been averting his face from his companion, and drawing cabalistic signs upon a piece of paper in front of him, now turned suddenly, and looked the other full in the face. Hubert became suddenly confused beneath the searching gaze bent upon him, coloured, hesitated, and finally stopped short. Not unnaturally Rudolf attri¬ buted his confusion to a totally wrong source, and a sudden paleness overspread his face, although not a muscle moved. “ Oh, indeed ! ” he said presently, in a voice that tried in vain to be natural. “ Shall I be premature in offering my congratulations ? ” Again his face was turned away, and Hubert, relieved from the scrutiny of those piercing dark eyes, re¬ covered himself quickly, and saw in a moment that advantage might be taken of that trifling misunder¬ standing. Rudolf had unconsciously betrayed himself, and his rival was not a man of nice scruples. “ Thanks, old fellow,” was the answer, slowly spoken. “ I am sorry to say that they are rather premature in the sense you mean ; but still I may perhaps accept them in a modified fashion ; for if not accepted, 1 am at least bidden to hope.” “ By Miss Tenant.?” “ Yes ; those were her very words.” Rudolf drew his papers together, and appeared to be studying them intently, whilst Hubert studied him. “ You don’t look very well,” he remarked presently. “ It’s so confoundedly hot !” was the not too gracious answer. “ And you have been working rather hard, too ; how¬ ever, a few weeks will bring the session to an end, and then you can have a holiday. Or no doubt the gover¬ nor would give you a few days’ leave of absence to run down to Marchwood for a breath of fresh air.” Rudolfs face contracted sharply. “ I shall never go to Marchwood again.” “ Whew ! You don’t mean to say you have quar¬ relled with the old boy .? ”

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136 “‘WOULD YOUR BROTHER CAKE FOR THIS SORT OF THING?’” (/>. 137). Certainly not.” Hubert paused a moment, but as Rudolf did not appear inclined to say more, he continued, with an air of sympathetic apprehension — Of course I can understand your feelings. It is awfully hard to be ousted from a fine property like that by a concatination of untoward circum¬ stances.’’ Rudolf interrupted by an impatient gesture. My dear Morrison, I never looked to inherit my uncle’s property ; and if other people expected that I should, it only shows their ignorance of the family history Marchwood is nothing to me, nor I to March wood. If it had not been for the fact of my family’s being there, I should never have set eyes upon the place ; and I have no intention of ever going there again.” Hubert strode from the room with a slight smile upon his face. “Well, I think I have about done his business for him. My father does not think that diplomacy is my forte, but I begin to think it is. I do not think that I need entertain any more fears that he will cross my path again.” Meantime Rudolf, left alone in the library, once more pushed away his papers and ran his fingers through his hair with a weary sigh. Then, after a brief spell of musing, he roused himself with a fierce shake. “ What is it to me ? As if I ever had any hopes of it or of her ! It is much better to have it finally settled, and out of one’s head. Not that I quite trust all he says ; one cannot picture that queenly Florence giving her hand to him. And yet, why not ? Stranger things have happened before now, and there is no reasoning about those attractions which go by the name of love, as I have bitter cause to know. Why should I care ? I am nothing to her, and never shall be ; and Violet still declares her to be a scheming, designing wom.an, whom it would not be safe to trust. And who am I that I should aspire to the hand of an heiress, and require to be put in my place by that haughty old man who dotes on her? No ; I am too proud to lay myself open to that. My mind is made up. I go to Marchwood no more.”

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The Stronger Will. 137 CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH. A DEFEAT. What Rudolf had said concerning his sister’s opinion of Florence Tenant was no more than the truth. Violet had Cadwallader blood in her veins, and it showed itself in her by a steadfast tenacity of purpose, and a resolute clinging to an opinion or prejudice, which, if once formed, remained as a dominating influence most difficult to eradicate. Violet had grown up in the belief that Florence was a designing, scheming woman, plotting ceaselessly for her own advancement in the world ; and what she had seen since her arrival at Marchwood had in¬ creased rather than diminished this feeling. Things appear to us very much according as we look at them, and Violet’s eyes were partially blinded by her preconceived ideas. Not even her engage¬ ment, which brought such sunshine and happiness into her heart, sufficed to drive out the feelings which had taken root there. True, Florence had been a friend and ally, and had helped to smooth their path for them as perhaps no one else could have done. Violet was not ungrateful for this, but neither did it change her attitude of mind. She saw self-seeking throughout. It was a great relief to Florence to put an end to the farce that the elders were playing in regard to herself and Edmund. It was a far pleasanter conclusion to the fiction than any declaration on her part could be ; and in doing a kindness to the lovers she had been working also for herself. But, do what she would, she always contrived to keep her place as the idol of her guardian’s heart, and Violet looked on bitterly, seeing with each week that passed how hopeless it was for her to dream of seeing Rudolf installed in his rightful position. Yet the question of the heirship of Marchwood was never named between her and Edmund. It was the one point on which they seemed to agree to keep silence. The girl knew how angry Rudolf would be if ever he thought she canvassed the question even with her affianced husband ; and she herself had plenty of pride ; and, besides, Edmund shared the general infatuation for Florence, and would never understand, in his simple good faith, the complex game that was being played out. So Violet held her peace, only watching closely all that went on, and keeping her own counsel. “ We shall soon see how the land really lies,” she said sometimes to herself. “The summer recess is close at hand, and Rudolf will be at liberty. If there is the least sincerity in all this gushing good-will, he will be asked down here, at any rate for a time, as a matter of course. Uncle Cadwallader speaks quite kindly of him, and seems interested in his welfare ; and Florence can do anything with him that she pleases. There can be no questioning a test like that.” It was a disappointment to Florence that she and Violet never drew any nearer together, but she was too wise to try and force matters, and trusted to time to remove the coolness. Violet went out but little, and that only to please Edmund, who longed to introduce her to his friends. Yet, wherever she went she always saw the same thing — Florence playing queen to a mimic court, flattered, admired, courted wherever she went. It irritated her sometimes even to see it, and kept alive the instinctive antagonism with which she had always regarded the lady of the manor. “Would your brother enjoy this kind of thing Florence asked one day, during the progress of some al fresco fete at Marchwood. “ I dare say he would,” answered Violet coldly. “ Poor boy, he must be terribly fagged by the heat in town ; but such chances do not come to everyone.” Florence gave her a quick look. “ And he is so busy, too “ Yes, more busy than I like him to be.” “ But the session will end before very long, and then he will be free.” “ Yes : then he will be free.” The two girls stood facing one another ; for once in her life Florence looked not entirely at ease, and there was a trace of effort in her smile. “ And then we must see what we can do,” she said ; and Violet smiled in a peculiar way. “ Yes, we shall see,” she said ; and Florence turned away, saying in her heart — “Oh, Uncle Oliver! Uncle Oliver! why is it that just in the case when I want it most I dare not tender an invitation as I should with anybody else t No wonder Violet does not understand ! ” But that very evening she broached the subject with her guardian, and for almost the first time in her life met with defeat. “ Uncle Oliver,” she began, in her most confident tone, “ don’t you think it is time you sent an invitation to Rudolf Stanhope to spend a week or so here when the session closes ? ” Mr. Cadwallader looked up quickly. “ No, Florence, certainly not. I see no reason at all for such a step.” Florence looked up with a coaxing smile. “ Now don’t be cross, Uncle Oliver. I’m sure it was a very natural question to ask. When a man’s family live in one house together, of course he will be made welcome to visit them from time to time. Of course he ought to be able to look upon the place as a kind of home, too.” “No such thing!” answered Mr. Cadwallader sharply. “ The rest are here because they naturally remain at present with their mother. His case is totally different.” “ Yes, to be sure. It would be absurd for him to live here ; but I should have thought he would be expected to come for a part of his vacation — or whatever he calls it — for the time he has to do what he likes with.” “No, I cannot agree with you. He does not like the country or the life here. He does not get on with me, and I confess it annoys me to have him here. He is much better travelling or visiting his own friends. 1 have no intention of asking him to Marchwood.” “Is Aunt Felicia never to see him, then?” asked

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The Stronger Will. 138 Florence, not in the least ruffled by his visible, though restrained, irritation. “That is for Felicia herself to decide, of course. At present I have seen no signs of special yearning after him. She evidently does not think it worth the trouble of a visit to town, and so long as she is so indifferent, I do not see why 1 need disturb myself about it. After all, he was here at Easter ; it would be making too strong a precedent of it to ask him again at midsum¬ mer. He would always be expecting to come.” “ 1 don’t know. Rudolf never seemed to me the sort of man to take things for granted like that. You do not intend to exclude him altogether from March wood, do you. Uncle Oliver ? There is a differ¬ ence between asking him always and asking him never.” “ Oh ! I suppose he must come as an occasional thing. I hope I am never altogether unreasonable ; but he ought not to expect more, and I certainly shall not offer it.” Florence smiled in a fashion that made Mr. Cad- wallader ask quickly — “ W ell, what is it, madam ? ” “It is so funny to hear you trying to be inhospitable. Uncle Oliver. One can see that it goes so dreadfully against the grain.” The word “ inhospitable ” struck unpleasantly upon the ears of the master of Marchwood. “ I have no wish to be inhospitable to anyone,” he answered slowly, “ but in this particular instance I have very good reasons for taking up the firm stand I intend to do.” “ I suppose you cannot quite get over the fact that he is a Stanhope.? ” It is not entirely that,” answered Mr. Cadwallader. “ Violet is a Stanhope too ; but I see no reason for excluding her from Marchwood.” “No; you are wonderfully good to her, which is as it should be. But what have you heard against Rudolf? I should be sorry to hear of anything to his disadvan¬ tage, for I liked him very much, and the children are quite touchingly fond of him. It always seems to me a point in a young man’s favour when little children love him. They have such wonderful power of discrimina¬ tion. You will have to make your peace with them for not asking him down ; they will be dreadfully disap¬ pointed. The culminating point of their happiness always seems in the anticipation of showing everything to ‘brother.’ You must break the news to them. It has never occurred to them that he is not coming as soon as his duties permit.” Mr. Cadwallader looked a little bit less at ease than he wished to do. “ Do not spoil the children, Florence,” he said. “ Do not bring them up to think they are to have everything they wish for.” “ I will try not ; but it is so nice to see their enjoy¬ ment of everything, and to help to make them happy. However, Rudolfs absence this summer will give the inevitable element of disappointment that we can never escape for long.” For a moment Florence’s bright face was grave, and Mr. Cadwallader, quick to note every smallest change that passed over that well-loved cotmtenancey asked her with repressed uneasiness — “ Surely you are not disappointed too ? ’” She looked at him with her bright smile. “Not for myself exactly. Uncle Oliver, but a little for other people.” “ F or whom ? ” “For his mother, and for Violet, and the children' even more. And I am just a little bit disappointed for you and for Rudolf.” “ For me ? ” questioned Mr. Cadwallader quickly. “ Yes, a little,” answered Florence, seating herself at his feet, in a way that had become habitual to her from a little child. “You see, Uncle Oliver, you have always brought me up to look at life from your own. high standpoint, and I have not been able to help taking you as a model of everything high-minded and noble. And now you see you are perplexing me just the least little bit in the world by seeming to hang back from being altogether generous and just. You mustn’t be angry with me for speaking so plainly,” she added quickly, looking up at him with the shining light in her eyes, “ because you have always- taught me from a little child to say everything that was in my heart.” He put his hand upon her head, and caressed her sunny curls. “ Go on, my dear, go on. What is it that is per¬ plexing you ? Do not be afraid to speak.” “ It is this sort of hugging of the old family quarrel,” answered Florence, with grave directness. “ You know, in old days it was Aunt Felicia who held aloof. You did your part, but it was not responded to. It always made me sorry to think that there had been a quarrel, that there were relatives of yours you had never seen and seldom heard from ; but I understood how it had all happened, and I did not see any way out of it. But when Mr. Freer died, and you decided to open Marchwood to them all, then I did hope that the old misunderstanding and estrangement were going to be done away with altogether. And it is- because it seems as if Rudolf were to be left out that I feel sorry and perplexed. It is no fault of his that his father offended you, and it does not seem to me to- be fair to exclude him from the general amnesty.” Mr. Cadwallader moved in his seat uneasily. “You do not understand all the bearings of the case, my dear.” “ 1 understand, I think, that you have nothing against him except that he is his father’s son. Is not that so. Uncle Oliver?” “ Certainly I have nothing against the young man personally.” “ Very well, then ; in that case I cannot think it just to exclude him from the reconciliation you have made with all the others.” “You exaggerate matters, Florence. He is not excluded. He has been here, and probably may come again at some future time. He has sat at my table as my guest, and we are on perfectly friendly terms. I have offered him an allowance if he chooses- to accept it. I wish to be just and generous to him, but

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The Stronger Will. 139 I do make one reservation as regards him : I do not wish to give him the right to come and go at March- wood as he pleases, or, indeed, to have him here at all often. Anything else I will gladly do for him, but not that.^’ And yet, as matters now stand, that is about the only thing you can do for him. He does not want pecuniary assistance. He does not even at present require influence. All he does want from you is a welcome to the house that is the home of his mother and his sister : the feeling that it is a sort of home for him too when he needs one ; and this you decline to allow him.^’ “ I have my reasons, my dear,” he said, “ for acting as I do. I think it is much better, for Rudolf’s own sake, that he does not come here often.” “ For his own sake ? ” “ Yes.” Mr. Cadwallader spoke that monosyllable so very decidedly that Florence looked searchingly at him. His face was grave and set ; they were .both more serious than usual. Her eyes were very bright and clear, but the laughing light was extinguished by one more deep and earnest. “ Uncle Oliver, will you tell me why ? ” “Yes, my dear, if you wish it. Perhaps it is best that you should thoroughly understand the matter, and then you will better be able to estimate the wisdom of the course I have adopted. You are aware, of course, of the position in relation to this property which that young man occupies ? ” “ He is your heir,” answered Florence unhesitat¬ ingly. Mr. Cadwallader smiled a little. “No, Florence, you are mistaken there. Rudolf Stanhope is not my heir, and never will be ; and it is precisely on that account that I decline to have him continually hanging about the place. It would give rise to hopes and expectations that would never be realised, and might unsettle his mind from steady perseverance after honest success of his own winning.” Florence had risen ; she looked very grave, and her face wore an expression of settled purpose. “ Uncle Oliver - ” But, for once in his life, Mr. Cadwallader declined to hear her out. “No, Florence, let me hear no more of it. My decision is final. For this time I am bent upon my own way, and not even your pleading can change my purpose. I know what is best for you both, and I shall act accordingly.” And perhaps because Florence was a really strong woman, and because she was as resolute as her guardian, she knew when to give way — when to hold her peace. Instead of fighting the ground over again and again, and strengthening the opposition in the process, she gave in quietly, and left him conqueror on the field. Some day she would return to the charge, but it was plain that the time was not yet ripe. “ I am sorry to say, Violet,” she said next day, that I cannot ask your brother down. Uncle seems to think it better not. I felt I must tell you, as I had half pledged my word that he should come. You know there is just a little— what shall I call it? — awkward?iess between him and his uncle, but indeed I believe that time will heal the breach.” Violet looked up with a smile that seemed to have some subtle meaning. “ I quite understand, and thank you for your good offices. It is kind of you to wish it, but I do not suppose that Rudolf would in any case have accepter' the invitation had it been offered.” Violet turned again to her writing, and Florence left the room, seeing that she was not wanted. “ But you took very good care that it should not be offered— as though you could not do exactly what you chose in this house ! But Mr. Cadwallader makes, a very convenient stalking-horse.” Violet spoke out aloud, believing herself to be alone, but a voice from behind the window curtain caused her to start violently. “ Exactly so ; you had better let Rudolf know whom he has really to thank for this exclusion.” “ Vernon ! How you startled me ! ” “ Did I ? Well, you will get over it. Violet, I call it a crying shame. If Rudolf has the least spark of proper pride, he will never condescend to come near the place again ! ” “ I’m afraid it will end in that,” said Violet gravely “but, Vernon, do not try to stir him up against Uncle Cadwallader. It is not his doing, you may be sure : it is hers. Let him distrust her as much as he likes— the more the better— but I believe our uncle would like him if he really knew him.” “ Exactly my opinion,” said Vernon, as he walked away ; and presently he added to himself, “ So it is much safer, as far as I am concerned, for him to keep out of the way. It is no doing of mine, but if Rudolf is not to be the heir, there is no harm in my doing my best to push my own interests. Anyone who can oust Miss Tenant from the stronghold will be doing a service to the whole family ; and my uncle is cer¬ tainly a just and liberal man, and will not be able to will his property out of his family without a qualm. I have seen traces of uneasiness before now. It would not be a bad thing to enter into an alliance- offensive and defensive — with young Morrison. He wants the heiress, and I want March wood. Of course we should both like to have both, but there must always be a division of spoil. He really wants money more than land, and she has plenty, and will be less encumbered in some ways if she has no property to keep up. I think we can help one another, and together we can surely keep Rudolf out of the way.” Vernon drew his brows together. He did not exactly enjoy plotting against his brother’s interests, but the love of self had always been his prevailing passion. “ It is doing no real injury to Rudolf He w'ould only quarrel furiously with Uncle Cadwallader before a week was out. He is much better away for every reason. Yes, I will certainly write to Morrison soon, or try and see him in town. Possibly a personal interview might be best.” END OF CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH.

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140 HOW WE AMUSED OURSELVES DURING A LONG VOYAGE. THE GAME OF BULL. fT is no small trouble to decide as to the line of steamers to which you will commit yourself in a voyage to the Antipodes. You collect rates of passage. You find out friends who have knowledge of steamers. You inquire as to whether it is better to go by the Canal or round by the Cape. You hear stories of the heat of the Red Sea, when poor passengers lounge “ in their boxes, when stokers are tumbled overboard, having died from the heat, when even the ship has to turn round and go in an opposite direction to that she wishes to pursue, in order to get a breath of fresh air. You compare rates. You find you can go first-class by some steamers for less than ^40, and that by others you must pay from fifty guineas to seventy. You look at the difference in the aggregate when you require six or seven tickets. You walk down Leadenhall Street or Fenchurch Avenue in considerable perplexity, which is continued until something great or small inclines to one line or the other. Perhaps your perplexity is increased by the offers of agents to procure your tickets. One will suggest one line, another will “ be prepared to recom- board you find which your ex¬ cess luggage is tabulated at a rate that may even seem to you excessive. But before that luggage reached the steamer you had no end of anxiety in se¬ curing cases of right size to go under your berth, to pack them, to get labels for those to be put in your cabin and mend another.” They don't care which you take provided they secure the five per cent, which is paid by the company to themselves, on the issue of the ticket. These agents see in the papers that you are intend¬ ing to go abroad, and write in shoals, requesting the honour of “ securing for you good berths by any line.” Some you are obliged to reply to because they write, having some knowledge of yourself ; others you can leave unanswered, and consign their communications to the waste-paper basket. Then don^t you wish there were no such thing as luggage ? Shall you sell your furniture, or rather give it away at auction, or shall you take it? More worries as to cost of transit. When you have resolved to send your household goods by sailing vessel, and risk the amount of duty you will have to pay in a country where pro¬ tection obtains, you have still a number of packages you must take with you. The “ Orient ” considerately allows a ton to each passenger, but this is a ton measurement, and not twenty hundredweight. Now, forty feet measurement is soon filled, and when you get on that in the purser’s office is a list in CONSIGNED TO THE WASTE-PAPER BASKET.

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How WE Amused Ourselves during a Long Voyage. 141 those to be put in the hold, labelled “ Not wanted for the voyage.” What a muddle you get in at Fenchurch Station as you start for Tilbury ! In despair you leap into the compartment, and hope your luggage will find its way somehow to the ship. Alas ! if some special package that contains some articles you inevitably require in your long voyage is missing. Apart from the attacks of 7nal-cle-mer^ one has very little to endure as a first-class passenger. Those who go second or third say that they have some things to put up with which are very painful. When one thinks of the narrow space in which for six weeks ing one of such grand civic edifices as the Town Hall at Bruges or Brussels. At Gibraltar you may be overwhelmed at the sight of the gigantic rock, honey¬ combed with numerous galleries, and hiding many a gun. You can go over the frontier, and be struck with the quaintness and filthiness of the Spanish town. At Naples for further interest there is St. Elmo, the Palace, the Museum, Vesuvius, and Pompeii. Then at Port Said, at Suez, at Aden, at Colombo, at Albany, Adelaide, Melbourne, and Sydney you find constantly something new to break the monotony of the voyage. Every day also on board is helped along by the inevitable meals. You have your cup of tea and DONKEY-MEN AT SUEZ. ten or twelve hundred people are packed, it is remark¬ able that so little inconvenience is suffered and so few worries started. Passengers to the East or to Australia need not be greatly troubled with en7iui. On a voyage to the East they have the ship^s library to which they can resort. If they have not brought a supply of books with them— cheap “ yellow-backs ” or more pretentious volumes — they will find often a good supply of standard fiction on board. There is amusement to those not afflicted with 7nal-de-mer in watching the waves or seeing the sea-birds skim along in the wake of the vessel, or they can with well-adjusted glasses decipher the names of passing vessels. There is interest also in stopping at various places on the route. At Plymouth you can see the Hoe, where Drake played bowls when the announcement of the approach of the Armada was made ; or you can go and look at the remarkable modern municipal buildings, remind- biscuit at seven, your de- jeiiTter d la fourchette at nine, your lunch at one, your tea at four, your dinner at six, and, if you like, your glass of lemon-squash and biscuit at nine. The feeding affords to many the greatest amusement, and the study of the 77ie7tu is more interesting than a sensational “ yellow-back.” Much interest is found in intercourse with and study of your fellow-passengers. You very soon know much concerning them. Their antecedents, tastes, habits, aims, prospects are gradually un¬ folded, apart from any inquisitiveness on your part, for many seem to delight in speaking of themselves even to a stranger. Beyond all these ordinary matters of interest there are various definite means of amusement. Chess¬ boards and draughts are provided ; cards are played in the smoking and dining saloons ; ship-quoits can be played by means of a short thick stick being fastened in a board, and over the stick rope-quoits are thrown. Then there is “shuffle-board,” played by means of flat heavy pieces of wood pushed along the deck by large spoon-shaped poles, and sent into squares with numbers marked in chalk. Another game, and one fresh to me this voyage, is “bull.” It is somewhat like shuffle-board, only it is played by means of leaden disks, covered with canvas, and thrown on a white, slanting board. In the game your numbers are not counted to you unless you get them in regular succession from one upwards. Another popular game played now on Australian and Indian steamers is marine cricket. The captain

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142 How WE Amused Ourselves during a Long Voyage. of the Oroya was very considerate, an*d had a long strip of broad cocoanut matting laid down along the spacious deck. As the ship is nearly 500 feet long, and the saloon deck alone close on 300 feet long, there is ample room for a good game. Bats are kept on board. The boatswain or deck steward makes balls of rope. The stumps are fixed in thick boards. The sides of the ship are enclosed by netting, and the upper part of the play-space by the awning, so that the balls were not often lost. Some passengers played all day long. When the Australian cricketers came over they had cricket from morning to night. One day I had the pleasure of playing in a match of six gentlemen against seven ladies. We had to play with short sticks, and the ladies with bats. We had two innings, and then only beat the ladies by one. One lady actually bowled three gentlemen out with three successive balls ! It will be seen that they were not opponents to be trifled with. In the evening it is common to have singing and playing in the library. A piano and organ are pro¬ vided there ; but one on deck is kept in a case, both in the first saloon and in the second. Hence enter¬ tainments are easily promoted. One evening the first officer specially arranged one side of the ship’s deck, draping it with flags and festooning it with strips of bunting. Eight electric lights were fixed up at one end of the deck by the electrician. All who took part were arrayed in various costumes. It was amusing to see them come in one by one to dinner beforehand. A French abbd sat beside a Spanish brigand, a graceful Greek by the side of a Mexican mantilla-decked dame. One was dressed as Britannia, another as Scotland, and another as Ireland. Rome and Venice were represented. One was arrayed as a boatswain, another had borrowed the white garments of the chief cook, and his wife came as a French bonne. One had borrowed the uniform of an officer, another that of an ordinary seaman. Some were arrayed in the powdered and florid style of the last century. Mephistopheles also put in an appear¬ ance, and afterwards paid great attention to Young Rome. There was no masking either at dinner or afterwards. However strange the costumes, they appeared not to interfere with appetite. As we came through the Canal we had several times to tie up the steamer at one or other of the stations to allow other steamers to pass. As a good stretch of sand was just on our side, a number of the Maori football-players, who were returning to New Zealand, soon were down the gangway into a boat, leaping ashore, and three footballs speedily flying over the sands or high in air. To pass steamers in the Canal was of interest. We enjoyed watching the signalling at stations on shore, for the Canal is worked on a system similar to the “ block system ” on railways. The ships passed close to us, and no little chaff went on between various passengers. The men of a great transport, homeward bound, jocosely taunted those bound to Australia with “ Going the wrong way ! ” “ Turn round ! ” they said. “ England’s the place ! “ Home, sweet home ! ” At Suez our ship had to coal, and we leaned long over the bulwark, watching the wiry fellaheen filling the baskets and handing them up. They seemed to chant in unison, in response to the lead of one of their num¬ ber. I noticed that they did this at early morning and at midday, so I suppose they were performing their devotions while earn¬ ing their daily bread. Work and prayer combined by these rough-looking fellows ! To watch the boatmen and to hear the haggling for money was an amusement. Then the donkey -men gave us much to think about. They are a strong, violent, greedy set. They have much humour : they called their donkeys by various English names, as “ Mrs. Langtry,” “"Grand Old Man.” One asked us whether we would ride “ Scots wha’ hae wi’ Wallace bled ? ” He pronounced the Scotch capitally. It is a two-mile ride from the wharf to the town of Suez, and the donkey-drivers seize the opportunity half-way to ex¬ tort “backsheesh.” One of our fel¬ low-passengers was so beset that he slipped off his donkey and determined to walk. The man was so enraged at this that he seized hold of the traveller by his watch- chain, and not until he received a very THE CATAMARAN.

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143 vigorous repulse would he let go. Then he howled and cried like a cat at night. Undoing part of his turban, he bound up the wound. He was then docile enough, and ran beside the donkey, whimpering and moaning, a veri¬ table coward. Ladies would be in a sorry plight in the hands of such a rascal. Things are managed much better at Aden. We were struck with the contrast. There the strong hand of English orderliness controls boats, donkeys, and carriages. No sooner was our steamer at anchor than our ears were saluted with vigorous cries in unison, “ Have a dive ?” A number of little black fellows, almost naked, had come off in tiny boats, and were ready to dive for money. It was amusing to see a number of little dark heads and very white teeth in the green waters. A copper or sixpence thrown into the water would immediately cause the black woolly heads to dis¬ appear, and only the white soles of a number of feet to be seen as they swam deep down to seize the sinking bit of copper or silver. They have no fear of the sharks, but would be ready to dive under one and kill it if they had a knife. Several leaped from the loftiest rail of our great steamer into the water for a sixpence. They made us laugh by pretending to fight in the water, tumbling over one another, and ducking to miss a blow, then coming up behind the opponent. Colombo, in Ceylon, is soon reached, and here the ennui of the voyage is again broken. More revela¬ tions of Oriental life. What colour ! what crowds of natives ! what smells ! We would not, however, have missed for a great deal the sight of the gaudily tinted and grotesquely decorated temple in the native quarter. Then the ride to land and back in one of those strange craft called a ‘‘ catamaran ” was a fresh experience and amusement. However the outriggers are kept clear of ropes and boats I don’t know. Clever fellows, those Cingalese ! Here it will amuse you to have to arrange about clothes - washing with a Cingalese gentleman with his hair curled up and held back by a large tortoiseshell comb. Your soiled garments will be taken on shore and brought back clean in three hours’ time. Of course you pay extra for such alacrity. It was amusing to see one of these comb-tipped gentlemen, who had been delayed somewhat in receiving payment, go down the ladder at the ship’s side, and finding the “ cata¬ maran ” gone, leap into the water and swim after it. He left the bundle he carried to sink or swim as it liked. In the Indian Ocean further interest is found in watching flying-fish skimming over the waves, or the great albatross cruising steadily after the ship ; but amusements begin to pale over this greatest stretch of waters. On Sundays we had some break to the monotony by the parade of all hands, and the inspection by the captain. Then there were the services on deck, or in the library when too rough for outside. Soon we were more interested in looking for land than in anything else. Yes, there at last is the bluff cape, the first headland of this continent under the southern cross. We are thankful to see it, and yet what a voyage we have had ! It has been full of variety and joy. It has indeed been a simple pleasure-trip. Upon landing at Adelaide we had a renewal of passenger pains, in the shape of customs inspection. We have come to a “ protective ” colony. The duties on imports are high ; hence customs officers are rather strict. I was, however, treated most cour¬ teously, and the charges made as light as consistent with the rate of duties. Fred Hastings.

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144 AN ANATOMY OF HANDWRITING. BY AN EXPERT. IN TWO PARTS —PART I. T is, perhaps, by reason of the almost universal prevalence of the art of Handwriting — one of the most simple and useful modes of human expres¬ sion ever devised — that so little regard is paid to the importance of the sub¬ ject of its physiology. Yet few sub¬ jects whose scope of inquiry includes the consideration of some of those subtler pheno¬ mena of individual life and character which are supposed to be indicative of conditions of moral and physical well-being or otherwise, have so per¬ sonal and, at the same time, so general an in¬ terest. Even apart from its physiological signifi¬ cance, the subject of Handwriting has essentially an obvious value that will well repay investigation. For instance, the process of its gradual development from the rude and primitive signs and symbols which sufficed for the wants of the early races of man¬ kind to the highly finished, characteristic caligraphy of the present day, necessarily suggests a theme of uncommon historical importance. But it is proposed in these papers to regard the subject chiefly from the point of view of the specialist, or expert, as he is popularly termed, in the science of chirography, and to submit some observations — with illustrative data — on the results obtained from a considerable experience in the anatomy of specimens of handwriting of almost every conceivable kind. It may at once be admitted that in any system of anatomising the physiological features of handwriting, tit M«s. OLiPHANT. {Reduced to | scale.) J ^ — U 7 Qm 2 o ■ ^ GRORGE ELIOT. attempted with the view, for instance, of determining from written data the identity of the writer, and, if possible, of ascertaining what are his or her prevailing moral or physical qualities, many obvious difficulties confront the expert. Of course, his initial inquiry as to the sex of the writer, so far as that can be identi¬ fied by means of handwriting, may be readily enough disposed of. For it is, generally speaking, as easy to tell — it certainly needs no specialist’s diagnosis to detect — the ordinary handwriting of a male from that of a female, as to distinguish between any of the out¬ standing physical features that differentiate the sexes. Even when the attempt is made by a female hand to disguise its customary style of penmanship, it is usu¬ ally as apparent as when a woman, dressed in male attire, tries to pass muster as a man. Her trick is too palpable by far to be successful. In the matter of gait, gesture, bearing, and such-like outward evidences of sex that denote the male from the female, her de¬ ficiencies are conspicuously apparent ; or, when these are assumed, the copy is much overdone. The “ swashing and the martial outside ” which the be¬ nighted Rosalind and Celia heroically endeavoured to don with their male garments of disguise becomes, as a rule, too great an assumption for the female trickster when trying for the nonce to enlist in the rank and file of the rougher sex ; and so her fraud becomes only too easily exposed. So in the matter of female handwriting, marked as it commonly is with that uniform angularity or sharp-edgedness which is its predominant characteristic — any attempt to imitate

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An Anatomy of Handwriting. 145 /^Cyt/tyU^ ■^C jdtyftV ytey/*f _y^yyy^y HANDWRITING OF A MAN ACCUSTOMED TO THE USE OF PICK AND SHOVEL. (| SCale.) those sinewy chirographic strokes and flourishes, those energetic and muscular flights and somersaults of the male penman are certain to end in total failure, just because it is against nature, or to show, at best, such clumsy results that he who runs may read. Still, there are many females whose handwriting it is almost impossible to define as betraying, in that feature common to it just referred to, the sex of the writers, and which, when placed side by side promiscuously with that by the other sex, appears to be as masculine in its general form and sweep as the boldest and strongest male caligraphy ever penned. The hand¬ writing, for instance, of the late “ George Eliot ” may be quoted as a case in point, and is highly indicative of— in addition to other uncommon characteristics— the mental robustness of that remarkable lady. In the same category may be placed the striking penmanship of Mrs. Oliphant, that most versatile and indefatigable, of writers. No woman of the present day plies a busier pen than she, and to more excellent purpose. In her time she must have covered an immense quantity of manuscript with her pen, though probably the type- writer may, latterly, have rendered her invaluable assistance in the process of preparing her articles and books for the press. The specimen of Mrs. Oliphant’s caligraphy which is produced here is invaluable, therefore, in so far as it shows how the mental characteristics of the writer may yet be well pronounced in spite of the abnormal wear and tear to which the handwriting has for long been subjected. J Like that of “ George Eliot,” the penmanship of Mrs. Oliphant is essentially masculine in its predominant features. Not so bold and rounded, perhaps, as that of the author of “ Adam Bede,” it is more deft and nervous ; but unless it be in its general appearance of neatness — a feature that at once arrests attention, and which is of course eminently suggestive of a highly refined organisation — there is not in any speci¬ mens we have seen of the caligraphy of the author of the “ Makers of Venice” any indication of the sex of which she is so distinguished an ornament. Many other more or less notable examples of strong masculine - featured female penmanship might be quoted, as demonstrating how very difficult it some¬ times is to identify the sex by means of such evidence per se, or to show how, even when the caligraphy seems decidedly symptomatic of those robust mental and physical traits appertaining to the sterner sex, the writer of it may, nevertheless, be one of the gentlest and tenderest of women. Civ ^ tf- eiXctu^ Cc<oc<u /t (Xe RICHARD JEFFERIE.S. (f scale.) PROFESSOR MASSON. (§ scale.) Another and comparatively new element affecting the long-prevalent characteristics of female hand¬ writing has, however, to be considered in defining the distinctions existing in the handwriting of the sexes, and constituting so far the difference between them. Many young ladies are now being trained to write according to certain departmental standards of pen¬ manship. To reach the desired maximum of cali- graphic efficiency in order to secure appointments — in the service of the Post Office, for instance— the ac¬ quisition of a rounded clerkly hand is the one thing needful. The old angularities, “ the sharps and darts and pointed arrow-heads,” which the fair Juliets used, time out of mind, to employ when writing their love-epistles, are thus surely, if slowly, giving way to a style of penmanship which, perhaps, may have enough of business “ go ” and work-a-day dash about it, but which, it is to be feared, has little of that keen passionateness to re¬ commend it in the eyes of their romantic and, haply, disconsolate Romeos ! But, apart from the question of the hand¬ writing of the sexes, the expert will, if he should find it necessar)^ to do so, generally classify all kinds of handwriting under some such technical division as — broadly — that of the educated and of the uneducated 730

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An Anatomy of Handwriting. 146 styles. For under one or other of these two main divisions all sorts and conditions of writers will na¬ turally fall, although it is often difficult enough to say to which of the two certain specimens should pro¬ perly belong. Usually, however, unless there is disguise attempted, it is as easy to distinguish between the literate and the illiterate styles of penmanship, as between an intelligent cast of countenance and a face that looks foolish and simple. Thus, take the handwriting, such • as it is, of a man accustomed to the use of the pick and shovel, or that of a woman who earns her liveli¬ hood by plying the needle or sewing-machine ; these persons and others of such-like manual employments cannot be supposed — they probably were never trained — to use the pen with the same fluency and skill as a clerk or governess, to whom the pen is a con¬ stantly familiar instrument. As a matter of fact, they cannot do so, though there will be some excep¬ tions to this rule. For many persons, otherwise illiterate, have a natural knack of using a fluent and clerkly style of penmanship ; while, on the other hand, there are many individuals who, having had all the advantages of education, adopt such a style that one would almost suppose a wretched, slovenly, un¬ decipherable “ hand ” was, in their view, the very token of their superiority. Such slovenliness may, perhaps, be accounted for by the haste of the pen¬ man, or because of his having become a slave to his pen : hence, many persons— authors, journalists, clergymen, physicians, and others — show but indif¬ ferent specimens of caligraphy. Or perhaps it may be caused by sheer nervousness and physical inaptitude to write in that clear, bold, legible hand which gener- 'S Ip » Ipr U-QjLawol. Crv^ T VAv^ MR. R. L. STEVENSON. (| SCo/a.) ally betokens strength of nerve, openness and brave¬ ness of character. But even in such exceptions to this prevalent rule, there is little difficulty in noting the characteristics which distinguish the caligraphy of the educated from that of illiterate persons. Keeping in view, therefore, these two main divisions of the kinds or styles of penmanship, the question now suggests itself : How far, if at all, may the various classes of people be differentiated from each other by means of their caligraphy? It would be absurd to lay down any hard and fast principle bearing on this aspect of the subject. For there is really no class- caligraphy : /.e.j a person’s handwriting does not, cannot possibly, indicate the particular class to which he and others belong. A classification of this kind is sometimes attempted by those professing to read character from the handwriting ; but, at best, it can only be a very haphazard, conjectural science that declares it can distinguish between, say, a mili¬ tary man and a clergyman merely by a few strokes of the pen. At the same time, there are certain well-defined traits in the handwriting of some men and women in¬ dicative in a general way of the profession or class to which they belong. Thus, it is easy to account for the general disregard of caligraphic distinctness that the handwriting of physicians frequently presents. With medical men generally, a hurried anxiety may be said to be the pre-disposing cause of their indistinct penmanship. And yet, having to write prescriptions for patients — where thought and deliberation are most requisite — ought in a measure to check hurried pen¬ manship, and, as some people might think, be a strong reason why that should be unusually clear and legible. We have, however, seen not a few specimens of the caligraphy of well-known busy medical men, which go far to modify this theory. So, too, is it with the handwriting of clergymen. Never judge a man by the cut of his coat or by the fashion in which he wears his necktie. It would be as absurd to judge of a clergy¬ man by his penmanship. To do so, as a class, would be to subject them to a severe black-balling. For, probably, no class of men have a greater con¬ tempt for the rules — such as they are — teaching how to acquire a fairly legible style of chirography. An in¬ teresting chapter might be written on this branch of the subject to prove our assertion ; but perhaps it might best be explained by the following, among other reasons : — 1st. Clergymen have not the same especial need, in writing the MS. of their sermons, &c., to write any more distinctly than is necessary for their own convenience — hence their pens “ go as they please.” 2nd. A more frequent use of the .'KM c

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Under Suspicion: a pen than that required, as a rule, by other profes¬ sional men, inclines them to negligence of style. 3rd. Writing— let it be in fairness assumed- under the influence of strong mental excitement and emo¬ tion, style of penmanship is necessarily the last con¬ sideration with them. To most clergymen who desire to excuse their cali- graphy, the foregoing considerations might aptly apply ; but there may, nevertheless, be other reasons urged, such as physical inaptitude to write in a characteristic hand, or sheer indifference with respect thereto, and so on (for a score of reasons might be given). The handwriting of authors and literary persons is often subjected to adverse criticism because of its slovenly style and general indistinctness. Much writing, of course, corrupts the style ; and the constant writing of books and articles subjects the caligraphy of authors and journalists to those ‘‘ wear and tear” traits which are its common features. With the majority of such persons the penmanship is jsually the last element in their work requiring consideration. Hhic tllcB lacrimcB of the poor compositor, who — after the editor, of course— is the greatest sufferer from the hasty penmanship of autocratic authors. But, as every rule has its exceptions, so in the present instance also there are many even eminent authors of the present day whose caligraphy is excellently clear and distinct, and a pleasure to read. Mr. William Black, for in stance, writes a notably neat hand : a fact all the more surprising when one considers not only the large amount of MS. his published works have covered, but also the rough-and-ready experience acquired previ¬ ously as a busy journalist. The late Richard Jefferies wrote in a characteristically careful style \ the specimen of his handwriting here shown exhibits some of that attention to the minutiae of detail by which his literary Market-Day Story. 147 workmanship was so well known. A conspicuously fine literary hand is that of Professor David Masson, which affords real pleasure to peruse. The preparation of his voluminous Life of Milton,” completed before the type-writer was available, in addition to much official chirographic work for his students, has pro¬ bably helped to bring about that occasional desire to “ compound ” his letters — a symptom of haste and anxiety — noticeable in some of his MSS. But, when a young man, the author of Drummond of Haw- thornden,” &c., must have been the possessor of an uncommonly bold, open, and massive style of cali¬ graphy, as rare as it is pleasing. Many thousands of readers are more or less familiar with the exquisite literary workmanship of Robert Louis Stevenson. Few have, however, had an oppor¬ tunity of seeing his penmanship, of which a specimen is here produced. To be the caligraphy of a com¬ paratively young man, although his extensive literary experience might hardly warrant his being so described, it would seem already to indicate considerable wear and tear, bespeaking bad times in store for the “ comps.” As a matter of fact, it is by no means a robust hand, physically speaking— the abnormal slope or slant of the lines being a common indication of lack of fistiness,” so to speak, which, in other words, simply denotes a limited amount of muscular grip or verve in the owner. In not a few examples we have seen of this “ backward slope ” style of penmanship, inquiry has brought out the fact that the writers were invariably persons of weak physique. In some cases it may be due to a habit formed in youth, in others to a structural defect of the wrist, which does not permit the pen to move in the ordinary way ; but in the majority of instances the foregoing explanation will be found the correct one. UNDER SUSPICION : A MARKET-DAY STORY. N the towns of the Midland Coun- ties, to which my experience had been mainly confined, an unwonted number of carts and gigs driving in between eleven and one, and out between five and seven ; an unusual number of farmers and farmers' wives and daughters in the streets, and increased activity in the tradesmen’s shops, with, perhaps, an occasional sample bag produced at some corner, where two or three men are critically examining a handful of corn which one of them holds, vv'hile each in turn takes a few grains, that, after careful scrutiny, he proceeds to munch : these are to the casual observer the only outward signs that it is market-day. In the North of England it is far otherwise. There the market-square is still in reality what it is in name. Once a week, and sometimes even twice a week, the open space is filled with stalls, on which articles of all descriptions are exposed for sale. Vegetables, fish, meat, butter, bacon, cheese, farm produce of all sorts, clothes, drapers’ stuffs, lace, gloves, feathers, buttons, china on the stall and on the ground, frag' ments of brass and iron fittings, sweets, cheap jewel¬ lery, and many things besides are there in great profusion ; and the proprietors lose no opportunity of convincing the passers-by of the excellence of the commodities of which they are anxious to dispose. Nor is this all. Often in the midst of the stalls them¬ selves, more often on some vacant spot close by, energetic salesmen, and sometimes saleswomen, carry on a brisk sale by auction, or by the inverse process peculiar to those representatives of commerce who are commonly known as Cheap Jacks. “ Now understand me,” says one, who would have

Page 158

Under Suspicion : a Market-Day Story. 148 no man be without a reliable index of the time, ‘‘ what I’m a-going to offer you is a good article ; I have got some cheaper ones inside — and even they are sound watches — but they won’t do for you, I know what you want. You want the best there is to be got, and you shall have it. I’ll guarantee this to keep time ; there’s no better, not if you give twenty pounds for it. And what am I going to ask you for this watch ? Twenty pounds ? No, not twenty shillings ! Fifteen shillings buys this watch ! You can’t afford it ? Very well, then. Twelve-and-six ! Ten shillings ! You don’t want it? Now, look here ! I’m going to sell this watch, if I lose a sovereign by it ; and you won’t get another chance like it for many a day. Ten shillings ! nine ! eight ! seven ! six ! five ! I’ll take five shillings for this watch ! — Only this one, mind you ! I’ll sell this one for five shillings, and then you won’t get another like it if you offer me five pounds. Five shillings ! Who’ll have it ? Thank you. Pass it over. You’ve got a bargain if ever a man had.” And a mild youth wends his way through the crowd with a pleased smile upon his face. In another corner a very energetic lady is doing a brisk business with handkerchiefs, pieces of lace, and lengths of stuff for dresses. Attracted, I suppose, by the, to me, novelty of the proceedings, I loitered one Saturday in February for fully an hour in the market-place of Chesterport. I had been staying for three days in the town on business ; being, in fact, in the employ of a firm of engineers who were the patentees of an ingenious invention for the transmission of messages over short distances — an invention that bids fair to entirely supersede the arrangement of tubes by which com¬ munication is at present established between different offices of the same firm. I had done all the business I hoped to do in the town, and had only to wait till the Monday morning before starting on a journey still further north ; and, beyond packing up some apparatus which I had arranged for display in a show-room at the hotel, I had absolutely nothing to do. I was, therefore, easily tempted to loiter again at a sale of furniture, such as I have since found are very often held in the open air in or near the market-square, which was going on within two minutes’ walk of the industrious dealer in watches. It was an odd collection of almost worthless frag¬ ments that the man was selling, and they were scat¬ tered about in incongruous confusion on the stone- paved ground. The auctioneer was a merry little man, whose manner of selling, rather than what he had to sell, had attracted a large and miscellaneous crowd, on the outskirts of which I took up my position. Presently, as a man and woman who had been standing just in front of me made their way out qf the throng, each of them loaded with a variety of kitchen apparatus which they had just bought in one lot, my eyes fell on an old and dilapidated piece of furniture which had evidently been constructed by unskilful hands by piecing an old desk and a small table together. The two were in all respects unlike : the one was made of oak, the other of mahogany, and they were fastened together with nails which had split the wood, and which were used as no carpenter would have used them. A panel at the end of the desk arrested my attention. The whole piece of furniture was, as I have said, in a shattered condition, and had not only been carelessly patched up, but had also been allowed to become extremely dirty. From this particular panel, however, some of the dirt had been removed, probably by someone in the crowd curious to see what the accumulated dust concealed ; and it was easy to distinguish within a roughly carved bor¬ der a heart carved equally roughly, yet by no means ineffectively. A blow at some time or another had broken the panel in two, and right across the heart there was a gap in the wood. 1 went up and proceeded to a closer examina¬ tion of the desk. As I did so, a young girl, who was standing with one hand resting upon it, looked up at me for a moment, and again directed her attention to the ruins of a sewing-machine of a very ancient pattern which the auctioneer’s assist¬ ant was holding up in order that it might be the better seen by the people ; and when his chief, enlarging on the piteous fact that so useful an article was going for two shillings, elicited a response to the effect that it was “ Plenty, too, if the brute won’t stitch ! ” the girl, who had looked at the machine on its first appearance with the rapid, searching glance of an expert, laughed merrily. But the laughter sud¬ denly gave place to a second and more anxious look at me when she found that 1 was still intent upon the broken desk, and was trying without success to open the lid. A few more articles were disposed of, and then the auctioneer called attention to the shattered piece of furniture I was examining ; and it, too, was lifted shoulder-high for inspection by the assistant, one of the table-legs giving way under the strain. As he took it up I could not help noticing the expression of the girl’s face, and her evident relief when it was re¬ placed. The bidding commenced at half-a-crown from a man on the other side of the crowd, and in a little time it rose to three-and-nine. “ Four shillings,” I heard the girl say very faintly. There was a pause in the bidding, and the auctioneer had already got to “ Four shillings, once ; four shillings, twice,” when “ four-and-three” came again from the other side. There was just the faintest suggestion of a suppressed cry from the girl beside me, and when I turned to look at her, she was emptying her purse and counting its contents. I looked round at the auctioneer, feel¬ ing quite an interest in the sale of the broken-down box. “ Four-and-six,” said the auctioneer, “thank you ! ” and I imagined my neighbour had had the good fortune to discover that her resources would stand another rise. “ Four-and-six ! Going at four- and-six, if no advance ! Once, twice, at four-and-six ! Gone ! ” and down came the broken handle of a small brush, which had been pressed into service as a hammer. “Gentleman over there,” said the auctioneer,

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Under Suspicion : a Market-Day Story. in answer to his assistant’s look of inquiry. I looked round to see who had been anxious to possess this useless wreck, and also to see if the girl was disap¬ pointed. There was no doubt she was : not only disappointed, but distressed. By this time the as¬ sistant had made his way towards us, and was asking me for the money. I looked at him, astonished. 149 of my way out of the crowd. But what was 1 to do with my new acquisition ? The custom evidently was to pick up what you had bought and carry it away ; but I was scarcely disposed to do that. There was clearly no intention of sending it, and I had given no address. But what did it matter? I really didn’t want it ; I would just leave it where it was and go “Your bid, sir,” he said, “ four-and-six ! ” I had certainly no intention of bidding, though I remem¬ bered looking towards the auctioneer in a way that might be mistaken for a nod ; and I was in no way desirous of possessing the article. However, I was still less desirous of arguing the question in public ; so, with something of annoyance, but more of amuse¬ ment, I handed over the required sum. I had, however, had quite enough of the furniture sale, especially now that, having become a purchaser, I knew I should receive unwelcome attention from the auctioneer. I determined, therefore, to make the best away. But that was by no means so easy. First one importunate youth, and then another, persisted in offers to carry it home. As I declined their help, they only persevered the more, and the people watched the issue. It was, in fact, quite an unusual occurrence for anyone to buy anything at these sales who did not, as a matter of course, hoist it on his shoulders and take it away. At last, annoyed at the whole affair, I told one of the lads to bring it along and follow me. I started off briskly in the direction of my hotel, without paying much attention to my property or the lad who carried it, and glad to be away from the

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150 Under Suspicion : a Market- Day Story. scene in which, quite unintentionally, I had become rather prominent. I should not have been sorry if he had lost sight of me altogether, for I could not help picturing the amusement of the practical and jocular landlady if she saw me arrive with the dust- or rather dirt-covered and shattered desk. But when I stopped at the hotel-porch and looked round, my porter almost simultaneously deposited the wreck on the pavement, and proceeded to wipe his brow and neck. A happy thought seized me at the moment, and motioning him to follow, I led the way down the hotel-yard and up the steps to my show-room, of which I had the key. There was a moment’s delay in opening the door, and as I showed the lad where to put it, I saw at the entrance to the hotel-yard the girl who had made a bid for the desk. 1 paid the lad for his trouble and went into the room, amused at my queer possession, and wondering why this girl took such an evident interest in it. I looked out of the window, and she was still there ; as 1 did so she saw me, and came a few steps down the yard. I opened the door and went down the steps. Timidly she came towards me, and, after a moment’s hesitation, asked if she could speak to me. “ Certainly,” I said ; “ what is it ? ” “ You bought a desk, sir, at that sale up there ? ” “Yes.” The girl looked round, as if she was afraid of some¬ thing. “ Can I speak to you alone ? ” “ Oh, yes, if you like. Come in here.” I led the way into the show-room. “ Well, what is it ? ” She looked at me with a strangely earnest expres¬ sion in her face, and tears, beyond her control, rose in her eyes. It belonged to some of her friends, I thought, and they were obliged to sell it ; it was seized, perhaps, for rent, and the girl is anxious to get it back. “ Was it yours ? ” 1 asked. “ Do you want to have it again ? ” “No ; it wasn’t ours.” “ Then, what is it ? Are you anxious to possess it?” “ Yes ; at least — no. I don’t want the desk — but - ” She hesitated, and seemed unable to proceed ; and again the tears began to rise. Surely this dirty, broken rubbish was not worth all this emotion ; and yet the girl was certainly moved : so much so that I began to fear she would lose her self-control and cry right out. The prospect was hardly agreeable. “Come,” I said, “ sit down a little while, and say what you have to say presently.” She thanked me and sat down. There was not much furniture in the room ; the nearest available seat was an arm-chair, in front of a small table, at one end of it. At the other end vvas a second table on which my papers and one or two books were scattered. By way of filling up a few awkward minutes, I sat down to write a letter. When it was finished I looked round, and saw my companion still seemingly busy with her own thoughts. On the table at which she was sitting was one terminus of the temporary apparatus I had fitted up to exemplify the new patent of which I was in charge. I was in front of the other. There is no need to go into the details of the machine. Suffice it to say that at each end there is a tablet which can be placed on a desk or table, and a style attached. To pick up this style is to communicate with the other end by means of an electric gong, while what is written on the tablet is reproduced in fac-simile at the other end on a sheet of paper that is at once detached. I was just settling down to my second letter, and deciding in my own mind that this interview must be brought to an end, when the gong in front of me sounded, and in due course, a moment after, the cus¬ tomary slip of paper fell on to the table. “ I must do it. Oh ! I must,” was the message written. 1 turned round and looked at the girl, but she had not moved, and she took no notice. “ What must you do?” I asked. Suddenly she jumped up. “ How do you know?” she said. Unconsciously she had picked up the style that lay before her, and mechanically had traced upon the tablet the words that indicated the result of her deep thought. “ Come, tell me all about it,” I said. “ You have some trouble or other. I will help you, if I can.” “Thank you, sir,” she answered very earnestly. “ Sjt down here, and tell me quietly.” “ It’s my brother Joe, sir, and mother, and — and Frank Sennett,” and her eyes flashed as she spoke the name. “ Yes ; go on.” “ Frank and Joe worked at Mr. Ellis’s.” I knew the name well ; indeed, I had once, on a previous visit, met Mr. Ellis. He was the owner of large pottery w'orks in the town, and had achieved an enviable reputation for the artistic excellence of the work he turned out. “Frank Sennett was a clerk, and Joe worked in the shop. Frank was fond of me — or said he was — and I thought I liked him. A fortnight ago Mr. Ellis sent Frank up to London on business. He used to lodge in the same street we live in, and the works are three miles away. When he was sent to London, it was something important and quite sudden, and when Frank was told about it he had to go by the next train, and didn’t go back to his lodgings at all. Two days before, I went with an errand from mother to Mrs. King’s, where Frank lived. There was no one at home, only Frank; and he was in the front room, where he and Mrs. King used to sit. I told him my message, and was going to start back ; but he wouldn’t let me go. He kept me talking, and then he told me he — liked me, and all that. That desk was standing then in the room. Mrs. King’s sister, that lived up at Faircross, died a few weeks before, and they sent down the desk with some more things to her house. He was joking, was Frank, and said some day he should be a rich man. ‘ Do you see th^t desk, Mary ? ’ he

Page 161

Under Suspicion : a Market-Day Story. •said’; ‘there is something in there worth a year’s wages.’ I tried to open it, but the lid seemed to catch. He gave it a knock with his stick, and it came open. There was nothing inside but dust. Frank laughed. ‘You can’t see it, can you ?’ he said ; ‘but it’s there.’ ” “ I see, and that’s why you take so much interest in it : for Frank’s sake, eh?” “No, not for Frank’s sake.” The words came slowly, and she looked thoughtfully at the subject under discussion. “ But how came it down at the sale ? ” “ xMrs. King went through the things that came from her sister’s, and kept what she wanted, and sent the rest to the sale.” “ 1 see. Well, come, you take back the desk and give it to Frank.” “ You don’t understand, sir. Let me tell you the rest. The day after Frank went to London, Mr. Ellis, he sent for Joe, after he’d come home from work ; and when he came back he told mother he was dis¬ charged.” “What for?” “ Not long before, Mr. Ellis had bought from a Ger¬ man a new glaze for the pottery : at least, not a new glaze, but the way how to make it. He’d locked up the paper in a drawer in the office, just as the German gave it him. On the day Mr. Ellis sent for our Joe, he’d seen some new work turned out by Sim — Sim’s got that new place in Northend, and he’s jealous of Ellis — and when Mr. Ellis saw it, he felt sure it was done with the same glaze he’d bought of the German. He went to his drawer, and the paper was gone.” “ He thought your brother had stolen it?” “ Yes, he said so ; and it’s very near broke mother’s heart. It looked very bad against Joe. He was in the next room when Mr. Ellis and the German was talking ; and there was no one else near — that they knew of ; and Joe had been seen down at Sim’s, and there was one or two more things besides. But it wasn’t Joe, sir ; it was Frank Sennett as did it, and the .paper’s in there, in that desk.” “ What makes you think that ? ” “ From things Frank said to me, sir. Besides, I’ve found out two things : the paper was in a queer sort of writing, done by the German, and when the police made inquiry, Sim said he had got a new glaze, and had took out a patent, but it was nothing to do with a German ; it was an Englishman brought it, and wrote it all out.” “ Who told you that ? ” “ Mr. Ellis himself. Sim had told him so much, but wouldn’t tell him any more. You see, sir, when mother sat crying hours together, I went up to see Mr. Ellis ; and he was very kind, and said he’d help us both if he could ; but it was no use talking of Joe.” There was a pause for a moment, and then the girl went on in a whisper — “It looked so bad, sir, for Joe; he’d got into trouble before, once, and took something out of the 15I office, and that time Mr. Ellis forgave him. But Joe didn’t do this, sir. I’m sure; he’s a good boy now.” And the poor girl’s eyes were dim, and it was very hard to speak. By this time I had gone to the desk, and, after some difficulty, had forced the lid open. There’s nothing here,” I said : “ nothing but dust and dirt.” “ There was nothing in there, before.” I proceeded to examine the back — every part where there might be some secret drawer or corner— but I could find none. I turned it up and shook it, but with no result. “ Let me help you, sir.” Together we set it up again on its broken and un¬ even legs. “ There’s nothing here,” I said ; as spoke, I pushed down the lid, and it fell with a bang. “ What’s that, sir ? ” said the girl. There was a dis¬ tinct sound of a sheet of paper slipping down. We carried it close up to the window to get more light, and searched again : inside first, then underneath, back and front. “ Look, sir,” said the girl. She was kneeling down by the window, and examining the end ; and there, through the crack in the broken panel, was a piece of white paper. I opened the lid again, and saw that this broken end had been held together by a piece of wood roughly nailed inside. With the aid of a screw- driver, which I had always at hand to fix my machtnes, this was soon removed, and a sheet of paper fell out. The girl was right. There, written in English, but in the peculiar pointed style that betrays a German, was a list of ingredients and method of preparation of a new glaze. There is no need to dwell on the sequel. I made it my business to find out Mr. Ellis the same evening. On the following Monday a detective, started on the right track, found more links in the chain ; and when, a few days later, Mr. Frank Sennett was charged with his offence, and surprised by a circumstantial account of his proceedings, he was betrayed into a full con¬ fession. Joe, of course, was at once reinstated, and ample compensation made for the temporary injustice done to him. His sister had, I fancy, a fierce little fight before she could forget the man who had done such wrong to her and hers. “ Frank was fond of me,” she said that evening, “ and I thought I liked him.” But I think the struggle is over now. I have just finished reading a letter she has sent me, thanking me for the desk, which I sent to a local carpenter to be put as far as possible in order, and then forwarded to her as a present. There is much of generous thanks in it from her, from her mother, and her brother ; and this is how it ends : — “ The desk looks quite nice now, and seems so strong ; and the end where the carved panel with the heart was broken right in two, is so neatly mended, you can’t see where it was.”

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^5^

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153 FESTIVE FARE. BY THE AUTHOR OF “HOLIDAY FARE, INDOORS AND OUT.” HERE ! that will do, I think. Run to mother, Frances, and ask her if she approves of our inenu ; tell her that we are quite ready to commence operations.” The speaker was Myra Ham¬ mond, whose acquaintance the readers of this Magazine made in the summer ; she, together with her sister Frances, and her old schoolfellow, Beatrice French, was about to prepare for the entertain¬ ment of some friends on the follow¬ ing evening. First in order to arrive would be a dozen or so young friends of the boys and their own, in time for afternoon tea ; and at eight o’clock the parents of these young guests, with a few other friends, were invited to an entertain¬ ment to be given by the juniors ; during the interval of which, as well as on the arrival and departure of the audience, refreshments would be handed round, all to be of such a kind as to enable the guests to partake of them without leaving their seats. The idea of the “two parties in one” was Myra’s, and, after a very short discussion, it was voted a good arrangement, as was also the plan of setting out the edibles on a large table at one end of the room ; the space being insufficient to permit of a comfortable “ sit-down ” supper. “The creams, of course, we shall bring in at the last minute,” said Myra ; “ they are nothing if not cold ; I /lave tasted them after a few hours in a hot room, and they have been most sickly ; we’ll avoid t/iat error. We will get on with the savouries now, and make the sweets to-night.” The girls were soon at work. Myra proceeded to fillet a pair of large soles, the bones being at once broken up, and put in a stewpan with a pint of cold water, on a cool part of the range, to cook slowly, the stock being required for another dish. The fillets were then divided each into three, and coated with beaten egg and flour, the latter being more suitable than bread-crumbs for cold fillets, and these were of a novel kind. Care was taken to cover the cut edges well ; they were then fried a golden-brown, and *set aside, ready for garnishing the next day. Frances had minced- a lobster finely (from one of the best brands of tinned goods), and this, after being mixed with a table-spoonful each of lemon-juice, chopped capers, and minced parsley, was turned into a basin ; the stock from the bones of the soles being run through a clean linen cloth, and mixed thoroughly with it. When somewhat cool, it was seasoned with salt and pepper, then spread on a large, flat dish, and transferred to the cellar. “ You have forgotten the flour ! ” exclaimed Bea¬ trice. “ No,” said Myra ; “you are thinking of the kind of lobster cutlets which are to be served hot ; they are mixed with white sauce, made of flour, butter, and milk, and shaped and fried after cooling ; these will be cut into rounds and ovals to-morrow, and garnished as you will see ; they could be served as they are, only then we must have clarified the fish stock. I forgot to tell you that it was reduced to half a pint, and *• that I added a quarter of an ounce of gelatine to it.” To Beatrice, the initial process of what Myra termed the bo7i7ie~bouche of the evening, viz., some Ga77ie Sa7idwiches, had been entrusted ; and she was vigor¬ ously pounding the meat in a mortar, after first passing it through a mincing machine, and anxiously inquiring if it would do. Her fellow- workers laughed,, telling her that she had only just begun ; and, as she had forgotten the butter, the labour had been in¬ creased. “ I’ll go on pounding,” said Myra, “ while you jot it down, as you said you would like this recipe. Here it is.” And she read as follows : — “ ‘ Mince twelve ounces of the best part of a roasted hare (the back and legs should be used), then pound it with half its weight of butter, a table-spoonful of Wor¬ cester sauce, a good pinch each of powdered cloves and nutmeg, a little salt, a teaspoonful of sweet herbs in fine powder, and a little gravy.’ And it was for¬ tunate,” she continued, “that we had a hare for dinner, and were able to save the meat, or we could not have indulged in this.” “ What is the brown loaf for ? ” asked Beatrice. “ For these sandwiches,” was the reply ; “ and those tiny rolls which want ‘ rasping ’ — we have no rasp, so must use the large bread-grater— are for another lot of sandwiches called iTidiaii : they must be cut through, and some of the crumb taken out, so that they will hold a dessert-spoonful or so of the iiimcej and it is time I made it”— picking up, as she spoke, a thick, juicy beef-steak, which she minced and put on to stew in a little stock, stirring it frequently to prevent burning. In an hour’s time it was removed from the fire, after being seasoned with salt and pepper, and a little mulligatawny paste. Some tiny china moulds like miniature flower-pots were then produced by Myra, who explained that they were for ChickeTi Dariolesj the chicken had been boiled, and the best part cut up into dice, together with a little tongue. “Nothing else?” inquired Beatrice, who was told that the bones were stewing, and that, when the stock had reduced itself to a tea-cupful or so, she could mix it with the meat. “ Well, we can spare a little cream,” said Myra ; “ it makes such a difference. But don’t add it until the stock cools, because there is lemon-juice in it ; then you can fill the moulds, and set them in the cellar. To¬ morrow we will decorate the tops with chopped beet¬ root, and a couple of eggs boiled hard— we will leave

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154 Festive Fare. that until the last. It is a pretty dish, and very cheap ; only the breast and wings are required to make a good number, and the other parts of the chicken will come in for patties or little rolls ; but you must have the whitest meat for these darioles. Perhaps I’ll make some Rissolettes^^ she went on ; “ they are newer, and look nice.” “ How are they made ? ” asked the girls. “ You want some puff pastry,” answered Myra, “ and you rntist roll it evenly ; you place the mince on in little heaps, leaving a space between ; then cover with another sheet of pastry, and cut round the part where you have put the mince ; brush them over with beaten egg, and bake them ; then cut some rings out of the trimmings ; these should be about as large as a shilling — the rzssoleites must be larger, of course ; bake the rings separately, and lay them on the risso- lettes, and fill them with whatever is suitable. In this you must be guided by the kind of mince ; a little mayonnaise does nicely if it is of fish or chicken ; or you can put on thick sauce of any kind, or chopped aspic jelly. Sweet ones may be made with jam in them ; but mind it is a ; the rings of those you can fill with whipped cream, or a spoonful of custard ; damson cheese is effective, so is apple jelly, or any other kind you happen to have. Now we will set about the Creams I told you of ; one is Tea^ the other Coffee and VanillaR For the first, the tea had been specially purchased, viz., two ounces of orange-flavoured Pekoe ; this was put into an earthen pot with a couple of pints of boil¬ ing milk, then removed from the fire, and left until cool, when another half-pint of milk— in which six ounces of loaf sugar and two ounces of gelatine had been dissolved— was put in ; also a half-pint of cream, well whisked to increase its bulk. “ This will fill two moulds,” said Myra, but we will not pour it in till it begins to set ; it will turn out all the better ; it will be a change from Fruit Creams^ and will no doubt be eaten. Now for the coffee cream ! Will you make it.^ Just the same quantity ; here is the coffee ; six ounces of freshly roasted berries, very coarsely ground, as you see, and the same weight of sugar ; after it has infused for ten minutes, not more, carefully strain the milk through muslin before you mix it with the cream and gelatine ; the vanilla, you know, goes in last.” “ How much ?” asked Beatrice. “ Well, as this is very good essence, about a dessert¬ spoonful ; of some kinds you would want double that amount.” Frances then appeared with two dishes of Stewed Frezich Plums. “ I’ve kept them whole, you see ! ” she exclaimed, though they are quite soft ; and I’ve taken all the stones out ; and is not the syrup nice and thick? What shall I ornament them with, Myra? will cocoanut do?” “ Very nicely, and you might use a little coloured sugar ; put the grated nut on in tiny heaps, you know, and the sugar on the top. For the other dish you can have the whites of the eggs from my favoicrite pud- dmgj I only want the yolks, and I’ll see what I have left in the way of fruit, then I’ll show you how to con¬ vert it into a Meringue of Plums P Myra then boiled a pint of milk, which she poured over an equal measure of sponge-cake crumbs, two ounces of butter, and four ounces of white sugar. This she covered, while she prepared the fruits — cherries, angelica, and apricots — by cutting them small and putting them into a glassful of lemon syrup to soak. The mixture in the basin was then well beaten with the yolks of three eggs, and a few drops of essence of almonds, and transferred to a shallow pie-dish. “ There ! ” said Myra, “ that wants nicely baking ; a hot oven would spoil it. I shall finish it off in the morning.” “ You have left the fruits out,” cried Beatrice. “No, they are put on after it is baked ; there will be enough for a good layer, then 1 shall make a little thick custard and pour it round the pudding. The syrup in which the fruits are soaking will .flavour the custard. I think this completes the sweets, excepting the mince pies, and a Mmcezneat Pudding.^ which I will make next.” “Oh, no! ’’said Frances, “you forget the Oranges m Syrup; you know they are so refreshing to the vocalists. Beatrice and I can manage that dish ; I remember how we made it last year. Here, Beatrice,” handing her a dozen oranges, “ will you peel these, and take the skin off after you’ve divided the fruit ? Be sure you throw away any pips. I’ll make the syrup ; it takes a pound of sugar to half a pint of water, and the juice of an orange and a lemon ; and Myra always puts in a little orange-flower water. You pile the fruit up high, ready for the hot syrup.” “ Don’t you boil the oranges, then ?” asked Beatrice. “No ; the syrup makes them soft enough ; you will find it very good if you are fortunate enough to get a helping. Oh ! I forgot ; I must rasp the lumps of sugar on some of the rinds first, to get the flavour ; and we are to remember in handing the fruit to take sponge biscuits and finger-rusks as well.” Meanwhile, Myra was making the Mincemeat Pud- dhio^ as she knew that some of the expected guests would not eat pastry, but were, at the same time, partial to mincemeat, which could, by means of this particular pudding, be presented in a very agreeable and digestible form. Alternate layers of bread-and- butter and mincemeat were put into a quart pie-dish until they half filled it, when a pint of milk and three eggs were beaten and poured over. “No sugar, you see,” said Myra to Beatrice, who watched the operation, “ and we must bake it in the coolest part of the oven ; that is one reason why it generally agrees with people, they not only get rid of the pastry, but the mincemeat gets more thoroughly cooked than in mince pies. We made one for some old people who were entertained by our vicar last year, and there was quite a run on it, I assure you.” “ But why is the dish only half filled ?” Beatrice inquired. “To allow for swelling ; and to prevent the bread- and-butter getting dry, I shall put this old plate over until it is half baked ; we will not pour custard over

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155 “So Peevish and Irritable.” before serving, but we will take some round with it ; some persons may like it.” The following morning the girls were busy in giving the finishing touches to their respective dainties ; the fillets of fish were dotted over with mayonnaise sauce, then sprinkled with lobster coral ; the lobster cutlets were coated e7itirely with mayonnaise, and in the centre of each a prawn was placed, the remaining por¬ tion— from a small tin— being used, together with the trimmings of the lobster cutlets, to make Savoury Rolls^ their foundation consisting of tiny rolls, as used for the Indian sandwiches. The edibles looked very tempting when arranged on the “buffet,” as the girls called the large table ; and there was no fear of an insufficient supply, for, besides those made at home, there were cakes, biscuits, and chocolates, and fruits in plenty, fresh and preserved. And all agreed that the variety of beverages would be ample, as, in addition to coffee and chocolate, Myra had provided an excellent choice of cordials, syrups, aerated waters, and so on ; and as the girls had a last look round just before tea, they took sufficient credit to themselves to announce that, if the dishes were not speedily emptied, it would not be their fault ; and Myra also cherished the hope that a little surprise in the shape of cups of beef-tea, made from a good meat extract, which she intended to present on the departure of the visitors, would be a welcome one. “SO PEEVISH AND IRRITABLE.” BY A FAMILY DOCTOR. OST of us grown-up folks have rather more than our share of troubles and worry and weariness. The oft-quoted text, “ Man is born unto trouble as the sparks fly upwards,” does not, I fear, always console us ; and we go about airing our afflictions among, and seeking consolation from, our nearest and dearest. Well, our griefs and pains are generally very real ; yet how seldom we think that there are others among us whose sorrows and aches are equally real, but who are deprived of the power of giving verbal expression thereof, or of seeking sympathy in any way whatever, except by the plaintive, peevish cry ! I allude, of course, to ailing little ones ; infants, young children — call them what you may. The mortality among these in the earlier stages of existence is very great indeed, and in a direct ratio to the ignorance which prevails as to their manage¬ ment and rearing. It is the children of the lower middle classes, and of the poor, that keep up this high rate of mortality. Nor is the latter due so much to the effects of povert> as to errors in diet, and inattention to the most ordinary rules of health The want of knowledge of the proper treatment of childhood is not, however, confined to the classes mentioned. Medical men encounter every day of their lives instances of the grossest ignorance of this kind, in the wealthier and well-to-do circles of society. And the little ones are the real sufferers. Indeed, in cases where kindly death does not step in to close their aching eyes, such children grow up, if not con¬ firmed invalids, puny, sallow weaklings, dwarfed as much in mind as in body. Such beings are in the world, but not of it. They live, perhaps, in golden cages. They have every human comfort and enjoyment, but understand not what life and living mean. Rosy •cheeks, muscularity, brightness of eye, firmness of tread, sturdy independence are human attributes they may have heard about or seen, but have no more in¬ trinsic knowledge of than my dog here has of the music of Haydn or the science of electricity. But I say, let any one of these world’s weaklings— rich though he may be — enjoy one day of bounding health, wholesome appetite, and genuine happiness, and to go back again to his gilded home and his e7tnui would seem like going to the dreariest prison. Here is a truth which mothers too often forget : on the correct and judicious care and feeding of the infant or child, depend the health and happiness of his manhood if spared to grow up. It is only in its early life that the foundation-stone can be laid. In infancy a child must build and build, and build. And he must be happy all the time he is building. If he is otherwise, morally he will be ruined as well as physically, for he will imbibe the bitterest pessimist ideas of life and everything and every creation around him. He will become selfish, morose, unaffectionate, self-conscious, and possessor of nevei an atom of sympathy to expend on the well-being of the fellow-beings with whom he must mingle in life. The fact that health and happiness are synony¬ mous terms cannot take too deep root in the memory of everyone who has a child or children to care for. Now, an infant is not 7iatu7'ally peevish or irritable. An infant, if well, ought to be as full of joy and mirth and playfulness when well awake as a kitten or a baa-lamb. Whether rosy-faced or not, he should at least be happy-faced. The desire to take notice of everything and everybody around him should be ex¬ pressed in his bright, clear eyes. Touch his cheek : it does not give to your finger in soft soddenness. Take his hand : you do not feel as if you had got hold of the tail of a dead fish. There is firmness in it, and a wholesome amount of warmth, while the fingers have a considerable degree of grasping power.

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“So Peevish and Irritable.” 156 He will hardly let go the fore-finger you have pre¬ sented him with. “ Wait a moment,” he seems to say ; “ I want to collect myself, and find out what it all means. You may be a very good sort of fellow, but I haven’t summed you up yet ; and I can’t think so last as you.” When he has summed you up, perhaps he lets your finger free with a broad grin or chuckle, which, could it only be interpreted, would very likely be found to mean something far from complimentary to your general appearance and character. Well, get hold now of this young fellow’s calf, and give it a shake : you will find the knee-joints as firm as if leg and thigh were all one piece, and the flesh as hard and tough as vulcanite. Perhaps the skin is not even silky or over-smooth. All the better ; he will grow up the stronger. Perhaps it is brown instead of satin-white. Better again ; this means pure blood, with a good dash of iron in it, and plenty of oxygen all through. And as the leg, so the heart will be. A child like this, you will find, is a good hand with the spoon. Eating is to him the serious business of his young life, and all his observation is concentrated on the dish before him. He would be jealous even of the cat having a morsel till he himself were done. Then, with right good John-Bull heartiness, he will push the dish towards her, and scream with delight to see her eat. Daddy and mammy may well be proud of such a ‘‘ birkie ” as this. But here is a child of another sort. I sketch from the life — such life as it is, alas ! The parents are both well-to-do, and dote upon the boy, who is just eighteen months old. He is in his mother’s arms now : one arm clinging round her neck, the other hanging listlessly down. A bonnie boy in truth, with locks of soft amber hair, and eyes of himmel blue. But his face is flushed and somewhat hot, and the eyelids droop rather, and are thicker than they ought to be. There is a moistness in his skin that I do not half like, and his limbs are soft and flabby — unwholesome to the touch. “ How does he eat.^ ” “ Not at all well, doctor. He used to thrive wonder¬ fully well on a patent flour food, and took plenty of milk, but now he refuses that, and will only take food with coaxing.” “ Meat and broth perhaps “And potatoes, yes. We feed him much as we do ourselves.” “ Ah ! there you err.” “And he is so feverish and irritable all day long. I pity even the nurse.” “ So do I. How does he sleep “ He does not or cannot sleep at all, all day. At night he will sleep in the nurse’s arms, but if she puts him down he wakes and screams. The sleep he gets does not appear to refresh him. He starts often, and has bad dreams ; tosses his arms about, and grinds his teeth ; and his eyes are often half-open. By day he refuses to be amused like other children, and is bitterly cross at times without the slightest reason. Do you think he is dangerously ill ?” “ I do not wish to alarm you needlessly,” I reply, “ but this is a case which may end in brain congestion, or even inflammation. You must do precisely what I tell you, and the child will get well.” The child does get well. One mistake has been the terribly destructive error of administering certain so- called remedies to produce so-called sleep. This is given up at once, and is the beginning of the happy dhioue7ne?it. But this irritability of brain I am talking of, this peevishness by day and sleeplessness by night, may — pray remember — be the precursor of some serious coming illness, so that if it lasts for any length of time, even for a week, you should consult the physician. Do not, as many mothers do, put everything down to the evils caused by dentition. Children do not cut a fresh tooth every morning, as some nurses would almost make us believe. Even delayed dentition itself, however, is an ailment that points to something wrong — some weak¬ ness perhaps of the constitution, or debility caused by errors in diet. Indigestion is a too frequent complaint with very young children who are improperly fed. This will cause restlessness, tossing about in bed, and general peevishness. Do not imagine that if you can subdue these symptoms, and create a kind of sleep or stupor by the administration of some nursery drug, you have cured the child. More likely the infant will awake worse than ever. A little dill-water will be a safe corrective ; or a gentle aperient may do good. Further than this we do not advise mothers to venture in the administra¬ tion of medicine without consulting the family friend — the physician. If I have succeeded in making mothers or nurses believe that peevishness and irritability really are symptoms of a state of matters which may lead to serious illness, I am content and happy ; for, believing this, they will get skilled advice. Even a medical man will not be quick to jump at a conclusion or diagnosis. He must feel his way, and that right cautiously. Whatever medicine he may give or order must be unhesitatingly administered in the proper quantity and at the right time. But do not forget that 7‘est is often half the battle, and sleep by day imperative. If the head be hot and the face somewhat flushed, cold applied to the brow, by means of a rag dipped in water in which a little toilet vinegar has been mixed, will help to soothe the little brain and conduce to sleep. Aperient medicine in moderation often does much good, and if you are far from advice a little grey powder, followed by some syrup of senna, will be needed ; or even a simple dose of warmed castor oil. As to diet, it must be nourishing and easily di¬ gested. Nothing that clogs the stomach should be administered. Milk is the sheet-anchor, though a little beef-tea is also warranted ; and, if the child be old enough, a lightly boiled egg. Puddings too are nourishing.

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157 In an Air-Lock: an Underground Experience. In this paper, then, I have tried rather to show what should be avoided in the treatment of irritability in children rather than to inculcate any mode of cure. For different cases require different treatment. But no mother can err who sees that her child sleeps warmly, but not in too hot a bed, that the room is quiet and well ventilated, that his food is nourishing and simple, and that real rest is obtained. IN AN AIR-LOCK: AN UNDERGROUND EXPERIENCE. BY HENRY FRITH. I DING home on the top of a tram- car one evening in October, I encountered a pleasant - featured navvy — a man of rank amongst navvies ; apparently a ganger who was evidently on his way to work. His clothes were clean and tidy ; he carried a basket with his sup¬ per in it, and seemed ready to undertake some night duty. It was about a quarter to six, and my curiosity was aroused concerning his destination, which I quickly learned was the “ Swan ” at Stockwell. A rem.ark concerning the progress of the sub¬ way over which our car was running led to con¬ versation. Yes,” replied my companion to my question, ‘‘ the river has given us trouble — the Effra, that’s it — there’s where it runs,” he continued, indicating a certain portion of the road. “ You are going down, I suppose ? ” was my next remark, tentatively. “ Yes ; I’m goin’ down for seven hours — in com¬ pressed air too,” he replied slowly. “ Rather trying that, isn’t it?” said I, recalling certain experiences of the Forth Bridge. “Yes, the air-lock ain’t comfortable when you ain't accustomed to it. We are.” “ I should like to see it,” was my reply. “ Can I go down ?— this evening, for instance.” “ Well, I could take ye underground for a while,” he replied doubtfully, as he prepared to quit the car at the “ Swan.” “ Come along, sir ; ye may as well see it.” A suggestion concerning a current coin was not repudiated, though not insisted on ; and with this understanding we crossed the road and passed within the hoarding, where an engine, supplied by three locomotive boilers, is incessantly in action pumping compressed air into the workings. Some curiosity was expressed by the men on the bank as they stood in the flaring light. Cer¬ tainly a tall hat, town clothes, an umbrella, and a parcel of books were not the best things with which to descend into a railway subway. The cage was coming up as I peered into the pit. “ Not quite so bad as mining,” remarked my conductor. “ Not so far down, and ye don’t get so bumped ! Stoop your head, sir.” I bent my back and bowed my head, as directed, beneath the bar which affords a hold as it passes along the top of the “cage.” In a moment we had descended, and carrying a candle stuck in a lump of damp clay, I trudged along the subway towards a group of men who were seated, holding lighted candles stuck on boards, along the wall of the tunnel, waiting for something or somebody. We had met a gang of men going out ; these others were perhaps the “ new drift ” going in. But whither ? And why were they all seated in a line by the ringed

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^5^ In an Air-Lock: an Underground Experience. wall of the subway ? The tunnel is about ten feet wide, cut tube-fashion in rings of iron made in seg¬ ments. The effect is that of circular girders bolted together, each ring being equi-distant from its neigh¬ bour. We were, in fact, in a tube of horse-shoe shape — almost. The effect and the sensation were rather weird. The navvies, silently scanning my appearance and impedi¬ menta, smiled at each other, and wondered, no doubt, why anyone should want to penetrate sixty feet under¬ ground, amid mud and dirt, unless obliged to do so. You’ll go through the air-lock with us, won’t ye ? ” inquired my first acquaintance. “ Yes, if you will bring me back again,” said I. “ Oh, I’ll put ye through safe enough if ye can stand it. It’s compressed air, mind ye.” “ Better take an old hat,” said one of the men. “ Leave yours and your parcels. It ain’t over-nice.” In a minute I was equipped, and an iron door cut off the party from any communication with the tunnel outside. In front was a similar iron door, and I now perceived that the men were all seated between these air-tight screens. The ganger turned a tap in the side of this vault, and immediately a loud and fierce rushing sound suc¬ ceeded. Hold your head up, sir,” came a voice from some far-distant navvy, as I thought. “ How do you feel P”' he added. “All right,” was my reply. But was I all right? The men gazed at me steadily, as if in expectation ; my conductor still let the air in ; then a fearfully pain¬ ful sensation of deafness came upon me. My head throbbed within iron bands, as it seemed. A plug or wedge was being driven into each of my ears — a sing¬ ing, surging, rushing sound and sharp pains succeeded —then I was completely deaf, and silence fell on me. In silence, apparently, the men sat ; the candles guttered over our hands as the front door was opened ; a faint sensation of hearing returned as we all stepped forth into the distant excavation which had been so hindered by the Effra river. The tunnel is sandy and perfectly dry on the roof and sides, if muddy below. “ Take this and go ahead,” whispered a voice in my ear. “ Mind ye don’t pitch into any holes.” It was impossible to retreat, so taking the flat board offered me, the candle stuck on its lower end, and holding it so as to cast the light at my feet, I proceeded to the end of the tunnel, where the rushing of water be¬ hind a palisade told of the river, perhaps. A machine called a “shield” is used by means of hydraulic rams. This shield is really a cylinder which cuts into the earth, while the navvies shovel and dig out the displaced gravel and sand. A kind of bulkhead keeps the surrounding earth from fall¬ ing in, and a door in it is really the centre opening through which the machine works, and by which the men assist in clearing away the soil. The space between the outer edge of the “ shield,” or cutting machine, and the clay, is filled up with liquid cement— a process technically termed “grout¬ ing.” When all is firm the men comd on, and put in the rings or segments already mentioned. “Nice kind o’ workshop this,” re¬ marked one of the men, as he divested himself of his upper garments. “Are you in for long.?” I shouted. My voice surged in my head like a roaring sound of the sea. “For seven hours,” he replied — taking up a pick as he spoke. “ Now for it, mate.” The man addressed joined him, and I turned back as they commenced work. Avoiding the “ skeps,” or trol¬ leys, I found my conductor, who ex¬ amined me carefully, by candle-light. I was deadly pale ; I felt so ! “ ril put ye in a fresh candle,” he said, “ and we’ll go back.” This done, we again entered the “ air-lock,” as it is called. The doors were closed, the other tap was turned, and ordinar}’- air admitted. In a mo¬ ment or two the intense pressure was removed from my ears. Something THE SHIELD — WORKING BY COMPRESSED A.IR.

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159 I seemed to give way in each side of my head. The “wedges” were removed ; a trickling sensation as of an incipient cold made me seek my handkerchief. Drip, drip, faster and faster. It was blood ! My nose was bleeding, and I could not find my handkerchief, for I had forgotten that I had placed it on my head within the hat that had been lent to me. “ Never mind,” said my conductor; “ let it run a bit ; or put your nose on my sleeve. I don’t mind a drop or two.” This kindly suggestion was not adopted. The door was soon opened ; and, still rather deaf, I quickly made my way back to the cage. By the time I had re¬ sumed my impedimenta and hat the bleeding had ceased, and nothing remained but to ascend. This was accomplished after some preliminary negotia¬ tions not altogether unconnected with the coin of the realm ; for if the gentleman in charge of the cage had refused me passage, it might have resulted in “ another mysterious disappearance ! ” 4ir-Lo(l(^ However, the negotiations were quite successful. I parted with my conductor upon friendly terms, and gained the bank, where another “ solicitor ” required some attention. But he was soon appeased, and, led carefully along the boards, and amid timber struts, where the engine was still throbbing loudly, I emerged into the high road — half deaf, very muddy, but other¬ wise little the worse for my adventure underground. I may add, for the benefit of intending visitors to “air-locks,” that I am still deaf to a certain extent, and suffer from headache, induced apparently by pressure on the frontal bones. This is the sensation — and it is not pleasant, but, perhaps, as my friends say, it “ serves me right ! ” TO BE GIVEN UP. By KATE EYRE, Author of “For the Good of the Family,” “A Step in the Dark,” &c. <fcc. CHAPTER THE NINTH. EOVE OR HONOUR? SjHE tall figure, of whose presence Mabyn had , suddenly become aware, as she stood be¬ moaning her fate on the verandah at South- - fields, was that of a man of about thirty, with a grave, bearded face, and steadfast eyes. Not a handsome man by any means, but still, one at whom most women would glance a second time. Philip Dacre and Miss Eastabrook were still at the piano together ; and the man was watching them intently. As he watched them, his mouth became firmer, and his eyes graver — but not less kindly. It was Frederick Charrington — he who had, so short a time before, told Miss Eastabrook that her existence was to him the one great reality of life. Mabyn started as she recognised him, while he looked towards her. Whether or not he had noticed her before she could not determine. Then he advanced to within a yard of where she was standing ; and their eyes met. No word was spoken on either side~at least, not

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i6o To BE Given up. for a minute or two — and yet there was a tacit under¬ standing between them ; a silent assurance of sym¬ pathy. For they both knew that to each had come that night the death-knell of hope — knew it instinc¬ tively. “ It is chilly out here, Miss Littledale,” Mr. Ghar¬ ri ngton said at length. Then without another word he drew her shawl **closer round her, arranging it so that it might best shield her from the night-air, as a woman might have done. Mabyn shivered. “ I suppose I must go in,*’ she said wearily. Somehow she did not feel as if she minded Mr. Charrington noticing her distress. He looked at her critically. Two tear-drops were drying on her cheeks, and her face was much dis- turbed, sufficiently so to have attracted the attention of the most casual observer. “ Let me see ! the beginning of the second move¬ ment. That sonata won’t be over for a good ten minutes yet. Will you come once round the garden ? There will be time, and it is cahn out there in the quiet moonlight.” He spoke in a matter-of-fact, business-like tone, that made his offer all the easier to accept. “ Yes.” He offered her his arm, and she took it without a word. Only^once did he speak. “ Won’t you raise your dress a little? The dew is heavy to-night.” She did as he suggested, but made no other reply. Then, just as they were nearing the house, he paused and looked at her again. Apparently he was better satisfied this time, for he led her back to the drawing-room without making any further remark. He kept near to her for the remainder of the evening, saying but little. Nevertheless, he succeeded in shielding her from observation, which was probably the object he had in view. Then, when they were all in the hall, saying good¬ bye, he turned to his brother : “ You needn’t wait for me, Ted. I shall go the other way round.” Now the “ other way round ” led past The Fountains and Grange House. To Mabyn’s intense relief. Miss Eastabrook walked on in front with her father and Ralph, leaving her half-cousin and Mr. Charrington to follow. Mabyn and Mr. Charrington followed closely behind, in perfect silence. Perhaps they were both interested in listening to Miss Eastabrook, who was giving her father a graphic account of her first meeting with Philip Dacre. Mabyn was truly thankful to be left in peace. Philip’s farewell was still ringing in her ears, and causing her exquisite pain by its forced friendliness. “Why, Miss Littledale, 1 seem to have seen hardly anything of you the whole evening. Where did you get to ? And now you are actually going ! ” he had exclaimed. “ Papa will have been expecting us for the last hour,” Mabyn had replied, after a short pause. She was quite thankful to think so ordinary an observa¬ tion had occurred to her. The evening has gone so quickly, has it not ?” Quickly ! To Mabyn it had seemed interminable. Sophy had, however, rushed up to bid her good-bye at that moment, and she had been saved the awkward¬ ness of attempting to reply to Philip’s remarks. “ Why, Mabsy, how pale you are ! ” exclaimed Miss Eastabrook, as she turned to wish her cousin good night at the entrance to The Fountains. “Gaiety doesn’t suit you, I’m afraid. My dear child, what is the matter with you ? ” and her tone was now tho¬ roughly concerned. She had taken Mabyn’s hand in her own, and had discovered how cold it was. “Really, Clare, there’s nothing the matter with me. “ I know better. You can’t deceive me like that, Mabby. But there, good night, dear ; I won’t make matters worse by keeping you standing.” “ Good night, Clare. Good night. Uncle Nat.” Then Mabyn proceeded on her way home, between her brother and Mr. Charrington. Mr. Charrington roused himself to talk to Ralph, thus leaving Mabyn still free to follow her own sad thoughts. Mabyn had just glanced up at Mr. Charrington as he wished Clare good night. But his voice had been quite steady, and his eyes had for a moment sought hers unflinchingly. “ He is very brave,” thought poor Mabyn. “ Brave and yet so gentle. But perhaps the two qualities go together. I think they should.” Outside Grange House the brother and sister paused to bid Mr. Charrington adieu. “ Good night, Mr. Charrington,” said Mabyn. “ Good-dye^ Miss Littledale.” A slight stress was laid upon the second word, as if the speaker were desirous that his good wishes should extend over a longer period. He took the little cold hand she held out to him, and looked down on her with a very kindly light in his grey eyes. Involuntarily her lips formed the words, “Thank you.” Then the colour mounted to her face. Why had she spoken ? Would it not have been more dignified to have kept silence? Still he had been very thoughtful for her. He did not attempt any reply : only a very slight pressure of her hand showed that her words had reached him. “ Poor child ! It is harder on her than it is on me,” he murmured, as he resumed his walk. “ A sorrow of that kind must always bear more heavily on a woman.” Yes, he was right. It was harder, infinitely harder, on her. “Well, my dear, have you had a pleasant time?” asked Mrs. Littledale. Mabyn paused so long before replying to her mother’s question that Ralph answered for her — “ As that sort of thing goes, it wasn’t half bad.” Ralph was just at that age when young men pretend to have grown weary of life.

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And how did you enjoy yourself, dear ? ” asked Mrs. Littledale, again turning to her daughter. “ The garden-party was very enjoyable, mamma.” “ And did you not have a pleasant evening ? ” “ I felt rather tired. It has been such a long day.” “ You are looking quite worn out now, dear.” “ Yes, I think I had better go to bed ; ” and Mabyn picked up the bonnet she had taken off on first enter¬ ing the parlour. “ But you haven’t told me anything about it yet,” exclaimed Mrs. Littledale. “Was Bevan Dudson there ? ” “ Yes, mamma.” “ And did he pay Julia such very marked attention ? Mrs. Grey told me the other day that she thought there really was something in it.” “ They are engaged.” “ Engaged ! Dear me, it is an excellent match for her.” “She’s a stunning handsome girl,” put in Ralph. “ More showy-looking than handsome, I should call her. Did you hear when Philip is expected home, Ralph ? ” “He returned this evening. Came in about nine.” “ Home to-night ! But surely they didn’t expect him home so soon ? ” “He said something about having come back earlier than he intended because of Sophy’s birth» day.” “ Will he come here as usual to-morrow ? ” “ Bothered if 1 know. It seems that he and Clare have met before, in Paris I fancy they said ; and they

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102 To BE Given up. appeared to think it such a wonderful coincidence, and had so much to say to each other about it, that really I saw next to nothing of Philip the whole evening,” replied Ralph, with the manner of one who felt he had a right to be aggrieved. “ I shouldn’t be a bit surprised, do you know, Ralph, if those two were to take a fancy to each other. She would make him a capital wife. A man of his extra¬ vagant habits ought to marry a woman with money.” Mrs. Littledale smiled with satisfaction. If Philip Dacre were married and settled, then would he cease to lead her son into temptation. “Well it’s early days to forget his old friends,” grumbled Ralph. “ People of that stamp are never to be depended on,” remarked Mrs. Littledale, thinking it was a golden opportunity to say a word in season. “ I don’t know what you mean by ‘ people of that stamp,’ mother. Philip’s no end of a good fellow%” ex¬ claimed Ralph rather warmly. To abuse his friend himself was one thing, to allow his mother to do so, quite another. “ Mamma, Mr. Dacre asked particularly after you and papa,” put in Mabyn. She, too, did not like to hear a word said in Philip’s dispraise. “ Well, my dears, you may both be right, and I may be wrong. Time will prove.” There vvas a slight pause, and Mabyn took the opportunity to wish her mother and Ralph good night. Once in her own little room, she locked the door, and sat down — to think. It was all over, the dream of her girlhood. The man whose coming had made all things new to her, was about to pass out of her life. If only her sorrow had been of such a nature that she could have gone to Clare for sympathy, she felt she could better have borne it. But Clare, her unconscious rival, must never know the truth. Mabyn would at least spare herself that bitter humiliation. And then she remembered how, on the first evening Clare had come to The Fountains, she had been tempted to tell her all her hopes and fears. Hopes and fears — should she not rather have said hopes only ? She had had no fears then. Now she was hopeless. Nevertheless, she would 7iot let her sorrow crush her. Then she arose, and began preparing for bed with a look of quiet resoluteness on her face. But when she laid her head on her pillow, she found that all the resolution in the world would not summon sleep. And then, as the hours went slowly by, the weight of her sorrow seemed to increase, until at length she felt as if she would never have the strength to throw it off. Towards morning, forgetfulness came to her in the form of a heavy, dreamless sleep. But, oh ! the awakening. The first, dull, unreasoning sense of pain ; the agonising return to consciousness, slow in its appreciation of facts up to a certain point, and then leaping with a bound to the fullest realisation of the most minute details. “ They did not mean anything.” she murmured, as her thoughts reverted to the words which had been spoken in the sweetness of that summer morning. “ But, oh ! how happy they made me.” But in truth those words had meant — did still mean — much to Philip Dacre. He had no very clear recollection of them ; they were not engraven on his mind as they were on Mabyn’s heart. Still he re¬ membered enough of their purport to know that it did behove him, as an honourable man, to bear them in mind. Nor could he recall the exact state of his feelings when he uttered them. He knew he had gone to Grange House that morning with no fixed intention of making Mabyn an offer ; and he was equally certain that he was actually about to ask her to be his wife, when Ralph appeared so inopportunely. Had he really loved her then 1 Facts seemed to point to such a conclusion, but subsequent events had so obliterated her memory from his mind, that he found it almost impossible to realise she had ever been specially dear to him. There was, however, another phase of the matter to be considered ; one to which Philip was disposed to attach the utmost importance. Did Mabyn love him 1 Here again, he felt that memory was not a safe guide. He must take steps to decide this momentous question, and on the answer he succeeded in obtaining, should his future conduct depend. If he saw good reason to believe that he had taught Mabyn to love him, then she should be his wife. To his mind, a man who could win a woman’s heart and afterwards spurn it, had forfeited his claim to the title of a gentle¬ man. And nothing this world had to offer — no, not even Clare Eastabrook’s love — would compensate Philip for so terrible a loss. Nor would he lose time in endeavouring to ascertain how the land lay. If Mabyn Littledale was to be his wife, then would delay tend only to make the perform¬ ance of that which he considered his duty the more difficult ; while if Miss Eastabrook — but no, he dare not let his mind dwell on such an alternative : it would unnerve him. So he called at Grange House on the Sunday after¬ noon, as his custom had been before he went away. Mabyn was at the schools, as he had calculated that she would be. He stayed about an hjour, talking to the Littledales of his travels and so forth. Then he took his leave, saying quite frankly that as he had seen so little of Mabyn the previous evening, he intended to walk in the direction of the schools with a view to meeting her as she returned home Everything should be done in a thoroughly open manner, he was determined. Dr. Littledale and Ralph, who were standing at the gate wishing him good-bye, offered no opposition to his proposal. If they thought about it at all, they probably attributed it to pure friendliness. Had Mrs. Little¬ dale been present, she would doubtless have felt some¬ what alarmed. Fortunately, however, she had never suspected Mabyn’s partiality for Ralph’s friend ; and this blindness on her part had saved her much un¬ easiness. There was hardly a man living whom she would not have preferred to Philip Dacre as a son- in-law.

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To BE Given up. ‘‘Well, good-bye, old fellow. I wish you could have stayed on. You’ll meet Mabyn about half-way if you start now,” said Ralph. “ Mind, no promising to be home to dinner next Sunday,” chimed in the doctor, with whom Philip was a special favourite. Next Sundi'y ? Probably he would then be received in Grange House in the character of Mabyn’s future husband. Ah, well, honour is honour, and one must pay the price of obedience to its behests. Philip walked towards the schools thinking of this. He would take Mabyn right away. He could ntver live in Dursington as Mabyn’s husband with that face constantly before him. But would he not be haunted by Clare’s face, let the distance between it and him be ever so great ? Well, yes, perhaps so ; but he, and he alone, would suffer. To Mabyn he would be all that a loving husband should be ; the less capable he was of giving her that perfect love and never-failing con¬ fidence to which every wife is entitled, the more care¬ ful would he be to study her happiness. So he walked rapidly on. He would get it over, so that there should be no fear of his courage failing him. He looked eagerly ahead. Was each instant bring¬ ing him nearer to his future wife 1 Yes, he felt that it was so. A turn in the road brought her in view — her — Mabyn Littledale. But she was not alone. Walking *by her side, with that stately step which was already so familiar to him, was her half-cousin, Clare Easta- b'rook. CHAPTER THE TENTH. WHAT CAN IT ALL MEAN? Lookers-ON, it is said, see most of the game : an assertion the truth of which was, to some extent, made manifest on the afternoon of the garden-party at Southfields, when Mabyn, in her character of looker- on, did observe that Mr. Nightingale paid Sophy Hacre marked attention ; while Sophy, who was so closely connected with the game, was unaware of anything unusual in the gentleman’s manner towards herself. That he was often at her side, did occur to her more than once ; but, then, so were others ; and if it is ever to be a young woman’s fate to have that position eagerly sought after, the competition for it will probably be keen on the occasion of her twenty-first birthday party. That her father should treat the man as an honoured guest in a very marked degree was nothing new. From the time of his first coming to Southfields — an event which had taken place about a month previously — this had been so. The man’s coming had in itself been mysterious ; so at least the feminine members of the Dacre family had felt. “ I am expecting a gentleman to call here this evening on business, and I may, perhaps, ask him to stay to dinner. See that things are ship-shape, Sophy,” Mr. Dacre had said one morning, as he stood brushing his hat, preparatory to starting for the bank. Sophy and her two younger brocners were the 163 only members of the manager’s family who were present on the occasion. Mrs. Dacre was too much of an invalid to come down to breakfast, and of late Julia had taken to breakfasting with “dear mamma” in her dressing-room, in case the elder lady should feel lonely. “ Is it anyone 1 know, papa?” Sophy had innocently inquired. “ If it were anyone you knew I should have men¬ tioned his name,'’ replied her father testily. Then Sophy became aware that her father was not in a good humour. He was a man who was apt to get irritable at times, and his irritability had of late been very generally felt by his family. He was fond of dis¬ play of every description, and would encourage his wife and daughters to be extravagant. Then when the tradesmen’s bills came in he would complain bitterly of the expense to which he had been put. Latterly there had been many bills, and much consequent un¬ pleasantness. “ What is his name, then, papa ? ” Sophy had per¬ sisted. “ Nightingale.” “ Is he a married man ? ” “ I know nothing whatever about Mr. Nightingale’s domestic affairs,” Mr. Dacre had replied ; and his voice had been so angry, and his frown so repelling, that even Sophy, ready as she invariably was to brave the paternal wrath, had sought refuge in silence. Then Mr. Nightingale had come, and had been closeted in the library with Mr. Dacre for upwards of an hour. At the expiration of that time Mr. Dacre had in¬ troduced him to his family, and had intimated to them that the stranger would stay to dinner. And in doing this, Mr. Dacre had not been quite himself. His manner had been, for him, wonderfully subdued ; he had even refrained from boasting. It has already been stated that Mr. Nightingale was a man of unprepossessing appearance. He was fat and bald, with a pimply face and small watery eyes. And then that objectionable habit he had of mopping his face and head ! Julia had with difficulty concealed her aversion to the man, as her father introduced him to her. From the first, however, Mr. Nightingale had taken but little notice of the elder Miss Dacre. All his attention had been bestowed on Sophy. Sophy was ever brimming over with fun and good humour ; it had, therefore, cost her no effort to make herself agreeable to her father’s guest. So she had talked to Mr. Nightingale pleasantly enough, and had heroically refrained from shuddering as he used that odious red silk handkerchief. Julia had always enjoyed the proud distinction of being the acknowledged beauty of the family, and she was by no means disposed to carry her honours meekly. No one would ever look at Sophy if she were present ; such was the estimation in which she held her own charms. Sophy was also of this opinion. “ It is no use for me to attempt to do any little business on my own account as long as Julia is by to take all the

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To BE Given up. 164 shine out of me. I must wait until she has completed her bargain before I carry my goods to market,” Sophy was wont to laughingly declare. Certainly Ted Charrington had always infinitely preferred the younger sister, and had been heard to boldly aver that, in his opinion, Julia wasn’t a patch on her. But then he was so intimately acquainted with each member of the Dacre family, that his judgment of the two girls’ claims to beauty was probably warped by his knowledge of their respective dispositions. Nevertheless, although it was admitted on all sides — Ted Charrington excepted — that Sophy was no beauty, she was a thoroughly jolly -looking girl, with rosy cheeks, merry eyes, and a quantity of nut-brown hair. A girl whose step was buoyant, and whose laugh was, perhaps, a trifle too loud ; one whose eyes could dance with mischief— aye, and fill with ready tears, too, at the sight of distress. Mr. Nightingale had seemed to be of Ted Charring- ton’s way of thinking, for he had hardly glanced at Julia, as he had sat talking to Sophy, and chuckling over her whimsical remarks with very evident enjoy¬ ment. “Now you are what I call a downright jolly young lady. Miss Sophy. There’s no nonsense about you, and that’s what I like,” Mr. N ightingale had exclaimed, as the evening was drawing to a close. “Good gracious, Mr. Nightingale, don’t call me a young lady, if you please ! I can’t bear the term,” bophy had replied with energy. “ Well, what am I to call you, if you are not a young lady?” Mr. Nightingale had asked in much surprise. “ You can call me either a girl, or else a young woman ; which you please,” Sophy had said with decision. “ I will call you a girl then ; and a jolly, nice girl, too.” “ I don’t mind what epithets you prefix.” “ Ah, but you wouldn’t like me to say quite what I think about you — not just at present, you know.” “ I don’t suppose we should any of us like to know just what others think of us, Mr. Nightingale.” “ Oh, I wasn’t meaning anything bad, I assure you ; quite the reverse.” And then Mr. Nightingale had said a word to Mr. Dacre, and the two men had again retired to the library. “ I wish he wasn’t so fond of speaking of his deceased wife as the late Mrs. N.,” Sophy had re¬ marked. “ He will be asking you to become the future Mrs. N.” “Julia ! Why, he is as old or older than papa. And so fat too ! ” Sophy had indignantly replied. “I was not aware that either age or obesity consti¬ tuted a just cause or impediment against marriage.” “Anyhow, Julia, I suppose I should be allowed to have a voice in the matter.” “ Your voice, dear, is at all times a little too loud.” “ It would indeed be very loud if the possibility of my becoming the future Mrs. N. were the matter under discussion.” “Never mind, Sophy dear,” Mrs. Dacre had said gently, as she observed the angry flush on her younger daughter’s cheek ; “ I am sure Julia didn’t mean what she said.” Sophy had crossed over to Mrs. Dacre’s couch. “ Why, of course, mother darling, it is all utter non¬ sense. Julia only said it to tease me.” And that was just why Sophy had been angry, and had so re¬ sented Julia’s remarks. Then Mr. Nightingale had returned to the drawing¬ room to wish the family adieu. “ Well, good-bye. Miss Sophy. You and I haven’t had our last word on that subject yet.” he had re¬ marked, alluding to some little matter about which they had had a rather lively argument, “ for your pa has been good enough to ask me to come down again next Saturday. So it’s a case of ta-ta for the present only and Mr. Nightingale took his leave, being ap¬ parently in the best of spirits. “ Is it true, papa, that you have asked that odious man to come here again next Saturday ?” Julia had inquired, when Mr. Dacre returned to the drawing¬ room, after having been to the front door to see the last of Mr. Nightingale. “Mr. Nightingale is a friend of mine, and I must therefore request you not to speak of him in that way.’^ “ But is he coming next Saturday ? ” persisted Julia, who never allowed herself to be quelled by her father’s anger. “He is. Have you any objection, pray ? ” “ Then I shall make a point of being out.” “ You can make a point of - ” but Mrs. Dacre, seeing that a storm was brewing, had asked her hus¬ band to re-arrange her ^hawls for her, so that the sentence was never conipieted. After that, Mr. Nightingale was a frequent guest at Southfields, and everyone observed the satisfaction which his visits seemed to afford Mr. Dacre. In fact, Mr. Dacre was a changed man. His irritability was a thing of the past ; he said hardly a word as he ran his eye over the monthly bills ; he even took to cracking little jokes in the sanctity of his home-circle, generally singling out Sophy as the object of his good- humoured merriment. In short, it would almost have seemed as if some weight, which had hitherto greatly oppressed him, had been suddenly lifted from his shoulders. But still Sophy suspected nothing. That her father’s high spirits were in some way connected with Mr. Nightingale’s frequent visits did occur to her, while she could not bring herself to believe that Mr. Dacre’s very evident satisfaction was entirely due to the pleasure he derived from his new friend’s society. “ What can it all mean ? ” she asked herself over and over again in her endeavour to hit on a probable solu¬ tion to the mystery. But that there might be some scheme on foot in which she was expected to play an important part, never so much as crossed her mind. And then the whole family was thrown into a state of the wildest excitement by Julia’s engagement to Mr. Bevan Dudson. That Julia would eventually succeed in securing a matrimonial prize, all those who knew

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To BE Given up. her had always unhesitatingly prophesied. But such a prize as this ! A man of suitable age, and not un¬ gainly appearance, the heir to a fine property and a baronetcy to boot. No wonder that Miss Dacre held her head high, and was a bit starchy,’’ as Mr. Nightingale was wont to pronounce her. Did not a well-poised head and an unbending demeanour befit the future Lady Dudson ? There was also an im¬ pression abroad that, in trying for this great prize, Julia had encountered many difficulties, so that the formal announcement of her engagement was the more befit¬ ting occasion for congratulation. It was believed that the lover had been somewhat unduly impressed by his own unquestionable eligibility, and that the fair one had been obliged to exercise all her arts before she succeeded in bringing him to her feet. But of all this Julia herself said nothing. It ill becomes the suc¬ cessful to enlarge upon the difficulties over which they have triumphed. And so Julia kept silence, alluding neither to the obstacles she had overcome, nor to the greatness of the prize she had secured. For a time the excitement of Julia’s engagement had served to divert Sophy’s thoughts from Mr. Night¬ ingale, and the strange influence he appeared to exer¬ cise over her father. The gentleman’s presence at the garden-party had, however, revived her interest in him. But still she had felt no alarm on her own account. Ted Charrington had, however, like Mabyn, watched the game very closely, and he thought he saw which way the wind was blowing. Deep, indeed, was his indignation. “ They’ve succeeded in nabbing Dudson — poor chap ! — for Julia ; and now they want to secure that old fool for Sophy ! ]^r. Dacre ought to be ashamed of himself. Well', T/shall hesitate no longer. I may be as poor as Job — worse luck ! — but still I do think Sophy would have a better time as my wife than she would if she were forced into marrying a man old enough to be her father. And such a man, too ! ” And then Ted fell to wishing that he, instead of his brother Fred, were the elder son. It’s always the way ! There’s Fred could marry if he wished to, and I don’t believe there’s a woman living that he cares a brass farthing for. While here am I, over head and ears in love with Sophy, and without the wherewithal to buy even sufficient bread and cheese.” From which it will be seen that Ted knew nothing of that interview between his brother and Miss Eastabrook. But then men, when they rave against fate, invariably are misinformed as to their premises. Ted was an architect, and had very little to depend on except what he earned himself. Thinking of this, he did admit that he was hardly the son-in-law whom an ambitious man would welcome with open arms. Still, Mr. Dacre had no right to force his daughter to marry against her inclination. And by dint of dwell¬ ing on this disquieting subject, Ted persuaded him¬ self that to rescue poor Sophy from the terrible fate that was in store for her was an imperative duty — to rescue her by fair means, if possible, and if not— well, then, let Mr. Dacre be on his guard. As a preliminary step, Ted presented himself at 165 Southfields on the Monday evening after the garden- party. “ Papa has gone to a committee meeting in connec¬ tion with the new hospital,” announced Sophy, as Ted Joined her in the garden, having been sent thither by Mrs. Dacre, who was unaware of her husband’s tactics. “Which reassuring fact 1 took the pains to ascer¬ tain before venturing here,” replied Ted, feeling that he was already proving himself to be a perfect master of Machiavelian arts. “ Well, to be sure, Ted ! What made you do that “You know very well, Sophy, that your father is determined to banish me for ever from your side,” said Ted, in a tone which suggested that his career as an exponent of the tragic muse might have been emi¬ nently successful. “ Has he told you so ? ” “ He has not ventured to address me on the subject — not as yet. But I can take a hint as quickly as most men, I hope.” “ I don’t see why you need be in such a hurry to take the hint. Papa has been very strange lately altG gether.” “ I do not choose to be placed in such an equivocal position. I must know my fate, Sophy, one way or the other. I must know it at once.” Sophy laughed outright. “ What do you mean by knowing your fate ? ” “ Sophy, this is no fit subject for jesting,” said Ted, with offended dignity. “My dear boy, why these melodramatic airs.?” But Ted walked beside her in silence with his head well in the air. It was all very well determining to rescue a young woman from a terrible and impending fate, but if she did not realise her danger, and did not wish to be rescued ? “ Ted, what is it.? Have I offended you ?” “ I thought you were attached to me. But, of course, I have been mistaken. To trifle with a man’s affection would seem to be the principal amusement of a woman’s life.” “Now, Ted, do get off the high horse, and be sen¬ sible, if you can. I have never told you that I do not care for you, and I certainly have never amused myself at your expense.” “ If you really loved me, you would hardly suffer another man to approach you as a suitor.” “ It is my turn now to declare this to be no fit sub¬ ject on which to jest.” “Nor am I jesting.” “ Seriously, do you mean to bring such an accusa¬ tion against me ? You must be going out of your mind.” “ Do you mean to tell me that the object your father has in view in endeavouring to separate us, has not suggested itself to you .? ” “ Ted, speak out quickly ; say what you mean,” ex¬ claimed Sophy hurriedly. “ Has it not occurred to you that Mr. Nightingale is - .?” “ Ted ! He cant mean it — papa, I mean. He couldn't wish such a dreadful thing.”

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To BE Given up. 1 66 “ 1 think that is the explanation of his conduct which would occur to most people who had been at the pains of observing his tactics.” They had reached the summer-house now, and Sophy leant up against the entrance with her face turned towards Ted. For a few moments she kept silence. Then she said, in a low, pained voice, which was oddly at variance with her wonted outspokenness — “ Ted, do you really and truly believe that papa wants to sell me — me, his daughter ? ” The moon emerged from behind a cloud at that moment, and shone full on her face, showing up every feature distinctly. To Ted’s utter astonishment the tears were rolling down her cheeks, and falling in quick succession on to her tightly clasped hands. He was off the high horse in a moment. Sophy crying ! And crying because of something he had told her. What a brute he had been not to break it to her more gently. “ Sophy, dear, don’t, don’t, there’s a dear, dear girl ! You’re making me so terribly unhappy.” Then he put his arm round her waist, and drew her gently towards him, while he pressed his lips to her forehead. Oh, Ted, he can’t love me in the very, very least,” and now she was fairly sobbing on her lover’s shoulder. But I love you, dear — love you ever, ever, ever so dearly !” exclaimed Ted, endeavouring, not unnatur¬ ally, to comfort his lady-love by protestations of his own unfathomable affection. But still she continued to sob. “ Don’t cry any more, there’s a darling. Nobody can force you to marry him against your will, you know.” “No, he shall never have me — never, never. I would die first.” Then she raised her head, and there was quite a fierce look in her eyes. “Oh, but to think that papa could do such a thing ! And he always said 1 was his favourite !” and her tears began to flow again. “ And you will be true to me, dearest, come what may ? ” asked Ted, passing over Mr. Dacre’s wrong¬ doing. “Yes. You are the only one I have to love now ; you, and mamma ; oh, and the boys — only they are not old enough to understand things, except Philip ; I do love him very dearly,” she sobbed, enlarging her circle of loved ones as her memory became clearer. “And Prince, the dog.?” suggested Ted, endeavour¬ ing to give a lighter tone to the conversation. “ Oh, yes, dear old Prince ! I do love him, too, if he is only a dog. It’s all very well for you to laugh, Ted, but I don’t believe Prince would ever want to s-s-sell me to a-an-anybody,” and there was another outburst of grief. “ But nobody can harm you if you will only stand firm, and declare that you will marry me, and you wo7i^t marry anybody else.” “ All the king’s horses and all the king’s men shan’t make me do it,” she declared, speaking with reference to the latter part of Ted’s suggestion. “ That’s my own brave girl.” “ I am going to be your own girl, always — always.” “And I shall inform your father of our engagement to-morrow,” said Ted, preparing to remount the high horse, now that Sophy was on the fair way to recovery. “ But you won’t say anything about Mr. Nightin¬ gale, Ted. You know we really cannot be quite sure about it. It is just possible we may both be mis¬ taken.” “ My dear girl, I don’t think there is the slightest reason to entertain any doubt about the matter. Nevertheless, if your father does not introduce Mr. Nightingale’s name, I hope I shall have sufficient control over my feelings not to be the first to mention so unpleasant a subject.” He was fairly in the saddle again now, and had thrown back his head with a very effective gesture. But Sophy was still too subdued to laugh at him for his pains, as she certainly would have done had she been in her usual light-hearted mood. CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH. IN WHICH TED CHARRINGTON BEARDS THE LION' IN HIS DEN. After his interview with Sophy, Ted Charrington walked away from Southfields, feeling quite a hero in his new character of rescuer to an oppressed damsel. He had won Sophy’s consent, which, truth to tell, he had been pretty confident of doing, and now all that remained to be done was to demand her from her father. Of course, it would have to be a case of demanding ; a courteous application for Sophy’s hand would be worse than useless in dealing with a parent so obviously wanting in all natural affection. Mr. Dacre had doubtless laid his plans with considerable skill, but he would find that in Ted Charrington he had a tough customer with whom to deal. Such was the feeling uppermost in Ted’s mind over-night. In the morning, however, he was inclined to attach rather more importance to his own impecu¬ nious condition. It might be all very well to say out boldly to Mr. Dacre, “ Sir, I have come to demand your daughter,” but if the old gentleman should reply, “And pray, sir, on what do you intend to support her ? ” might not the question be a little awkward ? Still Ted had promised Sophy he would beard the lion in his den, and he had no intention of breaking his word.- So he stimulated his courage by dwelling on the distress she had exhibited on the previous evening, and by ten o’clock he was knocking at the door of Southfields. It would, he felt, be better to get the interview over in the morning. The very fact of his calling at so unusual an hour would tend to im¬ press on Mr. Dacre the solemnity of the occasion. Ted asked for the master of the house with as much assurance as he could command. The housemaid informed him that Mr. Dacre was not yet down, and then showed him into the library. A faint rustle overhead did suggest to him the possi¬ bility that Sophy might be looking over the banisters, but he was far too much on his dignity to glance in that direction. L

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To BE Given up. 167 “He’s come about Miss Sophy ; you see if he ain’t ” remarked the housemaid on her return to the kitchen. “ He might have saved hisself the trouble then, for master won’t let him have her,” replied the cook with much decision. Still, if Mr. Dacre did not intend to grant Ted’s little request, or rather, comply with his demand, he nevertheless received him with much courtesy when, half an hour later, he entered the library. But during that agonising half-hour, Ted’s courage had been steadily oozing out at his finger-tips. Nor was it revived by Mr. Dacre’s courteous reception of him. Ted had come prepared for war, and now, when he was asked in the suavest of tones to state his business, he felt that the wind was being taken out of his sails. Still he managed to stumble through some sort of statement, and then he waited for Mr. D acre’s reply. Mr. Dacre was a man to whom suavity was not natural ; nevertheless, he was on this occasion very suave. He listened to Ted with the blandest and most encouraging of smiles, gently crossing and re¬ crossing his hands as the young man proceeded. “ Sophy— you want Sophy, if I understand you aright ? ” “ Your daughter has so far honoured me as to accept me as her future husband.” “Ye-es — her future husband. I am afraid, my dear young friend, your assumption of that position will have to be very much in the future.” Nothing could have exceeded the extreme benignity of Mr. Dacre’s smile. “ Certainly, sir, I am not in a position to - ” “To marry for many years. I am glad that you so fully realise this, because it has saved me from the disagreeableness of being the first to mention it.” “ I was about to say, sir, that I could not of course offer your daughter a home which, as far as material comforts go, would compare - ” “ Hardly, my dear boy, hardly. I think without boasting I may be allowed to say that I have always been able to surround Sophy with every reasonable comfort.” “ Of course I know that anything I could offer her would - ” “ Would be a terrible change for her after the habits she has contracted as my daughter, and there¬ fore you very properly see that a marriage between you is at the present moment quite out of the ques¬ tion.” “ Marriage, perhaps. But may I ask you not to withhold your consent to our engagement ? ” urged poor Tec], feeling painfully conscious that he was proving anything but a tough customer with whom to deal. “ My dear boy, I like you personally — have always liked you, as you must be well aware. But still I don’t think a recognised engagement between you and Sophy would be advisable. I really don’t. Not at present, you understand.” “ But your daughter has herself consented to - ” “ Sophy is very young, and there is plenty of time. I venture to think that her home is a happy one. As you are doubtless aware, I always make a point of according a warm welcome to any of my daughters’ friends who care to partake of the hospitality of South- fields ; and I allow my daughters more liberty than most fathers would perhaps deem advisable. You and Sophy have, I fancy, seen a good deal of each other in the past, and there is no reason why you should not continue to meet, provided such meeting be mutually agreeable. My house is always open to you. But I do not think that I can say more than this. You yourself were the first to admit that your position is not such as to render marriage advisable ; and we are both agreed that Sophy, who has been accustomed to so many — shall we say luxuries?— would hardly be happy in straitened circumstances.” All this was so undeniably true that poor Ted did indeed feel the wind had been taken out of his sails. A tough customer to deal with ! Was he not rather as clay in the hand of a skilful potter ? Still he did brace himself up for one more effort. “ Will you not consent to a recognised engagement, sir, seeing that Sophy herself wishes it?” “No, I think not. 1 think in a case like this I must take upon myself to decide what is best for Sophy. Of course, you will quite understand that her happiness is my one care. As I have before suggested, you can continue to meet, and, should your prospects improve, we can at any time reconsider the question.” “And I may continue to come here, sir ?” “ Certainly, Ted. Have I not already said so i* ” “ I fancied, sir, that of late you had not been so pleased to see me.” “My dear boy, what an idea !” Nothing could have been more ineffably sweet than Mr. Dacre’s smile at that moment. And so the interview ended. Sophy was of course waiting near the front door to hear the result. “ Well, Ted, what does papa say ?” “ He will consent to nothing— absolutely nothing.” “And does he think that he is going to part you and me ? ” There was an expression of much determination on Sophy’s face as she asked this question, and her lips, either by accident or design, were temptingly near her lover’s. Of course Ted took advantage of this cir¬ cumstance before replying. “ He says I can continue to come here as usual, dear,” replied Ted, a feeling of disgust at the tameness of the whole thing taking possession of him. “ Did papa say anything about Mr. Nightingale ? ” “Not a word — not a syllable. If he had only intro¬ duced that odious man’s name, then I could have insisted on my right to snatch you away from his clutches.” “Ted, I think we are worrying ourselves unneces¬ sarily. I don’t believe papa has any more thought of Mr. Nightingale’s marrying me than I have,” said Sophy, who did not appear to feel any very deep regret that her lover had had no opportunity of exhibiting his prowess.

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To BE Given up 1 68 “ Then why does he refuse his consent to our engagement ? Tell me that, Sophy.” “ Perhaps he thinks you are not quite well off enough yet, dear,” suggested Sophy, who certainly deserved some credit for the delicate manner in which his. Perhaps, however, she thought that a young man who had risen a full half-hour earlier than usual, and had gone through the trying ordeal of asking for a lady’s hand, did truly deserve some such reward as this. she alluded to this obvious difficulty in the way ot their union, “ It is enough to drive a man out of his mind,” ex¬ claimed Ted melodramatically. “ But still we can continue to see each other very often, Ted dear, and that is so much, isn’t it?” replied Sophy soothingly And then she must have forgotten for a moment that there was to be no en¬ gagement between them, for she let her hands rest on her lover’s shoulders while she raised her lips to CHAPTER THE TWELFTH. PHILIP IS DETERMINED TO LEARN HIS FATE. Philip Dacre’s first feeling on recognising Miss Easrabrook in the distance, walking by the side of her cousin, was one of surprise ; his second, of great unreasoning joy ; and his third, of annoyance, in¬ asmuch as her presence would leave him no oppor¬ tunity of carrying out the purpose he had in view when he planned to meet Mabyn. However, that could not be helped now, so he

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i69 To BE Given up. greeted the ladies with much cordiality and turned to walk back with them. He saw at a glance that Miss Eastabrook was much elated. It was natural to her to throw herself heart and soul into all she undertook ; and she was at the present moment deeply interested in a new scheme, which she was determined to see carried out. Do you still consider yourself a Dursington man, Mr. Dacre ? ” she asked eagerly, with her glorious eyes resting full on his face. “Unquestionably. May I ask, Miss Eastabrook, in what way you think it possible I may have for¬ feited my right to be so considered ? ” “ Because you no longer live here. Didn’t you tell me. May,” turning to her cousin, “that Mr. Dacre only came home from Saturday to Monday now ? ” “ I dare say I may have mentioned it, Clare ; I don’t remember. But Mr. Dacre takes great interest in all that concerns the welfare of the Dursingtonites.” “ That’s right. Miss Littledale, take my part.” “ I am not taking your part, Mr. Dacre, there is no need to do that ; I am only stating an undeniable fact. See how hard you have worked to make the new hospital a success.” “ I shall certainly apply to you. Miss Littledale, when 1 want a good character.” “ It would be safer to apply to me only in the event of your wanting a just one, Mr. Dacre.” Then Mabyn relapsed into silence. Philip’s sudden appearance upon the scene was to her a confirmation of her worst fears. Of course he had come with the fixed intention of meeting Clare. To court her rival in her very presence did seem to Mabyn to be un¬ necessary cruelty. Surely he might have let her creep quietly out of sight first. “Well, then, Mr. Dacre, since you profess to be interested in all that concerns the welfare of the Dursingtonites, I shall have no further hesitation . in asking you for your sympathy, and perhaps more sub¬ stantial help, in my new scheme. I want to open a Working Girls’ Evening Home. We try to do so much for our children as long as they remain at the schools, and then just when they are at the most criti¬ cal age, they leave school, and we lose sight of them.” “ 1 am sure it is very good of you. Miss Eastabrook, to trouble about such matters at all, and if I can be of any assistance, I shall only be too delighted.” “ Excuse me, Mr. Dacre, but it is not good of me at all. I can’t bear to hear goodness attributed to people because they make some poor little imperfect attempt to do their duty.” “ I beg your pardon, Miss Eastabrook, for using a cant phrase in speaking to you. I might have known that you would resent it.” “ Do you approve of cant phrases yourself?” “No, I don’t think I do.” They talked a little more about Miss Eastabrook’s scheme, Mabyn joining in but seldom, until they reached Grange House. “ I know it is no use asking you to come in, Clare.” “ Not the least in the world.” Then, after a mo¬ mentary pause, as if she feared her reply might have sounded somewhat curt, she added, “ Papa is waiting at home for me, you know; expecting me every minute.” Then Mabyn went in, and Philip and Miss Eastabrook walked on towards The Fountains to¬ gether. “ 1 have all sorts of brilliant ideas in connection with my scheme — really they are brilliant, Mr. Dacre, laughed Miss Eastabrook. “ I am going to begin quite in a small way at first. Just one large room in a central position in the town, furnished to look as home-like as possible. I shall get a machine, and encourage the girls to bring their work. We might cut out their dresses for them, and teach them to make them neatly ; they could trim their hats, too ; I am sure they would like that.” “ Can you make dresses and trim hats ? ” asked Philip in surprise. “ Why, yes. What a useless kind of person you must think me, to be so surprised that I can use my fingers.” “ I am afraid I shan’t be of much assistance in the way of making garments.” “ I hardly look to you for assistance of that kind,” laughed Miss Eastabrook. “ But perhaps your sisters will help me. I intend to ask them.” “ I dare say Sophy will.” “ And you yourself can help me in other ways.” “ A subscription - ” “ Yes, a subscription I shall be truly thankful for. I shan’t be able to get on without subscriptions. But I shall want other help from you. I have a piano that I mean to lend to the Home, and when we have musical evenings, I shall depend on you for assistance. I should be very glad if you would audit the accounts, too. And then I hope to get a circu¬ lating library togethe** by degrees. I am sure the literature that most of our factory-girls read is un^ wholesome.” Miss Eastabrook continued to talk, with that enthu¬ siastic eagerness she was wont to give to a favourite project, until she wished Mr. Dacre good-bye at the entrance to The Fountains. More than once, Philip glanced at her in surprise. He had already observed that in society she was rather reserved. The previous evening, he had been the talker, she the listener. Now their positions were reversed. It was evident, he thought, she was kindly disposed towards him ; the eagerness with which she solicited his help, proved that much. At the same time he felt that her very friendliness showed how little real interest she took in him. His face had never haunted her, as hers had haunted him ; of that he was fully convinced. And as Philip dwelt on the difficulties he would doubtless encounter were he free to win Miss Eastabrook’s love, his longing to possess himself of that love well-nigh overpowered him. Still he did not waver. His fate must depend on Mabyn. If she loved him— if she consented to be¬ come his wife, then farewell for ever to that other dream. But no opportunity would at present be afforded

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170 To BE Given up. liim of learning his fate. He was returning to Lon- don early on the Monday, and he would not see Mabyn again unless he surprised her in the garden before breakfast, as he had done on that memorable — • should he not rather say fatal ? — morning now two months ago. He could not bring himself to do this, greatly as he longed to end his suspense. For every¬ thing to be just the same as it had been then, barring that icy coldness at his heart— no, he lacked the courage to go through such an ordeal. He would, however, speak to her the following week. If no opportunity occurred, then would he make one. He would even go the length of calling at Grange House, and asking to see Mabyn alone, rather than again leave Dursington without having asked her to be his wife. His mind was firmly made up even before a chance remark of Ralph’s tended to strengthen his resolve. It was on the afternoon of the following Saturday, and the two young men had Just taken their seats in a train bound for Dursington. There now, 1 declare if I haven’t forgotten it after all ! ” exclaimed Ralph, in a tone of much vexation. “ What have you forgotten, old man ? ” inquired Philip. “ The mater wrote to me and asked me to get some of - ’s cod-liver oil,” mentioning a special prepara¬ tion of this popular medicine. “ She says Mabyn has been looking so awfully queer all the week, that she is getting quite anxious about her.” “ 1 am very sorry to hear your sister is ill.” “ Oh, I don’t suppose there is much the matter with her. The two boys are home from school, and I dare say she’s had too much to do. The mater’s always getting alarmed about some of us, and then she per¬ sists in dosing us with cod-liver oil. I’m afraid she’ll be vexed, though, that I’ve forgotten it, as she took the trouble to write to me about it.” “ I expect they’ve got some at home. My mother always takes it. I’ll inquire when I get in, and if there is any. I’ll send Miss Littledale a bottle.” Thanks, old fellow. If you let her have just enough for two or three doses, I’ll send some on by parcel post, as soon as I get back to London.” Mabyn ill ! Perhaps his silence was causing her uneasiness. Yes, she had looked pale that night when he returned home. He remembered now how his mother had seemed rather distressed about her. She hadn’t been quite herself either on the Sunday after¬ noon when he had gone to meet her. Poor Mabyn ! It would never do for her to be worrying herself. Well, he would soon put an end to her suspense — that is, if she felt any — and to his own. He could never love her— not, at least, as she deserved to be loved ; still, he would be very thoughtful, very tender to her. It seemed to be Ralph’s fate, in reference to Philip, to do, with the best intentions in the world, just that of which Mabyn would the most stropgly disapprove. He had interrupted the interview between his sister and her lover at the most critical of moments ; and now he was, all unconsciously, it is true, enlisting Philip’s pity on Mabyn’s behalf. “ Oh, I say, mater, I’m awfully sorry, but I’ve for¬ gotten that cod-liver oil. But Dacre says he thinks his mother has some by her, and if she has, he’ll let Mabyn have a bottle. I’ll send some by parcel post as soon as I get back,” blurted out Ralph, without the slightest regard to Mrs. Littledale’s warning frown. “ What is that, mamma ? ” asked Mabyn, with forced calmness. “ Did you ask Ralph to bring me cod-liver oil ? ” “ I thought you were looking rather pale, dear, and that a few doses might do you good. This warm weather is so very trying,” replied Mrs. Littledale, in a deprecatory tone. She had observed lately how prone Mabyn was to resent all sympathy. “And how came you to say anything about it to Mr. Dacre, Ralph?” “ I didn’t discover I had forgotten it until after I was in the train. Dacre seemed quite concerned about it, and said he would be sure to send up a bottle if his mother had any by her.” Poor Mabyn ! She had flattered herself that she was bearing her trouble in such a way that none but herself would know how heavily it was weighing her down. And now, here was her mother writing to Ralph to tell him to bring her cod-liver oil ; and, worse still, Ralph actually mentioning the circum¬ stance to Philip. Philip did not have to wait long for that oppor¬ tunity of speaking to Mabyn, to which he was looking forward so anxiously. That very Saturday evening, just as he had started out, intending to call at Grange House, he met Mabyn within a few yards of Southfields. The meeting took them both by surprise. Mabyn, having calculated that the Dacres would still be at dinner, had therefore ventured to go into the town by the most direct route ; while Philip was so intent on making an opportunity to see Mabyn, that he could hardly believe in his good fortune when a turn in the road brought him face to face with her. Mabyn saw at once that escape was impossible. So, with a painful consciousness of her rising colour, she replied to Philip’s greeting. Almost the first words he said to her were ill-chosen : “ Ralph tells me you have been ill ; that Mrs. Little¬ dale is getting quite anxious about you.” “It is news to me, Mr. Dacre,” replied Mabyn coldly. “ But I noticed that you were not looking well last Saturday evening.” “ I think I must have taken a slight chill then. I stayed out in the garden rather longer than I should have done. But really, Mr. Dacre, I mustn’t enlist your pity under false pretences ; there is nothing the matter with me worth mentioning.” “ I hope you are not doing too much. You are always such a busy little woman.” “ Oh, of course, the boys being at home makes a little more to be done in the house ; but still I shouldn’t feel justified in posing as an over- worked young woman.” “ I don’t think you would ever pose in any attitude.”

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THE L O V E - 1' I M E OF THE YEAR 183 {See />, i-ji.)

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More Early Spring Flowers. ‘‘No, I don’t think I should. I am, to all intents and purposes, a thoroughly matter-of-fact young per¬ son.” Poor Mabyn ! How much happier she would then have been feeling had there been more truth in those words ! He walked beside her in silence for a few minutes.- He hardly knew how to broach the subject so near to his heart. If he had loved her! Ah, it would have been so easy then. A word, a look, a pressure of the hand would have been enough to open the flood-gates of his eloquence “ Mabyn - ” Then he paused. “ Yes, M7\ Dacre.” Philip fancied she laid some 171 slight stress on the prefix. Did she mean to reprove him for addressing her by her Christian name 1 “ Mabyn, do you remember that morning I came over to wish you good-bye before starting for Paris ? ” “Perfectly, Mr. Dacre.” He glanced at her in astonishment. He could hardly believe it was Mabyn Littledale speaking, she was so composed, so coldly polite. “ Did you guess what I was about to say when Ralph interrupted us ? ” “ I don’t think that is quite a fair question.” “You are right ; it is not. I will substitute another. Mabyn, will you be my wife 1 ” END OF CHAPTER THE TWELFTH. THE LOVE-TIME OF THE YEAR. O more the blast of winter blows ^ Athwart the dale the blindng snows ; Some signs of life astir there be, The throstle sings on yonder tree ; And “ Spring is coming 1 Spring is. coming 1 ” Swells the music, glad and clear, “ Soon the wild bee will be humming In the love-time of the year ! ” Why stays Olivia, beauteous maid. Her steps at dawn within the glade ? What makes her eyes more brightly shine, A blush her cheeks incarnadine ? Hark ! “ Spring is coming I Spring is coming ! Sings the throstle in her ear ; “ Soon the wild bee will be humming, Soon a lover will appear I ” John H. Davies, M.A. MORE EARLY SPRING FLOWERS. r'^> again we find our- selves looking back upon those long winter nights as — for a time at least — a thing of the past, and rapidly as the days now draw out do we also find ourselves engrossed by the beauty of our early spring flowers, that are the heralds of still lovelier ones to come in the summer. Last month we were speaking of our cinerarias, which in this month of Feb¬ ruary ought to be in the perfection of their bloom in our greenhouse, and of the general culture of one or two other popular favourites at this time of the year we shall now have a few words to say. Now, there is a certain degree of pleasant fragrance arising from the cineraria, which can be discovered if you are standing close to it; but a mere spray of the wall¬ flower, concealed, it may be, by a host of others arranged on our table, is quite sufficient to scent a whole room, or even to perfume the length of our staircase. It is certainly, then, worth a little atten¬ tion. And, indeed, its more professional name of Chei7'anthiis^ or “ hand-flower,” would of itself seem to suggest it as the one spring flower of all others the most appropriate for use as a portable nosegay. How, therefore, it got to be known as a “ -ze/^^/Z-flower ” it is difficult to say, more particularly as this is an epithet sometimes mirthfully applied to those members of our Christmas gatherings whose “ bloom ” is past. But to come at once to our subject, we may remark at the outset that there are few plants so hardy as the wall -flower ; we are speaking now chiefly of the single variety, which, though less rich and beautiful to the sight than the double variety, is far more hardy, and its perfume stronger. Of the single, then, we will speak first. The two well-known colours of the wall¬ flower are the blood-colour and the golden ; the seed of this we sow on any ordinary bed in the month of April, vvhile about the following midsummer our young seedlings may be planted out ten or twelve inches apart, and should a mild winter ensue they will bloom as early as the third week in February. But in a severe season it is as well to give them a little protec¬ tion by means of, for example, an evergreen bough ; for although we have many plants and shrubs that are generally acknowledged to be capable of standing an ordinary English winter, yet the same will sometimes

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More Early Spring Flowers. until the time for sowing has actually come. And this sowing-time you can readily vary in some degree, in proportion as you wish to have your plants forward or late. Indeed, the importance of successional sow¬ ing holds true for our flowers just as much as it does for our vegetables. But the beauty of the double wall-flower is uni¬ versally admitted, and of that we must now speak. The single varieties we rarely propagate by slips or cuttings, but the double ones are always so raised, and here our frames and greenhouses, or our bell- glasses, will come into requisition. Now, after the double wall-flower has bloomed you will notice plenty of shoots all over the stem of your plant. When these have got about an inch and a half long strip them carefully off, and take the little leaves off the lower half-inch of these young shoots ; plant them all im¬ mediately in a large pot or pan, using good loam and manure, or, indeed, any ordinary potting compost, and protect them by a bell-glass or set them in a frame. You will find that they will all strike. When you once notice that they have thoroughly struck, plant them out singly in sixty ”-sized pots ; they will like plenty of air and some warm showers, but, like most of the vegetable and animal creation, they will strongly object to a north-east wind. When the roots have filled the pots — and here we might say generally that it never does for any plant to be what is called pot-bound,’’ that is to say, one that has a mass of fibrous roots covering the entire surface of the pot, and evidently asking as loudly as it can for more room — shift them into “ forty-eight ’’-sized pots ; and again later on, when a further growth has been established, you will similarly see that a second shifting into size No. 32 will become a necessity. In these last your plants will bloom well and strongly. These double varieties, then, of the wall-flower must be treated as frame plants, but the chief things that would check their progress would be want of water or any sudden accession of cold. But we must now notice their treatment after blooming is over. Each plant should be cut down afterwards into that shape that will make the new growth form a handsome and healthy plant. They can then stand on a hard ground or shady place in the open garden, or should you keep them in a frame, have them well watered and protected from any hot sun. Thus much, then, for our wall-flowers ; but Feb¬ ruary is a busy month in our greenhouse, where the large bulk of many of our plants will require the annual re-potting. In fact, it is the month of all others that we generally devote to going over our greenhouse stock and to re-potting. And in our fruit- garden pruning is one of those essential operations that will no longer admit of much delay. The gooseberries and currants, perhaps, may be put off to the last, but the wall-fruit in an early spring is sometimes by this time breaking into bloom. Never, then, postpone any necessary operation to a time when it is almost too late to begin ; on the other hand, premature pruning is dangerous because of after- . frost. 172 succumb when the winter is extraordinarily severe. It is best also to plant out your seedlings in the spots in which you intend them to bloom, since a second re¬ moval is sure to entail some slight check to the well¬ being of your plant. Sometimes, however, the second planting is difficult to avoid, more especially on our flower-beds, which by midsummer would certainly be occupied to their fullest extent. At all events, ^long large borders or carriage-drives it would be as well to plant your seedlings, and let them remain there from the first, as in this case there is, of course, plenty of room. Now from our seedlings we are rarely able to obtain a double variety, and even if we did, there is no chance of still further improving upon it. Of these single and hardy kinds the best shaped and the best coloured are only to be got from the best plants ; mark them, then, early “ for seed,” so as to prevent them being gathered for nosegays or decora¬ tions. Have the seed-pods laid by when ripe, and the seed on no account removed from the pod MAKING THE BEST OF THE FLOWERS.

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173 THE REVIVAL OF MINOR ARTS. N this rapid age in which we live, little thought has been given to the simpler arts, which in days gone by were regarded as pastime, or even waste¬ time, and' were practised by every fireside all over the civil¬ ised world. The working of such industries was of the greatest possible value in exercising a moral and social in¬ fluence on the people engaged therein. Thoughtful and artistic people, and those interested in the wel¬ fare of future generations, have at length awakened to the fact that it was time to prevent any further decay of these arts. With all due reverence and pride for the wonderful mechanical inventions of this century, we find ourselves drifting into the torrent of machine-wrought sameness which is destructive to an original and individual type of work. To stay this danger, and to revive the ancient arts, many ladies and gentlemen have formed an Association, which has its head-quarters and training studios in London. Care¬ ful training is all that is required, and this is now largely available. The Association has undertaken to teach the poor how to make prettily for themselves such things as they want, and to secure not only “ art the people, but by the people.” A few years back some Saturday classes were started in various localities, by some zealous amateurs, to teach working men and boys artistic handicrafts. Success crowned their efforts, and the Cottage Arts Association,” as it was termed, quickly developed into a larger and more important body of workers, and is now incorporated with the “Home Arts and Industries Association.” There are branches open all over the United Kingdom, and all may be said to have gained a very firm footing. Tbe teachers are trained at the chief office in London, and it is noteworthy that the teachers are almost entirely voluntary. Besides the training of teachers, the head office undertakes the distribution of chosen designs and casts, and leaflets of information, to the various branches, and the organisation of a yearly exhibition and sale in Lon¬ don, which gives opportunity for the comparison and criticism of the work done. The value of this work as the basis of technical education, and in bringing within the reach of young people who are employed in our great manufactures the means of carrying on their education in the par¬ ticular branches of business with which they are occu¬ pied, is widely recognised. The difficulty at first was, of course, to interest children in such occupations, and the teachers had to be trained to initiate them into successful methods. The first art taught was wood-carving, for which the pupils in every little village or hamlet showed con¬ siderable aptitude, and attained great proficiency in carving. Evidences of such work as this are not yet extinct, even in machine-bound England and Wales, and many fine old carved panels are to be found at ancient farm-houses and cottages, which the farm labourers produced as the amusement of their long winter evenings. A great deal of the skill and beauty in artistic home work is, no doubt, due to their being hereditary family acquirements. Wood-carving is thought by many to be a difficult art, but in reality there is little difficulty, except in holding the tools properly. It is very little harder to carve or indent a panel in low relief than it is to trace and transfer patterns to the surface of the wood ; and with ordinary perseverance and intelligence, carving from the round may soon be acquired. Besides classes for teaching design and drawing and wood-carving, there are classes for carving in hardened chalk, leather- work, basket-making, reponssb work in brass and copper, wrought iron, pottery, mo¬ saic setting, modelling, embroidery, flax-spinning by hand, stencilling, &c. The majority of people can master these arts in a short time, and the delight of seeing the productions of their own hands arouses a desire to attain greater skill. One of the most interesting revivals among these arts is that of the old leather-work. This does not consist merely in the common art of making leaves and flowers, but includes the old cuir bouilli^ of boiled and hardened solid leather- work. Until the last two centuries this art was very popular in Italy and the East, and was used for a variety of useful and orna¬ mental purposes, such as the cylindrical boxes made in Italy to contain family documents ; bowls, or cups, such as the mazer bowls so common in the Middle Ages ; sword-hilts, quivers, &c. F or elegance, dura¬ bility, and toughness and hardness combined, cuir bouilli is superior to wood, gutta-percha, or any other material. Objects equal to those, now rarely seen except at museums, may be made for a few shillings, for all that is required is a supply of cheap leather and leather- waste, old newspapers, wood, sheet brass, paste, glue, and tools. Beyond this, skill in manipu¬ lating it, so as to be able to model and mould it like wax, must be acquired, and this may be attained after a few days’ practice. Stencilling is an easy but effective art, and it would be well if the travelling workers who roam over the country could be prevailed upon to take up this form of art, and travel from village to village as cheap art decorators. It may be said that stencilling is a very low form of art, but this is only the case when bad patterns are supplied. The patterns sup¬ plied by the Home Arts and Industries Association are excellent, and the effects of them could only be good. By stencilling in distemper on coarse canvas

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174 In the Wild West. or linen, curious imitations of old tapestry lor portieres ■or curtains may be produced, and would become very popular amongst the masses. Basket-making, again, is easily learned, and although excellent raw materials may be obtained in our own country, all the liner qualities for basket-work come from abroad, where regular schools exist, and village school children are taught the art. Women and children are most engaged in this industry. Those who recollect the Exhibition of 1851 must be struck with the progress England has made in in¬ dustrial art since that time. Then the art was in little better than a state of barbarism, and the condition of public taste was very low. In labourers’ cottages, nondescript articles, called ornaments, were to be seen, which certainly were not so far advanced in art as are many of the works of the Fiji Islanders The good work of the Association is at length beginning to be felt, and the humanising effect it has already produced on those attending the classes is highly gratifying. We are all aware that the one characteristic which marks the English people is their intense love of home, and all in our power should therefore be done to render our abodes worthy of that little word home..” We have not implanted in each of our natures one special design, for which no training or preparatory education is required for its development, as in the case of such humble little workers as the bee and the spider. No one can help admiring the work per¬ formed unaided by rule or visible guide in the honey¬ cell of the bee and the net of the spider. There is displayed a miraculous accuracy of form, approaching to mathematical correctness, and a marvellous adapta¬ tion to the circumstances of their surroundings. There is no bargaining between one and the other of these little workers, either as to the alteration of the plan or a blending or compounding of one design with the other. Men, on the other hand, are by nature imitators. The Greeks left behind magnificent examples, which we certainly do not excel, although we have their ex¬ perience and labours to aid us. The accumulated experience of the masters should, however, not be ignored. Wherever progress has been made it has always been in the direction to which the old ways led. Design and workmanship have risen to a higher point, not when materials and tools have been de¬ spised, but when apter, fitter, and more sympathetic treatment has been adopted, when more idiomatic expression has been found. Popular interest in these minor arts appears to be growing, and there is some ground for hope that the change may be lasting, inasmuch as it is a recurrence to the catholic appreciation of the arts, which has characterised all periods when art has thriven. The Home Arts and Industrial Association are now as¬ sisted in their good work by the Recreative Evening Schools Association, whose desire it is to encourage social intercourse of an elevating character, by the opening of halls for girls and youths between the ages of thirteen and eighteen. They also hold attractive evening classes, and hope in time to prevent the enor¬ mous waste of money expended on our national system of education. IN THE WILD WEST. A STORY OF ADVENTURE. BY J. BERWICK HARWOOD, AUTHOR OF “ PAUL KNOX, PITMAN,^’ “WHAT THE CORAL REEFS GAVE ME,” ETC. CHAPTER THE FIFTH. R. JEFFREYS was as good as his word, and he and a sound con¬ stitution did pull me through the sharp attack of Missouri fever which I, in common with most natives of the North, had to un¬ dergo. The fever left me miser¬ ably wan and weak, and barely able to totter across the room with the support of Edith’s arm. I had, I found, to be thankful to the doctor not merely for his skilful treatment of my case, but for his prudence in preventing my wife from injuring her own health by too constant attend¬ ance upon me during the prevalence of the worst symptoms of the fever. My illness, however, was an unfortunate thing, for it left me feeble and fit for little work ; while, when the doctor and the nurse and the other expenses had been paid, there was not much left out of the hundred and fifty dollars that I had earned by planning and building the bridge at Ithaca Farm. There was the silk, to be sure, the price of which would some day drop in, but both Nash and the horse- reporter had warned me that I should act wisely in not stipulating for ready money payments on account of it. But I was myself out of the way, unluckily, of earn¬ ing ready money. With my blanched cheek and shaking limbs I could scarcely hope to back and break in Harris the horse-dealer’s half-tamed steeds, nor was I able to superintend the repairs of unroofed barns or crazy dwelling-houses leagues off, among swamp and forest. Now and then, as my hand grew steadier, I could sketch a mausoleum for Ephraim Hucks at the stoneyard, and once I earned thirty dollars by de¬ signing an extension to the State gaol, but it was seldom that an opportunity for exerting any skill I may have possessed in a strictly professional capacity presented itselt. I scarcely could tell where to turn for the means of tiding on at this period of my life. As accountant, artist, or engineer, I did manage at spasmodic inter¬ vals to pick up a few dollars ; while Edith continued

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In the Wild West. 175 to give music lessons to the rare pupils whose parents desired such an accomplishment for their daughters. But I have often, as 1 loitered beside the Yellow River, envied the negro crews of the broad-horns as they went by laden with maize, madder, or tobacco, and singing blithely as they trimmed the sail or plied the oars of their boat. The editor of the Argus, who had long since, to use his own expression, buried the hatchet so far as 1 was concerned, and who never failed to greet me amicably when we met, would have been willing to enrol me among his literary helpers ; but I could never con¬ quer the prejudice against provincial journalism which I had imbibed during my brief connection with the unlucky Banner of Freedom, while I invariably failed in getting my contributions to New York periodicals printed and paid for. “ Why don’t you ask Lycurgus Parsons, of Ithaca, to loan you a few hundred dollars, just to rub along till your silkworms come to be to you what hogs and Indian corn are to him?” demanded old Captain Bates, who took an interest in my pet project, and who had often dropped in to see the worms revelling in the cool mulberry-leaves, and to admire the patient gen¬ tleness with which my wife cared for their welfare. The money would be but a flea-bite to Parsons, and you’d pay it back easy when you get your second crop of silk — which I guess should be a thumping one, if all goes well with the eggs.” I had an almost invincible repugnance, however, to borrowing what I might never be in a position to re-fund ; and I shrank, too, from seeming to presume on the service which 1 had accidentally been able to render to the farmer and his family on the occasion of the night attack of Daly and his gang ; and I could see that the old buffalo-hunter, though he ridiculed my scruples as the high-falutin’ nonsense of a Britisher, secretly respected them. “ I’d advance you the tin myself, squire, and make no bones about it,” he said, more than once ; “ but I am living on an annuity, as I think you know, and have just the wherewithal to make both ends meet. But I’d speak to Lycurgus for you — or write to him — any day, if you can’t make up your mouth to ask a favour that he’d be glad to grant.” From such an expedient, however, I was preserved by the receipt, at the expiration of three months, of cheques in payment of my small consignments of silk to the North. Better still, the Philadelphia firm with which my chief dealings had been, wrote me word that they were greatly pleased with the quality of my American -grown silk, would take a fresh supply to any amount, and should it be convenient, would make me a moderate advance of cash from time to time, say to the value of one-third of the estimated harvest. The words swam before my eyes as 1 read them, so over¬ joyed was I, for now I felt that unless some unfore¬ seen misfortune should dash the cup from my lips, I was saved, and so was dear Edith, from the pressure of poverty in a strange land. Of course I gratefully wrote in recognition of the kindness of my business correspondents, and accepted their offer. I waited. however, to avail myself of it until I should ascertain the amount of the new hatch and the prospects of the brood. Should all go well, a considerable crop of the costly raw material might be looked for, so great — as compared with the packet of eggs sent out from Dorsetshire — was now the quantity of silken seed in store. There was plenty to do as the winter months went by, and we began to anticipate the coming season for our silkworms. Last year’s cages were all too few, and there was need to hang up shelves for the accommo¬ dation of the new worms, in the making of which weeks were spent ; and also to add to the verandah by build¬ ing a shed of light woodwork, roofed with cane-thatch, which I chose as keeping out the sun’s heat better than an ordinary shingled roof could do. Fresh ar¬ rangements too were made for ventilating the rooms in which the worms were to pass the night, and a daily supply of mulberry-leaves— too heavy for Black Sophy to carry in her hand- basket as before— had also to be secured. Now that things seemed to be progressing more smoothly, Edith was able at last to write more explicit letters to her old home than she had hitherto ventured to do ; and the answers which she received from her father and sisters, full of sympathy as they were, showed how little they had conjectured to what a pass we had at one time been reduced, and by what a slender bridge, so to speak, we had contrived to cross the gulf of ruin. I was anxious yet, though my dear wife was sanguine as to our success. “ We must recollect, my darling,” said I prudently, “ that the basketful of glass is not yet sold, and that Alnaschar is not as yet housed in his palace and happily married to the daughter of the Grand Vizier. Silk, though a very profitable, is also you know a very precarious crop. Suppose a disease, such as sometimes devastates the great magnaneries, as they call them in Italy or France, were to break out among our worms ? ” Edith held up her hands in horror, and insisted, with feminine logic, that no such thing should be allowed to happen. The care which we should take of the tiny creatures would prevent that. “But, Edith, love,” I replied, “we must not have all our eggs, as the homely proverb calls it, in one basket, or pin our faith entirely on the good results I hope will accrue from our scheme. I must not suffer those around me to forget, while I feed the silkworms, that I am a civil engineer and surveyor, the rather that I have been asked to assist in the affair of repairing the town wharf and landing-stage on the strength of what I did at Ithaca. Nor must I let you, darling, weary yourself in perpetual attendance on our crawling flock, which will be very numerous nOw. We must have help of some sort.” Such help, however, as I felt to be requisite at the pinch was not readily to be discovered. The coloured folks who did most of the work at Jefferson would be useless where silkworms or, indeed, delicate live stock of any sort were concerned. A negress can almost always cook, and makes an excellent sick-nurse where

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In the Wild West. 176 “‘guess you kinder got a scare,’ grimly remarked CAPTAIN bates.” a white invalid has to be cared for, but to hand over dumb creatures to her tutelage with any expectation of success would be to put undue credence in African human nature. Black Sophy was a warm-hearted creature, and attached to Edith and myself, but she would have considered anything good enough for the “ dratted worms, as 1 have heard her call them, with no intention to offend, while Edith and I were slaving for their comfort. “ I was thinking,” said I one day, when I came in from the garden, where I had been tending the lettuces, now more thickly planted than ever, in anti¬ cipation of the silkworms, whose first food they were to be, ‘‘that our washerwoman — or more correctly, washerman — might help us to what we want in the shape of some countrymen of his own.” “What! Chang- Sing, the Chinaman.^” exclaimed my wife, in surprise. “Why not?” I answered, smiling, for I had thought the matter over quietly, and was pleased with the idea. “ Chang-Sing is himself, as you know, a capital substi¬ tute for a laundress, sends home the linen white and well folded, makes no mistakes in the washing bill, and is, in fact, an honest and obliging fellow. Depend on it, he knows all about scores of other natives of the Flowery Land, now crowding into the cheap labour market, in spite of ill-usage and popular antipathy. Chinamen can do more than wash, and make good servants when once one gets over one’s early prejudice against their pigtails and curved finger-nails. There is old Mr. Curtis — Senator Curtis — in Washington Street, who has none but Chinese domestics now to do the housework ; and Mrs. Curtis, when I met her the other day, was quite enthusiastic in her praise of their neat-handed ways and attentive service.” “But they do look so dreadfully sly !” protested Edith, with a shudder that she could not repress. However, she allowed herself to be persuaded, and I had my desired interview with Chang-Sing. That pig¬ tailed personage, who happened, as it was a red-letter day in the Buddhist calendar, to be attired in his best robe of plum-coloured satin, as he burned little sticks of incense on a miniature altar in bronze before a veiled idol that was dimly visible in its little gilded niche, looked at me with inscrutable eyes as I stated my wishes, and then expressed his willingness to further them. “You see, master,” he said urbanely enough, “you ought to have topside servant, no bobbery make, steal never, and with not too much wages be content. Think I know — sure 1 do — sort of boy would suit master, not long from China ; write me word from New Orleans, to ask me get him good place. His family very top¬ side good people in Yun Nan, my own province. Eng- Sin good boy, piecey clever, quite careful, and got his young brother, Chung — fourteen years old — with him. You get the two, sir, cheap, and so two good servants, for less than what one Irish Paddy want paid to him.” And it certainly appeared, on further inquiry, that Eng-Sin and his brother Chung, who were respect¬ ably connected and well-behaved specimens of their nation, would enter my service on very low terms in¬ deed, so frugal are the habits of a Chinaman on his promotion. The cost of their journey would, it seemed, be small, and I was assured that they were plastic enough to turn their hands to anything. The washerman’s letter was despatched, and in a fortnight Eng and Chung were at Jefferson, just before the silkworms emerged from the flat eggs. Edith, for my sake, m.anaged to dissemble any prejudice ; but Black Sophy regarded the new-comers with undis¬ guised dislike. Most intelligent and eager to please were they, gliding to and fro noiselessly, and plump and sleek on board wages that would have been scorned by the roughest Irishman. Even Edith was not so tender in handling the delicate young silk¬ worms as were our Celestials, the elder of whom had been used to tend and feed them in his native pro¬ vince. Once, with all our care, a mortality broke out ; but by isolating the survivors from the other cages we checked the progress of the disease. “ Guess you kinder got a scare,” grimly remarked Captain Bates, the buffalo-hunter, as he watched our pig-tailed helpers, in their blue robes and crimson slippers, deftly brushing their sleek charges from one mulberry - leaf to another. “Sheep give a farmer many a sleepless night, and so do cattle ; but these soft things are daintier than so many babies, I calculate.” Yet, on the whole, the worms throve, and the silk which I was presently able to send to market brought in a considerable sum of money, and thus rendered me

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In the Wild West. 177 able to try a new investment, and one which I had every reason to hope would prove more substantial than my ill-fated speculation as sub-editor and part proprietor of the Ba?iner of Freedo^n. CHAPTER THE SIXTH. Again a partnership was proposed to me, and this time the offer was of a bona fide character. It was on the part of my former employer, Seth Harris, the horse-dealer, whose rough-rider, when pinched by poverty, I had been glad to be, and who was admitted by all to be a respectable citizen and moneyed man. Mr. Harris was stricken in years, however, and could no longer conduct the outlying portion of his business as actively as of old, while he had faith in my un¬ worthy self. “ I’d rather have you, Mr. Prescott, for my partner,” he said, “ than any chap from here to Memphis. The terms are simple. You put down ten thousand dollars — you made twelve, you know, by them worms of yours — and undertake the travelling jobs, and you shall have one-third of the swag for yourself. That’s fair, ain’t it? seeing I have fifty thousand, if I’ve a red cent, embarked in the business — a pretty profit¬ able one, as you know.” That the business, carefully managed, did bring in large profits, I knew well, and I was also aware that the proposal was a liberal one. I ended by accepting it ; and though Edith expressed some apprehensions for my personal safety when among wild scenes and lawless people, I comforted her by pointing out that Mr. Harris, at any rate, had reached old age without coming to harm, and I anticipated a period, not very remote, when I should be rich enough to buy land, and live under the shadow, literally, of my own vines, which succeed well in Missouri. In the meantime the articles of partnership were signed, the money paid over, and my senior in the firm explained to me the nature of my first mission. “ We — I say we, neighbour, now that you and I are in the same boat — have got a thumping order to execute, and this time Uncle Sam himself will be our paymaster. Government ain’t princely about price, but the heavy dollars are there down on the nail, and I reckon the gain on this bargain will be main worth our notice, once the nags are delivered at the Fort. Every dealer in the State would have jumped at it ; but, as luck would have it, the officials had heard of old Seth Harris.” The order, it seemed, was for nothing less im¬ portant than the re-mount of the Second United States Cavalry, then stationed at Fort Webster, for the protection of the frontier from Indian raids. The Major of the regiment, accompanied by a Commissary - General, was then in Jefferson to choose the animals required for that purpose, and he had almost come to terms with Mr. Harris, who happened to have at that moment an unusual amount of live stock at his disposal. Should the agreement be ratified, subject to the approbation of the Lieutenant-Colonel in command, I should have to travel with the “ mob ” of horses to Fort Webster, there to sign a receipt to the United States, and receive payment in cash. Next day I was introduced to Major Hawkins, a stout red-faced veteran, remark¬ ably silent for an American, and tightly buttoned up in his braided military frock, in spite of the heat of the weather. Very different was the administrative officer who accompanied him. Commissary-General Clay was a pleasant-spoken and cheerful-looking gentleman, with very white teeth and a perpetual smile. He was a dandy, too, and wore glittering trinkets, and a satin waistcoat, and the most spotless of kid gloves. We soon did come to terms as to the horses, v/hich were, in truth, a fine herd of animals — young and sound and strong, and well worth their price. The Commissary, who made up for the taciturnity of his companion by chirping like a canary-bird, assured me that the Colonel’s consent to purchase was a mere formality, once the selection had been made by competent judges like the Major and himself. In two days’ time I had bidden Edith good-bye, and we had started on our long ride across the leagues of prairie that lay between Jefferson and the Fort. Be¬ sides the old trapper who was to act as our guide, the two Government officials, and myself, there were four mounted men armed with long whips to drive the horses ; none of these was of the same nationality as his comrades. There was Irish Mike, a deserter from some British regiment in Canada, and who served us more faithfully than he had done the Queen: a muscular fellow, bold as a bull-dog, but not overburdened with brains. There was a lathy lad from Kentucky who “ ‘ we’ve traitors IX THE CAMP, TOO ! ’ ” {p. I78). 732

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In the Wild West. 178 measured six-feet two in his stockings, and whose name was Saul Perks. Then there was a florid young German, Hans Muller, who had been a Bursch and a clerk, and now was glad to earn our pay. And lastly, there was a tall Osage stripling, known as Indian Jack. This Jack was my especial henchman and satellite, since an Indian is capable of strong feelings of grati¬ tude as well as of resentment ; and I had chanced to save him in a village street some twenty miles from Jefferson, three months before, from the tender mercies of a gang of drunken rowdies, who were about to kill and scalp him for no offence but the colour of his skin, but whom I contrived to conciliate by half-jesting speeches and prodigal expenditure, until at length they permitted me to carry off their captive safe and sound. It was the fourth evening of our camping out, after a long and weary march beneath a burning sky and sun. Our well-earned supper was over, the horses had been heedfully tethered among the long coarse grass, and we were lying round our smouldering camp fires, smoking or preparing for rest, wrapped in blankets or bleached buftalo-hides, as fancy prescribed. There is a certain charm and freedom in this gipsy life which for a time enables one to scoff at hardship and fatigue ; and then, too, the most of our journey was performed, since two days more would bring us to the Fort. 1 was sinking into a doze when I felt the touch of light fingers on my wrist. “Hist! Master, it is I!” whispered someone in my ear. I opened my eyes. Jack, the Indian lad, was bend¬ ing over me, but before I descried his copper-coloured face I knew him by his mode of address. I was the only white on whom he bestowed the title of Master. He now seemed strangely agitated for one of his im¬ passive race. “ Master ! ” he hissed out cautiously, laying his finger on his lips by way of warning to me to reply in as low a tone. “ Bad men — very bad — yonder I ” And he jerked his thumb expressively towards the part of our bivouac where, as I knew, the Commissary and the Major had taken up their quarters. “Them have forked tongue. Lucky Jack near, or horses gone, and we all lose.” He made a second expressive gesture here, by draw¬ ing his hand around his head, just beneath the roots of the long black hair he wore. “You come speak to trapper ! He tell you better than Jack can tell.” I obeyed without a word of remonstrance or inquiry, for the boy’s earnest manner showed that something serious must have occurred. Under the .shadow of a mass of white soapstone rock, which cropped abruptly up from the turf of the prairie, I found the guide, Jethro Hett, gravely puffing at his long pipe of Indian make. This old trapper had been recommended by Captain Bates as one whose life had been spent in the wilderness, and who might prove useful in the hour of need Jethro Hett had a contempt for townsmen, but to me, of whose share in the defence of the farmhouse he had heard from his friend Bates, he was civil from the fir.st- He said nothing now, but continued to smoke, await¬ ing my question. “ Something wrong, eh, Mr. Hett? I fear so, by the boy’s report.” The trapper allowed the blue spirals of smoke to rise curling from his bearded lips before he made answer. “ Phew ! Yes ! Ef robbery’s wrong, ef mur¬ der’s wrong, yew may bet your boots. Mister, thet there’s something amiss. Thank your stars. Squire, and thank the sharp ears of that young redskin, if we keep our hair on our heads, and if them horse-beasts ain’t toted off into Texas to be got across the Rio Grande and sold in Mexico.” “Are we in danger of some Indian attack, then?” I began. “ Worse than that I ” impatiently exclaimed the guide. “ I’d sooner meet any band — Comanches or Arapahoes — than hev to deal with those who’ll be upon us afore day-dawn. We’ve traitors in the camp, too 1 ” And as he spoke he pointed with his pipe towards the quarter where I knew that the two United States officials were bivouacking. “A Commissary-General — and a Major!” said I, hesitating. “ Clap a lamb’s skin on the shoulders of a wolf, and yet he’ll hev his teeth. Mister, won’t he ?” growled out the trapper. “ Them two madder-dyed, all-fired villains hev no more to do with Government, Squire, than Jack there. They are just decoy-ducks for the gang of one yevv’ve mebbe heard of— Baker, the West Texan outlaw — he that boasts he’s killed twenty-nine white men with his own hand, let alone niggers by the dozen. He and his men are nearer now. Squire, than it’s pleasant to think of.” I had heard of this notorious captain of horse-thieves •as one of the most bloodthirsty miscreants on the frontier, but it was difficult to imagine him a con¬ federate of plausible, white-handed Mr. Clay. The trapper, however, proceeded to give me a suffi¬ ciently clear explanation of how matters stood. Some chance word between the pair of smooth-spoken rogues, overheard by Indian Jack, had caused the lad first to listen to their conversation and then to warn the guide, who had learned long ago from his red associates how to crawl through the grass, so as to approach the camp fire without his presence being detected. Jethro Hett had heard enough to justify the worst apprehensions. It was clear that the impostors who had pretended to be bound for Fort Webster merely wished to allure us, with our valuable convoy of horses, within reach of Captain Baker and his marauding gang. These desperadoes, partly consisting of outlawed white men and partly of their Indian allies, were capable of any atrocity, while their leader’s favourite maxim was that “ Dead men tell no tales.” We should be butchered, if surprised, and the horses— worth some thousands of pounds sterling — would be hurried off over the plains and across Texas, for sale in the markets of Mexico. “Sure as death, Mister, it’s for to-night. About an

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In the Wild West. hour oefore sunrise I guess is the likeliest,” was the cheerful conclusion of the old trapper. What was to be done ? We talked the matter over long and earnestly, calling Indian Jack into our council of war, but no plan seemed quite right. Yet a counter¬ plot of some sort was necessary, or we should simply be overpowered by numbers, and slaughtered like so many sheep. What was to be done ? We might awaken the men, saddle our steeds, and slip quietly away, leaving the rich booty at the mercy of the plunderers. But that would have been cowardly in itself, and unfair to Mr. 179 which the trapper hearkened to with increasing seri¬ ousness. “One of the scamps,” he said pithily, “is off— reckon it’s to meet Baker. It’s the skunk that calls himself Clay, and he has gone on foot, for Jack trailed his prints across the parara. The other lies still, sham¬ ming sleep. What’s worse, they’ve given our chaps drink— hocussed liquor, 1 guess. The Paddy snores like a hog, and so does young Saul. We must rouse ’em, though ; for we want every finger that can pull a trigger.” The trouble which it cost us to awaken Irish Mike “of the front rank, three were INDIANS” (/. l8o). Harris, my partner, who had entrusted our joint pro¬ perty to my care. No good was to be done by taxing the spies with their guilt, since already, no doubt, our exact position was known to the ruffians about to swoop down on our camp. The most hopeful project appeared to be to get ready for resistance, and to pre¬ pare an ambuscade, so that the assailants, not we, should be taken by surprise. And this was agreed to. The trapper, who spoke the Osage language fluently, said a few words to Jack, and the lad nodded silently, and slipped off like a snake through the tall grass. “I just sent him to scout round. Squire,” explained the old man. “ His moccasins, like mine, make no noise on the turf.” Jack presently returned. “ Bad, Master, bad ! ” he said ruefully to me, and then made a much longer speech in his own tongue, and Saul Perks from their drunken sleep, and the difficulty of making the idea of our pressing peril take root in their bewildered brains, can hardly be appre¬ ciated by those who have not gone through a similar experience. At last, however, our two patients were able to shake off the stupefaction caused by the nar¬ cotic, and to stagger to their feet. The German, Muller, had fortunately refused the offered whisky, and showed more coolness and courage than 1 should have credited him with. “One can die but once, you see. Mein Herr.” was his philosophical remark, as he buckled on hi. belt and pouch, and tried the lock of his pistol. We were all well armed, according to Western fashion — that is, with rifle, bowie-knife, and revolver, without which it v/ould have been madness to venture forth so far upon the plains. But here again the shrewdness of the old

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i8o In the Wild West. trapper did good service. Without saying a word, he picked up and examined the weapons of Mike and Saul. “ 1 thought as much— the thieving, skulking curs ! ” muttered he, as he showed me grimly that the arms had been tampered with. The charges had all been drawn, and carefully replaced by blank cartridges, the discharge of which would probably have been received with mocking laughter by Baker and his band. How¬ ever, we had plenty of good gunpowder and honest lead, and the pieces were soon ready for a struggle that we foresaw would not be child^s play. The next question was, What was to be done with the remaining spy, Hawkins ? Mike, who was enraged at the double trick that had been played him, and whose brains were still on fire with the alcohol he had swallowed, proposed shooting him through the head ; and Jack fingered the light tomahawk that swungfrom his belt, and looked inquiringly at me. But Jethro and I agreed that his punishment must be left to the law, but that no time should be lost in depriving him of the power to do mischief. As might have been expected, the knave proved a poltroon of the first water. His purple complexion blanched to pallor when taxed with his treachery, and he offered no resistance when we proceeded to disarm and bind him hand and foot. By Jethro’s advice, he was also gagged. The trail of the false Commissary-General Clay, whose footprints Indian Jack had traced for some distance, pointed out from which quarter the an¬ ticipated attack would be made. And I could well believe the dictum of the experienced trapper, that the most probable hour for the assault was a little before the dawn. By Jethro’s advice, we laid fuel on the camp fires, so that the red glow might, for a long time to come, be perceptible to those approaching, and then moved on into the prairie, and proceeded to select our ground. Some quarter of a mile away we found a hollow between two rolling sweeps of the undulating ground, well adapted to our purpose, as being full of stones and rough brushwood. “Couldn’t do better! These boulders and the sumach-bushes and buffalo-thorns will give us good shelter against horse,” pronounced our Mentor-— “ Better lying for an ambush in the plains couldn’t well be ! ” We had a long time to wait. We conversed spar¬ ingly and in whispers ; but it was necessary to prevent any of our small party from going to sleep before the arrival of our rough visitors. I thought of Edith, and the recollection of her dear face and her love for me nerved me to do my best. The stars were beginning to wear a wan, sickly look, prelude to the dawn, when old Jethro came creeping to my side. “Hist, Squire !’’ he said; “Jack has heard the hoofs of their horses far off in the prairie, and, after a minute, I, whose ears were sharper once, heard the tramp, too. Here comes Jack, to lie behind this grey rock, and fight by his master s side. We 11 be at it soon. Now, Squire, I know you’re clear grit, but there’s sense as well as manhood goes to win a muss of this sort. They are three, or mebbe four, to our one ; but I don’t believe there’s a fel¬ low of the lot is right-out dangerous, ’cept Captain Baker himself. Cut - throats as they are, they’d rather fight than be fought. He alone is real grit, as strong and as tough as a grizzly bear. Yew’ll know him — wears a Mexican poncho and Spanish hat, and rides in front — a big forty-five-year-old man, with a red beard. Only hit hz7?i^ and the rest won t stand— see if they do 1 You can shoot, I know— so could I, but my hand and eye don’t draw a bead as fine as once — but mind, the bit of lead deserves a blessing that rids the country of Barnabas Baker!’ Soon, too, did my ears distinguish the dull thud of coming hoofs on the thick turf of the prairie, nor was it long before the enemy appeared. They came on,, six abreast, some eighteen strong. Of the front ranky three were Indians, of the Kiowa tribe, so Jethro whispered, judging by their painted faces and plumed heads, and these were armed with spears. But conspicuous above all was a middle-aged man,, of towering stature, wearing a Spanish sombrero and faded suit of green velvet and silver, and whose shaggy red beard, restless blue eyes, and air of reck¬ less ferocity reminded me of the description of the captain of^ horse-thieves. “ That’s Baker ! ” said the trapper cautiously. The robber chief had his short rifle slung at his back, but in his hand he bore a heavy revolver, while the brass-mounted butts of two more were discernible in his broad belt, and at his side hung a huge knife in its leathern sheath. The two white men who were also in front were simi¬ larly armed, but less fancifully attired, wearing the red flannel shirts and slop clothes of ordinary miners or herdsmen. “ Hurroosh ! ” most inopportunely shouted Mike, rising from behind a stone and discharging his gun into the thick of the foe. A yell of pain and rage proved that the shot had told ; but our ambush was now revealed, and with savage cries the maraudeis came charging down upon us. The poor Irishman paid the penalty of his rashness, for a shot from Baker’s revolver stretched him on the earth ; while my own neck was grazed by a thrust from the spear of the Kiowa warrior nearest me : an attention which I returned by sending a bullet through his heart ; while Jack fired and killed the mustang on which the robber captain was mounted, and two more of the assailants dropped gasping from their saddles before the fire of Jethro and our other two men. What followed has always seemed to me more like some horrid dream than actual experience : the bang, bang of the firearms, mingled with the war- whoop of the savages and the furious yells and impre¬ cations of their white allies. 1 remember that Captain Baker, whose bat had fallen off, and whose broad forehead streamed with blood, singled me out in the scuffle, and made a dash at me, clutching me in such a grip as I had never before felt, and doing his best to bear me down. His strength was wonderful, and 1 was all but overpowered, while the look of cruel triumph in the robber’s eyes indicated confidence in

Page 192

Pictures of the Months. an easy victory, when crash, crash, came down Jack’s tomahawk on his bare head, and he staggered and re¬ laxed the grasp of his left hand. I profited by it to draw my pistol and fire. “ Whoop, mates ! Baker’s killed ! ” bawled out old Jethro in a voice that was heard above the din of the affray. No announcement could have produced a happier effect. The assailants gave a cry of dismay, wavered, broke, and fled as fast as their mustangs could carry them across the prairie. The panic was complete. The trapper had been quite correct when he asserted that the robber captain was the only really brave man in the band. When day dawned, not a trace could be seen of the surviving enemy. We had lost but one life, that of poor Mike the Irishman, who had been shot through the head at the com¬ mencement of the fight, and whom we left sleeping in his shallow grave, such as we could contrive to dig with our knives and hatchets. In a pocket of Captain Baker’s velvet coat, with its silver bell-buttons, made originally, no doubt, for some Mexican dandy, were found letters fully proving the complicity of Messrs. Clay and Hawkins with the West Texan outlaw, and the nature of the plot in which he and they had been concerned. And very severe indeed was the sentence passed by the Supreme Court on Mr. John Parker Robinson, alias Hawkins, when he was put upon his trial for fraud, robbery, and attempted murder, soon after our return to Jefferson. That return, I need hardly say, i8i was welcomed by all who knew the story, and partook of the nature of a triumphal entry as we came in, sun¬ burnt and weary, but bringing back with us every one of the rescued horses and our prisoner, whose wrists were fastened together with a cord of which the other end was secured to Indian Jack’s saddle. The pseudo major confessed all before he was sentenced to twenty years’ imprisonment in the State gaol. He had really, it seemed, been once an officer in the small army of the United States, but had been disgracefully dismissed for peculation, and had sunk at last to the position of a decoy-duck for Baker and his band. His accomplice. Clay — whose real name, it appeared, was Pell — had fol¬ lowed many callings, and had been auctioneer and preacher, keeper of a gambling-house and manager of a theatre, before he became connected with the gang of the West Texan outlaw. On this occasion he escaped chastisement, but had to fly the country, as had also the surviving members of the band, while I received, perhaps, an undue amount of praise for having freed the West from a standing source of terror. All has thriven with me since that day, and three years later, when the partnership was dissolved by the death of Mr. Harris, I found myself rich enough, to Edith’s delight, to purchase vineyards and sugar plan¬ tations, and have since led an uneventful life ; though my faithful follower, Indian Jack, is still in my em¬ ployment, and, indeed, would scarcely consent in this lower world of ours to be separated from his master, now generally known as “ Squire ” Prescott. PICTURES OF THE MONTHS. February. cji GLINT of blue in the winter sky ; Soft airs unlocking the frozen stream. And stirring the sap in the elm-trees high A maiden stands in the sunny gleam. And plucks the snowdrops wild of tlie wood ; Shy flowers, like the thoughts of maidenhood.

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i82 SONG. Words by J. T. Burton Wollaston. _ ^ _ _ Voice. IFt Music by Erskine A.llon. zee izzzii: ;z: When I would see Poco Aiidante. Piano. ^ vip '/'N “ ' -4- . _ ^ • M — 1 J J ,5^ — l1^ The fair - est stars that =i^i m

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mf 183

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184 WHAT TO WEAR IN FEBRUARY. CHIT-CHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR PARIS AND LONDON CORRESPONDENTS. I. — FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. HE all-important ques¬ tion in dress at the present moment is not so much what to wear as how to wear the clothes which Fashion renders imperative. There are as many styles as there are gar¬ ments, and as many different cuts as there are bodices. In the initial letter to this chapter you see quite a new departure. It requires much guess- ing, promoted by ex¬ perience, to tell where this said bodice fastens. It looks as if it had grown on the well-shaped figure. Uniformity is quite dis¬ carded now. No two sides of any garment are ever alike. This particular dress is made in a fine green cloth, falling apparently in an unbroken line from the neck to the hem, and yet adapted perfectly to the waist and bust. It is trimmed with beaver, which encircles the throat, and on one side simulates a jacket-front ; but on one side only, as though the wearer had omitted to slip the arm through the other half of the jacket. There are two sleeves : one tight and perfectly plain, the other oblong and pendent, showing a red silk lining, of that particular tone of red which closely trenches on pink ; and the beaver is carried round the hanging sleeve. There is one point, however, which deserves special attention, viz., the height and fulness given on the shoulder by the ar¬ rangement of this over-sleeve, which crosses, and is united almost to the elbow, where it is allowed to flow open. The hat worn with this costume is large, with a broad brim standing up above the face, the crown low, and covered with feathers— for ostrich-plumes are much in demand just now. Crossing bodices are the fashion, and ladies with Slender figures, at all events, cannot object to them, for they are essentially graceful, and most becoming. The sketch given here of a very good example would be easy to make by a home dressmaker. In Paris just now there is a great feeling for fabrics made in winter colours and Oriental mixtures ; and many of the woollen stuffs have patterns inspired by Indian shawls, which everybody admires, but no one now wears in their natural condition. On the next page is shown a dress made of silver-grey cloth, over a winter-coloured woollen fabric, which shows in the front of the skirt, forms the V-shape vest at the throat, constitutes the entire sleeve, and is used for the side pieces, both in the back and front of the bodice ; as also very prominent and long sash-ends, falling at the side in long tasselled ends. The rest of the dress closely resembles a coat, the skirt straight and plain, the bodice made to appear full by the manner in which the material is arranged to cross back and front. The left side is bordered with the coloured cloth, as though it were lined there¬ with, and turned over ; the collar is high and straight, and the sleeves have an epaulette, formed by a drapery of grey cloth on the top. The hat is large, made in grey velvet, with grey feathers ; a grey gauze veil bordered with lace — very light and transparent, but covering the face well — is tied over the hat. The velvet matches a long voluminous cloak, which a Frenchwoman removes be¬ fore she enters a room, and only wears out of doors. They seldom pay visits in the out-door garment, as so many Englishwomen do, sitting in a heated room over-clothed, face the wintry air again unprepared, and let in a store of colds, lasting often the entire winter. For walking, in contradistinction to driving, French¬ women choose garments which show off their figures to perfection, and in the other figure, which I have not yet described there is quite a new idea in capes, which, in this particular instance, is combined with a close-fitting jacket-bodice, apparently worn over a plain under-bodice. The dress is made in a soft, striped woollen— one of those silky fabrics which French weavers alone seem able to compass. The skirt is full and almost plain ; it has an extended apron front, bordered, like all the rest of the dress, with curled feather trimming to match. This edges the sleeves, the basque of the bodice, and the cape, and forms the pretty revers which are the distinguishing features of the costume. The hat is a simple felt, trimmed with ribbon and feathers. This is a useful article for hard wear and travelling, but is exactly suited to a young girl for general use in England. By-the-by, I notice that many of the daintiest party frocks worn by English children are sent over from here, but that layettes and other fine handiwork are despatched from London to France. There is not a better plain worker in the world than an English woman when she is good; but the indifferent needle¬ women are in the majority. In case a mother should be anxious to know how to make a stylish frock for girls above seven years old, I will describe a most elegant costume I have been admiring this morning, worn by the daughter of one of our leaders of style. The front of the bodice and skirt was soft grey silk, tucked perpendicularly to a depth of some six inches below the waist, and some five inches below the chin ; a grey pleated velvet sash confined the fulness at the waist ; a grey velvet band formed the collar. Then

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What to Wear in February. there was a Louis XV. coat, reaching to the hem, quite open, and apparently unfastened, made in an in¬ termediate shade of grey, neither so dark as the velvet nor so light as the silk. It appeared to be made in soft plush, with perpendicular hair-lines of silk close-set. The cuffs, flaps, pockets, and large revers at the neck were made of velvet, bordered with em¬ broidered galon, the same tone as the coat, the velvet being much darker. It was trim and stylish, and might be reproduced in plain woollen, or even in washing materials, as the season advances. We in Paris are always ahead of the fashions, and in England this style will probably be quite the mode for another year, at all events. II.— FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. Time was when a tea-gown was only a necessary portion of the wardrobe of a vmman of fashion. Now everybody has found out what a comfortable garment it is, and wears it on many varied occasions — but herein lies the distinction. Fashionable women adopt a certain make, generally of rich and costly materials, for home dinner wear, and less elaborate styles for five o’clock tea and lounging, donning such gowns when they return from their drive in town, or their brisk walk in the country. The rest of the world are too apt to receive their guests in London before, at, and after dinner, in too loose a make of garment, suggestive of a dressing-gown, which is a fault against good taste. The dress in my illustration might be worn on almost any occasion if a velvet collar and habit-shirt were slipped in under the neck of the bodice, which is cut rather too low for day wear. The model was made in em¬ broidered crepe de Chine, but it would be suitable for silk or for brocaded wool, or for watered silk intermixed with some of the many figured gauzes now sold. Note the arrange¬ ment of the skirt. It is full and plain at the back, forms a broad overlapping panel at the side, bordered with fringe, while the front is pleated and draped. A sash in pleats crosses the waist in front. The bodice is full beneath the loose jacket-fronts. These are edged with fringe, which appears again at the throat ; for fringe will be worn throughout the year. The sleeves are made on the new and improved principle of fulness ; coat-sleeves have been done to death. The material forms puffs at the shoulder, and is caught in above the wrist, where the sleeves are finished off with a double frill of lace, like the pagoda sleeves we used to wear some twenty years ago. The other dress in the sketch which ac¬ companies this article is well fitted for more general wear, and is a combination of light stone woollen and dark red cloth, which latter appears as a side panel, as a Swiss belt, and a Senorita jacket, all totally un¬ trimmed ; the colour is enforced by a double row of red buttons on the bodice and tight sleeves, which may be either of velvet or the vegetable ivory, which can be had to match almost any colour. A great deal of money is spent on buttons, and I saw the other day a boy’s suit worn at a wedding, fastened with paste buttons costing a pound each. It was for an only son, but I am afraid it was money which might have been better spent. Knitted stays have found much favour, as they yield to the figure, and are especially easy, pleasant wear to those who suffer from indigestion and other ailments, but they have never been pretty to look at made in wool. Now they have been brought out in silk, laced at the back as well as fastening in front, giving thereby ample means of freedom. They are somewhat costly. I saw these when I was trying to discover if any new ideas in hygienic clothing had been brought to fruition, and I found that much caie had been bestowed in producing a tiny vest in Shet¬ land wool for a baby, supple and fine as Queen Mab’s web, light, and very warm— exactly what such delicam specimens of humanity need. The buskin cloth is much favoured by those who make health in diess a first consideration. It is now to be had in all colours, and is, without doubt, very durable and very cheap, being wide. It is well suited to walking-gowns in town and m hard country wear. It is admirably adapted to the divided skirt, which, even with some of the more A C1I.\NCE ENCOUNTER.

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i86 What to Wear in February. energetic Frenchwomen, is finding favour. It is far more feminine than gaiters and knickerbockers worn by our sportswomen and many who spend the autumn in Scotland. The divided skin looks like any other if properly made— in two parts, each measuring four yards round. The skirts of the ordinary make, bound up to the depth of a quarter of a yard or more with coloured leather, are well suited for wearing just now : for example, a fawn and red check woollen, with deep red leather round, and red leather waistcoat and cuffs, the buttons match¬ ing. The red lea¬ ther binding can be cleansed and sponged free from mud at once, and yet is sightly. Such gowns are good to look at and good to wear. The colours a la mode this winter, and likely to be popular this spring, are more decided and vivid than have been seen of late. For example, a tea-gown of grey plush is lined with yellow silk, and opens over pink silk. A dinner- gown of Chartreuse silk is one of the most fashionable tints, and this is a vivid green, like young lettuce stalks. It blends with pink well, and shows through black spotted lace perhaps better than any other colour. In the day-time red gowns are still worn, and much light grey, with de¬ licate primrose or cream silk. Heliotrope and darker violet blend to¬ gether for day and evening wear, and make us all wish some invention may find approval that will make the London smoke self-consuming, for light tints and smoke are always bitter enemies. Tartans are to be seen on all sides, and they are treated in a novel way, viz., cut on the straight for the back breadth, and on the cross for all the rest of the skirt. The stuff can be turned to excellent ac¬ count in this way. The bodices with sucli dresses are generally made of plain cloth of the dominant tone. Seasons must have changed since our grand- EXPLANATIONS. mothers’ time. Now a cloth gown is serviceable all the year round, except perhaps the end of July and beginning of August. In June it is now often cold enough for fires, and few housekeepers can resolutely refuse to have a fire as soon as mid-spring is well advanced. Fifty years ago Englishwomen began wear¬ ing cottons and muslins early in May, and chimneys \^ere swept and fireplaces furnished, and in ordinary middle-class houses no one dreamed of lighting a fire till the autumn season came round again. Baby’s wardrobe is often a matter of interest. It is curious tha*. in Eng¬ land infants rarely^ if ever, wear caps, while abroad they mostly do, and pretty, dainty ones, too, composed of fine work and lace insertion, and closely pleated lace with bows of nar¬ row ribbon in front next the face. An old fashion has been revived, of long veils made of net edged with lace, which almost reach to the hem of the cloak ; and they throw back easily, being of such soft compressible neff Robes and cloaks do not differ much as years roll by. Corded silk is often now employed for the cloaks, which are wadded, and lined with a thinner make of silk ; but the capes are much deeper, and often bordered with thick embroidery upon muslin, and then appliqu^d on to the silk with a full frill of lace at the edge. A good method of trimming cots and babies’ baskets is to arrange so that the coverings are all slipped on together, and then they can easily be tied on. For the cot the curtains are quilted beneath a circle of material, and under this they are secured to the uprights ; all the rest of the covering consists of a wide lace-edged flounce for the outside, and some wadded stuff for inside — all in one, and tied on in a minute. In lieu of muslin, soft silk is mostly used, edged with lace. The basket is arranged on the same principle.

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i87 THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars respecting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge him.self to notice every article or work submitted. _ A Simple Mode of Exercise. cles of the frame are brought into play, adopted in many schools and gymnasia. The wood¬ cut illustrates a very simple and inexpen¬ sive device for exercising the eye and mus¬ cles in a chamber. It will be seen to consist merely of an elastic ball, tethered above and be¬ low ; but in dealing it blows and dodging its movements all the mus- It has been A Petroleum Miner’s Lamp. The Thorneburry miner’s lamp is an improvement on the older patterns in several respects. It gives a much better light to begin with, the flame being equi¬ valent to one and a half candles, whereas many of the older lamps yield only half a candle power. A heavy petroleum of high flashing point (250° Fahr.) is burnt ; and the arrangement is such that the lamp is self¬ extinguishing in currents of an explosive mixture of air and fire-damp. According to tests by Sir Frederick Abel and Professor Dewar, the light went out in a few minutes when the lamp was held in explosive currents having a velocity as high as fifty feet per second, or 3,000 feet per minute. The lamp is .simple in construction, and both the gauges and chimney can be inspected without unlocking it. Electricity and Light. Professor Hertz, of Vienna, has recently made a number of remarkable experiments tending to sup¬ port the theory of the late Cleik Maxwell, that light and electricity are both phenomena of the lumini¬ ferous ether. It has long been known that the velo¬ city of light — 192,000 miles a second — is about the same as the velocity of electricity. Professor Hertz, in experimenting on the discharge of Leyden jars and electrical machines, now shows that electric waves are produced in the ether by such discharges, which appear to be identical in kind with the waves of light, and differ only in dimensions. They are much greater than the waves of light ; but he thinks that if we could produce them of the same size, we should be able to make light. They can be reflected, refracted, and polarised, like the waves of light, and they are propagated through the ether with the same velocity. A New Lipped Saucepan. Cooks will be glad to hear of a new maslin saucepan that has just been patented by a Bewdley firm. It is cast entirely in a brass that is absolutely free from lead, and will not chip, break, or discolour, if fairly used. For boiling milk or cooking such dishes as blanc-manges or gravies, saucepans of this material ought to prove very serviceable and advantageous. The Syphon Water-Meter. Cowan’s syphon water-meter belongs to the class of “low-pressure” meters, and can be used either with a cistern or without. Our illustration shows the internal arrangement of the meter used with cisterns. The water is admitted, by the operation of a ball-valve, into the meter, as indicated by the arrow. It ^ passes by a re- | cipr o cat ing funnel, D, into one or other of two compart¬ ments, A B, of the meter. Each compart¬ ment has a syphon, which discharges it into the cis¬ tern. The out¬ let of each syphon is situated over a swing bucket, C, and as either end of this bucket is filled alternately by its corresponding syphon, the bucket rocks on its pivot, and works the reciprocating funnel so as to .fill each compartment. A, B, alternately, while at the same time it actuates the counters, E, and indicates the quantity of water received.

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i88 The Gatherer. The Phonograph and Hearing. M. Lichtwitz, a French savant^ has suggested the use of the new Edison phonograph by aurists to test the hearing powers of their patients. The phonograph can utter all the sounds of speech, and the loudness can be graduated, while all the instruments are made 'alike, so that results obtained in one place are com¬ parable with those of another. It is proposed to form phonograms into an acoumetric scale for the examina¬ tion of the hearing. Another suggestion with regard to this ingenious instrument is that the appearance of an orator in delivering a speech might be preserved in a series of lightning photographs, say ten a second, and reproduced by a magic lantern while a phonograph is uttering the speech, so that posterity might have a fair idea of the manner of its delivery. A New Handle for Crockery. The accompanying woodcut represents a new form of handle introduced by Mr. F. W. White. It is designed to supersede the old open handle in such vessels as require considerable force to lift and sustain. Our readers, on reflection, will call to mind several vessels which cannot be conveniently raised and held up without putting the thumb into the lip of the vessel as well, a practice sometimes objectionable. The new handle avoids all necessity of touching the rim of the vessel. The illustration shows how the han¬ dle is formed, and the manner of grasp¬ ing it ; the thumb getting the necessary purchase on a lip moulded on the han¬ dle itself. This handle has some other advantages ; it is not liable to be knocked off, or broken, and it affords good leverage in holding. Apart from household purposes, it may be useful to chemists, grocers, and others. A Cipher Type-Writer. A type-writer which can at will be caused to print a message in cipher without any trouble to the writer has been recently brought out. The machine is small in size and comparatively simple in make. When it is desired to write the message in cipher, that is to say as a cryptogram, the pointer P in the figure is moved by the stud D to right or left as the case may be, and the relations of the types are thu> changed, so that in working the instrument in the ordinary way, a different set of the types to that of the message is substituted. The recipient of the cipher messages must know how to set the pointer of his instrument to correspond with the sending machine, and then by copying the cipher message in his machine he gets the true message of the sender. The plan admits of only four changes, but the types themselves are movable and can be placed in any order, and thus a great variety of ciphers can be introduced. The printing is effected by the studs A and B, while the spacing is controlled by C. The Nampa Image. The image of a man recently brought up to the surface from a bore-hole 320 feet deep, at the Nampa station of the Oregon Short Line Railroad in Idaho, is believed by some to be the earliest specimen of human handiwork yet found. ’ It is carved in pumice stone, which has become covered with a coat of red oxide ol iron, and its general^ppearance will be gathered from our illustration. According to Mr. Emmons, of the United States Geological Survey, the sand-beds in which the curio was found have been formed by the damming of the Snake River by a flood of lava ; and these beds have subsequently been covered by a stratum of lava, through which the bore-hole passed before it reached the sand-beds. Professors Putnam and Haynes are satisfied of the genuineness of the discovery, which appears to bear out the theory that men were more advanced formerly on the Pacific Slope of America than on the Atlantic Slope, and perhaps also in Europe at the ^ame period. Edible Flowers. The flowers of the Calligonum are, according to Mr. Duthie, bo¬ tanical director for Northern India, mixed with flour and eaten with salt, or other condiments, by the poorer classes of North-Western

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The Gatherer. 189 India. A little “ghee ” is added as a luxury by those who can afford the expense. The flowers are swept off the ground, and kept over-night in a closed vessel of earthenware, so that they are faded in the morning. In this condition they will keep for a long time. A Railway Writing-Desk. A writing-tablet or portable desk, for writing in railway or other carriages where there is considerable vibration, is shown in our figure. It consists of a writing-tablet. A, which is fastened under the right fore-arm, and likewise suspended — as shown— from the luggage rack or other convenient point, by means of a cord and hook, B. Thus fastened, it is freed from much of the jarring and Jolting of the vehicle. More New Parlour Games. “Quoitac” and “ Slidit ” are the very expressive names of two little boxes of games which have just been patented by a Yorkshire inventor. Each box contains a number of counters — eight large and sixteen smaller ones — variously coloured, and by means of these quite a host of new games may be played, in accordance with the rules contained in the book that accompanies each box. For some of the games figured squares are to be drawn on the table-cloth, and the counters thrown, shot, or otherwise propelled into them. In other cases the box serves as a sort of well, into which the counters are to be manoeuvred. Though the requirements for these games are very few and readily procurable, they offer infinite possibilities of amusement for both young and old. A New Grotto. A wonderful cave has been discovered near the well-known cavern of stalactites at Adelsberg, in Carniola, Austria. The interior is of snow-white colour, relieved here and there with grey ; and the extent is such that two hours are occupied in walking through it. The entrance is ornamented with stalac¬ tites in the form of curtains, and stalagmites resem¬ bling cactus plants. The next gallery contains a multitude of stalactites bearing the form of wild animals, which puzzle and amuse the spectator. After passing under several lofty domes a large hall is reached, adorned with hundreds of white flags and streamers, suspended by hollow tubes of calcareous matter. The walls appear to be spangled with diamonds, which glow with colour when it is lighted up. The last apartment is vaulted, and contains a grove of marble-white trees in the middle, rising to a height of forty or fifty feet. Aerated Water on Draught. The “tubes ” hitherto used for storing nitrous oxide gas are now employed to transport liquefied carbonic acid. The gas is obtained in a pure state from the Eifel mountain springs east of the Rhine. By con¬ necting a tube to a copper cistern containing water the liquid can be aerated with the gas in a simple manner, and the aerated water kept on draught. A Sheep-shearing Machine. Mr. F. Y. Wolseley, a brother of Lord Wolseley, has invented an ingenious machine for fleecing sheep. It consists of a steel comb with curving teeth, which catch the wool while a three-bladed cutter traverses it, and shears away the fleece. The machine is driven by a small motor — for example, a Priestman kerosine engine. It is capable of shearing 115 sheep a day, and it is stated to cut so cleanly and safely that left wool can be gleaned by it after the sheep has been clipped in the ordinary way. Experiments made at Melbourne show that it can shear a sheep in from three to five minutes. A Bagpipe Burglar-Alarm. Our figure show^s an ingenious little burglar-alarm, which may be described as an automatic bagpipe. The device is represented by D f, an upright stem which is firmly planted on the floor by its pointed feet, E, just behind the door of a room, G, or on the sash of a window. When the door is pushed open, it presses on the bent lever, F, and allows the spring, L, to press on the spring-valve, C, thus opening a passage for the air in the wind-bag. A, to escape through the reed-pipe, B, and sound a piercing note of alarm. The mouth-

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1 90 The Gatherer. piece, D, is used to inflate the wind-bag in setting the alarm. It will be understood that the device is so firmly set in the floor or sash that the door cannot be pushed open beyond the fraction of an inch necessary to sound the alarm, so that, in any case, no one can enter. The apparatus goes into a small box, and "Spare wind-bags are provided. It will be useful to travellers who are afraid of intruders into their cham¬ bers, as well as to householders in districts liable to burglary. A larger and more powerful form of the apparatus, with a concertina bellows, is also provided for halls. Both of these can be worked by electricity if desired, the current being established by the burglar in opening any door or window of the house, and electro-magnets opening the valves. A Rolled Screw-Nail. Screw-nails for timber are now made, without cutting the metal, by rolling wire of soft open-hearth steel in a series of dies until the thread is sufficiently formed. The figure shows one of these screws in a die, with the thread, A B, partially formed. The work is done by a machine, which turns out fifty screws a minute. A Famous Elephant. The Ceylon papers recently announced the death of Sella, an elephant which served the Public Works Department for over sixty-five years. It belonged originally to the last King of Kandy, and passed with about a hundred others to the British Government in 1813, when the Kandyan dynasty was overthrown, and the whole of Ceylon passed into British hands. In 1880 Sella was sold to Mr. De Soysa, a well-known resident of Colombo, with whom it has remained. Sella was very gentle and a steady worker all its life. It aided in several hunts for the capture of wild elephants. Three years ago it became totally blind, but continued to draw the plough until a short time before its death. Sella stood eight feet high, and carried a pair of tusks five feet in length. Underground Temperature. It has long been known that the temperature of deep mines and bore-holes rises the further down one goes ; and recent observations made in a bore-hole over a mile deep at Schladebach, near Duerrenberg in Germany, have shown that the rate of increase of tem¬ perature in descending is one degree Fahrenheit for every sixty-five feet. Great precautions against error were taken in these experiments, which appear to be the most reliable of their kind yet made. The Pulsion Telephone. This apparatus is a new mechanical telephone, that is to say, an improved form of the lover’s or string telephone, in which the vibrations of the voice are caught on a diaphragm and transmitted along a wire to a similar diaphragm at which the correspondent listens. No electricity is used in connection with the “ Pulsion ” telephone, which consists essentially of a metal diaphragm and a steel wire connected to it. The former corresponds to the parchment of the lover’s telephone, and the latter to the string. As tried recently at Glasgow over a wire a third of a mile long, the sounds were clearly audible. Microbes in the Soil. M. Schloesling has made a series of experiments tending to confirm the supposition that certain microbes in the soil secrete nitrogen from the atmosphere, and thus help to fertilise it. Farmers have a partiality for ordinary manure as distinct from artificial fertilisers, and it may be that the former is richer in these nitro¬ genous microbes. We may add that recent experiments of M. Berthellot, communicated to the French Academy of Sciences, have shown that electrifying soil causes it to gain nitrogen either under the influence of vegetation or without it. It is understood, however, that the soil without vegetation contained microbes. It w'ould thus appear that electricity had a stimulating effect in the fixation of nitrogen in the soil. for Harness. The leather back- band of the saddle which supports the shafts of a vehicle is commonly made in one piece, and hence is apt to wear as show’n at A in Fig. i when the vehicle is on an incline. By a recent improvement the band is now made in three pieces, with a joint at A on both sides, as shown in Fig. 2. This device allows the band to shift without cracking when the horse is going on steep gradients or through a narrow stable door. Sisal-Hemp. Sisal-hemp, or hennequen, which affords a strong fibre, not inferior to Manilla hemp, has proved a source of prosperity to Yucatan, from which it is exported in large quantities to New York. The wild grass has recently been cultivated in the Bahama FIG. 2. A New Back-Band FIG. I.

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The Gatherer. Islands, where it flourishes on waste and rocky lands, avoided by the cattle. It promises to become a valuable export, and the Governor of the islands •estimates the value of the crop at fifty dollars an acre, a price which is considered below rather than above the mark. A New Siemens Furnace. Messrs. Siemens were the first to heat both the gas and air supplied to a gas furnace, and now they have introduced a furnace which recovers and utilises the waste gases and waste heat. We need not enter into the details of this contrivance, which are some¬ what complicated, but will content ourselves with giving some account of its performances. The first of the kind was constructed at Wishaw, for the Father Iron and Steel Company, and the results of six months’ working have shown an average saving of 5 per cent, in waste on the weight of iron heated, and a saving of over two-thirds in the weight of coal consumed in making the gaseous fuel. The total saving effected is estimated at 18 tons of coal per week for a furnace heating 8 tons of iron in a shift, and the money saved in iron and coal per annum exceeds ^1,000. The new furnace has recently been applied for heating the billets of the United Horseshoe Company. Banana Fibre. A German consular report recommends the utilisa¬ tion of the fibres of the banana plant for industrial purposes. The leaf contains a very tough fibre, which is used by the Indians of Central America for making carpets, hammocks, strings, and other things. Paper, coffee-bags, and ropes ol great strength might very well be manufactured from the fibre. Light in the Sea. Further experiments by M. Fol made from his yacht the Amp/izasire while cruising between Corsica and the mainland, have shown that in July, when the sun was 68° above the horizon, his rays penetrated 465 metres into the sea. In March, when his altitude was only 48°, the depth to which the light descended was 380 to 400 metres. These results were obtained by submerging very sensitive photographic plates of the gelatine-bromide order, and exposing them for ten minutes. An Ink Plant. In New Granada, South America, now commonly known as the United States of Colombia, is found a plant {Coriaria ihyznifoHd) whose juices serve as a capital ready-made ink, and which is in con¬ sequence known as the “ ink plant.” At the time of using, the ink is of a reddish colour, but speedily assumes a black hue. It is said that it is entirely free from the corrosive properties of ordinary ink. Utilising the Waves. At Ocean Grove, on the Atlantic coast of the United States, the power of the waves has been simply utilised to pump sea-water into a reservoir igi forty feet high, in order that it might be made useful in flushing the drains and watering the streets. Between two piles of the pier a swing door was arranged so that the force of the waves in striking it made it oscil¬ late, and the motion thus obtained was by a system of mechanical gearing caused to work the pump and raise the water. Some forty thousand gallons of sea¬ water were in this way supplied to the reservoir in a day. An Electrical Capstan. A novelty in electrical traction is the capstan used at the Gare de la Chapelle, Paris, for hauling purposes. The capstan-head, C, in the figure is rotated by means of an electric motor, M, geared to it below the platform as shown. Sacks are also transported along a single rail by means of small electric locomotives, with hooks below to hang the sacks upon. At the recent Paris Exhibition a travelling hoist for staircases was shown in operation. Two rails, one above the other, were fastened to the balusters of the stair, and an open carriage mounted on them, propelled by electricity. It was so constructed that a person could easily step on or off at will, and its purpose was to lift visitors up the stairs of houses to any flat. A Subterranean River. Two explorers, M. Martel and M. Gaujullat, have discovered an underground river in the district of Miers, which is situated in the department of Lot, in France. The country around is wild and mountain¬ ous, with caves and grottoes in its recesses. At the bottom of an abyss known as the Pit of Paderac the explorers found the entrance to the river, and having procured a canvas boat, they followed the stream for two miles through a series of grottoes, ornamented with stalactites. In the course of the voyage they traversed a chain of lakes or ponds, and shot a number of rapids. The river is believed to join one of the head-waters of the Dordogne, six miles distant from its mouth ; but further explorations will be attempted.

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192 The Gatherer. A Highland Torquay. The Kyles of Bute is one of the most picturesque inlets on the coast of Argyleshire, that county of wild scenery. It is situated, as is well known, between the Island of Bute and the district of Cowall on the main¬ land. Rothesay in Bute has long been famous for its mild winter climate, and has been called the Madeira of Scotland ; but Tignabruaich (that is, in English, the town on the brae), a little watering-place in the Kyles, is believed to ri\'al it in the matter of climate, while far exceeding it in the magnificence of its outlook. According to observations, the winter temperature of Tignabruaich is as warm or even warmer than that of Torquay in South Devon ; the snow, which seldom falls, does not remain, and the hills around shelter the town from the western gales as well as the north-east winds. Fogs are rare and sunshine is common, so that invalids are beginning to make it their winter quarters. “ Star-Land.” That children are better for learning something at least of the wonders of the night-sky no one can doubt. Their interest in the stars is almost proverbial, and the utility of a good grounding in the ascertained facts of astronomy immeasurable. Sir Robert Stawell Ball has xlone for young readers in “ Star-Land (Cassell) what he has already done for older readers in “The Story of the Heavens.” The later book consists in the main of the lectures which Sir Robert delivered to children at the Royal Institu¬ tion. It is copiously illustrated, not only with star- maps, but also by numbers of homely diagrams, that serve most admirably to explain the letter- press. Sir Robert is past-master in the art of “ writing down ” — in the best sense of the term — to juvenile readers, and we commend his work to the notice of all heads of families while the stars are still visible at an hour when young eyes may not im¬ prudently be invited to watch them. The Exploration of Palestine. Major Conder has been so intimately connected in the mind of the reading public with the work of the Palestine Exploration Fund, that it was a happy' thought on the part of the editors of “ The World’s Explorers and Explorations” (G. Philip & Son) to ask him to contribute a volume on his experiences to the series. The volume is now before us, presenting a most graphic account of travel and labour in modern Palestine, illustrated by numerous engravings of storied sites, and accompanied by a collection of most useful maps. Work on the part of Englishmen in such a climate as that of the Holy Land is necessarily diffi¬ cult, and it is not surprising to read in Major Conder’s narrative of his party being delayed from time to time while one or all of its members were ill. But this and all other incidental difficulties were cheerfully faced by Major Conder and his assistants, and the result was the eminently successful survey that gave rise to this most interesting volume. By-Ways of Nature. A paper read by Mr. John Stuttard, before the Rochdale Literary and Scientific Society, has been ex¬ panded by its author into a handy little volume under the title “The Butterfly: its History, Development,, and Attributes” (T. Fisher Unwin). It does not profess to set forth new entomological theories ; it simply and very practically describes its author’s ex¬ perience, and that in a manner which must attract increased attention to this branch of natural history on the part of its readers. In this connection we may notice a new edition of a ver>' pretty collection of “ English Idylls” (Sampson Lo\v & Co.) by Mr. P. H. Emerson. Like Mr. Stuttard, he is a keen observer of nature, and makes good use of his obser¬ vations. But some of the character- sketches in these “ Idylls ” are very attractive. There is a wonderful freshness and breeziness about the volume, that is sure to endear it to lovers of the country and the sea. Books Worth Read ng. Mr. Rider Haggard has a brother, who seems to share his love for the adventurous and wonderful in fiction. In “ Dodo and I ” (Blackwood), he has given us a story, very readable as such, and full of incident and marvel. “ Barbara Allan ” (same publishers — two vols.), as its sub-title “ ‘ The Provost’s Daughter,’ by R. Cleland,” tells, is a Scotch story. Still, it is not too Scotch for the most Saxon of readers to be able to appreciate it. The motive of the story is not a new one — a father’s wrong-doing, and his daughter’s suffering. Barbara is a good character in every way, and the reader feels satisfied when he leaves her with her husband in their new home across the Atlantic. “ Polly,” the new-fashioned girl, who plays the title- role in L. T. Meade’s story (Cassell), is another good heroine, for the sake of knowing whom alone the tale is well worth reading. Mrs. Meade is always happiest in her girl characters, as readers of “ Engaged to be Married ” in our own pages last year must know. Despite its rather forced title, “Another Such Victory,” by Annette Lyster (Blackwood — three vols.), is very readable. It might fittingly be described as a story of mistakes, but all the mistakes are propeily rectified by the time the third volume closes, with the setting right of the greatest mistake of all— the estrangement of husband and wife. “Dr. Hermione” (same pub¬ lishers) is good, and possesses the merit of being comprised in a single volume. Tom Thornton is, to our mind, the best of its characters, but the two blue¬ stockings are charming. No doubt all readers will do as the worthy Dr. Jones advises the heroine to do — remember that she was “ Dr. Hermione,” although she ends up as Mrs. Thornton. “ The Splendid Spur” (Cassell) is the latest story by “ Q,” who gave us “ Dead Man’s Rock,” and inimitable “ Troy Town.” This new story calls to mind the former rather than its successor, although it takes us back to the days of the great Civil War. There is abundance of incident in the volume, but plenty of love as well— so all tastes ought to be gratified.

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i93 TO BE GIVEN UP. By KATE EYRE, Author of “For the Good of the Family,” “A Step in the Dark,” &c. See. CEIAPTER THE THIRTEENTH. OFF WITH THE OLD LOVE. ABYN, will you be my wife? ” Mabyn listened to the words in a dazed kind of way, trying to realise their full significance, j! It had come at last. Philip Dacre was actually asking her — Mabyn Littledale— to be his wife ! Did he in very truth love her, and desire her for his wife ? She shot le swift, searching glance at him. ^ He was walking beside her, calmly awaiting her reply, his eyes fixed on the ground. She was not deceived by Philip’s offer, though for one brief mpnient she tried to deceive herself. He did not love her. Ralph had told him she was ill, and he, divining the cause of her illness, was trying to make reparation for the wrong he had done her. She saw it all so clearly : the man’s fine sense of honour, strong enough to force him to do right, but powerless to enable him to simulate an affection he had ceased to feel. “ Mabyn, will you not answer me ?” I do not know what to say, Mr. Dacre.” “ Will not one word be sufficient, dear ? ” He tried to make his voice pleading, but succeeded in rendering it only gentle. “ If my answer is to be given in one word, Mr. Dacre, that one word must be ‘ No.’” It was done. With her own hand she had cut herself off from ^11 hope of happiness. Then he walked on beside her in silence for some minutes, the only sign by which she knew that he had heard her answer being his suddenly increased speed. Once she ventured to glance up at, his face. It was getting dark, so that she could hardly distinguish his features ; still she fancied his mouth was very firmly set. “ I suppose I must have been a conceited cox¬ comb, Miss Littledale ; but I certainly did think you cared for me.” The vexation in his tone was unmistakable. Mabyn started, while a vision of happiness inde¬ scribable w'as momentarily revealed to her. Was it possible that he loved her after all? For one bliss¬ ful minute she allowed herself to think it might be so. But her common sense asserted itself even while she was engaged in picturing this too radiant future, and again all that lay before her was dull, monotonous, hopeless. ‘‘ One may be so easily mistaken, Mr. Dacre,” she said, at length, speaking very slowly,* lest he should notice how her voice trembled. Perhaps 733 she meant the remark to apply more to herself than to him. “Then I never succeeded in making you love me?” “ Did you try to make me ? ” She put the question eagerly, longing to hear from his own lips the justification of her love for him. “ Yes, I tried — tried and failed, apparently.” Again he let his vexation be seen. And yet he was relieved. Still, it was almost humiliating to have been prepared to sacrifice himself for a woman who was either indifferent to him, or at all events both desirous and capable of appearing so. “ Mr. Dacre, you are not vexed with me ? We have been such good — friends, I should not like to grieve you in any way.” Even with the object of setting him free— of giving him an opportunity of winning for himself life¬ long happiness — she shrank from inflicting momentary pain. “Vexed with you? No, I’ve no right to feel vexed with you. I was idiotic enough to flatter myself that you loved me, and now I find I’ve made a mistake ; that’s all.” “ A shock from which you will speedily recover,” re¬ plied Mabyn quickly, failing utterly in her endeavour to speak lightly. “What do you mean. Miss Littledale? I don’t understand you.” He glanced at her sharply, although it was now too dark for him to see more than the outline of her face. Could she by any possibility have discovered his love for Clare ? But he put the idea aside almost as soon as it had suggested itself to his mind. “ I only meant that all men take such disappoint¬ ments more or less lightly.” “ I am by no means prepared to admit any such thing ; but I am not going to defend my opinion on general grounds at the present moment. Mabyn, surely on that morning when Ralph surprised us you were not wholly indifferent to me ? Of course, I’m not such an ass as to imagine that there is anything in me deserving of your special regard ; but if you didn’t like me a little then — well, you acted as if you did ; and I cannot believe you were merely amusing yourself at my expense.” He felt that he was acting foolishly in speaking thus. He had asked the girl to be his wife, and she had refused. Surely he should have let well alone, and gone on his way rejoicing that he was free to woo the woman he so passionately loved. Such was the common-sense view of the case. But he wanted to probe Mabyn’s refusal ; it puzzled him. “ That morning is a long time ago now, Mr. Dacre

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194 To BE Given up. — at least, it seems so to me. Quite long enough for one’s feelings to have undergone a change.” Again her remark was more applicable to her lis¬ tener than to herself. How true Philip felt her words to be, unconsciously as he believed her to have uttered them ! “ You admit that I was not wholly indifferent to you then, dear ? ” And now he did take her hand in his. She offered no resistance ; the interview was so overtaxing her strength, that her every effort was directed towards the endeavour to keep calm. “ I admit nothing, Mr. Dacre. I can hardly re¬ member what my feelings were on that occasion. Had we not better speak of the present instead of the past?” Her words seemed to be an echo of his very thoughts. But in truth she understood him, perhaps better than he understood himself. ‘‘ And you do not love me now ?” She was long in framing her answer. She would tell him nothing that was not true. “ My feelings towards you are not such that I could consent to be your wife.” “ That is your answer ? ” and as he spoke he re¬ leased her hand. “ That is my answer.” And it is final ?” ‘^Yes.” If only she could escape from him ! The interview had, it seemed to her, lasted so .long — although its duration was probably not more than ten minutes. I am going to see my dressmaker ; she lives down here ; ” and Mabyn held out her hand as a hint that she did not wish Philip to wait for her. “Will you not allow me to see you home. Miss Littledale? It is nearly dark.” “ No, thank you, Mr. Dacre ; it is quite early, you know.” “ Still, I think you should allow* me to accompany you.” “ I would rather you did not, if you will forgive me for saying so.” “ Of course, I do not wish to inflict myself on you. Miss Littledale, if my presence is disagreeable in any way.” Mabyn looked alarmed. “ Mr. Dacre,” she said, speaking very earnestly, “ I am disturbed this evening, and therefore would rather return home alone. But I do not wish that wdiich has been said to-night to make any difference in your relation towards us as a family. You see, you are Ralph’s particular friend, and my father, I know, likes you ; and he is not one to attach himself to people. I should be grieved— very grieved — if any unpleasantness should arise. I w'ant you to try to forget this evening ; to be in the future just as you have been in the past, coming in and out of Grange House in the old friendly way w^hich has afforded us all so much pleas'ire. And, Mr. Dacre, I hardly like to mention it, because it seems so wholly unneces¬ sary, but — but — well, I shall not speak of what has occurred to-night to anybody — not even to my cousin Clare, who is, you know, my dearest friend — or, I should rather say, my very dear friend, since, in speaking of her, any term implying comparison is out of place.” Although Mabyn still loved Clare dearly, she was jealous — bitterly jealous — of her. But now, in the excitement of the moment, she \vanted to be generous to her. She wished to explain, as delicately as she could, that Philip was under no obligation to allow some time to elapse in deference to his supposed dis¬ appointment regarding herself, before showing his preference for her rival. Philip understood all this very imperfectly. He had an impression that Mabyn was behaving well ; a certain impulsiveness, and the absence of all self- consciousness in her manner, gave him this idea ; but he could not follow her train of thought. Nothing Mabyn could have said would ever have impressed him with her indifference to himself as did her very evident desire that he should continue to visit Grange House on the old familiar footing. “ She can never have had a thought for me beyond that of the merest friendship,” he reflected ; “ and yet — w’ell, I don’t understand it. Women are enigmas.” “ Then you would wish me to take tea at Grange House to-morrow, a^ arranged. Miss Littledale ? ” he said aloud. “ I should be thoroughly vexed were you to hesitate to do so, Mr. Dacre.” “Very well ; since it is your wish, I will come.” Then he wished her good-bye, and took her hand. To his surprise, he felt it tremble in his own. But she drew it away hastily, and having murmured a few words of farewell, walked rapidly away from him. Arrived at the dressmaker’s, she tried to remember on what errand she had come. She waited for a few minutes in the vain hope of regaining her composure ; but finding this to be impossible, she decided not to call that evening, and retracing her steps, she was soon back again at Grange House. “ Clare and your uncle have been here,” were Mrs. Littledale’s first words to her daughter. “Why didn’t they wait until I came back?” asked Mabyn, feeling, nevertheless, very relieved that they had not done so. “They were going to a concert at the Town HalL and they wanted you to go with them.” “ I didn’t know they intended going.” “ They decided to go the last moment, I fancy. Are you disappointed, dear?” “ I disappointed ? Oh, no ! ” Mabyn’s tone was so utterly weary, that Mrs. Littledale looked at her in alarm. “Why, how ill and miserable you are looking, child ! Your uncle and Clare are coming here to tea to-morrow. Perhaps they will cheer you up.” “ Coming here — to-morrow ? Oh, mamma ! ” There was no mistaking the anguish in her voice. “ Mabyn, my dear, dear child, whatever is the

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To BE Given up. 195 matter with you? I thought you were so fond of Clare. Tm sure, at one time you never seemed so happy as when you were with her. You haven’t quarrelled, have you ? ” “ Quarrelled with Clare ? Oh, no. I shall be very pleased to see her and my uncle, of course. I was only a little surprised that they should come at such a short notice.” Poor Mabyn ! her conscience pricked her the mo¬ ment after she had made this lame excuse. But how could she have explained to her mother that it was the dread of being present at the meeting between Clare and Philip that had caused her such dismay? “ After all,” she thought, when she had retired to her own little room to remove her outdoor garments, “ I shall have to get used to seeing them together.” And then Mabyn fell to deploring her own hard fate in being a woman. “ If I were only a man I could go right’ away. If I could only go from here until all is settled between Philip and Clare, I think I could bear it bravely. But to watch the progress of their court¬ ship, knowing and yet dreading the inevitable end, will be simply torture.” Then Mabyn began turning over plans in her mind to enable her to leave home for a time. She had . friends and relatives whom she could have visited, but she shrank from going to them, fearing they might question her as to the cause of her pale looks. She wanted to creep away and hide herself until she had regained sufficient strength to meet her trouble with¬ out flinching. And then she did think of a plan which seemed to offer her some such asylum as she needed. She would go to London and stay with Ralph, if he would have her. Ralph was living in a boarding-house, and if she were with him, she would, of course, have to mix with the other boarders ; still they would be strangers to her, and would not, therefore, observe anything unusual about her man¬ ner or appearance. CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH. SOPHY FAILS TO MAKE THE IMPRESSION SHE DESIRES ON MR. NIGHTINGALE. Ted Charrington went away from South fields, after his interview with Mr. Dacre, and subsequent explana¬ tion to Sophy, feeling somewhat crestfallen. He had risen early, and had gone forth equipped for battle; when lo! the enemy had taken him gently by the hand, and had quietly explained away the casus belli. Sophy, however, was inclined to view the matter in a very different light. When it had first been sug¬ gested that she was threatened by Mr. Nightingale’s attentions, she had been loud in her protestations of fidelity to Ted. And if the choice had been offered her either to become the wealthy Mr. Nightingale’s bride, or else to share Ted Charrington’s poverty, she would unhesitatingly have chosen to do the latter. But she was not at all sorry when she heard that no necessity existed for accepting either alternative on the spur of the moment. She was very fond of Ted Charrington, but her affection for him was of such gradual growth that it lacked the ardour of a more suddenly developed attachment. And then she so fully appreciated the comforts of her luxurious home. So when Ted told her he was to be allowed to con¬ tinue his visits to Southfields, and further stated that no word had been said as to the Nightingale alliance, she was far too well pleased with the result of the interview to deplore its tameness. She did just wonder if her father would broach the subject to her. But when several days passed and nothing was said, she was well content to let things re¬ main as they were, and to interest herself, as did the rest of the family, in Julia’s engagement. Mr. Nightin¬ gale still continued to devote himself assiduously to her, which was of course a little trying, but now that she was assured her father was not scheming to secure him as a son-in-law, she was certainly not going to allow the gentleman’s frequent visits to Southfields to trouble her. Julia’s engagement was not progressing altogether satisfactorily. True, she had a magnificent diamond ring, but no word had as yet been said about the fixing of a definite date for the solemnisation of the marriage. Mr. Hudson had, of course, asked Mr. Dacre for his daughter’s hand, and the latter gentleman had granted the request, hinting very broadly that it was a gift which had been denied to many. Not a word, how¬ ever, did he say about settlements. The lover’s position as the only son of wealthy parents might have induced him to think that all such precautions were unneces¬ sary. Be that as it may, it would have been only becoming for the bridegroom elect to have observed the same reticence. But Mr. Dudson did not allow delicacy to restrain him from putting a question to Mr. Dacre upon the subject. Then did the father up and speak : Julia would have nothing, absolutely nothing, while her parents lived. At her mother’s death she would inherit her share of Mrs. Dacre’s property, Mr. Dacre further adding that he would himself probably be in a position to leave her a trifle, and the tone in which he mentioned the word “trifle” was full of promise. And as Mr. Dacre made this statement, there had been in his eye that which said plainly enough that the suppliant might take Julia or leave her, just as he pleased. The young man had essayed to take her, but his manner of doing so- had not been gracious. Nor did Sir Bevan and Lady Dudson display any great warmth of feeling towards their future daughter- in-law. Lady Dudson called at Southfields as soon as the engagement was formally announced, and Mrs. Dacre, Julia, and Sophy returned the call. Mrs. Dacre was in such delicate health that her visit to Combermere Court was quite an event. She was, however, very anxious to see her daughter’s future home, and did not murmur at ihe subsequent long spell of pain- occasioned by such unusual excitement. Then there had been a dinner en famille at the Court, Mr. Dacre, Julia, and Sophy being the only guests present on the occasion.

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To BE Given up. 196 During the evening Sophy found an opportunity of whispering to her sister that it was about the slowest affair at which it had ever been her misfortune to assist. It is to be hoped that her lover’s presence brightened the occasion to Julia. In the course of the evening, Sir Bevan and Lady Dudson, with very questionable taste as Mr. Dacre thought, alluded to Julia’s dowerless condition by declaring that their dear son was happily in a position which justified him in having greater regard to the satisfying of his heart than to the filling of his purse ; but in saying this, their tone, if not their words, seemed to imply doubt as to whether Julia did possess in any pre-eminent degree the qualities best calculated to ensure Bevan’s happiness. A few days afterwards, Sir Bevan and Lady Dudson were invited to dinner at Southfields, but when they declined on the score of distance, the hospitalities between Combermere Court and Southfields termin¬ ated abruptly. This would not have particularly distressed Mr. Dacre if Bevan had evinced a becoming degree of impatience to claim his bride. But the young man appeared able to submit to delay with exemplary forti¬ tude. Then did Mr. Dacre wax angry. He would, he declared, be the last to hurry on a marriage where the parties were not in a position to settle — a statement for the truth of which Sophy could have vouched — but where no adequate reason existed for delay, he was strongly opposed to long engagements. And then he announced his intention of telling Bevan Dudson out plainly that he must either make Julia his own within a stated period, or else leave her free to be wooed by some more ardent admirer. Julia implored him to do no such thing. If he would only have patience, all would be well. Mr. Dacre hesitated. Julia was, he firmly believed, a very clever woman ; moreover she was one who would not allow false pride to stand in the way of her advancement. Meanwhile Julia busied herself in preparing her trousseau, appearing quite undisturbed by tier lover’s tardiness. Nothing, she declared, was more trying than to be obliged to hurry over one’s purchases. About this time, Sophy again began to feel very uneasy regarding Mr. Nightingale. She had no fear, after what Ted Charrington had told her, but that her father was in ignorance of the object the widower might possibly have in view ; but she could no longer shut her own eyes to the man’s intentions. He evi¬ dently intended making her an offer of marriage, but was too wily to do anything precipitate. If only he would come to the point, and have done with it ! thought Sophy. Then she deplored her inability to decline the honour of becoming the future Mrs. N. before being asked to fill that position. So thinking, she much regretted that her father had refused to sanction a recognised engagement between herself and Ted Charrington. If Mr. Nightingale could only be made to understand her heart inclined else¬ where, he would of course discontinue his attentions. But who was to convey this information to the amorous widower.^ At first she thought of asking Ted to do so, but quickly put aside the idea when she remembered how hot-tempered and melodramatic her lover could be on occasions. Of course there was her father, but somehow she shrank from broaching the subject to him. And so at length she decided to herself give Mr. Nightingale a hint as to how matters stood. It was rather an unusual thing for a young lady to do, Sophy was prepared to admit, but she was not the girl to be debarred from attempting that which she had made up her mind to achieve, simply be¬ cause she knew of no precedent upon which to fall back. It was, however, not an easy subject to intro¬ duce in a natural manner, and Sophy had to wait several days before a suitable opportunity presented itself. At last it came. She was walking round the garden with Mr. Nightingale, and he was remarking on her unwonted quietness. “ I rather expected Mr. Charrington this evening, and I am disappointed that he has not come,” said Sophy, throwing much meaning into her words. “ Ah, a nice, bright young fellow, that ! ” replied Mr. Nightingale, with the utmost good humour. “ I am very pleased to hear you speak so highly of him, Mr. Nightingale, because he is a particular — a very particular — friend of mine.” “ Ah ! you and he are a bit spoony, you mean. Your revered pa told me as much. Been going on ever since you and he were no higher than the table, I think he said.” A bit spoony ! What a disgustingly coarse way of describing their attachment ! ‘‘ We hope to be married some day, Mr. Nightin¬ gale,” said Sophy solemnly, the calm manner in which her news was being received inducing her to speak more plainly than she would otherwise have done. “ Oh, come now. Miss Sophy, that’s going rather too far. Bread and cheese and kisses are all very well in their way, and I’m sure such nice rosy lips as yours would impart an extra relish ; but it’s not to 'be sup¬ posed that a young lady who has been accustomed to all the comforts that you’ve been brought up to could live on such poor stuff as that. It ain’t in the nature o’ things.” . Sophy replied, with all the dignity she could command, that she was prepared to wait until Mr. Charrington was in a position to offer her a suitable home. “ Ah, I see : just keeping him on until somebody better turns up,” replied Mr. Nightingale, with a know¬ ing leer that so infuriated Sophy she did not dare to continue the conversation. “ Papa,” said Sophy, on the evening of the same day, bursting unexpectedly into her father’s study, “will you kindly oblige me by informing Mr. Nightingale that I hold myself engaged to Ted Charrington ?” Mr. Dacre glanced at his daughter with what he meant to be a look of mild surprise. Later on

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To BE Given up. Sophy learnt to dread that expression more than the fiercest utterances. “ My dear, how am I to inform Mr. Nightingale of that which I do not know myself.^” “But, papa, surely you remember Ted speaking to you on the subject himself.^ ” 197 “ My dear, when poverty comes in at the door — I dare say you know the rest.” “ Love need not escape, if people did not connive at his flight by leaving the window open.” “Well, well, we shall see. There is no hurry just at present, is there, my dear ? ” “ I remember his saying something rat er foolish which I soon succeeded in laughing him out of.” “ It is no laughing matter, papa.” “It certainly would not be, my dear, if, with your extravagant habits, you were to marry a poor young man like Ted Charrington.” “Papa,” said Sophy solemnly, “Ted and I love each other.” Mr. Dacre leant back in his chair and smiled blandly at his daughter. CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH. MABYN BEGINS TO FEEL UNEASY ABOUT RALPH. As Mabyn made her way to the school-rooms on the afternoon of the Sunday following the evening on which Philip had asked her to be his wife, she began to realise how much she dreaded meeting Clare. Hitherto she had been so loyal to her in every thought, word, and deed. But now she was painfully conscious of feeling bitterly, unreasonably jealous of her beautiful cousin. It was strange, that while she

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To BE Given up. 198 felt no resentment against Philip, a sentiment near akin to fierce hatred towards Miss Eastabrook was beginning to manifest itself. Perhaps the bitterest drop in Mabyn’s cup of woe was the unfavourable light in which her own nature was being revealed to her. Miss Eastabrook was in one of her happiest moods. As the two girls walked back from the schools, she slipped her hand through Mabyn’s arm, and began speaking of the concert at which she had been pre¬ sent the previous evening. “My dear child, I was so disappointed you didn’t come with us. It was simply delightful. I thought of you half a dozen times during the evening, wish¬ ing you had been there. I never get quite the full measure of enjoyment out of anything if I cannot glance at your quiet little face every now and again. You are always able to supply just that touch of still¬ ness which my own nature lacks. I wonder,” she added musingly, “if anyone else will ever satisfy me quite as you do, or if you are destined to be the only one to whom I shall ever have been quite my natural self.” Mabyn glanced at Miss Eastabrook. What a glorious “self” it was of which she spoke: so frank, generous, liberal-minded, and many-sided ; and yet, withal, such a faulty “self,” so impulsive and way¬ ward, quick to judge, impatient of all restraint, and prone to scorn that which fell short of its high ideal. A thoroughly contradictory, paradoxical, but wholly lovable “ self.” “ It is to be hoped, Clare, that one other, at least, will satisfy you even better.” ‘‘ What a sentimental little goose it is ! Always hinting that life cannot be perfect unless that one particular kind of love enters into it.” “ That which is incomplete cannot be perfect.” “ But I hold that either a man or woman’s life need not be incomplete if he or she succeeds in Teaming the one great lesson to which all the teachers of morality point — the lesson of self-forgetfulness.” Mabyn shook her head. “The lesson cannot be learnt in all its fulness singly ; for its highest develop¬ ment it needs to be both studied and practised by a perfect human being.” “ And a perfect human being is - ” “ Neither a man nor a woman, but the two united.” “Mabby, when you meet your ‘fate,’ what a loyal little wife you will make him ! ” “ It does not follow that one will meet one’s fate, as you express it, at all. Don’t think that I myself am looking forward to that dual existence of which I have spoken.” “But why not, since you deem it the only state compatible with the attainment of perfect happi¬ ness ? ” “ It is for the few, not the many.” “ May not I be one of the many, then ? ” “ Clare, don’t— don’t ; it is too solemn a subject to speak of in so light a vein. Remember, goodness and happiness are synonymous terms.” “ My dear May, just think for a moment what you are saying. You are actually declaring that neither a man nor a woman can reach a state of the highest attainable human goodness unless he or she marries.” Mabyn paused. “ Yes, Clare ; it would not have occurred to me to put it quite in that way ; but now that you have done so, I can see plainly that you have expressed my meaning exactly.” “ And how about the many — women especially — who never have a chance of marrying? Will you have the boldness to assert that they are thereby debarred from attaining the highest standard of human excel¬ lence ? ” “ I do not think they are debarred because they have not married ; but I do think that, inasmuch as a perfect union affords the highest possibilities of happiness, it must fall to the lot of those who have best qualified themselves to profit by the opportuni¬ ties it offers.” “ It reduces itself to simply this, then : that true marriages are possible only between those who are capable of attaining the highest form of human goodness.” “To such, true marriages are not only possible, but inevitable ; at least, that is my theory. I believe that a man and woman go on developing on separate lines up to a certain point, but that, when that point is gained, they must either unite, and, as a complete being, advance towards perfection, or else they will retrograde on their respective lines.” “ A true union, then, is impossible until that point is gained ?” “Yes, I believe so.” “ But the greater number of people do not reach that point ? ” “ Certainly they do not ; few start on the journey with any fixed intention of pressing on.” “Then, if that idea were carried out, the holy estate of matrimony would be very exclusive.” “ Very exclusive, and very holy. But its exclusive¬ ness would last for only a few generations, whereas its holiness would become more all-pervading as time went on.” “ Why would its exclusiveness cease, you little philosopher ? ” “Because the children born of true marriages would inherit the capacity to qualify for the holy estate.” “ Well, it’s a pretty idea, Mabsy. How came you to think of it ? ” “ I hardly know. I suppose it is a subject on which all women’s thoughts dwell more or less. Per¬ haps the old adage, ‘ Marriages are made in heaven,’ suggested the theory.” “ Yes ; but most women don’t theorise on the sub¬ ject like the veriest philosopher : they are interested only in their own matrimonial prospects. Mab, you have told me something without meaning to do so : you love someone yourself. But I didn’t think you would have left me to guess your secret.” Clare looked hurt, as she invariably did if she

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To BE Given up. 199 fancied she was not in full possession of Mabyn's con¬ fidence. “Mabsy, I think you might have told me,” she re¬ peated, as Mabyn kept silence. Mabyn glanced up at her cousin, and, as she did so, Clare saw that her pretty grey eyes were filled with tears. “ I didn’t mean to vex you, Mabby dear.” “ I am not vexed, Clare.” “ What is it, then ? But there, I won’t force your confidence.” “ I have nothing to confide to you.” “ Why are you crying, then ? ” “ Am I crying ? Perhaps it is that I have not gained the point yet, and that just now it seemed such a very long way off. But don’t let us talk about it any more. Tell me what you heard at the concert last night, Clare.” Clare was her brilliant self in a moment, as she gave Mabyn an enthusiastic account of the concert, her words rushing out in torrents, and her eyes spark¬ ling with delight. She was pre-eminently a person of moods, ever giving indications of the combination of very opposite characteristics, and thereby greatly puzzling those who knew her but slightly. When the two girls reached Grange House, Philip Dacre had already arrived. Mabyn recognised his voice as she and Clare began ascending the stairs ; but she said nothing. She could not bring herself to pronounce his name. Suddenly Clare paused and listened. “Isn’t that Philip Dacre’s voice.?” she asked, turning to Mabyn. “ 'Ves, I believe so,” replied Mabyn, with all the indifference she could command. “ But how came you to recognise it.?” She felt a horrible pang of jealousy as she spoke. Theorise as she would, she could not stifle her pain. “ Oh, 1 always remember voices,” said Clare care¬ lessly. “ But did you expect Mr. Dacre .?” “ Yes.” “ Why didn’t you tell me .? ” “ He generally takes tea with us on Sundays. He and Ralph are such fast friends, you know.” “ He is surely much older than Ralph .?” “ Yes ; I believe he is.” “ Dear me ! how I wish my hair were not so thick,” remarked Clare later on, as she stood before the glass, putting in a hair-pin here and there, the better to secure her massive plaits. “It is so heavy, I don’t know what to do with it.” Mabyn was sitting by the side of the dressing-table, watching her half-cousin. And the longer she looked at her, the better she understood Philip’s infatuation. Clare’s face was like her mood, for ever changing. Even the slight annoyance caused by a refractory hair-pin, and the satisfaction experienced when one slid easily into its place, were reflected on her mobfle features. Why, Mabsy, you haven’t done your own hair prettily to-day. Let me dress it for you. I love making you look nice.” Mabyn closed with the offer eagerly. Anything that delayed the meeting with Philip was to her a welcome respite. But the hairdressing did not take long, and with a beating heart Mabyn descended the stairs, followed by Miss Eastabrook. In the hall, however, they were met by Mrs. Little- dale. They stopped to speak to her, and then made for the drawing-room. Mabyn was just turning the handle of the door when Mrs. Littledale called Clare back, so that Mabyn entered the room alone. Dr. Littledale, Ralph, and Philip were standing on the hearth-rug together ; Mr. Eastabrook had not yet arrived. Mabyn advanced towards them with much outward composure. Her mouth was a little troublesome, the muscles twitched now and again, but only very slightly. She exhibited no other sign of the agitation she felt. Philip advanced a step or two to meet her. For a moment he, too, seemed embarrassed. But when she greeted him in her old friendly way, he quickly re¬ covered his habitual ease of manner. She said very little, only a word or two in fact ; but then to him she had ever been a silent woman. He had begun replying at some length to her in¬ quiries about his family, when he stopped suddenly short and a great change came over his face. He recovered himself in a moment, and finished what he was saying. He had recognised Clare’s voice. Any lingering hope to which Mabyn had clung in spite of her better judgment deserted her at that moment, as she became conscious of Philip’s look of glad expectancy. “ He never cared for me like that,” she thought. “ Are they not both converging to that point where their union will become a necessity to their further advancement .? And I am foolish — wicked enough to regret it. Oh, for a big brave heart to rejoice in the happiness of others, and to lose this horrible over¬ whelming regard for my poor little insignificant self! I love them both so dearly, and I feel so firmly convinced that theirs will be one of heaven’s marriages ; and yet, reason with myself as I may, the contemplation of their bliss tortures me. Shall I ever learn the lesson of self- forgetfulness .?” The evening passed pleasantly enough, both girls appearing to be in high spirits. But an acute observer would soon have discerned that whereas Miss Easta- brook’s gaiety was merely the outward manifestation ot the sunshine within, Mabyn’s was assumed in response to the exigencies of the situation. Philip said very little to Miss Eastabrook; in fact he appeared to prefer talking to her through Mabyn ; but Mabyn noticed his eyes followed Clare’s every moment, and that he always listened to what she was saying, even when her remarks were addressed to others while he was himself engaged in conversation. Although Miss Eastabrook seemed conscious of this close scrutiny, she did not appear displeased by it. Presently the conversation turned on the new hos¬ pital, an institution in which all present were much interested. “ The subscriptions seem flowing in pretty freely,”

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200 To BE Given up. remarked Dr. Littledale. “ I suppose you will soon be thinking about beginning the new wing “ No, Pm afraid not just yet awhile. We haven’t much balance in hand at present,” replied Philip. “ And yet everyone seems anxious to support the hospital,” remarked Dr. Littledale, who in his profes¬ sional capacity gleaned a good deal of information on the subject. “ Yes, people have been very liberal, but the current expenses swallow up all the subscriptions, and a large proportion of the donations.” “ I don’t quite see where all the money goes to,” mused the doctor. “ Of course we are doing a good deal there, but since the idea of adding another wing has been started, the townspeople have come forward in a very generous spirit.” The subject was discussed for some time, both Dr. Littledale and Mr. Eastabrook being anxious to learn all they could regarding the management of the con¬ cern. “ 1 am afraid I can’t give you much practical in¬ formation,” remarked Philip, who certainly did not appear to be particularly well up in the working details. “ I take an immense interest in the hospital, and am, as you know, on the committee of management, but of course, not living in Dursington, I cannot attend all the meetings.” “ Oh, but you do a great deal, Mr. Dacre,” put in Mabyn. “ Mr. Charrington was saying only the other day how energetic you were.” “ I devote my energies for the most part to the lengthening of the subscription list, and seldom meddle with the use to which the money is put, hence my ignorance as to working details, Miss Littledale.” “ But your father must be w'ell versed in these matters. I suppose the business management of the hospital devolves almost entirely on him ? ” said Dr. Littledale. “ Yes ; he does a great deal, I believe. So does Fred Charrington. Charrington is one of those men who get through an immensity of work, and no one ever seems to hear anything about it.” “Well, I should have thought you would have known all about it, from hearing your father discuss it,” remarked Dr. Littledale, who was a little put out at not being able to arrive at the information for which he thirsted. “ My father and I seldom discuss business matters,” replied Philip rather curtly. He w'as looking decidedly annoyed. Mabyn, who had learned fo read every expression which was w^ont to flit across his face, imagined that she divined the reason. Although no word had ever been said on the subject, she well knew that Philip and his father were not on particularly cordial terms : and she fancied that he was vexed anything should have transpired tending to show the absence of confidence between them. Long afterwards, both Mabyn and Clare endea¬ voured to recall every word of this conversation, in the vain attempt to arrive at an answer to a ques¬ tion which had become to them a matter ot life and death. “The hospital seems to be doing excellent work, and to be a thoroughly well-managed institution,” re¬ marked Mr. Eastabrook, with the well-meant intention of putting an end to an awkward pause. “ It is the greatest boon to the poor people,” de¬ clared Mabyn enthusiastically. “ Mr. Dacre, if more money is so urgently needed, don’t you think something might be done in the way of a bazaar?” suggested Miss Eastabrook. “The very thing !” exclaimed Mabyn. “Clare, we will set to work at once, and see if something can’t be arranged.” Then Miss Eastabrook began making all sorts of brilliant suggestions, giving ample proof both of her originality and her keen eye to business. It should be a shilling fair. That would save all the trouble of pricing the goods, and tend to do away with the iniquitous practice of overcharging the purchasers. The stall-keepers should wear peasant costumes : the dress would be inexpensive and artistic. Palmisters, phrenologists, and photographers should be present, to practise their arts at the uniform charge. So pleasantly did the evening pass, that every¬ one, with the exception of Mabyn, expressed surprise when Mr. Eastabrook suggested it was time for Clare to be putting on her outdoor wraps. “ I hope we shall see you at 'The Fountains ’ before very long,” said Mr. Eastabrook to Philip Dacre. “ Don’t wait for a formal invitation. My daughter and I don’t profess to entertain guests ; we prefer a small circle of friends to a crowd of mere acquaint¬ ances.” Miss Eastabrook entered the room at this moment, equipped for walking. “ Yes, Mr. Dacre, do come. Your sisters— especially Sophy— often visit us ; and I shall think you are unneighbourly if you do not follow their example.” Nothing could have exceeded the perfect ease with which Miss Eastabrook seconded her father’s in¬ vitation. “Well, it is over at last,” sighed Mabyn, as she turned away from bidding farewell to the three guests, Philip had fulfilled her expectation by leaving at the same time as Mr. and Miss Eastabrook, so as to walk as far as “ The Fountains ” with them. “ May, don’t go to bed yet,” whispered Ralph, as he observed his sister about to light her bedroom candle. “ Come in here a moment.” Mabyn followed him into a small sitting-room at the end of the hall, and waited with some anxiety while he shut the door and turned up the gas. The light fell full on his face, and she quite started as she observed how haggard it was. “ What is it, dear ? ” she asked, in much concern, putting her hand caressingly on his arm, and looking up at him with a wealth of sisterly love in her sweet grey eyes. “ Oh, nothing that you need look so veiy^ blue about,” he answered almost roughly.

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201 “THE LONGER SHE LOOKED AT HER, THE BETTER SHE UNDERSTOOD PHILIP’S INFATUATION” {p. I99). Then she waited in silence for him to explain him¬ self, a pained expression flitting across her face. Brothers, ev^en when they love their sisters, as Ralph loved Mabyn, have seldom much regard for their feelings. “ I’ve been ploughed. May.” He jerked the words out, and, as he spoke, he separated himself from Mabyn, and stood by the empty fire-place. “ I didn’t know the list was out yet.” The news had startled her, and she was as yet un¬ prepared with words of consolation. I knew it on Friday night.” “ Is papa very angry ? ” “ He doesn’t know yet. That’s just what I wanted to speak to you about.” “ Oh, Ralph ! had you not better tell him at once ? ” “ That’s more easily said than done.” “But he must know, and the sooner the better.” “ Yes, and look here. May, I want you to tell him for me.” Mabyn looked uneasy. “Well, I didn’t think you were the kind of girl to refuse to help a fellow in a fix.” “ Ralph, I’m sure papa would be less angry if you were to tell him yourself.” “ If you won’t help me, say so ; but don’t pretend that you are refusing for my good.” Mabyn bit her lips to keep back an angry retort. “ Ralph, how long will it throw you back 1 ” she asked, at length.

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202 To BE Given up. “ Six months — that is, if I pass next time.” “ Surely that is not so very long ? ” “ Oh, yes, it is. You don’t understand. Come, May, will you do as I ask you, or not “ I will, if you really wish it ; but I think it would be far better for you to speak to papa yourself.” “ If you’ll do it, that’s all that’s wanted. I shouldn’t have asked you if I hadn’t wished it.” “ Very well then, dear, 1 will tell papa in the morn¬ ing — that is, unless you would rather I went to him to-night.” “ Rather not ! You wait till I’m well off the premises, and then out with it. And, May, I’m most awfully hard up. 1 really don’t know which way to turn for money. My allowance is so ridiculously small. I suppose you couldn’t ask the pater to let me have a fiver ? ” “ I don’t think I could very well, after telling him about the examination.” Ralph did not press the point, probably agreeing with Mabyn that the occasion would be unpropitious. But he stood kicking the fender and fire-irons, and looking the picture of misery. “ Ralph, I think I could let you have a couple of pounds out of my dress allowance, if they would be of any use to you.” “ Thanks, old girl ; it’s awfully good of you to offer. But I won’t take your money.” “Why not.?” “ Because I have about twice as much to spend on myself as you have.” “ Still, if you are so very badly in need of it - ” ‘‘ No, May, I’m not going to be such a mean cur as that ! I suppose I shall rub along somehow.” He heaved a sigh, and again turned to the empty grate, with his back to Mabyn. “ Ralph, there is something I want to speak to you about too.” “Well.?” He turned half round, but his thoughts were evidently still busy with his own difficulties. “ I haven’t been feeling very well lately ; and I want a change.” “You had better go to Aunt Emma at Broadstairs then ; hadn’t you ? ” “Oh, no, Ralph !” “Well, what do you want to do?” asked Ralph carelessly, wondering why Mabyn had broached the subject at that particular moment when he was feeling so bothered about his own affairs. “ I should like to go to London and stay with you for a little while if you will have me.” Ralph turned full round. “ Stay with me, Mabyn ! Why, you must be out of your mind to think of such a thing.” The carelessness in his voice had now given place to a tone of startled alarm. “But Mrs. Jenkins takes lady boarders, does she not?” “ Yes ; but what in the name of all that’s wonderful do you want to go there for ? ” “ I want a change so badly, Ralph. Think how monotonous it must get here month after month. I shouldn’t mind it only I am not feeling well.” “If you are not feeling well, you should go the sea¬ side. A month with Aunt Emma at Broadstairs would set you up for the winter.” “ Oh, Ralph, I couldn’t go to Aunt Emma’s ; not just now, at least.” “ But what is your idea in going to London ? It is awfully hot and stuffy there in August.” “ I want a complete change for one thing ; and then I should like to be with you, Ralph.” “Well, it wouldn’t be much change for you to be with me, I should think.” “ I should like it so much.” “ But you see. May, I ought to be devoting every spare moment to study ; it would never do to be ploughed a second time. And really, if you are not feeling well, I think the sea-side is the place for you. You want good, bracing air, and you wouldn’t get that in London.” “ Oh, of course, if you don’t want me, Ralph - ” Mabyn began, and then her eyes filled with tears. “Now that is always the way with women. One gives them a straightforward reason for not wishing a thing, and then they immediately imagine there is something behind it. Of course I should be pleased enough to have you with me in Bedford Square, but I don’t think the change would do you any good ; while I ought to be working my hardest to make up for lost time. Now be a sensible girl, and see things in a proper light.” “ Very well then, Ralph. I will give up the idea, since you consider it unadvisable.” “ And you had better get the mater to write to Aunt Emma about having you down with her at Broadstairs.” “No, Ralph, I shan’t do that.” “ Well, but you ought to have a change if you are not feeling well. And reall}', now you come to speak of it, I have noticed that you have not been looking the thing lately.” “ Oh, I dare say I shall get all right again.” “ Now don’t be thinking me unkind and all the rest of it. I’ve had a lot of bother lately one way and another, and you mustn’t mind my having been a little impatient. It’s awfully good of you to have promised to speak to the pater, and I’m no end obliged to you.” Mabyn smiled, trying her hardest not to look hurt. “ I do hope the pater won’t be very angry, Ralph ; and if he isn’t. I’ll see what I can do about asking him to advance you some money.” Ralph’s eyes brightened. “ What a brick you are. May ! ” he exclaimed delightedly. “ But look here, old girl, don’t you go worrying yourself about me. 1 shall jog along somehow ; never fear.” He had come up close to her now, and had thrown his arm round her waist. “ Good night, Ralph dear,” she said caressingly, as she pushed her brother’s soft curly hair from his fore¬ head, and looked up anxiously into his handsome boyish face. He kissed her warmly. “ What a jolly little sister you are. May ! Good night. And mind now, I shall talk to the mater when I’m down next week, and see if

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To BE Given up. we can’t arrange something in the way of a change that will really do you good.” “No, Ralph, don’t speak to mamma about me, please. Promise me you won’t.” “ Well, I won’t, then, if you would rather I didn’t. But mind now, I shall examine you carefully every week, and if I don’t soon see a marked improvement in your appearance, I shall take the matter into my own hands.” Then they parted for the night, and Mabyn retired to her room, feeling much disturbed about her brother. CHAPTER THE SIXTEENTH. SOPHY’S ENGAGEMENT. Owing to what struck Mabyn as a rather strange co¬ incidence, she did go to Broadstairs, notwithstanding the decided manner in which she had put aside the idea when it was suggested by her brother. The very next morning after her conversation with Ralph on the Sunday, brought her a letter from Aunt Emma, in which that lady complained of feeling far from well, and wound up by saying that if Mrs. Littledale could spare Mabyn for a few weeks, her presence would be sure to work a miraculous cure. So Mabyn went to Broadstairs, having first broken the news of Ralph’s failure to Dr. Littledale, and written to her brother to apprise him of the spirit in which her tidings had been received. Change, sea-air, and Aunt Emma’s kindness did much, during the six weeks that Mabyn stayed at Broadstairs, towards restoring her health. But she soon discovered, as most of us are destined to do at some period of our lives, that putting distance be¬ tween ourselves and the scene of our trouble will not obliterate it. But although Mabyn did not succeed in forgetting her trouble, she did much towards strengthening her moral nature to meet it bravely ; and if, when she returned home, an acute observer would still have looked in vain for the light of happiness that had once shone from her eyes, some compensation was to be found in the calm, unflinching gaze which had taken its place. The day after that on which Mabyn returned to Grange House, Julia and Sophy Dacre made a formal call. Apart from her pleasure at seeing Sophy again, Mabyn hailed their visit with delight. If Philip were either engaged, or even about to be engaged to Clare, surely his sisters would say something about it. “ Mrs. Littledale told us she was expecting you yesterday, so we made a point of being amongst the first to welcome you back,” remarked Julia, with her polite society smile. “ It was very kind of you to take so much trouble on my account,” replied Mabyn, trying to put as much cordiality into her tone as possible. “ I’m awfully glad you’re home again,” put in Sophy with all her wonted warmth of manner. Then the conversation turned on Mabyn’s visit, and the attractions of Broadstairs. 203 Presently there was a slight pause, broken at length by Mrs. Littledale asking Julia if the date of her wedding were yet fixed. In putting this question, Mrs. Littledale did not mean to be ill-natured, although Julia was no favourite of hers ; for she had no knowledge of any hitch in the arrangements. Julia smiled very sweetly, and looked exceedingly handsome. “ No, not yet. Mr. Dudson and I are not in a hurry. In fact, mine will not be the first wedding in the family.” “ Oh, indeed ! Is your brother Philip engaged, then ? ” Fortunately Mabyn was sitting with her back to the window. She turned half round, and looked out across the lawn, while every nerve in her body seemed to quiver as she listened for the reply to her mother’s question. “ What made you think of Philip, Mrs. Littledale ? ” asked Julia, still smiling sweetly. Mrs. Littledale hesitated. “ I have fancied lately that his thoughts rather tend in that direction.” Julia looked radiant. “And did you fix on the lady, Mrs. Littledale.^” Mrs. Littledale fidgeted uneasily. “ I have sometimes thought that there might be something between him and my niece. Miss Easta- brook ; they are so very much together.” “ The same idea has occurred to all of us. But this is quite between ourselves. We all like Miss Easta- brook so much, that perhaps we may be allowing our wishes to influence our judgment.” “ Then who is it that is going to be married so shortly. Miss Dacre ? ” “ Sophy. Her wedding is fixed for this day month.” “ Indeed ! I am very pleased to hear it. Mr. Edward Charrington has always been a great favourite of mine.” All this time Sophy had kept silence. But now ' at the mention of Mr. Charrington’s name she blushed furiously. “Oh, Sophy dear, I’m so glad !” put in Mabyn heartily. “We are all very pleased about dear Sophy’s engagement ; but it is not to Ted Charrington. That is a very old affair ; just one of those boy and girl attachments that never do lead to matri¬ mony,” said Julia, still with that provokingly forced smile of hers. Mrs. Littledale looked exceedingly uncomfortable, while Mabyn hastened to ask the name of the gentle¬ man. “ He is a Mr. Nightingale ; I fancy you must have met him at Southfields, Mabyn,” replied Julia. “Oh, Sophy!” exclaimed Mabyn, making no at¬ tempt to hide her dismay. Mrs. Littledale looked quite mystified. It was the first time she had heard of Mr. Nightingale. “ Mr. Nightingale is a widower, which may perhaps account for Mabyn’s very evident surprise. He is also

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204 The Planets in 1890. rather older than dear Sophy, but most suitable in every other respect,” said Julia, with a slight air of offended dignity. “ Tm sure, dear, I hope you will be happy,” Mrs. Littledale hastened to say. But Mabyn was too horrified to make any attempt to offer formal congratulations. A few minutes after the two girls took their leave. Mabyn,” whispered Sophy, as she was saying good-bye, “ I want you to promise to be one of my bridesmaids. Now you won’t refuse, dear, will you ?” Mabyn hesitated. How could she consent to assist at such a marriage as this ? ‘‘ Come round to-morrow, and let us talk it over,” suggested Sophy, divining the reason of her silence. This Mabyn readily promised to do. Much to Mabyn’s astonishment, when she arrived at Southfields the following day, she found Sophy in the best of spirits. The bride’s trousseau was in course of preparation, and Sophy was evidently taking the liveliest interest in every little detail. Mabyn was well-nigh speechless with surprise. At first she thought that Sophy’s high spirits were affected out of mere bravado, but one glance at her beaming face was enough to dispel this idea. “ I had no idea nest-building was such a business,” laughed Sophy. “ I’m being measured, and fitted, and pinned in, and laced up, and turned round, and good¬ ness knows what besides, all day long.” “ You seem very happy about it all, Sophy,” re¬ marked Mabyn, allowing her surprise to be plainly seen. For a moment Sophy looked grave. ‘‘ Look here, Mabyn,” she said at length, “ I was unhappy enough at first to have satisfied even you, with all your ultra- sentimental notions. I should never have accepted Mr. Nightingale of my own free will. I was down¬ right forced into doing so. Papa didn’t give me a moment’s peace. But all that is past and done with, and I’m happy enough now. Of course there is much in what 'I am about to do that I regret, and always shall regret ; still, I am not going to hold myself re¬ sponsible for it. Papa has driven me to it ; I shall always maintain that.’ ‘‘ Oh, Sophy, how can you do it ? I did think you cared for Ted,” said Mabyn reproachfully. Poor dear Ted ! he’s not half a bad fellow,” mur¬ mured Sophy. “Is he coining to your wedding, Sophy ?” “ Not as an invited guest ; but I rather fancy he will be present at the ceremony.” The preparations for the wedding went gaily forward. Mr. Nightingale being a widower, there was but little to be done in the way of buying furniture ; and with reference to that little, Sophy appeared anxious for the bridegroom to gratify his own taste in preference to consulting her wishes. But in her trousseau she continued to take the warmest interest. Considering how eccentric Sophy often was, her conventionality on the occasion of her approaching marriage was quite surprising. In two particulars, however, she persisted in running counter to Julia’s wishes : she positively refused to have her clothes marked with her new name ; and she insisted on being married in her travelling-dress. On these two points Julia at length yielded with a fairly good grace. On the morning of the wedding, the bride expressed one other wish. She dressed without assistance, and was ready, even to her gloves, by half-past ten. Then she asked to be left to herself for three-quarters of an hour, and returning to her bedroom, she locked her¬ self in. The three-quarters of an hour passed, everyone being too busy with his or her own toilet to give much thought to the bride’s meditations. Then Julia knocked at her sister’s door to tell her it would be time for her to start in ten minutes, as the bridesmaids were just leaving. She 7'eccived no aitswer. She knocked yet more loudly. Still no answer. In a few minutes all the guests were congregated outside Sophy’s door, consternation being expressed on every face. One young man had just volunteered to burst the lock, when a commotion was heard in the hall below, and several of the guests recognised the bridegroom’s voice raised as if in anger. END OF CHAPTER THE SIXTEENTH. THE PLANETS IN 189 0. N HAPPILY, England’s climate is scarcely mild enough to induce her inhabitants to sit out of doors much at night, and even in the summer time cloudless nights are too in¬ frequent to encourage a general in¬ terest in astronomy. A few make the stars a study ; all are interested in them ; but the interest of the majority is called forth only at intervals, when an exceptionally fine dis¬ play of stars attracts casual attention to the sky when out “on business or pleasure bent.” To such, the appearance of a strange star in some familiar portion of the sky is apt to be a puzzle ; many at once know it for a planet, which one they can only guess at ; others adopt some extravagant “ star of Bethlehem ” idea, and are even encouraged in such notions by public prints, which should be better informed. The exact positions of the planets from day to day, or from night to night, must be obtained from an almanack. The following brief account of the move¬ ments of the planets in 1890 will give the casual observer a guide as to what to look for, and where to look for it, at any suitable opportunity that may occur. Mercury and Venus, the two planets nearest the sun, and both of them revolving within the orbit of

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205 The Planets in 1890. the earth, arc, of course, the planets whose wanderings are most marked. They are both bright planets, moreover, yet, owing to their varying distance from the earth as they revolve round the sun, are con¬ siderably brighter at some times than at others. In the telescope, too, they exhibit phases similar to those of the moon, according to their positions with relation to the sun and earth. Owing to the fact that they are never at a very great distance from the sun, and appearing conspicuously either shortly before or shortly after sunrise, they are known for the time being as the morning and evening stars. Mercury, from his comparatively rapid revolution round the sun, varies most in position during any specified period. The times when he will be most conspicuous during 1890 are as follow: — Towards the middle of January he appeared after the sun went down, and was therefore called an evening star.” From about the middle of February to the be¬ ginning of March, he appears before sunrise, and is called a ‘‘morning star.” He will be noticeable again as an evening star about the beginning of May. From the middle to the end of June he will be con¬ spicuous as a morning star. Throughout the month of i\ugust and well into September he appears as an evening star. About the middle of October he is once more a morning star, and towards the end of December again an evening star. Being always near the sun, he will appear in the direction of sunrise or sunset, as the case may be, and at the periods given above should be found without difficulty, as the times when he will be too near the sun to attract attention are not given to perplex the reader. Venus, like Mercury, rises before or after sunset in pretty much the direction in which the sun itself ap¬ pears or disappears, but she is frequently to be ob¬ served at a greater distance from the sun than Mer¬ cury is ever seen, for whereas Mercury’s greatest time of rising before or after the sun is only about one hour and a half, Venus’ greatest time approaches three hours. In 1890 Venus will be too near the sun to excite notice till well into the second quarter of the year, when she will be noticed as an evening star, gradually setting later and later after the sun, and being, there¬ fore, for a longer and longer time visible till August and September, when she will appear at her highest position above the horizon. From that period, the time between the sun’s setting and her own disappearance below the horizon will gradually shorten. She remains an evening star till December, so that she is visible after sunset throughout the greater portion of the year. Mars, easily distinguished by his ruddy colour, is not too favourably situated for observation in England in 1890, as he is south of the celestial equator through¬ out the year. At the beginning of January, Mars did not rise till two in the morning, after which time he may be looked for in a south-easterly direction, crosses the meridian — or, as it is termed, “ souths ” — at seven, and sets at noon, when, of course, no stars are visible without a telescope. As with the stars. Mars rises earlier with each succeeding day, but, unlike the stars, alters his latitude; but for the year 1890 in an un¬ favourable direction — that is to say, further south. The best indication that can be given for the popular recognition of this planet is to give the time when the planet will be due south, and its approximate height above the horizon at that time. At an earlier period of the night it must be looked for more to the south¬ east, and at a later period more to the south-west. About the middle of January, Mars “southed” about 6.30 a.m., and was about 27 degrees above the horizon ; about the middle of February, at about 5.30 a.m., and about 22 degrees above the horizon — that is, about one-fourth of the distance between the horizon and the zenith — the point immediately over¬ head. About the middle of March, Mars souths at about 4.30, and is about 20 degrees in altitude ; about the middle of April, at about 3.0 in the morning, with an altitude of about 19 degrees. In May, Mars is more likely to attract attention, as before the end of the month he is due south before midnight, and visible therefore throughout the entire night, though only at an altitude of less than 20 degrees. About the middle of June the planet souths at 10 p.m. ; middle of July, 8 p.m. ; August, 7 p.m. ; September and October, 6 p.m. ; November and December, 5 p.m. After June, therefore. Mars must be looked for a little to the west of south, and very low down. Jupiter also is very low down in 1890, but being a very bright object, usually draws attention, and re¬ quires little looking for. As, moreover, an opera- glass of very moderate capabilities shows the attend¬ ant moons, the confirmation of his identity is easy. At the beginning of the year he was only visible for a short time before sunrise, but about the beginning of May the planet rises at midnight, and is well visible in the early morning before sunrise a little to the east of south. Rising a few minutes earlier each evening, by the end of July, Jupiter crosses the meridian about midnight, when he, of course, is due south ; visible throughout the night, he may be seen east or west of due south before and after midnight respectively. By the end of October, Jupiter souths before darkness sets in, and is only to be seen in the early part of the evening towards the south-west. Unlike Mars and Jupiter, Saturn is north of the equator in 1890— approximately about midway be¬ tween the horizon and the zenith at the time of south¬ ing or crossing the meridian. At the beginning of January, his meridian passage taking place about three in the morning, Saturn was still low down in the south-east before midnight. About the middle of February, Saturn southed at midnight, about the middle of March at 10.30 p.m., the middle of April about 8.24 p.m. After April, Saturn is only visible west of the meridian, and by the end of June he sets too soon after the sun to be at all conspicuous. At the latter end of the year Saturn again becomes visible, but only in the morning. Saturn, owing to his greater distance from the sun, is not so bright as Jupiter, and from his comparatively slow motion amongst the stars is not so easily recognised as Mars. The remaining planets, being invisible to the naked eye, may be omitted in a brief guide to star-gazers. c. Ray Woods.

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2o6 THE WORK OF PUBLIC SPEAKERS. BY AN OLD REPORTER. THE PREMIER. EMORIES of great speakers of the past crowd in upon the mind, but it is not of ll^ the classical orators of the past we wish to speak, it is of speakers of this gene¬ ration, most of whom are “still with us.” John Bright, Mr. Gladstone, the late Lord Iddesleigh, Mr. Goschen, Lord Sherbrooke, Lord Salisbury, Sir Wilfrid Lawson, Lord Randolph Churchill, and Mr. Joseph Chamberlain represent varied types of oratory, and — except pulpit oratory — they may be held to be fairly representative of popular public speakers of to¬ day. First of these is the eminent man whose recent loss Europe and America mourned. It did not require much knowledge of Mr. Bright’s speeches to observe that they had traces of preparation. But in most it was the “ framework ” of the speech that was pre¬ pared, not the body put together. There had been evident careful study of the subject ; there was often reference to some choice poem, as when the orator quoted “ Content sits smiling on the lap of Toil,” and there was usually a peroration, one of the finest of which was that in a famous Reform speech at Glasgow. I have heard, too, Mr. Bright speak without preparation except such as was the outcome of a few minutes’ thought ; and one speech on the temperance question, thus, delivered, takes high rank. His de¬ livery, sonorous, clear, and slow in comparison to some speakers, aided the expression of his thought, but his gestures were few. The Marquis of Salisbury takes rank as an orator who is heard to best effect in the speeches in which there have been opportunities for preparation. His style is robust, his manner at times not quite so good as his matter, but the “ literary finish ” is usually admirable. When he speaks in the House of Lords, the address is almost shorn of “action,” but it is gravely uttered, with occasionally a sub-acid flavour that now and then comes to the surface in taunt. It has not fallen to my lot to report Lord Salisbury at any great public gathering, but there he becomes impressive. Mr. Bright spoke best to the populace. Mr. Gladstone speaks best to the cultured, the intellectual — to those who can follow up classical allusion and olden lore. He is at his best, in the writer’s opinion, in the House of Commons. Springing from his seat, with a sheet of paper in his hand, he commences calmly, looking right across at his opponents. He refers little to his notes, a glance seems to give him the clue to the continuation of his argu¬ ment, and a wealth of words pours out. His nicety of distinction is remarkable. He uses “action, action, action ” — now he leans over the despatch-box on the table ; now he menaces an opponent with an uplifted forefinger, then he sways round upright an-d looks his followers in the face, as if seeking their assent, and then he beats time with some volume he has just now LORD R.\NDOLPH CHURCHILL.

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The Work of Public, Speakers. 207 quoted from. His sentences are at times involved, but the proportions are massive, the wording is choice and accurate, and the voice gives tones of singular cadence. Lord Sherbrooke — who, as Mr. Robert Lowe, took front rank as a political debater — was a picturesque figure in the House of Commons, and some of the speeches he delivered abound in happy allusions. His infirmity of short-sightedness lessened probably his use of notes, but as he stood at the Ministers’ table, well-proportioned, upright, but his head a little bent forward, his white hair seeming to make his face rud¬ dier, words fell from him clearly, except when the need for reference to notes for figures rendered his speech more hesitating, and wide reading brought in now a quartet from “ Hudibras,” then an excerpt from some Italian story, and few speakers had the art of present¬ ing a case more ably or with more pungent criticism of opponents. The Chancellor of the Exchequer in recent years has almost always been one of the foremost orators, and Mr. Goschen is a brilliant proof of the rule. But it may be that it is not so much in Parliament that his peculiar tact in speaking shows itself— that tact including readiness of reply. His preparation seems limited, his notes are few, but he has the ability to see the weak point in an antagonist’s case in an instant, and his analysis of the error is unsparing. Before a vast audience, in which is a sprinkling of opponents, he seems for a time to court interruption, and then replies to the interjected arguments in a manner proving that his speeches have preparation of IMR. CHAMBERLAIN. MR. GLADSTONE. subject, but little beyond, and that his immense know¬ ledge of public affairs comes to him as an argumentative aid, a reminder, and a storehouse whence his weapons are drawn. The Right Hon. Joseph Chamberlain occupies con¬ stantly a large portion of public attention ; and in office or out of office, he does no small share of public work in the education of the electorate. His speeches have the ring of preparation ; his notes, however, as far as I have seen on several occasions, are not very long. One speech, when he was President of the Board of Trade, I heard, and the notes occupied some three half-sheets of note-paper, a printed extract, gummed thereon, forming the bulk of the matter on one. He masters his subject, grasps the bearing of objections, is not inclined to answer in¬ terruptions much, and having mentally arranged the order of his speech, coolness, long-trained use of lan¬ guage in public life, and the ability to gauge the feelings of his audience, go far to make his speeches clear and cogent. His impromptu speeches are even happier, as far as I have heard them, they are more concise, perhaps a little less dogmatic, and though they do not display so wide a course of reading, they are terse, sometimes epigrammatic, and always able. Grouping now other public speakers, the late Lord Iddesleigh might be referred to as one more happy in his unprepared speeches than in the set, formal ones duty now and then laid upon him. He had an easy, fluent style, facility in expression, and a kindly feeling pervaded most of his utterances. He could well attack, but he excelled in the efforts made before those who knew him, who valued him, and who regarded both the speech and the speaker. He seemed to derive much of his inspiration from surroundings or

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2o8 An Anatomy of Handwriting, from preceding speeches, his memory seemed to supply all that he needed as aids to arrangement, and though his speeches will never rank among great efforts, he was a type of the south -countryman trained by local duties to express his thoughts, and to endeavour to bring his hearers to his way of thought. Lord Randolph Chui chill differs widely ; iiis orations are more often attacks, generally prepared with greater skill, are aided by the method of reception, have more literary polish, and have also a much more stirring effect. The writer never heard Lord Beaconsfield (to whom Lord Randolph Churchill has been often compared), but reading the speeches of the former, for the contrast, one great difference at once strikes those who hear the scion of the house of Marlborough— his words are simpler and better chosen than the sesquipedalian sentences delighted in, in the later speeches of Mr. Disraeli. But there are some resemblances, and there is especially the wonder aroused at the daring of both, and the amazement from time to time at the unexpected turns of thought. Referring now to Sir Wilfrid Lawson, whose name has wide-spread if sectional interest, preparation is found more largely evidenced. His notes are ex¬ tensive, his quotations frequent, and always readily arranged. He aims much more at illustration, he has a desire to avail himself of “ apt alliteration’s artful aid,” and his humorous sallies are well known. He quotes much from the poets of progress, but there is greater inequality in his platform efforts than there is with most of those whose names are well known. Other orators’ names rise in the memory : silver- tongued Earl Granville, whose sentences trip plea¬ santly along, but none the less do they now and then show the sword in a silken sheath ; Mr. Joseph Cowen, whose ornate thoughts gave dignity to even a rough Northumbrian burr, and whose Parliamentary speeches were for a few sessions among the literary treats “ the House ” afforded ; Mr. Sexton, with that eloquence which faintly recalls some of Shell’s ; and many another. And from the observation of scores of such speakers, these general deductions may be drav n : that the first duty of the orator is to master the subject of which he is to speak ; to arrange loosely the order in which he purposes to speak ; and to leave the turn of the sentences more to the inspiration of the moment, to the needs of the audience, and to the suggestions which experience makes even in the midst of a speech when the speaker has learnt the art of “ thinking on his legs.” Possibly our public oratory is not so grand as it was ; it is true that, with a few exceptions, public speakers are nearer on one level than they were ; but though the average speaker soars less above his audience, he may be more effective in utterance if less eloquent in the expression of his thoughts. AN ANATOMY OF HANDWRITING. BY AN EXPERT. IN TWO PARTS.— PART II. N any diagnosis of handwriting, a very important consideration is that of the evidence which may be held to be indicative of the character of the physique of the writer. That hand¬ writing can supply a clue thereto, there can be no question, though there must naturally be a variety of opinion on this part of the subject. The following general principles may, however, be accepted as com¬ monly applicable to handwriting, especially that of the male sex : — I. When the do strokes of certain letters — for example, y ” or “ g,” or “ p ” or “ f are strongly or heavily formed, it indicates the writer to be a large- handed, strong-wristed person, especially the latter. That being so, the physique will usually be strong and powerful. The “ up ” or “ return ” strokes need not have the same feature, for here the thumb is largely the regulating motor. 2. A scrawling hand, of one uniform lightness of stroke, invariably indicates the writer to be of en¬ feebled or aged physique. Two specimens are produced by way of illustrating these fundamental principles in the anatomy of hand¬ writing. As to the former specimen, the writer of it happens to be a gentleman in the best vigour of man¬ hood, strikingly robust and well built ; a noted sports¬ man, and, generally, a man of great strength of nerve and perfect physical frame. His handwriting decidedly endorses this certificate of his character. In regard to the other, the writer is almost an octogenarian : in fair, but by no means robust, health. He never was a strong man, in the accepted term : never handled a rod or gun iu his life, though, from having been a teacher by pro- ' fession, he had many a time, no doubt, handled the rod ! But in each case the different characteristics of physique are markedly pronounced, the nerve and muscular strength of the one man showing in con¬ trast to the nervelessness and general feebleness of the other. Of course there are many exceptions to the principles here set down, and many circumstances may favour or disfavour their raisoit d^etre^ such as the kind or quality of pen or quill employed, the con¬ ditions of writing, the state of health at the time, &c. But in nine instances out of ten, by the application of the foregoing simple test-principles, it is perfectly

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An Anatomy of Handwriting. 209 possible to correctly classify or differentiate the hand¬ writing of persons physically robust and capable, from that of persons who are not so fortunate. In a long experience in the testing or reading of handwriting, and in forming thereby some adequate idea of the de¬ gree of physical capacity supposed to be attached a~ HANDWRITING OF A ROBUST MAN. (f SCalc.') thereto (oftentimes a very important clue to the identity of individuals), the foregoing simple principles have, almost without exception, proved to be sound and trustworthy. The question has occasionally been asked : Does handwriting ever exhibit hereditary characteristics 1 This is also an interesting branch of the subject, and although a great deal might be said pro and co7i., the question may, generally speaking, be answered in the affirmative. Indeed, there is to be found in the sub¬ ject of the heredity of hctiidwriting a significance of ascertained fact in favour of the general prevalence of such a law transmitting its effects from one generation to another, which is well worthy of the consideration of physiologists. Nothing, however, can be more cer¬ tain than that, in the matter of handwriting, family re¬ semblances are as common to almost every representative as, for instance, the family nose, the family gait or habit of speech, or other peculiarity by which one particular family is distin¬ guished from another. It may, of course, be said that a large proportion of this supposed vraiseinbla7ice in family handwriting is attributable as much to obvious facilities for imita¬ tion, thus producing a general unity of likeness, as to any pre -disposing natural cause subject to the opera¬ tion of the law of heredity. With such facilities a son’s handwriting- let it be supposed — may happen to resemble in some respects that of his father, or a daugh¬ ter’s that of her mother or of an aunt, or other female relative, or one brother’s that of another brother, and so on, the styles or characteristics of family handwriting being variously duplicated or reproduced. Still, while that is the case in many instances, there will doubt¬ lessly be numerous exceptions to this pretty general rule. For, as in human physiology it is a well- accredited fact that no two faces are alike in every feature, so with chirography, no two penmen will be found precisely to resemble each other in all points? however nearly they may seem to do so. Sometimes, indeed, the difference is so great— just as in the human face or features— that it is quite impossible to detect any link of the relationship existing. Furthermore, the peculiarities of family handwriting may, like other more common hereditary symptoms and dispositions, entirely pass over a generation, and then once more re-appear, bearing evidence, in not a few points of similarity, of their kin to the original copy. This fact, however, applies more especially to families with whom the use of the quill or pen has ever been one of its strong points. It can obviously have no reference to persons whose opportunities in the practice of handwriting have been few and inconsiderable. But why it should be possible for this trait of chirography sometimes to skip one or two generations, and then again unmistakably to re-assert itself, is perhaps only another and — it may be reckoned — a trivial example of that erratic course which Nature oftentimes pursues, baffling all human comprehension. A clue to this singular fact of transmuted chirographic likeness skipping one or more generations, and then re-appear¬ ing, may, of course, be found not so much in the moral as in the physical disposition inherited. And so the heredity of handwriting may be, perhaps, best explained according to that invariable process of Nature by which a man inherits something of the ligaments as well as the lineaments of his progenitor — something of the manipulative power and grasp of the fingers, as well as of the form and expression of the face. Instances of this family likeness as exhibited by means of the handwriting will probably be within the knowledge of many readers, the evidence of kinship being apparent sometimes in certain caligraphic tricks common to several members of the same family, or sometimes in HANDWRITING OF AN AGED MAN. (f SCalc.) 734

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2 lO An Anatomy of Handwriting. the general style and character of the penmanship. This likeness is, however, to be observed with greater frequency in female than in male handwriting, pro¬ bably because of the larger scope for similarity in the sharp, angular style peculiar to the former ; but there PROFESSOR HLACKIE. (£• SCalc.) are also very numerous cases of almost facsimile pen¬ manship of different members of the same family be¬ longing to the other sex, even where the degree of relationship is sometimes that of cousinship. A case in point within the knowledge of the writer may be quoted. Two brothers, whose penmanship was almost identical, quarrelled on the death of their father over certain properties, and separated, the younger going to a fiir country, while the elder remained at home. All correspondence between them ceased for some years. One day the elder brother received a letter which, from the style and character of the penmanship of the address, he thought to be from the younger, and, without opening it (such was the feeling of estrangement between them !), returned it to the care of a cousin, with a note to that relative that he desired to receive no communication from his brother until certain legal unpleasantnesses were removed, and begged him, therefore, to re-forward hislettei\ Imagine his chagrin when he learned that the epistle was not indeed from his younger brother, but from the cousin himself, whose handwriting had so striking a likeness to his. One of the most interesting cases of family likeness in handwriting ever submitted is that of a brother and a sister, the former being one of the best-known public men of the time, and a man highly esteemed by all classes — to wit, Professor John Stuart Blackie. Many of his correspondents will at once recognise the very characteristic hand ” of the genial professor in the specimen shown ; but were the fact not mentioned, it would be difficult to distinguish his from that of his amiable sister, Miss Blackie, who has not only her brother’s style of penmanship, but shares with him many other mental gifts and graces. Perhaps it is because Professor Blackie has for many years written so much in Greek characters that his penmanship is not so clear and distinct as it might be. Allowing for its angularity of style which that experience has pro¬ bably occasioned, it is nevertheless eloquent of his well-known emphasis, force, and fluency. And yet in many respects it would be difficult to distinguish be¬ tween his caligraphy and that of his sister. An interesting personal experience bearing on the family likeness in handwriting may bring our subject at present to a close. A year or two ago the writer of this paper was consulted by certain criminal authori¬ ties in a case of forgery, by means of which — the forged document being a letter— a firm of merchants were defrauded of a large sum of money, as repre¬ sented in goods obtained from them by the perpe¬ trator of the forgery. A “ suspect ” was soon found and “ shadowed” in the person of a ‘Mady,” who had “ done a term ” before for a similar crime. A former letter of hers (extracted, presumably, from the police- office album) was submitted along with the letter that had been the means of defrauding the merchants in the present instance, and the question was asked: “Were the two documents written by the same hand ?” On examination the reply was equivocal, both “ Yes'^ and “No.”. There were differences, certainly, but there were also many singular points or features of resemblance ; in fact, a “ family ” likeness common to both. The authorities had expected the decision that both letters were written by the same hand, any differences being accounted for partly from want of practice (the “ lady ” had just done five years, during which the pen must have been largely in abeyance !) and partly from an attempt, or supposed attempt, at disguise. But on the evidence supplied the writer could make no such decision, suggesting, however, another member of the “ suspect’s ” family — a sister or daughter — as the probable forger of the second letter. As a matter of fact, this turned out to be the case, for on arrest, the elder criminal confessed she had, for obvious reasons, induced her daughter to forge the document by which she herself was made at length to suffer a further period of obscure retirement from a world abounding in temptation. The experience of the expert in handwriting is, of ^ MISS BLACKIE. (J SCalc.)

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Miss Roxendale’s Suitors. 21 I course, likely to be a difficult, if it be an interesting one. When specimens of penmanship are submitted to his diagnosis, he is oftentimes expected to play a sort of desk-detective’s part, and to supply from the evidence of a few mere pen-strokes or manoeuvres, as exhibited, for instance, within the narrow limit of a signature, a clue to the identity of the writer, which —let it be supposed — that individual has endeavoured to disguise. In this respect too much is sometimes required of the expert. His judgment is apt, like that of other specialists, to be at fault ; and he is a bold expert who will, in the face of many obvious difficulties surrounding this deeply interesting branch of inquiry, determine — especially in criminal cases — as to how much is due to accident 4nd how much to design. MISS ROXENDALE’S SUITORS. (THE CHRONICLES OF CARDEWE MANOR.) BY LUCY FARMER. CHAPTER THE FIRST. THE RIVALS. HAT do you think of Scot¬ land, Lucy?” said Mrs. Cardewe to me the morn¬ ing after our arrival at Glenkillie Castle in the late summer time. “ Well, ma’am,” was my reply, ‘‘it seems bare in many respects ; and I haven’t had time to get accustomed to the kilts yet. But it’s a fine place, indeed. The mountains are lovely, and the lakes remind me of the Conti¬ nent.” They certainly did, and I considered myself fortu¬ nate in having come up, or down, whichever it is, to Scotland. 1 wish these things could be settled. Mr. Cardewe goes “ up to London,” and “ runs down to see his nephew at Oxford,” but his nephew always “goes up to Oxford”; it’s worse than the weather puzzles which are in the papers. At any rate, there we were, and it was a grand place. Mr. Mac Somebody said it was “ braw ! ” Perhaps he meant “ raw,” for the air was chilly ! Glenkillie Castle was inhabited by a Mr. Roxen- dale, his daughter, and several people he had invited, with servants in numbers. There were ladies and gentlemen who fished, and rode, and drove, and made excursions in boats ; and besides the river, on horse¬ back and in carriages with “jellies ” — they call them — and other attendants : bare-kneed and tartaned, with knives sticking in their stockings — a dangerous practice when dancing round-a-bouts, or reels and flings, as they do — or did then ; perhaps the Queen has stopped them since ! Miss Roxendale, who was (and is) the most charm¬ ing young lady I ever met, was the belle of the whole district. Everyone, “jellies ” and all, were for admir¬ ing her. She was tall and proud-looking, put her feet well down when walking, as straight as an arrow, fine dark eyes and a square forehead, an out-of-door complexion, no pink and white, like those foreign ices, but a good healthy brown, with a soft skin ; a figure which did her dresses justice, and as nice and pleasant a young lady as ever 1 dressed for dinner. No wonder her papa was proud of her ; and no wonder Mr. Brydges, the young engineer, was as sweet on her as honey and treacle. Mr. Brydges (a good name) was a man, I should say, not easily crossed. He was very firm and deter¬ mined, yet when talking to the opposite sex he had a kind of an arch way about him very becoming to him ; and they tell me in the housekeeper’s room that he was well connected in two counties, with peers and other grandees for his supporters. But there is so much joking in the Castle that I can’t say for certain! Mr. Brydges comes of an old family which has somehow fallen into decay. So he took to engineer¬ ing work, and can do all kinds of things with water and steam, which he told Miss Helen Roxendale are the same thing— as if they could be ! But some gentlemen like to puzzle young ladies. At any rate, she took a great interest in steam and water, and in the water-works which Mr. Brydges was making for Mr. Roxendale, with fountains and a dripping tree which rained on me when I stood under it, and nearly ruined my shot silk. My husband called it a “ watered silk,” but men don’t know the difference ! As Charley says I can see into a mile-stone as far as most people, you may think I could see under that Brydges’ plans. Of course I could ! But his love- making was not plain sailing, for if ever I saw a little meddler in the business it was Mr. Drayton-West. Oh ! I have no patience with him. He was an arro¬ gant little man, w'hose father had bought up Stone- kilt Abbey — a lovely place, which he closed up with gates and notice boards, and keepers and dogs. Once upon a time people could walk round the woods of Stonekilt ; now the draper-man — for he is only a draper in Glasgow and London, with a big house in Kensington Gorey, as they call it— won’t let anyone in. But our picnic was permitted — for the draper wanted a call on the Roxendales ; and his son managed to leave the shop and come to Glenkillie Castle for a few days. This little Parvenoo^ as Miss Emily in my hearing

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2 I 2 Miss Roxendale’s Suitors. called him, came, and immediately began to interfere. No one is so foolish as to run down men who began life, so to say, low down, and came up after busi¬ ness hours to society ; but in “ society ’’ let such behave as gentlefolks, and not go putting on airs and golden swagger because rich ! This Mr. Parvefioo did, and Mr. Brydges disliked him — so did I, so did Miss Roxendale — but her papa did not dislike Mr. Drayton-West ; so he presumed on the old man’s favour. The fact is, Mr. Roxendale, though well off during his life, will not leave much behind him, so he wants his daughter well married. Thus it came to pass that he favoured Mr. West’s claims to Miss Roxendale, being quite ignorant that she and the engineer were in love ; though I am quite certain that Mr. Brydges had not confessed his affection to Miss Roxendale. She tried, like a dutiful daughter, to be kind to Mr. Drayton-West. Ugh! He made me shudder! His manner to the servants would convince you that he was a snob, his airs and his impudence, as if all the men weie dirt under his feet ; and his impertinent ways with the females. Oh ! I gave him such a hint one day. Now, Mr. Brydges was always considerate to the people, and thanked them for services. What Mr. Roxendale could see in that draper’s son, / can’t tell! One afternoon I was sitting on the terrace, working, when who should come up and sit just round the corner but the Parve7ioo and Mr. Roxendale. I detest listening, as everyone knows ; but what could I do ? If I got up I must pass them, and they might imagine I had already heard their conversation and if I remained where I was, 1 should probably hear more than they intended I should. While I was listening and debating with myself, Mr. Roxendale said — ‘‘The fact is. West, I cannot interfere. My daughter must choose for herself in this matter. Her happiness is at stake. Means she will not possess. This I tell you in confidence ; but I will not coerce her to marry for money. Do you understand me?” ‘‘Yes,” replied Mr. West; “1 think I do. You would rather she married Brydges” ‘•Brydges! Do you mean to assert that my daughter and Mr. Brydges are attached to each other, Mr. West?” cried Mr. Roxendale, angry-like. “ I can’t assert anything,” he replied. “ All I can tell you is that they seem to understand each other perfectly. I don’t think he has proposed to Miss Roxendale.” “ Well, ‘ forewarned is forearmed.’ My daughter cannot marry a penniless engineer ; in fact, I look much higher for her. However, you may rest assured that I will not oppose your suit. If Miss Roxendale should accept you, I will not forbid her choice.” “ I can settle three thousand on her,” began Mr. West ; “ and - ” “ Never mind details,” replied Mr. Roxendale — “they can be settled afterwards. But you do not think much of Brydges, I gather?” “ I do not. I have reasons, and would spare your * Mrs. Farmer’s usual excuse. — Ed. charming daughter humiliation. My career, at any rate, has been clear and above board ! ” Above board ! I wondered whether he meant over the counter ! His voice was sneering and cruel. I was certain he would play some nasty trick if he only got the opportunity. He was venomous — I could hear so much. “ Well,” replied Mr. Roxendale, rising, “ we can speak of this again. Good afternoon ; I have some correspondence to attend to just now. Excuse me, please.” He went away, and Mr. West accompanied him to the end of the terrace. After a while I rose, and sat in the front, where I could be seen ; and when I had settled myself, I saw Miss Roxendale returning alone through the grounds. Where she had been 1 could guess — sketching by the stream, no doubt. A pretty stream used to run through the woods, but lately it had been stopped for the completion of the water- works. The supply for the fountains and cascades was to be carried along the bed of the stream into the grounds, and the water was for a while dammed up in a reservoir into which the supply from the hills ran. Miss Roxendale had been in the stream-track, sketching ; and, seeing her alone, Mr. West hurried to meet her. They met and exchanged greetings, and she con¬ tinued her way towards the terrace, he walking beside her, chatting. I couldn’t hear what they said, but he was evidently trying to be agreeable, and she let him chatter. They came nearer. Suddenly she stopped and said, in a clear voice — “ Mr. West, you are not serious ? ” “ I am,” he cried. “ Dearest Helen, I love you ! ” “Hush I we may be overheard. Be silent, I beg of you. I never can return your affection ; so you may spare me any further scenes.” “ Ah ! ” sneered Mr. Spiteful, “ you are spoony on that beggarly engineer, I suppose?” “You coward!” she said; “never speak to me again. If Mr. Brydges were here you vvpuld not dare to insult me in this manner. Go, sir, and learn better manners. Ladies are not to be purchased like your father’s stuffs ! ” This was rather strong for Miss Roxendale, though I dare say he deserved the reminder. Mr. West said something which I will not repeat ; and declared that if he did not marry her, no “ cad of an engineer” — a “navvy” he called him. afterwards — should. “ Mr. Brydges is a gentleman, and my father’s guest, Mr. West. Here is my brother ; you can tell him all you have said, and leave the Castle as soon as you please.” “ You vixen ! ” cried West, clenching his hands and walking past me. He hardly noticed me in his anger, but I noticed him ! He was perfectly savage, and pale with rage, and would not stop to meet young Mr. Roxendale, who had apparently just returned from a visit. He met and kissed his sister, and returned with her to the house. As for Mr. West, he looked more like a murderer than a draper— and not good at

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Miss Roxen dale’s Suitors 213 either. I was certain he meant mischief, and you will see he did. It is perfectly astonishing what mean men will do ■when they are jealous. Mr. West was very mean, and mad with jealousy and disappointment. Mischief was brewing, I could see. After Mr. West had made his proposition to Miss Roxendale he appeared to be very sulky. He did not leave the Castle immediately, but took little or no in¬ terest in the preparations for the grand fete which was to be held when the fountains were to be tried. It was tixed for the 29th of July, and for a wonder the “MR. ROXENDALE MANAGED TO KEEP UP. HE CARRIED HIS SISTER ACROSS” {p. 215). CHAPTER THE SECOND. THE parvenu’s REVENGE. I WROTE all this to Charley at the time, and that is the reason why I am able to tell you the exact details of this business. But the horrible consequences of Mr. West’s unpleasant jealousy I told Charley when I returned home. He had a nice time with the children, I expect ; but he never minds my being away — for a while ! weather promised to be all that could be expected up in Scotland. But if Mr. West did not take very much interest in the fcte^ he took a great deal of interest in the work. Charley says I am suspicious — if I am, no one can deny that I have had cause. After all my experiences I think I may say that I am justified in being so, and surely Mr. West would give anyone a fit of it. He went out next day^oh ! I saw him — and looked at

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1 Miss Roxendale’s Suitors. 2 14 the pipes and the taps, and arrangements for the water display. This wouldn’t have troubled me much if a circum¬ stance which I witnessed had not been hand and glove with my suspicion. We were all permitted to see Mr. Brydges’ plans, and as the day for completion drew near we saw the sluices, &c., from the reservoir. The man who was in charge — a “navvy ” — did not do as he was ordered, and Mr. Brydges dismissed him at once. The fellow was very rude and insolent, so he was paid his wages that day, and sent away, grumb¬ ling, in a dreadful taking. “That man will remember you, Brydges,” said young Mr. Roxendale — Harold his name is ; “ he looked as if he could eat you without salt.” “ He will find me pretty tough, I can tell you,” laughed Mr. Brydges. “ I can take care of myself ! ” “ Well, I wouldn’t like to meet him in the dark this evening, after your scolding and his dismissal. He is a dangerous customer.” Miss Roxendale looked a little alarmed, and said, “ I am sure Mr. Brydges will be careful. We should all be sorry if anything happened to him - ” “ Until the fountains are ready. Miss Roxendale ; I understand. I will run no risks, for their sakes,” he retorted teasingly. “And ours, Mr. Brydges,” she replied, looking down. “ We have some feeling for our friends.” This pleased him ; but Mr. West, who was to leave that afternoon, was “ mad.” He went back alone and furious. I had to go, too ; and while 1 was passing through the woods 1 heard voices. “Yes ; I’ll do it,” said a grulf voice. “ I owe him one ; you leave it to me, sir. No murder ! Oh, not me ! I’ll put a plug in his tap !” What did this mean.^ — “Put a plug in a tap” might be anything — a “ slang term,” as Mrs. Car- dewe says when she scolds Miss Emily, her niece, for talking American after Miss Fallutine’s pattern. But when I saw Mr. Drayton-West and the navvy separate with nods, then I knew that they had arranged some¬ thing which did not promise well for Mr. Brydges. But there was nothing for me to work upon. I could not denounce either man, because they both had quitted the neiglibourhood : the gentleman had returned to his Abbey — the shop ; the working man in search of employment apparently. So I puzzled my poor head about the matter, and wished for Charley to advise me. Suppose the fountains were destroyed, and the pipes tampered with ! Suppose the water¬ works failed ! Then Mr. Roxendale would blame the engineer, and there would be no wedding. The twenty-eighth of July was a wet day, and there was a thunderstorm over the hills. Mr. Brydges was rather anxious while it lasted, for I think he was afraid for his “ puddled embankment ” — but every path and road was full of puddles for that matter, so why he need have been afraid of a puddle in his embankment, / can’t imagine. Engineers are very fanciful creatures with their levels, and gauges, and thing-a-mynometery,* and such tools. Fortunately the * We fancy Mrs. Farmer means trigonometry. — Ed. afternoon was fine, and everyone went out in the woods. Mrs. Cardewe gave me a holiday ; so Mrs. Clarkson, the housekeeper, and I had a walk, and saw Miss Roxendale sketching as usual in the bed of the stream. “ Good afternoon,” she cried out to us. “ This is almost my last chance for this view ! ” Mrs. Clarkson had lived with the Roxendales for years, and had nursed Miss Helen, so there was no¬ thing peculiar in the greeting. She is a kind young lady, and somehow I thought she was in danger. A something came before my eyes, and a terrible feeling at my heart, and I said — “ Take care, miss ; maybe you will get wet ! ” She laughed merrily. She was painting on a big flat rock in the middle of the stream — a beautiful bit of glen scenery was visible up the river. There was a little cascade, now dry, and overhanging trees ; beyond was a pool, surrounded, as it seemed, by trees and woods. The river was rather wide hereabouts where Miss Roxendale was sketching, and it narrowed up to the cascade. They call streams “burns” up there, though till then I always thought he was a writer of poetry in Scotch language, with dreadful spelling. It was a pretty picture — Miss Helen in the stream, mermaid-like, drawing a picture as pretty as herself. We waited for a while, and then went home, I puzzling all the time about Mr. West’s revenge. What a mean fellow he must be, I thought, to spoil an enjoy¬ able day, and a young rival’s prospects ! The next day was delightful — warm and sunny. Any birds that had not quitted the woods for England, sang ; the burns sparkled — not ours, it was dry ; and when I went out to see the preparations, I was delighted. Masts and streamers, tents and French marquees — very grand. A band was coming, and there were to be sports : throwing stones and tossing things about, leaping, and flinging, I dare say, also. The “jellies” were all dressed in costume ; and the pipers made such a terrible disturbance that I was glad to run off with my fingers in my ears to the top of the hill, where I could see the reservoir glinting in the sun, and \vatch the engineer’s sluices opened. Miss Roxendale was finishing her sketch as 1 passed up the burn-side. She did not notice me, she was so busy. The ceremony was for one o’clock, and it was past eleven then. The minister had come, and many others were arriving. Mr. Drayton-West was coming. I understood, to luncheon, with his father. Let him ! Ugh! I sat up on the hillside watching the place. There was a sluice-gate, and an arrangement by which the water could, in a moment, be let into the pipes and to the stream. At a signal the men would let the water out, and then rush, bang, roar, down it would come, tearing into the burn through the wood and up in the fountains : the main body going off, as usual, in the old track round the grounds, while the fountains played, and the band music did “ Rule, Britannia.” Twelve o'clock. Our minister and young Mr. Roxendale, with Mr. Brydges, came up the hill, and

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Miss Roxendale’s Suitors. 215 cHatted. I confess I was nervous, and I could not help hearing Mr. Brydges say— “ Hullo ! what does that fellow want there? Look, Roxendale ; he is prowling about for no good ! 1 looked, and easily recognised the navvy who had been dismissed for impudence a few days before. Mr. Brydges watched him, and said — ‘‘ I suppose my fellows are at dinner or refreshing themselves, or he wouldnk be allowed there. How¬ ever, he can’t do any harm.’^ “ Oh, let him alone,” said Mr. Roxendale. “ You dismissed him, didn’t you ? • let him see the fun.” “But it isn’t fun shouted Mr. Brydges, jumping up. “ See, he’s got the winch, and is going to open the sluices. Good gracious ! all will be spoiled — tlie time is not up yet by nearly an hour. Oh, what a villain ! 1 will stop him if I can— mind the water.” It was some distance from the top of the hill down to the reservoir, which had been made to hold all the surface water, and the storms had filled it quite full. There was an overflow rivulet at the side ; but, of course, when the sluice was opened the whole body of water would rush down the stream. The tap in the pipe would set the fountains off, too — unless it was closed up. “Oh, the water,” I cried, jumping up, “and Miss Helen in the middle of the river ! ” The malignant navvy had opened the sluices in revenge. Then the torrent came down foaming ; the rush was terrible. He helped it by cutting at the embankment, and the pressure soon tore away the clay and gravel. It was a terrible sight, and I couldn’t help saying, “ Lord, preserve Miss Roxen¬ dale ! ” “ Miss Roxendale ? ” shouted her brother ; “ is she in danger ? ” “ Yes, sir ; in the river sketching. Oh ! save her.” He was off like a deer. The minister ran after him. I waited to see what Mr. Brydges would do. There he was, bounding down the road — but too late ! The water was out, the day was spoiled, the plans upset, if no worse things happened. Mr. Brydges came down with a rush. The man heard him, and turned to face him, a pickaxe in his hand. But the engineer came along the slope like a war-horse or an engine. With a rush he caught the navvy by the collar, and before I could say, “ Serve him right ! ” pitched him into the gully where the water was rushing and foaming like a whirlpool. It was a terrible scene, and I never shall forget the engineer tossing the man into the stream, and the navvy floundering about, carried off his feet, bumped and bruised as he tried to rise, and hurried on again by the water. He was caught in his own trap nicely. Mr. Brydges blew a whistle to collect his men ; but 1 did not wait. I hurried down to the wood, half afraid to find Miss Roxendale a dead body. Dear me, it was dreadful ! As I came down I could see through the trees the water rushing in front of me — brown, with a white crest, lashing and tearing away the bank, smashing sticks and branches, and hurrying dead wood down in the whirlpool it made. The cascade was foaming already ; and there, in the middle of the river, was Mr. Roxendale, wading just as he was dressed. His sister was standing on the rock holding up her petticoats, and calling to him to make haste. There was no time to lose. I could do nothing but scream for help. The minister had already taken off his shoes and stockings. He plunged in, and came up to help Mr. Roxendale, who was then carrying his sister across. The sketch was lost altogether. A big branch of a tree was coming down, and the minister hurried to stop it. Mr. Brydges was taking his shoes off before I could guess how he had come down the hill again ; but he had run round ^nd got before me. We saw nothing of the man who had done all the mischief — perhaps the workmen had rescued him. Mr. Roxendale managed to keep up. He carried his sister across. I can see them now as I shut my eyes — her arms round his neck, and he holding her bravely— for she must have tried his arms, strong as they are. Fortunately the branch was caught by the minister, and did no harm to the brother and sister, who landed in safety. Mr. Roxendale told me to look after Miss Helen ; but I found that she preferred to remain with the engineer, so I left them, and went, accompanied by the minister, to find the wretched navvy. We did find him, bruised, and bleeding, and soaked through, sitting on the bank near the cascade. When Mr. Cathcart appealed to him, he at first denied the deed ; but when I tackled him, and reminded him of Mr. West’s talk with him, he sulkily confessed he had been “ bribed to do it ! ” “ And were nearly guilty of Miss Roxendale’s death,” said Mr. Cathcart. “ You will surely be arrested and punished.” “Then others will go with me,” said the man. “ You go and find Mr. Drayton-West, and tell him I told ye. There ! He’s the man ! He wanted to spoil thc/ee^ to-day. He didn’t want no droundin’ of young ladies — not him ! ” “ You had better be off, then,” said the minister. “ We can deal with your tempter. Be oflf before the men catch you.” “ Think you’re about right, guv'nor,” said he, as he crawled away into the woods, without a word of thanks or gratitude. The lawn was in a terrible mess, for the fountains had played too much ; but after a while the taps were turned and the force regulated. Fortunately, Miss Roxendale was no worse. Mr. Roxendale was in excellent spirits. The party congratulated her and him, and praised her brother’s pluck ; and thanked Mr. Brydges for the arrangements, which eventually were carried out. To my surprise, Mr. West came up, and addressed Miss Roxendale, who, with her brother and Mr. Brydges, was inspecting the “dripping tree” — a zinc invention full of pipes which rain on you. She turned and stared at him coldly, but made no reply. Mr. Roxendale asked him his business ; and ]\Ir. Brydges

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2I6 Some Digestible Forms of Cheese Cookery. wanted to know “ how much he had paid his accom- plice — the navvy ? ” “ He has confessed your treachery, you reptile ! ” said Mr. Roxendale. “ You may leave the grounds. We do not know you, and if you do not leave quietly, the servants shall eject you. Come, Brydges ; come, Nell.” Mr. West stood still and fumed, but did not go. In five minutes one of the indoor servants came to tell him his carriage was waiting, and he had to leave. No one noticed him, nor spoke to him, and he drove rapidly home, punished, and properly cut ” by all. The remainder of the day was charming. The games were most interesting ; and the ‘‘jellies ” were most active in tossing and “flinging,” and got reeling at last, I was told, which I did not see myself, I am glad to say — only a Highland dance did I remark. Everyone seemed happy, and one couple in particular ; for in the evening I just caught a voice, which I knew was Miss Roxendale’s, saying clearly and sweetly — ‘‘ Dear Archie, I am sure papa will not interfere with my choice, and I have chosen ” ‘* Dearest,” was the reply, “ I am yours, and yours only, come what may, till death do us part.” Then I came away, for I was convinced that the arrangements had been perfectly successful, and that the young engineer had won his prize and got his reward. SOME DIGESTIBLE FORMS OF CHEESE COOKERY. ETWEEN those who assume that cheese is an article of diet which can be eaten with im¬ punity by everybody, and the large number of people who condemn it in to to, there is certainly room for various ex¬ pressions of opinion, and for the exercise of ingenuity as to the best ways of rendering it more digestible ; for it should be borne in mind that it is a highly con¬ centrated food, and as such, is too powerful for many, especially sedentary livers. By way of introduction to the hints and recipes herein given, I will first own my indebtedness to Pro¬ fessor Mattieu Williams, he being the originator of the treatment of cheese with bicarbonate of potash, to which special attention is requested, and all the recipes (other than his own, which are duly acknow¬ ledged) are the direct outcome of the suggestions given in his admirable work, “The Chemistry of Cookery.” All thinking people must agree with the professor that cheese demands greater attention than it usually obtains, as “it may be brought from any part of the world where cows and goats can be fed, and can be stored more readily, and kept longer, than other kinds of animal food.” As to its nutritive properties, it contains, taking the average of the best varieties, not much over 30 per cent, of water, as against more than 70 per cent, in beef ; thus, at starting, there is more than double the amount of solid, i.e., wate7'-free nou¬ rishment. But the practical question, “ Can we assimi¬ late and convert into our own substance the cheese food as easily as we can the flesh food 1 ” is answered very decidedly in the negative by the author, who says, “ We cannot, if eaten raw, but we may if suit¬ ably cooked ; for, although mountaineers can digest raw cheese as a staple article of food, and prove its nutritive value by the result, yet feebler bipeds of the plains and towns cannot do the like.” As to the potash treatment, its advantages may be briefly summed up as — making up the deficiency of mineral matter, which in cheese-making is left behind in the whey, neutralising the acid, and converting the casein into its original form, as it existed in the milk. With reference to the best kinds of cheese for cook¬ ing purposes, any of the soft rich varieties are superior to Parmesan, so far as digestion is concerned, though they lack its peculiar and generally liked flavour. Gorgonzola, as well as the cheeses of Cheddar, Gloucester, Stilton, and the Midland counties generally, likewise the best sorts of American, are all available for cooking purposes ; and it is the opinion of a high authority, both in the medical and dietetic world, that a cheese which is soft enough to spread on bread, hurts nobody, as a rule. The outer portion should be dried, and reserved for dishes which require the cheese to be grated instead of sliced. Professor Williams says, regarding the solubility of cheese, that he found great difference in the various samples and that, generally speaking, the newer and milder the cheese, the more soluble it is. Some that he tried “ left a stubbornly insoluble residuum, detestably tough.” The average quantity of potash required is the fourth of an ounce for every pound of cheese used, whatever the nature of the dish. In these propor¬ tions the flavour of the potash will not be detected. In some e.xperiments in which Professor Williams doubled the quantity of the alkali, he found that the bitter flavour just perceived. The first dish — and a very nice one — on my list is the following. Fill a pie-dish with slices of bread and butter (first soaking them in a mixture of milk and eggs) and grated cheese in alternate layers, allowing time for saturation, then bake gently ; or, grate the bread as well as the cheese, and thoroughly mix, then add the eggs and milk. This, in the opinion of a lady who wrote to Professor Williams on the subject, is the

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Some Digestible Forms of Cheese Cookery. 217 better way. She also advises a shallow tin for the baking, as for Yorkshire pudding, as this gives more of the browned surface. Although the above is called “ Cheese Pudding,” the author asserts that it is too nutritious to supplement a joint, “and as its savoury character tempts one to eat it too freely, it would be far wiser to use it as the Swiss peasant uses his fondu : i.c.^ as the substantial dish of a wholesome dinner.” 1 would here recommend a trial of a steamed pud¬ ding made in either of the foregoing ways. It will be found very much lighter (though a little less savoury) and easier of digestion ; but the mixture, to ensure its turning out successfully, must be made stiffen To each half-pint of milk used an ounce of flour should be added, and more eggs will be required to set it than for a baked pudding. Any previously cooked cereal — rice, for instance — is also a good addition, as it not only helps to “bind,” but gives bulk, thus making it more economical, as well as better adapted to the requirements of some people ; and all who require to make the dish as laxative as possible will be wise to use whole-meal bread in preference to white for its foundation. I will mention, en passant^ that the addition of the potash is not so necessary when the milk which is added is just drawn from a cow, that being in itself slightly alkaline. Professor Williams says that, in his opinion, the absence of potash seems the one serious objection to the free use of a cheese diet, and that he is satisfied that cheese can never take that place in an economic dietary which is otherwise justified by its nutritious composition, unless this deficiency of potash is somehow supplied ; and that his device of using it with milk as a solvent supplies it in a simple and natural manner. Cheese Souffles^ or Fondas, are very popular, but as usually made they are decidedly indigestible ; and in Professor Williams’s own recipe he advises a gill of milk, as much powdered bicarbonate of potash as will stand upon a threepenny-piece, and four ounces of grated cheese to be heated carefully until it is com¬ pletely dissolved, after which three beaten eggs are to be added, and the mixture poured into shallow dishes or trays of metal or earthenware that will stand heating, and baked or fried until 7iea7dy sotidified^ The difference, it will be noted, consists in the fact that, owing to the utensils being shallow, less time is required for the cooking, and the surface will not be “an air-tight, leathery skin,” as it often is. For a cheaper dish, fewer eggs will suffice, and bread-crumbs will make it more acceptable to some palates. The seasoning is as usual — viz., mustard, cayenne, white pepper, and, if liked, a dash of nutmeg. The quantity of salt must be regulated by the kind of cheese used. Recipes for dishes of this kind could easily be multi¬ plied if space allowed ; and although I have not yet subjected a cheese omelet to the potash treatment, I see no reason why it should not be as successful as a fondu. Referring to dishes consisting of cheese and any of the various forms of Italian paste, Professor Williams contrasts the usual English treatment, notably of clieese and macaroni, with that of the Italians ; the latter take care that the cheese is delicately cooked, while in England, the top layer being often of grated cheese, after placing in an oven or before a fire the surface “ is browned, and converted into a horny, caseous form of carbon that would induce chronic dyspepsia in the stomach of a wild boar if he fed upon it for a week.” Indeed, whatever the actual recipe, the chief point to ensure a digestible dish is for the cheese to be mixed, softened, and diffused in the liquid used as the “ solvent,” whether water or milk, or stock if the dish is to take the form of a soup or stew. I recommend the following as a light and nourishing way of serving Maca^'oni and Cheese. Mix one ounce of potato flour with a little cold milk, add a pint of hot milk, put it into a stewpan and boil for a minute or two, stirring well ; then remove it from the fire (this is to lower the temperature, that the cheese may not be hardened), and stir in until quite dissolved two or three ounces of cheese, grated if dry enough, or thinly sliced if soft ; add salt and pepper to taste, then pour it over four table-spoonfuls of previously cooked macaroni, cut small, and laid in a dish. Garnish with sippets of dry toast, and serve hot. Boiled rice, as well as vermicelli and other Italian pastes, may be used for this. Another result of what Professor Williams calls his cheese-cooking researches is a class of dishes in the form of porridge : which, he says, are not intended for epicures, but for men and women who eat in order to live and work, and which are especially fitted for those who work in the open air. They must be carefully used by sedentary brain-workers, “ lest they suffer from over-nutrition, which is but a few degrees worse than partial starvation.” The author’s typical cheese porridge is described as “ ordinary oatmeal porridge, made in the usual manner, but to which grated cheese, or some of the cheese solution above described, is added, either while in the cookery pot or after it is taken out, and yet as hot as possible ; it should be sprinkled gradually, and well stirred in.” The professor, no doubt, by ordinary oatmeal porridge means thoroughly cooked porridge ; half-cooked oat¬ meal is one of the most indigestible foods one can eat. I remember at a lecture on food one of the audience asking the lecturer, “Is it 7'eally true that starchy foods swell very much and require a long time to cook, &c. ?” He replied, “Yes; and if you won’t give them time to swell outside the body, they must do the swelling inside.” This did not lack force, at any rate, and probably made an impression upon all present. I can endorse the author’s recommendation to add cheese to Hasty Puddmg, which converts it, as he says, into a savoury and highly nutritious porridge ; and the same may be said of boiled rice and other forms of edible starch. It is not necessary always to add milk ; those who prefer it may, after mixing the cheese thoroughly with the porridge — by the way, hominy must not be forgotten — add a little gravy, or

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2i8 A Peep at a Russian P'air. tomato puree, or I would suggest for variety the addition of any of the usual sauces, parsley, onion, celery, &c. Cheese pudding, or cheese porridge, made by adding cheese to baked potatoes, with a little milk if liked, is worthy of consideration ; this may be served as it is, or pressed into a dish and slightly browned for the sake of appearance, but will be more digestible inintts this treatment. Boiled potatoes will not do ; a potato cooked in its skin aloiie contains all its original saline constituents ; and these, as previously stated, are specially demanded in combination with cheese. I have not tried fish sauce with cheese, added, or fish and cheese pudding, both of which are pronounced excellent ; and grated cheese with stewed tripe is said by the professor to be very good ; but I may here suggest to any vegetarian readers who are au fait in the concoction of vegetable soups and pureds into which milk enters, that they make trial of cheese, by dissolving it in milk, with or without the potash, according to individual requirements, and adding it just before serving the potage. Those who appreciate Cauliflower ail gratin — viz., a nicely cooked cauliflower coated with thick white sauce with grated cheese in, will find many other vegetables equally good similarly served. I feel that these suggestions will lack completeness if I omit a reference to toasted cheese and Welsh rarebit, perhaps the most familiar and popular forms of cheese cookery, as well as the most indigestible as ordinarily prepared ; the toasted cheese is often cooked by so fierce a heat, that it is so hardened and toughened that the moment it begins to cool it re¬ sembles india-rubber ; and in the case of the Welsh rarebit, the rapid boiling ensures similar hardening of the cheese, and also robs it of its nourishment. Justice compels me to state that I know no way of making toasted cheese pure and simple any other than indigestible, but cheese can be digestibly cooked by stewing. Supposing you have in your saucepan a little milk (which may be advantageously thickened with flour, or whole-rneal for brown bread eaters) : let this boil, then add the cheese, and don’t allow it to boil again, simply dissolve it. Those with whom eggs agree can add one well beaten with the cheese ; it will cook in a few minutes at the reduced tempera¬ ture, and be found a very excellent dish. It should be poured over or served with some nicely made toast. Tomato conserve is a good flavouring medium for the above. In conclusion, I am well aware that many very delicious cheese dishes, especially such as have a pastry foundation, are omitted from this paper, and purposely, as I have excluded all such as are outside the pale of digestible dishes ; for the same reason I have discarded cream, although it usually enters into the composition of dishes of cheese, my object being to draw attention to unusual varieties of cheese cookery. A PEEP AT A RUSSIAN FAIR. IF the traveller in Russia should happen to find himself in the interest¬ ing old city of Moscow during the month of August or September, he should on no ac¬ count miss the oppor¬ tunity afforded him of paying a visit to the world- renowned fair of Nijni-Nov- gorod. Modern railways, which have brought distant coun¬ tries so near together, have shorn this great mart of some of its former splendour and importance ; and with the gradual disappearing of the various distinctive national costumes — which are get¬ ting woefully Europeanised — is departing one of its most interesting features. But in spite of these drawbacks, the great fair will well repay a visit, and a day spent in the midst of its busy traffic will leave an interesting and unique recol¬ lection in the mind, which will amply reward any discomfort and fatigue that may be incident to the journey. Let me try and describe a day we spent one August in this great market. Nijni-Novgorod — Lower New Town (there is an¬ other Novgorod a little south of St. Petersburg)— is situated 410 versts, or 273 miles, from Moscow in an almost direct easterly line. The town boasts several hotels, but as we did not hear very favourable reports of these, and as they are said to be uncomfortably crowded during the time the fair is being held, and not to be altogether comfortable quarters for ladies, we preferred to follow the usual plan of travelling down by the night train, spending a long day at the fair, and returning the next night to Moscow. (N.B. — I have been told since that some of these hotels are very fairly comfortable, and we might well have ventured upon the experiment of spend¬ ing a night there ; so it may be that the guide-books we consulted — not always reliable — had been malign¬ ing them.) One hears a good deal about the comfort and

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A Peep at a Russian Fair. 2 19 luxury of railway travelling in Russia, and we are told of its being superior to railway travelling iu any other part of the world. Tastes differ ; but so far as my own experience goes, I have no hesitation in saying that tlie railways in either England or Ameiica are vastly better, especially for night journeys. To be sure, in Russia the sleeping - carriages provide ex¬ tremely comfortable linen-covered chairs, which make either a luxurious lounge or most restful seat. But the berths provided by the Great Northern Railway here, or the Pullman cars in America, are far supe¬ rior, while the toilette accommodation on a Russian train is of the scantiest and shab¬ biest. It is a chance whether you find a sufiicient supply of water to perform even the most perfunctory of ablutions. I Then again for day travelling. As each compartment — or in the undivided car¬ riages what corre¬ sponds to a compart¬ ment — has only one window — and that a rather high one — where anywhere else you have three, the view, as may be well imagined, is very much circumscribed ; and if the traveller wants to make the most of the view of the country as he is carried along, he is compelled to assume an upright position, which is decidedly fatiguing. But perhaps the Russian rail¬ way companies have come to the conclusion that the very flat and monotonous districts through which their lines run do not offer much attraction to the traveller’s view. And add to these disadvantages the extreme slow¬ ness of the trains and their great unpunctuality— for a train to be an hour late in arriving at its destination seems to be a usual occurrence — in time one grows never to expect to be punctual. The ‘‘ fast train” that runs from Moscow to Nijni- Novgorod, leaving at 8.30 p.m., takes thirteen hours— or rather is timed to take thirteen hours — to make the journey of 273 miles. I suppose in England six hours or so would serve to accomplish the task. The station is some distance out of the town, and is quite distinct from the one for St. Petersburg. This seems to be the rule in Russia, where each railway company erects its terminus without ever consulting the convenience of travellers by making the various stations adjoin. Thus in Moscow the lines to St. Petersburg, Nijni-Novgorod, and Warsaw, all start from termini several versts apart. We drove to this outlying station in the hotel omni¬ bus drawn by four horses harnessed abreast ; secured three linen-covered lounges for the night journey ; and then prepared to make ourselves as comfortable as possible under the circumstances. The night was not too hot for sleep, so that the time passed tolerably quickly, and with morning light one felt comparatively rested and refreshed. With morning one saw at each station a rather strange but very welcome sight, particularly as toilette accommodation “on board” was noticeable by its absence — viz., a row of four or five women at each end of the platform, each provided with a stand holding a brass basin and a saucer full of varieties of scented soap. Each had also a tall ewer of fresh water and a pile of beautifully clean towels, fringed and embroidered. Thus, should the traveller have taken the old- maidish precaution — as I confess to having done — of providing himself with a sponge, comb, &c., a very tolerable toilette could be made at the cost of a few kopecks — twopence or four- pence, as your gene¬ rosity prompted you to give. And a good washing of face and hands in cold fresh water after a night of travelling is more refreshing than those who have not tried it can well imagine. It refreshed us even more than the glasses of tea — always good in Russia — which we consumed at various stations on the line, at the moderate cost of twopence each. For be it observed that, time being apparently of little consequence in Russia, the stoppages at the various stations are generally from ten to twenty minutes, so that you have time to take a leisurely breakfast or lunch with¬ out the hurry and bustle which seem inseparable from travel in England. The weather was close and heavy when, after a rather weary time, we at last sighted Nijni-Novgorod and alighted at the station, where, at a very fairly good restaurant, and under the care of an obliging waiter, who undertook the charge of our cloaks, &c., for the day, we made a tolerably good breakfast. Then we sallied forth and made our way along the rough, dusty, and unpaved streets in the direction of the great fair. The houses that lined the road were mostly low, one-storeyed wooden erections, bearing the stamp of poverty ; and in the dust and dirt unkempt children were playing quite happily with the pigs and dogs which seemed to abound. We passed several trains of country waggons — heavy CHINA TOWN.

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2:o A Peep at a Russian Fair. rather like weak imitation of Shetland work ; silver trinkets from Armenia, presided over by handsome and picturesque Armenians or Circassians ; and stalls for all manner of fruits and outlandish cakes and con¬ fectionery, the appearance of which was not tempt¬ ing to the Western eye. And here temptation assailed us ; and though we knew we were only on the outskirts of the fair, we could not resist investing in some of the tempting wares : a seal-skin cap, otter trimmed, which we bought for just about one-third of what we should have given in England ; some silver trinkets for keepsakes ; some quaint little scent-bottles — Parisian, as it turned out ; and so forth. And let me remark here how needful it is when purchasing anything for the traveller to be always on his guard against being cheated ; for the tradespeople are quite prepared to take him in at every possible turn ; will name the highest price which they can persuade him to pay for any article, and, if possible, will palm off upon their victim imitation malachite, silver, and so forth, for the real article. One common form of cheating we found was to ask a certain moderate price for something which might take the would-be purchaser’s fancy, and when, after a little hesitation, the article was taken, we would find that the price had risen — three, five, or seven roubles, as the case might be — the bland merchant declaring that the higher price was what he had named from the first. This difficulty we obviated after it had been tried once or twice upon our confiding innocence, by making the seller write down the exact sum he men¬ tioned at first, so that there might be no mistake ; and this plan we found to succeed perfectly. The real Eastern method of buying and selling obtains largely here, and you are almost invariably asked some pre¬ posterous price for any article, which it is quite out of the question to pay. You then mention a far lower sum, which the merchant, with much injured gesti¬ culation and much glib talking, which in all probability you do not understand, declares to be quite impossible for him to entertain for one moment. He then lowers his own price a little ; you raise yours; and finally, after a great deal of haggling and much waste of time, you may perhaps come to an agreement, or perhaps you may not, in which case the proper thing is to make a feint of going away. Then you are usually followed and brought back, with the offer of a further reduction, and probably in the end come to a mutual understanding. This haggling goes a good deal against one’s tastes and ideas at first, and it was some time before I could rid myself of the notion that we were beating down these merchants in a most shabby and unmerci¬ ful fashion, and their injured tones and looks filled me with a sort of shame. awkward vehicles, which seem to be almost all wheel and frame work, with very small capacity for carriage ; skirted the dirty little Lybed river which divides the town into two parts, and finally reached the goal of our journey — the great fair itself. Part of this huge bazaar stands upon a sort of small island surrounded by a canal, which has been con¬ structed as a preventive of fires, which are not infre¬ quent, and which are liable to do great damage. Put the shops overflow far beyond this island ; and the long streets of one-storeyed buildings, running mostly parallel or at right angles, seem interminable. The roads in the fair itself are paved wkh cobble stones, rough, dusty, and uneven ; and the trottoirs arc laid with bricks worn down by the feet of who shall say how many generations The Governor’s house might be called the entrance to the fair, and is quite an imposing building. Below it is a large restaurant, and just beyond a great covered bazaar. Here a band played during certain times of the day, and the effect of the various stalls with their merchandise was not altogether unlike the Palais Royal — for many of them were kept by Frenchmen or Germans, and the wares had often a distinctly Western look, and bore Brussels, Paris, or even London trade marks. But interspersed with these were stalls that looked much less familiar and homelike. Here was one where Russian furs were sold ; some simply the dressed skins, and others made up into tasteful caps and gar¬ ments ; others were for the sale of ornaments made of malachite, lapis lazuli, and other stones from Siberia ; knitted goods from the East, which looked WHERE FURS ARE SOLD.

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221 NIJNI-NOVGOROD. But when the bargain was hnally struck a change would usually come over the seller’s face. A look of bland satisfaction would replace the injured and dis¬ contented expression, and we would part with a sweep¬ ing bow of content on his part. And to do them justice, these Russians— no matter how wishful they might be to take advantage of us — we never knew to try and back out of a bargain when once it was struck. From a drosky-driver upwards we always found that they honourably kept to their agreement. Outside the bazaar — whose attractions had detained us for a considerable time — the streets extended in tantalising lines until one did not know which way to turn because of the abundance of distractions on all hands. Mere were numberless shops for furs, where you could buy all manner of dressed skins — astrachan, sable, ermine, mink, raccoon, wolf, bear, &c. Here if you chose you might invest in a warm lining for a great-coat from fifteen roubles to three hundred — a tolerably wide margin. Some of the garments already made up, especially the black sable, were quite superb, and the prices — quality considered— extremely reason¬ able. The old-world plan of the tradesmen of one calling congregating together seemed the fashion in Nijni. One part of the fair— and a very important one, too — was set apart entirely for the sale of tea, and was known as China Town. This has quite a “ Celestial” appearance, with its pagodas and Chinese shop signs. Here we saw stall after stall whose only merchandise was tea— tea in pound packages ; tea in dainty little painted canisters ; and endless twenty-pound bales sewn up in sheepskins. This latter was mostly what is known as ‘'caravan tea,” having been brought from the far East across the desert on camels, and is sup¬ posed to be much superior to any other sort. This will fetch twelve roubles a pound— that is no?nmally thirty-nine shillings, in reality twenty-one shillings in English money. In former days the Chinese used to flock to the fair to sell their tea. but they have ceased to come now, and we looked in vain for the sight of even one blue- bloused, pig-tailed individual with the “ child-like and bland” countenance. The tea trade of Nijni is not so flourishing as it once was when the importation of sea-borne tea was prohibited. But if we saw no Celestials anywhere, other nations were well represented, and the distinctive national costumes have not wholly disappeared. The majority of the busy crowd wore European dress, but among them we saw unmistakable hook-nosed and not too clean-looking Jews from the Bosphorus ; Kalmucks with their coarse, forbidding faces ; Astrachans ; handsome Circassians and Armenians ; eagle-nosed, hatchet-faced Persians in their inevitable fezzes ; and many others in picturesque confusion. In some neighbourhoods of the fair you come across lanes or alleys of a distinctly inferior kind, where roughly made clothing, common domestic utensils, cheap books, and icons, &c., are to be sold ; where unsavoury dainties assail the nostrils with their odours, and where the crowd is far from clean or fi'agrant. Again, you come across a bright-faced lad hawking minor wares in a basket slung to his neck — match¬ boxes, books, cheap icons, different coloured wooden

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222 1'he Stronger Will. balls that fit into each other, and such-like small matters ; or a clean, pleasant-faced old woman with a basket-load of wooden spoons of quaint shapes and devices, with whom you really have not the heart to haggle, and so meekly pay her what she asks, for the sake of her bright face and cheery chatter, of which, perhaps, you understand nothing but the number of kopecks she names as the price of her wares. And so on through endless streets and lanes until the mind is almost bewildered with the profusion of tempting articles spread around — Persian embroideries ; Bulgarian needlework ; Parisian trinkets ; malachite, amber, lapis lazuli ; silver ornaments (which are ‘Miall-marked ” with the figures “84” instead of our lion) ; picture books ; scented soaps in all kinds of devices ; confectionery ; lamps and candlesticks, &c. ; an endless variety, until one’s purse grows light, and one begins to feel it is high time to flee from further temptation. It is said that ^16,000,000 sterling pass annually through the hands of traders at this fair, which con¬ tinues at its height from the beginning of August until the middle of September ; and authentic records state that it was held so far back as 1366. Perhaps it is inevitable that in time the importance of this huge bazaar should diminish, as the facilities of railroads increase and distant countries are thereby brought nearer together. But as yet no European railway runs further east than Nijni, and the fair still continues the great institution where East and West meet annually to exchange their various wares and commodities. Much of the merchandise is conveyed by the river Volga now, which is crowded with modern-looking steamers and craft of all sorts — busy steam-tugs ; heavy barges laden with fruit, hay, grindstones, iron, and so forth ; huge well-boats for the conveyance of live fish ; and heavy-prowed craft characteristic of Russia. Much merchandise, too, is brought overland pain¬ fully long distances, being conv^eyed by the strings of wooden carts one sees, with their dejected horses and travel-stained drivers, who have probably been C7i route for many a weary week, or even month, and who all look as if a “ wash and brush-up ” were a luxury only known— if ever— in the dim ages of the past. When we had explored the fair pretty thoroughly, and had put ourselves within measurable distance of bankruptcy, we wandered down to the river, chartered one of the heavy-prowed boats which ply as ferry¬ boats, and crossed over to the other side, whence we climbed the stiff hill that overlooks the town. Here* the heat was great, and it was pleasant to sit on the dry grass and rest one’s weary feet and listen to the whirring and chirping of the grasshoopers around, while one could enjoy the splendid bird's-eye view of the town below, with the great fair occupying the angle of land formed by the junction of the two rivers, the Volga and the Oka — both busy and crowded, and both lying blue under the summer sky. A little lower down a many-arched bridge spans the Volga, which we crossed on our return, and which was one unceasing stream of slow-going carts or hurrying droskies, with here and there a carriage and pair of well-groomed horses, unmistakably the pro¬ perty of some private gentleman. And so once more through the uncleanly and unsavoury crowds of Jews, Astrachans, Tartars, and Moujiks, and through the tempting bazaars, until we reluctantly found ourselves outside at last, after a long day which had passed only too quickly. Then by drosky to the railway station, where we collected our various purchases and recovered our belongings from the waiter who had good-naturedly taken charge of them for us ; then, after some refresh¬ ment and a makeshift sort of toilette, we again took our places in the waiting train, secured each a com¬ fortable lounge for the night, and at 8.30— just twenty- four hours since leaving Moscow — w^e steamed slowly aw'ay from the noise, heat, and dust of the great fair into the cool darkness of the summer night. THE STRONGER WILL. By EVELYN EVERETT GREEN. Author of “Monica,' &c. CHAPTER THE TWELFTH. A SUMMONS. AM SO disappointed about brother,” said Ethel, with a great sigh. “ So am I,” returned Cuthbert, strok¬ ing Don’s silky head. “ I never guessed but what he’d come as soon as ever Parliament stopped.” I can’t think why he doesn’t,” cried Ethel, looking thoroughly aggrieved. “ Mother says she doesn’t think he w^ould care to come. Vernon says he isn’t wanted here : but that’s not true, I’m sure ; and Cousin Florence laughed, and told me to ask Uncle Oliver ; but I think she w'as sorry.” And you did ask Uncle Oliver, didn’t you ?” “Yes, I begged and coaxed as much as ever I could ; but he only teased me and laughed at first, and said little girls had to learn to do without big brothers ; and when I w'ouldn’t give up, he got rather vexed, and said he could not do with teasing ob¬ stinate little girls, and sent me out of his study. I don’t understand it a bit. I can’t think why they are all so unkind about brother. It makes me very miserable.” . Two big tears stood in Ethel’s brown eyes as she

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The Stronger Will. finished speaking. She was depressed alike by the subject she was discussing and by the discomfort of her surroundings. It was a July day, but the rain was pouring down in torrents, and the two children, crouching together beneath a great oak-tree, were pretty well soaked to the skin. They had been over¬ taken by the rain some distance from home, had got wet through before they reached the doubtful shelter of the tree, and had decided then, with the ignorant hardihood of childhood, to sit on the wet grass, under the dripping leaves, to wait for the shower to pass. ' Altogether, it was rather a lugubrious couple that returned to the house — soaked and limp — an hour later. The rain had never ceased, and the wind had risen and blown very chill, and at length Cuthbert had grown so cold and benumbed, that he had hardly been able to struggle home at all. Both children were thoroughly chilled, but Cuthbert’s lips were blue, and his teeth were chattering in his head. They were met by Cousin Florence, who seemed to be on the watch for them. ‘‘You poor little drowned kittens!” she exclaimed, as she drew them into the friendly shelter of the porch. “ Where have you been, all this tirne.f^ Why didn’t you take shelter in some cottage ? ” “ There weren’t any cottages where we were,” an¬ swered Ethel. “ We did sit under a tree for a long time ; but by-and-by it rained more there than any¬ where, and Cuthbert got so cold ; and then w^e came home.” Florence asked no more questions, but hurried both children upstairs to their nursery, lighted a fire there with her own hands, helped them off with their wet clothes, and, to their great astonishment, popped them both into bed, and made them drink something very hot and nasty, that made them feel “all on fire inside,” as Ethel said, and sent her off into a sound sleep almost at once. She slept all the rest of the day, and all night too, and woke up none the worse for her soaking. But Cuthbert seemed languid and tired, complained of headache when he got up, and was imprisoned by Cousin Florence in the nursery, where a little wood fire was kept burning all day, to Ethel’s amusement and delight. Towards evening Cuthbert had begun to cough — a sort of cough Ethel had learned to associate with linseed poultices and several days in bed. He looked flushed and tired, and did not care to be troubled to talk, or even to listen to Ethel’s chatter. He did not complain, however, though he admitted that his chest was all “ sore and tight,” and that he could not draw a deep breath ; but he added that he often felt like that, and it didn’t matter. He was grateful, however, to be made comfortable upon the sofa — as only Cousin Florence could make him — with a pillow behind his head, and the hot glow of the fire shaded from his face. Florence went in search of Mrs. Freer. “ I wish you would come and see Cuthbert,” she said. “ I am afraid he took a chill yesterday. He seems very poorly to-night.” 223 “I will go up to him after dinner,” answered Mrs. Freer, who was not fond of putting herself out of the way ; “ but I do not imagine it is anything to be alarmed about. Cuthbert’s chest has always been delicate, and he is subject to severe coughs. If you had seen as many as 1 have, you would think less of them.” Florence was not certain of this, but dinner was already announced, and she said no more. She was a good deal more concerned about the child than his mother was, and left the table earlier than usual, anxious to go up to him again. She put him to bed herself, and sat beside him until he sank into a sort of uneasy sleep ; but the difficulty of breathing and the pain of the cough aroused him perpetually, and it seemed as if nothing eased him but being held against her shoulder, whilst she stroked his damp hair, and sang softly to him some soothing lullaby. Mr. Cadwallader came up by-and-by, and looked at the child, feeling his pulse, and touching his hot head. “Felicia does not seem alarmed about him in any way,” he remarked to Florence, “ but I must say I think he ought to have a doctor to him.” The doctor arrived, and soon confirmed their fears. There was undoubtedly inflammation of one lung, and the other was threatened. Cuthbert was seriously ill, and there was the possibility of danger to come. The greatest care was enjoined, and the doctor left, pro¬ mising to be there early the following day. Time only served to verify the doctor’s worst fears. Both lungs were attacked, and Cuthbert lay danger¬ ously ill for many days. Florence was the best and most devoted of nurses, and the child could hardly bear her out of his sight. Mrs. Freer and Violet did all they could to be help¬ ful, but a nurse is born, not made, and their efforts in that direction were not successful. It was always Florence, Florence, Florence who was wanted, and Florence was ready to answer every demand made upon her. At length the fever departed ; but the child’s frame was so exhausted that it seemed almost as if he must sink, as if he could not find strength to rally from the violence of the prostrating sickness. For many days he lay in a very critical state, hovering be¬ tween life and death, but now with a mind quite clear, and all his faculties sharpened to preternatural acuteness. He had often talked of Rudolf in his wanderings, but now he spoke with all his wits about him. “ Cousin Florence,” he whispered, as he lay wide awake one night, his little face very white and drawn, and his eyes unnaturally large and bright, “ Cousin Florence, am 1 going to die ? ” “ I hope not, dear little man. We are going to try all we can to make you better.” He took her hand in his and kissed it. “ I do want something so much — if perhaps I am going to die.” “ What is that, Cuthbert ?”

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224 The Stronger Will. “ I do so want to see — brother again.” Florence did not at once reply, and he looked wist¬ fully into her face with his sightless eyes. “ Do you think uncle would let him come ? ” “ I think he would, dear.” “ May I ask him next time he comes to see me “ Yes, dear.” The boy looked relieved. “ I am so glad. I do so want him sometimes. He was always so kind to us. Till you came. Cousin Florence, there was nobody who was half as good to us as brother. I do so want to see him again.” Cuthbert always talked about “ seeing ” people, as most of the blind do. If I were to die — without — he would be so sorry.” “ Hush, dear boy,” said Florence gently. “ You are tiring yourself with so much talking. Lie still and try to sleep now ; and when Uncle Oliver comes in the morning we will ask him. I am sure he will let your brother come and see you.” Cuthbert smiled peacefully, for he had perfect faith in Florence ; he folded his hands together a moment, said a little prayer, and was asleep almost imme¬ diately with a smile upon his face. Two days later Rudolf, coming in to his lonely rooms after a hard and fagging day’s work, found a letter awaiting him, addressed in his uncle’s hand¬ writing. He had been hearing daily from Marchwood for the past week, as Cuthbert’s dangerous illness had made him very anxious, and he had asked his sister to let him know how things went on from day to day. He was very fond of the two children — more really fond than most men are even of their own young sisters and brothers. The love of the two little ones had been the most home-like influence he had ever known, the softest and warmest spot in rather a hard and loveless life. Odd as it may seem, the haughty, high-spirited Rudolf was conscious of a strange craving for love and sympathy ; and this love he had only met with so far in the trusting confidence of his little half-brother and sister. Fie had lost his father early in life,. his mother’s love had never satisfied him, his sister he had never really understood. It was only the little ones who had loved him with all their hearts, and had given him their confidence without limitation or doubt of any kind ; and he had felt the separation from them very much more than he had believed it possible. When he had heard of the dangerous illness of the little boy, his first impulse had been to go straight to Marchwood, and claim the right of a kinsman to be with the child at such a time ; but the absence of all hint or expectation on the part of others that he should do this held him back at first, and then his pride rose in arms against any attempt to force himself into a house where he evidently was not wanted, where he was regarded with suspicion and dislike. So he was feeling rather bitter during these long summer days, and was trying to forget in sheer hard work the aching and stinging pain he often felt in his heart. His time was at his own disposal now. Parliament had ad¬ journed, Sir Arthur Morrison had gone abroad ; but there was plenty of work that his employer had left him to do, and he worked with a will, finding it the best thing possible for keeping down bitter feelings and haunting regrets. He felt considerable surprise at seeing his uncle’s handwriting. Mr. Cadwallader had never written to him once all his life. He took up the letter slowly, a curious thrill running through him. “ I suppose the poor little fellow is dead,” he said to himself, “ and nobody else is able to write.” He set his face rather sternly as he opened the letter. It seemed to him at that moment a hard thing that he should be a sort of alien from the house that was home to those he loved best. The letter ran as follows : — “ Dear Rudolf, — Can you come down for a few days to March- wood, at your early convenience ? Cuthbert continues very ill, and is anxious to see you. Name your own day and train. You shall be met at Hawkhurst. Yours faithfully, “Oliver Cadwallader. “Marchwood, August ist.” Rudolf Stood quite still, the letter in his hand. It was very plain what it meant. The boy was dying, and his dying wish had triumphed over other con¬ siderations. If the young man had been less fond of the child, he might have hesitated about accepting such a perfunctory, coldly worded invitation. As it was, he telegraphed at once that he would come down on the following day. Cuthbert had been very ill all day ; but when, in the afternoon, he heard a familiar step approaching down the corridor, his head was lifted with sudden energy, and he gripped Florence’s hand hard. “ He’s come ! ” he whispered. He’s come !” Next moment Ethel had rushed forward, with a stifled cry of ‘‘ Brother ! Brother ! ” and had flung herself, sobbing convulsively, into Rudolf’s arms. Florence drew a little away into the shadow, watch¬ ing him whilst he soothed and caressed his little sister, and bent over the blind boy to let him make sure of him by the satisfaction of touch as well as of hearing. For a short time he was unaware of her presence in the room, being engrossed by the two children, and there was therefore no restraint upon his manner towards them, and his manly tender¬ ness and gentleness struck her as something rare, and even beautiful. She had seen him under a variety of different cir¬ cumstances, and in many different moods ; but never before when the deeper feelings of his nature had been called into play, as they were at this moment. He was very quiet, very undemonstrative, even now ; but perhaps that only showed the more plainly hew very deep and earnest was the love he felt for the little children from whom he had so long been separated. Florence hardly knew which was prettier, their over¬ whelming delight at having him again, or his visible and half-pathetic pleasure in receiving once more some tangible manifestations of love. Florence was so keenly sympathetic an observer, that she read a very great deal in a very short time. She knew that

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The Stronger Will. 225 he had missed the little ones, had unconsciously hungered after their love, and had wanted them in his lonely life — more, a good deal, than they had wanted him. This did not seem to her a sign of weakness. It gave her a better idea of Rudolfs truer nature. She liked and respected him more at that moment than she had ever done before. But she saw that he was un¬ conscious of her presence, and she stepped forward. “ I am very glad you have come,” she said. “Your presence will be the best possible tonic he could have. He has been so anxious to have you ; we have hardly known how to keep him quiet all day.” At the sound of her voice Rudolf had risen quickly from the bed, on the edge of which he had seated himself. His face changed quickly, and he spoke with chill politeness. “ I beg your pardon, Miss Tenant. I did not see you were here. I hope I am not intruding. I was told I might come up.” ‘‘ Well, probably, seeing it was for Cuthberfs sake you have come,” she answered, with that smile he knew so well, “ you are very welcome for your own sake, too, and for the good I know you will bring. N ow I am going to leave you three alone together, which is just what you want, I know ; and I will send you all up some tea, and the more you all make each other eat, the better I shall be pleased. Cuth- bert, you are not to talk, but you may ask brother Rudolf to talk to you. Now that you have got him, 1 know that you will be a good boy, and get well very fast.” She bent over him for a moment as she spoke, smoothing the hair away from his forehead with the gentle touch that always soothed him better than any¬ thing else. He lifted his arms, and clasped them about her neck. “ Don’t go because brother has come. I want you both.” “ Then you must learn not to be quite so grasping, young man, for you will have to spare me a little more now that you have got another slave. Good-bye, little one. It will not be very long before you see me again.” She vanished with her sweet arch smile and a pretty farewell gesture, and Ethel, drawing a long breath, said softly — “HE KEPT HIS EYE UPON THE MOTIONLESS FIGURE BESIDE FLORENCE” (/. 227). 735

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226 The Stronger Will. “ IsnT she sweet ?” But Rudolf, who had come to Marchwood fully determined not to be subjugated by the charms of the presiding spirit, made no reply, and turned the talk away from the subject of Miss Tenant. He and the little ones made the most of their time ; and under the influence— as it seemed — of his granted wish, Cuthbert made great strides towards recovery, and was soon pronounced out of danger. CHAPTER THE THIRTEENTH. AN ACCIDENT. “ Tm afraid, Cuthbert, that I cannot get you that one. I only know one place where it grows, and that is one where it is impossible to go/’ said Florence. “Why is it impossible asked Ethel, looking up from the picture in the botany book that she had just been describing to Cuthbert. “ Because it is high up in a very dangerous place in the old ruined castle by the lake — the place we went to pic-nic, you know. Up on the top of a shaky Avail there I saw the fern growing, but I don’t know of any other place, and nobody could get it down from there without too much risk.” “ What a pity ! ” said Cuthbert. “ I should so like to have had it for my collection ; but never mind. Ah ! here is brother.” Cuthbert was now progressing steadily towards con¬ valescence, and his favourite method of passing the time was in the study of botany — an odd fancy for a blind child, as it seemed at first, but his peculiar deli¬ cacy of touch made the handling of leaves or flowers a positive pleasure, and he seemed to know them almost as well by touch as Ethel did by sight. To¬ gether the children were mounting and classifying as many different kinds of ferns as they could get hold of, and all the botany books in the house were gradu¬ ally being brought upstairs for the delectation of the little patient. Ethel read extracts to him and de¬ scribed the pictures, and great was their delight when they could get possession of any fern depicted in the coloured plates. Cuthbert was so far on the road to recovery that Rudolf had begun to feel his presence at Marchwood an intrusion, and had already fixed an early day for his departure. He had seen very little of Mr. Cad- Avallader, as little as he could of Florence, and the main part of his time had been given to the children. When not with them, he was generally walking or riding alone : trying hard to persuade himself that this visit to Marchwood was not, after all, a disap¬ pointment to him : trying to believe that the sense of unsatisfied longing in his heart was only the delusion of a rather jaded mind. Perhaps Rudolf was not the only one who had been a little disappointed in his visit. As Florence drove home with her guardian one afternoon, from a visit to a house at some distance, she was thinking that it was a great pity Rudolf was going on the morrow, before anything in the least approaching a better understanding had been arrived at between him and his uncle. She was by nature sanguine and hopeful, and she was accustomed in some marvellous Avay to bring things round as she wished them to be brought. She had begun to fancy she had some gift for making things come right and for smoothing away difficulties ; yet in this particular case— perhaps because she was so deeply interested in it— she seemed quite powerless. She had two strong and self-willed masculine natures to deal with, and her influence, if exerted at all, must on no account be seen or recognised by either. She had rather built upon this visit of Rudolfs ; but it was all but ended now, and no result had been pro¬ duced. He was colder and more formal than ever with Mr. Cadvvallader, and he had evidently extended to her a share of the antipathy he felt for his uncle ; but at that she did not wonder, nor did she let it trouble her, for she had an instinct that she could overcome his aversion, if she only exerted herself to try. She, for her part, liked Rudolf increasingly the more she saw of him. His goodness and patience towards the little ones touched her, for he did not look like a man who would care to be victimised by children, and she knew by the way he submitted to and enjoyed their exactions that his heart was hungry and un¬ satisfied, and that there was a blank in his life that only home ties could fill. She liked this trait in his otherwise strong and determined character, and she wished that his uncle and he were not so perversely set against each other. They would like one another so much if they would but forget their mutual pre¬ judice. “ Stop a moment, Florence,” said Mr. Cadwallader suddenly. “ I thought I heard something.” Florence pulled up the horses and listened too. She had been so engrossed in thought before that she had not observed that they were passing by the ruin upon one wall of which grew the fern Cuthbert had coveted ; but when she heard a sort of muffled call— the fainter repetition of the cry that had attracted Mr. Cadwalla- dePs attention — a sudden fear took possession of her ; she felt almost as if she knew what had happened. “ Somebody is calling,” said Mr. Cadwallader, de- scending from the carriage. “ It may be someone in want of help.” By this time the groom had gone round to the horses’ heads, and Florence, without a word, put down the reins, and descended herself. “ I will go with you,” she said to her uncle. There was no repetition of the call now. All was quite silent, but Florence, without any hesitation, turned to the spot where the wall stood, upon which the fern had grown, and Mr. Cadwallader uttered a startled exclamation. A great piece of the wall had given way, and lay in scattered blocks and heaps of dust and rubble at the base of the gap ; and leaning against a portion of the wall that remained, his arm pinned tight beneath a mass of fallen stone, was Rudolf Stanhope, his face as white as death and contracted by pain. With an ejaculation of alarm and dismay, Mr. Cad¬ wallader hurried forward.

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The Stronger Will. 227 “ I have had a fall, you see,” said Rudolf, speak¬ ing very slowly, and evidently struggling desperately against the deadly faintness induced by the pain he was suffering. ‘‘ It was entirely my own fault — Miss Tenant, pray do not - ” But he could not finish his sentence. His lips were- so dry, his tongue was so heavy, that they refused to obey his will. A blackness was surging before his eyes, and the whole place reeled beneath his feet. He would have fallen had it not been that he was a close prisoner, and the wrench he gave his crushed arm brought him back to consciousness again. The weak¬ ness had been but momentary, and his vexation at it braced his will against a repetition. “We must get these stones moved as quickly as possible,” said Mr. Cadwallader to Florence, “ and free him, or he will be fainting, and hurting himself still more.” “ I shall not faint,” said Rudolf, roused to indig¬ nation by knowing that they had observed how near he had been to doing so. He set his teeth hard and clenched his uninjured hand, as he felt the stones being lifted off one by one ; but he was resolved not to “ make a fool of himself ” before these two people —the very last he would have selected to help him out of his predicament — he almost wished now he had not called out when he had heard the sound of wheels, but had waited till something else went by. At last the stones were all moved, and Mr. Cad¬ wallader looked rather grim as he saw the position of the arm and hand beneath. Rudolf made no attempt to move or to look, but stood with his back against the angle of the wall, and his face set as if carved out of stone. “ Tm afraid the limb is broken,” said Mr. Cadwalla¬ der, who knew something of surgery, and was very clever with injured animals. “ I believe so,” answered Rudolf. “ Can you bear to have it moved ? ” “ Yes.” “ I will do it as gently as I can, but it must pain you, it is so crushed and mangled. Florence, give me that scarf of yours to make a sling.” She did so, and obeyed his directions unshrinkingly and unfalteringly in assisting him to bind up and sling the injured member. Even in the midst of all the pain, Rudolf blessed her for the steadiness of her hands, that gave him no single added pang by an un¬ certain or tremulous movement. He was dizzy and passive now, and had no wish or care as to what became of him. He was just conscious enough to be grateful when he heard her say — “ Let him sit down a little while to rest before we take him home ; and let James drive to the nearest cottage for some water for him.” He sat down where he was told, and rested his head on his uninjured hand : but he did not hear any more that passed between his rescuers. “How could it have happened ” said Mr. Cad¬ wallader, as he returned from giving the order to the groom. “ I think I know,” she answered. “ Cuthbert had set his heart upon having a fern for his collection that grows on the wall here. I suppose Rudolf could not bear that he should be disappointed, and came to try and get it. The wall was horribly unsafe. It must have given way with him.” “ Yes ; and what a great piece fell with him ! He might have been killed. What a mercy we were driving this way, too ! It is such a lonely road, he might have been left like that for hours.” “ He may have been now, for all we know,” an¬ swered Florence. “ He looks fearfully exhausted.” “ Poor fellow ! yes ; no wonder, with all that crushing weight upon his broken arm. It is the left arm, luckily; but it will be a long time, I am afraid, before he has the full use of it again.” Florence's quick ears caught the sound of the returning carriage-wheels, and she hurried off to get the water. Rudolf, who was parched with thirst, drank eagerly, and felt revived. “ There, that’s better,” said Mr. Cadwallader kindly. “ You begin to look a little more like yourself. Don’t hurry ; take your time. It was a very nasty acci¬ dent, and might have been much worse. Have you any idea how long you were there before we rescued you ? ” “ It seemed an eternity, but I don’t suppose it was more than an hour. My watch stopped at three o’clock^ by which I suppose I was pitched off the wall then.” “And now it is nearly five,” said Florence, “and we have still five miles to drive. I’m afraid the movement will be almost as bad as waiting with the stones crushing you down.” She looked compassionately into his white face, and Rudolf, glancing up, met her eyes, and smiled. “ I am very tough,” he said, getting up slowly. “ 1 can stand a great deal.” Nevertheless, he felt horribly shaken, and was intensely disgusted with himself when he found that the walk to the carriage brought back all the old faint¬ ness again. He never quite knew how he managed to get up to the high seat of the Stanhope phaeton beside Flo¬ rence ; and when he had done so, her sweet anxious face swam before him in a sort of dim haze ; but again the pain of the movement, together with his own resolute determination, saved him from fainting, and he roused himself to say — “ All right, thanks. Don’t be afraid. It’s nothing.” Florence admired his pluck immensely, and, what was more to the point, she saw that Mr. Cadwallader did so too. He was surgeon enough to have a pretty good notion of the pain Rudolf must be suffering from his injuries, and he was a great admirer of resolution and fortitude whenever he met with them. He sat behind with the groom, but kept his eye upon the motionless figure beside Florence, and felt an in¬ creasing respect for and interest in anyone who showed the courage and self-mastery that Rudolf was evincing now. Twice Florence offered to stop the carriage on his account ; but each time came the same answer, firmly, if faintly, spoken —

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228 The Stronger Will. • “No, thank you. It really is not as painful as you suppose. Besides, I am getting used to it.” And the second time he added, with a sort of flickering smile, “ 1 suppose one can get to enjoy anything with practice.” “ Even broken bones ? ” said Florence, her face expressing a great deal of sympathy, though the tone was light. “It makes a variety, you know,” answered Rudolf, speaking his words slowly, as he had done when they first saw him, yet smiling as he spoke. They reached Marchwood at length, and Rudolf got down from his high seat steadily enough. “ I don’t want my mother to be alarmed,” he said. “ I believe my best plan would be to go to town to-day — immediately — instead of to-morrow, and see some surgeon there. They understand this sort of thing better there than here, you know - ” But the sentence was never finished. He had just reached the hall, and Ethel, who had been waiting impatiently for his return, came racing towards him in her headlong fashion. She had no time to observe that anything was amiss, but rushed straight upon him before anyone could stop her, with her head full tilt against his broken arm. He had not observed her approach — he did not even know what had happened ; he was aware of a few seconds’ intolerable pain, during which the whole house rocked beneath him ; then the heaving ground seemed to rise up and hit him in the face, and all was blackness and total blank. Florence caught the terrified child in her arms, and soon succeeded in hushing her convulsive sobs. Brother was not dead, she assured her, he had only hurt his arm very badly, and it made him faint when she touched it. She had not meant to hurt him, of course, and now she must try to be brave and good, and let Cousin Florence do what she could for poor brother. Ethel subiliitted to let Florence go, and crouched in a corner, watching intently all that went on. Rudolf lay on the hall sofa, looking sufficiently ghastly. It was some time before he showed any signs of returning consciousness, and Mr. Cadwallader and Florence both began to feel a little uneasiness at this prolonged insensibility. “ I don’t quite like his looks,” said Mr. Cadwallader, with some anxiety. “ A strapping young fellow like that ought hardly to feel a fall so much. Still, it was a nasty accident. It is a wonder he was not killed. I wish Howard would come. That arm ought to be attended to with as little delay as possible. Tm afraid it is rather a bad business ; fractures so near the wrist generally are.” “ And it seemed so dreadfully crushed, too, by all that weight of stone,” said Florence, who was bending over Rudolf, sprinkling his forehead with eau-de- Cologne, and moistening his parched lips. “ But he bore it all splendidly.” “ So he did. He is a very plucky fellow. Ah ! I think he is beginning to come to.” If there is anything more miserable than the sen¬ sations immediately preceding a faint, it is those that immediately follow. Rudolf awoke to the con¬ sciousness that he was supremely wretched, and felt an unreasonable irritation against the unknown being who was dragging him out of the pleasant gulf of restful forgetfulness. “ Do leave me alone ! ” he exclaimed impatiently, pushing away a hand that was holding something to his lips. Then, aroused by the sound of his own voice, he looked up, to see Florence bending over him. He was conscious of a curious thrill — he hardly knew if it was pleasure or pain ; but he could not resist the smile in her eyes. He took what she offered him, and thanked her. The restorative did him good, and he recalled with a sense of amusement his irritation of the previous moment. “ I beg your pardon,” he said. “ I don’t know why I felt so annoyed. I am awfully sorry to be so trou¬ blesome.” “ We are both troublesome, it seems,” answered Florence, with her bright smile. “You are quite w'elcome to abuse me, if it is any relief. I know it is a satisfaction sometimes to turn round on somebody.” Rudolf laughed a little, and lay still, not quite sure if he were dreaming or not, and quite hazy as to the events of the past few hours, but curiously content so long as he could look at Florence. He was further aroused by the sound of a stifled sob, and glanced round till he saw Ethel crouched up in her corner. “ What’s the matter. Pussy ? ” he asked ; and as soon as she heard his voice she sprang up, and was nearly precipitating herself on to him again, but was caught this time by Florence. “ She was frightened by your white face, and could not be persuaded to go away till she saw you look more yourself again.” “ It was my fault, too,” cried Ethel ; “ but I didn’t mean to hurt you, brother — 1 didn’t, indeed ; but it was all my fault.” “ Nonsense, Pussy ; it was all mine, for clambering up a wall that Cousin Florence warned us against. But I’ve got Cuthbert’s fern all safe, clasped tight up in my pocket-book. I’ll bring it up to him by-and-by.” “ Oh ! I’m so glad I didn’t do it,” said Ethel. “ I thought I did; but I only ran and jumped up to kiss you, and you didn’t say anything, but looked, oh, so dreadful ! and then Uncle Oliver caught hold of you, and when I looked again, you were on the sofa. I thought you were dead. But Cousin Florence made you come alive again. Cousin Florence can do every¬ thing. I think she made Cuthbert better, and she will make you better too, I know.” Florence laughed softly, and looked at Rudolf with frank amusement in her eyes. “ You see, you will have to be my patient, and do everything I tell you. Everybody at Marchwood obeys me, you know ; and I cannot admit of the exception, even to prove the rule. But we ought not to worry you with talking ; your arm is paining you very much, I am afraid.”

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THE YOUNG MISTRESS. 184 THE STROXGER WILL' {p. 229).

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The Stronger Will. 229 “ No, not at all ; it only feels numb now.” And Rudolf lay still, thinking it very pleasant to watch Florence sitting beside him, with Ethel on her knee. Rather fortunately, as many people felt, Mrs. Freer was safely out of the way for the time being. Violet was on a week’s visit to the Grevilles, and her mother had that afternoon been driven over to Hawkshold by Vernon, and was not expected back till evening. Her capabilities as a nurse had been tested by Mr. Floward during Cuthbert’s illness, and he was glad she was not on the spot now, though he retained Florence as his assistant, knowing that her nerve was to be depended upon. d he setting of the arm proved a tedious and painful process, as there was dislocation as well as fracture ; but Rudolf evinced great fortitude, and rose rapidly in his uncle’s esteem. Nevertheless, he looked exces¬ sively white and shaken when all was over, and neither the doctor nor Mr. Cadwallader, who was himself no mean surgeon, felt altogether comfortable about him ; but he was too drowsy and languid to answer questions, and only desirous of being left in peace. The release from severe and protracted pain had induced a state of pleasant restfulness from-which he had no desire to be roused. Florence seemed to divine his feelings. “Leave the poor boy alone now. Uncle Oliver,” she said. “ You have stared at him quite long enough. I dare say he will go to sleep now, if you will all leave him in peace. He seems quite comfortable, and I don’t think he will faint any more.” “Keep an eye on him. Miss Tenant,” said the doctor, as he shook hands with his assistant. “ I leave him under your care. It has pulled him down a good bit. Keep him quiet, and don’t let him be worried. Til come in to-morrow about noon, and see how he is going on. I dare say there will be a little fever and inflammation. That arm was badly crushed. But perfect rest and quiet will do him more good than anything. See that he gets them. Keep him under your own care. Mrs. Freer is no good for this sort of thing.” Rudolf did not hear these parting injunctions, but he soon felt that he was under Florence’s special pro¬ tection, and that she was securing for him the rest and freedom from notice that was all he craved just then. Nobody came to tease him with inquiries or con¬ dolences. He was allov/ed to lie still, without being worried even by being watched. Florence passed through the hall from time to time, and smiled as she went by, but did not speak; and little Ethel came and sat with him when the rest were at dinner, and coaxed him to eat a little of what was sent out to him. All this suited him exactly, and he felt that he had come uncommonly well out of an accident that might have been no end of a bother. As it was, he did not see that it need in any way upset his plans ; and he had quite resolved that he would still leave Marchwood on the morrow. Lying there, cool and quiet and comfortable, he told himself he could manage the journey very well on the next day, and if he did knock up a little afterwards it would not matter much, fie had only been asked for a few days to Marchwood, and he had already stayed ten ; he was not going to shelter himself behind a trumpery broken bone to prolong a visit distasteful to his hosts. They had certainly been very kind to him to-day, but perhaps they could hardly help themselves, under the circumstances. Mr. Cadwallader might make some polite pretence of urging his nephew to stay, but Rudolf meant to be very firm. He resolutely turned his mind from all thoughts of Florence, angry with himself at the thrill like that of absolute pain which ran through him at the thought of saying good-bye to her. He felt horribly conscious that he was falling again under the spell of her presence, and although he declared that this was only due to physical weakness, and would be thrown off directly he was on his legs again, he knew quite well, deep down in his heart, that the only way of avoiding falling hopelessly in love with the heiress of Marchwood was to leave the place without an instant’s needless delay. He was afraid to ask himself how much damage had already been done by this afternoon’s work. A broken arm was a small matter, but to have lost his heart uncon¬ sciously and unawares was sadly humiliating. It might have been possible for him to love Florence Tenant — whether or not she was the designing woman he had persuaded himself to believe — but it was utterly and absolutely impossible for him to aspire to the hand of one who occupied the position of Mr. Cadwallader’s heir. CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH. A REFRACTORY YOUNG MAN. Florence awoke next morning with a glad conviction that things were going to come right, after all. Of course, in one sense, she felt very sorry for Rudolfs accident ; but, at the same 'time, she could not but be aware that it might lead to excellent results in the long run. It must inevitably keep the young man some time longer at Marchwood, and most likely cause a better understanding to arise between himself and his uncle. Mr. Cadwallader loved nothing better than to have a patient under his care. He had made a careful study both of medicine and surgery, and was always interested in the management of any illness or acci¬ dent that came under his notice. He had been reading up fractures and dislocations till quite a late hour last night, and was evidently quite pleased at the thought of having an interesting and rather complicated case actually under his own eye. Rudolfs manly detestation of a fuss, and his courageous endurance of severe pain, had impressed the old man very favourably. He had himself assisted his nephew to bed at night, and had spoken of him to Florence as a “ very fine young fellow : the kind of young man he liked to come across.” Florence had been too wise to do more than quietly acquiesce ; but she had gone to bed feeling

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230 The Stronger Will. that the victory was already half won, and that all she needed to do now was to stand aside, and let uncle and nephew come together by the process of mutual affinity. The following morning was scorchingly hot — a regular “smoking^’ August day. The sun shone pitilessly in the glowing sky, and not a breath stirred the languid leaves upon the trees. “A bad day for Cuthbert and Rudolf, ’Svas Florence’s comment, as she encountered Mr. Cadwallader at the door of the chapel, after her morning round of the farm was over. “It is going to be fearfully hot. Have you seen your patient yet ? ” “No ; I went up to his room just now, but the door was shut, and everything perfectly quiet. I hoped he might be sleeping, so I did not go in. I would not risk disturbing him. I dare say he has had a bad night. There was a decided tendency to inflammation about the arm last night, though he made light of it himself.” Then Florence and Mr. Cadwallader entered the chapel together, to see, to their immense astonishment, that Rudolf was sitting in ffiis usual place, with Ethel close up against him, finding the places diligently in both books. His face was very pale, and there were dark shadows round his eyes and mouth ; his lips looked thin, and were closed somewhat grimly ; but he betrayed no signs of weakness, and followed the brief service with unfaltering exactitude. Mr. Cadwallader could say nothing until the service was concluded, and the congregation dismissed. He had been so astonished by Rudolfs presence, that he could not even look the reprobation he felt. He had certainly never told the young man to keep to his bed, because he had never for a moment dreamed that he would have thought of doing other¬ wise. He did not imagine he would have been equal to the exertion of dressing himself. He hardly knew whether to be amused or annoyed at his patient’s hardihood. “You’re a nice young man,” he remarked, as they left the chapel together. “What do you mean by such a piece of foolhardiness, eh ?” “You ought not to have done it,” said Florence, softening Mr. Cadwallader’s asperity with a smile. “ It is too. much for you.” “ Not at all,” he answered quietly. “ 1 want to take an early train to town, if possible, to avoid as much of the heat as I can. I believe there is an express at 10.15, if it would be convenient for me to go by it.” Mr. Cadwallader wheeled round suddenly, and looked at his nephew with a frown. “ What on earth are you talking about ? ” he asked. “About my journey to town,” answered Rudolf, facing him undauntedly. “ You remember, possibly, that this is the day fixed for my return. I should prefer leaving earlyj on account of the heat, if it is equally convenient to you.’^ Mr. Cadwallader seemed uncertain whether to be amused or annoyed, or simply incredulous. “You are in a great hurry to be off.” “ Well, yes ; I am, rather.” “And not at all disposed to favour us with any more of your society ? ” Rudolf fancied his uncle meant to laugh at him, and he was ill enough to be decidedly irritable. “ I wish to get to town as quickly as possible. I am very busy, and cannot possibly remain here longer.” “A broken arm will, of course, be no hindrance to your pursuits and engagements ? ” “ None at all.” “And you do not care to be looked after by your own relatives and friends ? You prefer the ministra¬ tions of strangers ? ” pursued Mr. Cadwallader sharply. “ I am in no need of any further nursing, thank you,” answered Rudolf, all the more haughtily for the pressure he was putting upon himself. “ 1 wish to get back to town as quickly as may be.” “ And you feel quite equal to the journey, of course ? ” The covert irony of the tone stung Rudolf, who hated above all things to be considered feeble or in¬ capable. “ Certainly,” he answered shortly. “ There is nothing whatever the matter with me to hinder me from travelling.” “Very well. I will order the cart ; and meantime you can come in to breakfast, and make a traveller’s meal. Is your portmanteau ready ? ” “Yes.” There was evidently no humbug about Rudolfs pro¬ fessed anxiety to be off. He had undoubtedly made up his mind to go. Florence was both disappointed and uneasy. She did not think Rudolf in the least fit to travel, or to be alone in dreary London lodgings, and yet she did not see how to interfere to stop his departure. Mr. Cadwallader appeared to have acquiesced in it com¬ pletely ; his own mind was evidently made up, and it seemed as if the latent hostility between the two men had sprung up again in all its old force. Yet Mr. Cadwallader’s face hardly looked angry, though undoubtedly a little grim, and there was a subdued humorous flash in his eye that reassured her somewhat. Still, he gave the order for the dog-cart, and hurried Rudolf to the breakfast-table, telling him he had not much time to spare. When once seated at table, Florence began to un¬ derstand a little her guardian’s apparent acquiescence in Rudolfs hardihood ; for before ten minutes had passed, it became evident enough that he was quite incapable of even sitting out the meal. His face grew whiter and whiter, the shadows beneath his eyes more heavy ; his efforts to shake off the over¬ powering faintness were quite unavailing. It became obvious that he must succumb at length. Mrs. Freer was engrossed by her morning letters the boys were quite unconscious of anything unusuaL Florence looked appealingly at her guardian many times, but she knew that in a crisis like this it was better to let him take his own way, even if it seemed rather a cruel one. Perhaps it would prove kinder in the end for Rudolf to learn, by rather a sharp lesson.

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231 The Stronger Will. that he could not set at defiance everything but his own will ; yet it was very hard to see him struggling so determinedly against yielding, and yet giving way inch by inch to a power too strong to be resisted. At last Mr. Cadwallader relented. “ Come, my lad,” he said kindly, this heat is too much for you. It is cooler in my study. You had better lie down there a little while— till the cart comes.” Rudolf pushed back his chair and rose, walked blindly and giddily into the next room, and let Mr. Cadwallader lay him down upon the sofa without at¬ tempting to resist. Just at that moment he was past resenting anything ; he was not even aware that any vengeance had been inflicted upon him. In a few minutes, however, he felt better. Florence had set the doors and windows open, and the cool current of air fanning his face revived him. “ Uncle Oliver, you were very cruel to the poor boy,” he heard Florence say. “ I wonder how you could be so hard-hearted.” ‘‘It was the only way to teach him, my dear. It was kinder than letting him go, to faint in the railway carriage. It is high time that young man learned that he cannot always have his own way.” “ Especially when he has Mr. Cadwallader to deal with,” returned Florence saucily. “ Uncle Oliver, he ought to be a nephew after your own heart. He has all the Cadwallader obstinacy in full measure.” Mr. Cadwallader chuckled. He was rather flattered by Florence’s remark, and also by the sense of having triumphed over his headstrong guest. Rudolf heard all this plainly, although his eyes were shut, and he appeared to take no notice. He was very indignant and angry ; but he felt so miserably ill that he did not know how to avenge himself on his foes. “ Look here, young man,” said Mr. Cadwallader, approaching the sofa, “ the cart will be round almost directly. How about this journey to London ? How about these engagements that will bear no postpone¬ ment ? Engagements in town in the middle of August, too!” Rudolfs eyes flashed open. It was too much to be trampled on like this when he was down. He strug¬ gled up into* a sitting posture, and was preparing to hurl back defiance, when Florence interposed. “ Uncle Olivier, I won’t have this,” she said, with her air of queenly authority. “ Mr. Howard left me in charge of this case, and I will not brook any inter¬ ference in it. Rudolf, lie down again directly. Do you enjoy fainting so much, that you must needs court another attack? You shall not be worried and badgered. You have given in, and you shall not be tormented anymore. You will make up your mind, will you not, to stay a little longer at Marchwood ? ” She looked at him with her most winning smile, and compelled the answer that no taunts from Mr. Cadwallader would have wrung from him. “ That’s right, my boy, that’s right,” said Mr. Cad¬ wallader, his native hospitality and kindliness triumph¬ ing over his innate love of victory. “You must stay until you are fit to fight your own battle with the world again. Nobody ever left MarchVood in bad health yet, and no one ever shall, if I can help it. Stay on as long as you will, boy, on this one condition : that you let me fix the day for your departure next time.” Rudolf was appeased by the ring of real kindliness in the tone. “ You are very good, sir,” he said, and was glad enough to relapse into silence. Harry sought Florence as soon as she reappeared, with many expressions of anxiety and apology. He was afraid it was partly his fault ; but he had not meant to do any harm. Rudolf had sent for him about eight o’clock, to help him to dress and pack his portmanteau, as he was going off to town directly after breakfast. The boy had felt very much surprised, as his brother looked anything but fit for so much exertion, and had had to sit down many times during the course of dressing ; but he had declared it was all right, and would on no account allow Harry to say anything or call anybody else. He hoped he had not done wrong ; but he did not know Rudolf was really ill. He had often seen people going about with broken arms, and he supposed his brother knew his own business best. Florence reassured Harry, and told him no real harm had been done. Perhaps, in the end, things would prove to have turned out for the best, and he went away consoled. Poor Rudolf was, however, by no means of this opinion. He was supremely miserable. The heat was terrific, and increased in intensity every hour of the day. His arm was growing unbearably painful. He was feverishly restless and uneasy, and he could not so much as lift his head without that intolerable giddiness and swimming, of which he had learned to stand in wholesome awe. He felt that he had made a ridiculous spectacle of himself, and was the laughing¬ stock of the man in whose eyes he wished above all things to appear dignified and resolute ; and worse than all, he was a prisoner in Mr. Cadwallader’s room, unable to escape, for fear of making another exhibition of himself. Vernon, who was by no means gratified at the turn matters had taken, came to sit with his brother whilst Mr. Cadwallader was out, and sympathised much with him in his desire of getting away quickly from March- wood. “ It always is detestable to be a guest in a house where one is not welcome ; and you’re not the kind of fellow to accept grudging hospitality. It’s an awful shame that you’re not cordially received here ; but one can’t stand against facts, and the way you’ve been treated speaks for itself. But for Cuthbert, you would never have been asked here at all.” “ But for him I’d never have come. I’ll leave to¬ morrow if I can.” “ I would ; the perpetual irritation of being here must in itself be bad for you.” Rudolf almost groaned. How much more trying than his brother could guess was his position here 1 No wonder his fever and pain increased hourly under the friction of maddening thought.

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2.^2 The Stronger Will. Mr. Howard was very indignant at finding Rudolf up when he came, but he could not help laughing to hear Mr. Cadwallader’s account of the occurrence of the morning. Florence and Ethel, between them, managed to nurse the patient through the tremendous heat of that most trying day, and by the time the cool of the evening head fallen he was decidedly better, though still suffering from the effects of his folly in the morn¬ ing. I’m afraid I’ve been an awful bear,” he said to Florence, with a look from his tired eyes that ex¬ pressed a good deal more compunction than the words. ‘‘I never had an ache or a pain in my life before. It makes me hate myself - ” ^‘And everybody else, too,” concluded Florence, with the light of sympathy shining in her eyes. “ I am quite sure it must do. I have never known an hour’s pain in my life ; and I think it makes me all the more sorry for other people.” You have been awfully good to me,” said Rudolf, "'and you know as well as I do that I don’t de¬ serve it.” She looked at him with a smile in her eyes, not quite certain if she understood him. “I have behaved very badly to you ever since I came to Marchwood,” he said. ‘‘ Vou must know that as well as I do.” " I don’t know anything of the kind,” she answered, with her peculiarly frank sweet gaze, meeting his eyes fearlessly, whilst a little arch smile curved the comers of her lips. I only know that you have not liked me very much.” Rudolfs white face flushed suddenly, and then grew yet more pale. Florence looked at him with her most reassuring smile. 'Vou must not mind my knowing that,” she said. Though perhaps I had better not have told you I had found it out ; but indeed I am not so exacting as to expect everybody to like me. I enjoy a great deal more popularity now than I at all deserve ; it would be too ridiculous to imagine that all the world must share Uncle Oliver’s enthusiasm. An exception is very salutary, I think, and only proves the rule, you know. Now, Rudolf, don’t look so awfully conscience-stricken. Surely you do not think I resent your having an independent opinion of your own. And I do not mind confessing to you that you have hit on something much nearer the truth in your estimate of me than anybody else has done. You think me a clever, designing woman ; and that is just what I am. I always have been designing, and I do believe I am rather clever, too.” Florence’s eyes were laughing, if her lips were grave. She could not have explained this sudden burst of confidence ; probably it was caused by the unerring instinct that told her she was no longer distrusted and misunderstood. "I have some very deep designs of my own in my head,” pursued Florence, with a quick look at him, ‘^but I am not going to divulge them yet. Now, Rudolf, do lie still, and keep quiet. You are much too fond of the sound of your own voice. As Mr. Howard truly says, you are the most refractory patient.” “ What is refractory. Cousin Florence ? ” asked Ethel, coming in at the open door. "It is being like brother when he wants his own way too much, as he did this morning.” Ethel looked very serious. " I hope, then, you won’t be refractory any more, brother ; you do look so dreadful when you are.” A light of laughter awoke in Florence’s eyes. ‘‘ She thinks being refractory is synonymous with fainting — Take the moral to heart, Rudolf,” she said sotto voce, adding aloud, “ No, Ethel, brother is not going to be refractory any more. We are going to keep him in wholesome subjection.” "You will keep him good, will you not.^” asked Ethel, whose confidence in Florence’s powers was boundless. " I don’t think anyone is ever refractory with you, Cousin Florence.” A call from Mr. Cadwallader took Florence away, her eyes brimming with laughter. Rudolf had coloured up a little, and in answer to Ethel’s pleading glance, he answered — " No, Pussy ; I’ll try not to be refractory ; and don’t you be an enfant terrihle,^^ END OF CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH.

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233 SHOPPING IN “THE STATES.” BY AN AMERICAN. F course we “go shop¬ ping” in street-cars — ’tis the way of the country. Ours is crowded with women, for it is a “shopping car.” The business cars, crowded with men, finished tlieir runs an hour ago, and only a few stragglers since have mingled with the advance-guard of the army of women. And now even these stragglers have fallen away, the last of them queer and forlorn, as if con¬ sciously out of his element in a garden of spring bonnets. Your Londoner has an adamantine conviction that the Americans are a noisy people. Acknowledged that they are when abroad, and that the neighbour¬ hood of the Langham resounds with their barbarian yells, it may yet be conscientiously denied that they are a noisy people at home. The excitement of meet¬ ing each other in a foreign land, the exhilaration of a just-finished sea-voyage, and the emotional stimulus of strange and storied scenes long hungered for, to¬ gether with the fact that the American voice A vibrant, and not booming, like the English, explains this difference, and not that there is more vocal vigour in the effort. America produces more singers than any other country, and her forests are fuller of singing birds. Among bobolinks are often jackdaws ; but what music-lover would declare that the jackdaws were all ? A shopping expedition into Boston would convince the most prejudiced “Britisher” that the American chez ltd roars him but mildly. Our electric car is as mum as a catafalque. Not a voice is heard, not a nasal note. All the way in from Harvard Square we might be corpses to ramparts carried, save for the muffled voices of a mother and daughter, whose words none can distinguish. It is almost always so, and street-car conversation, when it exists at all, has a woolly suggestion, as if murmured under blankets. In the great shops it is much the same. The voice of the national bird is not heard to complain. Nobody utters war-whoops. Shopmen and shoppers bend confidentially over counters and talk in discreetly modulated accents. As we stand in one of the great shops of Boston, New York, or Philadelphia, we are conscious of a short sharp shock incessantly repeated, and punc¬ tuating the woolly hum like the prickings of innu¬ merable pins. It comes from above our heads, and looking up to ascertain its cause, we find the upper space thickly threaded with metallic lines, like minia¬ ture railways. Over these railways round balls are continually rushing to and fro, in which money and purchase-slips are conveyed to and from the eyries of the auditing clerks. These balls fall into the stations for which they are designed with a sharp click. The American shopper does not trot up to a cashier's desk with her bit of paper to claim her package, like a nice proper little demoEelle, as the Parisian does, but the whole transaction is finished by means of these aorial railways between shopman and shopper. The nume¬ rous stations of the air lines, where auditing clerks work, look for all the world like tiny reading-desks, and are stuck about in all sorts of out-of-the-way places, poised in corners and impinging upon walls — more like swallow-nests than like places reached with¬ out wings. This manner of expressing money and purchase- slips is usually only for the lower floors. Upstairs little cash-girls run about with sparrow-like hop, skip, and flutter, and sparrow-like bickerings. They are not joys for ever or things of beauty. Taken from the very poorest of the poor classes at an age when the children of the ambitious labourer are kept, by hook or by crook, at the public schools, they have no chance to outgrow congenital ugliness and disease, even while growing sharp and clever in the ways of their own dark little world. It is remarkable how many of them, particularly in New York, tots of ten and twelve, wear spectacles, for short sight or to hide rheumy lids, and thus go goggling hither and yon— poorly dressed, queer, uncomely objects, for which our civilisation has no reason to rise up and call itself blessed. Britannia, who shops with us this June morning in Boston, gazes meditatively about the floors. “Where are the spittoons?” she murmurs as dulcetly as though she asked, “What are the wild waves saying ? ” “ Spittoons ? ” “Are not heaps of these shop-people, men and women, chewing gum with might and main ?” There was no “ denigin of it.” Chew, chev/, chew — “ sales-gentlemen ” and “ sales-ladies ” alike. Their jaws worked like automatic machines. We confessed then and there to Britannia that this habit of chewing is really a national one. Our chewers are in every rank of life, in eveiy profes¬ sion. Last summer, at the C - House on Beach Bluff-by-the-Sea, it was a spectacle to see faultlessly attired men and women upon the broad piazzas sway¬ ing for ever back and forth in rocking-chairs, chewing, chewing, ever chewing, though the eternal tides came in or the eternal tides went out : though ^olian music swept up from the great deep, or dusty zephyrs howled out from the wide land. Strange was it to hear a beauteous bride call from halfway up the stairs to her husband below — “Arthur, I do wish you would look under the seat of my rocker, and see if I didn’t leave my gum there !” So popular is this gum habit that physicians have

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224 Shopping in been known to advise it for gastric deficiencies, as aid to the salivary flow. In its first condition this gum is a hard lump, diffi¬ cult to manipulate. Not until it has been pretty thoroughly chewed is it agreeably chewable. F or this reason the first chewing is something to be avoided, if possible ; and a certain well-kuown figure, a boarder in a certain well-known hotel, is said to maintain his high popularity by preparing their gum for all his women-friends 1 Thus was Britannia persuaded, much against her will, that the cuspidor is not a feature of American “stores,” though the marble water-fountain is, with silvery tinkle into fluted shells. We saw a farmer¬ looking man drinking from a fountain. “ Is it sody ? ” asked his wife, hastening to his side. “ Norr,” quoth the husband, dropping the silver cup in disdain ; “ northin’ but ice water ! ” “What can the matter be ?” exclaimed Britannia. “ Somebody fainted ? ” We were near a little knot of women closely huddled about -some central object, and all gazing upward with intent expression. “ Only the elevator,” we explained, and laughed with our London friend at this new proof, where none was needed, of the indisposition of Americans to use their own pretty feet when it is possible to avoid it. At every one of the several elevators in the large American establishments is always this waiting group. At some of the stations sofas are provided, so that delicate Columbia may not even stand and wait. Usually one may see Columbias, more than one, wait¬ ing there five and ten minutes for the elevator’s next ascent, though their business is only to the floor above, and the stairs, close beside them, are wide and easy as Capitoline steps. That brilliant American novelist— George Fleming — once described one of her brilliant American heroines as “born tired.” George Fleming knows her American heroine ! So do we, thousands of her, and we see scores of her every time we go shopping, so glued to the cushioned seats of the elevator, that she leaves them reluctantly even when her floor is reached. Perhaps the reason of this constitutional fatigue is not far to seek— no further than Columbia’s mother and grandmother. A generation and more ago, American towns and cities were perfect pandemoniums of lawless domestic service— of raw “hired girls,” driven only by starvation from their Emerald Isle, and bringing scarce else with them to this country than great expectations and bog-born and bog-bred igno¬ rance. Not half the labour-saving conveniences existed then that nowadays make it possible to man¬ oeuvre an American house with half the help necessary to an English one of the same pretensions. Thus it doubtless comes about, because Columbia s giand- mother and mother spent anxious lives fleeing up¬ stairs and downstairs, and into all my lady’s chambers, that baby Columbia came to a heritage of fatigue not of her own earning. She is resting now in ‘ ele¬ vators,” “ electrics,” in rocking-chairs, and on sofas, “THE States.'' with electric bells and telephones at her elbow, and Biddy Americanised into Bessie, into Mamie, and Molly and Minnie, into Nellie and Annie and Jennie, when not even Edith and Maud and May ; and it is, perhaps, to be hoped that our daughters may reap the benefit of it all. “You’ve got seventeen people aboard, ’n y’aint ’low’d to carry but twelve 1 ” cried a pert minx of a sales-lady of sixteen to an elevator conductor. “ Shut yer head ! ” was that gentleman’s suave reply. He, too, was seated, and an open book was between him and his stool. Shoppers and shop-people meet freely in these mirrored and upholstered boxes. He who knelt at your feet a moment ago, fitting you with bottines, stands now beside you in a Napoleon-at-Elba attitude ; while he who a little while ago wooed you with the silken blandishments of ladies’ underwear in form le plus intime^ gazes heroically upon each descending floor, like Washington crossing the Delaware. This intermingling of shoppers and shop-people, unknown save in this Land of the Free-and-easy, brings one face to face with scraps of domestic histories else eternally hidden from us. The American sales-lady, as a rule, is not a secretive person ; and the sales- gentleman, when young, is like her. Our electric car may start from Bowdoin Square at five, and now it is past four. We have not selected our flower- seeds yet, nor yet prowled among the pirated English reprints sold at the price of a song, a newspaper, or an eighteenth-century chap-book. Nor can we, till a pair of shop-people can spare time to wait upon us from discussing the probabilities ot Ernest’s being “mashed” on Edith ; if Walter’s “parr” was mad because Walter had bought that “soot”; if Maud’s trousseau were as good as Gracie’s ; and if Mrs. Cleveland “ ain’t sorry she married old Grover, who is no bigger than other folks now ! ” Americans upon first shopping in London are very apt to vent nasal shrieks at each other in disgust of what they consider the offensive sycophancy and ser¬ vility of the English shopman. “Why,” screamed a Philadelphia bride, “would you believe it, a Waterloo Place young man said ‘ Thanks 1’ when I said I wouldn’t take any of that silk to-day I ” En reva7zche, the Londoner just arrived in America booms vigorous objections to seeing a declaration of independence in the manner not only of our sales¬ people, but of everyone who condescends to wait upon him. “ To whom shall I give these brasses ? ” a tourist was heard to ask in a vestibule car. “ I say, boss,” expostulated the porter ; “ carn’t you speak the Ammerrrican langwidge ? Them ain t ‘ brasses ’ — they’s ‘ checks ! ’” In one of Boston’s shopping streets is a showy millinery establishment, whose lavish display of ^arti¬ ficial flowers will smell as sweet if we call it “ The Bouquet ” as by any other name. That June morning Britannia yearned for lilacs to blossom on a new bonnet. A woman met us, stout

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Curiosities of Musical Examinations. and of somewhat Hebraic comeliness. Britannia murmured of lilacs. “Yes, dear/’ cooed the sales-lady ; “ I know exactly what you want. We have it just from Paris.” Britannia’s eyes grew prominent, but she tried the bonnet on. “ There, dear ; I knew I could suit you ! ” chirped Deborah (or Judith, and perhaps Saphyra). “It exactly suits your style.” “Isn’t — it — a trifle — youthful.^” breatlied Britannia. “Youthful.^ No, dear. You know I wouldn’t think !)f offering you a bonnet to betray your age, as one too youthful would. No, indeed, dear !” * The Londoner bought the bonnet. But she never mentions it now except as “that ‘dear’ bonnet from ‘ The Bouquet.’ ” New Yorkers are given to much tip-tilting of the nose at Boston and Philadelphia for their waterproofs and colp.ured petticoats — “so English, you know.” Boston and Philadelphia on their parts do not refrain from shooting out the lip at New York for its over¬ showiness of taste and embroidered petticoats — draggling through summer dust and winter mire. There is the same difference in the shops and shopping of these cities ; and the frills and flounces and fur¬ belows so conspicuous in one are replaced by more Puritan and Quaker-like stuffs in the other. But the principal shops in all American cities, while as fully provided with goods as those of London and Paris, lack the style of those shops. We have Oxford Street in plenty, but little of Regent Street and Piccadilly. No great establishment here requires saleswomen to wear the black silk gowns furnished them at reduced rates, and required of them in London and Paris. There are actually no sumptuary laws at all over 235 here— motley’s the only wear, and very motley it is. In a Whiteley-sort of Boston bazaar a sales-lady wears a dingy black gown and alpaca apron, with elaborately dressed and artificially golden hair, and complexion enough for a dozen renovated belles. In the same building a middle-aged woman waits upon us, and addresses us incessantly not as “madam,” but “ lady,” wearing one of the coarsest of Cardigan jackets out at elbows. Like everything else in America, our shops are more business-like than artistic. Far more Hamburg em¬ broidery is sold than hand-worked, more bed-spreads than lace flounces, more flannel than foulard. In spite of their extravagant reputation abroad, American women in the vast majority are domestic in their tastes and economical in their dress. Boston, New York, and Philadelphia shops cater to a vast population, not of those cities themselves alone, but of wide, teeming suburbs and outlying towns, brought close to the city by easy public con¬ veyances. This vast suburban population is not stylish, not extravagant, and it could buy everything it wants in Islington, or within a stone’s-throw of the Elephant and Castle. Londoners know nothing of this kind of American, for such never go to Europe, and the English tourist never works his way into the pine-fantasticality of our villa’d and cockney suburbs — where women read housekeeping journals with in¬ finitely more zest than fashion-books. But it is for these that the large American shops cater. It is something the same in all cities. But not all large shops, like those of Boston and Phila¬ delphia, deliberately choose to attract patrons by dis¬ plays of useful articles rather than decorative, flannel petticoats rather than jupes de point d’Alen^on. Deliverance Dingle. CURIOSITIES OF MUSICAL EXAMINATIONS. BY AN EXAMINER. NE of the most gratifying fea¬ tures in connection with the revival of musical culture in the United Kingdom is the effort of students to acquire a knowledge of the so-called “theory of music,” by which is understood the rules of musical grammar, musical terminology, and the construction of chords, as well as an acquaintance with the history of the art in past ages. This effort is greatly encouraged by the examinations held by the leading musical institutions of the country, a conspicuous place being occupied by the popular “Musical Knowledge” Examinations of a well-known London College. Among the thousands who present themselves as candidates for certificates, the majority come well prepared for the ordeal by competent teachers, but not a few afford diversion to the examiners by their helpless flounderings in the attempt to grapple with the difficulties of the questions set. Naturally, Junior candidates furnish the greatest fund of amusement ; in default of knowledge, they “take shots” at the answer. Thus : a Shake means “ when the same note is played two or three times, when it sounds shaky.” We are also informed that “ 9 crochets {s/c)=i minim,” and that — in a time-signature — “the lower number explains into how many ‘crochets’ the minim is divided.” The Italian directions employed in music yield scope for many ingenious and ingenuous speculations. Da Capo “ is to cut short ; it is deriven {sic) from the Italian.” Evidently, the candidate’s idea is “off with his head.” Another says that Da Capo means “ that the music is to be played slower,” also that Dal signifies “at the usual time.” Then we learn that slentando means “slenderly”; stringe?idOy “with

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Spring and Early Summer Flowers. 236 all the strings ” ; cantabile, “ in a cantering style ” ; accelerando, “ excelling ” ; fo7'zando means “ pressing forward”; sche7'zando^ “in a swerving manner,” or “ skimming along ” ; while tempo rubato is translated “ rubbing the time ” Volti siibito (turn over quickly) is rendered “ high, but subdued ” ; by others, “ getting gradually subsided,” “ in subjection,”- and “volatile.” A piacere (at pleasure) is made to mean “piously,” bitingly,” or “ in step.” Then we have the informa¬ tion that the notes of an arpeggio are “sounded successfully by a single part ” ; also that they are heard “simultaneously — one after another”; while another says that they are “ struck, not together, but simultaneously.” Coming to musical history, we are confronted with the astounding chronological statement that Schumann “ was born 1794, died 1764.” The attention of com¬ pilers of vital statistics is invited to this unique instance of a man dying thirty years before his birth. Schumann’s music is described as “ lively and grace¬ ful, but grand, very difficult indeed to execute.” The same critic says of Weber that “his music is ex¬ tremely lively and gay, also graceful and sweet.” Another knowing one opines that “ Weber’s last waltz is very popular with the common herd, but it is the sort of popularity which will not last, being too noisy.” We are left in doubt as to which is too noisy, the waltz or the popularity. “ State briefly what you know of Dr. Boyce?” was a question recently set. “ I do not happen to hav^e heard of this gentleman,” said one polite candidate ; “ life of Wagner instead.” Then followed a full biographical account of the com¬ poser of “ Parsifal,” which the examiner had not time to read. Of Mendelssohn a colonial candidate tells us that “ he was the founder of the Academy for Organists in London about the year 1852”; the reader need scarcely be reminded that Mendelssohn’s life was prematurely cut short in 1847. Mendelssohn is said by one to have founded the “ Royal College of Organists,” and another states that he was the “founder of Royal Academie and Schumann Trinity College.” In the December of last year Senior candidates w^ere at the last-mentioned College asked, “ Where and on what occasion was Mendelssohn’s Lobgesang produced?” These are a few of the answers: — “At Leipsic, on the occasion of unveiling a statute {sic) to Gottenburg”; “ It was produced at Douterdiitf on the revieling of the fourth sentinary of Art Printing”; “It was produced at Berlin on the oc¬ casion of the unveiling of the statue of Bullenger”; “ On the opening of St. Thomas’s Hospital ” ; and lastly, the occasion is given as “The upholding of the statute {sic) at Battenburg.” The English name of the Lobgesang is variously given as “ Lovesong,” “ Songs without words,” and “ Lauda Sion.” Students of harmony will be glad to know that the Leading-note “ should not be doubled, as it has the effect of too much sweetness”; also that Natural Modulation is “ when it glides of one key into another. An extraneous modulation is when it leaps from one key to another.” One more curiosity must end our selection ; it is from the paper of an aspirant for Honours, who tells us that the movements “ generally used ” in a symphony are “ Kyrie Eleison and Gloria in Excelsior.” The final word of our last quotation may well serve as the motto for those whose good work has been recognised and certified, as well as for those hapless ones whose slips have supplied the material for this brief article. The art and science of music is an inexhaustible study, and each peak scaled, although it raise us into a higher zone of purer air, yet opens to the artistic perception a vista of loftier heights beyond ; so let the maxim of every student of divine Cecilia’s art ever be — Excelsior ! E. BURRITT Lane. SPRING AND EARLY SUMMER FLOWERS. I HE month of March may justly be said to be one of paramount importance in the garden, so much so, in fact, that of neces¬ sity we shall devote a portion of our paper this month to the notice of some few’ operations, both in the kitchen and fruit and flow^er gardens, that at our peril we dare not neglect. Still, in accordance with our custom of late, the general culture of one or two flowers in particular will first engage our attention, so that in our gardening for each month some definite point may be gained and some increase of practical knowledge aimed at. A few words, then, about another popular favourite flower, the cyclamen, so called from its circular or bulb-like root, and a member of the natural order Pritntdacece. At the outset, then, we may remark that among the causes of ill-success in the growth of these beautiful flowers is the injudicious use of the water¬ ing-pot. All plants, of course, require water at cer¬ tain specified times, just as we do ourselves when thirsty, but there are some so sensitive in this matter — as, for example, the cyclamen — that, on the one hand, they would be much injured by an over-supply of water when in the dormant state, or, on the other, by being allowed to get too dry during the season of their growth. Still there is, of course, no great diffi-

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Spring and Early Summrr Flowers. culty in their culture ; and, indeed, anyone possessed of a frame and a pit or small greenhouse can readily raise the cyclamen. Protection from frost, but more particularly, as we have just hinted, pr@tection from excessive rain, is an important factor in its growth. Now, by far the best plan for growing the cyclamen is propagation by seed ; indeed, many good authorities say it is the €7ily method. Some again, a few years ago, used to recommend sowing immediately after the seed has ripened, but the more usual method of late years has been to sow towards the end of February, or indeed, early in the present month of March. The ordinary seed-pans of some four or five inches in depth will well answer your purpose ; see particularly to your drainage : have in your pan or wide-mouthed pot a good inch of broken potsherds, and on this you may have a layer of rough peat moss, while your compost itself'should consist of one-half of peat made rather fine, and the other half in equal proportions of thoroughly friable loam and silver sand. Fill up your seed-pot, then, to within about half an inch of its top : press it tightly down, and sow your seed, rather thinly than otherwise, upon the surface : sift some more compost over all : press down firmly, and give a moderate watering. A thin covering afterwards of a little loose moss will help to retain moisture, prevent evaporation, and lessen the necessity of frequent watering. Your pans should then be placed in your frame or pit, and kept thus protected until germination has thoroughly set in. In a strong sun some shading may be necessary, and in the fine weather most cer¬ tainly must some air be given. Indeed, that terrible dread of fresh air, which some people seem to think is actually injurious both to their flowers and to them¬ selves, is very often fatal in its results. When two or three young leaves have developed themselves, pot off your seedlings in small pots of about three inches diameter, and in a compost of exactly a similar character to that which you sowed your seed in. Select your strongest little plants, and in taking them out of their original seed-pans, avoid damaging the roots as far as pos¬ sible : particularly, also, avoid any injury to the leaves, which are attached, you will notice, to very slender and brittle stalks. In-potting, press the soil firmly round the base of your plant, and after¬ wards give water, and replace it in its frame. As your young plants begin to root round the sides of the pot, more air and less shade will be needed ; and as they grow more thoroughly hardened, the lights may be taken off the frame, saving during any time of heavy rain. Plants thus treated will make good ones for potting into larger pots, and for blooming in the fol¬ lowing year. We might, however, further add that during the dormant season water must, to a very large extent, be withheld until the following spring, when, about March, they will want shifting into larger pots, round which, when the roots begin to grow, a little manure-water may be added. The manure- water, however, must be of a very diluted character, and only given to the plant when in full health, and when the period of blooming is setting in. pruning: a march task. All these hints that we have given refer more particu¬ larly to the popular greenhouse species, the Cyclaine7t persicu77i : closely assimilated to this is the Cycla77ie7t repa7idu77i^ or the wavy-edged species. There are, however, many kinds sufficiently hardy to grow in the open flower garden, but for this purpose it is well to avoid those whose habit it is to bloom in the very early spring, as naturally the flower might likely enough be cut off by one of those late frosts that are sometimes more mischievous in the end of March than they are in January, when nearly everything is still quietly slumbering underground. Those, there¬ fore, whose bloom is produced in summer and autumn

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A Friendly Talk about Hysteria. 238 are much to be preferred for the open air, and for this purpose their culture will be under more favourable circumstances if you have not too hot a situation, nor one which is robbed of its moisture by any large tree. Then, again, a peat soil is most de¬ cidedly more favourable for the cyclamen in the open air. Now, an important item in our gardening this month is that of pruning : it is, first of all, the great month of all others in which we cut our roses carefully back : a good deal of judgment is necessary in carrying this out. To begin with, all the long, weak, and spindly branches should first come off close to where they spring from, and for this reason : they are never likely to be of any service to you for growth or for bloom, and allowing them to remain on will only tend much to weaken the whole standard : and next, the strong shoots must be shortened back in accord¬ ance with the proportions of your tree. Nor should a day longer be postponed any pruning of your currants and gooseberries : still, on the other hand, the danger of commencing the pruning very early in the year is that afterwards severe frosts may do damage ; no pruning at all should indeed be done when any frost is about. Another heavy and most necessary operation this month is the making up of our cucumber frame. Of course, where hot stable manure is always at hand — and this is generally the case where gardening is on a large and expensive scale — a frame is always in working order, but in our ordinary and quiet domestic gardening we make up a frame early in the month, and we shall find it of enormous use, especially in its early stage, for forcing on endless seed-pans and pots, which we afterwards remove to our greenhouse. In fact, a good frame — and if there are two, all the better — enables us not only to keep up successional bloom in the garden, but our stock of vegetables can also be all started under its shelter, and eventually pricked out when removed from the greenhouse. A FRIENDLY TALK ABOUT HYSTERIA. BY A FAMILY DOCTOR. 'HAT’S a cure for indigestion, doc¬ tor?” It was an odd sort of ques¬ tion, given in an odd off-hand way, and at an odd time. For Mr. N - and I were riding together outside an omnibus, and the “ ’bus ” had stopped to pick up.” I smiled, but made no reply. And after we had descended and were walking to¬ gether I said quietly — Just, N - , as if indigestion didn’t depend upon a hundred different causes, or rather sets of causes, and just as if there were not a dozen different sorts of indigestion ! ” Now Hysteria, which I am going to treat of to-day, is almost, if not quite, as complex a subject. Never¬ theless, I believe I can in one paper give many useful hints, and tell the reader some things he did not know before. Perhaps there is no ailment under the sun that is less generally understood than hysteria. It is one, too, for which the sufferer seldom receives a due meed of pity. The patient is said to be delicate and nervous ; this can be readily forgiven her, but human nature can go no greater length, and when the adjec¬ tive “ whimsical ” is added, it is usually with a slight shrug of the shoulders. Now the reason why I claim pity for one afflicted with some form of hysterical ailment is this : albeit the disease be not real in the true sense of the word, it is not “ put on ” — to use a simple term. The patient is a true sufferer ; she may certainly be deceiving others, but she has deceived herself in the first place. There is really no shamming about the matter — no feigning of illness which she does not really and truly believe exists, probably in a very aggravated and dangerous form. She is sensitive to a degree, easily hurt either in body or mind, while the very fact of the mind being turned inwards — if I may so phrase it — and permitted to meditate and dwell for a long time on certain fancied ailments, may account for the production of some real trouble in the ailing directions in process of time. A lady, for example, has hys¬ terical heart disease, i.e.^ she fancies she has heart disease, and that, with an almost acute desire to live, and be healthy and happy, she can neither exist long nor ever be well again. Every sensation, even the slightest, about the region of the chest emanates, she imagines, from this sick heart of hers. The prick of a

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A Friendly Talk about Hysteria. 239 pin might be thought a deadly pang from an internal hurt, a morsel of fluff on the inside of the inner garment might be magnified into the most uneasy, not to say painful, sensation in the heart itself ; and so in the end the organ becomes to some extent weakened, flabby probably, and prone to palpitate. Neuralgic pains — real — may for the same reason succeed the merely fanciful. The question might be asked : Is a person so afflicted of inferior intellect ? ” The answer is : “ Cer¬ tainly not, but sometimes quite the reverse.” It is often those whose minds are cast in the finest moulds who are most apt to become the subjects of hysteria. I have mentioned heart disease and neuralgia as ailments simulated by hysteria, but these are not all. Indeed, it would be difficult to name an ailment that this hysteria cannot counterfeit, chief among them being — in addition to the above — spinal complaints, that often cause the sufferer, to keep to her bed from fancied inability to get up ; some limb or joint troubles which render her almost, if not quite, lame, so that she can walk only with difficulty, or with the aid of a stick or friendly arm. I have seen such ladies many times and oft at the various watering-places round our coast, being helped slowly across the pavement from the houses in which they lodged to the wait¬ ing bath-chair. I could tell them almost at a glance — at all events, in nine cases out of ten my surmise as to the real nature of the cases would have been right. Consumption — and consumption, be it noted, without any wasting, though there may be cough, generally hysterical also ; difficulty in swallowing — attributed in all likelihood to disease of the assophagus or gullet ; laryngitis — considerably on the increase about the time the poor Emperor of Germany was suffering from his last illness ; loss of voice — a very common hysterical trouble, in which the patient cannot, or does not, talk above a whisper, and is usually nervous in a low way, and languid to a degree. But I might' fill this paper and another with the multiplicity of cases simulated by hysteria, and effect no good by doing so either. One thing, however, I must mention, and this would almost lead one to believe that there is in hysteria some perversion of the reasoning faculties — the patient will often eat well and heartily, and she re¬ mains in good condition. Can she not, it might be asked, herself see that these facts are somewhat in¬ compatible with a diseased body or a shattered con¬ stitution ? It is sometimes said that Mrs. So-and-so or Miss So-and-so likes to fancy herself an invalid. This is, to say the least of it, somewhat uncharitable. There may be instances of malingering in private life, but I believe they are very rare. Besides, given anyone who has suffered from this simulating ailment hys¬ teria for any length of time, and you /lave an invalid, if only for this reason : the person in question has been prevented, owing to her fancied ailment, from living according to the laws of health ; she has been thinking too much, er^o sleep is disturbed, or at least is not so refreshing as it ought to be ; sufficient exercise has not been, probably could not be, taken, the muscles are therefore weakened ; enough pure air to properly purify the blood has not been breathed, the vital fluid is therefore in a permanently vitiated condition ; the liver is torpid, and the brain or mind is rendered dull; the bath or thorough ablution has been neglected, and the skin therefore refuses to eliminate deleterious matter from the blood, greater work being thus thrown on the internal organs ; while, one way or another, the digestion must be impaired, and mayhap the whole alimentary canal thrown partially out of gear. Other and more troublesome symptoms than even these may occur ; so that on the whole, however unreal the ailment she complains of may be, the hysterical patient is deserving of our sympathy. I have not yet said a word about what is usually termed “ a fit of hysterics.” It usually occurs in the young and somewhat delicate woman after some un¬ pleasant excitement or another. The lady may have had “ a few words ” with someone she dearly loves, when all at once she seems to lose all control of her¬ self, gives herself up, as it were, to a sort of aba7idon of excitability of language and gesture. This results in speedy exhaustion, which causes her to throw her¬ self into a chair or on a sofa ; she laughs and cries by turns, hardly seems to know where she is, what she has been doing, or what it is all’ about. One little word of sympathy now from some foolish — I really cannot help using the term — female friend, one kindly pat on the shoulder, and lo ! the last act comes, matters become indescribably worse, the choking globus hysterictts has arisen, and she may be said to have a “ fit” now really and truly. She is worn out at last, and so gradually recovers, without, let us hope, the stimulant so often administered by that foolish female friend, who as a rule should never have been permitted to enter the room. Now I have little to say regarding this fit of hys¬ terics. I do know, however, as a medical man, that it is controllable in its early stage ; I do kno\v, also, that it is encouraged as often as not by the patient — in this case I ought hardly to say patient — and I do most earnestly warn those subject to such “ fits ” that they are not without their danger, present or subsequent. Hysteria, on the whole, whatsoever form it may assume, is certainly not a complaint to be pooh- poohed or made light of. It is painful to the sufferer, and it is distressing to everyone with whom she is associated. When it is once fairly established, it is difficult to get rid of, and this makes it imperative for the relatives of the sufferer to see that means are adopted to effect a cure as speedily as possible. Changes in the nerves of organic life must take place in cases of long standing, and then restoration ro health is doubly difficult. Hysteria often occurs in young people. In such cases it can the more easily be nipped in the bud. At all events, an attempt should be made to do so without delay. The supposed causes of hysteria I need hardly mention, there being none that would appeal to, or be understood by, the lay reader. One fact, however, deserves notice — namely, that we seldom find the

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240 A Sab Case ailment among those who work out of doors. In a great measure hysteria is a disease of polite society. It is sometimes found among men, and here the causes are less obscure— over-work, night-work, high living and fast life with too little sleep, may induce hysteria in males, but it then usually goes by the name of nervous debility. Now as to the treatment. The hysterical patient gene¬ rally expects and desires a great deal of sympathy, and some medical men recommend that this be withheld entirely. As I have already hinted, I deem this some¬ what harsh. Let the medical man do as he pleases, however — and most certainly the physician should be consulted— but he, is not always with the patient, but her friends and relatives are. Let them not be guilty of want of feeling. They may do their utmost to cheer and rouse the patient without actually turning a deaf ear to all her complainings. Besides, in doing so, there would be the danger of overlooking some real complaint. It is probably like the old fable of the shepherd and the wolf. Never mind, we must look out for the wolf just the same. But how are we to distinguish between a real or inflammatory pain, and that which is merely hysterical ? We have that good little fairy yclept the clinical thermometer, and no house should be without one. As to the treatment during a fit or paroxysm of hysteria, the dress is, of course, to be loosened, the patient kept as quiet as possible, and the windows opened. Smelling-salts will usually do the rest, or a dash of cold water. As already stated, in every case of hysteria the family physician must be consulted and obeyed. But it is a consolation for those who cannot easily get medical assistance to know that drugs are not always essential. A few drops of the dialysed iron — say, ten — may be given thrice daily in water, after meals, as this form of iron does not constipate ; if there be no paleness of countenance, even this will hardly be needed. Aperients may be necessary, but they must be mild. But diet and mode oflivingmustbe regulated. The former should be generous enough, but coffee and tea had better be left out of the scale. Nothing indi¬ gestible should be taken. Exercise every day, out of doors, is imperative ; so is the bath — cold, if possible — and daily friction to the spine. Healthy occupa¬ tion is part of the cure, and while amusement is of the greatest value, late hours, hot rooms, and excitement must be avoided. To young ladies a course of dumb¬ bell exercise will often do good. The mind must be kept employed as well as the body, and good sleep obtained at nights from days well spent. Last of all I may mention massage. A SAD CASE. manners of young men. It strikes one now and then. Are far from pretty ; And as for Cousin James — Ah, well ! that person claims Our deepest pity. Discussing people’s hair. And wanting bits to wear. Is not the fashion ; And when they tell you so, Why make things worse and go Into a passion ? And if perhaps, anon (Believing you are gone), Folks should ho, crying, What right have you to be Concealed behind a tree ? It’s vulgar spying. And when they hide their head (Because their eyes are red, And you confound them). Could conduct be more base Than this — to come and place Your arm around them? Frederick Langbridge.

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241 WHAT TO WEAR IN MARCH. CHll-CHAl ON DRESS : FROM OUR PARIS AND LONDON CORRESPONDENTS. I.— FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. A CAPE is one of the forms of out¬ door garments which has been vastly improved upon as time has gone on. Its actual definition is “the upper part of the coat or cloak turned over upon the shoulders.” In Henry VI IP's days the cape began to be a separate article of dress. From a ward¬ robe inventory Strutt quotes, “Half a yard of purple cloth of gold bandkyn makes a cape to a gown of bandkyn for the King;” and one of the Queen’s gifts is a Spanish cape of crimson satin embroidered all over with Venice gold tissue, and lined with crimson vel¬ vet, having five pairs of large aglets of gold— aglets, or aiglets, meaning tags. Bandkyn, or bandekyn, was a stuff worn by the upper classes, composed of silk interwoven with threads of gold. The little child who appears in the initial letter to this chapter wears a new style of cape of a far less ambitious type. It is, in fact, three capes and a turn-down collar, each bordered with four rows of braid, and a kilt-pleating at the edge which altogether covers the elbow. It foims part of a pelisse which has a perfectly plain bodice, fastening at the back ; to this a full skirt is sewn, which is also plain. The only addi¬ tional trimming is some five or six rows of braid for the cuffs. This is a favourite style of outdoor diess for a child of tender years in Paris, espe¬ cially when made in soft woollen of one of the numerous green tints. In the present case the frock, which is just visible beneath, is of terra-cotta — a dark, not a vivid shade— matching the stockings and the ostrich-feather in the green felt hat. The styles in dressmaking are so different from what they have been for the last few years, that if the gowns now in vogue had been seen unex¬ pectedly then, they would have been looked upon almost as fancy costumes, appertaining to quite another period. We have developed a strong ^€71- cha7it for the Tudor days, and many of the high, stuffed epaulettes and wire-beaded collars and cuffs might have been sported by dames at the Court of Catherine de Medici. The dress worn by the left- hand figure in the illustration has many original points, and is certainly picturesque. It is of a fawn shade of French poplin, trimmed with mousse velvet. The skirt falls in straight undraped lines, is scanty, and not distended in any way by steels, pads, or any under-petticoating. Dame Fashion has banished bustles, and women are quite con¬ tent without them. All the satire and pungent wiiting levelled at them had no effect whatever in suppressing them. Now we can see how preposterous that great hump at the back was. For how curious it is that whatever is in fashion is looked upon a? charming ; but once let it become out of date, then it has not a virtue left. An old book of photographic portraits shows that best. What miracles of ugliness seem the garments of past years, on which at the time we prided ourselves vastly ! The side trimming of the skirt we are describing is arranged with tabs of the poplin and bands of the velvet, and both appear in the broad waist-belt. wide, plain belt of mousse velvet encircles the waist, and over this comes a draped, folded piece of the pop¬ lin, secured on the right side by a rosette formed of loops of both materials. The bodice is arranged in a style that gives great width to the bust, and diminishes the apparent size of the waist. The dia¬ gonal opening on the right side, fastened with buttons, has a margin of silk of a deeper tone, edged with a broad band of mousse velvet, which forms a 736 APOLOGIES.

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242 What to Wear in March. pelerine cape, over - lapping the shoulders, and ending in a point in the middle of the bodice. The sleeves are quite novel ; they are full, and are gathered into a cuff-band of mousse velvet at the wrist, with a revers of fawn poplin. This sleeve is even fuller at the top, where it has some five slashings of velvet. A band of velvet encircles the throat ; a pretty capote of mousse velvet, and a little muff of poplin bordered with mousse velvet, make the whole very complete. This is an uncommon make of dress, a style in advance of the fashion, and those who are planning their spring outfits may safely follow it. Many of the new woollens will be made up after this idea. Generalities are mis¬ leading, and there are several exceptions to the rule I so often see laid down in the accounts of current modes, that long mantles are worn to the exclusion of any others. The ac¬ companying illustra¬ tion is a good ex¬ ample of a most stylish outdoor gar¬ ment, exactly suited to early spring. It fits the figure as all the most stylish cloaks of this kind do, and the double cape is gathered on the shoulders, so that it stands up very high indeed. It is bordered with blue fox - fur, which is carried round the neck and edges the first of the double points, falling at either side. It is cut quite shoit at the back, and the second pointed piece at the side is set in at the long waist-line, and bordered with a handsome drop fringe, which also edges the under¬ cape, made of rich brocaded velvet. 1 his is quite an old fashion revived, and the mixture of brocaded and plain velvet is very pretty. The sleeves are brocaded and edged with fur, and both velvets are of that gicy tone which assimilates to blue fox. If you happen to have by you some old fashion plates of about forty years ago, study them, and you will be able to pretty well indicate what changes are coming. There are three different lengths of skirts worn : quite short, intended for walking-dresses ; just touching the ground, which is the favourite length for indoor gowns and dinner-gowns— that is, the less elaborate evening gowns ; while the robes de luxe trail well on to the ground, and have silk balayeuses to keep them out. Rows of black velvet about an inch wide edge many of the skirts, for in the present severely plain style it is difficult to originate anything really new, and I have seen one or two Parisian gowns made with a band of broad piece velvet at the hem, and another half-way up the skirt. The fronts are often cut mitre fashion, viz., with a seam down the centre ; and instead of a pleat on either side, a short seam with the fulness cut away. They are sometimes gathered twice, at the back of the waist. Piping is once more to the fore : coarse pipings on cotton cords, which are placed along the seams at the back of the bodice. This takes away the effect of any roundness of shoulders. Many skirt seams are also corded. This is a revival of forty years ago, and the rou¬ leaux which were arranged in devices on the short skirts will follow. Even now the laurel-leaves and small, stiff, semicircular garlands worked above the hem just as they were then, are quite the newest trimming for the moment, on this side of the Channel. It is to be hoped the skirts will not become too scanty. II, — FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. I wonder whether it is that money is not so plenti¬ ful as it was, or that people generally have become far more helpful, but certainly women of our day are more practical in their housekeeping and their dress than they used to be, and those who cannot on an emergency make their own dresses and trim their own bonnets are the exception to the rule. Mending to any great extent by those who lead busy AN ARGUMENT.

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What to Wear in March. iives is ignored ; stockings and under-clothing can be bought at such a cheap rate, that it is easier to replace those that are beginning to wear out with new, than ■0 spend any length of time on fine darning. The fashions in dressmaking are all on the side of the borne dressmaker, and girls possessed of good figures •can almost drape the stuffs about their slender waists. The illustration which shows the crossing bodice is •certainly an easy one to compass. The skirt is quite plain, almost flat in front and very full at the back, •with a handsome conventional design in braiding above the hem. The skirt is sewn to the bodice, and both are put on together. The collar is cut very high, and there is a plain vest. The back is full, gathered in the centre ; the front has two full pieces, the one that crosses over being braided. There is a soft band of the material at the waist ending in a rosette. The sleeves are cut on quite a novel plan, the under part is plain, the upper cross-cut and ruffled, standing up very high on the shoulders. Sleeves now are fre¬ quently cut on the cross, narrow at the wrist and widening at the top, where they are gathered twice, giving great height. These crossing bodices and high upstanding sleeves will most certainly be more worn than any other style during the forthcoming spring and summer. The Catogan mode of arranging the hair is comi»g over here very certainly. The only point against it is that the hair being in contact with the dress bodice soils it, but the Catogan is far more graceful than the hair dragged up by the roots from the nape of the neck, *and an untidy fringe of short ends hanging downwards. The other dress is a very good illustration of a soft- falling material, and is well suited to summer morning wear as well as winter evening. The model is a soft- tinted crepe de Chine which is accordion-pleated, and accordingly takes an enormous quantity of stuff. On one side it is cut up in a V form, and allowed to drop £n cascade over broad guipure embroidery in white. The bodice is extremely graceful ; it is also accordion- pleated, and so are the sleeves, which are fully gathered on the shoulders and on the broad cuff of the guipure. Narrow sash ribbon encircles the waist, and a second piece starts from under the arm, and then falls in loops and ends at the side. A wide wired ruff of the cr^pe de Chine tapers in the front, and stands up well at the back, the neck being covered by a crossing fichu of lisse, and beyond there is a shaped piece of the guipure, wide on the shoulder, narrow in front ; this also is a new style, and an indication of what is likely to be the mode for some time. Have any of you ever seen a very full circular cloak, which used to be gathered into a pointed yoke, and was worn by our grandmothers and great-grand¬ mothers These are coming in again, and have much to recommend them. I have just seen one, made for a bride, in an artistic green cloth, set in a velvet yoke, and from this hung a rich knotted fringe, quite half a yard deep, It was lined with cream-grounded bro¬ cade studded with rose-buds, and accompanied by a 243 large hat. It was most piquant as well as thoroughly comfortable. Zouave pockets appear on most of the bodices, and small light velvet ones embroidered in gold or silver are most useful. A new material has found favour of late for brides, viz., faille velute, which is so soft that it could almost be passed through a wedding-ring, and the grey Meis- sonier white is often chosen in preference to any other, because it is most becoming to the complexion. Fringes of orange-blossom and other white flowers are used as a heading to lace, which is mostly narrow and put on full. Paniers are worn ; they diminish the size of the waist, and sometimes there is only one panier, the other side of the skirt being trimmed quite differently. The latest mode of wearing a sash is to attach it to the middle of the back like a Watteau pleat, whence it falls m one long end, being mostly made of some rich brocade. If you have any pieces of brocade by you, treasure them up, for such small pieces make a great effect on a dress. A little scrap is frequently introduced high up on the left side of the bodice, the drapery on the right side crossing over it, while on the left side the full piece only starts from beneath the arm. The sleeves of evening dresses have long ceased to be mere epaulettes, and several tiers of lisse one above the other, standing up high on the shoulders, veil the top of the arm ir, a most becoming fashion. If you have any velvet to make up, try it the light way down ; you will see it throws up the colour better. The collars worn are most piquant ; some stand up square while others of the same form are pointed in the centre, but they are intensely picturesque. Skirts of satins and woollens are often gauged round the waist in as many as twenty rows. Red has had an immense revival this season, and the crossing bodice and braided skirt in the illustra¬ tion are of that favourite colour. The old-fashioned straight and crimped fringes are being worn once more, especially, I note, on red gowns, though with them black trimmings, such as braidings and astrakan, are prefeiied. Astrakan fur has been second to none this year, and for the first time it has been introduced on to sealskins. A jacket that has lost something of its pristine freshness is vastly improved by a Medici collar and trimmings of astrakan. Velvet sleeves and vests with bodices and skirts in maiked contrasts are much worn ; those who wear out sleeves quickly, can have them thus easily re¬ placed without any trouble of matching. At most of the smart London weddings, the Louis XIV. coats have been seen with long all-round basques, flap pockets, and turn-back cuffs ; the waistcoat made of brocade, and finished off with cascade jabots of lace in front. One of the prettiest I have seen was a large- patterned grey velvet on a silk ground, and a white- and-silver braided waistcoat. Women who like to wear high dresses, which have a most dressy appearance, should have them filled in with white lisse, over pink or some light colour, the sleeves puffed in the same way.

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246 LADY ANGELA’S LATEST LION. DY ANGELA SMYTHE was filled with a passion for no¬ velty; her tastes were decidedly catholic, and nothing that was original came amiss to her. Therefore it was no marvel to her friends when she fell into raptures about a certain Mar- chese di San Floriano, who was good-looking, possessed an imposing title, and in addition, could play a little instrument she called a “ mandolinetta,” sing delightful (and quite incom¬ prehensible) Italian ditties, and make delicious sweet¬ meats, whereof he was in the habit of sending little packets to his friends. One hot evening in June her drawing-room was specially crowded, as a. whole constellation of par¬ ticular stars ” were gathered, and she and her niece, an enthusiastic young lady of two-and-twenty, were extremely busy amongst the guests, introducing and entertaining them. A gentleman with long fair hair and an enormous display of shirt-front had just finished a recitation, at which his audience seemed doubtful whether it would be more polite to laugh or to weep, when there was a small stir in the doorway, and Lady Angela extended her hands in greeting to a slight, dark young fellow with a carefully trimmed moustache, who was carrying under his arm a dimi¬ nutive guitar. “ Ah, Marchese,” she said, “ I feared you would not come ; you are so late.” The young man bowed gracefully as he made his excuses, and his hostess, placing her hand on his arm, led him across the room to be introduced to several of her friends. During this process he preserved an admirable gravity, notwithstanding the fact that the execrable French in which she chose to clothe her remarks on his talents or those of the persons to whom she presented him made her conversation at times irresistibly comic. Voila, Marquis,” she said at length, as she paused in front of a pretty girl in a pale blue dress, who was accompanied by a handsome lady in black velvet. “ This young lady has come all the way from Windsor to hear your delightful music.” Agnes Sherard, as the young lady was named, could hardly repress a smile as she murmured a few words in response ; and Lady Angela, being called away at the moment, left the Marchese to improve the acquaintance. Agnes, however, though a genial girl, with plenty to say, seemed seized with an un¬ accountable fit of silence, and her cousin, Mrs. Mars- ton, was obliged to take up the conversation until the Italian was summoned to the music-room to “give one of his delightful ballads.” Here, seated on a low divan, with his little guitar slung across his shoulders by a broad red ribbon, he thrummed a few chords, and sang in a pleasing tenor voice an air with a refrain in valse time, very much like the popular “ Santa Lucia.” “ Agnes, why do you stare at that poor young man so intently ? and why did you not speak to him ? ” enquired Mrs. Marston, under cover of the applause which followed the cessation of the music. “ His face and voice seem familiar to me,” replied Agnes. “ I cannot help thinking I have seen him before.” “You met him in Rome, perhaps ?” queried Mrs. Marston. “No ; I am sure I did not,” answered Agnes, and silence ensued, as Miss Smythe, Lady Angela’s niece,, begged the singer for another ballad. “ The one about the girl at the festa,” she said entreatingly. “ I fear I cannot recollect it,” was the reply. “ Oh, yes, please do,” exclaimed a chorus of voices. “ You can improvise if you do not remember,” added Miss Smythe. Thus adjured, the Marchese began a quaint little air with rapid changes of time and variations of key,, and sang \n patois the history of one Ninetta, who lost her purchases, her dinner, and finally her lover, through a series of foolish mischances at a fair. “ I wish I could remember where I have seen him,” said Agnes. “ Perhaps I shall when I speak to him again. I seemed to know all about that song.” ' “It is a popular little canzonet you might have heard anywhere,” said Mrs. Marston, who was becom¬ ing a little tired of Agnes’ preoccupation. They did not again speak to the Marchese, who remained all the time till his early departure in the music-room ; and the circumstance soon faded from Mrs. Marston’s mind. Agnes, who shortly returned to her home in the country, thought sometimes of the young Italian, and told her mother about him. In the course of a few weeks they heard that he was seen everywhere with Lady Angela and her niece, and Agnes was told she had better be prepared to attend the wedding of her friend, Florence Smythe, as the Marchese evidently intended taking back to his Italian estates an English Marchesa ! One morning, amongst a pile of letters on her breakfast-table Mrs. Sherard found a note with an invitation to a picnic from Lady Angela. “ I should like to go, mother,” said Agnes, as she read it. “It is to be in Lord Hilderton’s park, and you know how lovely it must be there now. We have been talking of spending a day there by ourselves.” “Yes, we can easily drive over,” said Mrs. Sherard, as she rose from the breakfast-table. “ Perhaps I shall meet the Marchese again,” said Agnes. “My dear, I shall begin to think the Italian has made an impression on you,” said her mother, with a smile. “ I am sure you have mentioned him half a dozen times ! ”

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Lady Angelas Latest Lion. The day of the picnic was an exquisite one, and Mrs. Sherard and her daughter enjoyed their drive through the lovely Berkshire lanes, and were charmed with the spot chosen for the gathering. Under the overhanging boughs of great beeches and oaks the table-cloth had been spread on the mossy grass ; and girls in light dresses, and young men in every variety of coloured “ blazer ” known to the tennis-lawn, were Hitting about, unpacking, arranging, and decorating the viands and the dishes. The first greetings over. Miss Smythe said to Agnes, “There has been such an accident! The box of meringues has been left behind, and a large case of eggs put in instead. Auntie has been in despair ; but our dear Marchese has come to the rescue, and is actually making omelettes for us. He is so clever and funny ; do come and help him.” As she spoke, followed by Mrs. Sherard and Agnes, she led the way to a small copse, where, against a back-ground of firs, a table was placed, on which were arranged piles of eggs, and sundry basins, plates, and jugs, while one or two girls were chopping ham and herbs. A small fireplace of bricks had been hastily constructed, the smoke from which was curling in blue wreaths in the summer air ; while the centre figure of the group was the Marchese, who, in a costume of white flannel, and with a serviette round his waist and a cap of white paper on his head, was, at the moment of the arrival of our party, removing the frying-pan from the fire, and dexterously sliding its contents to a dish held by a laughing girl for the purpose. “ Good gracious ! it is Giuseppe I ” exclaimed Agnes, turning to her mother. “My dear, what do you mean.?” enquired Mrs. Sherard, in astonishment. Miss Smythe had hastened towards the group engaged in cookery, and so, fortu¬ nately, did not hear the remark. “ Mother,” said Agnes, “ it is the handsome little cook who used to be at Vico, when we were in the Pension. You would have remembered him if you had heard him sing. We had to ask him to leave off bringing his guitar out to the terrace in the evenings when you were so ill.” I recollect him quite well,” said Mrs. Sherard, who had been attentively scanning the group. “It is dreadful!” exclaimed Agnes. “What a wicked impostor he is ! ” “Hush, my dear,” said her mother; “we must think of Lady Angela. It would distress her so much if we were to expose him. I will consider during luncheon what we can do. Be silent for the present.” Miss Smythe was beckoning to them, and they joined her, and watched the operations of the amateur cooks, and soon the whole party were seated on the graiss, enjoying the al fresco luncheon, and especially the unusual addition of the delicious omelettes. After the meal was concluded, the young people rose, and strolled about in the lovely glades of the woods, whilst some clustered round the Marchese, who, seated on a mossy mound at the foot of a spreading beech, made a most picturesque figure, with the coloured ribbon of 247 his mandolinetta catching the sunlight as he sang one of his little songs. “Where did you meet the Marchese.?” enquired Mrs. Sherard of Lady Angela ; “have you known him long ? ” “ Oh, no,” was the reply. “ We are so intimate,, though, that it seems as if he had been our friend for years. He was introduced to me by my old friend Mrs. Hawkins, who met him, I think, in Naples. She wrote, asking me to do all I could for her fro/e ^e. She said I should find him very clever ; but she did not tell me he was so musical.” “ Was he an old friend of hers ? ” pursued Mrs. Sherard. “ She did not tell me so ; but I think he must have been, for she mentioned him as Giuseppe Rondini, and did not even say he was a marquis. He is such a dear fellow,” continued the enthusiastic lady ; “ and I am not at all surprised that my dear Florence has become attached to him.” “ Is he then engaged to your niece.?” enquired Mrs. Sherard, a tone of anxiety she could not repress find¬ ing its way into her voice. “No; not exactly,” replied Lady Angela, “but he is devoted in his attentions, and dear Florence con¬ fided to me last night that she would have no hesita¬ tion in accepting him ; and I feel sure she loves him deeply.” Perplexed and agitated, Mrs. Sherard did not pur¬ sue the conversation, but determined to lose no time in carrying out the plan that had suggested itself to her at luncheon. She, therefore, joined the group under the beech-tree, and, drawing Agnes aside, explained to her what she intended to do ; then, as the music ceased, and the singer rose, she requested he should be introduced to her, and while conversing, drew him down a charming glade which led to a summer-house overlooking the lake, and quite away from the guests. Directly they were out of earshot of the party,. Agnes said to him in Italian, “ Giuseppe Rondini, have you forgotten the Pension Signarelli at Vico .? ” They were fortunately just within the shelter of the little summer-house, for the poor Marchese, with aery of anguish and a gesture of despair, fell on his knees in front of the ladies as he exclaimed — “ Oh, signorini ! pity me. I am of men the most unhappy.” This behaviour on the part of the impostor was decidedly unexpected, and bidding the youth rise, Mrs. Sherard, in whose kind heart pity strove with anger, proceeded to question the ex-cook. “ How come you here, pretending to be a mar¬ quis .? ” she said sternly. “ Oh, signora, it has all been a mistake ! ” said the poor boy — for he was really little more — and great tears rolled from his large brown eyes and fell in heavy drops on his clasped hands. “Tell us everything,” said Mrs. Sherard. “lam anxious to spare Lady Angela the sorrow it would cause her to know how you have deceived her ; and if you tell me all the truth, I will try to help you.”

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2^8 Lady Angela’s Si, signora,” said the lad, and striving to check his tears, he proceeded to tell his story, partly in Italian, partly in English ; and with considerable help from his kind interlocutors, the following tale was elicited. Milady 'Aukins, as Giuseppe called her, had been much pleased with his cooking while she stayed at the Pension, and had taken him into her own service. After some months, the illness of a son compelled hei Latest Lion. Giuseppe Rondim^ Cuciuieve^ ’ on them, contained also a card of his patron, the Marchese di San Floriano, who had kindly permitted him to use his name if a reference were required. This card he had given in mistake for his own to Lady Angela’s footman, who in stentorian tones had announced him by that title to a roomful of ladies and gentlemen who were sipping afternoon tea, on the very day when Lady Angela had to leave Italy for Egypt, and she promised to aid him in obtaining a situation as chefxxi England. Jo c;nd she had written to enlist the services of Lady Angela, but very hurriedly, and had only asked help for her “clever protegi, Giuseppe Rondini,” leaving him to tell his own tale of his capabilities and re- quirements. “But how was it possible you were taken lor a marquis?” enquired Mrs. Sherard at this point. “ Ah, signora ! there is my folly— my sm ! and the youth’s tears began to stream afresh, as he explained that the envelope in which he carried his cards, with received the letter from Mrs. Hawkins about her ‘‘ clever protege^ “ I did not understand at first what had happened, explained poor Giuseppe ; “ and when I did I lacked the courage to speak. The lady was so kind, all the signorini were so good, it was just like a masqueiade ; and it seemed so easy to be a Marchese in Inghilterra. I did not mean to go on in deceit, but every day made it more difficult to reveal the truth ; and, oh, mihadi, ’elp me, forgive me ! ” he continued, turning his tear¬ laden eyes first to one lady, then to the other. “ But I fear the English signora she believe I lof her ! but

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Pictures of the Months. 249 I do not. I am so frightened when I think of it ; and her uncle he talk to me, and ask me of my ^ famiglia,’ and 1 know not what to do ! ” “ Indeed, Giuseppe,” said Mrs. Sherard, as he con¬ cluded, “ you have been very wicked ; but I hope you did not know how wrong it was, and for Lady Angela’s sake I will help you. You must write to-morrow to her and say you regret you cannot see her again.” “ But I cannot write,” said poor Giuseppe, “ and I know not how to say it.” How then have you replied to Lady Angela’s notes ? ” enquired Agnes. “ I do go to a man who writes letters for Italians,” was the answer. “ He lives in a place where there are many of us ; they do call it Lester Squarr.” “ Where do you live, and how have you been able to dress and present so good an appearance ? ” was the next enquiry. “ Ah ! ” said Giuseppe, “ my uncle at Vico he died, and left me his little money that I might travel to England and become ‘ chef de cuisine,’ and I had my wages from Miladi ’Aukins, who was generous like all English ladies. Then the Marchese gave me clothes — many clothes. His son, my foster-brother, is dead, and I wear these 1 ” said he, as he touched his garments. “ But my money is nearly gone, and I know not what to do. I have been a ‘miserable’ ever since I saw the signora in London ; I felt she would remember me ! ” Mrs. Sherard did not prolong the conversation, and cautioning Giuseppe he should plead a headache to account for his depression of spirits and woe-begone appearance, the trio rejoined the party. The sequel is soon told. Mrs. Sherard obtained a good situation for Giuseppe in the house of a friend in Yorkshire who possessed a large establishment, and thither the youth betook himself a week or two after the memorable picnic, becoming light-hearted again as soon as he found himself in his proper sphere, and once more surrounded by his congenial pots and pans ; while his absence was accounted for to Lady Angela in some beautifully written letters, announcing first the “indisposition,” and then the departure for an “ appointment,” of the Marchese, who deeply deplored his inability to bid adieu in person to his “stimatis- sime signorini.” It is to be hoped that no freak of fate or fortune will send Miss Florence Smythe to the kitchen of Barton Towers, the Yorkshire mansion where Giuseppe now wields the frying-pan, or will ever introduce her to the real Marchese di San Floriano, who has enjoyed a hearty laugh over the confession of Giuseppe Rondini, sent him by command of Mrs. Sherard. Miss Smythe posed during the whole of the winter as the victim of an unfortunate romantic attachment, but according to later accounts is now consoled by the attentions of a German Graf, with a name as long as his beard, the possessor of vast estates in Pomerania. M. R. L. PICTURES OF THE MONTHS.

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250 THE MIND-READING OF THE CHINESE* U N G a visit, in the summer of 1888, to San F'rancisco, I made the acquaintance of Sing Fon, a Chinaman who combines the two occu¬ pations of priest and merchant. Finding him to be a very entertain¬ ing and intelligent gen¬ tleman, 1 cultivated him until we became good friends. He told me many strange things about Chinese manners and customs, but the strangest of all was an exhibition he gave me of mind-reading. He required some ten days for preparation. At the appointed time I called for him at his store, and, going with me to the Joss House, we each of us removed our shoes, and put on in place of them a pair of white satin sandals. He enveloped himself in a white satin robe which reached almost to the floor. We were shown into a small room behind the plat¬ form upon which the three idols were seated, and from which daylight was entirely excluded. It was lighted by what seemed to be a hundred candles suspended from the ceiling by some invisible means. The walls were entirely concealed by silk hangings, beautifully embroidered, and the floor was covered with matting ornamented with grotesque and fantastic figures. 'Fhe only furniture in the room was a bamboo table, upon which stood two flat, covered vases and a lamp. As soon as we entered the room he required me to sit cross-legged on the floor, close to the table. He then blindfolded me, and asked me not to move or speak until he told me to do so. 1 heard him remove the covers from the vases, felt him wetting the hair on the top of my head, and smoothing it down close and flat. Then he seemed to be putting a cloth on it, which he touched here and there with his fingers, as though he were applying a plaister to a wound. Putting his open hand on the top of the cloth, and pressing my head with considerable force, he instructed me to think of some church I had seen, and to make as distinct a picture of it in my mind as possible. The Joss House being near by, I naturally fixed my mind upon the interior of it, and for perhaps two minutes there was absolute silence in the room. He then removed the bandage from my eyes, and, at his suggestion, I stood up beside him. Both vases were open on the table ; in one of them was a number of pieces of very thin white paper, about three inches [* The author of this paper is alone responsible' for the statements therein contained. — Ed. C. M.] square ; in the other was a single piece of paper, of like size, colour, and shape, immersed in what seemed to be water. This the priest took out and held over the flame of the lamp. As it became dry, there appeared upon it a faint outline picture of the Joss House. It was blurred and indistinct, but it was beyond question a picture of the room 1 had in my mind while sitting blindfold on the floor. The trick was a simple one, and I saw through it at once. I told Sing Fon that, of course, he knew I would have in my mind the room through which we’ had just passed, and he had his picture prepared beforehand. He smiled in a good-natured way, and, taking a powerful reading-glass from a drawer in the table, he bade me examine the picture more closely. I found it to be a picture, and a perfect one, of the Joss House, not as it really is, but as I had thought of it, and pictured it to myself from memory — for, on second thought, I could see where I had omitted many details. The priest suggested that we should try again, and I was more than willing. My theory was so far wrong that I abandoned it, and wanted the opportunity for further investigation. Repeating our former prepara¬ tions, I this time brought to mind a church more than two thousand miles away, that I was absolutely certain the priest had never seen or heard of. To my utter astonishment, as the paper dried the church appeared, almost perfect in every detail. Sing Fon was as much pleased as I was astonished. He asked me to sit down again, suggesting that this time I bring to mind the face of some woman or child. After blindfolding me as before, he arranged the hair low' down on the back of my head, and applied the paper close to my neck. While he applied the pressure of his hand I thought of Mary Anderson. In a few moments I was released, the paper was. dried, and through the glass could be seen a good likeness of the great Parthenia, at that time in England. We repeated the experiment over and over again,^ and numerous pictures of faces and places were pro¬ duced. I found, however, that no faces of any but the living could be made to appear. As a final test I tried to remember the verses so popular with the boys of a former generation, be¬ ginning — “Oh ! were you ne’er a schoolboy, And did you never train ? ” Upon examining the paper, the verses appeared as they were printed in the Second Reader, and above them w^as a copy, in faint outline, of the illustration showing the boys marching in uniform, and in the distance the flock of geese and the ‘‘sturdy gander that stopped to show' us fight.” Several lines of the poem that I had been unable to remember w'ere missing in the picture ; and in one place where I had

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The Mind-Reading of the Chinese. 251 misquoted a word, my mistake was shown on the paper. The priest declined to tell me how the paper was prepared, or how the pictures are produced. The manner of their production is a secret known only to the priesthood — a sacred mystery over three thousand years old. Professor Durand, to whom I related my singular experience, read a paper on the subject at the annual meeting of the Eclectic Psychological Association, in Boston, on the 23rd of December, 1888. The professor, in his statement of the facts, made some slight errors, which the members of the association who read this article will discover. But he was so far correct that, from a scientific standpoint, and for the purposes of investigation, the professor’s errors are harmless. His paper led to considerable dis¬ cussion. Those of the members inclined to be materialistic insisted that the thought matter filtered directly through my skull, and was impressed upon the prepared paper. Some of these held that thought is a mode of motion, as light is, and that the pictures are produced by its rays, as an image is formed upon the sensitive plate in a camera. Others, who are true psychologists and believers in the spiritual, reasoned that the brain of the Chinaman was the medium through which the thoughts were filtered and by which the picture was produced. With the former, it was held that all that was necessary to produce the pictures would be a know¬ ledge of how to prepare the paper. The latter in¬ sisted that not only must the paper be properly pre¬ pared, but the operator must possess peculiar gifts. There were still others who, following the teachings of the late Mr. Braid, of Manchester, the leading in¬ vestigator of hypnotism, held a middle course, insisting that by a continual fixation of the mental eye upon an object, with absolute repose and general quietude, the special senses are exalted, and the impression is made upon the motor, sentient, and sympathetic nerves ; that upon the brain, as the centre of the nervous system, the impression is most distinct, and, by reason of the close proximity of the prepared paper, the brain imparts the impression thereto, and the picture is formed. They agreed with the spiritualists that more was necessary than a proper preparation of the paper, but they differed from them in this : that while it was not necessary for the operator to possess peculiar gifts, it was necessary that the subject operated upon should be of peculiar temperament, and should be both mentally and physically in proper condition. Over all the pictures produced during my interview with the priest there ran a number of fine lines, tending to blur them slightly, and make them seem as if printed on shaded paper. The priest explained that my dark hair had made these lines, and that the grey hair, which predominates with me, had produced no such effect. He further told me that in pictures made from the head of a Chinaman no such lines are seen,, there being no hair on the head of a Chinaman at the points where the papers are applied. This seems to indicate the correctness of the materialistic theory, and leads to the supposition that dark hair is not a good conductor of thought-rays. It is to prevent the appearance of these lines upon the pictures that Chinamen are required to keep their heads closely shaven. In fact, where dark hair is so plentiful as to entirely conceal the skull whereon the prepared paper is placed, no picture will be produced. This singular art is utilised by the Chinese Govern¬ ment in many ways : as, for instance, the detection of crime. The prepared paper is applied to the head of a suspected criminal. Even against his will he may be made to think of the location where the crime was committed, with all its surroundings, and the picture formed is a silent but certain witness against him. Prisoners taken in battle are made to think of the forts, and camps, and troops they have just left behind them, and accurate plans of them all are drawn by this wonderful and certain process. The heads of prisoners whose custom it is to wear their hair are carefully shaven before the papers are applied. Any subject of the Emperor may be required at any moment to appear and take part in the sacred mystery^ and it is thought wise to have the people always in readiness. The queue worn by all of them is regarded as sacred, and this belief is encouraged by those in authority. It is really a matter of minor importance there is no objection to it ; and while the closely shaven head without the queue would present an un¬ pleasant and unfinished appearance, as they are now con'if)ined, each makes the other a by no means un¬ becoming ornament. Sing Eon showed some crude knowledge of phreno¬ logy. In explaining why, in the different experiments, he had changed his manipulations from the top to the lower back part of my head, he told me that pictures of sacred things only were produced on the top of the head, while those of women could be had only from near the nape of the neck. These locations correspond with ‘‘veneration” and “amativeness” in modern phrenology, and add another to the many proofs of the exactness of that science, besides showing its great antiquity. Unfortunately, no way is known to the Chinese to preserve these wonderful photographs of the mind. They gradually fade away, and in half an hour dis¬ appear entirely. Indeed, when subjected to any light but that of such candles as were burning in the room where we were, and the component parts of which are kept secret, they disappear instantly. The Mongolian is not a progressive race. It re¬ mains for the Caucasian to discover for himself, or learn from the Chinese, this beautiful and useful art, and further to discover some way to give permanence to the wonderful pictures. HORACE B. JONES.

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252 THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars respecting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge himself to notice every article or work submitted. _ A Pneumatic Hammer. The wood- cut illustrates a hamnier which is worked by the rarefac¬ tion and com¬ pression of air in the cylin¬ der shown at C. The rare¬ faction and compression are effected by a plunger, p, attached to a 1* e V o 1 V i n g disc-crank, D. With a velo¬ city of loo metres per minute of the plunger the pressure* of the air in the cylinder rises to four atmospheres. The hammer is made in five sizes, the smallest requiring about a horse¬ power to drive it, and the largest four horse-power. Eucalyptia and Malaria. the Editor ^Cassell's Magazine.” “ Dear Sir, — I have discovered a new, and to my mind a very important, use for the “ Pinol Euca¬ lyptia Dry Inhaler,” of which you gave an account a short time ago in the Gatherer. The Gold Coast is undoubtedly one of the most unhealthy places in the world, and malarial fever is the cause of the sickness and death of about eighty per cent, of the white residents there. I have not escaped the penalty of living in that country ; but it may be in teresting, and also useful, to your readers to know how I became proof against the malaria during the last six months of my residence there. ‘‘ Malaria is due to the poisonous germ - laden vapours rising from the swamps and gullies that are filled with decaying vegetable matter. These germs, taken into the lungs with the breath, poison the blood and thus produce malarial fever. “ It is a well-known fact that eucalyptia is one of the most powerful antiseptics, and it has been proved that microbes cannot exist when eucalyptia is present. I acted on this principle, and procured one of these Dry Inhalers, charging it with eucalyptia, and used it every morning on leaving my house, with the result that I have been perfectly free from malaria, and enjoyed excellent health from the time I adopted this plan, notwithstanding that the fever was raging in the district at the time. ^‘Trusting others will benefit by my experience, “ I am, dear Sir, yours truly, “A. McSwiney. ‘‘Axim, Gold Coast.” Street Indicators. Paris is to be provided with comprehensive street indicators in all the principal thoroughfares, and the first of these has recently been placed on the Boule¬ vard Magenta, close to the Northern Railway terminus. The indicator is supported by a figure in bronze, has four faces protected by glass, and is illuminated by night. The information given comprises the locality of all the post offices, police stations, fire brigade stations, hospitals, charitable institutions, omnibus stations, &c., in the neighbourhood ; together with the names and addresses of the public officers, physi¬ cians, apothecaries, dentists, &c., of the district. Some such indicators would be useful in other cities than Paris, and would save many inquiries of police con¬ stables and others. A Collapsing Crate. A crate of stout iron wire, which is capable of fold¬ ing up so as to go into small bulk, is shown in our woodcut. The top and bottom are hinged to the

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The Gatherer. 253 sides, and when the crate is required, they are closed up and secured by hooks on the edges. No rope or nailing is employed to fasten the receptacle, which is particularly useful in railway travelling. It can, of course, be lined inside. Whale V. Cable. In the early part of September last a “ fault broke out in the submarine cable between Santos and Santa Catharina, on the east coast of South America. Communication was not entirely interrupted, and signals could be exchanged by the telegraph clerks at both ends. The “flaw’’ was localised by suitable tests, and the Western and Brazilian Telegraph Com¬ pany, who own the cables, despatched their repairing steamer, the Viking, to grapple for the cable at that spot. On September 17th, while picking up the line in fifty- seven fathoms of water, at a point about seventy miles north of Santa Catharina, the body of a dead whale came up entangled in its coils. The carcase appeared to be about fifty feet long, and was much decom¬ posed. - The cable parted under the unusual strain, and the body of the whale rose to the surface and burst, from the imprisoned gases. The crew of the steamer were glad to see the offensive object drift to leeward. It was noticed that the skin of the leviathan was en¬ crusted with barnacles ; and it is probable that in try¬ ing to free himself of these pests, by rubbing against the cable, the animal was caught by the tail and perished for want of air. This is the third recorded instance of a whale being snared in a submarine cable. Compact Saucepans. For kitchen ranges of limited compass the sauce¬ pans we here illustrate will be found useful. Two of them, thanks to their shape, can stand on the round hole in the top of a kitchener and occupy little more room than one ordinary saucepan. In open grates they will drop into the fire and bring their contents to boiling-point very quickly. Electrical Tanning. The electric current has been successfully applied to facilitate the process of tanning hides, in a tannery at Bermondsey. The hides revolve slowly on a frame in the tan liquor, which is of the ordinary sorts ; and the current from a dynamo is passed through the vat. It IS said that the electricity hastens the union of the tannin in the liquor and the gelatine of the hides, thus shortening the time of tanning from several months to several weeks. A Rotary Album. A device called the “ photographoscope,” for show¬ ing photographs, one after another, by the turning of a handle, is illustrated herewith. It consists of an orna¬ mental frame with a photograph-holder behind, and as the handle seen on the right is turned, the photo¬ graphs appear in succession. The number of pictures is only limited by the size of the appliance ; but twenty- one will probably be sufficient for most private pur¬ poses. It is chiefly intended for the drawing-room table, but it may be useful in other circumstances. Tannin in Tea. Mr. D. Hooper, F.C.S., of Ootacamund, India, has made an elaborate analysis of Indian teas, and finds them, especially the best brands, rich in tannin, which is the source of the “ strength ” or “ body ” of the infusion. He recommends that the best Indian teas should be regarded as “ strong teas,” and either diluted with Chinese tea, which, as a rule, is weaker in tannin, or the infusion should be made with a smaller quantity of the leaves and during a shorter time. With a smaller quantity, good water, and an infusion of not more than ten minutes’ duration, he thinks we should hear less of this “ deleterious in¬ gredient,” tannin. The tea-broker’s infusion for five minutes removes about one-fifth of the extract from the leaves, one of ten minutes removes a third, one of fifteen minutes a half, and one of twenty minutes two- thirds of it. A Gigantic Cuttle-Fish. A specimen of the king cuttle-fish or gigantic squid was recently stranded at Blacksod Bay, on the west coast of Mayo. Though shrunk and maimed when it was examined, the body of the animal measured sixty

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254 The Gatherer. feet in circumference, including the short arms. The length of each tentacle was thirty feet, and the girth in some parts four feet ; so that the span of the animal was at least seventy feet. One of these ocean mon¬ sters, which might well be mistaken for the great sea- serpent, was cast ashore on Kerry more than 200 years ago ; another was reported from the banks of Newfoundland, a third from Shetland, and a fourth was picked up off Boffin, Isle of Mayo, some fourteen years ago, portions of which are now in Dublin Museum. Sterilised Milk. The Dahl process of sterilising milk has recently been introduced into London. Fresh milk is placed in cans which are hermetically sealed, then heated and cooled alternately until the germs are destroyed. The milk can then be kept for years without losing its freshness, or failing to yield cream and butter. It has been found useful on steamers ; but it is likely to find its way into the nursery, and the kitchen too, if, as is claimed, all danger of infection is avoided by its use. Testing Fast Colours. It is stated that if a piece of dyed cloth is damped nnd rubbed on clean white paper it will leav^e no stain if the dye is a “fast ” one. Another test is to lay the cloth between two sheets of paper and iron it. There should be no mark in this case either. Again, if the cloth is covered with a perforated sheet of thick paper and exposed for some hours to direct sunlight, the colour of the exposed parts should not fade. An Instantaneous Boiler. Our illustration shows a boiler which has hitherto Been a desideratum for use in connection with domes¬ tic or small-power motors. Its peculiarity is that steam can be got up almost immediately. This is owing to the form of the heating coil in which the water is vaporised. From the corner figure on the •right it will be seen that this is a flat spiral of iron or copper, and it lies directly over the fire-box or furnace. The bore of the tube is so narrow that the water is quickly heated as it passes in a continuous stream through the spiral. The steam leaves it in a super¬ heated condition, ready for the motor. The figure shows the boiler and furnace applied to work a small motor, as well as a small dynamo for electric lighting, the latter being shown in the middle. The boiler is the invention of M. Serpollet, and a variation of this form has been successfully applied to drive a sociable tricycle. The total weight of the engine, boiler, and vehicle is 185 kilograms, and it can be driven at a speed of 25 kilometres (or about twenty miles) an hour. The Old Etruscans. In a recent Gatherer we referred to the argu¬ ments in favour of classing the Amorites, or blonde race of Palestine, and the Guanches of the Canary Islands as members of the same race as the ancient Libyans, who are now represented by the blonde or red-haired Berbers and Kabyles of Northern Africa. English visitors to Algeria have sometimes been struck at seeing tall sandy -haired men in the guise of the dark sallow Arabs, and the theory went that they \vere descendants of the old Goths. This theory is now believed to be erroneous ; and this far-travelled blonde race are likewise identified by Dr. Brunton, an American ethnologist, with that mysterious people the ancient Etruscans. The Etruscan traditions ac¬ cord with this view, for they place the origin of their race in North Africa (or ancient Libya), from which they crossed the Mediterranean into Italy. A Photoramic Lantern. Mr. Frieze Green, the well-known photographer, has introduced a magic lantern which combines trans¬ parent photographs after the manner of the “Zoe- trope,” so as to produce an image on the screen which has all the movements of life. A series of photographs is first taken by a special camera, so as to represent the object in all phases of its motion, and these are rendered into trans¬ parencies, then placed one after another on a long strip wound on rollers. When this strip is rapidly passed through the lantern, the per¬ sistence of the successive images on the retina appears to blend them into one and produce to the eye the effect of animation. The appa¬ ratus is similar in principle to the “Tachyscope” of Herr Ottamar Anschuetz, of Lissa, Prussia ; but in this the transparencies are arranged in order round the edge of a re¬ volving wheel, and each is illu¬ minated from behind by a Geissler tube as it passes by. The spec¬ tator sees a picture apparently endowed with life. Artists may find a use for these appliances in

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The Gatherer. 255 Studying the movements of men and animals. They will also be useful to the public lecturer. A New Street-Cleaner. Everyone must have felt that the London streets are mot only ill-cleaned, but a cruel footing for horses, espe¬ cially in bad weather. A satisfactory street-cleaner is therefore a want which should stimulate inventors. The Hercules cleaner consists of a tank-cart holding 300 gallons of water, with a sprinkling hose attached in front, and a screw-shaped revolvingbrush of indiarubber underneath. Both brush and hose are controlled by the driver of the vehicle, and one horse is sufficient to pull the machine on wood or asphalte paving. It has been tried successfully in some metropolitan parishes. It answers equally well in dry weather, since it wets the dust before brushing it away. According to the Surveyor to the Clerkenwell Board, one of these machines, which can be used on granite paving, too, effectually cleansed an area of 1,980 square yards in nine minutes with an e.xpenditure of 600 gallons of water. A New Gas Cooker. The Wilson gas cooker, which we illustrate, is a •combined grate and oven, in which all taint of gas is excluded from the viands. It consists chiefly of an oven, provided with three shelves, and a tiled floor. The heating is external and regenerative — that is to say, the air is first warmed before it passes to the at a cost of 2d. for the gas consumed. While upon this subject we may mention that, at a recent meet¬ ing of the Glasgow Philosophical Society, Mr^ D. R. Gardner pointed out that an ordinary gas globe can be made “ regenerative’^ by laying a cover fitted with apertures of the proper size to admit of up draught over the top orifice of the globe. This simple device heats the air in the globe, which feeds the flame, and makes the latter yield a much better light for the same consumption of gas. A New Engine-Room Telegraph. To the ordinary engine-room telegraph an addition has been made which is likely to prove serviceable, and has been adopted on one of the Allan Line steamers. The device is shown in the accompany¬ ing figure, where A is a copper chain connected with the indicator in the engine-room, and running round a pulley, B, which has a projecting finger, C, on one side of its centre. When the indicator passes the word “stop,” the chain turns the pulley, and brings the finger into con¬ tact with a crank, D, which is fixed on the top of the bell, as shown. This ac¬ tuates the hammer of the bell and strikes a loud note, which warns the engine-driver to reverse the engines, while the in- dicator itself shows whether it is to be “easy,” “half” or “full” speed. One advantage of this alarm-bell is that, should the engineer be some distance off, the loud stroke of the bell will call him back. The improvement does not interfere with the usual gong signal. Colour-Printing on Metal. A process of printing in colours upon metals has been devised by M. Cesar F. Josz, of Brussels, and brought out in London. The plates, of zinc or other metal, are first coated with copper, nickel, or both, and these are printed on from stones, after the manner of the lithograph. Enamel colours are employed, and the results are very striking. Some elegant show- tablets prepared in this way, and either plain or em¬ bossed, have been exhibited. row of gas-jets which form the furnace. The gas and air are well mixed by a “ baffle-plate ” before combus¬ tion, so that the heat is intense ; but it is confined to the cooker by asbestos packing, thus rendering the vicinity of the stove cool. It is stated that a dinner for fifteen persons can be cooked with this appliance “Household Wrinkles.” This is the very appropriate title of a book of household recipes just issued by Messrs. Longmans. The author is Mrs. De Salis, whose d la mode cookery books we noticed as they appeared. Not a few of the wrinkles and notions that the book contains have

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256 New Story CompetitiOxN. been given to readers of the Gatherer at one time or another in these pages, though, of course, not in quite the same form. After giving postal and other general information, the volume goes on to supply, in alphabetical order, hints on every conceivable subject of household interest, from the privileges of ambassa¬ dors and the treatment of accidents, to the manufacture of tooth-powder and the whitening of pianoforte-keys. Decidedly this is a book to have within reach. Stanley’s Routes. The routes of Mr. Stanley’s seven African marches are all shown very clearly on the large map of “ Stanley's Explorations in Africa,” which Messrs. G. Philip and Son have just issued. Readers who want a handy clue to the innumerable newspaper articles on the subject of African travel, cannot do better than procure and study this clear map. It is three-and- iwenty years since Mr. Stanley made his first African journey, as a press correspondent in the train of Lord Napier of Magdala on his Abyssinian campaign. How much has been done in the way of African ex¬ ploration since then, and what a large share of it has been done by Mr. Stanley, is shown by Mr. E. G. Ravenstein, F.R.G.S., in the resume of the intrepid explorer’s travels that accompanies the map, and adds not a little to its value. “Uncle Remus” Again. Mr. Joel Chandler Harris is better known on both sides of the Atlantic as “ Uncle Remus” than by his own name. In the volume just published by Mr. Fisher Unwin he comes before us once more with a fresh collection of his quaint stories, under the title “ Daddy Jake, the Runaway, and Short Stories told after Dark.” “ Daddy Jake ” himself is worth know¬ ing, though he is not to be mentioned in the same breath with his fellow-character, “Uncle Remus.” Jake runs away under the impression that he has killed a bullying overseer in anger. He is followed by his master’s little boy and girl, who are very dear to the old negro, who has long been their father’s coachman. The children find Jake and explain to him that the overseer was not killed, but lived to be dismissed for his tyranny, whereupon Jake returns in triumph with the children, whose absence has caused no slight misery. It would be futile to attempt any analysis of the short stories that make up the rest of this charming volume. “Brer Rabbit,” “Brer Fox,” and “ Brer Tarrypin” all play their humorous parts again, and will be gladly welcomed by all their old friends. Perhaps “ How Black Snake Caught the Wolf,” and “ Brother Rabbit’s Courtship,” stand out among the other stories, if any may be said to stand out where all are so good. And it is eminently satisfactory to find that the courtship was successful, and to close the volume with the pregnant sentence, “ But Brer Rabbit, he got de gal ! ” Two Books of Reference. The “ Metropolitan Year Book ” for 1890 (Cassell & Co.) has grown considerably in bulk, although this is but its second year of issue. The information that was given last year is revised throughout, and fuller particulars are given in many instances, notably in the space devoted to the London County Council and other matters of Local Government. The area dealt with in the volume is that under the Government of the County Council, and to all residents within that area, the volume ought to prove at once handy for reference, and full of instruction. The “ Educational Annual” for 1890 (G. Philip & Son) is also the second year’s issue of a work of reference dealing broadly with the whole educational world of England, and very fully with every department of public elementary education. All the intermediate schools and colleges throughout the country will be found classified under their respective towns, and grouped under the counties for convenience of reference, with a brief indication of the curriculum and the fees payable at each school, and the advantages offered in the way of scholarships. NEW STORY COMPETITION. OPEN TO ALL READERS OF CASSELL'S MAGAZINE. JJZE announced., m our January number., the particulars of a scheme under which we offered two Prizes ^ ^ of Eighty and Sixty Pounds., respectively, for the best and second-best ?iew and origmal Eight-pai't Serial Story. But ma7iy of oitr readers have ?tot at their disposal the time necessary for the worJcmg out of a story which tnust contam 80,000 words, so we have now pleasure m adding to our original offer another two Prizes, of £40 a7id £30 respectively, for the best and second-best origmal and suitable Story of domestic mterest, half that le^igth, or 40,000 words. These Prizes, which bring up the amoimt already offered this year to Two Himdred Guineas, are subject to the regulations printed 07t page 122 of our Ja7mary 7iU77iber, save that MSS. of these shorter sto7'ies will be received up to and mcludmg Septe/ziber \st, 1890. Each story 77iust be divided mto four parts of equal le7igth, a7id 77iust be acco77ipanied by a short outline {about 500 words in lengtJi) of its plot, together with a brief 7rsu77td of the conte7its of each of the four parts, show mg the progress of the story. Inte7iding co77ipetitors are advised to read carefully the full regulatio7is {p. 122) before sending off their MSS., as 710 irregularities ca7i be set right afterwards, a7id 7io prize ca7i be awarded to a story which does 7iot co77iply in every respect with the 7‘egulatio7is, as modified above iii the 77iatters of date, a7id the length of the story.

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257 THE STRONGER WILL. By EVELYN EVERETT GREEN, Author of CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH. A WARNING. >WEVER little it might be to his taste, however much he might secretly rebel against his fate, Rudolf was forced by sheer physical weakness to accept the part of an in¬ valid, and play it with what grace he could. His accident, and the strain he had put upon himself for the first twenty- four hours after it, had shaken him more than he was at first aware of : the injury to his arm was undeniably severe, and the intense heat of the following fortnight helped further to prostrate him. The heat, trying and reducing as it was, was never¬ theless a good friend to him in one respect, for it made the low upper rooms at Marchwood so unen- durably hot that the doctor was obliged, in common humanity, to let his patient get up each morning before the sun had gained its full power, and struggle down to the sofa in the shadiest north corner of the quiet cloister-like walk, which was undoubtedly the coolest place in the house, and where he could spend his day with the most comfort to himself, and without feeling so much of the invalid as he would have done shut up in his room upstairs. The children were having holiday, so that Ethel was always at hand to run errands for him, or do any¬ thing he asked. Nothing delighted her more than being useful to brother, and she was the quickest and brightest of messengers, and not at all a bad little nurse when he was tired or in pain. Cuthbert, released from captivity, spent much of his time in the cloistered walk ; and Florence, who had more leisure now that the children were enjoying holiday, passed a good deal of time there, too, keeping quiet guard over her two patients, and seeing that the little ones did not tire their brother with their chatter, and with too great demands upon his strength. She was a good deal struck by his exceeding patience and gentleness with them, for undoubtedly they did worry him at times ; and most young men under the circumstances would have spoken sharply, and have dismissed them again and again, when their play became noisy and their movements rough. Rudolf had plenty of visitors in those days, but, somehow, he never paid much heed to anybody but Florence ; and it was undoubtedly the pervading influence of her presence that made this unaccustomed and hateful inactivity so endurable to him. Monica,” &c. Edmund Greville drove Violet over daily, and he enjoyed their visits ; but he was glad that his sister was not a member of the Marchwood household just at this juncture. He never saw her without being reminded of her many warnings ; and somehow he was never less wishful to be reminded of them than just at this time, when he felt too weak to struggle against any emotion, and only able to float gently with the current, even though it’ might land him amid shoals and quicksands. Now that Rudolf had fairly given in, and was altogether in his [power, nothing could exceed Mr. CadwalladeFs kindness to him. He was quite aware that he had felt harshly towards the young man before, and even now he was not certain that he wished any intimacy to spring up between them ; he had not the least intention of permitting Rudolf a permanent footing in the house ; but his nephew had won his respect by the exhibition of an unusual amount of courage and fortitude, and by a display of self-will that could not but amuse the old man, who was quite able to enter into his feelings, and to see that in Rudolfs place he should probably have acted in ex¬ actly the same reckless manner. So he laid aside for the present all thoughts of the old feeling of annoyance and distrust, saying to him¬ self that the lad was a plucky, high-spirited fellow, and deserved to be made much of for a time. He was ill, and under his roof, an involuntary and rather unwilling guest, and as long as such were the circumstances of the case all hospitality and consider¬ ation must be shown him. He ordered down from town every periodical or review that he thought might interest the invalid, and paid him long visits, reading him the cream of the news, and getting him to talk on politics and the current topics of the day. He was increasingly struck by Rudolfs mental powers, and liked nothing better than to hear his account of the stirring life of the great vortex in which he habitually lived and moved. Mr. Cadwallader was a keen politician, although he had never mixed in the political world, and it was an immense pleasure to him to be, as it were, let in for a moment behind the scenes, and see the arena from the point of view of one who habitually moved there. Rudolf, though a staunch adherent of his own party, was too clear-sighted and too capable of seeing both sides of a question, to be a blind partisan of any cause. He could be very merciless to those on his own side of a question when he detected, or thought he detected, anything like unworthiness of motive or a pettiness of party spirit. Familiarity with some of the leading men of the day had bred within him a certain amount of contempt, and he and his uncle often enjoyed a pitched battle, in which both would display an amount of energy, and eloquence, and 737

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The Stronger Will. 258 erudition that raised each in the estimation of the other. Florence had many times to stop the battle when it was raging most fiercely, by pointing out how unfit “her patient” was for any needless excitement or exertion. Mr. Cadwallader would laugh at the notion of talking being exertion, yet he would take the hint and retire from the contest, for there was often a look of exhaustion about Rudolf that he did not altogethei: like, and neither he nor Mr. Howard was entirely satisfied as to the general health of their patient. There began to be a suspicion that he had given himself some kind of strain in the fall, which was affecting his recovery now. In fact, if Rudolf had been less reticent about him¬ self their anxiety would have been greater ; for since that one fainting fit in the hall, a few days ago, he had been bothered at intervals by a recurrence of the same uncomfortable sensations, only he had never actually lost consciousness a second time. Luckily, as he thought, he was generally alone at such times, and kept his secret religiously, having an extreme con¬ tempt for a weakness that seemed to him absolutely effeminate. Had his mother been a different kind of woman, he might have made a confidante of her; but as it was, he did all in his power to avoid alarm¬ ing or distressing her ; and she was, happily for herself, so calmly unobservant, that she had no sus¬ picion her son was not making excellent progress. Flqrencewas far less at ease about him, but it was not for her to raise the alarm ; and Vernon, who had spnietimes been with his brother when the attacks .had come on, was only too pleased, to keep his own counsel, as desired by Rudolf ; for he was not at all anxious that this visit to March wood should be need¬ lessly lengthened out. Poor Vernon was in anything but a happy frame of mind. He really was not a vicious youth, and it was not ple;a^nt to, think of absolutely scheming against his elder brother’s success in life ; and yet he had .allo\Yed his imagination tq run such riot — had set his heart so completely on being made heir of March- Avopd-^that he could not endure to see the fall of the airy: fabric. So, Rudolf’s, detention here, and the kindly good-will evinced towards him by reason of his accident in the mind; of his unqle, seemed exceedingly untoward to Verngp. He was, however, of a cautious tempera;- ment, and was ready to wait and see how matters turned. , It was never difficult to arouse Rudolfs irri¬ tation against a man who could be as provoking and •sometimes as intolerant as Mr. Cadwallader ; and it often seemed to the younger brother as if the patient were piore disposed to be unreasonable and impatient now >vhen he had less cause than ever in his life before., , His arni being such an “interesting ”, member, Mr. Howard had brought one or two medical friends to dookjpt it. One of these happened to bq a physiciap from Londori, with whom Rudolf , was slightly ac¬ quainted, |who chanced to be staying a night with Mr. fipw^j-'d on his way to the Continent. . After Mr. Cadwallader and Mr. Howard had left, he lingered behind to chat a little while with the young man about mutual acquaintances in town, when Rudolf was suddenly attacked by the faintness which he had learned to dread so much, and to which he had of late been so oddly susceptible. The doctor took prompt measures to restore him, and producing his stethoscope, examined him carefully, Rudolf watching his face with a sense of sudden vague alarm. “ Look here, my lad,” said his friend kindly, when he had finished his examination : “ have you not been working rather hard of late ? ” “ I was very busy till the end of the session,” an¬ swered Rudolf ; “ but I have done nothing at all for weeks past.” “ Dp you often feel as you did just then ? ” “ Hardly ever. I feel a little queer sometimes. I wish you’d tell me what you ard driving at.” Rudolf spoke with that quick irritability that had grown on him somewhat of late. The physician smiled a little. Yes, I will tell you what I am driving at. I want you to take my advice, and be careful of yourself for a little while. Do not do more work than is necessary for some little time to come. Avoid fatigue as far as you can, and just take life easily, as vve call it.” Rudolfs face was grave and set. “For how long do you mean?” he asked; “for a few weeks — a fpw months ?” “ Yes, for longer than that. I should recommend you to do as little as possible for twelve months to come, at least.” “ That is out of the question. I have my own living to get. I must keep my secretaryship at all costs.” The doctor nodded. “ Yes, yes, I understand. I do not mean that you need dp nothing at all. You can get through all the necessary work very well, I do not doubt ; but now tell me honestly, do you not do, in a general way, a great deal more than is required of you? Are you not working very much harder than you are obliged to do ? Do you not study hard at nights, when you might be sleeping? Do you not attend all kinds of lectures, and meetings, and gatherings that you are not absolutely called upon to do ? Come, be honest ; letjus have the whole truth.” “Why, of course I do. You don’t suppose I want to be nothing better than a private secretary all my life? A man must make himself of value if he can. 1 only do what I must do if I am to rise— if I am ever, to be anything better than I am now. You don’t knoyy what the competition is in these days.” Rudolf spoke with an eagerness that was almost imploring, The doctor smiled kindly. “Do I not, my lad? I rather think I have some notion of it, and I am sorry to have to give you un¬ palatable advice ; but it is my duty to warn you, and it would be cruel not to do so.” ;“ But I do not understand,” said Rudolf. “ I am very strong. I have never been ill in my life, and a broken arm is nothing. Why do you say all this ? ” “ Not because you have broken ypur arm, certainly.”

Page 271

The Stronger Will. Why, then ? » “ I will tell you the simple truth. I believe that you have overtaxed your, strength, and that it has brought on a weakness of the heart, or brought out one that was latent. There is no disease whatever, but a slight enlargement and a consequent weakness that, how¬ ever, can be practically cured by rest and care. There is no reason why you should not be as strong as ever again ; only you must be willing to lay aside for a time your aspiring ideas, and be content to save your¬ self as much as possible. After all, you are quite young still — a year or two sooner or later in satis¬ fying your ambition is but a small matter. Take a wise and manly view of the case ; recklessness or incautiousness now will do harm that you will bitterly repent in the future. I repeat what I have said : care and rest will give you back all your old strength. You have a splendid physique, and will very soon get over the strain you have put upon your¬ self; but rest yow 7mist have. Forget ambition and everything else for a couple of years. Be content to take life easily as a private secretary ; and then, with •restored health and your undoubted talents— of which, by-the-bye, I have heard much in several quarters — you may climb the tree as fast as you can, and be Prime Minister as soon as you like.” But Rudolf did not smile. He lay still, looking out before him into the sunny quadrangle. ‘‘ And avoid anything that brings on that faintness,” continued the doctor. I will speak to Howard about it^ and hear what he recommends. It is very bad for you.” Rudolf looked up quickly. “You will not say anything about what you have just told me ? “ I shall speak to Howard on the subject. You ought not to have kept him in the dark so long.” Rudolf flushed with vexation, but commanded him- •self to say quietly — “ Will you do me the favour to stipulate that no¬ thing shall be said on the matter to any member of my family } ” The doctor looked at him keenly. “ I am not certain that they ought to be kept in ignorance. You ought to be looked after a little.” “That would do no good,” said Rudolf. “They all live here, and I live in London. I will take care of myself, if it is of importance ; but I must request that the matter is not named to them. I have my reasons for what I say. I shall esteem it a favour if you will •do as I ask.” He spoke with energy, and with some slight agita¬ tion. The doctor looked at him kindly, and the kind¬ ness in his face prompted Rudolf to speak with more unreserve than he would have believed possible a little while before. , “ The fact is,” he said quickly, “ that my uncje, Mr. Cadwallader, is a man from whom it is impossible for me to accept favours— it you understood my position here you would see this for yourself— and he is both liberal and kind-hearted ; and if he were to hear what you have just told me, he might try to compel me to 259 give up my present employment, and live here in idleness for a time. Such a course is, however, en¬ tirely out of the question. I could on no account consent to the arrangement, and I would much rather be spared the trouble of fighting the battle. I do not expect you to understand my reasons for what I say, but to accept them as final and unalterable. I think if you do this you will see very clearly that it is better the whole matter was kept from them.” “Very well,” said the physician kindly. “I will advise that nothing shall be said, and you on your part will think over my advice, and not be rash or reckless.” “ I will be as prudent as I can ; and I will come to you for advice when we are both back in town, if I feel the need of any.” “ I shall be pleased to give you the best in my power, but I think you need only to keep this maxim in mind : ‘Take care of yourself.’” “ You could not have hit upon a more unpalatable one,” answered Rudolf, though he spoke with a smile that was brave enough so long as the physician was in sight. But as soon as he was alone a heavy cloud seemed to settle down upon his brow, and he rem’ained lost in deep thought. CHAPTER THE SIXTEENTH A CONFIDENCE. “ Rudolf,” said Florence, “ you have something on your mind.” ■ He looked up at her quickly ; he had been lost in thought for a long time, and had not even heard her approach. But the trivial words of denial or evasion that had sprung to his lips died away as he met the steady glance of her eyes. It was Sunday afternoon — a hot, sleepy Sunday. The children were dozing in the orchard, Mrs. Freer and Violet in the drawing-room, Mr. Cadwallader had gone to see Mr. Greville, and Rudolf was quite alone, not likely to be troubled by any other visitor. Florence sat down near to his sofa. He looked at her, but did not speak. “ I know that something is troubling you,” she said very gently. “ Aiid I am very, very sorry. I think perhaps I ought to tell you that I have a good idea what the trouble is.” His face changed, he looked a little startled, and raised himself on his elbow, Had anyone betrayed his secret, after all. ^ “ What do you mean ? ” he asked abruptly. “ I will tell you., You know that you had a London doctor to see you last Tuesday ? ” Rudolf’s brow contracted. “Yes— well?” “Well, I saw. them on their way to see you, and by-and-by I saw Uncle Oliver and Mr. Howard walk¬ ing in the garden together. I supposed the strange doctor was with them, and I thought I had better go and see how you were getting on. When I turned the angle, of the cloister I saw you lying with that look that I am familiar with now — what Ethel would call

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26o The Stronger Will. your reiractory look — and the doctor was sounding you with a stethoscope. Of course I went away directly, but I knew that he stayed with you some time, for I came back presently and he was talking still very gravely. And ever since you have been dif¬ ferent : something has been weighing on your mind ; and I cannot help putting two and two together.” He lay very still and silent, and only said, after a long pause — “No one has told you anything “No, and I do not want to intrude into anyone’s private affairs, or press for confidence that is not given willingly,” continued Florence, with that grave sweetness in her eyes that was one of her most winning expressions, “ but it is useless to pretend that I know nothing, and of course it makes me feel anxious. I should be very glad for some certainty that there was nothing very bad behind.” Rudolf raised his eyes to her. Yet his words were rather long in coming. “ I can reassure you there,” he answered gravely ; “ there is nothing very bad behind.” “ But enough to make you very quiet and pre-occu- pied : enough to put a look in your eyes that there never was in them before,” said Florence, looking at him with a curiously searching glance, that somehow conveyed the idea of an infinite amount of sympathy. “Do you know what has come over you these past few days ? It seems to me sometimes as if all the hope had been taken out of your life.” “ I think it has,” answered Rudolf in a low tone ; adding presently, with a touch of weariness in his voice, “ That is, all the old hope. I suppose when I have had time to look about me, I shall begin to find that there is still something left to hope for in life.” She was looking at him steadily. “ What did the doctor tell you, Rudolf ? Are you very ill.?” “ I am not ill at all. There is very little wrong with me, and that little can soon be set to-rights.” “ How ? ” “ By taking life easily : by doing as little instead of as much as I can for my employer : by being plea¬ santly idle instead of bothering myself over matters with which I have no special concern. A very simple •prescription, you see.” Yet although he spoke lightly, there was a subdued bitterness in his voice, and a sadness in his eyes, that she was instantly aware of, and it touched her deeply — more deeply than she cared to confess. “And that means a great deal to you ? ” “ It means so much that I am in two minds whether I shall follow the advice I have received, or go on in the old way — and take the consequences.” “ What are the consequences ? ” “ That is just what I want to know. If it was only death, I feel I could risk it ; but it may mean help¬ lessness, lingering illness, for aught I know, and I could not stand that. I have just had a taste of what it is like to be a helpless, good-for-nothing burden.” “ Hush, Rudolf ! ” said Florence gently. “ You should not say that.” Then after a little pause, she asked — “ Will you tell me what the difference to you will be?” guessing, with a woman’s tact, that it would do him good, and be a relief to speak of the trouble that was weighing him down. “ Yes ; only I do not know if you will ever be able to understand it. You lead such a quiet, sheltered existence here, that you have no idea of the struggle and battle that life is to a man who has his own way to make in the world. You know I have been brought up to no profession but politics. I might have lived by my scholarship if I had remained at Oxford ; but my bent was all in another direction, and after one or two preliminary berths, I got this secretaryship. My duties simply as secretary are not arduous. I could manage them easily, with no fatigue or strain of any kind ; but if I stop short there, all that makes my chance of success will be gone.” “How?” He paused, and then gathering himself up, spoke with increasing vehemence. “How? Well, I will explain if I can, and if you think me a self-satisfied braggart, I can’t help it. Sir Arthur likes me ; he trusts me ; he speaks well of me to his friends, and they are kind enough to ratify his verdict of my capabilities. I have brains, I know, and in my own line I can be useful to my party. I can write shorthand against any newspaper reporter, and can take notes of anything that goes on at any meeting to which I am sent. I can pitch upon the weak point in a speech, and detect a flaw in an argument more quickly than most men of my age. I can write speeches if they are wanted, and put argu¬ ments into logical form. I can see the weak places in our own cause, as well as in that of our opponents, and — well, never mind — I know it all sounds very conceited, but people do use me for one thing or another, send me to this place or that, entrust delicate missions to me, and hold out vague promises of doing something more substantial in time. If our side comes again into power — as some day I suppose it will — I believe I should stand a very fair chance of something good, if only I keep in the swim ; but so surely as I let myself drift into a backwater, out of the force of the stream, so surely will everything pass me by, and I shall end my days in mechanical drudgery, as something no better than what I am now.” He paused, and she said gently — “ Surely not quite that, Rudolf. You speak of friends ; surely they would not forget you in that way just because your health had failed a little?” He smiled rather bitterly. “You do not know the world,” he answered, “or what a cruel place it can be. The race is to the swift, and the battle to the strong : the weak are bound to go to the wall —it is only in the natural order of things that they should.” He paused, seemed to muse a little, and then continued, speaking quietly, and rather sadly — “This is what will happen to me : I shall have — if I obey orders — to tell Sir Arthur that I can only

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26i The Stronger Will. undertake my duties as an ordinary secretary, and leave the other things alone. He will be very kind about it, and say I am quite right to think of my own health, and just for the slack time in the autumn, per¬ haps, I shall not feel much difference in my position. But as soon as the strife and the tumult and the hurry begins again, I shall be called upon to act, and if I decline to do so, others will step in and take my place, and I shall be left stranded. I am not so conceited as to think myself of any real importance. There are dozens of clever young fellows eagerly waiting to press forward the moment any in front drop out of the ranks. I shall be quietly shouldered on one side. People in these days have no time to waste in sympathy with the fallen. A great strong fellow like myself will only be despised for giving in so easily- stamped as a good-for-nothing directly. And when I am perfectly well again— which I am told I shall be in a year or two how am I to win back the ground I have lost ? Practically, I shall never do it at all. Others will have taken my place, and I shall never re¬ cover it. And how am I to have any certainty that the strain of hard work — and it is a tremendous strain sometimes — if it has done me mischief once, may not do it again.? How do I know that if I do struggle up and up again, I may not again have to give up, and lose all the ground I regained ? ” His face was full of trouble. His strong young manhood was chafing and fighting against the miser¬ able humiliating consciousness of physical weakness. Rudolf hated himself, despised himself, for that weak¬ ness ; it seemed so degrading to him to have to own himself unequal to the battle of life. “ Poor boy ! ” said Florence softly ; ‘‘poor boy ! ” Something in her tone and in her look suddenly set his heart off beating wildly. All in a moment he realised as he had not done before what was the keenest sting in the warning that had been given him : why it was that the idea of relinquish¬ ing his golden dreams of success was so inexpressibly painful. He loved Florence ! Yes, he saw it all now re¬ vealed as by a lightning-flash. He loved her with every fibre of his being— that which he had feared and fought against, and others had feared for him, had come to pass. It mattered not to him that he had been warned again and again. She might be all that was said in some quarters : an interloper, a plotter, a designing woman, a siren who led her captives onward to destruction. No matter, he loved her ; and moreover, he felt that his love was of the kind that lasts as long as time itself. She might never regard him with anything but a friendly kindness : his position pre¬ cluded him from all thoughts of aspiring to her hand ;

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The Stronger Will. 262 yet she was the one woman in the world for him, and if he had not known it before he knew it now, as she sat facing him in that quiet place, a wandering sunbeam falling across the pure whiteness of her dress, and losing itself in the brightness of her hair. The sweet face was turned a little away, but he saw the look of sympathy upon it, and his heart con- tracted with sudden pain. Rudolf possessed that force of character, combined with talent, ambition, and energy, which gave him con¬ fidence of ultimate success, and often whilst saying to himself that Florence never could be his, he had been dreaming of the day in which he should be able to re¬ turn to Marchwood with his laurels on his brow, and learn from her lips whether there might not be a sweeter recompense awaiting him than the prais.e and applause of men. He did not think that Florence was a woman to be easily won. He could not fancy that she would ever elect to leave Marchwood during her guardian’s lifetime. True, he never recalled Hubert Morrison’s words about her without a sharp stab of jealousy ; but it was difficult to believe that a woman of her stamp would give her life into such keeping, and he hoped on without realising whither his heart was leading him. Give him but time to make his way— a few years might suffice — and then if she were still free That had been the burden of his unconscious thoughts during the weeks that had passed since the speir had fallen upon him. They had woven them¬ selves into the innermost fibre of his nature. He knew not till this moment how deeply he was involved, and the knowledge came upon him just at the moment when he had been plainly told that he must take his choice between broken health, a life cut short in its prime, or a lowly career that would never be crowned with worldly success. Oh ! it was hard — bitterly hard ; for in neither case could he hope to win Florence as his bride. CHAPTER THE SEVENTEENTH. IN THE YEW WALK. “ Cousin Florence ! Oh, Cousin Florence ! There is a ghost in the yew walk ! Oh, I saw him myself ! I am so frightened ! It is a real ghost all white and misty. Oh, I would never have gone if I had thought it would really be there ! and Ethel clung to Flo¬ rence, trembling in every limb, Cuthbert standing beside her, only a little less alarmed. It was close on nine o’clock on a hot evening quite early in September, and the children ought to have been in their beds ; but Ethel confessed that she and Cuthbert had been tempted to a breach of rule by a whisper they had heard amongst the servants, of a ghost in the haunted yew walk, and they had slipped out together at a forbidden hour, only to get a severe scare for their pains. Ethel was so excited and incoherent that Florence had much ado to understand the drift of her agitated flow of words. Wliat she did make out, however, was that the children had stolen out into the yew walk whilst their elders were dining, and had been scared out of their wits by the apparition of a gigantic white figure, of huge and indistinct proportions, which Ethel had seen and Cuthbert heard, though neither was in a condition to explain their sensations in rational fashion. As the children were pouring out their fears to Cousin Florence, whom luckily they had encountered in the hall, she was aware that Mr. Cadwallader had come out of the dining-room, and was listening, his expression divided betwixt amusement and annoyance. He took his hat and turned to Florence. “ There, take the little geese to bed, and get them off to sleep. I will go and inquire into this wonderful apparition.” “ Don’t go alone. Uncle Oliver. Take Vernon with you, or me.” “ Stuff and nonsense, my dear ! you take the chil¬ dren to bed. Vernon is with Rudolf, and his mother too, I dare say. Felicia is just the woman to be alarmed by a cock-and-bull story. I’ll soon come back and tell you what manner of creature this ghost is and Mr. Cadwallader marched off with a snort indicative of amused contempt. If his servants were playing practical jokes upon each other or the house¬ hold, it was high time somebody caught them in the act. He had no patience with idle fears or foolish jokes, and would have been glad to catch the offender red-handed in the very act. He therefore walked quietly enough in the direction of the yew walk, which he found, to all appearances, dim and deserted as usual. But as he gradually stole down it, he became aware of a curious and unwonted sound, which caused him to stop short and listen intently. Yes, there certainly was a sound— difficult to describe, but most resembling a loud rasping breathing- and it could not be at any great distance either, although from the point where he now stood Mr. Cadwallader could see nothing. But in another minute the full moon, which had been obscured by a passing cloud, shone out brilliantly again, and several thin shafts of silver light glinted in even through the dark yew-trees, and then Mr. Cad¬ wallader saw it. What it was he could not say— it appeared to be, as Ethel had said, a pale, ghostly fio-ure of colossal bulk and indeterminate shape, that from its very vagueness of outline had been endued with many terrible attributes. Even the master of March- wood could not restrain a start, and involuntarily took a step backward as the glimmering white mass moved a pace nearer to him. But Mr. Cadwallader was not a man to be easily daunted. Grasping his stick firmly in his hand, and raising it with a threatening gesture (he was standing in a patch of moonlight, so that he at least could be clearly seen), he roughly demanded the meaning of all that fooling. What did the intruder mean by mas¬ querading there at that hour of the night ? If Jiidn t come forward and declare himself, it would be the worse for him. The ghost apparently had not the smallest objection to do this. Suddenly there was the sound of a roar as of rage and defiance, the noise of trampling hoofs—

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The Stronger Will. 26 a lush a recoil a mbliient of wild confusion — and the next thing that Mr. Cadwallader knew was that he was forcibly pulled on one side, whilst the great ghostly monster tumbled past him, betraying by his gestures the extremity of blind rage. Gome !” cried a voice in his ear — a familiar voice, which, nevertheless, was not immediately recognised. “We shall have time to gain the house before he has got rid of my overcoat and torn it to shreds ; and in effect Mr. Cadwallader speedily found himself in the dim cloister of his house, face to face with Hubert Morrison, and in a state of bewilderment most unusual with him. “Now, what on earth is the meaning of all this?'' he asked. “Is it you who have been playing ghost on my property ? " Hubert laughed heartily. “ Have you not recognised your own ghost yet ?— your big, pale dun-coloured bull ? What a start the old fellow gave me as I was coming up the yew walk to-night ! But I'm uncommonly glad I kept quiet, watching what he meant to do. I'd got my overcoat all ready to throw over his horns if he attempted to charge me. It was lucky I had, for he was down on you in a twinkling ; and you did not seem at all dis¬ posed to move out of his way. He's not the kind of beast, though, to be set calmly at defiance." Mr. Cadwallader began to see light. He burst into a gruff laugh, though he realised that he had been in considerable peril that day, and that he owed no small debt of gratitude to the young man at his side, who had without doubt evinced considerable courage and presence of mind. “What! old Bucephalus? Why, so it was, I de¬ clare ! What idiot let him out ? To be sure he is almost white with age, and the older he grows the fiercer he gets. Poor old fellow ! I'm not certain that he ought not to have a bullet put into him. So he was the colossal ghost ! Gracious me, those children had an escape ! and so did I too, for that matter. I’m sure I'm very much obliged to you, Morrison. I had no more idea that it was the bull than that you were almost at my side. My mind was running on practical jokers, whom I wished to catch in the midst of their sport. It would never have occurred to me to spring out of the way of old Bucephalus." “ Bucephalus ! ” echoed Florence, who had de¬ scended after quieting the children, and was at their side before they were aware of her approach. “ Oh Uncle Oliver, you don't mean that that savage old bull is loose, and wandering about the place ! ” “It seems that he is, my love; so I will leave you to do the honours to our guest-to whom, by-the-bye I owe my soundness of limb at this moment, if not my hfe-whilst I go and give orders about the brute. Just to think of It !— and those children going out alone to look for the ghost ! I wonder if the cunning old fellow has been out before ? I must inquire into it." And Mr. Cadwallader walked off, leaving Florence and Hubert standing face to face, looking at one another with something, as it seemed, of mutual ea^^er- ness and pleasure. “Do tell me what has happened," cried Florence; and Hubert told his story modestly enough, knowing well that all due praise would be given to him by Mr. Cadwallader's adopted daughter— as indeed it was. “ But how came you to be there at all?" was her quick question. “Are you staying at Hawkshold? We had not heard." . ^ “No ; I am a guest at Twining House, three miles in the other direction. I have been asked down for a little shooting. I decided to walk across to March- wood after dinner, and came the short cut by the yew avenue, which has turned out lucky. I wanted im¬ mensely to see you all again, and by day I am not master of my own time." You are very welcome," said Florence warmly. Had she liked Hubert less than she did, she could not but have spoken warmly after what had just hap¬ pened. “Will you come and see the others? You know we have Rudolf Stanhope staying with us now. He had a bad accident a week or two ago, and is only just getting over it. He is generally to be found in the drawing-room at this hour, and his mother with him. Shall we join them ?" Hubert would sooner have paced the dim cloister alone with Florence, but he raised no objection to her suggestion. Rudolf had been wondering why she did not come, but when she appeared, with eyes alight as if with excitement, and her face all aglow, leading Hubert Morrison with her, a quick spasm of pain ran thiough him, and his face looked pale and haggard as he returned the greeting of the baronet’s son. The story of the yew avenue ghost, and the narrow escape of injury that had been experienced in more quarters than one, roused great interest and curiosity. Hubert was quite the hero of the hour, and when Mr. Cadwallader returned, he spoke out his thanks to the young man in a fashion that brought a blush to his face, though he answered in a modest and unassuming way, which was decidedly in his favour. Undoubtedly he had made his mark in that house ; and a cordial invitation was given him to come across to Marchwood whenever he could, and to pay a regular visit there so soon as his present engagement with his other friends should come to an end. Naturally Hubert accepted this invitation with alacrity, and though he could not stay long upon the' present occasion, he went carrying away with him the good-will of all the party ; and his visit was re¬ peated at short intervals during the ensuing days, and the same warm welcome was always accorded him. Vernon affected his society much, and was often over at the house where he was a guest : and Rudolfs invalided state made regular visits to Marchwood- look like acts of kindliness and friendly good-will : though it did not appear as if the young man himself appreciated them greatly. “You don't seem to get on particularly fast," he re¬ marked one day as he dropped in to have a chat with Rudolf. “ However, you have certainly managed to fall on your feet by being ill here. I dare say you are m no great hurry to forego the privilege of an invalid under Miss Tenant’s care." CO

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The Stronger Will. 264 Hubert laughed, and Rudolf flushed ; he felt the sting in the words more than he would have cared to own. “ You are quite mistaken,” he answered, somewhat haughtily. “ I would rather it had happened any¬ where but here.” “ Well, there’s no accounting for taste, certainly ; but you’ve evidently played your cards well, and I congratulate you. The old gentleman has come round wonderfully. I dare say you could really get something substantial out of him. He likes bestowing favours, one can see. He likes feeling the power it gives him over people. He’s not half a bad old boy, this Mr. Cadwallader. You really should try and ingratiate yourself.” Rudolf s face was icily irresponsive. “ You entirely misunderstand my position here.” ‘‘ Do I ? How ? One can see that you are in much higher favour than before. Don’t be so scornful over it. Stanhope. We’ve not been friends all these years for nothing ; and of course I know all about your family history, and can’t help taking a friend’s interest in your little game. I’m admiring your skill and diplomacy— I really am.” “ I have not the least idea what you are talking about.” Hubert laughed with admirable good temper. Oh, you needn’t mind me. I’m quite harmless. I sympathise most truly — I do, indeed — although I don’t deny that I am a rival in the field.” “A rival?” ‘‘ Yes, in the good graces of Miss Tenant. Anyone can see that you have come down from your high horse, and are paying court to the ruling divinity of the place. The only wonder is that you held out so long. Come, come. Stanhope, you should not take it like that. I am always frank with you. You need not be so proud and stiff with me. You are doing very well for yourself. I shouldn’t a bit wonder to see you in high favour yet — made quite a gentleman at large.” ‘‘ If you think I should accept favours from Mr. Cadwallader, you are very much mistaken.” ‘‘Well, well, as you please. I’m sure my father does not want to lose you; and you have a career before you, as everybody knows. By-the-bye, if ever you get tired of present quarters, my people will be very pleased to see you in Scotland, at the old place. I was specially entrusted with the mes¬ sage ; and you look as if a bracing up would do you good.” And then Hubert wandered off with his hands in his pockets, and a pleasant smile upon his face. “That fellow will never make any capital out of his chances,” he said musingly. “ He is much too proud. Well, so much the better for other people, that is all.” _ CHAPTER THE EIGHTEENTH. AN EXPLOSION. In another week’s time Rudolf was on his feet again, trying hard to persuade himself that he felt none the worse for his accident, and conscious all the while that he was a great deal more weak and shaken than he had a right to be, or was expected to be. It was a very good thing for him that Florence knew the whole truth, and could stand between him and his uncle ; for Mr. Cadwallader, who had taken a decided, if half-unconscious, liking for Rudolf of late, was inclined to urge him to exert himself as much as possible, and to laugh at him for any appearance of holding back ; and the young man, who was already disposed to spare himself little enough, was often only withheld from acts of decided rashness by the inter¬ vention of Florence, who contrived to shield him with¬ out appearing to do so. Mr. Cadwallader really enjoyed Rudolfs society and conversation, and was rather tickled by the young man’s unresponsiveness to the advances he made. He began to see that he had a proper pride about him, and an ample share of the Cadwallader tempera¬ ment ; and the more his nephew hung back from intimacy, the more he amused himself by trying to promote it. And now that he was up and about again, and the heat of August had given way to the warm freshness of September, he was always taking Rudolf on his rounds of the estate, talking over with him questions connected with landed interest and impending legislation, and giving him a practical insight into the working of agricultural problems and the condition of the labouring classes, that was welcomed eagerly enough by the youthful poli¬ tician. The only objection to these tramps was that they tired Rudolf a good deal : a fact of which Mr. Cad¬ wallader was not in the least aware, and which the young man kept quite to himself, unless, indeed, Florence found him out and scolded him. But Mr. Cadwallader did not like driving, and the per¬ petual getting in and out, nor could he go about the farms in any kind of conveyance. Rudolf could not yet manage to ride, the movement tried him too much, and he was not strong enough to manage a horse with one hand. The one attempt he made had nearly a disastrous ending ; for the pain and exertion brought on the old giddiness that he had believed to have left him entirely, and had Florence not observed the sudden whitening of his face, and caught the reins from his relaxing clasp, he would most likely have met with a serious accident. As it was, he merely had to dismount and walk home, leading his horse, under the battery of Mr. Cad- wallader’s bantering comments. It was humiliating to be beaten like this, and still more so to be laughed at for having lost nerve and pluck ; but Rudolf restrained his irritation in Florence’s presence, and was more than consoled by the knowledge that she understood him better. “You will get over it,” said Florence gently. “ You improve very fast, you know. Never mind Uncle. Oliver. He does not mean anything — it is only his way.” “ I wish he would leave me alone. I hate being badgered like that.”

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The Stronger Will. 265 “ I know you do. I think you take it wonderfully well.” “ I don’t, really. Of course, I can’t say much to a man of his age — nothing at all if you are by — but you don’t know how it makes me rage. I seem to have lost all control of my temper. I am horribly— un¬ reasonably — irritable.” Indeed, it was of this intense and unreasonable irritation that Rudolf was most painfully conscious at this time. He was all right so long as no de¬ mands were made upon him, and he was idle and quiet ; but so soon as he was in any way fatigued either by talking or by physical exertion, he was aware of the try¬ ing sense of vexa¬ tion and irritation, and often experi¬ enced considerable difficulty in keep¬ ing himself in hand, so as not to be betrayed into sharp speeches or angry retorts. He did, how¬ ever, generally manage to con¬ trol himself. He never spoke un¬ guardedly to his mother or sister, even though they tried his patience unwittingly at times ; and he was never betrayed into a rough word to the children, notwithstanding that their demands upon him were decidedly out ot proportion to his diminished stock of strength. But the hardest trial of the day was when he was left alone with Mr. Cadwallader and Vernon after dinner, after a day that had perhaps tired him out com¬ pletely, when his host was lively and talkative, and not in the least disposed to let him be quiet, or keep his ideas to himself. Mr. Cadwallader would not be conciliatory, how¬ ever kindly disposed he might feel, and Rudolf would not be submissive. He was very miserable just then, feeling all the wretchedness of a spoilt life and the pain of a hopeless love. He had renounced Florence in his heart, as he had renounced the ambitious aspi¬ rations that had till lately fired his imagination and his brain. He had fought out two fierce battles, and had come off victor in both ; yet he felt no sense of triumph, only a sort of despairing depression that was only lightened from time to time by the recollection of some of Florence’s words. He was weak, exhausted, and unhappy, in no mood to fight more battles or to keep himself very carefully in hand, and so it came about at last that he and his uncle came to an open rupture. It happened in this wise : — Mr. Cadwalla¬ der had been put¬ ting into definite shape a plan by which he intended to make his ne¬ phew’s way in life more smooth and easy, and just be¬ cause he was con¬ scious of feeling a glow of gene¬ rosity, and an im¬ pulse of soft-heart¬ edness, he was more brusque and dogmatic than usual in his man¬ ner. He insisted on taking Rudolf a very long walk after lunch — Flo¬ rence was lunch¬ ing at Hawkshold with Violet, and could not interfere — to see some model cottages he was building at the extreme limit of the estate. He walked very fast and talked very much, and stood about a long time watching the workmen and talk¬ ing to the foreman, keeping Rudolf beside him to be instructed by all that passed. Then they found themselves rather late, and had to hurry home as fast as possible in order to be ready for dinner. Rudolf was desperately tired, and hardly knew how to sit at table. When the ladies had gone, he rose also, and was about to excuse himself (Vernon, it may be mentioned, was dining out that night), when Mr. Cadwallader interposed in his bantering but authori¬ tative way — ‘‘ Now sit down, sit down. I have something I “he met her face to face in the little copse” (/. 267).

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266 The Stronger Will. want to talk to you about. Don’t be in such a hurry to get back to Florence.” Rudolf sat down, biting his lip with suppressed irri¬ tation. Mr. Cadwallader laughed. He saw the young man’s vexation, and not unnaturally supposed he had hit the right nail on the head. It seemed a natural thing enough that all the world should pay court to Florence. “ All is fair in love and war, you know,” he said, his eyes twinkling with humour. “ When fair ladies nurse wounded heroes - ” “ I believe you said you wished to speak to me, sir,” interrupted Rudolf sternly. “ I presume you did not detain me to listen to trivialities of this kind, which, allow me to tell you, strike me as being in peculiarly bad taste.” Mr. Cadwallader frowned. He did not approve ot being pulled up short in this way. “ I presume, in my own house, I have a right to say what I please,” he remarked coldly. “ Oh, certainly ; but I have the right to decline to listen to all you choose to say — a right of which I may possibly feel disposed to avail myself some day.” “You do not lack for assurance, young man,” said Mr. Cadwallader, partly angry, partly amused. “Will you oblige me by coming to the point?” Mr. Cadwallader repressed his own irritation by an effort. He did not know what it was that made his nephew so impatient and short-tempered. He had no idea how inexpressibly trying it was to him to have to sit and listen, with every nerve on edge, and that leaden weight of weariness pressing down upon him like a solid burden too heavy to be borne. He could make no excuse for the highly irritable condition of the young man’s mind, and felt that it was improper and unjustifiable. But it made him all the quicker in coming to the point, lest he should feel too much annoyed later on to say all that he wished. He knew it would be absurd to let a temporary sense of vexation hinder him from setting forth carefully matured plans ; yet he was by no means a placable man, and he felt it might be very easy to be turned aside if his temper was roused. He proceeded, therefore, to state with clearness and precision his intentions regarding the estate of East- lands : how he intended making it over to Mrs. Freer as soon as the lease expired, to be hers during her lifetime, and afterwards to pass to one of her sons. “ Not to you, though, Rudolf ; don’t you build your hopes on that,” Mr. Cadwallader said sharply. “ I shall entail it upon one of your half-brothers — Vernon, most likely.” Rudolf made no response ; he had felt grateful for the consideration shown towards his mother, but the tone of this last remark ruffled him again. Mr. Cadwallader noted his silence. “ So that does not please you, does it ? ” he asked, not without a touch of malice. “ You would like me to re-consider my decision on fhat point ? ” Rudolf drew himself up haughtily. “ What do you mean ? ” “ Why, that you would like Eastlands made ever te you, with a life interest only for your mother, eh ? ” Rudolf flushed, and then turned white. His. I'ips were very grimly set. An experienced eye would have seen that he was putting great pressure upon himself. “ I do not see that my being a guest beneath your roof, and indebted to you for some hospitality,, gives you the right to insult me, though it withholds me- from answering an insult as I should like. If you are not aware of it already, allow me to inform you that nothing whatever would induce me to accept favours^ at your hands. You often make me wish I had never set foot beneath your roof.” Mr. Cadwallader laughed. He was angry with Rudolf, yet he was honest enough and generous enough to feel a sympathy with his resentful pride. In his nephew’s place he would probably have said and done much the same. But he was not going to let Rudolf see this. “Come, come, lad,” he said sharply, “no heroics for me, if you please. Pride is all very well, but com¬ mon sense is better. I want you to listen to a little common sense now.” And then in hasty, and not too well-chosen words— rough and blunt, because he meant them really kindly- — he told Rudolf of the provision he wished to settle- upon him for the future. Rudolfs face looked as if carved out of marble,, white, and hard, and set ; but his eyes glowed like live coals, and his hand was clenched till the nails cut into the flesh. Mr. Cadwallader had made an unwise- allusion at starting to the displeasure he had always felt at his sister’s first marriage, and the young mant had taken it as an insult to his dead father, and his. blood seemed on fire. He had no sooner grasped the- drift of his uncle’s speech before he pushed back his. chair and rose to his feet, looking strangely tall in his overpowering wrath and indignation. “ You need say no more, sir,” he said in a suppressed voice. “ I thank you for your generous intentions, but I can only repeat that I absolutely decline to receive favours at your hands.” Mr. Cadwallader rose too. He was angry andi aggrieved. No man likes having his favours flung back upon him. He felt, too, that he had somehow managed matters badly, and, as is often the case,, vexation with self made him go from bad to worse. “ Listen to me, Rudolf,” he said peremptorily. “It is high time we understood one another.” “ I believe we understand one another perfectly.” “ Will you listen to me without interrupting me- every second moment ? ” Rudolfs lips closed, as if no power on earth would ever open them again. “ Look here, young man : there has been a good deal of sore feeling between us on both sides, and! perhaps with some reason ; but sometimes it is wise to bury the past in oblivion. I have modified some of my views of late, and I expect you to do the same.. You are my own kinsman, and, in a sense, my nearest one ; and although, of course, I cannot adopt towards- you sentiments that under other circumstances might

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The Stronger Will. have grown up naturally, still I quite recognise a certain claim on your part. My heir you can never be, but I wish to make you some compensation for the disappointment. I have considered the matter carefully, and I have decided to adopt the arrange¬ ment I have just proposed. You must be ready to meet me, and to accept it in the spirit in which it is offered. Don’t be a fool, Rudolf!” he concluded sharply ; “ my patience is not like that of Job.” “ Am I to be permitted to speak now ? ” asked Rudolf icily. “If you will speak sense, you are.” “ I will endeavour to do so. At least, I will be plain. I entirely decline to touch a penny of your money. I am my own master, and such I will re¬ main. I value my independence too much to sell it to anyone, least of all to you.” Then Mr. Cadwallader lost his temper. “ In point of fact, as you cannot have Marchwood, you will have nothing.” Rudolf’s eyes flashed fire. If he did not speak, it was because he could not, but there was something more eloquent in his silence than there could have l^een in any words. Mr. Cadwallader was sufficiently hurt and angry to be (which he was not often) tho¬ roughly unjust. “ Don’t tell me you do not want Marchwood. Do you suppose I am blind ? Do you think I have not seen how you have been paying court to the lady of the manor? Must I remind you again that Florence is not for you ? ” He regretted the words the moment they had passed his lips. He knew that they were cruel and ungener¬ ous, as well as unjust ; but they had been spoken, and could not be recalled. Rudolf made no attempt to reply, but walked slowly down the hall to the door, with a look about his erect figure that Mr. Cadwallader somehow did not like to see. He looked like a man who had received a crushing blow, but will not give way so long as his adversary is in sight. Mr. Howard entering the next moment, as he some¬ times did, to have a chat with his old friend, began by saying — “ I met your nephew outside in the hall ; have you been having a row with the young fellow ?” “ Well, I suppose I must say yes.” “Well, then, don’t do it again in a hurry. It’s bad for him. He’s not as strong yet as he looks.” Rudolf meantime walked upstairs to his room, and busied himself by packing his portmanteau. That done, he went to the bed-rooms of the children, and kissed them both in their dreams, lingering several minutes over little Ethel in her rosy sleep, feeling an odd aching pain gnawing at his heart. Intense fatigue deadened, however, his feeling-s to a great extent, and he slept that night the deep dream¬ less sleep of exhaustion. Early in the morning he rose, and dressed himself alone with some trouble. Then he summoned a servant, and directed that his portmanteau should be given to the carrier who passed about eight o’clock, to be left at the station. Then he sat down and 267 wrote a few lines, which he directed to Mr. Cad¬ wallader : — “ Dear Sir, — I am leaving your house to-day for ever. It is now the only course open to me. Possibly it may be due to you to give some reason for this step. If so, think over the last words you spoke to me last evening. There was this, much of truth in them, that it is impossible for me to risk falling into the peril you have pointed out. I know that your adopted daughter is not for me. I will not trouble you to remind me of the fact again. “ Rudolf Stanhope.” He sealed this letter, and left it upon the table ; then he went downstairs, and out into the cool fresh¬ ness of a still September morning. He had one more farewell to make before he could tear himself away. It would be present pain, yet pain that he could not bear to spare himself. He must see Florence once again, hold her hand once more in his, and look into her sweet face — after that his life seemed to stretch before him bare, and blank, and black. He knew where he should find her at this hour. He met her face to face in the little copse that lay between the house and the farm. She was alone, and he was glad of it. He dreaded having to face the cries and lamentations of the children. He had bid them good-bye last night. Florence saw him quickly, smiled her own sunny smile, but shook her head too. Mr. Howard had spoken to her last night, and she was not pleased to see him afoot so early in the morning. “ You bad boy 1” she said. “When are you going to learn a little prudence ? ” “ I think I am learning it very fast,” he said, smiling a little, yet with a curious whiteness about the lips. “ I have come to say good-bye. I am leaving March- wood immediately.” She looked at him quickly, and read his steadfast^ hopeless purpose in his eyes. “ What has happened ? ” “ Something that I would rather not talk about, if you will excuse me,” he said, speaking with visible eflbrt. “ I have trusted you sometimes before under difficult circumstances. Will you trust me now in return, and believe that I am taking the only possible course in what I do to-day ? ” “ But you are not fit to leave us — to be alone.” “ I shall be much better alone, now. Please do not think me ungrateful. I can never thank you enough for all your goodness to me. I shall never forget it to the day of my death. But I must go, and at once. If you knew all, you would not try to detain me.” She looked up at him with a mute sympathy that was almost too much for him. “ Will you say good-bye to them all ? ” he asked. “ I could not ; I felt it would be rather too much for me. Tell the children I kissed them both in their sleep last night. I leave them in good hands. I have often wanted to thank you for all you have done for them, as well as all you have done for me. I shall never forget it. I shall bless you for it every day of my life.” He spoke very quietly, under evident and extreme

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268 A Yorkshire Dale. pressure. She said hardly a word, but her eyes spoke for her. He felt himself understood. She was not angry or resentful, only very sorry for him. “ Rudolf,” she said gently, at last, “ will you not tell me why you are going ? ” “ I am going because I love you,” he answered, very quietly, “ and because I can never ask you to be mine.” He raised her hand to his lips, kissed it once gently and reverently ; and then he turned quickly away, lifted his hat, and was gone. END OF CHAPTER THE EIGHTEENTH. A YORKSHIRE DALE. GOWTHWAITE HALL. SAVING the Lake District of Westmoreland and Cumberland, there is no finer inland scenery to be found in this Merrie England of ours than away in that corner of the broad shire of York known as “The Dales” — a series of some half-dozen narrow valleys lying more or less parallel, but sepa¬ rated from one another by lofty moorland ridges and craggy ^‘""'be^werley.*^ """ fells, down each of which a brawling river flows, giving its name to the valley. Scoring deeply into the heart of the Pennine range, under the frowning crests of Penyghent and Whernside, they grow wider and shallower as they run eastward, till they die down at last into the fertile plain of York. Of these, Nidderdale is one of the loveliest and most pic¬ turesque, and yet least known. The appellation “ Switzerland of England,” which enthusiastic admirers have given to this Yorkshire dale is a piece of absurd exaggeration which is likely to lead to disappointment, for indeed it has few, if any, claims to such a distinctive title. Wanting many of the glories of the surrounding valleys, Nidderdale has yet beauties all its own; and if it lacks the luxurious woods of Wharfedale and of Wensleydale, and has not the wildness of Swaledale, it is a winding panorama of rock and moor and leafy glens, of undulating pasture-land, and lofty billowy fells. And it its river, Nidd, does not flow past ro¬ mantic abbey ruins and rush down sylvan gorges like the Wharfe, foam and plunge in white cascades like the Ure, or fling itself a shuddering cataract over a lofty cliff like the Tees, it has yet a witching way of leaping gaily in tiny “forces,” of sliding laughingly round the big brown boulders and mossy stones which fill its bed, and gliding gently along deep reaches, where the big trout swim lazily in the shady depths below. Altogether, a delightful region this — a happy hunt¬ ing ground for the naturalist, a wondrous text-book for the geologist, a long series of choicest pictures for the artist— where the lover of Nature may worship her in all her charming, varying moods, far from the whirl and bustle of the outer world, surrounded by hospit¬ able, kindly folk— a race of stalwart men and buxom women, amongst whom linger many curious customs and much of the quaint speech of their fore¬ elders. The capital of Nidderdale is Pateley Bridge, a some¬ what uninteresting little town clinging to the sides of a hill, whose name is supposed to be derived from “ Pait,” a badger, and “ ley,” a field, and whose early

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269 THE TARN, GUYSCLIFFE. {From a photograph by Messrs. J. Valentine <5^ Sons, Dundee.) history is unknown. Leland mentions it casually as “ Patley Bridg and village a member of Ripon Paroche ” (which place lies twelve miles away), and says that its “ bridg” was of “ tymbre.” On the spur of the hill stand the ruins of the old church, used only when some elderly native is laid by the side of his forefathers in its almost deserted grave¬ yard, whilst the modern church, dedicated to St. Cuth- bert, which has replaced it, lies on the other side of the town, a plain structure, forming an oblong room covered with a flat ceiling. In its tower hangs a fine specimen of a pre-Reformation bell, with a black- letter inscription said to have come from Fountains Abbey. The parish registers date from 1552, and contain, amongst many curious entries, “ a cure for the biting of a mad dog.” The Wesleyan Methodist Chapel, a venerable edifice, is interesting as contain¬ ing the old canopied pulpit from which John Wesley preached in 1782, when he visited Pateley for the sixth time. Saturday is market-day, when the Dalesfolk gather in the main street, as their fathers have done since Edward II. granted the charter, and there are fairs on Easter, Whitsun, and Christmas Eves ; but the event of the year is the Feast in September, which lasts for a week, moving on day by day up the valley. But if the town itself is not interesting, it is a capital centre for exploring the valley, and its old-fashioned inns, where, in place of slip -shod waiter, rosy Phyllis serves, afibrd most comfortable quarters. On the other side of the river is Bewerley, once the Manor of Emeis de Bunin, ancestor of Lord Byron, and now held by the ancient and honourable family of Yorke, whose simple arms, ‘‘Arg. : a Saltire Az.,” are of greater worship than the pretentious coats borne by newer names, and who settled in the dale in 1546, when Sir John, whose grandfather was twice Lord Mayor of York city, and its representative in Edward I V.’s Parliaments, besides being for some time Mayor of the Staple in Calais, purchased the Forest of Nidderdale.” The Hall stands in a well-timbered park, which slopes gently to the Nidd : a fine grey embattled pile, chiefly modern, with two round towers of older date on the eastern side flanking the principal entrance. In the hall are some fine suits of armour, with a portrait gallery of old knightly ancestors. On the west side of the house is a small build¬ ing, once a monastic chapel, built when Marmaduke Huby was Abbot of Fountains (a.d. 1494 — 1526). His initials in Lombardic capitals are carved on all four walls, and on the eastern front is the motto, “ Soli Deo Honor et Gloria.” Beyond the road which leads over the moors into Wharfe- BELL AT PATELEY.

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A Yorkshire Dale. dale are the “Fishpond Woods/’ where the great beech-trees are reflected on the waters of a little lakelet, and the rabbits scamper over the velvety moss to the cawing of rooks swinging high aloft. One of the chief gems of the district is Ravensgill, a deep and steep ravine hard by, which runs up and is lost on the wild grouse moors above ; where the stream comes madly leaping and plunging amongst great crags and fern-fringed rocks into foam-flecked pools, shivering into gleaming spray as it suddenly flings itself into space. And then gathering its waters together, it again goes ever downward, hidden by the graceful larches and whispering ashes which cover ks banks, until it reaches the meadows far below, and flows past the gardens and turrets of Bewerley Hall to join the Nidd. Along the edge of the moor is a bold lace of grit¬ stone, called Guyscliffe, whose dark walls stand in sharp contrast to the bright green of the thick woods which roll their sylvan waves below. From the top of this escarpment is a glorious stretch of hill and vale across to where the famed Brimham Rocks cut the sky-line with their jagged heads, on which the Druids are popularly held to have offered sacrifices. Away up behind Bewerley lies Greenhow Hill, out of which immense quantities of lead-ore have been dug in prosperous times, when prices were good and the mines in full work. Now there is an air of de¬ solation about the silent workings, the dismantled fur¬ naces, and crushing mills. The. village of Greenhow is a quiet little hamlet (deserted by a mining popula¬ tion), claiming that its Church of St. Mary stands on higher ground than any other in England, being up¬ wards of 1,300 feet above sea-level. At the upper end of the village formerly stood “ Craven Crosse,” marking where the royal chase of Knaresborough Forest and the lands of the powerful Mowbrays and Cliffords met. A mile beyond, on the road from Nidderdale into Wharfedale, are the cele¬ brated Stump Cross Caverns, a series of chambers, reached by a descent of fifty roughly cut steps, all more or less thickly encrusted with white stalagmite and studded with stalactites, which glisten like frozen snow. Many fancy names have been given to various portions of the cavern : “ the Church ” is a roomy opening, with a curious range of crystal pillars, called the “ Organ,” ringing like bells when struck, and having a hollow stalactite pendent from the roof, which glows with loveliest hues when a candle is placed inside. The “ New Cavern,” after narrow turnings, opens into a lofty hall, known as the “ Parlour,” carpeted with formations like wrinkled fringes in stone ; besides these are many other wonders, stretching thus under ground for over 1,000 yards. From Greenhow, the turnpike-road descends steeply past the woods of Eagle Hall, a modern mansion built on the site of an old house, on the edge of a glen whose lower end has been dammed across to head its stream into a lake, and at Bewerley joins the road which runs “ Up Dale.” An ancient, albeit so-called “ new,” bridge for pack- horses and foot-passengers leads up to Wath Woods, where is a pretty cascade in a mossy dell, and a little higher up the valley the chimneys and gables of Gowthwaite Hall come into view. This fine example of an early seventeenth-century manor-house is a long two-storeyed building with deep mullioned windows and a porch queerly placed somewhat at one end. For generations it was the home of the Yorkes, and stories and traditions cling about its wainscoted and panel¬ led walls of turbulent and lawless times, and how a treasonable play was enacted under its lichen-stained HOWSTEAN BECK. {From a photograph by Messrs. Valentine Sons^ Dundee.')

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A Yorkshire Dale. 271 roof, knowledge whereof coining to the Star Chamber, resulted in a fine, to raise, which the then Sir John had to lease many a broad acre for fabulously long terms. Eugene Aram is believed to have for a time taught his scholars in one of the rooms. This mys¬ terious man was born close by at Ramsgill, where his house was standing until a few years ago. Except these associations, there is nothing of par¬ ticular interest in Ramsgill itself, as the chapel which the Byland monks built here has long since gone, a modern featureless church standing on the site. Years back a thunder-cloud is said to have burst on the moor above and suddenly flooded the hollow, to the anyone having followed the stream all through, so there is an opportunity for some reader hereof to be¬ come famous in these parts. Up the left-hand valley is How-Stean, as romantic, wild, and yet charming a bit of rock scenery as can be found anywhere. A deep, dark gorge in the limestone, with a tireless stream leaping and rushing through it, kissing the long- hartstongues which dip into it, and swirling the pebbles over sunless shallows : it is a veritable canon, an exact counterpart of those giant ones of Colorado and New Mexico. Several dark caverns and ghostly subter¬ ranean passages pierce its precipitous sides, in which unseen waters are heard falling into black hidden PACK HORSE BRIDGE, WATH. (From a photograph by Messrs. J. Valentine <Sr* Sons^ Dundee.') great destruction of property ; a farmer riding home was swept along by the raging beck, and, thinking his last moments were comej yelled out at the top of his voice the terms of his last will and testament, “ Ralph, Robin, aiV Rebecca ; all alike ! all alike ! ” The good man was not drowned, but lived to hear his words become a saying on matters relating to equal division. Passing by spots of noticeable beauty, the road enters the village of Lofthouse, and here‘ the dale proper forks, the valley to the right being the one which is scored by the old river channel, though, except from a few small streams, there is no water filling it in ordi¬ narily dry weather, the Nidd disappearing into the long weird tunnel of Goyden Pot, where it rolls in darkness for nearly three miles, and comes to light again just below the Vicarage at Lofthouse. These aw^esome caverns are well worth exploring, and can be for a long distaince, if nerve and candles do not fail, without the wearisome guide who is associated with most such show-places. There is no record of depths. In a field adjoining is the entrance to Eglin’5 Hole, a long, winding passage under the hill-side, which can be explored for nearly two miles ; and just beyond, upon its buttress-like hill, is Middlesmoor, a hamlet of picturesque cottages, which stand anyhow and at all angles to the road and one another. Its one object of interest is the church, which was con¬ secrated “in ye year 1484 by Dromorend, Bishop of York, in ye Second year of Richard the Third,” as an entry in its register testifies. Another interest¬ ing entry reads, “ Loftus : Eugenius Aram and Anna Spence, married May 4th,, after Bans thrice asked, 1731.” Here are buried some of the Yorkes, ancestors of the present lord of the manor and Bewerley. In the north aisle hangs an old bell, said to have once rung at Fountains Abbey. From the porch is an extensive view down the valley, to where the bold front, of Guyscliffe turns it to eastward, a vast expanse of hill and moor lying on each side of a narrow strip of meadovy, down the

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Influenza Colds and Whooping-Cough. middle of which the Nidd stretches like a silver ser¬ pent. To stand here in “ God’s acre,” with the old dalesfolk sleeping peacefully around, and see the sun set in crimsoned splendour over the Fells, flushing them a rosy hue and filling the valley with a purple haze, and then to watch the light die out of the heavens and the stars begin to gleam faintly in the steel-blue sky, in a silence only broken by the hooting of a distant owl, is like realising some poet’s dream. Such is something of what Nidderdale is, and those who once visit it, though they may smile at the men¬ tion of the word Switzerland, will deem it one of the most charming of valleys, whose beauties are ever new and numberless. q, Vickars-Gaskell. AN APRIL HY is Cynthia very fair. In my eyes beyond compare ? ’Tis no easy thing to say. But I think a reason good Is because in every mood She is like an April day. In an April mood she’ll sit While above her cloudlets flit, And she'll be as sad as they. In an April mood again. Just like sunshine after rain, Smiles will chase her tears away. Soulless beauty, haughty grace Lend no charm to any face Such as Cynthia’s has for me. This it is that makes her fair. In my eyes beyond compare : Ever-ready sympathy ! G. Weatherly. INFLUENZA COLDS AND WHOOPING-COUGH. BY A FAMILY DOCTOR. of atmosphere may undoubtedly increase the number of clouds of bacteria, and mankind and even the E spring-time of the year is in this country dreaded by almost everyone who is not by any means robust in con¬ stitution ; more especially is it feared by foreigners who visit our shores. There is one question which has never been properly set at rest by scientists of the medical profession, namely— What is it that causes such an amount of trouble in the shape of chest ail¬ ments at this season? Sudden changes from cold weather to mild, or vice versa^ some will tell us. But this is not going quite to the root of the evil, I think , and, without entering too deeply into the study of the germ theory, one is half inclined to believe that the multiplication of spores, or bacteria, has much to do with what we are in the habit of calling common colds. There is, for instance, in exceptionally mild weather an excessive multiplication of germs inimical to human life. The leaves and other products of vegetable growth are not yet quite decayed in the country, while in back slums of towns less care is taken to obey the laws of sanitation-if, indeed, enough attention is ever paid to them. Moreover, be the reason what or where it may, in very mild spring weather we notice that the ephemei^al midges, gnats, &c., are rapidly evolved from their pupal state, and are to be seen dancing in the air in thousands every afternoon. The same state domestic animals may be the sufferers in consequence ; so that in the early spring months it is not always the cold weather that brings us illnesses, although sudden lowering of the temperature is bound to affect the chests of delicate subjects. Pure cold by itself would ; but if hard frost succeeds, it brings everything down from the upper strata of the air. One day in the beginning of this month (March), I noticed my gar¬ dener lighting a fire to burn some weeds and branches. The frost was intense, and for some time after he had succeeded in firing his pile I observed that a great portion of the smoke, instead of rising in the air, hugged the grass and went rolling along it. It was, in fact, beaten down by the weight of the atmosphere. From this a child could perceive the density or con¬ centration of the air close to the ground, and this is what we must breathe during frost. We need not wonder, then, if influenza is increased by a low tem¬ perature. It seems, therefore, that we must protect ourselves against both hard and mild weather. But, stay, I would not have my readers deceive themselves— it is extra hard or extra mild weather that does the mis¬ chief, more especially when these keep alternating. The symptoms of true influenza are now almost too well known to need description. It is a fever- cold that attacks one suddenly, coming on with shiver- ings, followed by heat and elevation of temperature.

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[Drawn by Tom Graham.] AN APRIL MOOD. {See j>as[e 272.)

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Influenza Colds and Whooping-Cough. 273 great thirst, loss of appetite and taste, intense head¬ ache, the running of acrid water from nose and eyes, pains in the limbs, stiffness and soreness all over, perhaps a rash, with swelling of some joints, and, over and above all this pretty array of symptoms, extreme depression of spirits and great debility. The treat¬ ment consists in perfect rest in bed, in a not too warm but very well-ventilated room ; a slop diet for two days, or until fever and thirst abate (this diet must be nourishing, however : barley-water with lemon-juice, raw eggs, soda-water and milk, oranges — any number — beef-tea and toast, &c.) ; then a gradual return to solid food, puddings, oysters, &c. It cannot be too clearly impressed upon an influenza patient that the danger is not over when the fever is ; indeed, it only really commences with the stage of convalescence. What one has to avoid, then, is exposure to cold and damp. Do not, I pray you, rush into extremes, however, and “ plot yourself by wearing too heavy clothes, sweating yourself in bed, or sticking too closely to the fire in warm rooms. Be careful : that is all. Live by rule for weeks and weeks after you have suffered from an attack of influenza, for a relapse might mean bronchitis, or even inflammation of the lungs. In all cases of influenza, however mild, it is best to consult a doctor at the commencement. He may order quinine or anti-pyrine ; but under no circum¬ stances should either of these drugs be prescribed by the patient for himself, or by the patient’s friends for the patient. Quinine may be in many cases contra-indicated by the idiosyncrasy of a sufferer — in plainer English, everybody cannot take quinine with comfort ; and as for anti-pyrine, it is as dangerous a drug as ever was placed within reach of suffering humanity. It is sold in tablets. The action of the “stuff” is to lower the frequency and power of the heart’s beat, but it may stop it entirely. I could give anyone the names of unfortunate people that have killed themselves, or been killed, with anti-pyrine. One was a doctor. Although advised not to play with this so-called remedy for neuralgia, he would and did — and died. Pray, reader, be warned. I would as soon give a baby an open razor as give any patient of mine a bottle of anti-pyrine tablets to play fast and loose with. Calomel is often prescribed by the doctor on the first night after an attack of influenza has commenced, and probably followed next morning by a large glass of Pullna or Friedrichshal water. This secures a good action and clears the liver, but only one’s own physician must prescribe the calomel. It should be re¬ membered that Nature tries to eliminate the poison of influenza through the whole lining membrane (mucous) of the air passages and digestive canal, as well as through the great internal glands of secretion, and this fact guides us in our treatment. The hot-air bath may be therefore judicious at the very outset, if it can be borne ; and if there is much pain in the chest, a mustard plaster to the breast, well up towards the neck, will do good, with the mustard foot-bath. Inhalations of steam also do good, especially if medicated with a little laudanum or vmum ipecacu¬ anha^ or whatever else the doctor advises. Sanitas should be placed in saucers all round the room ; and I must confess I am a great believer also in the germ¬ killing powers of sulphurous acid. It may be plenti¬ fully evolved by pouring a little oil of vitriol on a saucer containing a few table-spoonfuls of table salt. There are always so-called influenza colds rife about this season. Again, many nervous people depress themselves most unnecessarily in times like these by magnifying their very ordinary attacks of very common colds into attacks of the true influenza. How can people avoid illnesses in spring ? This is certainly a difficult question to answer, for there is really no known prophylactic. When sickness is rife we all breathe disease germs. How is it, then, that only about one-tenth of the people are attacked .? An answer to this last question will be the best reply to the first. It is a law of Nature, which we see ex¬ emplified every day of our lives, that the fittest survive. If one be weakly, he is liable to all sorts and condi¬ tions of ailments. We are everywhere surrounded by enemies in the form of illness ; the air is at all times alive with disease germs ; and if we are out of form or below par, we are more liable to fall victims thereto. Only by keeping the strength up to, but not above, a healthy standard, can we walk through a pestilence- affected air and still be safe. In spring-time, therefore, if at all delicate, we should live moderately well, abjure stimulants of all kinds and excess in everything, rise early and go to bed ere it is late, keep clear of crowded roonis^ take a matutinal bath and a spell of light (two pounds or less) dumb-beH exercise before breakfast, plenty of exercise in the open ^ir, and good sleep in perfectly ventilated rooms. We may then, as a rule, laugh at influenza colds, and common colds as well. Of course we are to wear warm light clothing, and keep away from the enervating fire as much as pos¬ sible in the evenings. Do you know what a mulled patient or invalid means ? There he sits, or there she sits, in a corner near the fire, arrayed in thick-lined dressing-gown and cataplasmic slippers. A screen surrounds her easy-chair, yet she listens impatiently when a door is opened, to make sure it is closed again. She shudders as the wind howls round the chimney, and sips something warm from a tumbler. She now and then says she is sure that some window upstairs is open, or that there is a draught somewhere. By-and- by she will go to bed — an extra well-warmed one — with perhaps a bottle of hot water at her feet, and she will not come down to breakfast till the room is- thoroughly heated and the day far spent. But here she comes at last, looking somewhat pale and w’ashed- out, and no wonder. She takes her seat languidly enough ; and I take the opportunity of introducing, her : “ Ladies and gentlemen — my mulled patient.” It is time now I should say a few words about whooping-cough. It is an infectious disease like influenza, and almost entirely confined to childhoods 738

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2 74 Never Cleared Up: It begins like an ordinary cold, which, however, does not pass off, and in about a fortnight or less it de¬ velops its well-known spasmodic character. It is a very serious complaint, and as soon as it shows itself medical advice must be had, because of the complica¬ tions which may occur. Convulsions even may ensue, and put an end to the poor child’s sufferings. At the season when common colds are rife, however slight an attack may be, it should be attended to from the first, by regulation of diet, attention to the state of the 'system (a dose of castor-oil or grey powder may do much good at the early stage), warm clothing, and protection from inclement weather. If there be pain and wheezing in the chest, the latter may be reduced by rubbing with a little turpentine poured A Mystery of the Sea. on a piece of hot damp flannel, and; warm drinks given at night. Beware of so-called cough mixtures or lozenges unless recommended by your doctor ; they nearly all contain opium in some form. Soothing or sleeping draughts are also dangerous in the extreme. Under the influence of some of these the child does not cough, but the discharge from the lungs is retained, and may cause congestion, or even suffocation. In the acute stage of whooping-cough everything must be left to the doctor ; and during convalescence, in addition to all ordinary precautions against cold and damp, the child must have tonics — cod-liver oil and extract of malt — with plenty of nourishing food, and, above all, fresh air. MORNING MORNING. LITTLE lighting of the dark thick gloom, A little stir in heavy-scented air, A little twittering in the tree-tops there ; A gradual seeing of the darkened room, A breaking of the shadows that entomb The weary day, so full of anxious care. We longed for night to make the puzzle fair. But day, in rising, calls us to our doom ; Then louder songs, and wider breadth of light. The stir of sleepers waking to their toil ; A voice, a tread of feet, a heavy sigh, Then rolling wheels, and then again the sight Is vexed once more with all the smirch and soil We left last night, when sleep came softly by. AND EVENING. EVENING. The air is full of cradle-songs at eve ; The twittering birds sing to their nested young. Their evening songs beneath their breath are sung ; So soft they are, they seem in truth to grieve To watch the dying daylight slowly leave The patient earth, whose toil-worn heart is wrung By work and mortal agony. Each tongue Grows silent now, for twilight’s shadows weave Their misty wreaths above the tired earth. That folding round her mantle turns to sleep ; And lovers wander in the darkening lane. And new-born hopes spring vigorous to the birth. For love is young, and should not learn to weep. And evening brings the wanderer home again. J. E. Panton. NEVER CLEARED UP : A MYSTERY OF THE SEA. BY THOMAS KEYWORTH, AUTHOR OF “ MISTRESS JUNE, ETC. CHAPTER THE FIRST. ERNEST TEMPLEMORE’S RECOL¬ LECTIONS. is well that these records should go forth to the world in the simple form which they as¬ sumed at first. They refer to a time when early man¬ hood shed its hopes and joys around me. I have seen much of the world since then, but I have no desire to alter anything which I wrote in those golden days, long ago. I say “ long ago,” because the time seems long since to me, though, if it were measured by years, it would appear to be com¬ paratively recent. The portions which others wrote I must not venture to touch. I will only add that the period referred to was before the Suez Canal was made, and when very few steamers were sailing be¬ tween England and Australia. “ Go out in the A7itarciic, if you can,” my friends said to me. “ It is worth all it costs, and more. You are sure to have good company, and Captain Cass- grave is a man in a thousand. Tne A^iicirctzc ought to be called The Royal Road to Australia^ I had been several years in England, during which time the advantage of ease and luxury was impressed upon me by actual enjoyment. The old Mermaid^ in which I made the voyage from Melbourne to London, was not a palace of delight by any means^ and I had no desire to repeat that experience of slow sailing, poor food, and imperfect attendance. My time in England had been devoted to educational pursuits ; but" I had been a guest in some good houses, especially in Suffolk— the county to which my family belonged.

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Never Cleared Up : A Mystery of the Sea. “ You have been spoiled, that is certain,’’ said an old squatter to me, a few days before we started from Liverpool on our long voyage. His name was Myrtle- wood, and he was fond of despising what he called the ornaments and superfluities of civilisation. I met him at the house of an Australian who had settled in England, and he was always talking about his early experiences in the bush, and the struggles which he- went through before Fortune favoured his efforts. ‘‘ You have been spoiled,” he said. Then he told about the ship in which he went out to Sydney, forty years before. It must have been worse than a convict transport ; but he gloried in his story of suffering and endurance, and hinted plainly, at the same time, that men like myself were not likely to do as well for Australia as he had done. I have heard other men indulge in the same strain. Let me remark at this point, however, that during the time when I saw Myrtlewood every day, on board the Antarctic, there was no man or woman who expected so much attention or who demanded so much comfort as he did. But it is not of Myrtlewood I am desired to write. I say ‘‘ desired,” for this narrative is penned at the special request of one whose wishes have all the weight of commands with me. The pleasant thoughts which come into my mind at the mention of the Antaixtic are associated with the name and form of Janet Montgomery. I noticed her as soon as we embarked, and was surprised to see that, like myself, she was alone. I soon discovered that Janet was an orphan, and was going out under the captain’s special care. She had friends in South Australia, and intended to make her home not far from Adelaide. Captain Cass- grave told me this quite early in the voyage. I had never thought of getting letters of introduction to the captain ; but several people who knew me well, and who knew him well, had scribbled notes which they recommended me to take, so that I might enter upon what they called my “ Antarctic career ” with all the credit which I deserved. Janet seemed sad and lonely. She was leaving everybody behind whom she knew, and “going with strangers to strangers,” as I managed to express myself at the time, with some feeling of pride at the neatness of the phrase. Cassgrave had introduced me at once— a privilege which I owed to those kind friends who had taken upon themselves the responsibility of sounding my praises. This is not altogether a love-story, and yet I find it very difficult to remember the details of life on ship¬ board until the time when a dreadful shock affected us all. The first part of the voyage is to my mind a shifting scene, in which Janet Montgomery fills the most important place. In my mind’s eye I can see hei in the saloon and on the deck ; she is a steadfast figure amid the rough weather, and she is the fairest object when the sea is scarcely rippled. History is not vay forte, I am sure. Where is my sense of pro¬ portion and perspective? Yet, as I have said, this task has been thrust upon me. 275 We had a full complement of passengers. How many they amounted to is more than I can tell. There were first-class, second-class, and steerage. We were well officered, and had an excellent crew. Captain Cassgrave was all that his admirers had said about him. He was a powerfully built man, and very hand¬ some : a perfect gentleman, too. His ship was well- ordered, and everything was done “ Bristol fashion,” as some of the passengers were fond of remarking. We had made nearly half the voyage, and I for one was in no hurry for the other portion to be completed, strange as the confession may sound, when we were all thrown into a state of consternation by hearing that the captain was missing, and could not be found anywhere. This was early in the morning. There had been some rough weather in the night — nothing very serious ; but as we had just had a long spell of perfect calm, the change was noticeable. At first I thought there must be some mistake. The largest ship contains only a very limited space. How could a man be missing, the captain especially ? So it was, however ; he had not been well for a few days, though I cannot say that I had noticed any¬ thing unusual. (Perhaps that might be accounted for without difficulty.) He had retired to his cabin the night before, and in the morning he was gone. That was a strange day, I remember. The chief officer took command, and the ship was filled with gloom. Then, to add to the trouble, we heard that one of the steerage passengers was dead — a man called Delaney. Nobody had the slightest suspicion that there was any connection between Delaney’s death and the captain’s disappearance. CHAPTER THE SECOND. BY THE HELP OF JANET MONTGOMERY’S DIARY. I CANNOT consent to have the entries in my journal copied word for word, or even the passages quoted which refer to Captain Cassgrave’s disappearance. I am willing to make extracts myself, or to write an account of the events which happened, and to assist my memory by frequent reference to the diary. This is all I can promise. I had looked forward to the voyage with great dread. The thought of leaving Scotland was terrible to me ; but father died when I was a child, and my mother, on her death-bed, made me promise that I would go to New Hope, in South Australia, and live with her life-long friends, the Armours, who were settled there in the midst of plenty, but who were childless. I may explain that I was not going out to be a charge upon their charity. What had sufficed for mother and me would suffice abundantly for me alone. I might have remained at Heatherlow, but mother ex¬ tracted the promise from me that I would join the Armours, and as soon after her death as possible I proceeded to carry out her wishes. Mr. Graham, my mother’s executor, made all the arrangements, and he placed me under the care of Captain Cassgrave, whom he knew very well. It was

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Never Cleared Up : A Mystery of the Sea. 276 an unexpected business engagement which prevented him bidding me farewell on the ship when we left the port. He took me on board, and had to go at once, after putting me in Captain Cassgrave’s charge. This point is not important, but I desire to mention it, because a certain gentleman is fond of saying that 1 was consigned to the other side of the world like a bale of goods. I intended to keep a diary from the beginning of the voyage, but until we were clear of the Bay of Biscay I was not able to settle down to it regularly. There are a few entries which refer chiefly to the weather. Afterwards, I was able to devote more time to the task, and I value the book in which my im¬ pressions are recorded. Privacy is not always within one’s reach on board ship. That must be the reason why many of the paragraphs are brought to a sudden close with the words, “ Mr. T. has come, and I must stop.” Mr. T., of course, is Ernest Templemore. The captain introduced him as a friend of many old friends, and a man who was likely to prove a credit to the Two Bri tains. Captain Cassgrave had sailed most of his life between England and Australia : that must have been the reason why he liked the expres¬ sion, “ The Two Britains.” If anybody suggested that there was a third in North America, he agreed with the correction, spoke highly of Canada, and then fell back upon his old mode of expression. He was an Irishman, and as kind a gentleman as any lonely girl like myself could be entrusted to. When Ernest Templemore began to show marked at¬ tentions, the captain appeared to be puzzled how to act ; but he said nothing to me, and I am not aware that he said anything to Ernest. People are brought into very intimate relations on shipboard, and it seems natural that friends should be very friendly. How can it be otherwise ? Day after day we saw the same faces and heard the same voices. I thought beforehand that it would be monotonous ; but it was not. We had one passenger, a Mr. Myrtlewood, who amused me very much. He professed to despise all comforts, but I never knew a man in my life who acted as if he appreciated them more. The ship’s doctor was the opposite of Mr. Myrtle- wood : he was always praising what he called “ our part of the nineteenth centui*}^,” and the advantages which it affords, but he never appeared to care about these advantages. He was a most abstemious man, a great student, and he never spared himself when anybody was ill. I have very pleasant recollections of Dr. Wroeburn, and my diary contains many references to his interesting conversations. These are in connec¬ tion with the early part of the voyage ; afterwards, Ernest scarcely gave me a chance of hearing what anybody had to say but himself. Even Mr. Myrtle- wood’s stories were lost upon him. I was annoyed, because they referred chiefly to people whom he had seen on former voyages, and whom he described as “ love-sick swains.” He said that they loved and parted ; and to hear him exclaim, “ Out of sight, out of mind,” was very trying to the temper. But Ernest wishes me to give what particulars I can about Captain Cassgrave’s disappearance. I had noticed for several days that our good captain was not in his usual health and spirits. He told me he was sleeping badly, which was an unusual thing with him ; and I remember that he made several jokes about shipping some sleep among the cargo the next time he entered port. He was so light-hearted that it was impossible to take much notice of his indisposi¬ tion. I do not find any reference to it in my diary. But I have this entry concerning his disappearance. I evidently wrote it on the day when the painful fact became known : — “The strangest event imaginable happened to-day. The steward told us he could not find the captain. At first we were inclined to treat it as a joke, but when we heard his cabin window was open, we felt alarmed. The weather was rough last night, and the ship rolled a good deal, but it was difficult to think of anyone being washed overboard, or even falling overboard, without being seen. A number of us went into the captain’s room at once. The window was unfastened, but it was not open when I entered. I saw at a glance the berth had not been occupied. On the table were writing materials and sealing-wax, but there was not a letter. Mr. Fox, the chief officer, was there, and he examined the place carefully. I caught my foot against some¬ thing which rattled, and I found it was a bunch of keys. Mr. Fox asked us to withdraw while he and the surgeon made further investigation ; so we went into the saloon — not very willingly, I must acknow¬ ledge. We heard further particulars afterwards. We were told that the captain’s gold watch and his money were missing, and that nothing had been discovered which threw any light on the strange affair. The sailors were mustered, but none of them had seen or heard anything unusual in the night. Sea¬ men are very superstitious, and they all looked terribly afraid. Mr. Fox has told us that below the cabin window there is a ledge, and there are scratches on it, as if somebody had been struggling to hold on there. By looking over the bulwarks the ledge can be seen, and I have just peeped at the place. The scratches are plain enough.” The next entry was made on the following evening, but it does not help to explain what so bewildered us. “This has been another painful day. Nothing further has been discovered in connection with the captain. Many a time I expected to see his pleasant face or to hear his cheery voice ; then I remem¬ bered our loss. At sunset yesterday we had a funeral — our first, and I hope our last. A steerage passenger, called Delaney, fell down the companion- way early in the morning, and he died some hours afterwards. He had no friends on board, but he was mourned sincerely by everybody. Poor man ! Nobody appears to know anything about him. A passenger called Boyd was with him a great deal ; but Boyd says they were strangers when the voyage commenced.” There is nothing else in my diary which bears directly upon this painful subject.

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Never Cleared Up : A Mystery of the Sea. 277 CHAPTER THE THIRD. BY THE HELP OF DOCTOR WROEBURN’S NOTE-BOOK. I AM requested to give any particulars which may help to clear up the mystery of Captain Cassgrave’s disappearance from the Antarctic^ and I am asked to use as few technicalities as possible. I am quite willing to comply with both wishes, especially as I am given to understand that a lady who was a passenger to my notes, that there was one circumstance which I noticed at the time, though I did not attach any im¬ portance to it : Delaney was very anxious to see a passenger called Boyd, and to see him alone. Delaney was in the ship’s hospital then, and I granted his request. What he said to Boyd I do not know, but I believe it was a request to throw something overboard. I saw Boyd in Melbourne, while the ship was in port, “CASSGRAVE HAD INTRODUCED ME AT ONCE’' (/. 275). with us during that eventful voyage is interested in the case, and has expressed her confidence in my ability to set this crooked matter straight, if anybody can. I am greatly obliged to Miss Montgomery for her good opinion, but I am afraid my best efforts will not lead to anything satisfactory. F rom what I can learn, there is an impression in some minds that Captain Cassgrave’s disappear¬ ance and the death of a steerage passenger called Delaney were in some way connected. I have not heard the particulars, and am not able, therefore, to say what probability the supposition contains. I may mention, however, at this point, and before referring and I spoke to him, and asked him what he intended to do, and whether he had written to Delaney’s friends. He repeated then, what I remembered he had said before, that Delaney was a total stranger to him. Boyd was a gardener by trade, and he informed me that he had been engaged by Griffith Myrtlewood, whom I remember very well as the most contra¬ dictory passenger it was ever my lot to see on board a ship. Now in reference to Captain Cassgrave : he had not been well for some days before his disappear¬ ance. He was troubled with insomnia, and I pre¬ scribed for him the ordinary remedies, which I do not

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278 Never Cleared Up: A need to mention here. He talked to me several times about dreams, and wanted my opinion on the subject. As I have made what is now called mental physiology a special study during my life at sea, I gave him what may be called the latest views of experts. Theories they are to a great extent, of course, but still they are based upon observation and careful synthesis. There is another subject which 1 may as well mention, though I made no reference to it in my notes. He told me that when he was a young man in Ireland, he joined a secret society called “ The Boys to Do,” and that he acted very foolishly in entangling himself with people who — to judge by his remarks — were not very scrupulous. There were no marks of blood in the captain’s cabin. I examined the place carefully. There were no par¬ ticular signs of disturbance ; but for a few hours in the night the wind had blown half a gale, and this naturally upset things a bit. A man could have got through the window, but not without considerable difficulty ; or a man, if disabled, could have been thrust through. Captain Cassgrave was well built and strong, and he must first have been rendered quite unconscious, if he was the vic¬ tim of foul play, and was disposed of through the window. Cassgrave was a very unlikely man to lay violent hands on himself. He was a favourite with the crew and the passengers — deservedly so ; then, who was there to take his life ? Now in reference to the man Delaney : he was found at the bottom of the steerage companion-way at a time when he had no right to be there. He was then unconscious, and was bleeding from two wounds on the scalp. I had him removed to the sick-berth, where I carefully examined him. His skull was not fractured, so I bound up his wounds, and he soon re¬ covered consciousness. I did not apprehend any fatal results, but in four hours he was dead. There was no necessity for 2.j)0st mortem^ as I had no doubt that he died from effusion of blood on the brain. It is well known that effusion takes place slowly at first, and may be arrested by the effects of stupor from concussion, or by a portion of the blood coagulating about the ruptured orifices of the vessels ; but sooner or later — especially if the patient be excited the bleeding will recur, and destroy life. This is all I can say, and I am sorry it is not more conclusive ; but it would be well to see that man Boyd, whom I have mentioned previously. He may know something ; whether he will tell it or not is another matter. CHAPTER THJE FOURTH. THE CONTENTS OF THE SEALED BOTTLE. “I, Henry Moorhouse, Master of the barque Anna7tdale, bound from Dundee to Newcastle, in New South Wales, declare that on Tuesday, August 14th, 18 — , we were becalmed in S. Lat. 16*^ 20, W. Long. 5° 8', when the second mate, a Shetland man, called Logan, noticed something in the water, which Mystery of the Sea. looked like a sealed bottle. He called my attention to it, and I ordered a boat to be manned, knowing quite well that messages from sinking ships have often been preserved in that way, and believing that it is the duty of every sailor to obtain news, it pos¬ sible, of those who have found a watery grave. “ The bottle was brought to me, and I saw that my supposition was correct ; several bundles of paper were visible through the glass. The bottle looked as* if it might have contained pickles or French plums I have similar bottles on board the Annandale : they have short wide necks, so that bulky articles can be placed within them. The cork of this bottle had been completely covered with red sealing-wax, and the contents had suffered no damage from contact with the water. “ I proceeded to my cabin, and in the presence of James Carter, chief officer, and David Logan, second officer, the wax was removed and the cork withdrawn. The following is a full and correct statement of what the bottle contained : — “ A gold watch and chain, carefully wrapped in many thicknesses of paper. A purse, containing the sum of seven pounds four shillings : this was wrapped in several pieces of paper. A sheet of foolscap paper, folded and placed in an envelope, having the follow¬ ing direction written legibly upon it : ‘ The finder is requested to read what is enclosed, and to inform the nearest British Consul of its contents.’ “ I unfastened the envelope and read what follows : — “ ‘Tuesday, August 7th, 18 — . “‘On board the steamship A^itarctic, bound from Liverpool to Melbourne. “‘An explanation by John Cassgrave. “ ‘ I think it necessary that I should take some steps to put myself right in the eyes of the world, and, therefore, I am writing this brief account of what I did many years ago, that my friends may understand the reason for what is about to happen. When I was little more than a boy I joined a secret society in Cork, called “The Boys to Do.” I was young and. foolish. I did not think about the possible conse¬ quences to me of the oaths which I then took. The purpose of the society I must not explain, inasmuch as I bound myself to observe the strictest secrecy. As my life for many years has been spent at sea, except during the short periods when I have been in port, I have not kept up any connection with “ The Boys to Do,” and I ceased to regard myself as a member of* the association. During the last two years, however, there has been considerable activity manifested by “ The Boys,” and I have received a number of letters, reminding me of my obligations, and calling upon me to render what I call ridiculous service. My opinions on the subject have entirely changed, and I no longer sympathise with the objects which the society was founded to promote. I took no notice of the corre¬ spondence, and threatening letters were sent to me. Some came the last time I was at Melbourne, and I could see that they had been posted in Australia. During my last visit to England I was pestered all the time with warnings and threats. I resolved to

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279 Never Cleared Up; A Mystery of the Sea. take no notice of the insulting messages ; but in spite of myself the« subject has tormented me during the present voyage, and I have not been able to sleep without the help of drugs. When sleep has come to me, it has proved itself an enemy instead of a friend. Dreadful dreams have tormented me. Several times I have thought that a man entered my cabin to destroy me. I could see him, but was not able to offer any resistance. He bound me hand and foot, told me he was acting as the emissary of “ The Boys to Do,” and then began to thrust me through the window. When I expected to fall into the dark waters below, I awoke, and suffered agonies of dread. That “ The Boys ” have decreed my death, I do not doubt, because it was one of - but no, I will not betray the secret. In my dreams it has always been the same man who has entered my cabin ; his features seemed familiar to me, but I could not remember where I had seen him. To-day I recognised my foe. He is among the steerage passengers, and I have learnt that his name is Michael Delaney. Something tells me that I shall be killed, and I am resolved to make the truth known, in hope that my message may be picked up and pub¬ lished to the whole world. My watch and purse, together with this statement, I shall place in a bottle, securely protected, and I shall cast it into the water if I have the dream again. I believe the ship is full of conspirators. The crew, the passengers, even the women, have some connection with “The Boys to Do.” “ ‘ This statement I solemnly make, being at this present time in a sound condition of mind. “ ‘John Cassgrave.’ ” CHAPTER THE FIFTH. AN INTERVIEW WITH WILLIAM BOYD. BY STANLEY REED. I HAVE been requested by my friend Ernest Temple- more (who is on a visit to New Hope, in South Australia) to see a man called Boyd, and obtain from him, if possible, certain particulars in connection with the death of Michael Delaney, which occurred on board the steamship Antarctic, about the time of Cap¬ tain Cassgrave’s disappearance. I understood that Boyd was employed as a gardener by Griffith Myrtle- wood, an old squatter, who resides at Wattle Wild, not far from Melbourne. I know Myrtlewood, and so do a great many other people. The best plan, I thought, was to call and see him, and discover whether the gardener was still in his employment. Myrtle- wood is an awkward man to have dealings with ; he will tell you anything you do not want to know, but he will tell you nothing else. I asked him a few questions about Templemore and Miss Montgomery, but he treated those subjects with supreme contempt ; and he told iTfe all about his last visit home, and the strange events which happened onho3.vd the Antarctic during his return voyage. I soon learnt that Boyd was still with him ; and when I went out to see the grounds, I noticed the man, so that I might know him again. He was a tidy- looking fellow, from the North of England. To judge by his appearance, he was not likely to have had anything to do with a bloodthirsty lot of con¬ spirators. While Myrtlewood was finding fault with a carpen¬ ter who was at work on the premises, I arranged with Boyd to call and see me at my place in Melbourne. The man came punctually at the time agreed upon,, and expressed his willingness to give me any infor¬ mation in his power. “ My name is William Boyd,” he said, “and 1 am a native of Maltby, in the East Riding of Yorkshire. I was originally a farm labourer, but I picked up a decent knowledge of gardening and of a few other trades, and I thought I would emigrate, because people told me that a Jack-of-all-trades was like¬ lier to do well out here than in England.” “ How did you make the acquaintance of Michael. Delaney ?” I asked. “ His berth was next to mine on the ship,” he replied, “ and as neither of us knew anybody there, we naturally took to each other. Delaney was quiet for an Irishman ; but he had whiskey with him, and he was fond of it. I am a teetotaller myself, and I think Delaney liked me for that, because he asked me more than once to watch him, and not let him drink too* much. He was only once what is called ‘ over the mark,’ and then he was angry with himself afterwards. He wanted to know whether he had been talking,, and what he had said. But I told him it was all blarney and nonsense, and that appeared to satisfy him.” “ Had he said anything particular ?” “ Not that I can remember. I never pay much attention to a drunken man’s talk — it is never edi¬ fying.” “ Do you think he was drunk when he fell down the companion-way ?” “ He may have been, but I cannot tell. I turned in at ten o’clock, and fell asleep. It was just before daybreak when Delaney was found.” “ Do you think he had anything to do with Captaia Cassgrave’s disappearance ? ” I asked. Boyd was surprised at this question, and replied — “ Such a thought never entered my mind. I must say, however, that when I saw Delaney in the sick- bunk I told him the captain could not be found,, and he made some remark about it being a good job ; but I thought the poor fellow was rambling in his mind. That was a few minutes before he died.” “ He sent for you to ask a special favour of you, did. he not ? ” “ Yes ; that was peculiar, but he explained it at the time. He said he had some love-letters sewed inside his waistcoat, and he made me promise to destroy them if he died. I was to destroy them without opening them, or allowing anybody else to do so. I got his waistcoat then, and took from inside the lining three or four letters. These I tied in a bundle with a big clasp-knife, to sink them ; and I promised him that if he died I would throw the bundle overboard

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r !. 280 “what the bottle contained" [p. 278). at once ; but if he recovered I would return it to him.” “He did not give you the sweetheart’s address, I suppose ? ” “ No ; he said she was dead. A man called Molloy was to meet him at Melbourne. That was the only name mentioned. Molloy came on board when we reached port, and Delaney’s things were^ given to him by the purser.” “ And what had you done with the letters ? ” “ The moment I heard the doctor say that Delaney was dead, I went on deck and threw the bundle over¬ board. It sunk immediately, for the knife was heavy.” “You did not notice any marks on the knife, I suppose } ” “ No ; it was nearly new. Delaney said it was a present, and he wanted it to go with the letters. I thought the poor fellow was demented, and a bit superstitious, too ; but my word was given, and I did what I had promised.” “ Have you seen anything of Molloy ? ” I asked, in conclusion. “ I have not seen him since he left the ship with Delaney’s chest,” was the reply. This is all I have to record ; but I cannot close without expressing the hope that England will send many men to Australia of William Boyd^ stamp. CHAPTER THE SIXTH. ERNEST TEMPLEMORE’S CONCLUSION. When Captain Moorhouse, of the barque A7inan- dale^ made known that he had discovered a sealed bottle in the Atlantic, about a week .after the dis¬ appearance of Captain Cassgrave, and near the spot where the Aiitarctic must have been at that time, and when he revealed the contents of the paper which was enclosed with various valuable articles dn the bottle, my dear Janet became very anxious for me to use my best endeavours to clear up this perplexing mystery, if possible. “ You shall have a full explanation as a wedding present,” I said, believing then that the strange affair would become clear and simple when all the evidence was carefully sifted. Mr. and Mrs. Armour had already learnt that the visitor who came from the other side of the world to cheer their childless home was purposing to bless another habitation with her presence. If Mr. Armour had known that Janet was in danger of falling a prey to the “ wiles of a gay callant ” (that is the compli¬ mentary name which he gives to me), I think even at his age he would have fetched dear Janet himself, and it would have required a skilful and persevering wooer to get near her. But it was not to be, and I am certain their loss will prove my unspeakable gain. Part of my promise to Janet will be fulfilled. To¬ morrow I shall be able to give her a full account of the discoveries which I have made, including her own contribution to the record. (It is not often that lovers’ presents are returned in such a manner.) But I cannot say that everything is clear. I hoped that Stanley Reed would be able to find .the missing link in William Boyd’s possession, but I was mistaken. Stanley is to be at my wedding, and to act as grooms¬ man ; he promises to make amends for any disap¬ pointment which I may feel in connectfon with his past services by seeing that the marriage ceremony is satisfactorily performed. I suppose I must be content with that. Perhaps in the future what puzzles us now will be made clear. That Delaney intended to kill Captain

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Savoury Dishes for Spring. 281 Cassgrave I have no doubt, but whether he did it or not is another question. I cannot help regretting the destruction of Delaney’s letters. They might have thrown a lurid light on a foul conspiracy. Nobody can blame Boyd for acting as he did under the cir¬ cumstances, but I am convinced the simple-minded fellow was deceived. After reading Stanley Reed’s communication, I set the police to work in Melbourne, in the hope that Molloy might be found. But they were too late ; he had gone away to America, it was thought. Time may show, or perhaps these mysteries must be left to the all-revealing eternity. This one thing I will say : a nobler-hearted man than Captain Cassgrave it was never my fortune to know ; and I had no suspicion that in the thought¬ lessness of youth he had banded himself with men who, in their lawlessness, have no scruples or com¬ punction. The shadow of that early indiscretion fell across his years, and I am afraid it darkened his closing hours. There is truth in what Myrtlewood said the last time I saw him. He was not referring to this subject, I may remark, but there is truth in his words. He said — “Fools may tie a knot with their tongues which they cannot untie with their teeth.” THE END. SAVOURY DISHES FOR SPRING. HERE are few people who have not experienced the desire for change in diet as soon as balmy spring ap¬ pears ; indeed, there is no time of the year, perhaps, when the appetite is more capricious, especially of those who, if not actually ill, may be classed as “not of the strongest”; and as, in many cases, there is partial (and sometimes total) disinclination for animal food, I will in the following hints, depending mainly on fish, eggs, and the various products of the vegetable world, detail some cheap and easy dishes suitable for this season. First, to turn to fish ; any of the white varieties, as soles, plaice, whiting, turbot, flounders, &c., are suitable for use in carrying out the following recipes, and in each case a idiSty plat may be had at little expense. For Fricassee of Fish the washing process must be quickly performed, in order to retain the flavour, and be followed by careful drying and trimming, and the division of the fish into convenient pieces for serving. To each pound half a pint of hot water should be added, with a few white peppercorns, a bunch of herbs, a tiny bit of mace, and a little salt. After stewing until the flesh looks white at the bone, the fish should be dished in a circle or pyramid, and kept hot while the sauce is prepared, simply by straining the liquor and thickening it with an ounce each of corn-flour and butter (the corn-flour to be smoothly mixed with cold milk), allowing it to boil up well, then adding, off the fire, the yolk of one egg, beating hard for several minutes ; lemon-juice or vinegar, or essence of anchovies or shrimps, may be added to flavour. The stewpan should be set near the fire for a minute — on no account must it boil again— until the sauce is hot, when it should be poured over the fish. Not the least recom¬ mendation of a dish of this sort is that the nutriment of the fish is retained to the full, while, unfortunately, when fish is served plainly boiled much is lost in the water. This is a fitting opportunity to call attention to the superiority of steamed over boiled fish, espe cially when any is required for re-serving in some of its numerous appetising forms. Apropos of fish rechaufiTes^ I would recommend a particularly nice one in the form of a puddingy for which a round cake- tin is needed ; it should be brushed well all over the inside with liquefied butter, afterwards coated with bread-crumbs and filled with alternate layers of the following, in the order given : — Mashed potatoes ; any cooked fish, freed from skin and bone, and flaked ; enough sauce to cover the fish ; some boiled macaroni, cut into small pieces. The top layer should be potatoes, with the whole of which a raw egg must be well beaten. The proportions are : a pound of potatoes, a pound of fish, half a pint of sauce, and four ounces of macaroni. Bread-crumbs should be sprinkled over the top, and then moistened with a little butter, and the pudding baked in a good oven for half an hour or more, until well browned, when it will turn out and look as good as it will taste ; a little sauce to be poured round it just before serving. Here is a capital way of cooking a flat fish of any kind for a plain family dinner — a fish of three to four pounds in weight being recommended. First, after washing and drying, cut it down the centre on the white side, then raise the flesh from the bone, as if for fillets, but stopping when the fins are reached. Pre¬ pare a forcemeat as if for veal, using butter instead of suet, and a beaten egg to bind it — no milk. There should be at least a generous teacupful of the forcemeat. Spread it on the under-side of the raised flesh, then press it down to the bone again, and brush the top with milk or a beaten egg ; dredge it with bread¬ crumbs and bake in a tin, basting with a little hot fat (just as if cooking a joint of meat), in a moderate oven for thirty or forty minutes, according to the thickness of the fish. The surface should be well browned, and some sauce sent separately to table or poured round the fish. One made as follows can be depended upon as very appetising, though some may prefer a white

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282 Savoury Dishes for Spring. sauce : — Blend two ounces each of butter and flour in a stewpan, add a pint of stock from bones, if available, or made from a morsel of fresh meat ; failing that, use a dash of extract of meat ; add salt to taste, a table¬ spoonful of finely chopped capers, with twice that measure of their vinegar, and boil for five minutes. A word now on the kinds of fish usually classed as “oily’’; such are, undoubtedly, more satisfying, and, where they can be digested, more nourishing than white fish. All require care in the cooking, and it is well to choose those modes which detract from rather than add to their rich properties ; thus for mackerel there are few better ways than to remove the backbones, and coat the fish with a mixture of bread-crumbs, parsley, thyme, salt, cayenne pepper, and a grate of nutmeg, laying two mackerel together sandwich fashion, previous to baking in a tin, without any fat save enough to just smear the bqttom of the tin, and a sheet of white paper with which to cover the fish. It will be noted that this stuffing is dry — no fat, and n^ egg — for the simple reason that neither is needed, the fish itself being so rich. A sauce piqiiante may be served with them, ox gooseberry sauce, with a small quantity of brown gravy added, is very delicious ; so is a brown sauce containing some tomato conserve. Curries of fish are not only generally enjoyable, but the dish, if oily fish forms the foundation, may be ren¬ dered very wholesome — that is to say, a curry, or rather the ingredients which go to form the combina¬ tion, will nullify its richness, particularly if the curry paste or powder be of the best quality, and a good proportion of fruit and vegetables assists in its concoc¬ tion. For instance, rhubarb or gooseberries should form the basis of the sauce, an onion being added, as for meat curries, and simmered for a while in a little hot butter, the curry paste or powder being added next, with enough fish stock to bring it to the required con¬ sistency. For white fish, cream, if only a small quan¬ tity, is a desideratum, just as for oily fish brown stock or gravy is preferable. The flavourings for curries are innumerable, but in all cases lemon-juice or vinegar must not be omitted, either being added off the fire w^hen cream enters into the composition of the curry. The fish, if previously cooked, must be flaked only, and put into the sauce just long enough to become thoroughly heated. Fresh fish, naturally, makes the better curry; it should be divided into pieces just large enough to eat without further division. Eggs boiled hard, then sliced or quartered, form a suitable garnish, and boiled rice should be handed with the curry. Tarragon is a suitable addition to all fish curries, but it must be very cautiously used ; essence of tar¬ ragon is now sold in bottles, a few drops of which will flavour a curry, fish sauce, or salad to perfection. How seldom in England, except in the homes of the well-to-do, is a dish of rice seen at table in any other form than plainly boiled ! Yet recipes are numerous ; sometimes the rice is cooked in water until half done^ then put into stock or milk and boiled until it has absorbed it, and ever>^ grain is swollen and soft ; then the condiments ad lib. may be added, as chutnee, sweet pickles, raisins, &c. One very nice combination is an ounce or so of sultana raisins, a teaspoonful of curry paste and chopped pickles, or apple chutnee, and an ounce of grated Parmesan cheese, with half a pound of rice boiled in stock. After the added in¬ gredients have simmered for a short time the mixture should be piled on a hot dish, and served at once. Few dishes of this class, however, can excel that known as Risotto, made by boiling rice, piling it up on a dish, and seasoning it with salt and pepper, then covering it with a tomato puree, for which preserved tomatoes answer very well if carefully freed from skin. The best way is to simmer them for a short time, then rub them through a hair sieve. Finally, some grated cheese is sprinkled all over, all Parmesan being used, or a mixture of that with some other kind ; any English cheese will do if dry enough to grate. The heat of the tomato purie will liquefy the cheese, though, in my opinion, it is preferable, and more digestible, dissolved first in a small quantity of milk until it resembles thick custard. When macaroni or other Italian pastes are employed instead of rice for this, the dish becomes sparghetti. One hesitates to mention cream in a paper on cheap cookery, and yet relatively the dish for which it is in¬ tended need not be extravagant ; indeed, it will pro¬ bably cost less than the hot joint, which at this season some such dainty as a mayonnaise of lobster or salmon might with advantage supplant. A tin of either of the just-named fish will answer as well as fresh, and with a good supply of lettuces and half a pint of dressing, consisting of two yolks of eggs, a gill each of cream and salad oil, with a little French vinegar, and the usual seasonings, a real dainty is obtainable at com¬ paratively small cost. A cheaper dressing is obtained by using a floury potato as a basis instead of eggs. Another nice salad is to be had from cold meat — say veal — the bones of which should be boiled down for stock, which is strained and left until it begins to set ; it can then be whipped up lightly with an equal quan¬ tity of mayonnaise or other dressing, or placed about the salad in little heaps, the sauce to be poured over as usual. By using the stock in this way economy is practised, and extra flavour imparted. In summer time, in carrying out the same method, it is advisable to add a little dissolved gelatine to the bone stock. 1 give, in conclusion, with full confidence that it will be appreciated, a Ghteaii de Lobster. It should be eaten while hot, but is eatable when cold. Pour a small tumblerful of hot milk over the same measure of bread-crumbs, cover until cold, then stir in a table¬ spoonful of fried parsley mixed with a grate of nut¬ meg, a saltspoonful of pepper, and a teaspoonful of salt ; add two eggs and mix well ; mince a lobster (tin¬ ned will answer), add it to the rest, then put the mix¬ ture into a mould, well buttered, and coated with bread¬ crumbs. Shake more crumbs on the top, and add a few small pieces of butter. Bake in a rather quick oven twenty to forty minutes, according to depth of tin. It should feel firm, and turn out easily. If there is any coral in the tin of lobster, reserve it for sprinkling over the the last thing. L. HERITAGE.

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283 ANNUALS IN THE FLOWER GARDEN. The month ot April, upon which we are just entering, may justly be called the month of gar¬ den resuscitation. But although the bitter winds of March are once more passed in the wild circus of time, still we must not congra¬ tulate ourselves as yet, as if we were altogether “ out of the wood.” An April frost is no¬ thing out of the common, and we must be prepared for it in all our half-acre operations this month. But what, some may ask, has all this croaking about the possibilities of a cold spring got to do with “annuals in the flower- garden ? ” Well, perhaps a good deal more than you think. If there is one month more than another in which we are busy over the sowing, rearing, forcing, and planting out of that class of delightful flowers known as annuals, it is the month of April, so a few hints as to some popular favourites in this family will be well adapted to make up our paper this month. What would our flower-gardens look like without the gaiety and variety of our annuals ? Yet here and there we have seen some, where the formality of cold fashion thinks proper to have for barely five months in the year a few isosceles and equilateral triangles of scarlet and scentless geranium, and empty beds for the remaining seven. Infinitely preferable, in our opinion, is the homely cottage where the solitary apple or cherry tree, breaking down with its load, perhaps overshadows the sow in the well-kept sty in the little back garden, but where the front garden is a veritable nosecrav for nine months out of the twelve. Our annuals, then, we shall naturally divide into two classes — the hardy and the half-hardy. First of all, though, how shall we clearly define each class so as to avoid confusion not only of the two, but confusion in our practical gardening ? What is a hardy annual ? Hardy annuals are those that may be fearlessly sown in the open flower-garden from the middle of March or, at all events, from the beginning of the present month, when the soil has got dried by the winds, and a little genial spring weather and sunshine have set in. But for the chance of getting some early bloom it is quite worth while to try the experiment of sowing some few of the hardiest seeds even a fortnight earlier, when, should some severe weather intervene, a little protection could be given in the usual way, but if you have selected a sheltered situation, or if your seeds have not shown above ground, there is probably little doubt that you will succeed in obtaining some pro¬ portionately early bloom. Then, again, subsequently to the great sowing season which is now upon us in full swing, we can go on with some fortnightly sowing of hardy annual seed in the open flower garden quite up to the middle of July, and the last sown will afford us some flowers late into the autumn. Or taking the other side of the question, if you are wish¬ ing for a very early bloom, hardy annuals can be sown in February in a gentle hot-bed, and after they are up they can be moved to a cooler place or cold frame, and thus gradually hardened off to display their flowering beauties as soon as the season will admit of it. These, then, are hardy annuals. Half-hardy annuals, on the other hand, are those that in all cases require sowing in artificial warinth. Only a moderate heat, however, is necessary, so that there is no need whatever to think that the possession of a tropical house all the year round is essential for the cultivation of half-hardy annuals. These seeds can be sown in pans or pots and placed in a garden frame, even where the heat is half gone. When your little plants are large enough for careful manipu¬ lation, “ prick ” them out into other pans of similar compost, but at a little distance from each other, and replace them in the same frame. When they have got still larger they had better be again shifted, putting three of them into “ sixty ”-sized pots. Do not expose your half-hardy annuals to the open air until the general bedding-out time has quite set in, but before that time they ought to share fully in the hardening-off process to which most greenhouse plants are during April subjected. Your plants can be readily trans¬ ferred to the open border from the small pots when the transformation scene of bedding out takes place in the middle of May. And now for a few instructions under each head — taking first the hardy annuals. Iberis odorata^ or the white candytuft, flowers very freely in June and July, about a foot from the ground ; the purple specimen, Iberis umbellata^ is a particularly hardy one, flowering at the same time, and would almost stand a mild winter if sown the previous autumn. Then, again, we might notice the saffron- coloured escholtzia, which flowers about the same time — its habit is to spread ; the Californian species is of a brighter yellow. We need not, however^ be too concise in our description of favourites such as our hardy annuals ; to name a few others is almost suffi¬ cient for our purpose. The convolvulus minor is well known ; the convolvulus major, however, is half-hardy, and must be treated as such. Then we have the variety of colour afforded us by the Delphinmm^ i.e., the larkspur, whether of the dwarf or the branching specimen. The nemophila, again, blue with a white centre, and the Nemophila atomaria^ or spotted speci¬ men, which is particularly hardy, is well known. But where shall we stop if we go into detail over hardy annuals? The ten-week stock, the slender lobelia, the fragrant Martynia, of a rich purple, arc among those we think of that belong to the half-hardy tribe. Our old friend the hardy sweet pea can, when sown thickly, be made to answer the purpose of a temporary

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284 ^ hedge, and in a measure is capable of partially hiding an ugly corner in the summer, if, indeed, there ought to be any ugly corner at such a time. An ugly corner in the winter is some¬ times difficult to avoid. The petunia is best treated as a half-hardy annual, is very useful in the garden, and will flower from Midsummer to Michaelmas. The poppy, again, is a very showy fellow, and in July its brilliancy of colour gives us plenty to look at ; it is very hardy, but care should be taken in the arrange¬ ment of our annuals as to their colour ; so large is our choice, and so various their shade, that there is really no excuse for any unhappy or incongruous mixture, which can only serve as an eyesore. Espe¬ cially is this hint valuable in the month which ^ precedes our general bedding-out, for quite by the middle of April we begin the harden- y, % ing - off process, which minimises our Ayq chances of failure, and insures neatness A -11 \\v M in the early summer. ^ ^ I

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LETTERS FROM THE PLANETS. CANAL LIFE ON MARS.* ORNING came. The bright sun shone into the metal- adorned dwelling : the same glorious sun as we had known at home, and as you behold on Earth, to which indeed all Earth life — plants, animals, men — owes vitality and heat. It shone on the ornate and bright metal pavement of copper and tin ; it shone on the metal walls, and was reflected upon us. We arose, and left the dwelling to look on the forest around. There were the crimson trees in rich splen¬ dour, through whose glinting foliage the ruddy rays of the sunlight pierced. There were the rocks rising over the tall metal dome of the house ; there in an opening appeared the distant green sea and the summit of far-off snowy mountains. Red, white, and green— all were commingled in that glowing spec¬ tacle. We returned to the house. Our kind but gigantic host welcomed us on our return, and said to me — ‘Hf you wish to see the canals, the electric boat is at your service. You may take a long voyage in it, if you like.” “ We should indeed,” I said. “ I wish my com¬ panion to see the great canals of your wonderful world. But how shall we manage about disguise ? ” “ I have some garments of our children, which may suit you as disguises if no one comes near our boat ; and if they do, perchance they may not observe that you are of an order of beings different from ourselves.” So he lifted the portcullis, which served for an inner door, and shortly came forth with our kind hostess, Alehiro, who brought with her the robes of metal scales and glass fibre which her children used. They were beautiful glittering robes, though very different from ours. However, we easily wrapped ourselves in them, and, covering our heads with metallic helms, looked like two Martian children. A little vessel wa*^ floating on the green canal waters, chained to the shore. Our host- drew it towards him and entered it. He beckoned to us to do the same. We stepped on board, and lay on the couch which was in the bow. The boat was shaped like a torpedo boat, for throughout the universe the laws of mathematics and mechanics must be the same, and thus the principle of the least possible resistance must be the same, even as far as the attendant worlds ^of Sirius or Alcyone. Our Martian host touched a brass knob in the bow, and rapidly and silently the boat was propelled upon the green waters. Forward we swept along the straight reach, with ruddy foliage on either side rising in crimson glories, gorgeous in the sun’s light. Here and there amid ♦ See “Our Second Voyage to Mars”— Cassell’s Magazine, 1889. Page 166. the red leaves were the glittering metal domes of dwellings. On the shore strange forms of living beings, of shapes unknown to Earth or Venus, might be seen, while others were in the water or flying in the air above. It is true that the types of life are the same throughout the solar system, and thus you, on Earth, may have all the various forms in which it is developed. But still, as there is underlying unity, there is also an infinite diversity in creation. Thus, although the forms of Earth’s animal and vegetable life were there, they were all distinct from those you have on Earth. No animal was the same as that you have here, nor even very like it, although in many forms of life the type of some of the animals which you see on Earth, and such as we have with us, could be traced. Then, again, developments of life, such as are very rare on Earth, were here most common ; and those which on Earth are small were here gigantic ; while, on the other hand, animals which on earth are very common— the horse, the bull, the sheep, the sparrow, the finch — could not be seen at all, nor any creature like them. Thus the scene before me was one of life and motion, for Mars is made to support life as much as the Earth ; but still each and every development of life was distinct from what men see, and the whole scene was like the monstrous imagination of a disordered dream. Still each creature was formed in perfect harmony with its position in creation, and many were very beautiful in glowing colours and in graceful forms. You need not wonder that in another world the forms of life are different from those on Earth, for is not (even on Earth) marine life distinct from terres¬ trial, though belonging to the same planet ? and even on the land in past ages forms have prevailed and been highly developed, which now are rare and small : the trilobites of the ancient seas, the silures, the plants of the carboniferous era, the iguanodons, and ichthyosauri, and plesiosauri of secondary ages. These are but Earthly creatures, though of Earth’s infancy^ and such as man might suppose fitted for another planet. Nay, more, even on Earth at this time are not the flora and fauna of Australia different from those of Europe ? How different must be the life on another planet, even though one so like Earth as is Mars ! On we dashed over the green waters embosomed by the crimson forests and fields, till we came to a wide reach, which stretched for eight miles wide, and extended for a thousand miles and more (as our con¬ ductor told us) from sea to sea. Its shores were perfectly straight, and it looked like a vast river — like the Mississippi or Amazon on Earth — indeed, no river on Earth in continuous width approaches its size. But it was all the result of the industry and command over nature of the Martians. Rivers had been straightened, lowlands had been submerged, hills had been blown up, whole territories had been altered

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286 Letters from the Planets. Martians, with domed houses of bright metal, which glittered in the sun, and in the midst what looked like huge statues, but which, as I imagined, were also the residences or public buildings of the citizens. At each end was a great engine, where it was manifest force was being generated (probably steam, for smoke was issuing from and changed in aspect, to make that huge canal, or rather submerged land, through which the fertilisingwaters flowed, to bring moisture and life to the immense sub- " FORWARD WE SWEPT” [p. 285). marine fields of vegetation which grew there. Com¬ pared to this, the Suez Canal or the greatest ship canals of Earth were but as the little gutters dug by a child for an afternoon’s amusement. Moving on the vast canal, or rather artificial sound, about a mile from us, there was a floating city, resting upon huge pontoons, nearly a mile long, and about a quarter of a mile wide. Each end of the city was narrowed to a point, so its form was not unlike that of a river steamer, only its size as compared with the greatest ocean liners, like the City of Rome or the Oceana, was as these are to the little ships of your forefathers. The pontoons themselves were enormous vessels, larger than any ship you have on earth. They were bound together in rows, and a pointed one was in the head at each side, acting as a cut-water. The city was formed like the usual towns of the one 01 Lneni;. “ Why do not they build their city on one huge ship ? I see it rests on pontoons.” “ For fear ot accidents. Should a vast ship, capable of supporting such a city as that, meet with an accident — get into shallow water or strike a rock —the loss and risk would be terrible. But now that city has twenty-two pon¬ toons on which to rest. Should any accident befall one of these, it can be removed and replaced by another, which may be obtained in any of the cities on the bank. The city is then uninjured.” “ Are those great statues or houses that I see ?” “That lofty statue of a Martian lady is only the representation of a heroine who lived in this floating city of Golonor five hundred years ago. It was in the bad old days, when we had wars in our land. A king of one of the countries the city passed through stopped it, and seized it for ransom, and wanted to enslave the people. They were yielding themselves to slavery, but she roused them to arms, and set her¬ self at their head. They gained the victory, but she was killed. So in her memory they made a statue of her, and put it in the city ; not a solid statue, but a hollow one, so that some of her descendants might live in it. They live there to this day.” “In the old war times you speak of, these floating cities must have been exposed to frequent dangers.’^ “ Very true, they were ; and this was one of the arguments that were urged agcinst war in the final Peace Congress. They said, even supposing the in¬ habitants of the land could dwell in peace in their homesteads, those who lived on the seas and rivers were cosrnopolites, and ought to be able to go every¬ where. Then, again, you see how much of our food is derived from the waters. It was most unjust for those who lived on the shores to claim all the food supplies near them. So we declared all the waters free, and all in them, and thus we made the way to^ making the land free, and all nations in amity.” “ On Earth,” I said, “ things may tend in this direction. By the law of the nations of Earth the high seas are the property of all, and international law alone rules there. If seas were a chief source of human food, and if, as I see here, a large portion of mankind — men, women, and children — lived upon the

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Letters from the Planets. sea, we should find something of this state of things. But however have you obtained force to make these vast canals ? Have all nations combined ? “ Yes, we have now immense control of nature’s forces, as you know. By the action of nature’s powers we can mould her to our will. These canals are the works of centuries, wrought by a whole world at peace. The force we once wasted in wars against each other we now use in overcoming nature’s obstacles : in sinking land and flooding it with water when we need it ; in piercing mountains and moulding them to our purposes ; in widening rivers and making them straight. We can do almost what we will with nature, by the kind and loving permission of our Divine Creator, for we are a world at peace and com¬ bined, and a thousand millions of Martians with machinery and science at their disposal can, in a few centuries, do almost anything to mould the surface of our planet to our utility.” “ But tell me,” said my companion, “ what is that other huge statue two hundred feet high that I see right in the very centre of the floating city ? ” “That is merely the Town Hall, where the citizens assemble for public business. The figure represents the city of Golonor. It is the symbol they know it by from the shore, as it floats from sea to sea.” We soon got ahead of the floating city of Golonor, when another appeared going the opposite way. It was still larger, about a mile and a half long, and had seven immense towers rising from its metal domes. “ How can the inhabitants of these cities get food I asked. “ Do you not remember,” asked my guide, “ that most of our food is floating on the waters, not attached to the land ? Those vast aquatic fields offer an almost endless stock of food.” He pointed to the great fields of what were more 287 like huge algae than anything on Earth, the vast marine plants that floated on the canals, some as big as forest trees. Many of the singular changes and variations in tint of Martian seas which even Earth’s astronomers have noticed are due to the tinting of the great waters by these vast fields of marine vegeta¬ tion. As on Earth men and cattle are mainly sup¬ ported by the grasses and corn, so in Mars it is the aquatic plants in the canals and seas that are the main supports of life. Hence the need for the vast system of irrigation. On Earth the rice plant is the chief marsh plant that provides man with food. Here vast fields and aquatic forests laden with tons of food, transforming the oxygen and carbon of atmos¬ phere and water into food, waved hither and thither in the watery currents, and varied with many tints the green waters. On we floated in the centre of the stream amidst these submarine forests, passing now in one direction, now in another, the floating cities which slowly and majestically moved through the vast canals. We had not proceeded above fifty miles before we came to another huge sound — or rather canal, stretch¬ ing one hundred miles to the north, cutting our canal at right angles. On its waters were two floating cities, and vast forests of vegetation waving in the currents, with their great leaves floating like water-lilies. Forward we went, and then, some twenty miles on, another canal, with a city built on the shore at the confluence, opened to view. So we went on pass¬ ing cities and forests, both on sea and land, on this huge masterpiece of the marvellous skill and power of the Martians — an achievement as far superior to any man has yet achieved in this age of steam and iron, as the works of human skill in the nineteenth cen¬ tury are superior to the works of man in the Stone Age. Aleriel. THE FLOATING CITY.

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By KATE EYRE, Author of “For the Good of the Family,” “A Step in the Dark,” &c. <&c. CHAPTER THE SEVENTEENTH. 'all’s fair. in love and war.” As soon as Mr. gale^s Nightin- voice was recog¬ nised, all those who were congregated outside Sophy’s door rushed down to the hall. The expectant bride¬ groom, who was gesticula- ■ ting wildly and crying aloud for vengeance, was in such an excited state, that it was _ some time before his interrogators could understand what had occurred. By degrees, however, the following facts came to light Mr. Nightingale and his best man had repaired to the church at the appointed time. Just outside the porch they were met by Sophy herself. But she was not alone : on the contrary, she was leaning on the arm of Mr. Edward Charrington. To meet one’s bride in the porch twenty minutes before she is due, lean¬ ing on the arm of a young man who has not been in¬ vited to be present at the ceremony, is in itself a suspicious circumstance ; and for the lady to be look¬ ing mischievous beyond description does not tend to dissipate one’s fears. Under these trying circum¬ stances, Mr. Nightingale was certainly justified in his demand for an explanation. “ Miss Dacre,” said he, “may I ask what is the meaning of this ? ” “ Excuse me, sir,” put in Ted Charrington, politely raising his hat; “but this lady is no longer Miss Dacre. She has just done me the honour of becoming Mrs. Edward Charrington.” “Yes ; and we have been|jjvvaiting here for a quarter of an hour, having come straight from the registry- office on purpose to give you early intimation of the event, as we thought you might perhaps feel interested,” chimed in Sophy. Mr. Nightingale fumed and raged, declaring he would take steps to nullify the marriage. In the midst of the excitement a carriage drew up, into which stepped Mr. Edward Charrington and his wife. Then, as the happy pair drove off, Sophy saucily kissed her hand to her ex-lover, saying she was afraid he was rather “ up a tree,” but that being a Nightin¬ gale, he ought not to mind. This, then, was the explanation of Sophy’s all- absorbing interest in her trousseau ; her indifference to the replenishings of Mr. Nightingale’s house ; her firmness in declining to have her clothes marked ; her anxiety that her boxes should be sent down to the station over-night ; and her deeply rooted desire to be married in her travelling-dress. Mr. Nightingale was furious, and permitted his anger to get the better of his discretion. He was not the man, he declared, to allow a girl hardly out of her teens to make a laughing-stock of him before all his friends with impunity. He believed it had all been planned from the very first. The whole family had combined to rob him — yes, rob him : that was the right expression. But he would be revenged on them — here he shot a meaning glance at Mr. Dacre, who quailed beneath it ; he would make his wrongs known far and wide ; he would enter an action against Sophy for breach of promise of marriage, and would force her to deliver up in open court the valuable presents he had made her. At that moment a messenger arrived from the railway-station, bringing a good-sized parcel addressed to Mr. Nightingale, which was found to contain every¬ thing he had bestowed on Sophy since he had been her affianced husband ; a short note from Edward Charrington to Mr. Dacre, announcing, in melodra¬ matic phraseology, his marriage, and the address of a rural retreat, for which the newly wedded pair were en route, with a postscript, added by Sophy herself, in which she craved her father’s forgiveness, and sent her love to all the members of the family ; and a somewhat lengthy epistle from Sophy to Mabyn Littledale, which had been written the previous even¬ ing. “ When you receive this,” ran the letter, “ I shall be Ted’s wife. I have been burning to tell you all about it ever since we first made our arrangements, but Ted made me promise solemnly not to breathe a word to anybody — consign the secret to the keeping of another breast was, if I remember rightly, his expres¬ sion. He always uses high-flown language when he has really serious business on hand. I’m most awfully sorry to have deceived everybody so. And I do so hope that you, and all the rest, will forgive me. I shan’t be happy if you don’t, although I do love Ted so dearly. You see, I told Mr. Nightingale quite plainly how fond Ted and I were of each other, and papa knew it too ; but they both pretended to think that I did not mean what I said, so I was obliged to prove to them how much in earnest I was. I don’t fancy mamma and Philip will mind much, for 1 don’t believe either of them really approved of my be¬ trothal to Mr. Nightingale. Ted is so happy. If papa had consented to our engagement when Ted asked him to do so, and we had been married in a humdrum fashion, I don’t believe Ted would have cared half as much about it. I don’t half like the idea of being married in a registry-office, myself ; but Ted says it can’t be helped, and I am not to mind. Ted says he thinks his brother Fred will be most awfully surprised when he hears the news. Ted declares Fred doesn’t care anything at all about girls himself, and he

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289 will never understand how miserable Ted would have been if I had married Mr. Nightingale. I did really and truly intend to marry Mr. Nightingale when I was first engaged to him, papa seemed so set on it. I wouldn’t have accepted him at all if I hadn’t meant it at the time ; but it was so dreadful feeling that I was going to be his wife, and loathing him more and more every day. And then Ted declared that if I persisted in carrying out what he termed my infamous design, he would drown himself on my wedding day— sink despairing into a watery grave at the moment in which I became Sophia Nightingale— as he put it — that really, you know, Mabyn dear, I was down¬ right obliged to do as he suggested. I don’t suppose he would really have drowned himself ; but I do believe that he would have been Very, very unhappy.” Mabyn was so thrilled with excitement as she read this letter that she hardly knew whether she was most pleased or grieved by what had occurred. That Sophy’s happiness should be sacrificed to her father’s love of wealth did seem to her a very terrible thing but then, on the other hand, the method by which Sophy had effected her escape was altogether opposed to Mabyn’s ideas of right and wrong. She would have sympathised with her warmly had she been firm in her refusal to become Mr. Nightingale’s wife, no matter with what severity Mr. Dacre had urged such a course upon her. But to have deceived them all, as Sophy had done ; to have got her extensive trousseau 739

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290 To BE Given up. by false pretences ; to have made a downright fool of a man, who was probably incapable of realising that in desiring to make her his wife he was doing her an injury, and to glory, as Sophy had evidently gloried, in his discomfiture, did seem to Mabyn to be behav¬ ing in a manner that was at once mean and cowardly. In all this Mabyn was a little hard on Sophy, judging her actions by the same standard as she would have criticised her own, and making no allow¬ ance for difference of temperament and environment. When Mabyn looked up, after having read her letter, she found she was standing close to Mrs. Dacre. “Oh, Mabyn,” whispered that lady, “ I can’t help feeling glad. Julia was so pleased about it, but I never liked it — never. I would rather see her ever so poor than the wife of a man she did not love. And I think Fred Charrington will help them : he is so very generous.” The tears were running down Mrs. Dacre’s cheeks as she spoke, and her voice shook until it was hardly audible. Mabyn looked at her in surprise. If she had so strongly disapproved of the intended marriage, why had she not interfered to prevent it ? That was the question which Mabyn’s eyes were asking, although her lips remained closed. “ My dear, he was so set on it. I have never seen him so anxious for anything before. I did beg and entreat him not to force it on her ; and I never saw him so angry.” Here the terror in Mrs. Dacre’s eyes filled Mabyn with alarm. “Mabyn, it was dreadful, dreadful ! ” continued the poor woman. “ What was I to do? You don’t know what it is to be married, my dear : you are just as powerless as if you were chained hand and foot ; you have nothing of your own ever again — body, mind, and conscience are all in your husband’s keeping. It is always so, but when he is kind and good you don’t seem to feel the bondage. I can’t think why he was so eager for it,” said Mrs. Dacre, again reverting to Sophy’s engagement to Mr. Nightingale. “ He seemed as if he could not rest until it was settled. And yet he was fond of Sophy ; she used to be his favourite.” “ Had you not better lie down for a little while ? you are looking so exhausted,” suggested Mabyn, hardly knowing what to say in reply to this strange confidence. Mrs. Dacre glanced timidly in the direction of her husband, almost as if she expected him to punish her there and then. “He will blame me for what has happened,” she whispered to Mabyn. “ I wouldn’t urge her to accept Mr. Nightingale. I told her she must do as she herself thought best. He will think it is all my fault now.” Mabyfi glanced at Mr. Dacre. The man was quiet, quieter than she had ever yet seen him. His eyes were fixed on Mr. Nightingale, and every now and again he put in a word, meant to pacify the disap¬ pointed bridegroom. But not one syllable did he utter of anger against Sophy. It almost seemed as if he were too dazed to give vent to his passion. Mabyn drew Mrs. Dacre’s arm within her own. “Do let me lead you to your sofa. I am afraid you will be quite ill to-morrow if you do not rest now.” Mrs. Dacre acquiesced silently, and Mabyn had soon placed her so that she could rest comfortably. “ I can’t think why he was so anxious for it,” re¬ iterated the poor woman, holding Mabyn’s hand as if she was afraid of being left alone. “He never tells me about his alfairs. Oh, my dear, I do so hope nothing dreadful is going to happen ! ” “ Nothing that can happen will be so dreadful as it would have been for Sophy to have married Mr. Nightingale when she loved Mr. Charrington, dear Mrs. Dacre,” said Mabyn, soothingly. “ Miss Littledaie is quite right, mother : nothing could have been worse than that. I had no idea of what was going on. From what my father said, I thought Sophy was well pleased with her bargain.” Philip had come into the room just in time to over¬ hear Mabyn’s attempt at consolation. He was thoroughly upset by what had happened. Not living at home, he was not so conversant as were the others with all the little details of family life at Southfields. Moreover, his thoughts had lately been occupied almost exclusively with his efforts to win Miss Eastabrook’s regard. So that when he was told of Sophy’s engagement, although the news surprised him, he was far from suspecting the amount of pressure which had been brought to bear on his sister in order to induce her to accept Mr. Nightingale as her future husband. The man was wealthy, and Sophy was ac¬ customed to luxury : such was Mr. Dacre’s explanation of the situation ; and Philip, although in the past he had often had cause to question the truth ofhis father’s statements, had been too much absorbed in his own affairs to get to the root of the matter. “ Poor girl ! You must not blame her, Philip. Her father forced her into it. I never knew him so per¬ sistent about anything before.” “ But, mother, why didn’t you tell me what was going on ? I could at least have told my father what I thought of the arrangement.” Mabyn had started when she heard Philip’s voice, and would now have made good her escape, had not Mrs. Dacre still retained her hand. As for Philip, he seemed hardly conscious of her presence, as, with knitted brow and flaming eyes, he stood by his mother’s sofa, pulling savagely at his moustache. “ My dear boy, don’t be angry with me. I didn’t dare to tell you what was going on. I wouldn’t per¬ suade Sophy to marry Mr. Nightingale ; no, not all that your father said to me would induce me to do that. But oh, Philip, if you could only know what I have suffered ! ” He bent down and kissed her tenderly enough, although the angry expression had not died out of his. eyes. “ Poor mother ! poor dear little mother ! ” he mur¬ mured. “ Philip, I can’t think what has come to him lately. He never used to be like this. He was pas¬ sionate always, and would brook no opposition. But

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To BE Given up. tjow he never seems to rest. Philip, I am positively afraid of him.” Mrs. Dacre whispered the words hoarsely into her son’s ear, and then glanced nervously round the room, as if she were afraid that the very walls would betray her. She and her son were alone together, for Mabyn had managed to steal out of the room unobserved. “Nonsense, mother dearest; you mustn’t allow yourself to get nervous. Sophy should have been firm. Had she refused to marry Mr. Nightingale, no one could have forced her to do so.” Mrs. Dacre shook her head. ‘‘ He would have starved her into submission, if nothing else would have done it. Philip, you don’t know him, dear, as I do. All the years we have been married, he has never once given way to me.” Philip looked down fondly and sadly at his mother, thinking, perhaps, that if she had been firmer her husband would have been less of a tyrant. “ Poor mother ! ” again he murmured, gently strok¬ ing her hand. “Not that I mean he has always been unkind to Tne, my dear ; sometimes he has seemed to find delight in lavishing all sorts of things on me. But he has been my master in everything ; he has ruled me with a rod of iron, and I have had to bend beneath it, until now I seem to have lost the power of exercising my own judgment.” He could answer her only with a caress. “What are they all going to do.^” she presently asked, speaking of the guests who had been bidden to the marriage feast. “ Mr. Nightingale and most of his personal friends hard left before I came in here. I hardly knew how to look the man in the face after the treatment he had received at our hands. It is the first time I have ever had to offer an apology that I felt would not be .accepted. The rest of the people are still offering their condolences to my father. I suppose they will soon be leaving. Ju will see them off the premises. She seems equal to the occasion.” “Yes, she will feel the mortification acutely; but few will guess it from her manner. Poor girl ! I am glad now that Sir Bevan and Lady Dudson declined. She was dreadfully annoyed about it at the time ; but it was all for the best, as things have turned •out.” “ Why did they refuse ? ” “ They said it was too far to come.” “Too far ! But they could have driven over.” “ Oh, of course ; it was only an excuse, dear. You know they have never been really nice to Julia.” “No, I didn’t know it.” And Philip began pacing up and down the room with angry strides. “ Then I suppose they do not approve of their son’s ■engagement to Julia?” “They have offered no opposition, but I do not think they are particularly pleased about it.” “And my father knows this ?” 29 [ “ Yes : but it does not seem to trouble him much. He is angry, however, that Mr. Dudson has said nothing about fixing a date for the marriage to take place.” “ Things are indeed coming to a pretty pass. My father is anxious to force Julia into a family who are not prepared to welcome her ; and harasses Sophy until she promises to marry one man, and elopes with another. It seems to me he must have forgotten the very meaning of the words dignity and honour.” “ Hush, hush, Philip ! I can hear his step.” Philip made as if he would have left the room : he was in no humour to encounter his father then. But Mrs. Dacre stretched out her arms to¬ wards him, and looked up imploringly into his face. “ Don’t leave me, dear. 1 dare not face him alone. Oh, Philip ! what shall 1 do ? what shall I do ?” She was clinging to him, the tears running down her cheeks, and her face convulsed with terror. It was no time to argue with her ; all that Philip could do was to soothe her with gentle touches and loving words. His poor mother — so weak as she was, both morally and physically — was very dear to him, and he would have sacrificed much to have shielded her from sorrow. But the footsteps died away in the distance, and Mr. Dacre passed on to his Study, without entering his wife’s room. Could Sophy have looked into that study an hour later, some feeling of remorse might have been hers. The man whose wife was filled with terror at the sound of his approach, and whose daughter had had recourse to strategy rather than face his anger, was sitting motionless, his arms crossed on the table, and his head resting on them. He had sat thus for half-an-hour. There was a knock at the door of his study — first soft ; then louder ; then again, yet louder. But there was no reply. _ CHAPTER THE EIGHTEENTH. “will you come into my parlour?” said the spider TO THE FLY. It will be remembered that when Ralph failed to pass his final examination, he requested his sister to inform Dr. Littledale of the regrettable circumstance ; and that Mabyn, having done so, wrote to her brother, giving him an account of her interview with their father. As Mabyn had expected, the doctor had at once inquired why Ralph had not conveyed the in¬ telligence himself, and had then made one or two remarks to the disparagement of his son. He received the news, however, without giving vent to any special outburst of anger, so that Mabyn had been able to write many words of consolation to Ralph. And then that “ fiver,” on the acquisition of which Ralph had declared so much of his comfort depended, had also been forthcoming. All this, it will be remembered, happened immedk ately before Mabyn went to Broadstairs. She had, therefore, left home feeling comparatively happy about

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202 To BE Given up. Ralph. True he had been ploughed, and that was in itself a disquieting circumstance ; still he would be sure to apply himself so as to pass next time ; and, after all, to be thrown back for six months was not such a very terrible misfortune. However, the first occasion on which Mabyn met Ralph after her visit to Broadstairs, all her former fears concerning him returned in full force. There was still the uneasy look in his eyes, and the restless irritable manner which had so alarmed her before. That he was worrying about something she felt convinced, but she could form no idea as to the nature of his trouble. She did all in her power to win his confidence, making opportunities to be alone with him, and in¬ variably managing to turn the conversation to his ex¬ periences in the hospital, his life in London, and his luture prospects ; but all to no purpose. He would answer her monosyllabically, almost sulkily, while his brow would darken as they talked. “ Ralph, I donk believe you are happy, she said out boldly one day. “You are not a bit the same as you used to be.'’ “ Happy ! Few people can say they are that.” “ Well, but I mean that I think you are worrying yourself about something.” “ When a man goes out into the world to fight his way, there are generally plenty of things to worry him. Women can’t understand these things. They just stay quietly at home, and have nothing worse to disturb them than the sins, real or imaginary, of Mary Jane and Betsy Ann.” Mabyn had her own opinion as to the possibility of sorrow and worry visiting those who stay quietly at home, but she did not complicate matters by giving expression to it. “ But, Ralph, can’t you tell me some of the things that are worrying you ? Would it not be a relief to you to speak of them ? ” Ralph walked moodily away, kicking stray pebbles that lay in his path. “ I tell you what it is. May : I’ve a good mind to throw the whole thing up, and go out to the colonies,” he exclaimed at length. “ Oh, Ralph ! I thought you liked your profession. And then see what an opening there is for you as papa’s partner.” “ I’ve no fault to find with the profession, and if I could see my way to just settling down here quietly, I daresay I should like it well enough.” “ But I thought — we all thought — that that was what you fully intended to do.” “Look here. May, I’ve got into a regular mess. I can’t explain it to you, and you wouldn’t understand if I did. I’ve been a fool, and now I shall have to pay for my folly.” Mabyn looked up into her brother’s face with quick sympathy. He was a fine-looking young fellow, with soft curly brown hair and very blue eyes. Mabyn was apt to think and speak of him as a boy, but he was turned twenty-three ; still, both in manner and appearance he was boyish. “But, Ralph dear, cannot you retrieve the past? I don’t want to know what it is that is troubling you, if you would rather not tell me ; but surely, whatever it may be, if you will only firmly make up your mind to turn over a new leaf, you will be able to live it down.” “It’s easy enough talking.” “But how can I do anything more than talk when I don’t know what is the matter?” “ If I were to tell you the ins and outs of the case, you wouldn’t be able to understand, and even if you did, you couldn’t do anything. I’ve got into a mess, and I must just get out of it as best I can. And if the worst comes to the worst, I shall bolt ! ” “ Oh, Ralph, don’t— don’t do that ! ” “ I shan’t if I can help it : you may rest assured of that. May.” She put her hand on his arm, and looked up into his face with a world of affection in her big grey eyes. “ I am sure you will not leave us all, Ralph ; it would break our hearts. We have only to be brave, dear, and nothing can really hurt us then.” The words were an echo of the reasoning with which she had endeavoured to dissipate her own sorrow. It had not been very effectual in her own case, so that she had not much faith in its efficacy ; still, it was all she had to offer. “ Poor little May ! ” thought Ralph, as the train was bearing him back to London. “ I half wish I had told her all about it. She’d have thought me an awful fool, but she wouldn’t have said so ; and she might have been able to suggest something. After all, if I took her advice and braved it out, I should escape. Still, a man doesn’t wish to feel that he is acting like a mean sneak.” During the whole of that day he thought of what his sister had said, and by the time he turned his back on the hospital he had almost decided to follow Mabyn’s advice. “ If I had only passed that wretched exam. I could easily have got out of it then. What an ass I’ve been, to be sure ! ” he thought, as he made for Bed¬ ford Square. Arrived at the house in which he had boarded ever since the commencement of his course of medical study, he let himself in with a latch-key. He hung up his hat, and had just begun to ascend the stairs, two at a time, keeping his eyes firmly fixed on the objects in front of him, when he became conscious of the sound of an opening door in the hall below. He was Avell aware which door it was that creaked, and who it was that had opened it. Still he looked straight ahead. He was endeavouring to take the first step towards following Mabyn’s advice. “ Is that you, Mr. Littledale ?” He ascended two more stairs. “ Mr. Littledale, won’t you have a cup of tea?” The lady had come to the foot of the staircase now, and had so raised her voice that Ralph could no longer pretend not to hear her. “ I don’t think I want any,” replied Ralph irreso¬ lutely.

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To BE Given up. Oh, just a cup. IVe got it all ready, and I’m sure you must be thirsty this hot afternoon.” ‘‘ Well, I must swallow it up quickly, then, and be off to my room. I’ve no end of work to get through.” And then Ralph descended the stairs, and followed the lady into a small back-room, commanding a fine view of slates and chimney-pots. After all, it would never do to begin following Mabyn’s advice too abruptly, he reflected. The lady was tall and well formed, with a brilliant complexion, and saucy dark eyes. A fine figure of a girl : so she had been described on more than one occasion by more than one admirer. Her hair, which was brown and plentiful, was streaked with gold, and elaborately arranged, so that a profusion of little curls fell over her forehead, almost to her eyes, while others nestled in the nape of her neck. Her teeth, which were large, white, and even, were exposed to view rather too c»rten, owing to the frequency with which her somewhat loud laugh was heard ; while her mouth, although it was shaped ,in a bold fashion, was compassed about with lines that proclaimed the good -nature of its owner. She wore a cool fresh-looking dress of transparent muslin, through which the dazzling white¬ ness of her neck and arms was plainly discernible ; while many a ribbon and ornament were added to give effect to the toilet, and to enhance her un¬ deniable charms. The lady was Matilda Jenkins, only child of the proprietor and proprietress of the establishment. Since she had no elder sisters, there was no osten¬ sible reason why she should not have been spoken of as Miss Jenkins. But somehow the boarders had become accustomed both to address her and to speak of her as Miss Matilda — that is, all those had who were not privileged to call her Tilly. Ralph took his usual seat at the corner of a comfortable sofa — it was not the first time he bad been in that little parlour — while Miss Matilda handed him a cup of fragrant tea. Then having poured out another cup for herself, she took a seat at the further end of the sofa. Ralph was conscious of the length of space between them ; he even knew that he was expected to lessen it. But Mabyn's advice was still fresh in his memory, and so he refrained. Miss Matilda sat well back, and fanned herself with a vigour which suggested that the violence of the exercise would do much to minimize the effect of the draught she was at such pains to create. She knew quite well that if there be a space between a young man and a young woman, the young man must be the one to lessen it, or else he will not appreciate the advantages to be derived from its diminished dimen¬ sions. He may not be altogether a free agent : the magnetism of the lady’s eyes may draw him all unconsciously to her side : but he must at least be in- duced to believe that he has sought the position voluntarily. So Miss IMatilda went on fanning herself, 293 and using her eyes with good effect, hoping thereby to achieve her purpose. “ Lor ! isn’t it hot ? I’ve done nothing all day but sit down and fan myself. If I had had to do so much as lift my little finger, I should just have dropped down dead with exhaustion.” Ralph acquiesced lazily. He was much relieved to think that the conversation had turned on the very safe topic of weather, while he was vaguely conscious of some slight feeling of uneasiness attributable to the lady’s furtive glances. At present, however, he was well able to withstand her onslaughts. Uselessness was, according to Miss Matilda’s way of thinking, one of the distinguishing marks of fine-lady¬ hood. She therefore affected it, and could never be induced to admit the performance of any more arduous tasks than the practising of her music or the doing of a little shopping. By the boa-rders she was never seen until late in the afternoon, when she would always be more or less gorgeously attired. Her morning hours, she was wont to imply, were devoted to slumber and light literature. There was, however, a legend rife in the establishment to the effect that on more than one occasion she had been seen to flit from room to room, duster in hand, her hair tightly secured in patent curling- pins. And as Mrs. Jenkins was much given to remarking that she really did not know what she should do without Tilly, the story was generally believed to be authentic. “ Well, Tilly, and how have you been getting on?” asked Ralph at length, thinking that to drink the lady’s tea without making so much as a remark would be, to say the least of it, ungracious. Nearly killed with the heat and — loneliness.” “ Oh, come now, Tilly, you can’t have been lonely.” “ Well, I needn’t have been, for Tom Jackson came round on Saturday evening, and offered to take me just anywhere I pleased.” By “ coming round ” Miss Matilda meant to imply that' the gentleman had put aside the ill-humour in which he had previously indulged. To have applied the term in its peregrinatic sense would have been out of place, the “Tom Jackson” referred to being one of the boarders. “Well, and why didn’t you go ?” A swift reproachful glance was shot at him from those merry dark eyes. “Well, I didn’t think I should ever have been asked such a question as that by you, Mr. Littledale ; and after all that has occurred. But there, some people have no memory — and nothing worth calling a heart either, I’m thinking.” Ralph edged an inch nearer to the lady ; and she, observing it, rose to take his empty cup from him. “ Won’t you let me fill it for you again, Ralph— oh, lor ! Mr. Littledale, I suppose I ought to say?” “No, I don’t think I \vant any more, thank you, Tilly,” replied Ralph, letting the observation about the use of his Christian name pass unnoticed.

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294 To BE Given up. “Just half a cup/^ urged the lady with the manner of one who should say that although the gentleman was treating her badly, she would still be mag¬ nanimous enough to look after his creature-comforts. “ Well, it mustn^t be more than half, then.” She brought him back his tea, and this time, as if by the merest chance, she did sit down several inches nearer to him. She knew quite well that Ralph was always resolving to throw her over, and she also knew that his resolution had, on this occasion, taken firmer root than usual. But she had always triumphed in the past, and so she had no intention of accepting defeat now without a struggle. Ralph’s weekly visits to Dursington were invariably •fraught with danger to herself. “ Tom’s got a rise. He told me so on Saturday when he offered to take me out. His governor seems to set great store by him.” “ How do you know he does ?” And there was a gleam of anger in Ralph’s eyes which afforded Miss Matilda much inward satisfaction. “ Because he told me so.” “Who? Jackson’s governor?” asked Ralph in derision, well knowing that Tilly had never met the gentleman. “ No ; Tom himself.” “ He’s a conceited ass ! ” “ Do vou really think so, Ralph ? ” And this time Tilly said nothing about the use of her companion’s Christian name, well knowing that the victory was again hers. “ There can’t be two opinions about it. You must see it for yourself, Tilly.” “Well, perhaps he isn’t quite so nice as some one else I know.” Tilly’s eyes were very expressive at this moment — quite irresistibly so. There was plenty of vacant space on the sofa now, but one half of it was on Ralph’s left, and the other on Tilly’s right. A few minutes after Ralph did manage to get him¬ self out of the room, pleading, as in the first instance, press of work to be got through in the course of the evening. While sitting during that last five minutes with his arm round Tilly’s waist, he had had some thoughts of explaining to her that perhaps, for the future, it would be better he should not sit thus. But then he remembered that running account with Mrs. Jenkins, which dated so far back, and which in¬ creased in length each week ; and so thinking, he ended the interview in a way which Tilly felt to be very satisfactory. Poor Ralph was accustomed, when reviewing the situ¬ ation, to attribute all his troubles to the combined influ¬ ences of that little back parlour, and the triumphant airs which Tom Jackson had dared to assume when Miss Matilda had condescended to accept him. All the gentleman boarders paid Tilly attention with more or less persistency ; but not one of them, with the excep¬ tion of Tom Jackson, meant anything whatever by it. It must be admitted that Tom was by no means Miss Matilda’s favourite swain ; but she had sense enough to see that he was in earnest, while the others were not ; and so, after the display of much indecision, which had the effect of nearly driving poor Tom wild, she had graciously consented to be the future Mrs. Jackson. The match was a suitable one in every way. Tom was not a gentleman in the usual acceptation of the term ; but then, neither was Tilly a lady. He was a warehouseman in one of the City houses, and being a young man, with his wits well about him, was likely to get on ; Avhile Miss Matilda, although she was so foolish as to pretend to be a perfectly useless member of society, was in reality a thoroughly capable girl. The only little hitch in the arrangements was that Tom would give himself airs, just as if Tilly had smiled on him from the very first, and had never even so much as cast an approving glance on any of the other boarders. Exasperated by Tom’s unbe¬ coming air of triumph, Tilly’s former admirers again entered the lists, foremost amongst whom was Ralph Littledale. At first nothing very exciting happened. Tom scowled and Tilly laughed ; but the engagement was still considered binding by both parties. Then Tom, having a fortnight’s holiday, took Tilly down into the .country to introduce her to his parents. They were excessively kind people, and received their future daughter-in-law with much warmth ; but, alas ! they were very homely, the father being a grocer in a rather small way of business. Perhaps, if Tilly’s head had not been a little turned by the amount of attention she received, she would have thought more of the kindness and less of the homeliness. As it was, however, she returned to Bedford Square in a very discontented frame of mind. Her numerous admirers were quick to take ad¬ vantage of this. Again Ralph Littledale came to the fore, and this time he rendered himself so conspicuous that all Tom’s rage and jealousy were centred in him. And now comes the part which the back parlour played in the little drama. Tilly instituted five o’clock tea. It was not, however, formally recognised as part of the arrangements of the house, no one being supposed to partake of it unless specially invited to do so by Tilly herself. Now, Ralph was one of the first to come in of an evening ; consequently, he partook of five o’clock tea more regularly than did any of the others, and while he did so, Tilly and he were usually alone together. Even this might not have led to very much harm, if Tilly had not loved to tease Tom by constantly al¬ luding to it. Whether she was actuated merely by a love of mischief, or was fully alive to the advantages of having a medical practitioner for a father-in-law in preference to a grocer, it would be difficult to say. Probably, however, the latter consideration did have weight with her. Matters came to a climax. One evening Ralph entered what he was afterwards pleased to term that ill-fated little parlour, to find Tilly in tears.

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To BE Given up. “ Why, what is the matter, Tilly ?” It seemed so natural to call her by her Christian name when she was in such distress ; and then he soon found himself sitting beside her on the sofa in very close proximity : and that seemed natural too. “ Won't you tell me what is the matter, Tilly dear ? 1 can’t bear to see you so distressed.” “ Tom says he won’t have anything more to do with me, and— I am to— to give him back my ring.” “ What a mean cur ! ” No ; he isn’t mean.” “ Well, what’s he done it for, then ? ” inquired Ralph, feeling that he was somehow failing to administer consolation in doses proportionate to the depth of his sympathy. “ He — he says 1 like — I like you best.” ‘‘Me !” Tilly sobbed on, while Ralph’s arm stole round her waist. “And do you really like me best, dear ?” “ Oh, Mr. Littledale, what a question ! ” He did not repeat the question, but he pressed his lips to her forehead, and did not alter the position of his arm. “ Would you like me to like you best ? ” asked Tilly at length, thinking perhaps that the silence had lasted long enough. . What could he do, sitting in such a position, but murmur “ Yes? ” After that, Tom Jackson received back the ring he had given Miss Matilda, and Ralph found that a place had been laid for him at the dining-table next to the fair Tilly. But no further notice was taken of the affair ; and Mr. Jenkins, who was seldom seen above the basement, did not speak to Ralph on the subject. But then, neither had he done so to Tom Jackson, as far as Ralph was aware. One other change, which was undoubtedly attribut¬ able to his new position, was borne in upon Ralph : Mrs. Jenkins no longer pressed for the settlement of her little bill. It really was a little bill at that time. All this had taken place some three or four weeks before the date of that examination which Ralph had, alas ! failed to pass. And now, notwithstanding Mabyn’s advice, and his own desire to follow it, Ralph had again responded to the spider’s invitation to enter her parlour. And when there, he had thrown all his good resolutions to the wind by availing himself of the privileges of an ac¬ cepted lover. CHAPTER THE NINETEENTH. THE gipsy’s warning. In common with all startling incidents, Sophy’s elope¬ ment was to those whom it did not immediately . concern only a nine days’ wonder. To the inmates of Southfields, however, it was fraught with the gravest consequences. Mr. Dacre had been found in his study, soon after the last of the guests had departed on that ill-fated morning, in a dead faint. The application of the ^95 usual restoratives had brought him round, and he had been energetic in declaring that there was nothing much the matter with him : a statement which was to a certain extent borne out by his going to the Bank as usual the following day. Still, he was not himself. But perhaps, of all the Dacres, Philip was the one who felt most keenly the stigma of the family dis¬ honour. He himself was wooing a wealthy woman, and although he had loved her ere he knew of her wealth, he was aware that by outsiders his conduct would be regarded as being of a piece with his father’s, when the latter had gone such desperate lengths in order to secure a rich son-in-law. Although no words of love had passed between Philip and Clare, each was deeply conscious of the other’s regard. When Miss Eastabrook was in Philip’s company in the presence of others, she hardly noticed him, more than to accept very readily from his hands all the little courtesies of social life. But when they were alone together, she treated him as one whose opinion was valuable to her, and whose friendship was very precious. She never made the slightest effort to hide her preference. At first it had been only liking — thorough, genuine, out-and-out liking — for the man. She never knew when this comfortable feeling of mere satisfaction in the man’s society and confidence in his judgment gave place to love. To Philip, who was so eagerly looking for the change, it seemed long — very long — in coming ; to Clare, it appeared to overtake her with startling rapidity. And the love, when it came, was calm, deep, all-pervading, rather than passionate. She longed for him to make fre¬ quent calls on her sympathy and help ; the carrying out of his most lightly-expressed wish was a source of the deepest joy to her ; while she studied his every mood with watchful tenderness. She was such an essentially strong character, that the stirring of the depths of her nature must, under any circumstances, have produced devotion rather than the love which exacts homage from its object. But although the growth of love in her own heart had taken Clare by surprise, Mabyn had watched its progress with unerring discernment. At first, Clare had talked openly enough about Philip Dacre, saying, in her impetuous way, how much she liked him. But as her regard for him deepened, she grew silent about him, until at length she would have recourse to all sorts of little devices sooner than speak of anything they had undertaken together. Meanwhile, the . proverbial nine days’ wonder ex¬ cited by Sophy’s change of bridegrooms passed ; and the young couple settled in a picturesque cottage on the outskirts of Dursington. Although Mr. Dacre did not appear to harbour any resentment against Sophy, he firmly refused to receive her and her husband at Southfields. “ Nightingale might get to hear of it,” he declared, and was firm in his refusal. “But, papa,” pleaded Julia, “surely you do not intend never to have Sophy back again just because Mr. Nightingale might not approve of her coming?

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To BE Given up. 296 What difference can his disapproval make to us now ? We are never likely to see him again — and don't want to,” she added sotto voce. “ 1 tell you I won’t have it,” her father replied, with increasing irritation in his tone. of her wishes. And when Sophy was at home, I don’t remember that you and she were ever so parti¬ cularly affectionate towards each other,” he added, in a more conciliatory tone. There was undoubtedly an element of truth in this observation. ‘•THE SPIDER AND THE FLY” {p. 293). “ Well, I must say I think it is very hard that I am never to see my sister again, just because of Mr. Nightingale.” “I will be master in my own house, Julia ; under¬ stand that. When you remove to the Court, you can ask your sister there, if your husband will let you,” said Mr. Dacre angrily, indulging in a sneer at his daughter’s matrimonial prospects, although he was as anxious as ever she could be to see the consummation But in pleading her sister’s cause so warmly, Julia was not actuated solely by her affection for the absent one ; perhaps it would not be going too far to say that no such sentiment entered into her calculations. She did not consider that the quarrels, which were carried on before the eyes of the world, reflected any credit on those taking part in them. A few domestic discords, kept well in the background, did not much matter ; and a good old family feud might even cast a

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To BE Given up. halo of respectability on ail concerned ; but just an ordinary quarrel only tended to render those impli¬ cated in it ridiculous. Finding, however, as she haa often found before, that her father was obdurate, she devised a little scheme for letting the world see that Mr. Dacre had no objection to meeting his new son-in-law. The Shilling Fancy Fair, which, it will be remem¬ bered, had been suggested by Miss Eastabrook with a view to adding to the funds of the New Hospital, had been taken up so warmly by the ladies of the neighbourhood, that it was expected the proceeds would amount to a sum sufficiently large to justify the committee in commencing the new wing. As it was Miss Eastabrook’s pet scheme, Philip had, of course, greatly interested himself in its development. Julia and Sophy had intended to take stalls. Now, however, that her father so obstinately refused to receive Mr. and Mrs. Edward Charrington at Southfields, Julia thought she saw a way out of the difficulty. So she set to work with a will, supplied her own stall entirely with articles of her own making, and then, with the help of Mrs. Dacre and the younger children, she accumulated a sufficient number for Sophy, and handed them over to her to stock another stall. Then, having secured two stalls next to each Other, she dressed them both, saying that the second was to be in the charge of an old schoolfellow of hers. At the last moment, this schoolfellow having broken her promise, Julia wrote to Sophy, asking her if she would fill the unexpected (?) vacancy, and also secure her husband’s assistance for the evening. Sophy gladly promised to take the vacant stall, and further added that Ted would be sure to join her later on in the day. The Fair was to be opened at twelve o’clock by the Mayoress of Dursington. One of the first to appear on the scene, to see that everything was ready for her reception, was Philip Dacre, who had come down from London the previous evening. In fact, through¬ out the day he was one of the most noticeable figures present, as he moved amongst the crowd, giving a smile here and a pleasant word there, in his desire to make the affair go off brightly. Then when he had welcomed everybody, he as¬ cended a small platform, erected for the purpose, and offered to answer any question in civil law for a fee of one shilling. He had his wits well about him, and although the questions were often difficult enough to answer, from their very absurdity, he was seldom at a loss for a reply. How many remembered him afterwards as he appeared then, with his aristocratic bearing ; his ease of manner and innate courtesy ; his pleasant laugh, and whimsical replies to the many posers he was called upon to answer ; the tact with which he in¬ variably contrived that all the dclat of an amusing “ case ” should fall to the share of a client, rather than to that of his legal adviser ; and the heartiness with which he joined in every laugh against himself. Clare and Mabyn had stalls next to each other. Mabyn would fain have spared herself the pain of 297 watching her cousin and Philip Dacre together ; for where the one was, the other would soon follow. But it never seemed to occur to Clare that any other arrangement was possible ; and, rather than make a fuss, Mabyn had meekly fallen in with the plan. Clare’s stall was, of course, the centre of attraction ; and had it not been that she induced many of her would-be customers to make their purchases of Mabyn, Miss Eastabrook would have sold out all her wares within a couple of hours of the opening of the Fair. One of the best customers at the stalls of the two cousins was Fred Charrington. He had come early, to the surprise of many of his neighbours, who were not prepared to find him taking an interest in anything so frivolous a,s a Shilling Fancy Fair. Ted Charrington had been much surprised by the manner in which his brother Fred had received the intelligence of his marriage. He wrote just a short kindly note to the young couple while they were away spending their honeymoon, containing no hint of any disapproval he might feel at the step they had taken ; but wlien the brothers met he did say a word. ‘Mt would have been better to have kept faith with each other, and waited, old man ; you know the old adage : ‘ Everything comes to him wdio waits.’ ” “ But I might have waited for years before I should have been in anything of a position,” Ted had replied. ‘‘ I wasn’t thinking of that. Still, what’s done can’t be undone. As for your position, if you work hard, and always make your wife’s happiness your first consideration, you wmn’t find marriage such a bad institution, I fancy, even if you do have to pinch a bit to make both ends meet.” After that, Fred took Ted’s marriage as a fait accompli^ and said no more about it. When, however, the young couple began getting their home together, they found, much to their astonishment, that the ‘‘ old bachelor,” as Ted always laughingly designated his brother, had a fund of information, both practical and theoretical, at his finger-tips on the subject of nest-building, which he was ever ready to place at their service. ‘‘ ReaUy,” exclaimed Ted one night, when Fred had stayed until an unconscionably late hour, hanging pictures on the walls of The Dovecot, and had become, for him, quite uproariously cheerful as he proceeded with his work, “ I had no idea Fred was such a domesticated fellow. After all, do you know, Sophy, I don’t believe it \vould be such a bad idea for him to marry. It’s a pity he dislikes women so much. I must say he seems to have got on friendly terms with you quickly enough ; but then, you have such a fascinating way with you, little woman, that I don’t wonder he’s taken to you.” Still, I can’t believe, Ted dear, that Fred dis¬ likes all women but me,” Sophy had modestly re¬ plied. Fred’s goodness was the theme of Sophy’s conver-

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298 To BE Given up. sation with Julia as the two sisters stood side by side at the Fancy Fair. Julia was looking unusually handsome, and Mr. Be van Dudson was dancing attendance upon her. Notwithstanding these two gratifying facts, however, she kept glancing towards the entrance. But Mr. Dudson need not have felt jealous ; she was only watching for her father and brother-in-law. Edward Charrington was the first to arrive. He came straight up to his wife’s stall, and having shaken hands with Julia in his usual free-and-easy style, began helping Sophy to dispose of her wares. Ted and Sophy were much given to chaffing each other : a sure sign that the putting on of the wedding- ring had not extinguished their love. When, there¬ fore, Mr. Dacre came in, a little later on, and made at once for Julia’s stall, she was surrounded by a merry group. It was not, however, until he was nearly up to her that he recognised his daughter Sophy and her husband. Julia, who was watching him closely, saw him start. He was not, however, a man given to the cleansing of his soiled garments in public, and so, seeing that retreat would have attracted general attention, he came smilingly forward, and acted the benign father to perfection. Sophy was delighted. The rupture with her family had greatly distressed her. Now, however, she felt that a reconciliation was about to take place, so her spirits rose, and she laughed and talked incessantly. Then, just as her mirth was at its highest, and Mr. Dacre, who was really fond of Sophy, notwithstanding his attempt to force an uncongenial marriage upon her, was laughingly replying to her badinage, he stopped suddenly short in the middle of a sentence, and stared straight in front of him at a party ot fashionably dressed people who were approaching. “What is it, father?” asked Soph}^, in alarm, slipping her hand through his arm, and looking up anxiously into his face. “ Are you ill ?” His expression had become so haggard, that the question naturally suggested itself. He shook her off almost roughly. “ Isn’t that Mrs. Pritchard ? ” he asked, in a tremu¬ lous whisper, indicating a lady who was within a few yards’ distance, looking full at them. “ Why, to be sure it is ! ” replied Sophy, and, nothing daunted, she bowed politely. Mrs. Pritchard was Mr. Nightingale’s only sister, and had been one of the guests invited to the wedding. Although she stared hard at the Dacre group, she gave no sign of recognition as she swept past the stalls of the two sisters. “ She will be sure to tell him,” murmured Mr. Dacre, in so low a lone that Sophy was the only one who heard the remark. Sophy would have laughed aloud, thinking the in¬ cident an amusing one, had not her mirth been sud¬ denly checked by observing that her father was moving away with an angry scowl. Meanwhile, Miss Eastabrook and Miss Littledale were doing, as Mr. Charrington expressed it, a “ roaring trade ” ; and long before the hour for closing had arrived they neither of them had an article left. “ It was a capital idea of yours, Clare, to have all the things of equal value as nearly as possible, and sold at a uniform price,” observed Mabyn. “ People don’t mind spending a good many odd shillings when they feel they are getting fair value for their money.” “Yes, I don’t approve of being commercially dis¬ honest in the name of charity.” Then the two girls moved away, to offer assistance to other stall-keepers. Presently Miss Eastabrook found herself drawn into an animated group, gathered round a clever palmist, who, dressed as a gipsy, was exercising his art. He was known to have studied cheirography and chiromancy for years, and, as he was a stranger to nearly all present, his delineation of the characters of those who submitted their hands to his inspection was eagerly listened to, while the destinies which he professed to foretell were received with more or less credence. As Clare joined the group, Sophy, who had slipped off her wedding ring, was having her hand told publicly. Those who preferred not to have the secrets of their lives laid bare and their characters dissected for the general amusement could retire with the gipsy into a small tent, and there learn what “fate” was sup¬ posed to have in store for them, and in what degree they possessed the force of will to mould their careers in opposition to its decree : for the gipsy was emphatic in contending that destiny and character must ever re-act upon each other. “You are guided almost entirely by impulse,” the gipsy was saying to Sophy as Miss Eastabrook came up. “ This arises in a great measure from inertness, i^ou are equally careless about trifles and about matters of the gravest moment. Your heart is good ; you are, therefore, never unfaithful to pe7'so7is you love, but you are often unfaithful to your higher conceptions of truth. The future contains for you great possibilities ; you can, if you will, develope into a noble woman. In the past you have neglected your opportunities, and, unless you look well to it, you will go down to your grave with the highest possibilities of .your nature undeveloped. You are excessively cheerful and sweet- tempered ; you have a keen sense of humour and dearly love a joke. You are extravagant, but that, again, is attributable to the utter carelessness which is the most serious blemish in your character. You will marry young ” — here the gipsy hesitated — “ almost at once, I should say, and you will enjoy your husband’s confidence ; and your children, of whom you will have several, will, while they are children, love you dearly ; but unless you make a supreme effort to overcome the blemishes in- your own character, you will fail in your duties as a mother, and the failure in all its bitterness will re-act upon yourself through your sons and daughters. A great opportunity to strengthen ^our character will come to you shortly in the form of a terrible bereavement. You will lose some one who is dear to you in a way that will be inexpressibl)'

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The Public Life of Public Men. painful to you ; remorse will pull.fiercely at your heart¬ strings. But it will rest with yourself to make this grief the means of your salvation. That is all 1 have to tell you.’’ • To what have you been listening so attentively ? ” “ Sophy has been having her fortune — or, more correctly speaking, her character— told.” Miss Eastabrook did not turn round. She knew, when the first syllable reached her ear, that it was Philip Dacre who was addressing her. “Well?” “ I came up only at the fag-end. What I heard was marvellously true.” “ He’s a wonderfully clever fellow, and has, I am told, devoted years to the study of the subject.” “Do you believe in palmistry, then?” “ I hardly know. If character can be read from the features and expression of the face, and proclivities be determined by the bumps on the head, as physiog¬ nomists and phrenologists would tell us, it does not seem to me to be any very great advance to declare that the shape of the hand, and the lines and mounds thereon, give indications of temperament and character.” “ Miss Eastabrook, do come and have your fortune told,” cried one or two. 1 don’t think I should like to have all my short¬ comings so freely discussed.” 299 “ Oh, do ! You would make such a splendid sub¬ ject.” “ But I should certainly go into the tent,” replied Miss Eastabrook, hesitatingly. “ Yes, do go,” urged Philip. That was enough. With a half-mocking expression, Miss Eastabrook entered the tent. Then the crowd waited for what seemed a very long while, glancing from time to time at the closely-drawn curtains, behind which, as they imagined, such in¬ teresting facts were being revealed. At length Miss Eastabrook came forth. She had gone to hear her fate with a smile on her lips and a merry light in her eyes. She came from hearing it pale and stern, with something of that look of terror that Philip had seen her face wear on the night, now so long ago, when he had first met her. She made her way through the crowd straight to his side, without a word ; and those who had waited, mean¬ ing to question her eagerly, shrank away in silence. “What is it?” asked Philip, in much anxiety. “Nothing. At least, I have had a warning. That is all,” and she tried to smile, failing in the attempt. “ Won’t you tell me about it ? ” he asked, gently. She hesitated. “Yes, 1 will tell you, if you wish to know,” she said at length. ‘ END OF CHAI-TER THE NINETEENTH. THE PUBLIC LIFE OF PUBLIC MEN. WHAT DOES THE PRINCE OF WALES DO? N GLAND is the home of con¬ stitutional fictions, and we may include in the interesting cata¬ logue the fiction that the Prince of Wales has nothing to do. The constitution assigns him no public work, the Government of the day dare not give it to him, and there are persons of sane mind who, firmly believing in the constitution and the Government, and shutting their eyes to facts, imagine that his life must be uneventful, languid, and purely private. It is nothing of the kind. It was never intended to be anything of the kind. Even if the constitution had forgotten the Heir Apparent, the pressure of circum¬ stances, the force of his own individuality, and the splendid example set him by his august father, would, as we know they have done, have given him a public life certain to command attention and respect. The late Prince Albert trained his eldest son with a carefulness that many commoners might imitate. Nothing was omitted. He gave the Prince of Wales the best of advice ; he found him the best masters ; he sent him to Cambridge as well as to Oxford ; he personally superintended his studies in European lan¬ guages ; he mapped out all his travels. Superficial observers may easily fail to note the results. The Coin't Circular will not help them very much. It is a newspaper record, and not a personal diary ; it is external chronology, and not internal history. Nor is there much chance of personal inter¬ course correcting the mistakes made at a distance. It may be easy to draw a postcard from a states¬ man, but it is less easy for an individual, one of the “ dim common population,” to have speech with a prince. But the more extensive our information becomes, the higher is the estimate we must 'form of the public work of the Prince of Wales, and of the equipment that has been made for it. He is an accomplished linguist. He has stored his mind with the most varied information. Few men have a more extensive acquaintance with the various countries of the world and their public characters. As a young man, he wrote home letters to the Queen, describing his travels. The Prince’s public work commenced with his visit to Canada in 1859, when he was within a few months of his eighteenth year. H e opened exhibitions, bridges, and parks, laid foundation-stones, and received and replied to addresses by the score. His public work has never been interrupted since that date, except by his illness in 1871. In 1868 he spent ten days in

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The Public Life of Public Men. 300 Ireland. The Times pithily described his visit by saying, “ There were presentations and receptions, and receiving and answering addresses, processions, walk¬ ing, riding, and driving, in morning and evening, mili¬ tary, academic, and medicEval attire.” In the matter of tours, blending public, social, and countries, or had better opportunities of acquiring the most cosmopolitan information. The range, rapidity, and variety of these quasi¬ public tours once furnished Punch with the materials for a humorous tale of magic and mystery. An ambi¬ tious mortal was depicted as intent upon following an H.R.H. THE PRINXE OF WALES, K.G. {Frotn a Recent Photograph by Messrs. W. D. Downey.') private functions, the Prince has done, and continues to do, an amount of work that has never been equalled, much less excelled. During his Indian visit he was always engaged in some interesting public business, and varying his ceremonial and royal duties with recreations of an active and exhilarating nature. It has been the same with his European tours. No living man has received more public addresses, or conversed with more of the public men of all Illustrious Person in his travels by means of a magic opera-hat, which conveyed him from place to place. He kept up the chase for some days, flying from capital to capital, from country to country, from court to private castle, from public ceremony to private entertainment, until, physically and mentally ex¬ hausted, he was glad to be rid of his opera-hat, and to resume his quiet life as an ordinary being. The story conveyed some very useful teaching.

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The Public Life of Public Men. Reference has been made to the pressure of circum¬ stances, and all that needs to be said in interpretation of the phrase is that the Prince of Wales has, for several years, been called upon to assume many of the public functions that were formerly discharged by Prince Albert, and more legitimately fall upon a king than a queen. He has patterned his conduct on the example of his father. Speaking for the first time at the Royal Academy banquet in 1863, when in his twenty-second year, he said : “ I cannot, on this occasion, divest my mind of the associations connected with my beloved and lamented father. His bright example cannot fail to stimulate my efforts to tread in his footsteps.” The Prince Consort aimed at being short, pithy, and exhaustive. The Heir Apparent has taken him for his model, but he has touched a much greater variety of subjects. The published speeches of Prince Albert range from 1840 to i860, and are thirty- four in number. The Prince of Wales’s collected ad¬ dresses run from 1863 to 1883, and are one hundred and fifty-four in number. Eleven have been delivered at Royal Academy banquets, six at Trinity House, and four in connection with the Royal College of Music. The more numerous addresses touch such diversified sub¬ jects as commerce, agriculture, education, public works, medical charities, and general philanthropy. They are 301 short, kindly, and appreciative, obviously bearing about them the stamp of the Prince of Wales’s individuality. There is only one principle at the basis of the public work the Prince of Wales undertakes to perform. If it be likely to promote the national good, he is heart and soul in its favour. Three examples may be given in support of this statement. Address¬ ing the Royal Agricultural Benevolent Institution, he said : “ I may call myself a colleague of many of you present, as a farmer on a small scale, and I only hope that I may never have occasion to be a pensioner of this institution. It is impossible for any British gentle¬ man to live at his country place without taking an in¬ terest in agriculture, and in all those things which concern the farmers of this great country.” After appointing a committee to consider how best to constitute an Imperial Institute, the Prince gave to every clause of their report his consideration, and accepted it as a whole because it realised his ideal of what was good for the empire. The principle itself was more openly stated in founding the Royal College of Music, when he declared that “ were the object less than of national importance, I should not have troubled you — the heads of social life — to meet me here to-day, and I should not myself have undertaken the respon¬ sibility of acting as the leader and organiser of the THE PRIN'CE’S study AT MARLBOROUGH HOUSE.

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THE WRITING-ROOM AT SANDRINGHAM. movement.” Again, in laying the foundation-stone, he remarked : “In laying this great national question before you, I have followed the example of my father, by offering to place myself at the head of a great social movement.” How many social movements has his Royal High¬ ness not headed ? New departures find in him a friend and kindly adviser. He is ever on the watch to do good by publicly helping charities, inquiries, and p^hlanthropic objects. His daily studies at Sandring¬ ham, not less than in his work-room at Marlborough House, involve much dry reading of this kind — re¬ ports, public and private appeals, and the like. The “Bitter Cry of Outcast London” awoke a response in his heart. The alarm about leprosy found him equal to the occasion. Discrimination involves inquiry, and the balancing of evidence and probability. The Prince of Wales is constantly compelled to make exhaustive inquiries into the institutions he is asked to publicly assist, and it is high testimony to his carefulness and skill in such matters that he has seldom given his support to movements of an unsatis¬ factory nature. Considering how often he is invited to lend his aid to societies by public appearances, it is remarkable that he has found time for preliminary inquiries, involving the most delicate handling of facts, and negotiations with persons, in the midst of his many social and purely ceremonial duties. Indeed, he is now quite an expert in dealing with non-political public movements. He displays great tact and shrewdness in making and fulfilling these engage¬ ments. He is always genial and yet never fulsome. In the work of commission or committee, keen ob¬ servers have been much pleased with his business-like adroitness and alertness. He never makes a mistake, and if others unfortunately do so, he assists them with a ready aptitude, so clever in its effect, that three- fourths of the persons present never notice the C07it7'etemps. We have heard of many such instances as well as having witnessed several.

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What to Wear in April. 303 Tlie Prince has to keep abreast of the times, and this duty involves much reading, a good deal of writing, and discussion with competent informants. His public work occupies a portion of nearly every day, and his business habits teach him despatch, method, and prescience. He does not know what actual idleness means, and he is so well versed in public as distinct from party-political movements, that in a rigorous competitive examination he would not easily be beaten. Indeed, he could give points to some of the satirists who ignorantly regard him as a lazy personage. He enjoys public work, and no one can say of him that he looks bored or distrait. He is often fatigued with a round of work and social observances ; but he manfully executes all his duties, with a kindliness and punctilio seldom seen in such felicitous combination. There is no busier man in Europe. A minister of state has fewer social duties. A popular peer has not so many difficult public functions to perform. No philanthropist can excel him in delicately discrimi¬ nating benevolence. No Prince of England ever led so many new departures, or mixed so freely with public men in promoting purely national movements, social, educational, and charitable, or was ever so highly esteemed by the personages in immediate con¬ tact with him. As the Tunes once truly said, the representative duties of royalty are heavier than the private functions which the hardest worked English¬ man has to perform. Circumstances have imposed upon the Prince of Wales a very large share of these duties, and he has borne his part bravely, and with an alacrity and kindliness, a tact and cleverness, which cannot be praised too highly. He is a born leader and a born worker. Edwin Goadby. WHAT TO WEAR IN APRIL. CHIT-CHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR LONDON AND PARIS CORRESPONDENTS. I.— FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. T is curious to watch Paris fashions and to see how each year there is an attempt to revive tartans and checks. Now the revival would seem to have reached us, judging from the pretty frock worn by the child in our initial letter for this chapter. In April, winds occa¬ sionally blow as strong as they do in March, and a little cheering red is still in favour. The check used here is a bright one — red, light blue, and white — the frock open¬ ing over a full smocked red silk front, the smocking appearing at the throat and waist. This is a style that has prevailed for some time ; what is new is the arrangement of this front. At the hem it is gathered into a foot pleating, so that the upper part forms a bonllo7ine. There is a sash bow of red at the back ; the sleeves are new— full red sleeves to the wrist, where they are smocked, and have long over checked ones to the elbow ; but only to the elbow, which makes them pretty and quaint. The accompanying hat turns up over the face, showing a red velvet lining, but the bows over the brim are of soft red silk matching the front of the skirt. In millinery there are many decided changes ; note the hat worn by one of the young girls in the picture. It is a veritable Spanish hat with a high crown and a much broader brim than Spaniards have ever worn, but still it preserves its character. ' The hard turned- up brim shows a succession of beads, of a large round form, carried along the edge. The crown is height¬ ened with a bunch of red feathers, and the colour appears again in a band of ribbon and bows carried round the head. The long cloak savours of spring ; it opens at the neck and is trimmed with close feather bands, instead of fur. It is composed of ribbed silk and embroidei'ecl velvet, the velvet is cut as a Bolero jacket, elongated into panel sides over which fall the long pointed sleeves, embroidered on the outside of the arm, and edged like the jacket with ball fringe in character with the hat. It is a mantle that completely covers the dress. The muff matches the hat, and I notice women are wearing them well on to summer, possibly because they are so infinitesimal. The floral mufls are often carried by bridesmaids ; they are made of satin and covered with flowers so that but little of the foundation is seen. They let the odour of the flower be easily enjoyed by the holder, and are more to be desired than bouquets because they have a raison d'etre. As soon as it is possible women seem glad to discard mantles, and to enable them to do so earlier than is their wont, fur collars attached to fur plastrons are worn on the front of costumes. What I mean is fully shown in the dress worn by the accompanying figure to the Spanish hat and the Bolero jacket. It shows a brown woollen gown made as an all-round skirt, embroidered to the depth of half a yard at the back and down the length of a side box pleat. There are sash ends, fringed on either side of the front breadth, and these are embroidered also. At the hem

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304 What to Wear in April. from panel to panel extends a band of otter, the centre of the front of the skirt has six small pleats meeting in the middle, and the vest is pleated in the same way, but is almost hidden by the graduated vest of otter. Wide embroidery borders either side of it. There is a folded belt with a centre buckle. The sleeves are folded in at the wrist to a band of otter, and the high upstanding fall - over sleeves reach half way between the elbow and shoulder. It is a winterly dress for April, but our climate varies so that fur is generally acceptable till long after the ad¬ vent of May. Jackets are nearly all double breasted, save those which for later spring wear are cut to look as if they were, but have the under part removed. As a rule the buttons which fasten the out¬ door jackets are not allowed to show. Fly fronts and flap pockets are fashion¬ able, and so is the old patrol jacket once again, fitting the fig¬ ure closely, braided in wide braid, wfith the pendant tabs. Leather collars and cuffs are used for trimming m a n dresses ; and those gowns intended for hard \vear have no foundation at all, so that they have little weight — the most comfortable kind of skirt that can be had for shooting on Scotch moors. Brown of the tobacco shade has come in for cloth dresses trimmed with black braid, and it looks well, too, for the loose-fronted outdoor jackets with roll fronts. Some of the best gowns worn at fashionable weddings have been made in cloth of this tone, trimmed with handsome broidered trimmings specially made to match. Sleeves of velvet standing up exceedingly high are added to many of the spring dresses. Indeed, high sleeves are the fashion without a doubt ; but do not accept this axiom wdiether you have a longer short neck, high or sloping shoulders. Nothing is more dis¬ figuring to a short neck than the high shoulders — they constitute a deformity. To obviate this and still give the appearance of a fashionable sleeve, have the upper portion slashed. There is no doubt that high sleeves IDLERS. with the Medici roll at the top of the armhole, and the Medici ruff on evening dresses and mantles, are the most salient points in present fashions, and very pic¬ turesque and charming they look when a little prac¬ tical common sense is employed in their use. Short mantles are to be w'orn for the spring most elaborately embroidered, and the elega7itcs will be adopting coloured ones ; but it is too costly a mode for the general world, as so many would be needed. At all events, bright-coloured skirts and brocaded linings are a sine qiid non^ II.— FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. As yet the spring fashions in Paris are in abeyance. It is true that many houses have been busy pre¬ paring garments for the English market, but the modes French ladies are likely to really adopt are indi¬ cated rather than an¬ nounced as yet. The two young girls in the picture on the opposite page wear pretty gowns which .will not be out of date for months. The colourings are vivid : one w’ears blotting- paper pink, trimmed with green. The skirt is scanty, slight¬ ly full at the back, very plain in front; a band of vivid green is carried down the side, and a couple of bands across the front ; a strip ol soft ribbon or silk is twasted round the waist in such a fashion that no buckle or other fastening is needed. The bodice is one of those wEere the mate¬ rial is stretched to fit the human form, and any sur¬ plus fulness is gathered at the w'aist ; there are no seams and no darts. It opens down the front, and buttons and buttonholes appear on either side of the opening, but they are for ornament, not use. A V- formed vest of the bright green accords with the high green velvet collar. A strip of green is carried on the outside of the arm down the tight-fitting sleeve, which is gathered in high at the top. The buttons and buttonholes border the green the entire length of the sleeve, carrying out the same idea as on the bodice. But perhaps the most unique part of the toilette is the

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What to Wear in April. 305 hat — quite spoon-shape, the back slightly turning up with a bow, the brim in front standing well over the face ; a large bow of ribbon on the top. It ought to shade the face from any too impertinent sun. The dress worn by the other figure has much to commend it. It is made of light fawn woollen bro¬ caded in brown. There is a V-shaped plastron of brown velvet in front, and this same velvet appears again above the waist, like a stay bodice ; bows of the brown velvet hang at the side over the brown velvet corslet ; the elongated front breadth of the skirt is carried in pleats to the shoulder, which makes the bodice look full — a most admirable style for the figure. The sleeves are closely gathered at the top, and have a band of brown velvet for cuff. The skirt is box- pleated at the side, as will best be seen from the picture. The hat is covered with ostrich feathers on the outside and lined with dark brown velvet beneath. There are many details that are completely new. There are two new colours : one a peach tone of heliotrope, which is very pretty indeed — bright and spring-like ; the other a pink of the vieux rose order, but with a good deal more fawn in it than we have hitherto seen. Every bodice seems to be made either with a Bolero jacket in contrasting material, or with the Bolero in gold or black or coloured guipure. Some¬ times this is made of gold cord, sometim.es in designs like old Venetian point. The newest make has no back, simply a circular band carried round the arm¬ holes. These jackets are becoming to everybody, thin or stout, young or old, hence the fashion is becoming universal. Much passementerie and much embroidery are worn. A new kind of the former has pieces of com¬ position veined like marble in several tints, which blend with the colours in the trimming. Pointed pieces of this class are introduced on the sleeve, the wider portion starting from the shoulder, the points descending to the elbow, and the fronts of the skirts are often trimmed with these points, turning upwards. There are some magnificent brocades issuing from the Lyons factories, many of them with designs of spring flowers. One rich satin ground has stripes formed of crocuses and leaves, with snow¬ drops scattered at intervals between : the snowdrops, white with green foliage ; the crocuses yellow, with green foliage ; the ground-work tender green, light pink, or blue. Most of the floral designs — and there would seem to be a feeling for floral designs in preference to any other — are faithful copies of nature. One of the most beautiful I have seen this year, and one which is being despatched to England for Court trains, is an amalgamation of large caladium leaves and fern fronds of various kinds, against a background of palm, exactly as the rank tangled vegetation grows in the tropics, true to the life and very lovely. Foulards are fashionable in Paris, printed with white skeleton designs, on light grounds. Some ex¬ tremely pretty fronts of dresses are made in tulle, worked with long loose stitches in filoselle, as sun¬ flowers and leaves^ or acacia and other blooms — not INSPECTION. combined, but one distinct class of flower for each front, which, by-the-bye, is sufficiently wide and im¬ portant to extend far back to meet the train. Dis¬ tinct movable trains are often attached to dinner gowns even when they are made short. They are lined with the colour used in the trimming. The very short waists ending below the bust have found favour with many fashionable women, the front of the skirt being full. A beautiful dress of this class made in apple- green satin had a green tulle embroidered in gold on the front breadth which fell like a filmy veil almost from beneath the armpits ; the bodice trimmed with the same gold embroidery, and the sleeves made with the one full Empire puff set in a band, as nearly all the evening sleeves to low bodices are now made. Fashions are borrowed from the Empire, the Louis XV. and XVI. periods in Paris, and the three are sometimes curiously blended. Artistic, subdued tones are becoming modes of the past, bright colours and glar¬ ing contrasts having superseded them. But French women and French men know how to blend, and though, roughly speaking, the tints seem to be glaring, when combined they in no way appear to be so. The year 1890 promises to be signalised by great taste and art applied to dress. 740

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3o6 Voice. Piano. (Btntlt g)treamlet! I Words and Music ty F. PEEL, B.Mus. Oxon. - , — Anda^ite co7t inoto. ft- mf T —U- 1. Gen - tie 2. Gen - tie 3. Gen - tie 4. Gen - tie — t Ped. JIZ Ped. i.^z: ie=z!t * Ped. J - S stream - let, gen - tie stream - let, Wind -ing on - ward fair and free, stream - let, gen - tie stream - let, Oft I’ve loi - tered on my way, stream - let, gen - tie stream - let. As I watch thy wa-ters clear, stream - let, gen - tie stream - let. Roll thy crys - tal stream a - long. Nev -er rest - ing, al - ways Just to watch the danc - ing Mu - sic, min - gling with thy Rest -ing nev - er, flow - ing crcs. / - -y 1- roll - ing, sun - beams mur - mur, ev - er Roll - ing On thy Soft - ly Is the on rip ■ falls lang ward to the sea; . Nev-er rest - ing, al - ways roll - ing, Roll-ing pling bo-som play; . Just to watch the danc -ing sun -beams On thy up - on mine ear; . Mu -sic, min - gling with thy mur- mur, Soft-ly uage of thy song; . Rest- ing nev - er, flow- ing ev - er, - N-H - T— - — I - J— . - ! - ' , - - - 1 - r:. - i - 1 - H - Is the ward to the sea ! pling bo-som play ! up - on mine ear ! uage of thy song ! Gen -tie stream -let, gen -tie stream -let, How I love to sit and Gen -tie stream -let, gen -tie stream -let. Oh, how beau ti - ful thou Gen -tie stream -let, gen - tie stream - let. Sweet- est flow - ’rets bright and Gen - tie stream -let, gen - tie stream -let. Oh, how hap - py thou must

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307 JL dim. dim. mf ^ :5Etq i3rt dream Near to thee. soft glid-ing stream ! Gen - tie stream-let. art — Floods of joy o’er-flow my heart ! Gen - tie stream-let. gay Smile to cheer thee on thy way ! Gen - tie stream-let, be. Ev - er glid - ing, fair and free ! Gen - tie stream-let. gen -tie stream-let, How I gen -tie stream-let, Oh, how gen -tie stream-let. Sweet -est gen -tie stream-let, Oh, how love to sit and dream Near to thee, . soft-glid-ing stream: beau - ti - ful thou art — Floods of joy . o’er-flow my heart : flow - 'rets bright and gay Smile to cheer . thee on thy way : hap - py thou must be, Ev - er glid - ing fair and free : Nev-er rest - ing, Nev-er rest - ing, Nev-er rest - ing, Nev-er rest - ing. J al - ways al - ways al - ways al - ways cres. ' q : ritard. /TN ^ SS- « ^ ^ H' 4r-#-i - 1 — thee, thee, thee, thee, - 1— — — — soft - soft soft soft -1 - i — j - 1— glid - glid - glid - glid • ing ing ing ing 1 - ==1 e.rt Stream ! stream ! stream ! stream ! lEiSzEzzztyz

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3o8 THE CLARKES’ COUSIN. BY M. PAYNE SMITH. “'T'HE Clarkes have their ^ cousin from London staying with them, and are going to give a mu¬ sical party ! ’’ cried Lilian Durnford, bringing abreath of hot air from the street into the cool drawing¬ room, one baking July day. Mrs. Durnford and Maisie were both excited at the news. “ A real party ! exclaimed Maisie. “ Hurrah ! I shall have a chance of wearing my white dress at last ! When is it to be ? ’’ “Not just yet ! She is to stay a month, and the party is to be at the end of her visit. We are to practise some glees,” and Lilian collapsed into an arm-chair, and proceeded to fan herself with the nearest newspaper. At last Mrs. Durnford^s voice was heard. “ Is the cousin Miss Colville.^” she inquired; and as Lilian nodded, she proceeded. “Then I suppose the affair is coming off at last.” “What affair ? ” cried both girls. “ Mrs. Colville has always meant her daughter for Sam Clarke,” said their mother ; “ but I don’t know whether he has been consulted.” There was a rather ominous silence, then Lilian said, Fancy Sam married! I can’t imagine him with a wife ! ” Maisie said nothing, but went on steadily with her work ; and when her mother ventured to look at her she was as calm as usual, and Mrs. Durnford con¬ gratulated herself on having successfully administered a necessary hint. The Clarkes and Durnfords were great friends, as was not surprising when you consider that they had grown up together from childhood. Old Mr. Clarke had been a flourishing banker with a young wife and family when Mr. Durnford brought his bride to Woodham Rectory, and the two youngest Clarkes were the same ages as the rector’s daughters. Wood- ham was a small place, with very little society, but the young people at the Bank House and Rectory managed to enjoy themselves very fairly. Sam Clarke was the eldest son, and at his father’s death had taken his place at the bank, and of late had shown himself so attentive to Maisie that Mrs. Durnford was not at all sorry that Miss Colville had put in an appearance. “ Are you ready, Lilian ? ” “ Coming ! ” and after a minute’s interval Lilian appeared, in her blue flannel dress, with a racquet in her hand, and the two sisters started for the Bank House. Mrs. Clarke was sitting on the lawn with the young people round her, and Sam looked cross ! Maisie had time to notice that before she was introduced to Miss Colville, and was promptly crushed by the magni¬ ficence of the London cousin. Constance Colville was a splendid woman — there was no doubt of that fact ; and she entirely eclipsed the fresh pretty country girls, as much by her manner as by her attire. It was not so much her dil^ss as the way she wore it, which made the three other girls (for Janet Clarke was as bad as the Durnfords) look dowdy ; while her hair, which was neither abundant nor naturally curly, was arranged in such a truly wonderful manner that Lilian was positively thunder¬ struck by it. “Now then, let’s put it to the vote !” cried Sam. “ Miss Colville says it is too hot for tennis. Are you girls in favour of exercise or loafing ? ” “ I think exercise is much the pleasanter,” said Maisie, promptly. “I am ever so much cooler for walking here.” Miss Colville said nothing, but just looked at Maisie, and the girl suddenly realised that she was hotter than was quite becoming ; but as she had already imbibed a lively hatred of the London cousin she would not give in, and was soon sending the balls about merrily. It must be acknowledged, that when the game was over, all four players were rather red in the face, but that did not make it necessary for Miss Colville to- offer Maisie her fan in such a very pointed manner, that Sam suggested that as they were all equally hot, Miss Colville ought to fan them all. It was no use Sam’s trying to wait on Maisie as usual ; it was, “ Sam, your cousin wants some straw¬ berries,” “ Mr. Clarke, would you mind getting me another cup of tea ? ” “ Oh 1 thanks so much ! ” “ My dear boy, will you hand the bread-and-butter ? ” and so on, till at last the young man gave in, and sat down at Miss Colville’s feet, where he was left undisturbed but Maisie got very little tea, and no cream with her strawberries, and went home in a rather melancholy frame of mind. “ Sam 1 Sam ! where are you going “ Down to the rectory. I have not seen the girls for three days I” was the prompt answer. “You had better come too, and settle about those glees.” Janet looked irresolute. “ I should like to,” she said after a minute’s hesitation. “ I wonder if mother wants me to drive with Constance ? ” “Bother Constance !” was Sam’s extremely rude remark. “You had much better come with me. I have hardly seen you since that furbelowed young woman arrived.” “ My dear boy, you must not be so rude,” exclaimed his sister. “ Constance is your cousin and your guest.” “ I beg her pardon,” said Sam, ruefully. “ I would not abuse her if she didn’t make my very life a burden to me. Now, Janet, be honest ! Don’t you wish she were going next week ? ” •

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309 Janet laughed. “ I will go so far as to acknowledge that 1 should not break my heart if important duties called her away/’ said she. “ But she is really very amusing, and if she is a little spoiled, you must re¬ member she is immensely admired.” “ So she says ! ” remarked Sam, incredulously. The fellows she knows must be a queer set, I should think. I know I find her awfully stupid to talk to — she hasn’t got two ideas, and expects one to be per¬ petually waiting on her ; ” and he walked on in silence till they reached the rectory.’ The young ladies were at home, and in a few minutes they were all talking away as merrily as if there were no London cousin in the place, to spoil their fun ; but it must be confessed that Janet felt a little nervous, as she heard her brother making plans with Maisie. They were to come and practise glees that evening, and to go down the river to-morrow, and have a good walk next week, etc. etc., just as if Miss Colville would not have to be considered, and as if Mis. Clarke, who was rather a determined woman in her way, had not made up her mind that Sam’s intimacy at the rectory should be broken off before his fancy for Maisie grew to something more than friendship. The practice that evening was not a success. Miss Colville sneered at all the music the Durnford girls suggested, as old-fashioned and out of date, and tried to show them the charms of something very new and extraordinary, which Sam voted “balderdash,” while Maisie suggested that Woodham people liked their songs to have a little tune in them. At last some fine old madrigals were fixed on, and then it was discovered that Miss Colville could not sing at sight, and that she would have to study her part before she could begin to practise with the others. Moreover, her voice, though well-trained, was \t^eak, and did not show to advantage by the clear bird-like notes of the country girls ; so that the practising was cpite as good without her as if she had taken a part.

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The Clarkes’ Cousin. 310 Mr. Owen, the curate, sang bass, and Sam was the owner of a sweet, mellow tenor voice, which had a few unexpectedly pathetic notes in it— just the voice no one would have credited happy, fortunate Sam Clarke with. Constance was struck with the young man’s singing, and said so many pretty things to him about his voice, that (being a modest man) he was fairly overpowered. Maisie never paid him compliments, but scolded him if he lost his place or sang out of tune, and somehow he preferred her “ That was better, Sam,” to all Miss Colville’s sugared words ; and as he walked home with the girls he devoted himself to making her promise to sing My Lady’s Garden ” at the approaching party, and came home dejectedly be¬ cause she only snubbed him. Mrs. Clarke thought it would be just as well to join the young people on the river next morning, as her son would not show attention to Constance unless she were there to make him, and Maisie must be shown that Sam could not be thrown away on a country girl. The Colvilles were well connected, and in many ways Constance would have been a good match for the young banker, but he was using his eyes, and had already decided that she was not the right person for him. Even if he had liked her (which he did not), there were several things he did not like at all ; her dresses were very numerous, and extremely smart, and Sam rather wondered who paid for them. Meanwhile, Miss Colville had decided that Maisie must have a hint ; her forwardness and general behaviour being most unsuitable for a clergyman’s daughter, who ought not to expect attention from any marriageable man but the curate (at least that was Constance’s opinion), so she made ready for the boat¬ ing party in good time, and waited her opportunity. It came very soon ; for as she came downstairs she met Lilian on her way to Janet’s room, and found Maisie alone in the drawing-room. “ How do you do. Miss Durnford?” said Constance, sweetly. “Ah, you are ready for. a row, I see.” Maisie coloured as she glanced at her plain skirt and flannel blouse. “ I like old clothes on the river,” she answered. “ It is no use wearing things that may get spoiled.” “ You are very wise,” remarked Constance, with that slight sneer that ahyavs angered Maisie. “ And after all, Mr. Clarke never seems to notice what anybody wears.” “ Sam has rather good eyes for dress,” said Maisie. “ At least, he comes down on us, if we are too much got up, as he calls it.” “ So that is why you prefer simplicity,” said Con¬ stance w'ith a smile. Maisie blushed again. “ 1 don’t know what you mean ! ” she cried. “ Sam is a very old friend of ours, and criticises us, just as a brother might.” “ And you receive his criticisms more kindly than you would a brother’s,” proceeded Miss Colville. “ Forgive me ! I do not mean to be rude, only your preference is so openly shown, you know, “ I don’t know what you mean,” repeated Maisie, haughtily ; and as Mrs. Clarke made her appearance at the moment, no more was said ; only Maisie did know what Miss Colville meant, and went to the boat-house in a very unenviable frame of mind. “What’s the matter with Maisie?” inquired Sam, a couple of hours later, when they were all having tea on the river bank. “ I don’t know,” said Lilian ; “ she was all right when we started.” “You don’t think that blessed cousin of mine has been upsetting her, do you ? ” went on the young man. “ I wish she were my first cousin instead of third, and then I’d tell her what I think.” A brilliant idea occurred to Lilian, who promptly put it in operation. “You are only third cousins, are you?’’ said she; “ that accounts for it.” “ For what? ” “Never mind;” and Lilian looked unutterable things. The rest of the party had moved on, and the girl pretended she was going to follow them, but Sam took her by the arm. “ Look here, Lil, you are going to tell me what you mean or you go into the river,” he said griml^^ “I’ll scream!” cried Lilian, who was not at all afraid of his threats. No you won’t, you’ll go in, and get a horrid cold, and you’ll be an object on Tuesday for the party, and Tom is coming.” “ Tom coming ? ” (Tom was Sam’s younger brother.) “ Oh, Sam, you really are a very nice boy. Leave hold of my arm and I’ll tell' you ; ” and Lilian, looking very demure, began — “ Miss Colville has come down here to marry you, my dear boy, and if you had not manifested such an extreme dislike to her, you would have been married by now. What she said to Maisie I don’t know, but they were alone together ten minutes before we started, and they have both looked queer ever since. If I wanted to marry a man, I wouldn’t go and throw myself at his head, I know. He would have to come after me.” Sam’s countenance was glowing by this time. “All right, I’ll tell Tom,” he remarked, thereby throwing Lilian into os great a state of confusion as himself, after which they joined the others ; and Constance saw their blushes, and wondered if she had made a mistake, and given her “hint” to the wrong girl. The row home was much pleasanter than the row out ; Lilian was in high spirits, and laughed, and chatted away merrily, and though Maisie was still quiet, and disinclined to talk, she no longer snubbed Sam, but allowed him to look after her as usual. Miss Colville alone was silent and dist7'aitj she seemed no nearer her aim than at her arrival, nearly a month ago, and she was troubled by more than one debt. It is not so easy for young ladies to dress magnificently on next to nothing, and the Colvilles were poor, and the two beautiful daughters, who were to have made the family fortunes, were failures. The elder sister, after

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Some Recent Arrivals at the “ Zoo.” 311 several attempts at making a grand marriage, had ended by getting engaged to a poor lieutenant of Marines, while Constance was actually unsuccessful in her pursuit of a rich banker, and was seeing a simple little country girl succeed where she failed. “What is exciting you in this way, Lilian?” in¬ quired Mrs. Durnford, on Tuesday morning. “ I don’t suppose it is the party, for you have been to plenty of parties, but I never saw you in such a state before.” Lilian flung her arms' round her mother, and kissed her. “ Don’t ask inconvenient questions, Mammie,” she cried, “for I really can’t answer them. I will just tell you that something very nice will happen this even¬ ing!” “ I am glad to hear it,” said Mrs. Durnford, “but I hope Maisie will have her share. She has not looked well this last week.” “ Maisie will enjoy herself, never fear,” answered Lilian, and ran away, thinking, “ What a comfort it is mothers never know when their children are grown up 1” The evening came at last, and the two Durnford girls looked very nice in plain white silk, severe sim¬ plicity which set off their fresh prettiness. Miss Col¬ ville was gorgeous in pink tulle, but did not succeed, as usual, in making the rest look shabby. Mrs. Clarke received her guests with her usual cordiality, but now and then looked apprehensively at Sam, who was in a rather uncertain temper, and seemed by no means inclined to make himself agreeable. People arrived punctually at Woodham ; it was not long before the music began, and after the first glee, Sam’s brow relaxed, and he 'could even smile as he watched his mother having a quiet chat with Lilian in a corner. Presently it was time for Miss Colville’s song, and Sam bent over Maisie for a moment, “ Will you come out on the verandah ?” he whispered, and Maisie fol¬ lowed him without a moment’s hesitation. “We can hear just as well here,” he said, “ and it is not so hot.” There was a pause, and then he went on, “ You will sing ‘ My Lady’s Garden,’ won’t you ?” “If you like,” answered Maisie, dreamily. “How pretty the room looks from here. Shall we go in ? ” as the song came to an end.” “No 1 there’s a violin thing next — Maisie?” “ Yes!” “ Maisie ? ” “Yes!” “ You don’t think I like that London woman, do you ?” Maisie laughed. “ How ' very uncomplimentary you are !” she said. “No ! It’s very easy to see that you can’t bear her.” “ I can’t ! Mother is always at me to get married ; but - ” a long pause. “ Yes ! ” said Maisie, giving him a helping hand. “ I never cared for any girl but you ! - ” “Sam! are you there? It’s time for your song,” and Sam vvas led away by his sister. Maisie stayed outside a few moments, listening to the exquisite notes of his voice, and then came into the room, with a bright look in her eyes, which made her prettier than ever. For the rest of the evening she kept in full view, singing, playing accompaniments, smiling, looking after people, and generally helping. “One more song, Maisie?” said Janet, late in the evening. “ Is it any good ? ” “Yes ! the carriages aren’t all ready and before Maisie had time to object, a sheet of music was put in her hand, and the accompaniment began. She knew it well enough, and had sung it with Janet dozens of times ; but, though half the company were at supper, it was a trying ordeal to have to inform the rest that; “ her true love had her heart, and she had his.” “ Thank you, dear,” said a low voice in her ear, as she finished. She turned, saw Sam, forgot all about the rest of the company, and in another minute they were in the shady verandah again. The guests had to depart without another sight of their host, and it was not till Mrs. Durnford wanted Maisie that Janet let them be disturbed. They came out looking rather conscious, and Maisie did not recover herself till Sam told Mrs. Durnford that they were engaged ; then the old merry look came into the girl’s face as she cried — “ Indeed, Sam, I never said, ‘ Yes ! ’ ” “No! you said something nicer still,” was his answer ; and Miss Colville, standing unnoticed in the background, made up her mind to have a summons to London the next morning. SOME RECENT ARRIVALS AT THE “ZOO.” BY F. E. BEDDARD, M.A.. F.R.S.E., PROSECTOR TO THE ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON. fT is possible, unfortunately, that before these lines are published, some — perhaps all — of the — animals here referred to may have died ; but then it is equally possible that they may have been re¬ placed by other specimens. The large collection in the Regent’s Park Menagerie, though maintaining a very fairly constant average both in number and in species, is, of course, subject to continual change. Evei*)^ week about twenty animals die or are exchanged for others, and the same number are purchased or presented to the Society. Those who are curious in such matters may be interested to learn that in the year before last (i588) no less than one thousand one hundred and twenty-one animals were either pur¬ chased, presented, or born in the Gardens, while the number of deaths .in .the same year was nine

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312 Some Recekt Arrivals at the “ Zoo.” AN OLD FRIEND, “ SALLY.” hundred and forty-eight. From these figures it is ob¬ vious that the collection is by no means stationary. The most likely place in the Gardens for new arrivals of interest is the “ Marsupial House. The inscrip¬ tion over the door is, however, a little misleading, as its inhabitants are by no means always marsupials — indeed, just at present there are nearly, if not quite, as many creatures belonging to other orders. In the “ Marsupial House” lives the celebrated “Sally,” whose portrait is affixed to the wall outside ; but the intellectual achieve¬ ments of this chimpanzee are now, through Mr. Romanes’ articles, so well known that we will pass on to 3/ small creature which lives in the antechamber to the apartment which “ Sally ” shares with some other chimpanzees. On the right - hand side is a large cage in which used to dwell a pair of sloths. It is now in¬ habited by a little animal which it would hardly occur to anyone to re¬ gard as a deer. To begin with, it is of very small size — not much more than a foot long ; but then most groups of animals have their dwarfs as well as their giants. A weasel presents a greater contrast to a full- ^rown “ grizzly ” than this little chev- rotain does to a large deer like the North American Wapiti. In the second place, it has no horns. This is certainly unusual in the group to which it belongs ; but we have another instance in the musk deer — an animal which has often been confounded with the chevrotain. In order to appreciate the differences between the two forms, the visitor will have to make a journey to Bond Street, where in the shop window of Messrs. Piesse and Lubin is a stuffed specimen of Moschus moscliiferus — the musk deer. A curious point about the chevrotain is the enormous development of the canine teeth in the male, which form veritable tusks. These are, perhaps, used for fighting ; but it has been gravely asserted that the deer, when chased, springs into a tree, and suspends itself by the said tusks until the danger has passed by. Leaving the “ Marsupial House,” and crossing the canal by a bridge, from which in summer the canal, fringed with trees, offers a really beautiful prospect, we arrive, in course of time, at the Insect House, or Im sectarium, as it is sometimes called. At the time of writing this house is undergoing cleaning and repair ; when it is in full swing it is tenanted by a great number of creatures of all kinds — not only insects, but fishes and birds. Among the birds four specimens of the New Zealand Apteryx are “recent additions,” and very interesting. Unfortunately, they are shy and retiring in their habits, so that the visitors will, it is to be feared, have some difficulty in catching a sight of them. Their time for activity is night, when they prowl about and dig their long beaks into the soil — with which their cage is half filled — in search for earthworms. The Apteryx is one of the so-called “ wingless” birds, like the ostrich and cassowary ; but it really possesses wings, though they are rudimentary and absolutely useless for flying purposes. A» curious fact in the life-history of this bird seems to be very much in harmony with its antipodean habitat, where everything is supposed to be upside down. When it builds its nest, which is placed on the ground, it proceeds to ex¬ cavate a burrow underneath it, in which it remains off

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Some Recent Arrivals at the “ Zoo. f} that it has learnt to circumvent the wiles of that arch enemy of all feathered creatures — the cat ! In Samoa, which is the habitat of the manu-mea, there were originally no cats, but they were introduced later. When they did come they found abundance of food in the young chicks of Didtmculus^ which had the very unfortunate habit of nesting on the ground. This went on for some time, the bird getting scarcer and scarcer, until it suddenly occurred to the manu-mea that it was high time to prevent the utter extinction of its race ; so the bird discontinued its habit of nesting on the ground, and took to building upon the most inaccessible tree-top. After this it began to increase in numbers, and is now fairly common. It is a long way from the Insec- tarium to the Reptile House, though it is not a very great jump, zoologically, from a bird to a reptile ; perhaps the most interesting new arrival there is the little “ Horned Toad.’’ There are always examples of this odd creature on view, so that the prophecy with which this article commenced will probably not be verified in this particular case. In the first place, it is an example of the advantage which English names often possess of misleading the public as to the nature of the creature. The horned toad is a lizard which is common in Cali¬ fornia, and in spite of the formidable appearance which the spiny frills round its neck give to it, it is a harmless beast; but like many harmless creatures, it possesses cer¬ tain attributes which seem to be sufficient to frighten away some of its foes. “horned toad.” When, a n - noyed, it squirts out from certain glands in the neighbourhood of the neck a few drops of a blood- red fluid ; this capability must be of some protective value. The nature of this red fluid has not been tho roughly investigated ; it has a curious similarity to the red “ sweat” of the hippopotamus (which is supposed to have been the origin of the priestly deceptions in Egypt of bloody sweats} ; but in neither case has the fluid anything to do with blood. and on until the eggs are hatched. It is clear, there¬ fore, if this story is true, that the bird reverses the ordi¬ nary procedure, and sits not upon, but under its eggs ! In the same insect house is another bird — the manu- mea, or Diduncuhis—\v\i\Qh can hardly, perhaps, be considered a recent arrival, as it has been now a few years in the Gardens. But, considering that a parrot once lived for more than fifty years at the Zoo, it is not a very great exaggeration to include the manu-mea among recent arrivals. There is no great peculiarity in the appearance of this bird, and most visitors would probably pass it by unnoticed. It has no gaudy colours to attract attention, and no assertiveness of demeanour to compel the gaze of the passer-by, who, by the time that he has reached this ultima thule of the Gardens, is probably a trifle wearied. But the manu-mea is famous — or, rather, notorious — on account of the fact that it was for some time believed to be a near relative of the dodo. As the dodo was prob¬ ably the dull¬ est and most unshapely bird that ever existed, the al¬ liance claimed on behalf of the manu- mea, and which gave rise to its scientific name — Did- unculus — is not a noble one. The manu-mea is not dull, but uncommonly sharp - witted DIDUNCLLUS. - SO lllUCh SO,

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3H WHAT IS BAD LANGUAGE? RAMMAR/’ says Ben Jonson, “is the art of true and well speaking a lan¬ guage.^’ According to modern rule, the grammarian himself is here un¬ grammatical ; for triie^ the same as is doing duty as an adverb, and the precision of the present day would write truly. But what is truly if not a com¬ pound adjective, t7'ue-like,^ as very like in pronunciation is changed into ve7'ily ? Rules grow from ex¬ amples, or patterns, and we fall into a grave though common error of logic when we attempt to deduce example from rule, as is done by Victorian critics who censure Elizabethan grammar, founding their objections on mistaken instances, picked from the poets, historians, and dramatists of the six¬ teenth and seventeenth centuries. Let us take a case in point. Ben Jonson would scarcely have used its as a possessive pronoun. The word was an innovation in his time, and not established as grammar. Through¬ out the Authorised Version of the Scriptures there is no such word as its. His and as in genuine rustic speech of to-day, would have been the possessive case of //down to a period almost as late as Milton, who only once admitted its into “ Paradise Lost.” So rapidly, however, in the days of the Restoration, did its come into favour, that we find no less an authority than Dryden objecting to his for its, as “ ill syntax ” in Ben Jonson, Dryden unaccountably forgetting that such was the only syntax known till a period then recent. In turn we may now say that ill, in our generation, is not idiomatic English, when placed as an adjective before a noun, though we sometimes say that So-ahd-So is ill, meaning sick. The word ill has otherwise come to be used almost exclusively as an adverb. It would be as reasonable in critics now living to take Dryden to task for his ill ,sy7itax~\h2.X. phrase having for us a prankt and conceited sound— as it was in Dryden to censure Ben Jonson for not writing in accordance with a grammatical code which had not come into existence. Grammar makes itself ; or, at any rate, is not made by grammarians. Their “ operant powers ” extend only to schemes of theory and analysis ; and if there be any real grammar-makers, they are the makers of language as , the grammarians find it. What they (the acceptable writers) give, and we in time receive, as on authority, is grammar. The changes involved in the making or growth of this same grammar, from time to time, should be heedfully and jealously watched by all who love and respect their mother-tongue. It was in Shakespeare’s time — and,. for aught I know to the contrary, it may have been by Shakespeare him¬ self, though he did not repeat the peculiarity more than twice, or at the utmost thrice, in all his writings —that the innovation already mentioned, trivial, but not on that account more defensible, was first introduced. And when Shakespeare had used this newly-coined form of pronoun as many as (say) three times, it became fixed as grammatical English forth¬ with ; for, as some one pertinently said, by way of answering all questions as to the learning of Shakespeare, Shakespeare is learning, and his grammar was the best grammar of his day. Milton, as we have seen, turned his back upon the genitive its, preferring the more dignified his and he7‘, which, though they were beginning to be old-fashioned, were not on that account the less stately. The comparative modernism, its, was adduced by some cunning word- fancier I think it was Jacob Bryant’s critical adver¬ sary, Morritt, the friend of Sir Walter Scott— as proof positive against the validity of the poems ascribed by Chatterton to his supposititious Bristol monk, who, if he wrote at all, wrote in the fifteenth century. It was certainly curious that this crushing argument should have escaped the controversialists who swooped down upon the “ marvellous boy ” soon after the publication of his pretended discoveries. Such lines as Life and all its goods I scorn, should, as Dr. Trench remarks, have been at once decisive of the question. The importance, in our language, of little words cannot be over-rated. No parts of speech are better worth studying than particles. Only by the foolish and the wilfully ignorant are they slighted as matters beneath serious notice. Scarce one of our preposi¬ tions, conjunctions, adverbs, but has a pedigree which, if traced to its source, would clearly establish its right to be respected as a noun or a verb whose family has seen better days. Having parted, bit by bit, with their syntactical belongings, and lost the habic of inflection, the impoverished progenitors of the unfortunate par¬ ticle have left it with no more than it stands upright in. The history of to, as the sign of the infinitive mood in English, is instructive. This same mood formed itself, whilom, with a terminal inflection ; and I take it that the same formation is common to most, if not all, grown-up languages all- the world over. How came this datival prefix to be the peculiar pro¬ perty of the English infinitive mood ? By a strange process of evolution, seemingly. It began by denoting the future infinitive, not the simple, and may be recog¬ nised in such phrases as “hard to bear,” “sad to say,” “good to eat,” “easy to learn,” “we are to go,” “you are to blame,” &c., as likewise in the announcement one so frequently reads, in white letters, on large black-boards, just before quarter-day, “This house to let.” In these extra-grammatical times, over-educated, but scarcely 7£'(?//-educated builders and house-agents are accus¬ tomed to improve that form into “ This house to be let,” though lodging-house keepers, for the most part, stand on the ancient ways, and put forth the notice, “Apartments to let,” as before. The lodging-house

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What is Bad Language? 315 keepers, not caring much about it, are right ; the house-agents, thinking to be a cut above them in grammar, happen to be wrong. There was once, in the time of people not yet elderly, a familiar street cry, much in the mouths of hawkers carrying little trays before them, “ Young lambs to sell ! ” It would be no credit to the School Board if these vendors of nursery nick-nacks should now go about crying, “ Young lambs to be sold ! ” Much might be said, though not in a paper so slight as this, concerning to^ and its gradual transference to the simple infinitive mood, where it might rest quietly enough if untroubled by adverbs. We are now in the midst of a change which, fifty or sixty years ago, was reproved as a vain conceit. “ Some writers of the present day,” said Richard Taylor, in his “ Additional Notes” to Horne Tooke, “ have a disagreeable affecta¬ tion of putting an adverb between to and the infini¬ tive.” Here was another change in the fortunes of to. After a long wedded life, to was compulsorily divorced by a meddlesome, mischief-making adverb. The name of Byron honours this corruption, the noble bard’s line, commencing “To slowly draw’,” having first countenanced an abominable practice. The cor¬ ruption — for as such, despite the extraordinary and inexplicable sanction it has received from Browm- ing, in some of his noblest poetry, I cannot but regard this now common habit of maiming the infinitive mood — is shunned by alH other waiters of authority. In the louder grades of authorship, indeed, w^e continually find such dislocations as “ to at once recognise,” “ to skilfully operate,” “ to forcibly argue;” “to considerably improve,” “to highly appreciate,” and so on. It is since the time of Cowley and Milton that the word 7iJimc?'ons has completely altered its sense. With those men it was never used in the place of many, as it has come to be used now. Its most frequent employment throughout the seventeenth century, and during great part of the eighteenth, was in a poetical significance, relating to metre or rhythm, as when Waller wrote “ my numerous moan,” intend¬ ing by this expression to signify a plaint in numbers : that is to say, in verse. The word was altogether new in Shakespeare’s time, and as a matter of fact, though it might seem to be a notably Shakespearean word, it is w'holly absent from Shakespeare’s gigantic thesaurus. When it began to be used prosaically, it w^as applied only to nouns of multitude, as “ a numerous con¬ course,” “a numerous retinue,” “ a numerous flock.” Days of laxity in speech had come about, w’hen the world began to hear of numerous occasions, numerous instances, numerous horses, and numerous men. I have asked myself the question, “What is bad language ? ” and I will offer in reply my humble opinion that language is bad in proportion to the number of unnecessary changes it has passed through. All persons of sense wall allow that needful and natural changes in a language are inseparable from its true growth ; but at every stage of that growth it is best to let w^ell alone. The w^orst language, in short, is that which has been most doctored. Some lines back I took into service a good, strong, healthy, old adverb, who has been out of employment so long that I have incurred, I dare say, a few gibes for putting one so antiquated to w^ork at the present day. He is the grand old adverb whilom. He had escaped doctoring, only to be shelved in his hearty prime. Regard him well, and see if he deserves to be treated as a fossil. True, he has come down to us — or, rather, he had come down to our grandfathers — with all the original characteristics of his race unobliterated. Such a race, too, as it is ! JVhiles, wJiilo7}is brother adverb, is also unjustly superannuated ; and the parent noun, while., whose nounship is denied by some grammarians (alas, the while !), can only get employment as an adverb, having in this capacity survived his children. We must not say “awhile ago,” says one grammarian, who forbids us also, on peril of being deemed vulgar, to say “ a many.” But we may, he adds, say “ a great many” ; and I suppose he would have no objec¬ tion to the phrase, “a long while.” Whilst, 1 grant, is ungraceful, but not more so than amo7igst. It is, not good breeding, we are informed, to say either a while smce or beiwee7i whiles. Vulgarity is alwaj's taking fright at itself. Be it ever borne in mind by all who would safely shun vulgarity that the true vulgar is not always the most vulgar. On the contrary, it is often the least so, in an obnoxious sense. I once heard counsel in a wreck-inquiry ask a rough diver who had gone down to examine the hull and cargo of a sunken vessel, “ Did you assume an erect attitude } ” meaning, “ Did you stand upright ? ” I could not catch the reply, but it must have been a poor one not to have bettered the question. It is bad language that goes about for big words, and more than enough of them, as when a man says, instead of “ Somebody told me so,” “ A certain person informed me that such was the case.” There might have been no case ; perhaps the person was not really certain, nor even a person ; and it is open to doubt whether he either did or could inform. Those who look down upon prepositions as the very “ small potatoes ” of speech, are pleased to consider it an inelegance that any sentence or member of a sent¬ ence should be closed with one of them. Landor, on the other hand, contended that this manner of closing a sentence in English is not only as elegant as the alternative form of speech, but much more so. It is, says he, strictly idiomatical ; it avoids an unnecessary word ; and it is countenanced by the purest writers of Greece. “ I would rather,” Landor declares, “ close a sentence like this, ‘there is nobody to contend with,' than ‘ there is nobody with whom to contend ; ’ rather with ‘there is nobody to fight against,’ than ‘there is nobody against whom to fight.’ ” It is a very bleak region of prose that would not suffer by this inverted form of sentence, which employs “ with whom ” and “ on which ” to shirk the natural mode of ending, only because it is natural ; and the effect on poetry would be withering in a degree far more disastrous. I think we may conclude, then, that bad language is language whose characteristics are opposed to natural¬ ness and sincerity. Godfrey Turner.

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3i6 THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE, A Reminding Watch. The watch we illustrate has a simple device for re¬ minding the wearer of any appointment he may have on hand. A miniature dial, seen on the right, has hands which can be set to remain at any fixed time inde¬ pendently of the main dial. Sup¬ pose one has to catch a particular train, or see a par- ticular person, these hands can be set to the time in question. They 'an event — say, a political speech, or the time taken up by a railway journey. A Date Farm. An Algerian valley, the Oued Rir', has been turned into a date plantation. Oases have been formed by sinking artesian wells, 900 acres of desert land have been brought under cultivation, and 50,000 palms planted. The cost of this, including the erection of homes for the servants of the company, has been ^30,000. Henna, madder, cotton, flax, vines, and other pilants are also cultivated ; grass and cattle likewise form a part of the produce. The largest of the oases is 40 feet below the level of the sea, and the water m the wells comes from a depth of 230 feet below the surface. Two Novelties for Ladies. Unfortunately the number of ladies who knit well is not relatively so large as it was in our mothers’ days ; but all who do should welcome the new wool-holder which has Just been pa¬ tented by a Birmingham firm. Suspended by an ornamental hook from the belt or button-hole, the holder consists of a sickle - shaped bow of metal, hinged at one end to a cross-tree and fastening by means of a catch at the other. To this the ball of wool is readily fixed, and held in a position that enables a lady easily to draw from it the supply she needs without fear of her ball running away across the floor. A little clip is fixed to the holder by a light chain to secure the loose end of the wool when the ball is not in use. Possibly a short chatelaine chain between the hook that affixes the holder to the dress and the apparatus itself would be an improve¬ ment, but we advise all ladies who work with wool to try this handy little appliance. The ‘'Doris ’’belt is a novelty that appeals specially to mothers of young children, and is best described as a safety belt for use in perambulators, mail-carts, and even cots. It con¬ sists, really, of two belts strongly linked together— one of leather to be strapped round the child’s waist, and the other of webbing to be buckled to the back of the carriage, the chair of a swing, or the rail of a cot, leav¬ ing the little one in every case plenty of freedom, but at the same time providing against accident. A New Mucilage. M. Trojanowsky, a foreign chemist, has obtained a substitute for gum arabic by boiling one part of flax seed with eight of dilute sulphuric acid and eight of water until the mixture, which at first thickens, becomes quite fluid. This is then strained through muslin, and four times its volume of strong alcohol is added. The precipitate, when filtered, washed with alcohol and dried, is a clear gum without taste or odour, and 30 grains are sufficient to emulsionise an ounce of cod-liver oil. The Edinburgh Exhibition. Our illustration will give a fair idea of the main building of the forthcoming exhibition at Edinburgh, which is to celebrate the opening of the Forth Bridge Railway. It is in the style of the French Renais's- ance, with towers of a Moorish type. The architect is Mr. W. Allan Carter, M.I.C.E. Its length is 700 feet and its width 200 feet. A bridge across the Union Canal leads up to the main entrance. In the grounds, besides a park for football and other games, there will also serve to fix the duration THE EDINBURGH EXHIBITION.

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1 HE Gatherer. ii7 be a panorama, a Japanese village, a lighthouse, kiosks, numerous cafes, and so forth, besides electric launches on the canal, and a working model of a ship railway. A special lecture-hall will also be pro¬ vided for conferences and scientific meetings. Black Silver Jewellery. Bbc silver— really, we believe, the sulphide of silver of chemists — is now being used by a Parisian firm in the manufacture of all sorts of jewellery, and gives a very pleasing result. The bluish-black sur¬ face of the metal is stamped with gold and silver designs, appar¬ ently in the same way as tortoise-shell work, and the outcome is a very pretty and tasteful ornament. For mourn¬ ing jewellery and for table ornaments this new process (in which, by the way, the black silver is permanent) ought to prove very useful. The Seat of the Diamond. From a considera¬ tion of the rocks asso¬ ciated with the dia¬ mond, M. Daubr^e, the well-known French mineralogist, infers that this mysterious gem is brought up to the surface of the earth by irruptions from the infra - granitic rocks. It is commonly associated with peridotite, and has also been found in meteorites. Moreover, some volcanic blocks of Greenland have been found to contain cubical graphite, which is evidently formed from the diamond. Everything considered, M. Daubrde is of opinion that some of the deeper igneous rocks of the earth’s crust contain a large percent¬ age of diamond dust and crystals. While upon this subject we may mention that according to a report from America, gold has been discovered in a meteorite which recently fell there. A Cluster of Rainbows. On the 1 8th of September last, Mr. W. Scouller, an old student of the Natural Philosophy Class in Glas¬ gow' University, observed a group of three rainbows at Valparaiso. The sun was about to set in a very smooth sea, and there was a bright reflection from the water. Opposite the luminary, inland, Mr. Scouller saw a primary bow and its secondary parallel to it but higher up the sk}', while a third bow started from A CLUSTER OF RAINBOWS. — FIG. 2. the roots of the primary bow and intersected the secondary bow at two points. Fig. i will give some idea of the phenomenon. The unusual third bow was produced by the 7'eJlectio7i of the sun in the ocean. Soon after sunset Mr. Scouller saw a single bow, all pink, and traced it to the light of a cloud just above the hidden sun. Rainbows are very common in the West Highlands of Scotland, with their singularly pure atmosphere and flying showers. The writer has counted as many as seven distinct bows in the course of two or three hours, some of great bril¬ liancy. Dr. Percival Frost, of Cambridge, relates that from the top of Dunstaflnage Castle, near Oban, he once observed the curious effect seen in Fig. 2. The cluster consists of eight dis¬ tinct bows — namely, the usual primary and secondary bows ; pri¬ mary and secondary bows of sunlight re¬ flected from the bay ; primary and secondary bows formed by the sun reflected from the water after leaving cer¬ tain drops ; and pri¬ mary and secondary bows formed by light from the sun reflected at the water, and, after leaving other drops, again reflected at the water. A CLUSTER OF RAINBOWS. — FIG. I. A Double-Wedged Photometer. The late Mr. R. Sabine devised a photometer in which the light to be measured was weakened or partially quenched by passing through a wedge of neutral-tinted glass, and thus brought to the same in¬ tensity as a standard light of known intensity. The thickness of the glass became in this way a measure of the light under test. At a recent meeting of the Royal Society Mr. Edmund Spitta described a photo¬ meter on this principle with two wedges of neutral- tinted glass, one sliding over the other, by means of a turning-screw. The double wedge is preferable to the single for optical reasons. But Mr. Spitta’s apparatus appears to be substantially described in a British patent numbered 6,114 of the year 1882.

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3^8 The Gatherer. Perennial Pasture. Practical agriculture is indebted to Sir J. B. Lawes for his valuable paper on the history of a field laid down in permanent grass thirty years ago on the Rothamsted estate. During this time it has been mown for hay every season, and the result shows that by the judicious employment of manures, natural and artificial, arable land can be converted into perennial pasture, not only without loss, but with profit to the farmer. If hay is to be removed, it is essential to supply not only nitrogenous but an abundance oi mineral manures, and especially potash, a large quantity of which is removed by the crops, and has, therefore, to be replaced. When the grass is not mown but browsed, the exhaustion is much less ; but it is more pronounced if consumed for the production of milk than if for fattening of stock. Full particulars are given in Sir J. B. Lawes’ paper, which first appeared in the journal of the Royal Agricultural Society of England, and has been reprinted by Messrs. Spottiswoode. A Silent Air-Propeller. A new silent-work- ing air-propeller is shown, both front and side, in Figs, i and 2. It consists of an air- wheel or fanner which is capable of supplying fresh air to a building, or with¬ drawing foul. It has been applied to sev¬ eral public buildings with great success. The quantity of air delivered in a minute by a fan 3 feet in diameter is, accord¬ ing to Professor A. B. W. Kennedy, 12 J cubic feet multiplied by the number of revolutions it makes in that time. That delivered in the same time by a 2 ft. fan is FIG 2, 5.7 cubic feet multiplied by the number of revolu¬ tions per minute. The fans are capable of revolving up to speeds of six or seven hundred revolutions per minute. Rustless Iron. In Pittsburg, United States, iron is given a rustless coat by heating to a white heat in an oval furnace, made air-tight, and then allowing steam to act upon the glowing surface for eight hours. A magnetic oxide of iron is thus formed, and a subsequent bath of acid completes the process. A Tuning-Fork Relay. It is sometimes convenient to keep a tuning fork or diapason in continual vibration, and it is important that the impulse or fillip should be given to it with¬ out actually touching the fork. This can be done by the method illustrated in our figure, where F is the fork mounted on a resona¬ tor, R. Two electro-mag- nets, E, E, are brought near the sides of the fork as shown, and when these are excited by the current from a battery, B, they pull the forks apart. If the current be weakened, the forks will approach each other. To keep the fork in regular vibration, it is necessary that these impulses should keep time with the rate of the fork, and this is done by including a microphone, M, in the circuit of the battery and magnets. The micro¬ phone is agitated by the resonance of the box, R, and varies the strength of the current so as to regulate the pull of the magnets, and keep the fork sounding. The Spread of Epidemics. Dr. R. Assmann, a German observer, has arrived at the conclusion that the atmospheric conditions most favourable to the spread of organisms in the air are dryness of the soil, deficiency of snow and rainfall, existence of fogs and low clouds, high barometer with little intermixture of air in a vertical direction. These conditions, he remarks, were common throughout eastern and central Europe durmg last autumn, and the easterly winds may have carried the organisms of influenza to the west. It may also be mentioned in this place that Professor Schonbein, the discoverer of atmospheric ozone, found that by inhaling it he could produce effects of influenza — such as inflammation of the mucous membranes. Is it that an excess as well as a deficiency of ozone in the air is deleterious ? A Piloting Lighthouse. The “ spectro-telegraph ” of Captain Paul La Cour, inventorof the ‘‘ phonic wheel,”has recently been applied in part to the harbour lantern of Aarhuus in Jutland. The light is seen to be red when a vessel is in the proper course to make the entrance of the harbour, and green or blue if it deviates to one or other side of that course. Another part of La Cour’s invention is, however, to make the light signal its name by

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The Gatherer. 3^9 the Morse code. This is not done by eclipsing the light into long and short flashes, as proposed by Sir W. Thomson. The light remains quite steady, but some of it is cut off by a perforated screen, and it is passed through a prism which scatters it, so Unalterable Cheques and Receipts. The accompanying illustration shows a new form for cheques and receipts, for which Mr. T. C. Taylor has just applied for a patent. In the table at the side of the body of the cheque or receipt the amount for . |.| . THE UNION BANK OF LANCASHIRE . . . or order . . skillm^Sj . .pence, - . 0 1 2 3 4 i H 5 6 7 • 9 0 • 2 3 4 a 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 • 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 1 0 G . 7 8 • 0 1 2 3 4 S 5 6 7 % 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 0 1 2 3 5 Pence. 6 7 8 9 10 11 iriifT 'in ITTT msBm UNALTERABLE CHEQUES. that when viewed in the telescope the spectrum is seen to be broken up into the “dots’^ and “dashes’’ of the code which indicate the letters of its name. Ships’ forelights may also be made to signal their name in this way, and ships can converse at night in the same manner. Whether this method is better than the occulting plan above referred to is, perhaps, doubtful, but it is highly ingenious. The simpler mode of guiding ships into harbour, as carried out at Aarhuus, appears to be free from all objection except that arising from the possibility of colour-blindness on the part of the steersman. We may add here that the French Government has instituted trials in fog-signalling at sea by means of a cannon. The gun adopted is a very long self-loading machine weapon capable of firing twenty to thirty shots a minute. Marks of Handicraft. M. Bertillon, director of the Identification Depart¬ ment at the Prefecture of Police, Paris, has applied photography to study the physical peculiarities engen¬ dered by different occupations. Obviously if the trade of a murdered person can be proved by examining his hands it is an important clue ; but the results may bave a still wider influence in helping to keep the said peculiarities in check. M. Bertillon finds that the hand of a navvy looses its fine lines, and a callosity appears where the spade handle rubs on the skin. Tin-plate workers have their hands covered with little cracks produced by the acid used in soldering. The hands of lace- workers are, on the contrary, smooth, but callosities are apt to grow on the front of their shoulders, and blisters to appear upon their backs, owing to the friction of the loom straps. The thumbs and first joints of the right hands of metal-founders have often very large blisters, whilst their left hands are scarred with sparks of the metal. which it is made out is to be indicated by punching out the figures — an operation which may be very readily performed, and which, of course, makes any subsequent alteration in the document practically impossible. The principle of this device is one that seems capable of very wide extension to other forms of documents in which it is desirable to have a safe¬ guard against possible unauthorised alterations. We need hardly say that, under the existing law, these new cheques would require stamps, and the inventor’s specimen, from which we have made our illustration, must not be taken as establishing a new departure in this respect. A Binder for Lantern Slides. The two glasses forming a magic-lantern slide are usually bound with black strips ; but Mr. Vevers has introduced a coloured strip, gummed and ready for use, which has several advantages. It admits of the colours being varied so as to distinguish the slides, and the titles of the latter can be written on them. They are more adhesive than the black ones, and their price is just one-half. The Gymnastics of To-day. Despite all that pessimists have written about the “ deterioration ” of our race, we suppose that no one will be found to assert that we have one muscle or one joint the fewer than our fathers before us. Yet how widely different, how infinitely more varied, are the modes of exercise recommended to-day for in¬ creasing the strength of our muscles and the supple¬ ness of our joints than was the case, say, thirty years ago ! We suggest thirty years ago because, not long since, we chanced to pick up a “complete manual of gymnastic exercises” published about that time. Perhaps it was “ complete ” in its day, but the

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320 Pictures of the Months. whole work could hardly be compressed into the space of three chapters of the second, or “advanced,” part of “ Modern Gymnastic Exercises,” just pub¬ lished by Messrs. G. Philip & Son. The author of this new book is Mr. A. Alexander, whose right to speak in authoritative fashion is evidenced by the fact that he is director of the Liverpool Gymnasium. Figure marching and running, parallel and horizontal bars, trapeze, table, and rings, are only a few of the branches that need — and here receive — exhaustive treatment at the hands of an instructor in gymnastics. Let no reader, even the most sedentary and debilitated, be frightened from a study of this book by the word “Advanced” on its title-page, for in the admirable first chapter, entitled “ How to Get Strong ” (by the way, when shall we get a more expressive word than get? he will find a course of exercise prescribed, by following which no man could fail to derive benefit. Not the least useful chapter in the volume is the introductory one on “ Our Muscular System,” which should be carefully studied, with the aid of the accom¬ panying anatomical figures, by every tyro in gym¬ nastics. And does not this suggest the direction in which the gymnastic courses of to-day differ most satisfactorily from those of preceding generations ? It is not so much that we use more and better apparatus, or that we expect our athletes to go through more elaborate series of somersaults and throws, as that we are learning more and more to pay attention to the particular form of exercise needed to develop the individual, and enable him first to bring up the strength of the weakest member of his system to the general level, and then to train and develop the whole on sound anatomical principles. Where is the Memory? If the laws of supply and demand hold good in the literary world, the reader of to-day would seem to have a strong affection for psychological plots. We are all familiar with Mr. Louis Stevenson’s creation of the dual character of Jekyll and Hyde, on whom the transformation was wrought by means of a drug. Now we have Mr. Harland in “Two Women or One?” (Cassell), giving us a change of character from the bad to the good, brought about by means of a surgical operation. The whole plot of the story turns upon this operation, and its undoing is also the undoing of the story. The details we must, of course, leave our readers to find for themselves in the book, which will well repay perusal. To our minds it suggests the ques¬ tion with which this note is headed. Will our surgeons ever be able to locate the memory so exactly that by the movement of an instrument they can take from us all recollection of the past, and yet leave us physically and mentally fit for the future ? Medical science has, no doubt, made rapid strides of late, but it has hardly reached this point yet. PICTURES OF THE MONTHS. April. OFT and warm are the wafts of the breeze, ^ There are nesting songs thro’ the woodland wide ; ’Neath moist blue skies, o’er the flowery leas, A youth and a maiden walk side by side ; And tenderly sweet are the thoughts that come, Though glances meet not, or words be dumb.

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321 TO BE GIVEN UP. By KATE EYRE, Author of “For the Good of the Family,” “A Step in the Dark,” &c. &c. CHAPTER THE TWENTIETH. ON WITH THE NEW LOVE. [TELL?” V Philip Dacre had stood for some minutes by Miss Eastabrook’s side after she had said she would tell him the nature of the warning she had received. Finding, however, that she did not speak, he at length broke the silence. “ Yes, Mr. Dacre ? ” And as she looked up inquiringly into his face, he noticed how troubled was her expression. “ I am waiting for you to tell me what has startled you so.’^ “ I cannot tell you now ; wait until we are at home.” He looked down on her with a smile that was some¬ what mirthful, but w’holly tender. “ Humphreys has not really alarmed you, surely?” “ I am not exactly alarmed, but I feel as if some¬ thing of great moment might be about to happen. So much he told me was true — about my own character, I mean — that I am constrained to attach some import¬ ance to the events he predicted.” ‘‘ What did he tell you about your own character ? That is, if I may ask.” “ He commenced by saying that I was musical ; a fair linguist, passionately fond of poetry, and rather given to rhyming myself ; a little bit of an anti¬ quary - ” Miss Eastabrook, depend upon it he has seen you searching in the neighbourhood for Druidical re¬ mains,” laughed Philip. “ Mr. Dacre, what nonsense ! He said he had neither seen nor heard of me before ; and I firmly believe he was speaking the truth.” “Seriously, so do I. I know Humphreys to be a most honourable fellow, one who never endeavours to add to his reputation by pretending that knowledge, obtained in an ordinary way, has reached him through some occult agency. He did not see your face at the time either, did he ? ” “ No ; he was seated in a tent, behind a curtain, and I presented my hands for examination through a small opening.” “ May I ask what else he said ?” “ I hardly know ; but I have a distinct impression that he made me out to be an opinionated, dogmatic, self-satisfied, stiff-necked, and altogether unamiable sort of person. And the worst of it all is, I am afraid he is right.” Philip smiled as he listened to this long category of unpleasant characteristics, well knowing that Miss Eastabrook, in her desire not to spare herself, must have greatly exaggerated the faults of which the palmist had told her. “But surely, Miss Eastabrook, he touched upon a saving clause or two ? I find a difficulty in believing you to be altogether void of good points.” “Yes, he said some things which I suppose he meant to be complimentary.” “ May I not hear -them?” “He said I was a slave to prejudice. That on first meeting a person I made up my mind whether or not I liked that person, and that nothing he or she could subsequently do would modify my opinion in the slightest degree, unless I was convinced I had been intentionally deceived.” “ Pardon me, but was that one of the covipliine^itary things he said to you ? ” “Wait a moment, please. I am coming to the complimentary things — or rather, to those things which Mr. Humphreys appeared to view in that light. He insisted that I was capable both of feeling and in¬ spiring very deep affection, and that when 1 was with those I loved all my faults vanished, until those highly favoured mortals completely lost sight of the blemishes in my character, which to others are so ob¬ trusively plain.” “ I don’t agree with him there,” remarked Philip,, with energy. “ I believe those who love you best see your faults most clearly.” “ Then you are of opinion that the; faults he specifies are mine ? ” “ In some degree, yes.” Then seeing her eyes flash, he added — “ You would not wish me to say I thought you a perfect being, surely. Miss Eastabrook ? My own opinion, however, is that you have a predisposition to these faults, rather than that they are actually yours.” Her colour rose. “ Perhaps, Mr. Dacre, if you knew and liked me better, this predisposition would, in your opinion, have given place to actual possession, since you have just stated that those who like me best see my faults the most clearly.” He saw how cruelly he had hurt her pride. “Pardon me, Miss Eastabrook, if I have been too plain-spoken ; I did not mean to vex you.” “ I do not know why you should imagine you have done so,” she replied, with marked coldness. Then she added, after a rather long pause — “ Mr. Humphreys said that, although I was morbidly sensitive about the opinion others might form of me, I was most anxious to appear cynically indifferent to it. He was quite right. Nevertheless, I will be honest for once in my life ; I am vexed that you think so badly of me.” 741

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322 To BE Given up. “But I have never said that I think badly of you, Miss Eastabrook ; I only maintain that you are not perfect, and that those who love you well are not so blinded but that they can see this for themselves. It is quite true that in your intercourse with those whom you like your faults never obtrude themselves : that to them you are never opinionated, dogmatic, self-satisfied, stiff-necked, and an altogether unamiable sort of person — I believe that was the order in which you mentioned your less pleasing characteristics ? — Nevertheless, they may perhaps observe some slight tendency to these failings in your dealings with others.” “ 1 am sorry for that, because I do not like being found fault with by those I care for.” She tried to speak playfully, in her effort to regain her good-humour, but was not very successful in the attempt.” “ Does that mean you do not like me to find fault with you ? ” “ It does, Mr. Dacre.” He did not reply in words, but there was a happy look of triumph in his eyes as they sought hers. And then the angry flush died out of her cheeks, while a pleased smile hovered round her mouth. After all, playing at quarrelling was a delightful amuse¬ ment. “ I think I must let you find as much fault with me as you like,” she said at length, speaking very softly, until the tones of her voice were a caress. “It would afford you so much satisfaction that I haven’t the heart to object.” “ And in return, will you perform the same salutary service for me ? ” “ Mr. Humphreys says that those I — like can do no wrong in my eyes ; it is part of that prejudice of which he complains. So, you see, it would be useless for me to undertake to find fault with you, in return for the outspokenness you purpose practising towards me.” “Was it necessary to misquote Mr. Humphreys?” “ In what way did I do so ? ” “You substituted another verb. Might not the one he used have been allowed to stand ? ” Someone came up to speak to Miss Eastabrook at that moment, and when next she addressed Philip, it was on quite a different subject. “ By-the-bye, Mr. Dacre, you never came to make a purchase at my stall,” she said. “ And are you sold out ? ” “Not a single article left.” “ Oh, dear ! and I should so much have liked some¬ thing as a memento of the occasion.” “ I anticipated your wish, and seeing you were so busy with your clients, I bought something in for you.” “ Thanks, so much. May I have the ‘ something,’ • please ?” “ You must wait until we are at home, and then I will give it to you.” Two hours later- Philip entered the drawing-room at The Fountains, and joined Miss Eastabrook, who was standing looking thoughtfully into the fire. Although it was early in September, the evening was unseason¬ ably chilly. “ I have left Mr. Eastabrook with his cigar, and have come to claim the fulfilment of your two pro¬ mises, Miss Eastabrook.” “My two promises, Mr. Dacre ? ” “ That you would tell me the gipsy’s warning, and let me have tlie ‘ something ’ you bought in for me. He spoke playfully, but she did not look up. Then he observed how tightly her hands were locked in each other, and that the tear-drops were wet on her eyelashes. “ What is it, Clare ? ” he asked, not noticing that in the excitement of the moment he was calling her by her Christian name. “ I shall tell Humphreys he must be more careful, and not frighten people out of their wits.” “ I am not frightened. It is only that my thoughts have taken a painful turn.” “ Well, but what did he say ?” demanded Philip with the impatience of anxiety. “He said that a great trouble was overshadowing me, which would probably take the form of a parting, the anguish of which would stir my nature to its very depths ; and that as a critical moment in my caFc-er was almost upon me, he should advise me to advance slowly, well considering each step before taking it. Is it not strange he should have predicted trouble to befall both Sophy and me about the same time ?” “ But what are the painful thoughts suggested by his prediction ? For my own part, I should be in¬ clined to attach very little importance to so va^ue a prophecy.” “ I have been thinking of my father. He is an old man now, you know. It is so dreadful to realise that when two persons love each other death some day part them.’^ She was trembling violently now, and the tears were falling on her hands. “ But you say Humphreys alluded to your trouble and Sophy’s as if they were connected in some way ; it is not, therefore, very likely that he had a parting between you and your father in his mind when he spoke.” “ Perhaps the connection was more in my mind than his, and it may have been suggested only by the coincidence that trouble was to befall us both about the same time.” The possibility of another parting, in which he would be one of the sufferers, darted through Philip’s mind as his gaze rested on the troubled, beautiful face, so inexpressibly dear to him. Was he not acting foolishly in delaying to secure his prize ? He knew full well she loved him, and hitherto he had been content with the blissful avowal which her eyes had conveyed again and again. But was it wise to rest satisfied with such mute assurance of her love ? “ Is a parting from your father the only possible one that fills you with dismay ? ” “No.” The answer came soft and low. After a momentary pause, she added, “ I dwell on the part¬ ing with my dear father because it seems the one

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To BE Given up. 323 which it is most probable I shall be called upon to endure.” “ But why meet it half-way ? Such meeting will make it no easier to bear when it comes.” “ You are right. 1 will try to dismiss it from my mind. Let us talk of something else. You wish to see the purchase I have made for you?” As she :spoke she handed Philip a vellum manuscript book. It was a dainty little offering, and as Philip ten¬ derly turned over its pages he found it contained a favourite quotation from each of his favourite poets, artistically illuminated with his favourite flowers. Philip touched it reverently as he realised the number of hours Clare’s fair hands must have been employed •on it. • “ Did it not take you a very long time ? ” “ I have worked at it for an hour each day since we •decided on the Fancy Fair.” “ And you did it all for me ?” A merry light lit up Clare’s eyes. “ I did it for the Fancy Fair, if you please. But I bought it in for you, diinking you might, perhaps, like to have it.” “ It is not a gift, then?” “ Oh, dear, no ! You owe me a shilling, Mr. Dacre.” “ What if I refuse to pay that shilling ? ” ‘‘ I suppose I should have to report the case to the .treasurer, who would take legal proceedings against you.” He caught her hands, and held them fast in his own. “ Clare, I positively refuse to pay that shilling. I am going to take your exquisite work as a gift — as a gift from my own beautiful queen.” She raised her eyes to his, and he saw that they were humid with happiness. “No, it is not a gift from your queen; but you may take it, if you will, as a gift from the woman who loves you.” He folded her to his heart, and his lips met hers. My Clare! my darling I my wife ! ” he murmured. “Yes, your Clare,” she answered. “Yours for ever and ever, dear love.” Afterwards she said, with her hand in his, “ Do you know, Philip, I used not to believe in love. I fancied I could make my life complete w'ithout it.” “Do you realise the hopelessness of any such at¬ tempt now, my dearest ?” “ Yes, I think so. I know now that men and women living apart may make their lives useful, and thus find contentment ; or they may seek to gratify their ambition, and in being successful they may ex¬ perience some satisfaction but real, genuine happi¬ ness can never be theirs.” “ Clare, if the parting prophesied by Humphreys should be destined to separate you and me?” “ You mean if death should come to one of us while we are both young ? ” “ No, not that ; I was thinking of something coming between us.” “ That is impossible. We are one in hope, in faith, in love. If w^e w^ere never to meet again we should still be one in spirit. Nothing can ever really .part us — nothing, nothing* Oh, my love, my love ! ” She clung to him as she spoke, as if, notwithstand¬ ing her brave words, she was fearful of some impending danger. He soothed her with tenderest caresses. How often afterwards did Philip recall her words, and with what mingled feelings 1 And Clare ? Did they never haunt her ? Perhaps not the words themselves : one’s own utterances do not often live in the memory. But the sentiment which had prompted them was ever present to her mind, sometimes reproaching, sometimes upholding her in the fearful struggle that ensued. CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FIRST. IN WHICH FKED CHARKINGTON ENDEAVOURS TO ACT THE PART OF CONSOLER. The two girls were sitting in Miss Eastabrook’s boudoir when Clare first broached the subject of her engagement to Mabyn. “1 am so glad, you were able to come up at once, Mabsy,” she began by saying, “ because I have some¬ thing very particular to tell you.’’ “1 have brought my work with me. Let me get it out before we settle ourselves for a chat,” exclaimed Mabyn quickly. She knew intuitively what was coming, and felt that to have a piece of needlework in her hand would be a good excuse for keeping her head bent down. “ There, I’m ready now ! ” she said, bringing the words out with a Jerk in her effort to appear at ease. Then Clare told her tidings in quick, nervous sen¬ tences. She was too agitated herself to observe how silently Mabyn listened. “ Have you nothing to say to me, Mabyn ? ” Clare did at length ask when she had brought her tale to an end, and still Mabyn had not spoken. “ 1 hope you will be very happy, Clare,” Mabyn said with difficulty, and was dismayed to hear how unnatural her voice sounded. Did she at that moment desire Clare’s happiness ? Even as she expressed the wish she was conscious of its insincerity. “ Are you not surprised, May ? ” “ No.” “No 1 How did you— how could you — know?” “ By your silence. I knew you had learned to love him when you ceased to speak his name.” Clare laughed a little. “ 1 should never have given you credit for such keen observation ; but you are quite right. I don’t know how it is, but it costs me an effort to make the most unimportant remark about him. It seems almost like sacrilege to mention his name. It has pained me even to tell you about it, Mabsy ; only I thought you would be so hurt if you did not hear about it first from me.” She came and seated herself next to Mabyn on the sofa as she spoke, and put her arm around her cousin’s waist. That Mabyn’s reception of her news was a little cold did strike her. “ She is jealous, poor little Mabsy 1 ” she thought. “ She is afraid my heart is not large enough to hold both her and Philip.” Then aloud she said — “ May, dear, you are glad I am so blissfully happy ?”

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324 To BE Given up. “ Have I not said so, Clare “Your lips have, but not the tones of your voice, Mabsy. It will make no difference between you and me — I shall not love you less because my life over¬ flows with happiness.” Mabyn tried to smile. “You believe in my theory now, Clare “ The truth of your theory has been borne in upon me with wonderful force.’’ “ And it is very real to you ? ” “ The most real thing I have ever experienced ; it is part of my inmost being.” “ Does uncle approve ? ” Mabyn bent low over her work as she put the question. The conversation was simply torture to her, and yet she longed to hear every detail. “ He is happy now, and so is she — the two 1 love best in the world. Oh ! why cannot I be content?” she kept repeating to herself over and over again. “ Oh, yes ; my father has always liked Philip, you know.” Then there was a rather long silence between them. “ Mabyn,” said Clare at length, “do you know, the more I think over your theory the more convinced do I become that experience must have taught it to you. See, I have told you my secret. Won’t you be equally frank with me ? ” Miss Eastabrook bent forward to kiss her cousin as she made her appeal, but Mabyn shrank away from her with flushed face and flashing eyes. “ Don’t, Clare,” she exclaimed fiercely, flinging Miss Eastabrook’s arm aside. She was just in that state of nervous irritation when to be kissed and caressed by her successful rival was more than she could bring herself to endure. Miss Eastabrook drew herself up, and sat looking at Mabyn with cold, proud eyes. She was not accustomed to being repulsed. “ I suppose you are jealous, Mabyn,” she said at length. “Yes, you are quite right ; I am jealous— so jealous that I feel as if I almost hated you.” “ I must admit that I fail to see why you are allow¬ ing yourself to give way to such uncontrollable passion.” “ Because, if he loves you now, there was a time when he did love me ; because, if you had not crossed his path, he would have been mine now ; because, had he never seen you, I could have made him happy — I know it ; 1 feel it.” These were the words that passion prompted her to hurl at Clare ; but pride restrained her, pride and perhaps some nobler senti¬ ment. “It has all come upon me so suddenly, Clare,” she said lamely. “ You said you were not surprised just now, Mabyn.” “ I was not surprised that — you and Mr. Dacre loved each other ” — she brought out the words with a gulp— “ but your engagement has come upon me unawares. I don’t feel as if you would ever be quite the same to me again.” Clare was appeased in a moment. “Do you know. Mabyn, I was half afraid you would feel hurt. That was why I made a point of telling you about it my¬ self. But really it will make very little difference between you and me. And when I am married you will be able to come and stay wdth me. Philip would like it, I know. I am sure he is quite fond of you. And then see how friendly he is with Ralph.” “ If only I am a sensible girl, and will slip into a secondary place, and pretend to like it, my path shall be made smooth to me, you mean ?” replied Mabyn bitterly. She longed to relieve her passion by a tor¬ rent of angry words. To be told that “ Philip was quite fond of her, and would like to welcome her as his wife’s friend ” — could any woman in her position have listened to such words calmly ? “ Mabyn, you are not like yourself to-day. Surely our friendship is of too long standing to be broken in a moment.” Suddenly Mabyn relented, a great wave of tender¬ ness for her friend overcoming her anger. “ Oh, Clare, Clare, what a horrid girl I am !” Her tears were raining fast now,- and she was kneeling with her arms about Miss Eastabrook’s waist. “If I am cross and mopish at times don’t take any notice of me ; just leave me alone, and I shall soon get all right again. I don’t wonder Philip loves you. How could he help it when you are so beautiful, so good, so altogether lovable ? ” Clare caressed Mabyn with that easy grace which made her every action charming. “ Even if I were all that you tell me I am, don’t you think Philip more than deserves my love ? But there, I won’t ask you until you know him better, for handsome and courtly as he is, his noblest qualities lie hidden beneath the surface,” she replied, jealous for her lover’s honour. And so peace was restored between them. Each day Mabyn tried to stifle her own pain, and to rejoice in Clare’s happiness. She even ventured on a word of congratulation to Philip. “ Clare has told me all about it,” she found an opportunity of saying to him. Then Philip looked sharply into Mabyn’s face, wondering if she had told Clare of that offer which a sense of duty had prompted him to make her. “ I understood Clare to say you would be the first whom she would take into her confidence,” he replied guardedly. “ Yes ; she and I are very dear friends, as I dare say you already know. I hope Clare — I hope you will both be very happy.” “ Thank you. Miss Littledale ; you are very kind,” replied Philip, with far less than his usual ease of manner. But then it is embarrassing to be congratulated on one’s approaching marriage by a woman who has herself refused to be one’s wife. Doubtless Philip felt this. Still, he was relieved. Mabyn evidently meant to keep her own counsel about the offer he had made her. Then he thought very kindly of her. Poor little soul ! she had behaved exception¬ ally well, if she had really loved him all the time. For full ten minutes he felt quite sentimental about

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To BE Given up. 325 her ; but at the expiration of that time his thoughts were again centred in Clare. When a young man is well on with the new love, he has but few regrets to spare for the old. Then the news of the engagement spread far and wide, and congratulations poured in from all sides. person, and she approved of the manner in which the good wishes were conveyed. This one person was Mrs. Edward Charrington. Of course Sophy had heard from Julia of the really excellent match dear Philip was about to make ; but when she called at The Fountains to offer her congratulations, she was HCR TEARS WERE RAINING FAST NOW ” (/. 324). South fields was especially warm in its expressions of satisfaction at the betrothal. All congratulations were, however, somewhat coldly received by the heiress. In fact, to outsiders. Miss Eastabrook grew prouder and more reserved day by day, in proportion to the abandonment with which she devoted herself to Philip. The good wishes of one person, however, she received graciously enough ; but then she liked the far more conscious of welcoming a future sister-in-law she was prepared to love, than one who was in a posi¬ tion to enrich her brother. So she kissed Clare with her accustomed heartiness, called her at once by her Christian name, and instead of attempting to pay her compliments, broke into warm sisterly praises of Philip. “ Well, I hope the course of your true love will run more smoothly than mine did,” remarked Sophy, when the two girls had become quite confidential.

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To BE Given up. 326 All’s well that ends well, you know,” replied Clare. But it hasn’t ended well — at least, not at pre¬ sent.” ‘‘ What do you mean ? ” asked Clare, looking thoroughly alarmed. “ Oh, nothing so very dreadful,” laughed Sophy. “ Ted and I are still on speaking terms, 1 am happy to say.” “ But what is the matter, then ?” I am not at all happy about papa ; I can’t make him out.” Why not ? ” “ Well, you know, when I was first married, he wouldn’t have anything to say to me. Not that that surprised me so much, all things considered. But at the Fancy Fair, if you remember, 1 took a stall next to Julia’s, and papa came in, and he seemed quite friendly both to Ted and me. I was just beginning to rejoice at the satisfactory turn affairs were taking, when Mrs. Pritchard — Mr. Nightingale’s married sister — came sailing down the hall, and papa went off in high dudgeon. The next day I called at Southfields, and 1 could see at once that poor mamma was on needles and pins. So I put it to her quite plainly : does papa mind my coming ? And she said she was afraid he did, and that, perhaps, I had better not come again. Well, if you would believe it, a week or ten days after that, who should come driving up to The Dovecot — that is the name our friends have very kindly given our palatial abode — but papa himself, bubbling over with good humour. He made a point of Ted and me dining at Southfields the following Sunday ; and ever since that he has been cordiality itself to us. Isn’t it extraordinary ?” “And you have no idea why he relented so suddenly ? ” “ Not the least in the world.” “ Anyhow, his having done so is satisfactory.” “ Oh, of course. I am much happier now I am on good terms with them all. Still, I wish I could get to the bottom of it. However, I suppose it’s no use troubling about it. By-the-bye, how well the Fancy Fair went off ! Philip tells me it was all your idea. It is a pity, though, that it wasn’t more of a financial success.” “ But I thought that the sum realised exceeded the wildest hopes of the committee ? ” “ Oh, dear, no ! I forget the exact sum, but it is comparatively small.” “ You do surprise me, Sophy. I know for certain that nearly everything was sold. And Philip seemed so well satisfied.” “ But, you see, no article fetched more than a shilling.” “ Still, there was an immense number of articles.” “ Well, I am only telling you what papa told me.” “ Oh, I dare say you are right. Mr. Dacre would be sure to know all about it. I am afraid Philip will be disappointed.” “ But are you quite sure, Clare, that Philip himself believed it to be a financial success ?” “Yes. At least, I understood him to say so.” And then the conversation drifted into other channels. As Mrs. Edward Charrington was walking away from The Fountains in the direction of The Dovecot, she met Mabyn Littledale. “ I have just come from The Fountains,” explained Sophy. “I am so pleased about Philip’s engagement!” Before Mabyn had time to reply, they were joined by Fred Charrington. “I was coming round to The Dovecot,” he re¬ marked, shaking hands with both ladies. “ I’m so glad 1 A paper came this morning that I want you to see. It’s something about the poor rates, I fancy ; but I never can understand those things,” exclaimed Sophy, who always made use of her brother-in-law in a most unblushing manner. “ I’ll have a look at it,” replied Mr. Charrington good-naturedly. “ Mabyn and I were just speaking about Philip’s engagement.” This was not strictly true, because Mabyn had not opened her lips on the subject, but Sophy was conscious of no inaccuracy. “ And I was saying how pleased we all were about it.” Mabyn glanced furtively at Mr. Charrington, but beyond looking perhaps a shade graver than usual,, he showed no sign of emotion. “ I can’t tell you how pleased I am about it,” con¬ tinued Sophy, speaking with her accustomed hearti¬ ness. “ I have always been so fond of Philip : and! it is such a comfort to feel he is going to marry a nice girl, whom I can really love.” “ Yes, indeed,” murmured Mabyn, feeling very un¬ comfortable, even more on Mr. Charrington’s account than her own. “ He’s a dear fellow, and well deserves his good luck ; but still I do think he has been fortunate. Clare is so nice in every way. I don’t think so much about money as some people do, for I’m sure Ted and I are happy enough without it, but still, when it comes in addition to other things, I do think we ought to be grateful for it. And then Clare is so handsome, too. Now isn’t she, Fred ? ” “ I am sure you must be very pleased about it,” put in Mabyn hurriedly, in her anxiety to save Mr. Char¬ rington from having to reply to so embarrassing a question. “But it’s no use asking Fred if a girl is good-looking or not, because he never takes any notice of them. I often say to Ted that when I put on a pretty dress or some new ribbons I do it solely for him, for 1 don’t believe Fred ever notices what I wear,” con¬ tinued Sophy, who was not easily repressed. “ I am sure you always look very nice, Sophy,” said Mr. Charrington politely. “ Oh, that’s all very well,” laughed Sophy, but I’m not to be taken in so easily by polite little speeches. Come now, confess, sir, that you have never so much as observed that Miss Eastabrook is remark¬ ably handsome.” “ Even at the risk of disappointing you, I cannot admit that I am so blind as you would infer,” replied

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To BE Given up. 3^7 Mr. Charrington, very gravely, it is true, but with no sign of irritation in his manner. “ I must be hurrying home, or I shall be late for tea/’ said Mabyn, holding out her hand. “ Won’t you come and have tea with me ? ” asked Sophy hospitably. “ Not this evening, I think, thank you.” “ But you hardly ever come. Do fix an evening.” “ It is such a long way to get home after dark, and I can’t bear dragging your husband out every time I come.” “ If that is the only difficulty, Miss Littledale, I shall be very pleased to see you home at a.ny time, if Sophy would tell me when she is expecting you, and you would not object to accepting my escort.” Sophy looked up quickly at her brother-in-law, for there was an earnestness almost amounting to eager¬ ness in his tone that rather surprised her. “ But then, he is always so good-natured,” she thought, as she said aloud, “ Thanks, Fred ; but it doesn’t hurt Ted to see Miss Littledale home. Still, if Ted has a cold at any time, I dare say she wouldn’t mind accepting your escort.” “ It is very kind indeed of Mr. Charrington to offer,” Mabyn said quickly. She thought that Sophy accepted her brother-in-law’s many kindnesses in rather too off¬ hand a manner. “And now I really must hurry home.” “ But you haven’t fixed upon an evening,” persisted Sophy. “ Can’t you come on Monday ? ” Then Mabyn promised to take tea at The Dovecot on Monday, half wondering, as she did so, if Mr. Charrington would be there. ‘‘ If you are going to Grange House now, I will walk part of the way with you, if you will allow me. I have a commission in that direction,” Mr. Charring¬ ton surprised Mabyn by suggesting. ‘‘ But I thought you said you were coming to The Dovecot,” observed Sophy. “ So I am ; but I want to call in at Hutchinson’s first. I shall be with you by the time Ted’s home.” “Sophy lets her tongue run away with her,” re¬ marked Mabyn, as she and Mr. Charrington walked away together, allowing the vexation she felt to show itself in her manner. “ She would be the first to regret a hasty speech if she knew it had given pain. I often think if we could be confronted with a list of the awkward things we have unconsciously said in our time, how horrified many of us would be.” Mabyn couldn’t help laughing at the idea. “ Yes, I dare say we have all made awkward mis¬ takes erlough at times,” she replied. “ But few persons are so just as not to be annoyed by a remark that is vial a propos just because it is made in all uncon¬ sciousness and as she spoke she looked up into Mr. Charrington’s face with an approving smile. “ It is so pleasant having Ted and Sophy at The Dovecot. I can drop in there at any time, and feel sure of a welcome,” remarked Mr. Charrington rather hurriedly, as if he were anxious to stem the tide of Mabyn’s appreciative criticisms. “ Sophy tells me you are always doing something for them,” replied Mabyn, in a tone that sounded almost resentful. She still felt irritated with Sophy. “It always seems to me such a merciful Provi¬ dence that when things don’t go quite well with us, when the duties, to which we have perhaps looked forward, do not present themselves, it is still open to us to interest ourselves in the affairs of others, so that we need never fear lest our lives should be wasted, however keenly we may feel our disappointment.” Mabyn glanced up at the kind grave face of the man who was trying to comfort her out of the depths of his own sad experience. Would it ever be thus with him ? Would he always interest himself in the joys and sorrows of those who had no particular claim on him, never being called upon to respond to the more exacting requirements of wife and children ? Mabyn sighed involuntarily. A little boy in front of them was chasing a butterfly, which had soared too high for its pursuer to effect a capture, the boy’s eagerness being intensified by the rarity of such insects so late in the season. Mr. Charrington drew Mabyn’s attention to the boy. “ Poor little chap ! He had better give it up. It is useless to expend one’s energies in striving after those things which Providence does not mean us to possess.” “ I won’t cry for the moon any longer if I can help it, Mr. Charrington,” said Mabyn softly, divining his meaning. To no other human being could Mabyn have brought herself to acknowledge that an inaccessible moon had ever tantalised her, for the possession of which she had longed in vain. They walked on in silence for some minutes. Then Mabyn exclaimed — “We have passed Hutchinson’s, Mr. Charrington ! ” “ Hutchinson’s?” repeated Mr. Charrington, with a puzzled expression. “ Did you not want to call in there ? ” “As we have come so far past, I may as well walk with you to Grange House now. I can execute my commission on my way home.” CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SECOND. “THEN YOU ARE ENGAGED?” It will be remembered that immediately after Mabyn had rejected Philip’s offer, she suggested staying in London with her brother for a time, but that Ralph had scouted the idea in a way that both surprised and distressed his sister, and had then advised her to go to a certain Aunt Emma at Broadstairs. Mabyn did visit this aunt, and she did derive some benefit from the change. The invigorating effects of the sea- breezes, however, were soon dissipated when she re¬ turned home, to find herself again surrounded by the painful associations from which she had been so eager to escape. It was, therefore, with the keenest satisfaction that soon after the formal announcement of Clare’s engage-

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ment Mabyn received a letter in which this very Aunt Emma stated that some law business required her presence in London for the next few months, and that if Mabyn could possibly be spared from home, she would be delighted for her to join her as soon as pos¬ sible, and remain as long as ever she pleased. The boys were then at boarding-school, so that it was a time of comparative ease at Grange House. Mrs. Littledale was, therefore, only too pleased for Mabyn to avail herself of this kind offer, and a reply to that effect was speedily despatched to Aunt Emma. The following Saturday, Mabyn went to the station to meet Ralph, and as they were walking home to¬ gether, she told him of her intended visit to London. As he listened, his brow clouded over, and as soon as she had finished speaking, he exclaimed impa¬ tiently — “ Whatever does Aunt Emma want to come up to London for ? ” ‘‘ I told you, Ralph : she is coming about the trusteeship.’^ “ Well, but surely she could have arranged all that by letter.” “ She thinks it better to be on the spot.” “ It’s perfectly ridiculous ! Whereabouts is she going to stay ? ” “In Montague Street.” “ Good gracious ! ” “ She stayed in the same apartments two or three years ago, and was very comfortable, I believe.”

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To BE Given up. 329 “ I wonder she doesn’t go to an hotel.” “ She is likely to remain in London until after Christmas, and I don’t suppose she would care to stay at an hotel for so long. Is Montague Street anywhere near Bedford Square } ” “ Within a stone’s-throw.” “ Oh, Ralph, how delightful ! ” But Ralph did not look as if he thought it at all delightful. “ Ralph, won’t you like having us so near to you ? ” asked Mabyn quickly, observing her brother’s gloomy looks. “ Of course I shall like it,” he answered impatiently, but I don’t fancy you will care much about it yourself.” “ Why not ?.” “ Oh, there’s nothing but bricks and mortar and flagstones to be seen in Montague Street.” “ But we shan’t stay in the house all day.” “ Oh, well, do as you like ; but if you ask my advice, you’d better stay at home.” “ Ralph, I can’t think what has come over you the last six months or so. You are not a bit like you used to be. I am sure if, when you first went to London, I had been coming to stay near you, you would have seemed pleased about it.” “ If you are going to be so silly as to take offence at a word, I can’t help it, May,” answered Ralph sul¬ lenly. Cut to the quick, Mabyn relapsed into silence. The date of Ralph’s examination was drawing very near, and although, having now worked really hard, he felt almost sure of passing, he was nevertheless in the lowest possible spirits. He owed money right and left — only comparatively small sums, it is true, but still the total was swelling to a figure sufficiently large to excite Dr. Littledale’s wrath. And then for months he had allowed himself to be treated as the fiance of Matilda Jenkins. The Jenkinses were far too wise to force him to openly declare his intentions at present ; nevertheless, he was well aware that as soon as he should have become a duly qualified medical man, they would intimate what was expected of him. How could he then say to them, “ I have owed you money ; I have sponged on you ; I have allowed your daughter to believe I intended to make her my wife ; all this have I done, but now that I want nothing further from you, you may go to the Antipodes ” ? A man would indeed have to be hardened who could look forward with equanimity to the making of such a speech as that. And now his aunt and Mabyn were about to take up their quarters in Montague Street. Had the elder Miss Littledale been coming alone, Ralph must, of course, have called on her, and have offered to escort her to a picture gallery or concert occasionally ; but there the matter would have ended : Mabyn, how¬ ever, would make a point of calling on Mrs. Jen¬ kins, and would doubtless expect to be invited to dine in Bedford Square. He shuddered as he pic¬ tured her sitting, with quietly observant eyes, at Mrs. Jenkins’ hospitable board, now and again stealing a furtive glance at Tilly, as that young lady treated him with captivating playfulness, or slightly elevating her eyebrows as Mrs. Jenkins gave ample evidence of the motherly interest she took in her daughter’s fiance. As Ralph had feared, Mabyn did announce her intention of calling on Mrs. Jenkins. “ I don’t see why you need trouble to do that. May. Mrs. Jenkins is not the kind of woman you would care about.” “Nevertheless, I shouldn’t like to be discourteous to her.” “ Where would the discourtesy come in, seeing she doesn’t know you are in London ? ” “ Still, I think I had better call, Ralph ; I promised mamma I would,” said Mabyn, thinking of several motherly suggestions about the careful airing of sheets, &c., which Mrs. Littledale had made her promise she would whisper into Mrs. Jenkins’ ear. “Besides, I should like to see where you live.” There was no help for it ; to have raised any fur¬ ther objection would have been to arouse Mabyn’s suspicion. Mrs. Jenkins received Mabyn very affably : in fact, so much warmth of manner did she display that Mabyn was quite embarrassed. “ There’s no need for you to tell me who you are, my dear, for I can see ‘ Littledale ’ written on every feature of your face.” “ You think me like my brother, Mrs. Jenkins ? ” “The exact image of him, my dear. You’re a handsome family, I suppose ? ” Mabyn blushed. “ I never remember hearing any¬ one say so.” “No.^ Well, I think you are, if the two members I’ve seen are fair samples. But I hope some day to make the acquaintance of your pa and ma and your younger brothers and sisters — all the others are younger than you, ain’t they.^ — and then I’ll let you know if I alter my opinion.” “ Yes, Ralph is the eldest, and I come next to him,” replied Mabyn, avoiding alike discussion as to the family characteristics and the probability of Mrs. Jenkins’ wish being gratified. “You’ll come in and have a bit of dinner with us, won’t you, my dear?” asked Mrs. Jenkins hospitably, when Mabyn rose to leave, the suggestions about the airing of sheets, &:c., having been taken in good part. “ We dine at six, as I dare say your brother has told you.” “ Do you mean to-night, Mrs. Jenkins? ” “ Yes ; or any other time that’ll suit you best.” “ I am going to a concert to-night with my aunt.” “ Well, can you come to-morrow, then ? ” “ Thank you. I shall be very pleased to do so.” “And look here, my dear : in case you and 1 don’t get another opportunity of having a word or two together in private like, just you tell your ma, when you get back to Dursington, that she needn’t worry herself but what her dear boy is well looked after, for I feel like a mother to him myself already.” Mabyn thanked her, and wished her good morning, thinking what a kind, motherly soul she was.

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To BE Given up. 330 When Mabyn arrived in Bedford Square the follow¬ ing day, she was received by Mias Jenkins. That young lady had got herself up very elaborately, and was gracefully reclining on a sofa in her own little sitting-room— the room in which poor Ralph had be¬ haved so indiscreetly — reading a sensational novel, when Mabyn was announced. How do you do, Miss Littledale ? Ma’s lying down, and hopes you’ll excuse her for the present. She and I have been out shopping all the afternoon, and are that tired, we are just fit to drop — so at least ma is, and I’m nearly as bad,” said Tilly, with the same easy familiarity Mabyn had observed in Mrs. Jenkins’ manner. Mabyn hastened to express her sympathy with the fatigue from which both Mrs. and Miss Jenkins were suffering, adding that she was very glad the former was resting. “ That’s just what ma said: you were so nice and kind, she was sure you wouldn’t mind. She took quite a fancy to you, I assure you. But I wasn’t a bit surprised to hear her say so, for I seemed to know you quite well, having so often heard Ral — your brother — speak of you.” This was not altogether true, because Ralph in his intercourse with the Jenkinses avoided speaking of his family as far as possible. Doubtless, however, Tilly meant the remark to serve only as a polite con¬ versational opening. “ Has my brother come in yet ? ” asked Mabyn, hoping thereby to turn the conversation away from herself. “Not yet ; he’s late to-night. Mostly he comes in at five o’clock to the minute, and then just pops in here and has a quiet cup of tea. But there’s a big operation on at the hospital this afternoon, and that’s detaining him. He’ll be dead beat when he does come in ; and no wonder. Tm sure if I went into a dissecting-room, I should go off in a dead faint on the spot. Why, I have to run out of the room if a person so much as cuts her finger. But then I’m such a poor nervous creature ; always was, you know.” Mabyn was murmuring some sympathetic reply when, much to her astonishment, Miss Jenkins burst into a roar of laughter. “ Don’t mind me,” she gasped, when she had re¬ covered herself a little. “It was the sight of that fellow poking his head round the door to see who was here, that set me off. Did you notice him.^” Mabyn replied in the negative. “ It was only Tom Jackson. He can’t hear me raise my voice but he must needs know who I’m talking to. I never saw such a jealous fellow in my life ! Not that it’s any business of his who I talk to, and never will be.” Mabyn began to think that she did not care very much about Miss Jenkins. “ But what am I thinking about, keeping you standing here when you want to be taking your things off ? ” And so saying, Tilly led the way upstairs to her own bed-room. As Mabyn followed her, she could< not help thinking what a fine handsome girl she w’as, and how she spoilt herself by frizzing her hair, and wearing such a mixture of bright colours. To Mabyn the dinner was not a very pleasant, affair. She was placed next to her brother, but Tilly, who sat on the other side of him, managed to monopolise nearly all his attention. The boarders, one and all, stared hard at her, especially a red-haired,, rather fierce-looking young man, who, as the dinner proceeded, Tilly informed her, in a loud whisper, was- Tom Jackson, the gentleman who had poked his head in at the parlour-door. And then Mrs. Jenkins, who had sufficiently recovered from her fatigue to take the- head of the table, kept questioning her as to what Ralph did when he was at home, and failing to catch her replies. Mr. Jenkins did not appear ; but then, he seldom was seen above the basement unless some unfortunate boarder had to be severely taken to task about back payments. But what distressed Mabyn most of all was the air of proprietorship with which.- both Mrs. and Miss Jenkins treated Ralph, and the meek way in which he submitted to it. And then. Tilly was so very playful, helping Ralph to salt, andi insisting upon taking it all away again, lest she should, be helping him to sorrow; hiding his serviette ring;, declaring she would not have any of a particular pudding, for which she had previously expressed great partiality, unless he also partook of it. Nor were Mabyn’s fears assuaged when she observed Mr. Jackson’s brow growing darker and darker. Surely, she thought, with a terrible feeling of apprehension,. Ralph could never really care for a girl like Miss Jenkins, undeniably handsome as she was ; and yet, if he did not, why did he appear to be on such very familiar terms with her ? As the evening advanced Mabyn grew more and more uneasy. Either there was an understanding between her brother and Miss Jenkins, or else Ralph was carrying a flirtation a great deal too far. At last the clock pointed to ten, and Mabyn went upstairs to put on her outdoor apparel, accompanied by Miss Jenkins. “Lor! what a teaze Ralph — I mean your brother — is,” remarked Tilly, as Mabyn was putting on her hat. “ Is he ?” replied Mabyn, who had never observed this characteristic. “Why, yes; don’t you think so But there, I don’t suppose you see so much of him as I do.” Mabyn opened her eyes. “ I think I ought to know my own brother. Miss Jenkins.” Then she turned her gaze full on Tilly. “Excuse me. Miss Jenkins, but is — is there any kind of an understanding between you ? Don’t answer my question if you would rather not, be¬ cause I feel I have no right to put it ; only, of course, I am very deeply interested in all that con¬ cerns Ralph.” “Lor! Miss Littledale, what a question to ask!”' giggled Tilly.

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To BE Given up. n n T 00^ Then, seeing that Mabyn was regarding her very gravely, she added — “ I’m sure I thought that Ralph had told you all about it.” Then you are engaged ? ” Involuntarily Mabyn clutched hold of the dressing- table to steady herself, for she was shaking with ex¬ citement and pent-up teeling. “Yes, between ourselves; but we are not going to say anything about it until Ralph has passed his final. I thought I should have died of grief when he failed before, because I was so afraid it was my fault. He wouldj come with me here, and there, and every¬ where, although I was always telling him he ought to stick to his books.” Mabyn felt that she ought to congratulate her future sister-in-law, but no suitable words would come. She could only gaze stupidly in front of her, while her eyes filled with tears. “ You won’t let it out that I’ve told you ? ” pleaded Tilly. “ I must speak to Ralph about it, of course. I think he might have told me himself.” “But you won’t tell them at home about it until Ralph has passed his final ?” “ If Ralph would really rather they did not know at home, I suppose I ought not to disregard his wishes in the matter. Still, I do think he ought to mention it himself.” And with that half-promise Tilly had to rest satisfied. “ How quiet you are, May,” observed Ralph uneasily, as he accompanied his sister to Montague Street. “ Oh, Ralph, I am so terribly hurt ! ” “ What about ? ” “To think that you never told me.” “ Told you what ?” “About your engagement to Miss Jenkins.” Ralph gave a long low whistle. “ The cat’s out of the bag, is it ? ” “ I don’t think such a cat as that should ever have been put into a bag at all.” “ What do you mean. May ?” “ I mean that when a young man becomes engaged to be married, I think he owes it to his family to apprise them of the circumstance.” “It’s that wretched examination!” said Ralph, lamely. He was very, very unhappy about his engagement, but he was certainly not going to admit to his sister that he had been caught in the meshes of a de¬ signing woman. It was bad enough to know he had been a fool, without acknowledging it. “ Look here. May ; I wish you would oblige me by not saying anything about it at home. As soon as ever I’ve passed I’ll make a clean brenst of it ; but until then I would much rather the pater and mater knew nothing about it.” Rather reluctantly Mabyn promised. And then, as they had now reached the house in which her aunt lodged, she wished Ralph good night with a heavy heart. CHAPTER THE TWENTY-THIRD. A STARTLING INTERRUPTION. Mabyn returned to Dursington much troubled in her mind about Ralph. She had promised not to divulge his secret, but she was more than doubtful as to whether she ever ought to have made any such promise. Worrying about Ralph and his affairs did, during her visit to London, cause her own pain to be less present to her mind. On returning to Grange House, however, much of the old agony revived. Miss Eastabrook’s engagement was quite as general a topic of conversation as it had been before Mabyn went away, and it did not take her long to discover that some unpleasant rumours were abroad concerning Philip. When a man is about to do anything of signal importance in the eyes of the little world in which he lives, his biography, so to speak, is reviewed by his neighbours up to that date. And so the neigh¬ bours set themselves to discuss Philip s past, find¬ ing in it much over which to shake their heads.. He was the extravagant son of an extravagant father, and owed money right and left. And now he had set up a dog-cart, with a high-stepping tho¬ roughbred mare. To see him driving the beautiful Mis^s Eastabrook all over the place in it, while they both looked so triumphantly happy, was enough in itself to give rise to the gravest doubts con¬ cerning his inner life. Besides, a young man who lived during the week in London, and who seemed to- have a speaking acquaintance with all the upper ten, must be on the wrong road. And then all sorts of little stories got abroad, and they certainly did not lose in the telling. There was nothing either very definite or very disgraceful about them : they treated for the most part of the number and quality of the cigars he was known to smoke ; the length of his- tailor’s bill ; the fashionable but disreputable people with whom he had been seen in the park — betting men, and so on. Mabyn was not yet sufficiently mistress of herself ta boldly ask for information. She did question Ralph as to whether Philip led a fast life in London ; but she did not gather much comfort from her brother’s reply. What did she mean by a fast life? He supposed Dacre was much like other men ; all he’ knew about him was that he was a jolly nice fel¬ low. Eventually, however, the worst that was being said about Philip did reach Mabyn’s ears. A Mrs. Robin¬ son and her daughter, people whom Mabyn very much disliked, called at Grange House ; and after a time the conversation turned on the Dacre family. “ I should think Julia Dacre would do well to make sure of Mr. Dudson as soon as possible,” remarked Miss Robinson, who, so rumour said, would not have objected to become Mrs. Dudson herself. “ Sir Bevan and Lady Dudson were very much shocked about Sophy’s affair ; and now that there is all this commo¬ tion about Philip Dacre, I should think Mr. Dudson. would be glad enough to cry off.”

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332 To BE Given up. “ 1 never could understand what he saw in Julia,” replied Mrs. Littledale, with whom the eldest Miss Dacre had never been a favourite. “ But what do you mean about Philip.? I have heard nothing.” “ Indeed.? You do surprise me. All Dursington is talking about it,” put in Mrs. Robinson meaningly. “Talking about what.?” again asked Mrs. Littledale, while Mabyn clasped her hands tightly together, and listened breathlessly. Fortunately she was sitting with her back to the light, so that the other occupants of the room would not be likely to observe her agitation, “ Thoroughbred mares and liveried servants are not to be kept up on nothing, you know, and few young men nowadays are in a position to in¬ dulge such luxurious tastes,” replied Mrs. Robinson sententiously. “I always did fear that Philip Dacre was extrava¬ gant. From the very first I did all in my power to discourage the friendship between him and Ralph. As you say, young men have to be so careful if they are to live within their means.” “And you were quite right, Mrs. Littledale. I am sure I should be very sorry to see any son of mine associating with Philip Dacre.” “You see, extravagant habits are so easily ac¬ quired,” replied Mrs. Littledale, as if to excuse herself for having tried to separate Philip and Ralph. “ But still, Mr. Dacre is a very nice young man in other respects, and now that he is going to marry dear Clare, whose mother, you know, left her quite a fortune, it won’t matter so much if he does spend money rather freely.” “ Oh ! then you think Miss Eastabrook won’t object to pay her husband’s bills, contracted both before and after marriage.? For my own part, I must say I should strongly object to being called upon to settle the former,” remarked Miss Robinson spitefully. “Well,” said Mrs. Robinson, drawing herself up, ’while an expression of self-conscious virtue played on her features, “ I don’t wish to speak harshly of Miss Eastabrook’s conduct, because the poor girl has no mother to guide her ; but if she were 7ny daughter I should certainly not allow her to be seen in company with Mr. Dacre, now that such very terrible things are being said about him. As it is, 1 really should have thought her own self-respect would have compelled her to break off her engagement with - ” At this point Mrs. Littledale’s face assumed an expression of such terrible consternation, and her eyes fixed themselves with such intense earnestness on the French window, which, owing to the unusual warmth of the October sun, had been left open, that Mabyn, absorbed as she was in listening to Mrs. Robinson, turned to see what was attracting her mother’s attention. In another moment she had grasped the situation. There, coming quickly up the carriage-drive, and evidently bent on taking advantage of the open window rather than go through the ceremony of knocking for admittance at the front-door, was Clare herself. “Oh, Mrs. Robinson!” gasped Mrs. Littledale, in the vain hope of stemming the flow of that lady’s eloquence. But Mrs. Robinson, whose back was turned to the window, went ruthlessly on — “ No, don’t think, Mrs. Littledale, that I am blaming yoii^ although you are Miss Eastabrook’s aunt, for I know full well how opinionated and self-willed Miss Eastabrook is. But still, even with all her unwomanly love of setting public opinion at defiance, I can’t believe that she will really persist in marrying Philip Dacre, when she shall have heard all of which he is known to be guilty.” Again Mrs. Littledale gasped, but no words now came to her aid. Mabyn was thrilling with excitement — the situ¬ ation was so dramatic. For there, standing just within the window, was Clare, on whose ear every word of Mrs. Robinson’s last sentence had fallen distinctly. With her draperies falling in graceful folds about her, and her head well thrown back, she slowly advanced into the room, until she stood facing Mrs. Robinson. Mabyn thought that never before had she seen her look so handsome. “ May I beg to be informed of what Mr. Dacre is guilty that should prevent my fulfilling my engage¬ ment to him.?” she said, her voice ringing and her eyes flashing with scornful pride. END OF CHAPTER THE TWENTY-THIRD.

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HOW SOUNDS ARE MADE VISIBLE. BY J. F. ROWBOTHAM, AUTHOR OF “a HISTORY OF MUSIC.’ Amongst the most in¬ teresting results of its investigations that mo¬ dern science has revealed to us, is the discovery that musical sounds can, so to speak, imprint themselves upon matter, and produce definite forms as surely and unerringly as the elec¬ tric needle can record the motions of the fluid which is discharged from a dis¬ tant battery. Sound is a thing so ethereal to fancy, that its very nature long baffled the penetration of men, and we cannot wonder that the recondite aspect of its power to which we specially allude should have remained entirely unknown until a compara¬ tively recent period. Yet if we reflect upon the con¬ stitution of sound, we shall see nothing very surprising in the fact that it can be productive of form. When an elastic body vibrates, it imparts its vibrations to the surrounding atmosphere. The air vibrating in response to the movements of the body is itself the sound, though not recognised by us as such until these vibrations have been con¬ veyed to our ear. But as a breeze will cause a twig to stir, and as the slightest whisper of a wind will create motions among the leaves, and lift them to a new position from that which they occupied in the dead and tranquil calm preceding, so similarly the harmonious vibrations of the air will evidently have their effect in altering the conditions of the body they impinge on, no less than the breezes which strike the leaves. This fact, I imagine, was theo¬ retically conceded by men of science long before the possibility of demonstrating it was believed in ; but no test being practicable, it would be classed with the numerous dreams which have bewildered the path of philosophy without leading to any valuable result. Towards the close of last century, however, the theory — the dream — attracted the notice of the ingenious ex¬ perimentalist Chladni, who was at that time conduct¬ ing researches into the nature of the vibrations of sonorous bodies. In testing the vibrations of a plate of glass or metal, he noticed that it gave different sounds according as it was struck at various places. To obtain the most accurate results, he thought best to suspend the glass plate in air by means of a hole drilled through the middle, in which a rod was wedged, running up to the ceiling. Drawing a violin bow across the edge of the glass plate, he was enabled to listen to the purity of the tone, and observe the vibra¬ tions of the body. But immediately this second idea struck him, that if he at the same time scattered a little sand over the surface of the plate, he might ob¬ serve what effect the vibrations would have, upon the sand. The sand was scattered : the bow was drawn with a long musical note against the edge of the glass, and immediately the sand leapt from a heap of chaos to a pattern of perfect beauty and symmetry. As the fragments of glass in a kaleidoscope become, on our turning the tube, charming and symmetrical patterns to the eye, so did the sand sort itself to symmetry on the application of Chladni’s bow, and in patterns very similar to those of the kaleidoscope. Again and again he drew his bow, at different parts of the plate, producing different sounds ; and to ever new and various patterns leapt the sand. In using the word “ symmetry ” as de¬ scriptive of these pat¬ terns, we are using it in its strictest and most technical sense. The sand on the square plate was always equi- balanced. It most usually fell into two distinct parts, separated by a line of sand drawn diagonally, and each the exact reproduction of the other. An ara¬ besque of little rings on the left side of the line of section would be faithfully reflected by its counterpart on the right ; a fantastic device in one corner would never occur without its counterpart in the other corner ; rings, curves, lines, stars, circles invariably ran into sym¬ metrical pairs, and if broken at the line of partition the sand on the other side of the line would contain the corresponding half only.* TREE AND FERNS. * Engravings of the patterns which Chladni thus produced on the sand may be seen in “ Rowbotham’s History of Music,’’ vol. ii., p. 440. A MINIATURE LANDSCAPE.

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334 How Sounds are Made Visible. Such interesting experiments as these incontestably demonstrated the truth that sound could be productive of form, and that by its variation in intensity and pitch the form would change accordingly. The only drawback to convincing the most sceptical was the interference of the plate in the experiment ; for vulgar reasoning was apt to retort on the experimentalist that in the patterns of the sand we merely see the vibrations of the plate, and not the operations of the waves of sound. This objection, however, if it can be seriously called one, has since been overcome ; and experiment has amply proved that the human voice alone is capable of printing form upon matter as successfully and as distinctly as a violin bow drawn across the edges of a plate. The discoverer of this great fact is a lady, Mrs. Watts Hughes, who originally in¬ tended to devote herself to the art professionally, but through failure of health was led to renounce the inten¬ tion of a public career, and undertake delicate investi¬ gations into the nature of sound instead. Her efforts in this direction are likely to prove much more inte¬ resting to her contemporaries than if she had become a second Patti or Albani. The experiments are con¬ ducted as follows : — A hol¬ low receiver is procured, over the mouth of which is stretched an elastic mem¬ brane. The surface of the membrane is covered with a semi-fluid paste, of such consistency that very light im¬ pressions can be easily received. The singer then ap¬ proaching the apparatus sings on to the surface of the membrane, exercising the greatest care that his notes are singularly steady and perfectly accurate in the in¬ tonation of the given sound. At once the musical note mirrors itself on the paste, and in the most ■unexpected forms. The statement will doubtless not readily be believed when we say that the forms of flowers, as perfect as if they were drawn, occur among the rest, and, indeed, contribute the majority of the figures. Daisies, with every petal exactly shaped, are common ; lilies, as symmetrically made, are not rare. A change of note, or of timbre^ will produce a miniature tree on the paste. By some slight variation, impossible to estimate, the figure of a star¬ fish will appear on the surface of the membrane ; another imperceptible difference of sound will lay, side by side with the star-fish, an anemone. Occa¬ sionally the vibrations — presumably owing to an un¬ conscious augmentation of force on the part of the singer — will imprint themselves in the form of shells, beautifully voluted, the wrinkles in the scroll being so incisively indented that when photographed they appear as if creases in the picture. Suddenly desert¬ ing these marine forms as capriciously as it took them up, the sound will create ferns, suspend bunches of fruit, and otherwise adorn with similar emblems the surface. There is, of course, much room for conjec¬ ture in the explanation of these various forms. Some facts, however, we know for certain. When the sound is producing flowers on the paste, the singer can at pleasure increase the number of petals by gradually making the tone ascend. At each fraction of a tone on which his voice rises, a new petal is added to the flower. He can thus by a careful management of his breath increase a pigmy daisy that lies first imprinted on the paste to a gigantic sunflower, occupying nearly the whole surface. In the other forms — e.g.^ the shells —this addition of piece by piece does not appear, and the scroll once fashioned remains. The forms thus produced on the paste are photo¬ graphed whilst the mem¬ brane is in sonorous vibra¬ tion ; or water-colour im¬ pressions are taken, which are transferred on to glass immediately after being pro¬ duced. The advantage of the latter method is that the minute beauty and deli¬ cacy of the forms can be shown to perfection by the use of various colours for different parts of the same object. Some people, how¬ ever, when examining these reproductions have fallen into the error that the sound had likewise created the variety of colours, which is not the case. We parti¬ cularly allude to some specimens of both styles which elicited considerable attention at the recent Arts and Crafts Exhibition, where, while examining one of the plates, we overheard one or two erroneous remarks to that effect. Such results of modern science as the preceding bring us to the threshold of an interesting inquiry into the reality of one of the most extraordinary ideas of antiquity. The Greeks, who were certainly inno¬ cent of any such research into the mysteries of sound as we have just described, held in the person of Pytha¬ goras, his school, and numerous natural philosophers who followed him, the doctrine that music is the prin¬ ciple of form in nature, and that every shape and natural figure in the animate and inanimate world was determined and created by the divine infusion of music into the formless matter of chaos. “ By what¬ ever means it were introduced,’^ says one of the greatest of these ancient thinkers, “for on that point we are left entirely without a basis for speculation, music, and nothing else but music, must have been in¬ fused into matter so as to bring the formless universe •A. UAISV.

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The American Parliament, to harmonious order, and to produce the forms we see around us of landscapes, rivers, trees, flowers, instead of the everlasting chaos which preceded.’’ It is not a little singular in illustration of this ancient idea to find the vibrations of musical sound at the present day being proved to produce the forms of flowers, trees, shells, and other natural objects, spontaneously and without any previous suggestion of the form by pencil ■or the hand of man : to see the same power, when •exercised upon a chaos of grains of sand, at once throw the sand into patterns of symmetry, whose lines and curves might very easily, if we were disposed to carry out the analogy, be construed into miniature models of winding rivers, sweeping mountain chains, and other objects, which give order and outline to the vague monotony of a landscape. Pythagoras, who went further than others of the same school, f pro¬ ceeded to great detail in exemplifying the power of music in giving form to matter. He made the bold assertion — for which he has been called a madman — that the octave gave our globe its present form. We <2 C 00 J should not like to enumerate the treatises that have been written, or to allude to the endless derision which has been showered on this philosopher for his appar¬ ently wild and meaningless assertion. But we will remark — in strange agreement with such a hypothesis — the experiments of Chladni have revealed that whenever an octave is sounded on the glass plate the sand, whatever its previous position may have been, invariably ranges itself in the form of a circle. Into this phase of the subject, however, we do not intend to go, beyond remarking that a vast literature of dreams and speculations existed in antiquity — to which, en passant, belongs the doctrine of the harmony of the spheres — connected with the subject of which we have been treating. In modern times, the little that has been done in the way of scientific investiga¬ tion has been recorded above. But the field is an ample one, open for any experimentalist ; and if the moderns would only investigate it as much as the ancients dreamed about it, discoveries not only in¬ teresting but surprising might be expected. THE AMERICAN PARLIAMENT. BY AN ANGLO-AMERICAN. EFORE attempting to describe for uninitiated readers the appearance of Congress in session, it may be well to state a few facts regarding this important legislative body, ruling the destinies of over sixty millions of people, of which, no doubt, even many Americans are ignorant. Congress consists of two Houses, the Senate and the House of Representatives. Senators are elected by the Legislatures of the States they represent, two for each State — making just now eighty-four in all — for a term of six years. The terms of senators from the same State are not coterminous, however, each one being elected at a different session of the Legislature. A senator must be thirty years of age, and must have been an American citizen at least nine years. He must also be a resident of the State which elects him. The House of Representatives consists of 329 mem¬ bers, representing constituencies based on population —a readjustment taking place after each decennial census. In the first Congress, each member of the House represented a constituency of 30,000, while in the present Congress— the fiftieth— each member of the House represents a population of 151,912 souls. In spite of this increase in the population of the Con¬ gressional districts, as they are called, the number of Congressmen increases so fast in this rapidly grow¬ ing country that people are now discussing the ques¬ tion very seriously a-s to how to prevent the House getting unwieldy without making the constituencies too big. Members of the House must be twenty-five years of age, and must have been American citizens seven years. They must also be residents of the State in which they are elected. Although not exacted by law, the practice of requiring a man to be a resident of the Congressional district which he represents seems to be universal, and to have all the force of law. The disabilities attaching by the third section of Amendment XIV. of the Constitution to those who, having sworn to defend the Constitution of the United States, “shall have been engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof,” may be removed by a two-thirds vote in Congress ; and as a matter of fact, the only person disqualified under this Amendment during recent years was the late President of the Southern Confederacy, Mr. Jefferson Davis. It will be remembered, however, that the ex-Vice-President of the Confederacy, Mr. Alex. Stephens, of Georgia, was for several years before his death a member of Congress. In the matter of emoluments, these will no doubt appear extremely liberal to unpaid English M.P.’s. Both senators and representatives receive an annual salary of $5,000, or about ^1,000 English money ; they are allowed besides mileage at the rate of 20 c. a mile from their residence to Washington for each session of Congress, and they receive an allowance of $125 a year for newspapers and stationery. Besides the 329 members elected by regularly con¬ stituted Congressional districts, there are five dele¬ gates from the territories which are not yet erected

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SENATE CHAMBER. into States.* These delegates enjoy all the emolu¬ ments and privileges of regular members, save one — they cannot vote. Each one represents a terri¬ tory without reference to its population ; and thus Dakota, with 600,000 people, is represented in Con- • gress by one non-voting delegate, while Rhode Island, with half as many people, has two senators and two members, and Delaware, with only a third as many, has two senators and one member. By the way, speaking of delegates, there is one — he from Arizona — who hails from a place rejoicing in the cheerful name of Tombstone, while his colleague from New Mexico is always in hot water when at home, his place of residence being Ojo Caliente. Members of the House of Representatives are elected for only two years, on the first Tuesday in November of every even-numbered year, and take their seats, singularly enough, not at the next session of Congress, which commences on the December ist following election, but at the session which begins December ist of the year following. The defeated candidates thus return to Congress until the 4th of * By the bill passed since the above was written, three territories have been admitted to Statehood, making four new States : Dakota two, and Montana and Washington each one. This added eight senators and five representatives to the 51st (present) Congress, South Dakota being allowed two representatives, and each of the others one. March succeeding the election, when that Congress expires. Subsequent to that date, however, if the President of the United States were to call a special session, the newly elected members would convene, otherwise they do not assemble until the December following, or thirteen months after election — an arrangement which cannot but strike one as singularly absurd, and which in practice has many drawbacks. Of the actual members of Congress, all but 196 were defeated in 1888, so that in March last there were sitting in Congress no less than 129 members whose constituents had some months previously ex¬ pressed dissatisfaction with them by refusing to return them. The second session of each Congress which thus comes arbitrarily to an end on the 4th of March of every second (odd) year is known as the short session. The first session of each Congress continues in session until adjourned by its own act. There is no power by which Congress can be dissolved, or any appeal be taken to the country. Each Congressman’s pay and emoluments begin on the 4th of March subsequent to his election, and thus in the case of a Congressman elected next Nov¬ ember, and who should die before December ist of next year, salary would run for nearly nine months, although, should no extra session be convened (and

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The American Parliament. an extra session is very rare), he would never have served a single day in Congress. In the Senate, the presiding officer is always the Vice-President of the United States, when that office is not vacant, as at present. When there is no Vice- President, the Senate elects its own presiding officer. The gentleman now occupying that position te7iipore is Senator John J. Ingalls, and though no longer, as formerly, in the line of the Presidential succession, he nevertheless enjoys all the privileges, including the pay of the Vice-President of the United States. The Speaker of the House is elected by the members, and that honour was until lately held by Mr. John G. Carlisle, of Kentucky. His pay is the same as that of the President of the Senate — 8,000 dollars a year — but his power and influence in shaping legislation are infinitely greater. In the first place, being always elected by the members, he represents the majority in the House. He also selects the members of the fifty- four Standing Committees, and appoints the Chairmen, though in this he generally observes some unwritten laws as to seniority of service on the Committee. These Committees practically control all legislation, new bills being always referred to some of them except where a Select Committee has been specially appointed ; and unless the Committee is willing, it is next to impossible to secure action on any bill so referred by the House. “ Killed in Committee” is a very frequent epitaph recording the unhappy fate of a new member’s bill ; and in a general way this is no doubt a fortunate thing for the country. To an Englishman or Frenchman, accustomed to be ruled by a Government which depends for its exist¬ ence on its ability to command a majority in the House, it would seem odd to find the Opposition con¬ trolling the House during the greater part of an entire Administration, or even during the whole of it, as was the case during the 44th, 45th, and 46th Congresses. Mr. Cleveland had the advantage of having a majority in the House of Representatives on his SENATOR J. J. INGALLS. MR. J. G. CARLISLE. side, and Mr. Harrison, his successor in office^ will be equally fortunate, though in both cases the majority is a small one. The Senate, however, during the whole of Mr. Cleveland’s Administration^ was Republican. Another curious feature of the American system is the fact that the Government is unrepresented on the floor of either the House or Senate. If the President should select a member of Congress for a place in his Cabinet, the latter could not accept it without resign¬ ing his seat. Senators have frequently shown marked reluctance to give up their six-year terms in the Senate for a four-year term in the Cabinet, at a little extra pay, it is true, but with greatly increased ex¬ penses, greatly diminished influence, and a share of responsibility in an Administration where their advice may perhaps never be accepted ; for in this respect the President of the United States is far more in¬ dependent than a constitutional monarch, and need only accept the advice of his advisers when it suits him to do so. So much for the principal characteristics which distinguish the organisation of the American Congress. Now for its personality. We will proceed to the Capitol, up Pennsylvania Avenue, and as we go, we notice the United States flag flying over the south wing of the building. That denotes that the House is in session, and we will proceed at once to the “ Hall of Representatives.” On our way up to the top of the great stairs leading to the portico, and through the picture gallery under the great dome, through Statuary Hall, «&:c., to the entrance of the Hall, we notice a general absence of formality quite strange, and in some cases, due to the irreverence and bad manners of the lower class of American youth, somewhat unfortunate. Arriving at the door of the Hall, we send in our cards to an M.C. to whom we have introductions, and that gentle¬ man promptly makes his appearance. If there are no ladies of our party, he assumes his busiest manner, \ 742

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The American Parliament. 338 his brow knits with the cares of State (he was prob¬ ably listening to a good story behind the screen when our cards were presented to him), and persuaded that one of us is seeking his influence for an office, or that we want his aid in securing the passage of some private bill, he puts the usual question, “ Well, gentlemen, what can I do for you ?” When informed that, being strangers in Washington, we desire to see the House in session, his face clears up at once. He hands us a card of admission to the gallery reserved for the families and friends of members, promising perhaps to join us after a few moments. In the a uniform, and to European eyes there is doubtless a sad lack of something to add dignity as v/ell as tone and colour to the scene. Surrounding the semi¬ circle of desks and chairs are green baize screens, outside of which is a sort of foyer^ in which it is evi¬ dent that a member is presumed not to be in the House, for here one gentleman is lying upon a lounge, as we can see from our vantage-ground in the gallery ; one or two are smoking ; and there is our friend whose card admitted us to our present seats, who has re¬ sumed the story-telling our call interrupted — and the story must be a good one, judging by the very evident, HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. meantime we take our seats and look about us : a large hall lighted from above, and containing, arranged in semi-circular form, some 340 desks, each desk fur¬ nished with writing material and a comfortable re¬ volving chair. At the “hub” of the semi-circle, and opposite the main entrance or north door, is the Speaker's chair, on a raised platform, with a handsome white marble front ; below him the Clerk of the House and his assistants, and below them again the official reporters. To the Speaker’s right is a green marble pedestal, upon which stands the mace ; and close by, on a lower platform, sit at small desks two persons who, we are informed, are the Sergeant-at- Arms and his assistant. On the steps leading to the Speaker’s chair, on either side, are seated a knot of boys, apparently schoolboys just in from the play¬ ground! These are pages. Not an official in the House wears a robe of office, not an attendant wears though subdued, merriment of the little group. In¬ quiry reveals the fact that the members of the Demo¬ cratic party occupy the seats to the Speaker’s right as they have from time immemorial, the Republican members being seated at the left. There are no cross benches. Galleries surround the entire House, affording ac¬ commodation for 2,500 people. Most of these are open to the public, although some are reserved ex¬ clusively for ladies whenever the House is in session ; one is partitioned off for the diplomats or foreign Ministers resident in Washington ; another is reserved for the President ; and the one in which we are seated is reserved for persons holding tickets from members ; another, advantageously placed immediately behind and above the Speaker’s chair, is reserved for the gentlemen of the Press. This gallery communicates directly with a large apartment furnished with tables

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A May Garden. 339 and writing material for the accommodation of news¬ paper correspondents, and telegraph wires lead to it, communicating with the main lines of telegraph throughout the country. The Press is a power indeed in the United States, and nowhere more so than at Washington, where Senators and Congressmen vie with each other in extending favours to the numerous correspondents representing the leading papers in the United States. Both the Senate and the House of Representatives include among their respective officers a Chaplain, and botli Houses are regularly opened with prayer; this daily prayer while Congress is in session being apparently the sole duty required from the reverend gentlemen who act as Chaplains. The Chaplain of the House, the Rev. Mr. Milburn, is blind, and is accompanied on all occasions by a daughter, among whose duties is that of reading to her father every morning the proceedings of the day previous in Con¬ gress, and on these proceedings the Chaplain is accus¬ tomed to base his daily petitions. The privilege of admission to the floor of the House is limited to ex-members, secretaries of committees, each Standing Committee being entitled to such an officer, and to the pages and other officers and at¬ tendants. Ex-members are frequently employed by parties interested in the passage of special legislation, owing to their enjoyment of this privilege, which gives them access to the House, and consequently to the members, at all times. Another and a still less reputable class of lobbyists frequently to be met with in the vicinity of both Houses are the women who make a business of lobbying, and who, it is to be feared, presume not a little upon the privileges of their sex to harass mem¬ bers of Congress with a persistence which would, in a man, be promptly and decisively rebuked. The Senate Chamber does not differ materially in its arrangements from the House, except that, as befits its dignity, and the smaller number of members, the accommodations are more luxurious, the revolving cane chairs of members of the House being replaced in the Senate by large and comfortable arm-chairs. The Senate galleries accommodate only about half as many people as those in the House. Another per¬ ceptible difference is that the Senate may and does hold secret sessions, from which all but Senators and the officers of the Senate, not even excepting the highly favoured members of the Press, are rigidly excluded. All bills for raising revenue must originate in the House of Representatives ; and on the other hand, upon the Senate devolves the duty of ratifying ap¬ pointments made by the President of the United States, and all treaties made by him require its approval. Of the Senators, the most distinctive characteristic is probably their immense wealth. Very few of them are poor men, and these are mostly from the Southern States. Most of them are very rich men, many of them millionaires. . Another feature which strikes an Englishman as curious, is that night sessions of the House or Senate are extremely rare. Both Houses usually convene at noon and sit four or five hours — though, of course, at times the sessions are prolonged into the night, and sometimes the House has sat several days and nights without intermission. A description of the Capitol, which that gifted and versatile Frenchman, “ Max O’Rell,” declares to be one of the most imposing and grandest buildings to be found in the world, would require a paper to itself. All the illustrations to this paper, including the portraits, are engraved by special permission from photographs by Mr. C. M. Bell, Washington. A MAY GARDEN. ^ A S T month we were discussing the beauties of our hardy and half-hardy annuals in the flower garden, but in this trea¬ cherous month 'of Ma)^ and before passing on to other or kindred subjects, some¬ thing, perhaps, should be said, by way of supplement, relative to our annuals, occupying as they do such an im¬ portant place in our garden. Now, our tonder annuals succeed very well with only one re-potting : that is to say, where you have room for it they can be transferred straight away from the seed-pan or pot in which they were originally sown to that in which you intend them to bloom, and this change— or “ shift,” as we call it — should be made early in May, and by the end of the season yo-ii will find that the roots have filled the pot. And we must bear in mind that the distinction be¬ tween a green-house plant and an annual is this : that the annual, as implied by its name, as soon as it has attained its full size and growth, and in fact perfected itself, has fulfilled its mission, and it dies ; whereas, for example, a camellia or a heath when its roots have filled a pot is merely pot-bound, and another shift into a larger-sized pot at once gives it a fresh start, and its lease of life is renewed. A single shifting, then, for our annuals ought to be sufficient. This, again, being the month in which — however much we may diff'er in opinion as to the best method of summer arrangement of our garden — all our green¬ house stock and young cuttings are displayed to the best advantage in our open flower-beds for the season,

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340 A May Garden. we had better give a few general directions as to the cultivation of the more popular favourites that now so actively engross us for bedding-out. For the most part, we commence with the hardiest of our flowers by about the second week in May : these we put out first, and among them are our calceolarias and ver¬ benas ; a word, then, as to their general treat¬ ment. Being a good deal hardier than very many of our bedding-out plants, when we take cuttings from them at the end of August, of some three inches in length, we can afford to gain room in our green-house by putting calceolarias and verbenas in some dis¬ carded cucumber-frame. And here again, if the spot occupied by our frame is one that we value, and we feel sure that we shall want to replenish it early in March — which is the month in which we make up our hot-beds — the frame itself can simply be moved to any at all sheltered spot in the garden, and the young cuttings put into the simple and unprepared soil itself in August. Or at most, the soil need only be gently stirred, and when the cuttings are put into the ground, use a little ordinary silver sand on the surface. The light need not be put on the frame until about sunset, though after Michaelmas, of course, the light must be always on, unless it be partially removed for a very short time during the best of the day, for the purpose of admitting fresh air. Should a severe winter afterwards set in, throw over the whole frame some tarpaulin, matting, or old carpet, removing it only during the best of the day, if the frost be intense or prolonged. For recollect that all you wish to do in this, the cultivation of your verbenas and calceolarias, is merely to keep them “going” — so to speak — until the following May. Another great convenience and saving of time arising from this device is, that your hardy bedding- out plants that are thus wintering with their little roots in “mother earth” will probably require no watering at all during the winter, the natural moisture of the soil being most likely quite sufficient for them. Indeed, in this matter the writer is speaking from experience, having tried the experi¬ ment with perfect success during more than one winter : that is to say, the frame was removed from its usual place over the manure, and placed at the end of a cabbage bed — in fact, nearly under some apple-trees, and where a good high hedge protected it from the east wind. In April the young cuttings were so hardy and healthy, and hardly any had damped off during the winter, that when they came to be bedded out again early in May, they did not appear to be conscious of any change at all. On the other hand, you will find this month that if you impatiently transfer your geraniums and other bedding-out plants almost straight from the green¬ house to the open flower garden, the BEDDING OUT. leaves, more particularly if any May frosts or east winds are about, will become blackened or discoloured. Yet you need not be very much alarmed at this, for although your general stock will look ugly for a time, and its growth be impeded, yet in a fortnight or thereabouts your plants will recover themselves. Heliotropes, fuchsias, and perhaps petunias may be similarly tieated, but more particularly the fuchsias. This month, all climbing plants which run up the south side of your residence, such as, for example, the old China roses, passion-flowers, or bignonias, may very likely need some syringing with a good rose on the syringe ; and in doing so, take care to syringe underneath the leaves as well as over them, and use some little force in the operation. April and May are terrible months for the green fly, and indeed for all insect and caterpillar troubles ; and the last two or three weeks that your green-house is sheltering your stock of plants is often a critical time, partly from the overcrowding, and sometimes from the fly.

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341 THE VOICE IN THE WOODS* BY M. MOORSOM. WHEN Lucy Marlow and Dick Eccles were married, soon after the latter’s recovery from the serious injuries he had sus¬ tained in rescuing Lucy’s father from an accident at the Dearholm Station, the young couple decided to supplement their joint earnings by taking lodgers. Mrs. Marlow _ ^ advised a cottage in Manorfield Street similar to their own, with one lodger ; but Lucy took more ambitious views, and her father and Eccles supported her, having full confidence in her judgment. Eccles had been duly promoted to be inspector, in recognition of his plucky action in saving Marlow’s life ; and with his advanced pay and Lucy’s dress-making, the pretty little house in SoLithbank Street, which was to let at the May term, would not be far beyond their means ; and with the upper part let, to one or two unmarried clergymen, say, or the lady teachers at the High School, they would gain a handsome surplus while enjoying abetter class of house. Lucy determined to work chiefly at home, as going out by the day would prevent her having things properly comfortable, and her profits from the letting might afford a little servant to relieve her of the rough house- work. Fortunately, very soon after they settled in it, the house was provided with tenants — two ladies in the drawing-rooms, and on the floor above a young man who came on the recommendation of one of the minor canons, and of whom nothing was known save that his name was Austin, and that he had settled at Dearholm in order to live quietly, and devote him¬ self to studying languages under Mr. Turner, the clergyman who had introduced hirfi, and who was a widely celebrated linguist. He had Italian and German books on his table, but otherwise gave no sign of very close application to work, his afternoons being mostly spent about the wooded banks of the Dear, reading on the cool, shady seats, or taking faint little pencil sketches of the cathedral. The young stranger therefore became known by sight, and interested many people by his refined, thoughtful face, and appearance of delicate health : their knowledge of him went no farther, hovvever, as he made no acquaintances, and seemed quite indifferent to the social pleasures that were natural at his age. The fine summer evenings were also generally spent out of doors. To the Eccles he appeared a model lodger, being perfectly contented with his quarters, and his require¬ ments being simple and easily satisfied. He took * To this story was awarded the prize of £3 3s. offered in con¬ nection with the Amateur Free University for the best and most original short story. — Ed. C.M. early dinner in the town after his reading with Mr. Turner, requiring afterwards only coffee at five, and a frugal supper when he returned from his evening ramble, and soon he was accustomed to share the cosy meal which Lucy prepared for her husband after his work. And although Mr. Austin was a culti¬ vated gentleman, he found nothing but pleasure in this association with the railway man and his wife, both being sensible, intelligent people, well-mannered in the simple, unaffected way which comes of goodness and kindly feeling. The lodger took great interest in railway work, perceiving that romantic and pic¬ turesque side of it which the Ruskinites so fiercely deny, but which is very real and fascinating to those who appreciate it, and he delighted in Dick’s stories of adventures connected with the line. And if other subjects failed, they could always fall to discussing the voice in the woods. For it was during that summer that this mysterious singing first occurred, and by the time July was well in there were few people in Dearholm who had not heard it — none, probably, who had not formed some special theory, each more unlikely than the last. Two things seemed unaccountable — that the singer should be so determined to conceal his identity, and that he had so long succeeded in doing so. This was doubt¬ less due to the semi-darkness in which he sang, for his voice was never heard until the sun was beginning to wane, and then only in deepest shadow of the woods — Hillhall or Hinchliffe, or the little wood at the Eck, where people out for an evening stroll heard it to their wonder and delight. The voice was a high tenor of exquisite quality, true throughout and thrillingly sweet, but with occasional weakness and breaks in the lower notes which suggested delicacy of chest. Some¬ times short exercises were given without articulate words, or single notes sustained in wailing tones like a long sigh ; then again fragments from oratorios, or a few bars from such songs as “Adelaide” or “ The Message ; ” seldom anything complete. Many listeners were too enthralled by the beauty of the sound to think of tracing it to its source ; others who tried to follow it up said that directly they approached it ceased, and on reaching the spot it seemed to proceed from they found no one in sight. Naturally, Dearholm was greatly exercised by such a phenomenon, and the preference for sacred music attached pretty general suspicion to the choir-men, some one of whom, it was conjectured, had desired to create a sensation and be the hero of a mystery ; but, on the other hand, people with an ear for music declared that no such voice, nor any at all comparable to it, had been heard in the cathedral, and that its possessor, if he chose to present himself, might com¬ mand his own terms. An eccentric freak of some student at the University was suggested as a possible solution, while superstitious folk set it down at once

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342 The Voice in the Woods. to something uncanny, and the intensely sad and wailing tone into which the voice frequently fell, added to the invisible nature of the singer, did unquestion¬ ably produce a weird and awe-inspiring effect. Dick Eccles, a Highlander by birth, held firm belief in the supernatural, and was fully convinced that the voice was “ naught earthly ; his wife doubted, yet admitted the possibility, and the subject had that intense fascination for both which anything ghostly exercises over those who believe or half believe it. Mr. Austin took less interest ; he shared their talks, indeed, but had no very decided opinion to give, and often he turned the conversation to tales of super¬ natural experiences he had heard of, which Eccles accepted with implicit faith and Lucy heard with a shudder of dread. Perhaps his lukewarmness about the Dearholm mystery was owing to its inferiority in point of horror to his own blood-curdling narratives, or perhaps to the lack of taste for music which Mrs. Eccles attributed to him on account of his frequenting no society in musical Dearholm, and of his absolute silence in the house. “ I think you’ve got no turn for music, sir,” she remarked, in the course of one of their talks. “ I never hear so much as a bit hum or whistle, let alone a song. ’Tis a pity, too, for there’s many ’d be glad to have you join their practisin’s.” “ Nay, Lucy, ma lass, doesn’t tha hear th’ gentle¬ man’s voice is none strong.?” put in Marlow, who was spending an evening with his daughter. “ It sounds like as if he’d getten colded. A’se warrant now, if ye tuned up a bit, sir, it ’d mak’ ye hoarse in no time ? ” “ Very possibly it might. I am afraid I’m not of the stuff singers are made of,” Austin agreed lightly, but with an undertone of sadness in his voice. “Are you wise to be out so late, sir? ” Eccles asked. “ I notice oft you’re not in till dark, an’ our climate’s treacherous to strangers.” “ True ; but the evenings have been so lovely, and if it’s the least chilly I keep indoors. I’ve been ordered to be in the open air as much as possible, so I lounge away the hot hours in the Banks and take a walk later.” “ Then happen ye’ll ha’ heard this queer voice they talk aboot ? ” Marlow questioned. “ Why, yes, certainly ; I have come across it at times.” “An’ what might ye ha’ thowt on ’t ? There’s many mak's na doot it’s a boggart, but A’ve niver held wi’ them things.” “It canna be aught human,” Eccles interrupted. “ It’s far too wonderful for that ; it hands ye that ye scarce can breathe — your whole mind an’ body’s on the strain to hearken ; it sets one thinkin’ on all that’s beautiful i’ this warld, and on heaven an’ the blessed angels, an’ them that’s gane awa’ frae us to be happy yonder. Have ye never felt it so, Mr. Austin ?” Austin made no reply. He was gazing through the uncurtained window into the moonlight with a dreamy far-away look in his eyes and a smile on his lips ; so rapt indeed was the expression that it seemed as if such heavenly visions as Eccles had spoken of must even then be engrossing his mind. Dick, full of the subject, repeated his question, and the lodger roused himself to answer. “ I— I hardly know,” he said absently. “ I am no judge ; I couldn’t give an opinion about the voice. So you’ve no faith in ghosts, Marlow ? ” and with zest intensified by the incredulous face of his listener, he proceeded to try to convert the porter to a belief in “ boggarts.” That summer was long remembered for the spell of warmth which, in the changeable Dearholm climate, was quite an exceptional blessing. All July and August the “blue unclouded weather” lingered, then it finally broke up with a thunderstorm, followed by several days of heavy rain and a long period of cold and damp. Day and night the grey canopy of mingled fog and smoke which overhung the venerable city was never lifted, and the banks, sombre even in their summer beauty, became a very picture of desolation, the dripping trees wrapt in unwholesome mists from the dark silent river, which crawled along as sluggishly as if it had not been charged with flood from moorland streams above. And with summer and sunshine the voice in the woods had also vanished ; during August it had been heard less frequently, and now was altogether silent. Perhaps the boggart was rheumatic, or, like many human artistes, it objected to wasting its performance on a diminished audience. As to Mr. Austin, illness and the wet combined tc keep him pretty closely to his lodgings. Before the bad weather began, indeed, a blight seemed to have settled on his spirits and prospects ; for several weeks he had been forced to beg indulgence in his rent, and it became daily more evident that he was depressed by some secret care. He said that a friend who had undertaken to put him forward in the world, and on whom he was dependent for his present main¬ tenance, was abroad, and temporarily unable to send his allowance, but would assuredly do so very soon ; and although his extreme reserve about himself made the story appear singularly uncorroborated, yet Eccles and Lucy had grown to like and trust him, while his increasing ill-health appealed to their pity, so that they felt it impossible to press him for payment. Fearing to give trouble, he fought manfully against his illness ; but the hoarseness and incessant cough could not be hidden, and he was fain to admit at last that it was “ like a knife in his chest,” and disturbed his rest very much ; whereupon Lucy, in her kindness, nursed him with every available homely remedy, and every little luxury that was within her means to pro¬ cure. Finally a climax came when she told him he ought to have a doctor. “ A doctor ! ” he repeated bitterly. “ How could I pay for his advice ? Better send me to the hospital, before I get any farther into your debt.” “Nay, Mr. Austin ; never fash yoursel’ o’er that. Dick an’ me can wait.” Austin’s pale face grew yet more death-like ; he

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The Voice in the Woods. 343 leant back in his chair, silent and breathless, his thin hands twitching nervously at the table-cloth. “It’s useless to conceal it,” he said, with a painful effort, at last. “ I can’t pay, Mrs. Eccles ; I see no hope of paying. Oh ! for pity’s sake, do believe I never meant to defraud you. My friend who supplied me has fallen into difficulties : he can help me no more. I don’t know what is to become of me ; there is no one — in the world - ” Overcome by weakness and distress, his voice failed, and broke down into sobs of despair and shame, and Lucy laid a kind hand on his arm. “ Don’t take on that way, sir ; no, you mustn’t now, it’s so bad for ye. Things ’ll come right, never fear ; an’ you’ve got friends in Dick an’ me, and a roof owor your head, so long as ye need it. Nay, now don’t put yoursel’ about to thank me : let that bide, an’ just calm your mind, an’ think if there’s nae friend to turn to. You’ve never spoke o’ parents.? ” Austin shook his head. “My father held a small living in a poor district ; he was making his mark in the Church, I believe ; but he died early, after having insured his life with an office that turned out insolvent, and paid nothing. The parish collected a little sum for my mother; she devoted it all to my education, and earned her own living. She has been dead some years now.” “Poor lad! It’s a sad story : it is, indeed. And have ye no other near of kin ? ” “ Not one. But I have this,” he said, brightening a little, as he pulled out a letter, which was stamped with the address, “ Hazeldene Court, North Devon.” “ Dear Austin ’ (it ran), — “ I am truly sorry to hear of your dis¬ appointment in health and prospects, but trust both may yet be restored. You ought to get to a warmer climate at once ; why not come to us for a few weeks? We shall be delighted to have you, and my wife knows how to cosset invalids. Give me a line when to meet you at Tarryford. “ Your sincere friend, “C. Davrell-Edward.s." “If I could only accept this,” sighed the lodger, “ Devonshire’s the very place for me now. But it’s utterly out of my reach ; I couldn’t pay the journey.” “ Wouldn’t this gentleman, if he knew ?” “ No, no ; I couldn’t ask it,” Austin interrupted, flushing painfully. “ I’ve no claim on him whatever ; this kindness is most wonderful and unexpected ; 1 cannot encroach on him more.” For a moment Lucy wondered if the letter could be a fabrication, but a glance at Austin’s troubled face made her ashamed of the suspicion. “ Well, mebbe it might be managed. My man has a bit influence with the railway gentlemen,” she said, with a little gentle pride ; “ an’ there’s a meeting of them to-day. Happen they’d let him have a free pass to - where is it? Tarryford, North Devon.” Accordingly, Lucy took the letter to her husband, who brought back a ticket to Tarryford duly made out. “ Bless you, ’tis but a trifle to the Company,” he said lightly to his lodger, who was quite overpowered with amazement and gratitude ; and it was only after Austin had started on his journey that he learnt by chance from a fellow -passenger that the Company’s generosity had extended only to about half the dis¬ tance, Inspector Eccles making up the remainder out of his own hard-earned wages. The lodger had departed with expressions of un- dying gratitude, and promises to inform his friends of his welfare, and the young couple felt a glow of satis¬ faction at the help which they had rendered. But as quarter-day approached, and no fresh tenant filled the vacancy, they began to feel the loss of Austin’s rent and their outlay for him, and realised that if they were to profit by letting lodgings they must be less easily moved to compassion. And as months went by without tidings of Austin, suspicion arose that they had been duped by an im¬ postor. He had announced his arrival at Hazeldene, and some improvement in health, after which they had heard no more. In cleaning his room, too, Lucy had found scraps of a burnt letter, on which were legible some disconnected phrases : — “ Sorry to have misled you .... a dead failure .... on to the herring- pond when this reaches .... land’s too hot for me .... bother about your lodgings .... a mid¬ night flitting, and let ... . whistle for their money.” This, doubtless, was from the friend he had men¬ tioned, and its unprincipled tone gave them a decided shock, and combined with his long silence to con¬ demn him. “ It fairly discourages and hard-heartens me, it does,” Eccles declared. “ Seems there’s nae honesty i’ this warld.” Lucy suggested inquiring of Mr. Dayrell-Edwards, to whom Austin had gone ; but Dick would not hear of that. “ Happen the lad’s honest, after a’ ; it’d hurt him bitterly, us worritin’ his frien’s ; an’ if he’s a cheat we’ll gain naught, choose what we do. Come to my last penny. I’ll none mak’ mysel’ a laughing-stock.” And as autumn drew on again, it came indeed ta the last penny, for the “drawing-rooms” had left some time previously, and Lucy’s earnings were interrupted by illness, thus they were put to severe straits in order to raise rent and taxes. Unless things mended before Christmas, the pretty house must needs be given up, and Mrs. Marlow’s humbler scheme adopted. In December, however, a letter came bearing the Torquay post-mark, and containing a postal order for fifteen shillings and a few lines from Austin. He regretted his remittance being so small and tardy, but hoped soon to send a better instalment, and a full account of himself, his prospects now being brighter. Insignificant as the sum was, it gave infinite pleasure to the Eccles’, for it restored their faith in the lodger, and took all bitterness out of their loss. It seemed an earnest of good fortune too, for from that time they were prosperously settled with permanent lodgers. For many months Austin again kept silence, and they feared he had once more gone under in the struggle. But shortly before Christmas a quite bulky packet arrived, enclosing an order for the whole balance due, two pasteboard tickets, and — wonder of wonders I — a cheque for twenty pounds. “My Dear Friends” (the accompanying letter ran), — “I am truly thankful at last to discharge my debt. It is impossible for me

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344 “people heard it to their wonder and delight" (/. 341). ever to express a tithe ot the gratitude I feel, nevertheless I trust >ou will give me the happiness of accepting the enclosed little present in remembrance of your goodness, which I can truly tell you saved me from utter ruin in health and prospects. I want you both to use the tickets I send. I’m coming to Dearhclm that evening, and when the concert is over shall see if you have a welcome and a bit of supper as of old for your friend, Austin.” The concert in question w’as one at which numerous celebrities were to appear, the chief attraction being a new tenor, Alfred Beresford, who had made a great success in the past London season. Full of wonder and rejoicing, Eccles and Lucy were early in the excellent seats provided for them, marvelling how Mr. Austin could be concerned in the matter. Mr. Beresford's appearance was the signal for a buzz of anticipation. There was a wide difference between this handsome, prosperous, self-possessed gentleman bowing his acknowledgments with perfect ease, and the poverty-stricken invalid who had gone away broken in health and spirits, yet instantly they knew their former lodger ; and when the notes of “The Message” rang out, sweet, thrilling, and un¬ marred now by any touch of weakness, all musical Dearholm recognised the voice in the woods. Needless to say what a hearty greeting the singer received in Southbank Street. “Well, this ts a change, Mr. Austin,” Lucy said, as they drew round the fire. ‘‘Nay, I forgot: that’s none your name after a’.” “Indeed it is ^ Alfred Austin Beresford, at your service. I must explain everything now,” he said, “though I fear it’s a long history. Well, as I told you, my poor mother spent her all on my education,

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A Most Unwelcome Guest. 345 and I started as a bank clerk. But the work never suited my health, and at twenty-two I was in despair over it, when one day a certain Vucina chanced to hear me sing : a sort of musical man of business, who took pupils for the profession, organised concerts and operas, and so forth. He offered to train me as a singer, undertaking to maintain me during my pro¬ bation, and I binding myself to pay him a large share — the lion’s share— of my future earnings. For two years 1 studied hard privately, for he never allowed any publicity about pupils ; but the May before I came to you, an old acquaintance asked me to go with him to Mr. Dayrell-Edwards’, and sing at a very small party, and Vucina let me accept that, under my name of Austin only. I stayed to dinner after the party, and received the greatest kindness from Mr. and Mrs. Dayrell-Edwards ; they invited me often, and when leaving town for Hazeldene, made me promise to send news of my doings. By this time I had become terribly plagued with weakness of voice, and Vucina took me to a throat doctor, who said I had practised too much ; that my voice was of a very fine and peculiar quality, easily overstrained, and must have entire rest, excepting a little gentle practice in the open air, which in some cases was very strengthening to the throat and lungs. Vucina’s face fell ; but he soon decided my holiday must be devoted to per¬ fecting myself in languages, and having once done some service to Mr. Turner, he counted on getting free instruction for me here. Of course he knew Dear- holm was not a suitable climate ; but in such a hot summer that could hardly signify, and Vucina, I believe, treated it as kill or cure ; he feared his specu¬ lation in me was proving a failure, and if so, why, the sooner I collapsed the better. I was pledged to the strictest secrecy, for he dreaded any rival getting hold of me at the last, also that if my delicacy became known it might lower my value as a singer. Well, it was all fun to me, dodging about the woods, and playing ‘boggart,’ and hearing opinions unawares. The happiest moment I’d ever known, Eccles, was when you told me all your feelings about my voice. Ah ! but I soon found it was doing me no good ; I caught chills, I suppose, and Vucina’s irregularity about pay¬ ments depressed me ; foolishly, perhaps, I told him how ill and hopeless I felt, and he sent that cruel letter ending the matter. Maybe it was true he had made a disastrous speculation over some concerts, and was out of funds, yet even so, it was heartless to desert me then. Thanks to you, I got to Hazeldene, and stayed until they started for visits after Christmas, when they insisted on giving me the means to take a year’s rest — Heaven reward their goodness !— and they would have paid my debt if I’d asked them, only they had done so much, and I felt such a wish to repay you my own self. By the next winter I was earning something at private parties at Torquay, and last May, through Mr. Dayrell-Edwards’ help, I made my first public appearance in London. Of course Vucina’s abandon¬ ment of me cancelled my contract with him— I shall merely refund what he spent for me— and now that I’m well and strong, and my singing a pure delight, why, I hope to go on and prosper.” “ Well, I can scarce believe it was human, and nae boggart after a’,” Eccles remarked meditatively. “ One thing’s certain : if health lasts, there’s a great name and a grand future for the Voice in the Woods.” A MOST UNWELCOME GUEST. BY A FAMILY DOCl'OR. H.WE a bungalow,” I said, “down ‘by the sad sea waves ’ that ripple on the sands of C - . It is one of those portable businesses, you know, to which I can fly for rest occasionally and live eii ^arc^on^ mostly out of doors, with a dog and a rod and a boat. But I have a spare bedroom, and should welcome a literary friend like you. I shan’t disturb you. I shall be on the water all day or among the rocks, so you can lie on your back and plan and plot for another story.” “ How delightful ! ” he answered thoughtfully. “Yes,” I added, “it is delightful enough, but you don’t seem to jump at it. Let me see, now : to-day is the second of May. Weil, in three weeks’ time a maternal relation of mine — not by direct descent — comes to visit my wife ; she will then have company, and the days of ‘ auld lang syne’ to talk about*; so I could slip off, and you could come too. We could travel together.” “ No, we shouldn’t, mon ami^^ he said quickly. “ And why not, pray } ” He did not answer directly. “ The time would suit me if I didn’t expect a visitor.” “ Can’t you put him off ? ” I inquired. “ I fear I cannot, much though I should wish to.” I looked at my friend. He certainly was somewhat pale and nervous — a great many work-a-day literary men are. But who could his disagreeable visitor be Mr. Rubens was far too successful an author to be troubled with thoughts of money. Was it possible he had a skeleton of some kind in his closet, or did the ghost of some restless ancestor haunt his bachelor chambers ? “You look puzzled,” he said, “as well you may be ; and you are too well-bred to ask who this un¬ welcome guest of mine is^ so I’ll tell you. His name is Megrim.” “ Whew ! ” I whistled. “ I never suspected that.

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A Most Unwelcome Guest. 346 Here, now, off with your coat and waistcoat; I’m going to examine your heart.” Out came the stethoscope, and Rubens obeyed me to the letter as meekly as a child might. There was a slight bit of an anaemic thrill or purr, but otherwise nothing to indicate any disease. And so I told him. You have taken a load off my mind,” he said. “You took me all unawares, though. Had I dreamt my heart was to be examined, you wouldn’t have seen me here to-day. Now I think I can promise to come, but 1 won’t venture to ride in the same carriage.” “ For fear of bringing on your sick headache ?” “ Yes, we should talk ; and assuredly Mr. Megrim would come the next day to see what it was all about.” “ You have been troubled with these migraine head¬ aches for some years ? ” “ Yes, for ten at least. They are migra/ue now ; I should like them to migra/^y and the very feebleness of that joke of mine makes me believe I have an attack coming on now.” “Well,” I said, “there are three, if not four, dif¬ ferent kinds of megrim, and there may be a sort of megrim formed by the amalgamation of two of these. Tell me how yours behaves, and 1 may ’oe able to advise you how to steer clear of so unwelcome a guest.” “ I believe,” said my friend, “ you have hit the nail on the head, to begin with. I do believe my megrim is a mixed one, or that sometimes it begins in one style, then flies off at a tangent into another. Well, you know I do a deal of night work, and have now and then a deal of worry. So this work, combined with this worry, brings on two premonitory symptoms : slight acidity of the digestive organs and a confined con¬ dition of the system. Medicine now may drive off the attack for a time, but this is only running away from the enemy ; sooner or later he gains on me ; I am driven to bay, and have to fight him the best way I can, or simply succumb and suffer as meekly as I may. The culmination is the sick headache. This is ter¬ rible while it lasts. It usually comes on in the morn¬ ing, though I dare say it has been settling around all night, for I awake with a confused idea that I have been dreaming ; not downright nightmarish dreams, but disagreeable ones, for all that, and they have left me aching all over, and with a pain on one side of the head — the right. I am not going to get up that day, you may be sure. I don’t care to open my eyes or lift my head from the pillow. I may have engage¬ ments of the greatest importance, but I must let them slide for once. Breakfast, even in bed, is out of the question. If I could only sleep again ! But that too is usually impossible, so great is the pain. I may gently move the head or softly arrange the pil¬ low, but all is delusory, all in vain. The movement only exaggerates the symptoms. By-and-by, lying in bed itself seems intolerable. If I get up I stagger about and the pain increases, so I am glad to lie down again, but this same attempt to overcome my illness has brought on sickness. Then I am at the worst. The retching causes the perspiration to pour from brow and chest, ay, even my very hair becomes draggled. I need not tell you, because you must know what I suffer. Bile? Yes, I bring up bile. It regur¬ gitates from somewhere, as you doctors, with your partiality for verbs that are not pretty, like to express it. Somehow I think that the vomiting, although it causes me to feel as bad as if sea-sick, eases me. The intervals between retching become longer ; at last I doze and dream, and finally, perhaps, I sleep, and awaken cold and weak, but well. I may get up now, but I have to walk as if my head were simply fastened to my body with a slip of india-rubber. I finally collapse on the sofa, grateful, but weary, and next day I am about again — that is, mind you, if Mr. Megrim hasn’t brought any of his relations. If he has, he himself may go away, but they stop for days. My headache then becomes intermittent, and of that sort I think you term Hevticrania^'^ Leaving Mr. Rubens’ case on one side for a few minutes, lot me say a few words about the ordinary causes of this disagreeable visitor — megrim. To begin with, there are undoubted proofs that megrim is in many cases hereditary, and that although they may commence very early in life, its attacks seldom come upon one after the middle period, or age of forty-five in women. But the fact of megrim being constitutional or hereditary is no reason why we should not attempt to ward off attacks, or take means, wherever possible, to prevent their coming on at all. A person suffering from periodical attacks of the com¬ plaint is by no means to be regarded as suffering from actual disease. ~ To be sure, it is sometimes connected with certain disorders of the heart, else I should not have troubled to apply my stethoscope to the chest of my friend mentioned above. All who suffer, therefore, from megrim, should consult a medical man, and have the heart examined, if only for the sake of enabling them to be more easy in mind. The periodic nature of megrim causes it to be a very unpleasant ailment for anyone to be subject to. It may be said to be an enemy hovering continually on the flank of the army of life, making ever and anon another desperate attack, but usually retiring baffled after a time. Young girls under twenty are often subject to megrim, though it generally passes away in about a day, or after one good night’s rest. During the interval the person is generally in his or her usual health, and just after an attack, even better. As in Mr. Rubens’ case, the megrim is, as a rule, threatened beforehand, the stomach and system get out of order for a day or two, and these symptoms may be caused by the ailment itself, although we must not forget that they may cause it. Certain arti¬ cles of diet or drink are almost sure to induce a “ fi-t of megrim,” as it is sometimes called. Well, it stands to common sense that these latter should be most rigidly abstained from, however tempting such viands are to the senses.' Pork, pastry, veal, salmon, and even mutton may have to be avoided. Hot sauces, onions, and pickles should be

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THE ENGAGEMENT RING. {See />a^e 347-)

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/ The Engagement Ring. used with suspicion, and as to drinkables, tea-drinking, if the tea be strong, may do harm by lowering the nervous system, and vinous stimulants by sending the blood to the head. The bilious form of megrim is caused by anything that interferes with the functions of the liver. But apart from all bodily causes, the condition of the mind has to be taken into account when searching for the causes of megrim. Any kind of worry, all kinds of mental strain or over-work, and most kinds of excitement are liable to induce it. Why, we need hardly ask ; for such causes mean depression of the nervous system, and the powers of life generally. I have little inclination to dwell on the symptoms of megrim or sick headache. Unfortunately for thousands, they are far too well known. Besides, the case of Mr. Rubens is somewhat typical. But the pain is at times far more distressing than any that he eyer suffered. Just as birds and other animals get away into a quiet dark corner when ill, so do sufferers from megrim like to court the retirement and conceal¬ ment, I may say, of their rooms. There are many strange symptoms affecting the sight and sensations, which are generally very alarming to the patient, such as partial blindness, flashes of light, crackling in the brain, numbness of limbs, pins and needles, and a heavy stupid feeling, and these often make the suf¬ ferer fear he is to be struck with paralysis. Well, now, I hope the reader has already suspected, from what I have said of the causes of megrim, that the treatment cannot be in all cases the same, but to a large degree of the preventive order. We must admit that the chief seat of the ailment is the head. I do not say that it is always the brain itself, though it often is. It may be the brain-cover¬ ings that are congested. Some medical men doubt whether the liver has anything to do with the trouble. I myself do not. I mean that a bilious attack may culminate in megrim, for any poison that 07ight to be 347 eliminated by the great secreting organs, and is not so got rid of, will cause a species of blood-poisoning. The bile, as all know, has most important functions to perform in the animal economy, but if it is retained in the blood, the consequences are disastrous. “ I believe,’’ said Mr. Rubens, “ I could prevent my headache if I could be always on my guard. But nemo semper sapil, you know.” Well, but my friend did learn to live by rule, and still does, and although barely forty, he no longer suffers from megrim. He is a changed man. Night hours and long hours of labour, whether mental or bodily, must be avoided. That is the first sine qtid non of a return to health. Secondly, good nutritious diet must be taken, but over-eating must be strenuously guarded against. Exercise must become one of the daily habits of life. A hobby has ere now acted in itself as a cure. It must, however, be a hobby that keeps one out in the open air, and pleasantly engages the mind, while it exercises without fatiguing the body. Sleep will thus be got without dangerous artificial means, and remember sleep is all-important. Whenever one’s daily occupation interferes in any way with his natural rest at night, he is on the brink of danger. The Turkish or Russian bath (taken under medical advice) will very often tend to ward off an attack. The diet, though nutritious, must be plain. For drink, I have reason to believe lithia water will be found to do good, but a cup of tea in the afternoon is a great comfort. If there be much acidity, a soda and gentian mixture ; if paleness of face and gums, iron ; but the system must be kept open by rational means. Cod-liver oil with pancreatic emulsion often does much good. Try it and see. Do everything possible to get into a healthy habit of body and a calm condition of mind, and all will go well. When an attack does take place, send for a doctor, for the remedies post in use belong to the class called dangerous. THE ENGAGEMENT RING. HIS ring recalls the happy day He told his love to me. Which all my future life will stay Enshrined in memory. And yet the days must not be spent In dreams, however fair. For I would strive, with fixed intent, His highest aims to share. What charms were mine to draw his heart To choose so poor a prize ? With loyal trust, while doubts depart, I look into his eyes. My task, to aid his steadfast will. When clouds are dark above. To rule, his constant subject still, By sweet constraint of love. Dear ring, with rapture, new and fond, I see your Jewels shine. And dream of brighter joys, beyond All former hopes of mine. I kiss his treasured ring, and vow. In hours of bliss or pain, Flis blessing, as he calls me now, Hereafter to remain. j. R. EASTWOOD.

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r 348 ti)e ^tllacje (Bvmx* M. SCALf. Tempo di Me7iicetto. tr a teinpo. 1 I C7'es. poco 7'alL sf =i*=i=? f V we-H«--g- s-»- ^ » P ^g- s L.

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349

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350 COLONEL RUDDERBUFFS POSSESSIONS: A PAPER ON FURNITURE. BY THE AUTHOR OF “ HOW I FURNISHED FOR A HUNDRED POUNDS.'’ T HOPE that all my -*■ readers will under¬ stand that it is from no desire of boasting of my goods and chattels, but with a genuine wish to help others that I take up my pen to write a brief description of my house. I took to furnishing some¬ what late in life, for I only married and settled down a year ago. My wife, dear creature, was just out of the school -room, a sweet child who knew nothing of the comparative merits of tables and chairs ; so as I naturally wished our house to do us credit, I brought to the work the ex¬ perience of my sixty years, and man¬ aged things myself. The result has been a grand success. I hear every¬ where now that my house is the best furnished in the county ; my neigh¬ bours admire it immensely ; and I am beset with requests to tell them where and how I got my things, and, above all, what I paid for them. So bored have I been by repeated reiterations of Dear Colonel, would you mind telling me in confi¬ dence where you ob¬ tained that delightful easy-chair, or that soft¬ est of soft carpets ? " that, worn out by my own furniture, the idea of writing this paper came into my head, and I determined that once for all I would publish a description of some of my home treasures. I am not going to bore my readers by lengthily describing my house, or even the individual rooms. It would not benefit them to hear of my old Chippendale furniture, my inlaid harpsichord, and Barto- lozzi panels ; even the price of my old oak would be no guide to them ; lor these things range in price from the value that the sellers put upon them, and absolutely depend upon the fashion of the day. Many of my curios are priceless in value — I try to forget what I paid for them — while others I picked up in Germany and France for next to nothing. But these have all their own individuality, while the things 1 want to tell you about are those that can be bought by all who want them. My drawing-room is very large, and is almost en¬ tirely furnished in Chippendale. A casual observer would think that it was all of the same period, but I will tell you that the settee and chairs are modern, though if you could examine them you would find that they are quite as well made as the old. I am giving an illustration, in which you will notice that as the chairs are for a drawing-room they have straight cushioned backs, instead of having them cut as the dining-room Chippendale always are. This is much more comfortable. I paid twenty-seven guineas for this set. The chintz with which they are covered is well worth illustrating ; it is one of the most beautiful of modern chintzes, for modern it is, though it looks as if made fifty years ago— faded yellow roses on a cream ground with dull olive-green foliage. It could not be more artistic nor more moderate in price, for it only cost one and elevenpence a yard. The summer curtains are made of this chintz lined with washing Italian cloth in cream-colour. In the winter I hang up curtains of olive-green velvet, and I hardly know which set looks best with my wall-paper, which is one of the now fashionable large patterns in one colour — pale buff, on a lighter shade of the same. My mantelshelf is of mahogany. Nothing else looks so suitable with Chippendale furniture. I have no overmantel, only a little real Chippendale mirror, THE LIBRARY,

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351 A CORNER OF THE DRAWING-ROOM. costing .aDout two pounds, mahogany with cut edges and a gilded cock. No Chippendale room should ever have an overmantel ; it is the greatest mistake, as they do not belong to that period. The beautiful standing cabinet with the glass doors and drawers, and the china cupboard (shown in the illustration), are both modern, though an exact copy of old Chippendale. They are wonderfully inexpensive for furniture of such good design and workmanship. I only paid £;] 15s. 6d. for the cabinet and 17s. 6d. for the cupboard. Look well at the carved tops ; they give lightness and beauty to the whole. Give a glance also at my little corner stand in bamboo, with its bright-coloured palms and pots. These pots are joined to each other with a patent fastener, and can be taken apart and used for other purposes, while the stand will do for holding work-baskets, tea-cups, or books ; it cost just half a guinea. By rights the floor should be French-polished, and beyond a few rugs no carpet should be laid down. I tried this for a month, but the legs of sixty are not so nimble as those of twenty-five, and after 1 had en¬ tered my drawing-room head-foremost some half-dozen limes 1 resolved to try a change. “ Better be a slave to comfort than to fashion,^’ said I ; so tight over the floor is now drawn an olive-green kalmuk at is. iid. the yard. This colour does well with our covers and wall-paper, and makes a good ground for our beautiful antique Persian rugs. And now I must introduce you to my library book¬ cases, but I should like to take you first into the dining¬ room, and show you upon the dinner-table two new inventions which I find most useful. The first is my white china dinner set, with my crest in gold upon each article. You see nothing wonderful in it till the hot dishes are brought in, each fitted with a china cover bearing the crest. By hot dishes I mean the vegetable-dishes, soup-tureens, and sauce-bowls. The whole of the dish and cover is made of china. There is no metal fitting, but when the cover is tilted back it interlocks with the dish and supports itself in an up¬ right position, thus obviating the usual difficulty of drips falling on the table-cloth or on the carpet when covers are removed. There is nothing unusual either in the appearance of my plated spoons and forks ; you did not see them when half made as I did, and there¬ fore have not the satisfaction of knowing that extra quantities of silver are deposited on the parts most liable to wear. Thus, on the back of the prongs of a fork, and also on the handle (where the principal fric¬ tion comes), is an extra thickness of silver, making it about four times the ordinary durability. Both these are patent, and can be procured only from one firm. My library bookcases are of black oak, and are fitted with curtains, which I like better than glass doors. Below the woodwork of the bookcase, just at the top of the first shelf, runs a little brass rod, and at the bottom of the last shelf you see another like it. Both these are fitted with rings, to which the curtains are attached. Two curtains are used, and they should be wide enough to fall in ample folds when drawn. 1 think that my friends perhaps admire my library curtains more than anything in my house. They are of woven Bengalese silk, so fine that they could be almost drawn through a wedding-ring. They are made in many patterns in colours of straw and gold, with tints of pale green and strawberry intermixed. They are fringed, and cost 45s. a pair. I hang my windows with them ; but as for my bookcase I required width and not lengthy I bought a bed-quilt

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352 The Stronger Will. of the same material at 25s. 9d. This I cut in two, using the fringed side for the edge where the curtains join. I ought to add that my bookcase does not come down to the ground ; it stands upon carved oak cupboards, and therefore the curtains and dark oak line one side of the wall. My walls are covered with Morris blue willow-leaf paper, and to go with this I have a most beautiful Wilton carpet, electric-blue upon indigo ; it cost me 5s. 6d. a yard, and is wearing splendidly. I have a high mantelshelf made in the Adams style and painted white ; it is not enamelled, but is “ flatted,” which means that the paint is unvarnished, dull white. The little Adams mirror over the mantelpiece is flatted too ; it is a true copy from a very ancient one, and cost 26s. I hang no screens nor grasses above it, for such articles would be quite out of keeping with the style of my room ; but on each side of the mirror hang little sketches painted in red on white opal, and framed in black wood. My clock is in a wrought-iron case, and wrought-iron gas-brackets project on each side of the fireplace. 1 do not pretend to call this library an Adams room, for the oak furniture would prevent that being possible. It is full of chairs of all periods, bought only for comfort, and has artistic treasures from many foreign lands scattered on the shelves and hanging on the walls. My little carved oak corner table cost me only 30s.; it fits into the corner, and has a flap which can be let up or down at pleasure. Among my latest acquired curiosities is a Venetian painting, framed in a new way. The foundation of the framework is of deal, but it has been covered with a bright terra-cotta Roman satin, upon which a conventional pattern of dragons and cupids has been painted in steel-colour THE CORNER TABLE AND PATENT DINNER SERVICE. and gold in lustre. The effect is most excellent, and well repays any trouble taken in making it. My wife has copied it since very easily by simply ironing on an ordinary crewel- transfer pattern, and then filling it up with the paint. She finds that the rather coarse Roman satin at 3s. 6d. the yard and 52 inches wide is the best for this purpose. And now, as I begin to feel somewhat overpowered for want of my after-dinner nap, I think that I will finish. I have striven to satisfy my friends by de¬ scribing some few of my possessions, but I have not touched on my greatest treasure, nor mentioned my latest purchase — it was a black oak cradle. And quite between ourselves, because it is a little early and my friends might smile, I will tell you that I have planned the next time I am in town to procure at a certain well-known shop in Regent Street a large spotted rocking-horse for the sole use of Baby Rud- derbuff. THE STRONGER WILL. By EVELYN EVERETT GREEN, Author of “Monica,” &c. CHAPTER THE NINETEENTH. DEPARTURE. LOREN CE stood looking after him — a strange, beautiful light in her eyes. “My brave, true-hearted Rudolf!” she said half aloud, and turned to w'alk towards the house again. Rudolfs absence from morning chapel aroused no comment. Mr. Howard had spoken rather peremptorily last night as to his avoid¬ ing exertion for a time, and although only Florence understood the real significance of the injunction, it seemed to explain any slight indolence on his part. But Mr. Cadwallader was a little uncomfortable, re¬ membering the stormy interview of the previous even¬ ing, and knowing that both it and the previous amount of exertion he had forced upon Rudolf had been con¬ demned by the doctor. He remembered now how Rudolf had complained ot fatigue, how his plea had been disregarded, and how while he had looked as the interview proceeded. He had been angry with him the preceding evening, but he was not angry now ; his vexation had cooled, and he was a little uneasy about his nephew, on account of Mr. Howard’s manner, rather than by reason of his words. The first thing, therefore, that he did on leaving the chapel was to go up to Rudolfs room, which he found empty, the letter he had written the last thing lying where he had left it upon the table. Mr. Cadwallader broke the seal, and read the brief

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The Stronger Will. 353 communication. Then he put the paper in his pocket, and walked down to the breakfast-room with rather an odd grimness about his eyes and mouth. Nothing was said during the meal as to Rudolfs absence. He was supposed to be breakfasting in his own room. Florence was unusually silent, as was Mr. Cadwallader. When they rose from table he put his hand upon her arm, and led her into the garden. “ The boy has gone," he said abruptly. ‘‘ I know he has.” “ How do you know? Who told you ? ” “ He told me himself. He said good-bye to me not an hour ago.” ‘‘ He did ? Did he tell you the reason of his going ? ” “ Yes.” ‘‘ That we quarrelled last night ? That he got on his high horse and angered me till I spoke words that I ought not perhaps to have done ? Did he tell you all about it ? ” “ He never said a word of that. I guessed that something unpleasant must have happened, but he said nothing.” Mr. Cadwallader stopped and faced her, looking at her searchingly. “ Yet you say he told you the reason of his sudden departure ? ” “ He did.” Florence raised her eyes fearlessly as she spoke, and they stood looking thus at one another for several long seconds. A spasm of pain contracted Mr. Cad- wallader’s face. “ Florence,” he said, with sudden keen anxiety, ^‘you promised me once that you would never marry without my consent.” “ 1 did, Uncle Oliver; and I will keep my promise.” He heaved a little sigh that sounded like one of relief, yet as his eyes studied her face his own relaxed from its stern lines, and he presently asked, in a very low tone — “ Florence, do you love him ? ” She looked at him with an expression he hardly fathomed. Uncle Oliver,” she answered, with gentle dignity, until Rudolf asks me that question himself, no one else has a right to do so — not even you.” “ Then he has not done so^yet ? ” Ah, no ! Do you think it likely he would ? ” He was quick to note every look upon her face, every tone in her voice. Something that he either heard or saw made him ask, almost humbly — Are you blaming me in your heart, Florence?” Her sweet smile beamed out as she answered — “Oh, no, Uncle Oliver.” Still he was not quite satisfied. “You are not going to let this trouble you?” he asked, with a sort of gentle hesitancy. She smiled and shook her head. “You are sure of that, Florence?” “ Quite sure,” she answered, still smiling ; and then seeing his eyes fastened upon her, she raised hers fearlessly to his, and added, with that clearness of enunciation that with her was an indication of feelings somewhat deeply stirred, “ I am not troubled, because I know you so well. Uncle Oliver, and trust you so entirely : because I have perfect confidence in your justice, your generosity, your goodness of heart : because I know that whatever you may think now, some day we shall see things alike, and all will be made plain and smooth. I know all this because I know you, and I am quite content to wait for a day that I am sure is coming. Waiting may be a little hard sometimes, but it is very salutary — it is a lesson of which I think perhaps I stand somewhat in need, and possibly someone else too. Yes, Uncle Oliver, I am content to wait— 1 am content to wait as long as you wish.” She looked straight into his eyes as she said these last words, and she spoke them with a little more em¬ phasis than she had done before. Then she put her hands upon his shoulders, kissed him very tenderly, and went quietly away. Great was the astonishment of the household at learning that Rudolf, who was hardly yet off the sick list, and by no means in robust health, had suddenly taken himself off, apparently in anger, without so much as taking farewell of anyone, or leaving any explanation of his strange conduct behind him. Mrs. Freer was surprised and vexed, feeling certain, from her brother’s manner, that there had been a quarrel of some kind, in which probably Rudolf had been the aggressor. The children were inconsolable, and Violet’s eyes shone with a strange light as she heard the news. “ This is your doing, I presume ? ” she said to Flo¬ rence, as they met face to face in the garden, whither the latter had gone to gather flowers for the house. “ We owe it, I suppose, to you that Rudolf is again an outcast and a wanderer ? ” Florence did not answer at once. It was very hard to be so misunderstood by Rudolfs sister ; yet not even to her could she betray Rudolfs secret ; and she always felt that Violet’s antipathy and enmity towards her was rooted in her deep loyal love for her brother. When it was thus with her, surely it was not very hard to be patient. Reconciliation must come at length. “You do not answer,” said Violet. “ You cannot deny that this is your handiwork.” Florence looked away over the sweet sunny land¬ scape, a great softness coming into her beautiful eyes. “No, I cannot altogether deny it,” she answered dreamily, and passed onwards, whilst Violet walked towards the house, a tempest of angry thoughts stir¬ ring within her. On the terrace she met Vernon, who was thought¬ fully pacing to and fro. “ She has confessed it ! She has no shame ! La belle dame sans merci—^\2i\. is what she should be called. She made no attempt to deny it. I think she glories in it.” “ In what ? What are you talking about ? ” “About Rudolfs banishment. It is she who has sent him away ; and she admits it herself And he will never, never come here again — I know him too 743

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The Stronger Will. 354 veil ever to hope it. Ah ! why are women made so cold, so cruel, so hard-hearted ? It makes my blood boil in my veins !” “ She admitted it, did she ? Well, that was candid. Poor old Rudolf ; but he would not be warned. 1 did my best. I told him what she was like : that she would play with him and fool him to the top of his bent, as she is fooling young Morrison now, and then cast him off like an old glove. She is a deep one I She knew the best way to exclude him for ever from Marchwood.” Violet’s eyes were ablaze ; if the tears stood in them, they were tears of mortification and anger. “ And now I shall not have my own brother here on my wedding-day ! Vernon, do you think she will pre¬ vent his being here for that ? ” ‘‘ I should recommend your not attempting to get him back for some time to come. Our uncle is not a man to be trifled with, and who or whatever is the cause of this perpetual friction, at least it will ruin Rudolf’s chances (such as they are) if it is permitted to recur. I’m afraid, Violet, you must give up your natural hope of seeing Rudolf put in his right place. Nobody but Miss Tenant will ever be heir of March- wood.” “And Edmund believes in her through all— thinks her perfection and generosity itself. Oh, you men! How blind and stupid you are !” Mr. Cadwallader, it must be confessed, had been a little uneasy ever since the quarrel which had resulted in his nephew’s sudden departure. He was anxious on many grounds ; but he had not yet brought him¬ self to admit that he was sorry, and, like many men in this uncertain frame of mind, he could not keep oft the debateable ground. “ Young jackanapes ! I knew the game he was play¬ ing. That young Morrison is worth two of him ! ” Florence looked up, smiling. “ Uncle Oliver, if you have so very little critical discrimination, you would be wise to keep it to yourself” “What! You are going to pose as Rudolf Stan¬ hope’s admirer ? ” with a look of jealous misgiving that told a tale of its own. “ I never said so. But I certainly should not speak with such disrespect of Mr. Cadwallader’s heir.” The old man started and winced. “ Florence, listen to me once and for all, and let us have done with the subject. Rudolf understands his position with regard to this property, and it is time you should under¬ stand yours, if you do not understand it already. My nephew is not my heir, and never will be.” “ You have disinherited him, then ?” “ Disinherit is a strong word to apply to any but a son. There is no entail upon the Marchwood pro¬ perty. I am perfectly free to leave it as I choose. My heir is my dear adopted daughter, whom I have loved as my own child, and who has been the most dutiful and loving of children to me. You are mis¬ tress of Marchwood in name now, Florence ; at my death you will become mistress in reality.” He took her face between his hands and bent his head over her. She knelt before him, and returned his caress with all the warmth of a loving nature ; but there was an unusual depth of gravity upon her face, and presently she drew a little away and looked very seriously at him, still keeping his hands clasped in hers. “ Uncle Oliver,” she said, in her clear, fearless tones, “ do you think your father would have left Marchwood unreservedly to you if he had foreseen that you would pass over your kindred and his, and bequeath the old family inheritance to the child of a stranger, whose name he had never even heard ? ” Mr. Cadwallader was so astonished at this question that he could not say a word for a few minutes, and Florence spoke again. “ Uncle Oliver, if you were to hear of somebody else who owned a fine old property that had been for generations in the same family, and if you were told that he intended passing over his sister’s sons to leave it to the girl who had been his ward, I wonder what you would say. No, I do not \yonder, for I know quite well without. You would say that the man was an idiot ; that his will ought not to be allowed to stand ; and that the girl was a designing minx, who never ought to have a farthing left to her : that is what you would say, and most other people too.” She looked into his eyes steadily and fearlessly. Even at tliis moment one of her instinctive flashes of merriment shone like a sunbeam over her face. “Uncle Oliver, you have taught me, both in theory and practice, such a regard for the rights of property, such a conviction of the value of those rights, that I can’t, even to please you, think that family claims are nothing, and that estates are better for being bandied about from hand to hand, and cut up to suit the con¬ venience of the present proprietor. I have lived too long on Cadwallader land not to have learned what can be done for people and for places by keeping them in the direct line, under the same good old traditions, under the same name and the same race. Are there not people here whose fathers and grandfathers for generations have lived and served the Cadwalladeis ? Is not the churchyard full of tombstones of the Cad- walladers and their faithful retainers ? Does not the old place teem with legends and traditions of the old race ? Have I not been brought up with an instinctive love and reverence for all Cadwalladers — past, pre¬ sent, and future ? Have you not yourself delighted in my love and pride for the dear old home and its tia- ditions ? And vet — listen. Uncle Oliver, listen, and blush for your inconsistency — and yet you look to me — actually to — to be the means of rooting up eveiy- thing you have taught me to love and to revere, and of bringing down Marchwood to the level of any modern house, or, worse still, of an old one that has passed, into new hands. Not a drop of Cadwallader blood runs in my veins. 1 am a nobody, without so much as a pedigree worth having j and yet for a little upstait like me you would disinherit your nephews and natural heirs, and leave Marchwood to the mercy of any adventurous scapegrace who would marry me foi my money ! Uncle Oliver, be warned in time— never trust a woman ! ”

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The Stronger Will. “Well, Florence, have you done yet ?” he asked, in quiet, even tones ; and as she did not answer, he added, with cool deliberation, “ Because, if you have, you might, perhaps, like to read my will, 1 consider it rather a model document of the kind, so clear and concise. It is a will that it is impossible to improve upon— one upon which I shall not attempt to im¬ prove.” She looked at him steadily, and there was some¬ thing SO irresistibly pleading in the sweet, earnest face that his own relaxed somewhat, and he caressed her hair with his hand. “ You are a good child, Florence. You are gene¬ rous and chivalrous, but, like all your sex, utterly un¬ practical. All you have said is true in one sense ; but things cannot always go in the same way. ‘The old order changeth, giving place to new ; and God fulfils Himself in many ways.' There is a truth about those words that cannot be disputed. Now let us talk no more about this matter. It was unwise of me ever to have bioached it ; but, of course, I thought that you understood your position here, as everyone else under¬ stands it.” “ Uncle Oliver,” said Florence, still kneeling before him, and keeping her fearless glance bent full upon him, “ I have had my suspicions before ; but until to-day they were not actual certainties, and I did not feel that I had a right to speak. Now that I know now that you have told me in set terms what you have done, I think it would not be Cjuite honest or straightforward not to speak out my thoughts.” You have spoken them out, Florence — spoken them clearly and well. I entirely understand your point of view. There is no more to be said upon the matter.” “ Yes, Uncle Oliver, there is more to be said,'’ an¬ swered Florence gently. “ I must explain to you that It would be quite impossible for me ever to succeed to Marchwood whilst your own kindred were excluded." A deep upright line showed itself in Mr. Cadwal- lader’s brow. It was a line that Florence had not seen there many times in her life. “I thought you were fond of the place," he said with sudden sharpness. ’ “ So I am. I love it as I love no other place in the world. It has been the only home I have ever known —the happiest home a child or a woman could have. But, Uncle Oliver, it is not the place that has wound Itself round my heart ; it is the love I have received there that has hallowed and blessed it. It has been home to me because you were there— you, who have been to me father and mother in one, and have never let me know a sorrow or a tear. Dear, dear Uncle Oliver, do you think I should love or value March- wood if it were not because it is your home, and because your love has made it mine The hard look passed from his face ; he caressed her tenderly. “ I know, my love, I know ; but you are young, and I am old. In all human probability I must leave you alone some day. Why should you lose not only me, but your home also.? Nay, Florence, love, I wish I 355 had never spoken on the subject. It grieves and distresses you. You are not quite mistress of yourself, but some day you will see that your scruples are need¬ less and foolish. You are my child, my daughter ; all I have will be yours." ^ “ Uncle Oliver," she said very quietly, “ if you had meant to do this thing, you should not have brought me up as you have done." * “ I do not understand you.'’ Have you not brought me up to love the right, and to hate a wrong.? Have you not taught me That justice, honour, generosity, and uprightness are to be the guides of our life .? Have you not taught me to detest and despise the least shadow of meanness, or covetousness, or unfairness.? Who is it that has taught me to live alike before God and man ‘ without feai and without reproach,’ to keep a conscience clear of guilt, and to shun a conscious act of wrong, or even a thought of wrong, as one would shun a deadly crime .? Who has tried to give me a high and noble standard to live up to — has taught me both by precept and example that life is only worth living by being kept stainless, and pure, and worthy of the Hand that bestowed it.? Who has taught me all this.? And having taught it me, how can he expect me to unlearn it, even at his bidding .? ” And with one more caress, full of tender love, Florence rose and left him, feeling that for the present she had said enough. CHAPTER THE TWENTIETH. BATTLES. As for Rudolf, when he first turned his back on Marchwood he felt as if life held no farther attraction for him : as if it would be the best and happiest thing for him to pass quietly out of existence, leaving no"^ thing but a memory behind. Mechanically he made his way to town and to his lodgings there, which looked doubly dismal and dull by contrast with his spacious quarters in his uncle’s quaint old house. He was ill and wretched both in mind and body, unfit to be alone with his brooding thoughts, yet lacking the energy to make plans and carry them out. It was Florence’s face that floated ever before his eyes, her voice that sounded in his ears. Hope¬ less as he knew his love to be, he had not strength to try to battle with it. ^ But after a few days of this kind of dreamy exist¬ ence, Rudolf roused himself to a consciousness that It would not do to give way. He must think of him¬ self, of the state of his health — wjiich was by no means satisfactory— and do his utmost to get himself into condition by the lime it should be needful for him to set to work again ; and the result of this resolution was a letter despatched to Sir Arthur Morrison, ac¬ cepting his invitation to Scotland. Rudolf’s looks on his arrival excited no little com¬ miseration. He was none the better for the long fatiguing journey, and though his hosts were aware that he had met with an accident, they were by no means prepared for such a change in his appearance.

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356 The Stronger Will. Sir Arthur himself, on his return from his day’s shoot¬ ing, was greatly concerned about his secretary’s looks. TT u I- “ I really had no idea you had been so ill. Hubert is not a good correspondent. He told us no details. The whole house party was gathered together in the hall, where tea was circulating, and the sportsmen were clustered together, discussing the day’s campaign and retailing anecdotes for the benefit of the ladies. Rudolf and his host were in a quiet corner together, and the young man resolved to take advantage of the present opportunity to relieve his mind of a burden that had been weighing for some time upon it. “ The fact is. Sir Arthur, I am not quite the man I was. Whether this accident is the direct cause of the injury or not, I can’t say ; but I’ve been overhauled by a couple of doctors, and they both tell me the same thing : I’m not to do as much as I have been in the habh of doing. I’m doomed to ‘ take life easily ’ for a while. That being the case, I feel it only right to offer to resign my place as your secretary. I believe I have been of use to you hitherto ; but that is no reason why I should expect to keep my post where my value as a servant will be greatly diminished.” Sir Arthur looked at him with quick scrutiny. “ Do you say this. Stanhope, because you wish to leave me? Have you something else in view for yourself ? ” , “Nothing. I should have at once to begin that most depressing of searches— the search for employ- ment, with its attendant cir¬ cumstances of hardship.” “I thought perhaps your uncle might desire your pre¬ sence at Marchwood in some capacity.” ‘RUDOLF WINCED A LITTLE* ” {p. 357)- Rudolf involuntarily started. ^ “ Nothing would be farther from Mr. Cadwalladers thoughts or mine. My connection with Marchwood is entirely severed.” . . i “Well, then, if that is the case,” said Sir Arthur kindly, “’pi'ay talk no more of severing it with me. You know how I value your services. Stanhope. I would not lose you at any price. Say no more about it. I shall not expect more of you than you feel able to accomplish. Because you have done the work of two secretaries for the past three years, is that any reason why I should expect you always to keep on at the same high pressure? I’ve often told you before that you were working too hard.” “ The work had to be done,” said Rudolf, a little grimly, “ and often I was practically single-handed.” Sir Arthur laughed genially. “ Ah ! that scapegrace boy of mine liked play better than work. I know that well enough. Well, Stan¬ hope, you will not be single-handed any longer. Since I saw plainly that no steady work could be expected from Hubert, and especially since it^ becomes more and more evident that he has fish of his own to fry and the baronet glanced at Rudolf with a humorous twinkle in his eye— “ I have been looking about for a substitute, and have now engaged a young kinsman of mine, Mr. Vinrace by name, as a regular secretary to work with you. He is here on a visit, like yourself. 1 will call him and make you known to one another. I think you will find him clever and capable when he has learned his duties; and I am sure he will be willing. He has plenty of energy and ambition, and is anxious to get on in the woild. Rudolf saw it all in a flash. A minute could hardly have elapsed between the close of the baronet’s sen- tence and the introduction of a pleasant-lookmg, fa^ir- haired young man, who de¬ tached himself from the group round the fire, to be presented to his future col¬ league ; but in that minute Rudolf had seen the whole of his future career mapped out before him— the gradual yielding up of his present confidential post to the ener¬ getic young kinsman, who came thirsting for wealth and fame, and would of necessity work himself into the place which his senior had proved unable adequately to fill. Whilst Rudolf followed the advice bestowed upon him, and took life easily and quietly, his rival would push himself into the foremost place, and even if, with health restored, he might be able to resume his wonted labours, he would never regain the ground he had lost.

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The Stronger Will. A man once dropped out of the ranks sddom regains his place, and there was reason to doubt whether he would ever be fit for a continuous strain of hard work. An easy, quiet life would soon make a strong man of him ; but that was just the life which it was impossible for him to secure. “ Mr. Vinrace, this is my friend Mr. Stanhope, of whom you have heard me speak. I am glad to be able to make you known to one another so early. Mr. Stanhope has lately met with a serious accident, which, he tells me, has somewhat impaired his health. He will therefore be doubly glad of your assistance when business begins again.” ‘‘ I’m sure I shall be glad to save you all I can,” answered Mr. Vinrace, speaking easily and pleasantly as he took the vacated seat beside Rudolf. “ Fact is, I want to learn all I can and get on in the world ; and I heard such tales of your energy and capacity that I was half afraid I should have no chance of dis¬ tinguishing myself. It will be a charity to give me plenty to do, and you certainly look as if you wanted sparing for some time to come.” Rudolf winced a little, but answered in friendly fashion, and soon the two young men were in ani¬ mated talk. Vinrace was a very nice young fellow, without any assumption about him, and the longer he talked the better Rudolf liked him. “ After all,” he mused, as he reached his room that night, “ there is an equal balance in the world if one can only find it — one man’s failure is another man’s success ; and I might have a harder task before me than to see my place taken by that young fellow who has so much to recommend him. Why shouldn’t I make up my mind to help him on ? I can’t keep the place I once hoped for, for myself ; but I might easily push him into it and help him to hold it. He is full of hope and brightness ; he has all his life before him. I can never enjoy success even if I win it, so why should I fight for that which will bring no pleasure with it ? Better watch the success of one to whom it will give real happiness. And then, when he has achieved wealth and renown, perhaps he will re¬ member with gratitude the comrade who first helped to place his feet upon the ladder. Perhaps I shall find employment under him, and who can say that life need be less worth living because it is lived quietly and humbly, and makes no mark in the world ? ” So Rudolf’s friendship with Harold Vinrace became a source of pleasure ; and the more the young men saw of each other the more they liked the thought of working together shortly. “For I don’t expect Hubert will trouble us much,” said Vinrace once, with a short laugh. “ He never was much good, by all accounts ; and now he’s going to marry an heiress, isn’t he ? ” “Is he ? I didn’t know.” “ Oh, well, perhaps it hasn’t got as far as that yet ; but I think he’s on the high road to matrimony. It always was said in the family that Hubert must marry money. Sir Arthur has his four daughters to provide for, and though there is a fine old place in 357 Leicestershire, Hubert could never live there unless his wife had a fortune of her own.” “ So I’ve understood ; but Morrison has not been so far very successful in his quest.” “ He’s never been in love before, but I believe he really is bitten at last. Don’t you know something of the people ? I fancied I had heard you had come to grief at Marchwood.” Rudolf started at the name : hitherto he had been paying but little attention to his comrade’s words. “ Marchwood ? Yes, what about that ? ” “Why, that’s the name of the place where the heiress lives. You must have seen her. Do you think our friend Hubert has much chance there?” “ Really, I don’t consider myself in a position to judge. I should have been disposed to say that Miss Tenant could do better than that.” “Well, you see, I believe it’s like this : he had the luck to save the life of the young lady’s guardian, to ■ whom she is devotedly attached, and that led to an invitation to the house ; and the guardian, it appears, is encouraging his attentions, and unless there should be a more favoured suitor in the field, it seems not unlikely he may be accepted, as much out of gratitude as anything else. Sir Arthur is beginning to take a jubilant view of the case, and he is hardly the man to count his chickens before they are hatched. Why, Stanhope, how pale you are ! I’ve been walking you about too long. Come in and have a rest before you dress for dinner.” _ CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FIRST. MARRYING AND GIVING IN MARRIAGE. And was it a true report which had found its way to Scotland that Mr. Cadwallader was encouraging the attentions of Hubert Morrison to his ward, and would take his part if the day should come when he would be bold enough to pay his addresses openly to her ? Strange as it may appear on the face of it, this was very nearly the state of the case. Hubert had not much to recommend him beyond a pleasing person and a gentlemanly address, but he had had the good fortune to do the owner of Marchwood a great service ; and then he was made of metal that would be certain to prove pliable in strong hands. Truth to tell, Mr. Cadwallader had been made not a little uneasy by Florence’s manner and by her words on the occasion of Rudolf’s sudden departure. To some minds it might appear that a match between his adopted daughter and his natural heir would be an admirable way of solving a difficult problem. But Mr. Cadwallader was not an ordinary man, and he had set his mind distinctly against any such consum¬ mation. Had it been Vernon for whom Florence showed a liking, he might readily have given way ; but Rudolf was a Stanhope, and for a quarter of a century the strong-willed old man had set his mind steadily against enriching any Stanhope by a share of the fine old property built up to its present propor¬ tions by a long line of ancestors. Florence’s words on the subject had made him tho¬ roughly uncomfortable, and had shaken far more than

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358 The Stronger Will. she knew his absolute determination to bequeath all to her ; he was, indeed, seriously considering the question of making an heir of the clever young Vernon, who was playing his hand so well ; but whenever his thoughts took this direction, Rudolfs dark, stern, clever face would rise up before him, and he would find himself saying in his heart, “ If only he had been Freer, and the other Stanhope ! If only they could change places ! He is worth two of the younger fellow. But he is Stanhope’s son, and he shall never be master of Marchwood ! ” That question was' in Mr. Cadwallader’s own power ; but Florence’s preference was a matter beyond his control. True, she had promised not to marry with¬ out his consent, but then she was mistress of her own movements and of a handsome fortune. Suppose that some bit of good luck fell in Rudolfs way, as it very likely might (Mr. Cadwallader knew nothing of his nephew’s state of health as being a bar to advance¬ ment), and suppose he came and proposed to Florence, and was accepted, how could he possibly stand out against her sweet pleadings and the voice of public opinion ? And then Rudolf would take his wife away from the house where he had been openly insulted, and where he could only remain if his natural position were accorded him. Marchwood would lose its mis¬ tress, and he the one being who truly loved him, the child of his heart, the solace of his declining years. No, no ; such a thought could not be faced for a moment. Better see Florence safely married to some one less haughty and unyielding than young Stanhope ; better be content to take a second place in her affec¬ tions than to lose her altogether. Thus argued Mr. Cadwallader in the many fits of uneasy musing that recent events had forced upon him, and it seemed to him that he had an instrument ready to hand in the person of young Morrison, who haunted Marchwood just now, and was plainly as deeply in love with its mistress as man well could be. Florence seemed to like Hubert, and always spoke of him with gratitude and goodwill. Mr. Cadwallader did not desire her to be absorbingly in love with any¬ one. He wished her to be free to be to him what she had ever been hitherto. But surely, if she were to make a match with a man she liked and esteemed, and one who loved her devotedly, she would be happy, and things would go on calmly and quietly in the old home, and his declining years would Ido rendered happy by her gentle tending, and he should have the happiness of watching Florence’s children grow up around his knees. Naturally, then, there was no talk of bringing Rudolf to Marchwood for his sister’s wedding ; less than ever was that young man wanted at this juncture. Mrs. Freer never believed that he would come, if asked, and was too busy over the trousseau to have much thought to spare ; whilst Violet was too proud to say a word, and brooded in indignant silence over the pain it would be to Rudolf to be passed over, whilst Hubert Morrison was made a welcome guest. The children shed many tears in private, and begged Cousin Florence to ask brother ; but she was as powerless as they, and the one effort she made was so sternly negatived that she knew further words would be wasted. The wedding was to be very quiet. Violet had no desire for display, nor did anyone oppose her wish for simplicity. Edmund was then to take her abroad for some months. She was not very strong, and it was thought that a residence in a warmer climate would be good for her, especially during the early months of the year. During their absence Hawks- hold was to be so altered as to accommodate a double household, and on their return the newly married couple would take up their abode there, under the same roof as the old couple. “ Ah, Edmund !” said Violet one day, as he was dis¬ cussing the advantages of the arrangement with the eager boyishness which had never left him, ‘‘ it still wants one thing to make it perfect.’’ ‘‘ And what is that, dearest ? ” “ Rudolf at Marchwood,” she answered quietly. “ If I could think that one day my brother’s home would be here — as it should be — I should have nothing left to wish for.” “ Well, dearest, more wonderful things have hap¬ pened before now. Florence is a wonderful enchant¬ ress — she may even achieve that result.” “Florence! You poor deluded boy. Do you still believe that generous fiction ? ” “ Yes, you poor deluded girl ! and so will you do one of these days.” Violet only shook her head ; but this was a subject on which she and Edmund had agreed to differ. But however unsatisfactory the state of affairs, it was not one that Violet could mend, and save for that one drop of bitter in her cup, she was more unre¬ servedly happy than she had ever been in her life. Edmund was everything that she could desire in a husband. Mr. Cadwallader was exceedingly kind, playing the part of father with the open-handed gene¬ rosity that was characteristic of most of his deeds, and winning her gratitude and goodwill, despite his treat¬ ment of Rudolf, and that she resolutely set down to Florence’s influence. He gave her a trousseau that would not have disgraced a princess, made a settle¬ ment upon her which would enable her at least to clothe herself without appealing to her husband for funds ; and, in fact, did everything in his power to add to her happiness, and to show the world that he did not feel unkindly towards the Stanhopes so long as they kept in their place. The wedding, which took place immediately after Christmas, passed off smoothly and successfully. Edmund, in a state of visible elation, carried his bride away from Marchwood, and Hubert Morrison came as a guest to that house to enjoy a few runs with the hounds before returning to town. The winter was mild and open, and hunting men were in excellent spirits. He made the most of his opportunities whilst stay¬ ing at Marchwood. Florence was just as friendly and gracious as ever. There would have been something rather exasperating to a more experienced suitor m

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The Stronger Will. 359 her unvarying easy cordiality ; but to Hubert it was captivating in the extreme, and raised his hopes by many degrees. For some months, too, he and Vernon had formed a sort of mutual alliance, and were ready to help one another to the best of their ability. Hubert wanted Florence, with or without Marchwood ; Vernon wanted Marchwood, with or without Florence ; and both were of opinion that their chance of success de¬ pended mainly upon the exclusion of Rudolf from the scene, where the little drama was being played out. Hubert wanted to know how things were going. ‘‘ Excellently, as far as the old man is concerned. He seems really fond of me, and has frequently dropped hints of a most encouraging character. It’s my private opinion that he got a shock by discovering that his favourite was indulging a tender feeling to¬ wards Rudolf, for he was awfully disturbed after his sudden departure, and since then has been talking to me about Marchwood in a way that is at least sugges¬ tive. I fancy he sees that it would never do to trust a woman’s discretion. He’s just as fond of her ; but I think his confidence in her sound sense is a little shaken.” Hubert looked much disturbed. ‘‘ But you don’t think she really cares for Stan¬ hope ? ” “ No ; my own opinion of 'Miss Tenant is that her affections are centred in herself, and that she treats all the rest of the world exactly alike. She was kind to Rudolf when he was ill, as it is her nature to be kind to everyone ; possibly she did like him more than others, but she never speaks of him now. He would no more dream of asking her than of demand¬ ing the hand of a royal princess. He is permanently banished from Marchwood, and until Violet and Edmund establish themselves at Hawkshold — which will not be for six or eight months — he will have no chance of appearing in the neighbourhood. You must make the running before that.” Hubert had every intention of doing so. He paid court to Florence on every possible occasion. It became visible to the whole household that he was blindly, helplessly in love, and that Mr. Cadvvallader was openly forwarding his cause. Hubert had taken courage to address the girl’s guardian soon after his interview with Vernon, and had received most kindly encouragement. Mr. Cad- wallader plainly told him that if he would be content to make a home of Marchwood during his own life¬ time, he would gladly see him married to Florence as early as possible. She would havo plenty of money in any case, and although he made no promise as to the disposition of his own property, his adopted daughter would not be forgotten in his will, especi¬ ally if she had remained with him to the end of his life. Nothing could have suited Hubert better. A home at Marchwood, with Florence for his wife, was an ideal state of happiness. He could hardly believe in his good fortune — if only the lady would consent. “ I’ll tell you what it is, Flubert : a woman like that is not to be won every day. Look here, my boy, you are wise not to try and bring matters to a climax too early. If she takes that line with you, don’t put your fate to the touch just yet ; but have patience, and you may succeed in time.” If only I had opportunities!” I wilHtake care that you shall. I am on your side. I have not forgotten — nor has she — that I owe you my life. You will always be welcome at March- wood, and I will be your friend with Florence, and your cause shall not suffer from your absence.” So that Hubert left Marchwood a day oi^ two later in excellent spirits. If he was not Florence’s affi¬ anced husband, at least he was a favoured suitor ; and it was no wonder that a rumour soon circulated through Sir Arthur’s household to the effect that a match with Miss Tenant would soon be publicly an¬ nounced. _ CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SECOND. A .SURPRISE. Six or seven months had passed since Rudolf had quitted Marchwood in anger and bitterness of spirit ; the winter had come and gone, and the spring was coming, with its promises of hope and fruition, with¬ out bringing much of brightness to the young man’s life. He had got through the winter fairly well. There had been no great press of business, and Harold Vinrace had always taken the lion’s share, and had spared his companion in every possible way. This new friendship and Violet’s visit to town had been the bright spots in a dreary season, rendered the more dreary by the pointed way in which he had been ex¬ cluded from Marchwood at the time of his sister’s wedding. The news that was rumoured later respect¬ ing Florence and Hubert was but the final closing of the gates of Paradise. But he told himself that it made no manner of difference to him, and braced himself to meet this new blow with the same steadfast courage that had carried him through so much ad¬ verse fortune. Not unnaturally, his health suffered under the strain — or rather, he was unable to recover his wonted strength as he expected to do, considering how little work he was doing just now. His arm gradually mended, and at the end of six months he felt little inconvenienced, beyond a trifling stiffness in the joint ; but he still remained unpleasantly conscious that any exertion affected him curiously, and that he had not yet recovered from the strain and over¬ pressure which had ended so disastrously for him. He keenly missed the home life to which he had been accustomed, the clinging fondness of the child¬ ren, Violet’s undemonstrative but deep affection, and his mother’s presence and confidence. Never in his life before had he so needed the little watchful atten¬ tions that only near relations can give, the atmosphere of a cheerful home, the relaxation that can only be attained at one’s own fireside. He was not fit for the gay round of society life. He was too tired in the evenings to desire to turn out again ; but he sorely

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The Stronger Will. 360 needed the companionship of his own relatives, and the loneliness of a London lodging often weighed him down to the very dust. So poor Rudolf was in a somewhat evil case just now. At home he had no one but a well-meaning, ignorant landlady to look after him, no society except such as he was obliged to go out to obtain. He tried very hard to be prudent, and to avoid the over-fatigue against which he had been warned, and he was wonderfully patient and self-controlled for the most part ; yet he was but human, after all, and en¬ tirely without experience, and he could not always be caring for himself ; nor could he always know by instinct where he ought to draw the line. So he alternated between doing little and feeling strong enough to chafe against idleness, and doing too much and repenting it ; yet he hoped that he im¬ proved in health, and was more troubled by the diffi¬ culty of throwing off a heavy cold he caught in the treacherous spring east winds than by anything that had gone before. Now and then he was almost overwhelmed by an unconquerable yearning for the sight of a home face or the sound of a familiar voice. A sort of home¬ sickness would come over him, more trying than any other form of depression, and he would feel then as if he could not much longer endure this life : as if he must do something desperate to escape from it. His consciousness that his deepest longing of all was for Florence made it all the harder to bear. To long for her was to long for the utterly impossible and un¬ attainable. He was walking home wearily through the bitter east wind one evening early in March, and this miser¬ able sense of home-sickness was draining, as it seemed, every bit of power and hopefulness from him. He was oppressed too by cold, his cough tore him to pieces, and he ached in every limb with weariness and cold. He had done a hard day’s work too, and altogether he felt pretty well used up, and longed inexpressibly for the cheerful blaze of a piled-up fire and the welcome of a home. He knew what awaited him at his lodg¬ ings : a blank room, with a black and smoky fire, just lighted, a solitary cup of tea, and an equally solitary and perhaps an ill-cooked dinner. No pleasant idle talk, no merry children’s voices, no gentle words of sympathy and counsel. All that had passed for ever out of his life when he had said a last adieu to March- wood. He let himself in with his latch-key, and climbed the stairs wearily. He observed a ruddy line underneath his door, but paid no heed to it until his hand was actually upon the latch. But as he turned the handle he heard the sound of a familiar cry that almost caused him to drop with astonishment. “ Brother ! Brother ! Brother ! ” The door was flung open from within, and the next moment Ethel was in his arms, smothering him with kisses, and clinging round his neck as if she never intended letting him go. He did not try to unloose the clasp of the warm arms ; he half believed he was dreaming still, but if so, he had no wish to awaken himself. He could almost find it in his heart to wish that the dream might last for ever. “You have not a word or a look for anyone else, Rudolf,” said a well-known voice, and he suddenly found himself face to face with Florence. It was more like a dream than ever, seeing her standing there in all her old loveliness, her beautiful grey eyes looking straight into his, and her lips curved in one of her own gracious, sunny smiles. He took her hand in his ; its touch thrilled him through and through. He did not speak : he was thinking how and where he had seen her last ; but Florence, if she remembered his parting words, had at least the tact and self-possession not to betray any such recollection. Hand and eye and voice were alike steady, yet full of the sweetness of a true welcome. “We have done what we planned, I think, Rudolf,”" she said : “ we have taken you by surprise.” “ You have indeed,” he answered, drawing a long: breath, and seeming to wake out of a dream. “ 1 can hardly believe my own eyes. But you are very, very welcome. If only you knew how I was longing just now for the sight of a familiar face I ” The look upon his face told its own tale. Florence smiled all the more brightly because she felt the sparkle of tears deep down in her eyes. “And we have come in answer to your wish, you see — ^just as good fairies should do. Your mother will be here directly with Cuthbert ; I thought they would have arrived first. Now sit down and tell us all about yourself, and by-and-by we will all have tea together — a real March wood tea — for which we have brought, the wherewithal. You see, we have quartered our¬ selves upon you till further notice, and the only thing for you to do is to make the best of the infliction by submission.” Rudolf sat down in one arm-chair beside the glowing fire, Florence having taken the other, and Ethel climbed upon his knee. It was not all at once, how¬ ever, that he could fulfil the injunction to talk about himself. “What a cough you have, Rudolf!” said Florence. “ You ought not to be out in such bitter weather.” He smiled, and leaned back in his chair with a delightful sense of rest and contentment. “You want someone to look after you, I can see,’^ she said, shaking her head and smiling. “ I’ve been talking to your landlady about you. She tells me yon are not at all careful of yourself.” “ She maligns me shockingly then, for I am a model of care and prudence. But tell me about yourselves. What brings you here ? How long can you stay ?” “That depends chiefly upon the oculist. Do you know that there really seems a chance of Cuthbert’s getting back his sight “No? Is there really? How I wish he might,, poor little chap 1 What has happened to make you hope it ? ” “ His undoubted power of seeing a very little. He told me some weeks ago that he fancied he knew better and better the difference between light and

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The Stronger Will. 361 shadow, and, when the sun shone, even the colour of the ground he was traversing. He was vague and confused, but he was evidently conscious of some change; and I talked to Mr. Howard, and he has been treating him carefully ever since. Progress there un¬ doubtedly is, and to-day we took him to an oculist, and the end of it all is that there is to be a slight operation performed in the course of a few days, and every chance that, with care and patience, and improved constitutional vigour, he will in due time be able to see, if not as clearly as most people, at least better than ever we dared to hope.’’ “Are you staying for the operation ? ” “ I am stay¬ ing until I get a summons home. But U ncle Oliver is not very well ; he has got a touch of gout, and I hardly expect to be spared many days.” “It is kind of you to have let me have this pleasure,” said Rudolf, speaking with great self-mas¬ tery. “It is such a delight to see a fami¬ liar face.” Ethel, after a great deal of vehement caressing, had slipped away to superintend the unpacking of the Marchwood hamper by the worthy landlady. Florence and Ru¬ dolf were left alone in the twilight, with the scent of the spring flowers the guests had brought pervading the air. He nerved himself to make an effort, and said, with praiseworthy composure — “ I hope you will allow me to congratulate you ? ” “ Yes } On what account ? ” “ I hope I am not taking a liberty ; but my position at Sir Arthur Morrison’s has brought the matter to my knowledge. I have known the son many years, and I believe he is a very good fellow.” “So does Uncle Oliver,” said Florence quietly, a little ripple as of laughter underlying the words. “ I’m afraid that I am alone in my opinion. I have never been able to get up an enthusiasm for the mild though amiable and harmless youth.” A sort of electric thrill ran through Rudolf, though he Crushed down the momentary feeling of exultation with a strong hand. “ I beg your pardon ; but I had heard - ” “Yes, I be¬ lieve a good many people have heard the same. I hardly know why, ex¬ cept that Uncle Oliver and Mr. Morrison are great friends, and he comes often to March- wood. We all like him. Did you think 1 was in such a hurry to give up my liberty? Thank you ; I know better ! ” It was Flo¬ rence all over : the sparkling brightness of tone, with an underlying se¬ riousness that was felt rather than heard. Was she play¬ ing with him, as Violet said — leading on one and an¬ other to cast both off at last? It mattered nothing to him. She was her¬ self — that was all he cared for ; and she had not promised herself to another. She broke the silence herself before it had grown oppressive ; her voice had all the old winning charm. “ Rudolf, I want to know about yourself. We hear so little of you now. How are you getting on? Are you over- working ? ” “ Oh, no. I have a colleague now — one who does everything. He is a capital fellow. He saves me all the hardest work, and we are not very busy yet.” “ And your arm is better ? ” “ Oh, yes — almost as strong as the other. I believe I am a walking wonder.” “ Which is almost more than you deserve to be, “he suddenly found himself face to face with FLORENCE” [p. 360).

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The Stronger Will. .362 seeing that you turned refractory after all, and left us before I gave you my permission to do so — before you Avere at all fit to have sole care of yourself. I want to know how you are in other ways. I cannot say your looks are entirely satisfactory yet.” “ I am getting on very well,” he answered — quite as well as could be expected.” “ Is your doctor satisfied } ” “ Oh, yes.” Rudolf spoke rather dejectedly. “ He always says just the same thing. There is hardly anything the matter ; but he ends up with the old caution to take life easily. It seems to me that to take life easily is just about the hardest thing one can do.” Florence gave him one of her sweetest looks. “ But you are trying to do so .^” “ I am trying — yes.” “ Good boy,” she said, with gentle approbation. But you get very tired of it sometimes ?” He could not restrain a smile. “ Sometimes,” he said significantly. “You will have your reward some day, Rudolf,” she -said. ‘‘Patience is a difficult virtue to practise, but there is no training in the world like it. Believe me, that these long months of waiting will not be wasted. You will not only have re-established your health : you will have made yourself a better, a stronger, a worthier man. Constant self-restraint and self-sacrifice go very far towards the formation of a very noble •character.” She spoke with the sweet simple earnestness he knew so well — not as if she merely wished to comfort or cheer him, but as if she spoke from the depths of convictions, unassailable and unalterable. Rudolf smiled, but did not answer. It was difficult for him to realise the full truth of such words. Life looked sufficiently dark around and before him. “ Tell me,” she said, “ what dilference does all this make to you? Is it as you thought? Are you being passed in the race ? Will it make as much difference to you as you once thought ? ” “ Yes, quite as much — almost more, I think ; but I have made up my mind to it now.” “ But Sir Arthur Morrison does not value you less ? ” “ 1 am undoubtedly of less value to him. He is very kind, but he cannot help knowing it. I am not certain that when the summer session comes, with its heavy press of work, I shall not feel it my duty to resign. He needs a man who can do about twice the amount of work that I can get through now, even with Vinrace to help.” “And yet it was owing to the pressure of work you got through for him that you broke down.” “ Not entirely, I think ; I believe that fall strained me somehow. Besides, I must be honest ; it was by no means entirely on Sir Arthur's account that I worked so hard. I was thinking more of my own ad¬ vancement than of his interests ; or, at any rate, as much. There was the double impetus at work urging me on.” ‘Yet surely he will consider all that, and not dismiss you because for a time you are partially out of health ?” “No, I am sure he will not ; but I may think it best to give myself my conge^ “ And then ? ” “ Oh, perhaps something will turn up. 1 might find a berth more suited to me. I don’t know how to dabble in politics ; I want to give myself over heart and soul. And now that Violet is married, 1 shall always have a home to turn to if I need one.” “And there will be Eastlands soon,” said Florence gently. He noticed with a stab of pain, for which he felt indignant with himself, that she made no mention of March wood. “ No,” he said very quietly, “ I could hardly look on Eastlands as a home. It is practically Cadwallader property, even though it may have been made over to my mother.” Florence was silent. It was too dark for them to see each other’s faces. In a few moments more the door was burst open, and Ethel re-entered, leading Cuthbert by the hand ; and Mrs. Freer followed, all eagerness to see Rudolf again. It was a merry party that assembled round the table, where an unwontedly luxurious meal was spread — a real Marchwood tea, as Ethel triumphantly de¬ clared. Rudolf shook off his gravity by an effort, and was almost like his old self, only that the light re¬ vealed new lines of purpose in his face, as well as a worn look that went to Florence’s heart. It may be sublime “ to suffer and be strong,” but the lesson leaves its traces, and they are rather sad to the eyes of love ; and Florence Tenant loved Rudolf Stanhope as faithfully as he loved her, though as yet he knew it not ; and it seemed as if, from force of adverse circumstances, he never was to know it. The operation on Cuthbert’s eyes was so far suc¬ cessful, that every hope was entertained of complete recovery with time and careful treatment. The Marchwood party returned in excellent spirits, and Rudolf saw them off at the station, feeling that all the spring sunshine vanished with them, leaving behind only the raw chilliness of the keen east wind. Some ten days after the return of the party to Marchwood, Hubert received the following note “ Dear Morrison,— If you have any regard for your chances here, you must bestir yourself to get Rudolf out of the country — out of reach of Marchwood. I don’t know exactly what has happened ; but since that unlucky journey to London, which was the occa¬ sion of bringing Miss Tenant and Rudolf together again, a change has come over affairs here, of which I think it only friendly to warn you. I can’t tell you exactly what it is, but it is a change that I am certain you would not like to see. My uncle has had a sharp attack of illness : for the first time in his life, I believe ; and it seems to have weakened him, and to have put him more than ever in Miss Tenant’s power. That she is working upon him in some way I cannot doubt.

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Monograms. 363 Your name is hardly ever mentioned now ; and, alto¬ gether, there seems to be a change in the aspect of affairs, which 1 can only trace in some way to Rudolf. “As he hates Marchwood, and does nothing but quarrel with Mr. Cadwallader when they do meet, it would be absurd to attempt a reconciliation, if that is her little game ; but if she gets too much interested in him, you can see that it will materially affect your prospects. There is no immediate hurry. My uncle never makes up his mind in haste, and at present he is too unwell to set on foot any active plans ; but can you not meantime get Rudolf some •appointment that will take him quietly and naturally •out of the country? If once the ocean lies between him and Marchwood, I believe all will go well ; but ■until it is, I have grave doubts of success. “Yours truly, “Vernon Freer.” .And in ten days more this answer reached March- wood : — “ Dear Vernon, — Do everything in your power to keep things quiet at your end, and avoid a climax. Before very long we can manage all nicel3^ Stanhope is proving quite unfit for work. He fainted off dead the other night at a dinner party, and is often very seedy. My father talks of a sea-voyage, and getting him some Australian appointment, as he has an idea that the climate there would set him up again. He is certain to find him something soon, as he really likes the fellow, and knows he has talents. I think Aus¬ tralia would do capitally ; and something is sure to turn up before long, if we can just tide over a month or two. I think you are clever enough for that. “ Yours truly, “ Hubert Morrison.” “Yes,” mused Vernon, “ Australia will do capitally ; and the sooner he goes the better. And Morrison will manage it, too. He will not let grass grow under his feet ; he has too much at stake.” END OF CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SECOND. MONOGRAMS. BY PROFESSOR F. EDWARD HUOIE, F.S.A. MONOGRAM may be defined to be the agroupment in one device of two or more letters ; not neces¬ sarily, however, as a decorative arrangement, though that is the final outcome in these latter days. Many of the earlier monograms were but the evidence of the very natural desire on the part of the scribe to save needless trouble by re¬ sorting, where practicable, to abbreviations. The word “monogram” literally signifies a single character: being derived from the Greek words monos, one ; and gramma, a letter ; and where a quickly written mono- grammatic symbol could take the place of some oft- recurring word the gain was immediate and obvious. The device which is still commonly used as a contraction for the word “ and,” is a survival of this ancient practical use of the monogram, and we may in old MSS. trace the gradual transition from the Latin et, until we arrive at the very conventional symbol still in use. The merchants’ marks of the Middle Ages, devices .assumed partly for the same reason that the modern trade mark is adopted (as a means of identifying goods, and giving the purchaser a guarantee that he is really getting the product of some particular man’s skill), and partly as a set-off to the heraldic devices borne by “tl>e upper ten,” were often monogrammatic in their nature ; and the masons’ marks also on the old cathedrals and other buildings of the mediaeval period, though ordinarily very simple in type, may at times take this character. The very legitimate desire to receive the credit due to one’s own endeavours may be well seen in the potters’ marks stamped on the ceramic ware of all periods, and in the devices adopted by the early printers, painters, and engravers, and where such de¬ vices are monogrammatic — as they ordinarily are —they fall fully within the scope of our present paper. Modern artistic work is more ordinarily initialed or signed in full, but we may be permitted to quote, as an illustration of the revival of the olden practice, the combination of the N and P, employed by Sir Noel Paton on his work ; and other examples might readily be brought forward. One of the best-known examples is the monogram adopted by Albrecht Diirer, too well known to lovers of art to need reproduction here. We have, therefore, grouped together in our first illustration some less familiar devices from the works of various painters and engravers. Some of them belong to men whose names have perished, the use of the mono¬ gram instead of the full name on their work having pre¬ vented their identifi¬ cation beyond the generation in which they worked, while the others need scarcely be referred to at any length. The only exception which we may perhaps make is in the case of No. 10, the monogram of Antoine Fantuzzi, called also Antoine de Trente, from his FIG. I. — MONOGRAMS OF PAINTERS AND ENGRAVERS.

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Monograms. 364 birthplace, the device he employed introducing some¬ what ingeniously both his titles to fame. Hundreds ot illustrations of these monograms of painters and engravers may be found in the twenty-one volumes of “ Le Peintre graveur ” of Bartsch ; and should even this fail to satisfy the curiosity of any of our readers, they may turn with ad¬ vantage to Brulliot’s ‘•'Dictionnaire des Mono- grammes,^’ to Heller’s “ Monogrammen lexi- kon,” or to “L’abecedario pittorico” of Orlandi, — taking by the way, if they so please, the biographical dictionaries of Strutt or Bryan. The first impression probably that most persons will feel on looking at the illustrations in these old books, or at the few we have culled for our pages, is a sense of their badness and the poverty of invention shown in them ; but we must bear in mind that the intention of these artists was not to produce a pleasing decorative composition at all, but to merely affix a mark that from its clearness of form might be readily recognised and understood — a mark, moreover, that the brush of the painter, the sharp tool cutting into the soft clay of the potter, or into the hard metal plate of the engraver, could easily pro¬ duce. The sacred monogram is so commonly met with, not only in past art, but to the present day in ecclesiastical work, in embroideries, metal work, glass painting, and other decorative pro¬ cesses, that some few comments upon it may very well engage our attention. Two perfectly distinct forms of it have been employed : for many hundreds of years one form ex¬ clusively, for many other hundreds of years another form to the entire ex¬ clusion of the first, and then in these ^ present days of archaeological research and revived mediaevalism the joint use of both. The earlier forms of the sacred monogram are represented in the three smaller figures in our second illustration, the upper one being, perhaps, the most common. It is the form that supplanted the Imperial eagle on the Roman standards, and appeared on the coinage when the Emperor Constantine embraced Christianity, and all these forms are abundantly to be met with in the catacombs of Rome, the refuge of the early Church during the days of Pagan¬ ism, and the resting - place of countless confessors and martyrs of the new creed. At a later date this symbol was largely employed, as the cross also was, at the <;:.ommencement of any important FIG. 3. FIG. 4. FIG. 5. charter or other State paper, and this dedicatory and invocatory use of it may be very well seen in nume¬ rous examples in the British Museum. From two instances of this — the first a charter of Edgar, a.d. 691, and the second a charter of Canute, A.D. 1031 — we have derived the larger figures in our illustra¬ tion. Though somewhat more decorative in treat¬ ment, it will readily be seen that they are of precisely the same type as the smaller figures. It is com¬ posed of the leading letters of the Greek word for Christ ; hence even to the present day the word Christmas is often written Xmas by us, and in some cases at least without any clear apprehension of the reason of the abbrevia¬ tion. It is very curious that this symbol should have been in later days so en¬ tirely set aside in favour of the I H S. This latter is an abbreviation of the Greek name for Jesus. It is often affirmed that the letters are the initials of the Latin words signifying Jesus the Saviour of men, but this reading, though ingenious and appropriate, is after all an after-thought, and not the original intention. Turning our attention now to the numerous modern applications of monograms, we are at once struck with the variety and beauty of design exhibited, whether in jewellery, devices on note-paper, or the many other applications to every-day requirements ; some de¬ lighting us with their intricacy and complexity of arrangement, others with their quaintness of fancy or bold simplicity. In the present rage for collecting almost everything, useful or use¬ less, tasteful or tasteless — one man cumbering up his house with clocks of every available period, while another buys old used postage stamps, and trea¬ sures up some special ‘‘issue” of Brazil or New South Wales,* as wiser men cherish worthier ob¬ jects of interest — our readers will find but little difficulty in coming across some enthusiastic crest and monogram col¬ lector whose well-filled album will fully justify our en¬ comiums. The present illustrations we have ourselves designed to elucidate our own ideas on monogram¬ making, as we should scarcely have been justified in borrowing the designs of other men, even for com¬ mendation, without their consent, and still less so in using them as examples of what to avoid. The original and narrow conception of a monogram, the creation of the various letters by one continuous ♦ We once knew a collector of the names of locomotives, who probably felt as keen a delight in picking up a new name on some fresh line of railway as others have done in adding some graceful Wedgwood plaque to their collection, or placing in their cabinet some choice Greek coin of rare numismatic and artistic worth. FIG. 7. FIG. 8.

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Monograms. 365 line, is speedily felt to be a grievous limitation, and its hampering influ¬ ence and constraint is soon cast aside. Ex¬ amples of it are seen in the L, S, D, and the G, L, B, of our third and fourth figures. The soft and flowing lines used in forming the ordinary ^ ^ FIG. 10. writing characters are far better adapted to this special purpose than the more rigid characters used in printing, and we have seen some very good designs of this type produced by making the letters in semblance of ribbon or cord. It will soon, however, be found that the use of the continuous line makes many combinations of letters simply impossible, or so unpleasing in effect as to make impossibility the preferable fate. In our fifth illustration we have grouped together into one form the letters J, B, H. It forms a pleasant compromise between the continuous-line forms, and the entire disconnection of the letters seen in all the following examples : as, for instance. Fig. 6, where each letter has a distinct individuality, and is quite distinct and separable, though an integral and essential portion in the general balance of the composition. It will readily be seen that in this, and in monograms generally, letters of a more or less Gothic type freely reiTclered and modified are best adapted to produce a good result. The easiest letters to deal with are those that are bi-symmetrical, divisible into two similar halves, such as the M, A of Fig. 6. Other letters of the same type are the H, I, O, T, V, W, X, and Y, while others, as N, S, O, have a general balance that is a great help to successful arrangement. Some letters, as H, W, or T, are symmetrical in one form of alphabet and not in another; thus in Fig. 12 two H’s are introduced, one being symmetrical and the other no,t. Where two H’s or other identical letters appear in the same monogram they should be of one form, or it suggests the idea, from the introduction of a fourteenth century letter with a modern form, that the monogram was begun five hundred years ago and completed last week. Even in many symmetrical letters the balance is not absolutely the same, on ac¬ count of the thickening of various parts of the letter : the first stroke of tlie letter M, for instance, being thin, the second thick, the third thin again, and the last thick. The letters used in any design should all bear the same general propor¬ tion to each other — a rule not always suffi¬ ciently observed. In Fig. 7 the N and O conform to this rule, while Fig. 8 shows us two combina¬ tions of the same letters where its observance is disregarded. It is of course quite legitimate to incline the letters to one side, as in Figs. 7 and 9 ; there is no necessity that all the letters, as in Figs. 10 and ii, should be up¬ right. By thus inclining the letters one is often able to get a very good balance — as in Fig. 9— between letters that, like the D and F therein in¬ troduced, would otherwise be more difficult to deal with. All interlacings of the letters should as far as possible be alternately over and under each other, so as to appear to bind them together ; and where this may not always be practicable, the rule must at all events be observed as far as may be, or one letter gains undue prominence over the others. We may occasionally find designs in which Gothic and italic letters are combined, but this is altogether indefen¬ sible ; letters should be of the same nature in the same design. It is allowable, and indeed desirable, to make the surname initial dominant ; thus, in Fig. 12 the upper design reads correctly as the B, W, H that it is intended to be, while the lower design based on the same combination of letters would be read as H, B, W, and is therefore faulty in construction. In the same way, in Fig. 10 the respective sizes and general ar¬ rangement of the letters suggest EDWARD, while in Fig. II the same points land us in the conclusion that the sequence of the letters should run HULME. If we had really intended Fig. 10 to read DDRAWE, our design, despite any careful interlacing, careful balance, or what not, would have been an utter failure. It is often, as in Figs. 3, 4, 5, and 8, by no means necessary to en¬ close the letters in any panel or bound¬ ing line, but when we do so it should be a pleasing form in itself, and the letters and the line should seem made for each other; thus a circle round Fig. 7, instead of the line that we have placed there, would have been by no means so happy in effect, as the elongated construction of the monogram would have caused two large empty lateral spaces between the O and the bounding line. It is often no objection, and in fact a decidedly picturesque and quaint arrange¬ ment, to throw, as in Figs. 6 and 9, a portion of the mono¬ gram boldly outside what is elsewhere the enclosing form. The diapering of the back¬ ground is often a great en¬ richment, though in this case care must always be taken that the letters suffer nothing in clearness, and any addition of this kind should always be strictly accessory and subordinate. Even so simple a filling-in as a powdering of dots, as in Figs. 10, ii, and 13, may often be advantageously introduced as an enrichment. Though cyphers and monograms are often considered to be the same thing, the two terms are not in reality

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Botanical “Name-Words.” 366 interchangeable. In a monogram each required letter should appear but once, and no matter how much it may be thrown one way or another, will always read in the normal direction ; while in a cypher the letters are repeated and reversed so as to lorm an evenly balanced and bi-symmetrical composition, often very pleasing, but also often very confused and illegible. * Fig. 13 Ts a cypher constructed on the letters G, L. The Gothic or the ordinary modern printing characters used as a rule in monograms are quite unsuited to the construc¬ tion of cyphers, as they do not happily bear the revers¬ ing process. The letters employed should always be of the ordinary writing type. Such combinations as Figs. 10 and ii would be impossible in a cypher^ as six letters right way about plus the six reversed would produce a degree of bewildering complexity that would be chaotic. Cyphers, with a little patience, a little ingenuity, and a little tracing-paper, are very easy things to produce, and when done are scarcely worth even the trouble they have cost, the chief charm being the mechanical symmetry which we admire" almost as much in the fragments of coloured glass in a kaleidoscope ; while monograms are at once more legible and more tasteful, and in the non-repetition of the letters more in accordance with facts and common sense. BOTANICAL “ NAME-WORDS.’’ NGLISH ‘‘name- words ” — if one may coin such an ex¬ pression — would, as Arch- V bishop Trench suggested, form a highly curious and interesting study. To make _ a complete list of them would be a long and a laborious task, beyond our powers, and foreign to our present purpose, which is simply to mention some of the more conspicuous botanical name-words. Of these, some, such as the “ Doug¬ las pine” Donglasii\ carry their origin, so to speak, on the very face of them ; while others, now completely “denizened,”* and in¬ corporated into the language, are constantly employed by the unlearned without a suspicion of the history which lies embedded in them. “Pasony” belongs to the latter class ; and in this case we have an illus¬ tration of the truth of Gray’s now proverbial lines — “ Where ignorance is bliss, 'Tis. folly to be wi'-e.” For the learned are not by any means agreed as to the etymology of this household word. Dr. Trench derives it from “ Paean,” one of the names of Apollo ; and a yet more eminent authority than he, M. Littrd, gives it the same origin. On the other hand, Mr. D. T. Fish, the editor of “ Cassell’s Popular Gardening,” distinctly tells us that “paeony” is derived from P^eon, a physician, who used the plant medicinally. About the origin of the word “dahlia” there is, for¬ tunately, not any difference of opinion. That plant — which florists once took so much trouble to cultivate into “ doubleness,” and have since been at so much pains to cultivate back again into “ single blessedness ” “ The pearmain, which to France long ere to us was known, Which careful fruiterers now have denizened their own.” Drayton's Polyolbion." was introduced from Mexico into Europe, in the year 17S9, by a Swedish botanist named Dahl. Similarly the name of the fuchsia embodies the patronymic of the Bavarian botanist, Fuchs, who flourished— the phrase, though old-fashioned, suits the subject-matter here— in the sixteenth century. The camelia, or camellia ” as it is usually and more correctly, as well as phonetically, spelt— derives its name from Father Camelli, a Jesuit, who introduced it into Europe from Japan, in 1731. Pierre Magnol, a dis¬ tinguished French botanist, who died in 1715, it was that gave the magnolia its appellation. In the word “quassia” we have the name, or rather part of the name, of a negro sorcerer of Surinam, who discovered the properties of this plant in 1730. His full name, according to Littrd, who quotes from Stedman’s “Journey to Surinam,” was “ Gramand- quacy ''‘—oramaiid meaning “ great,” and quacy “ man,” in the language of the negroes of Dutch Guiana. “ Nicotine,” and the affected phrase, “nicotian weed,” both preserve to us the name of Jean Nicot, the French ambassador to Portugal who sent some tobacco from Lisbon to Catherine dei Medici in the year 1560. But though she for a time succeeded in getting the plant called Ther'be a la reine^ in her honour, it soon lost both that and its original appellation, nicoHane^ and now, as everyone knows, it bears substantially the same name in French, English, German, Spanish, and Italian. The etymology of this wide-spread word, however, is not free from doubt. Archbishop Trench, following the older etymologists, unhesitatingly con¬ nects it with the island of Tobago, while M. Maxime du Camp, writing in the Revue des Deux-Mondes, says that tabaco is a native word used by the inhabitants of San Salv^ador, in the time of Columbus, to designate the cigar, as distinguished from the plant itself, which they called cohiba. The shaddock derives its name from a Captain Shaddock, who first conveyed this tree from China, of which it is a native, to the West Indies, where it is

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3^7 Botanical now largely cultivated. This tree-the Citrus decu~ ma7ia of the botanists— produces fruit of an immense size, which sometimes qieasures two feet in circum¬ ference and weighs twenty pounds. It is only the smaller specimens of the shaddock that are sold undei the name of the “ Forbidden Fruit.” The larger ones are known in the market as Pompelmousses, Pompo- leons, and Pomaloes. The Banksia perpetuates the name of Sir Joseph Banks, who did so much foi botanical science and for natural history generally, as the Dryandra commemorates the services of his secre¬ tary, Dr. Dryander. Gentius, a king of Illyria, bestowed his name on the gentian, if we are to believe Pliny and Dioscorides, as many persons, including the celebrated French physician, Ambroise Pare, have been content to do. The Brassavolas, or Brassavolce, are a genus of plants sc called after Antonio Musa Brassavola, a Venetian nobleman distinguished for his love of botany. In like manner the Brassia, of which there are nearly a dozen known species, takes its name from Mr. Brass, an enthusiastic plant-collector. Well known to fungologists, though not an English species, is the Amanita Cccsa7'icnsis^ or Cesar’s mush¬ room. This beautiful fungus, which, far from being poisonous in itself, is remarkably good eating, derives its name from the fact that “ doctored ” by Locusta, under Agrippina’s orders, it put an end to the Emperor- Claudius. Among “ things not generally known ” may be reckoned the fact that several kinds of fungus emit a phosphorescent light. One of these, discovered by Mr. Gardner, and described by him in his Travels in the Interior of Brazil,” has since been called the Aga7'icus Ga7'd7ie7‘i. The Douglas fir, or Abies Douglasii, already mentioned, is another vegetable— to use the term which Gray applies to the beeches of Burnham— that takes its nam'e from the person who first described it. The giant flagstaff in Kew Gardens is composed of a comparatively dwarf specimen of this tree, which in its home in the valleys of the Rocky Mountains sometimes attains the height of two hundred feet. The Welwitschia 77iirabilis, the most extraordi¬ nary of the conifers, records the name of its dis¬ coverer, Dr. Welwitsch. The Napoleo7ia wipaHalis^ a native of tropical Africa, was so called by M. de Beauvois in honour of the first Napoleon, while the conqueror of that great conqueror has bestowed his name upon the Wclli77gto7iia^ or Mammoth tree, a specimen of which has been found three hundred and twenty-five feet high, and one hundred and sixteen feet in girth. The Benfha77iia commemorates the name of the late Mr. George Bentham, the Bu7'to7iia that of the late Mr. Decimus Burton, the Forsythia that of Mr. For¬ syth. In the botanical name of the Abies S77iithia7ia we seem to recognise one which most of us have heard before. The Nuttallia^ the Cu7i7tingha77iia smensis, the Cytisus A da77ii, the Ma7‘sdc7tia^ the St7'eptoca7'pus Sa7i7ide7‘sii, and the Streptocarpus Rexii, all embody proper names which have been transferred from men to plants. The last in the list, by the way, is described by the late Mr. J. Backhouse as the primrose of the Cape of Good Hope — from its abundance, not from Name-Words.” the hue or shape of its flowers, which are blue and tubular. Sir Stamford Raffles and Dr. Joseph Arnold may be said to be joint owners in the name of the “ greatest prodigy of the vegetable world,” the Rafflesia- A7‘noldi, a native of Sumatra, the flowers of which measure a full yard across, and smell exactly like tainted beef. The Cookia pimctata, or Wampi, a native of South- Eastern Asia, though now widely cultivated in tropical countries, owes its name, we believe, to Captain Cook — the A7'auca7da Cookii certainly does. Mi. Allan Cunningham has not only given his name to the Cu7i7ii77gha77iia si7ie7isis^ already mentioned, but also to the Araucaria Cu7i7ii7igha77ii. Most of the rhodo¬ dendrons, though first discovered and introduced into Europe by the late Sir William Hooker, beai specific names ending in zV, as, for instance, R. Falc07ic7t, A. Ca7npbellii, A. Auckkmdii, R. Fdgewo7i/iii, R. Tho77L- S07ii, R. Hodgso7iii, R. Madde7iii, which, though ugly enough in all conscience, yet serve to mark the services of Indian botanists, or patrons of science. Among the many specific names of the genus Begonia we find G7'iffithih though who this particular Griffiths was, or is, we cannot say. Conrade Gesner, ‘ the Pliny of Germany,” as it was once the fashion to call him, has bequeathed his name to a whole group of plants, the Ges7ie7'ace(B^ one family of which is known more speci¬ fically as the Ges7ier(X. Since not everyone is so learned as Lord Macaulay’s schoolboy, we may as well add that Gesner was an eminent physician and naturalist, who was born at Zurich in ^.nd died in 1565. The Strelitzia, a kind of palm, of which there are several species, derives its generic name from Queen Charlotte — a princess of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. That of the Brucea a7itidyse7itc7'ica commemorates the patronymic of the famous Abyssinian travellei. Foi- tune, the author of “Japan and China” and The Tea Countries,” is the eponym of the Cha77icBrops Fo7'tu77eij or fan-leaved palm, of Northern China, which he introduced into England in 1849. The name of Sir R. H. Schomburgk is preserved to us in that of the Schombw'gkia tibicma, the hollow stems, or pseudo-bulbs, of which are used by the natives of Central America as horns or trumpets ; but this traveller’s great “ find,” the Victoria Regia, which he met with in his voyage up the Berbice river, in the year 1837, was named after the gracious Sovereign whose long reign had then just begun. In justice, however, to pre-discoverers — if the word may be par¬ doned— it should be added that this magnificent water- plant, which the inhabitants of Corrientes call Mats del Agua, or water-maize, had been found by Dr. Poeppig in 1833, by M. d’Orbigny in 1827, by M. Bonpland in 1820, and by Haenke, the famous botanist, in the first year of this century. The name of the late Mr. James Backhouse, author and traveller, is recorded in that of the Buckhousia myi'tifolia, a native of Eastern Australia. In Swam- mc7'damia glomerata we have a trifling memento of the lifelong labours of the famous naturalist, Swammerdam. The Dac7^vdiu7n Franklmii takes its specific name

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Robes of State. 368 from Sir John Franklin of mournful memory. The A^nherstia nobilis was so christened by Dr. Wallich in compliment to the Countess Amherst and her daughter, who showed themselves such zealous friends and promoters of Indian botany : and Dr. Wallich himself is the eponym of a genus of palms — the WalHchtce. The name of Dr. Roxburgh, the author of the “Flora Indica,” has been conferred on the genus Roxburghia^ several species of which may be seen climbing up the rafters of one of the hothouses at Kevv. In Abies Menziesii we trace the name of another well-known traveller and writer; but, indeed, of these Latin genitives of the second declension there is, as the Germans say, “no end,’^ among the names of botanical species. We therefore designedly omit the rest, though the distinguished names of Darwin and Hooker frequently occur in this pseudo-classical guise. In the name of the Bon Chretien pear we have, according to Casanova, if not the actual name, at least the honourable nickname of St. Frangois de Paule, and Casanova’s opinion is supported by earlier authorities. From these it would appear that it was no less a personage than Louis XI. who endowed this delicious fruit with the universally accepted sobriquet of the holy man who first transferred some of the parent trees from their home in Italy to the less genial climate of Northern France. In this connection it is interesting to note that the custom of naming fruit-trees after those who discovered or first introduced or improved them is at least as old as the time of Pliny, who enumerates the Matian, the Cestian, the Mallian, and the Sceptian apples, among others, as having been christened on this principle. The person whose name has been transmitted to us in connection with the last- mentioned apple was only a freedman. In the name of that beautiful flower, the Gloxinia^ we find the patronymic of P. B. Gloxin, a botanist of Colmar, who first imported the plant from South America in the year 1815. To pass from the names of persons to those of places, Damascus has conferred its name upon the damson, Persia on the peach, and Corinth on the currant. The cherry was brought from Cerasus, a city of Pontus, by Lucullus, the celebrated epicure. The quince— altogether improbable as this may seem — takes its name from Cydon, a Cretan town, where it was supposed to be indigenous. Hence the Romans called it the Malum Cydoniumj Cydoiiium became coom in old French, whence the modern form, comg^ of which our word “quince” is an Anglicised form. “Indigo” is a French corruption of the Spanish “ Indico,” from the Latin “Indicum,” the neuter adjectival form of “ India.” “Rhubarb” is a corruption of “ Rha barbarum,” which means “ the root from the savage banks of the Rha or Volga,” while in the word “jalap” we have the name of a Mexican town, Jalapa. ROBES OF STATE, t WORN BY HrOH OFFICERS OF STATE AND OFFICERS OF THE ROYAL HOUSEHOLD.* FFICERS of State have, from time immemorial, on the rare occasions of high ceremonial, appeared in robes and badges appro¬ priate to their exalted rank. These insignia are not without interest, and as a rule illustrate, in some manner, our national his¬ tory. Without doubt, in the eyes of the commonalty, they add dignity to the several offices ; and as the judges’ wigs and robes are supposed, in a small de¬ gree, to vindicate the majesty of the law, so do these outward symbols help to establish in the public mind the value of that pomp and grandeur which, of a right, “doth hedge a king.” It is at a coronation that robes of State are seen to perfection, for all the * The illustrations to this paper are intended merely to represent the robes of State, and must not be regarded as portraits of any of the present holders of the offices mentioned. — Ed. C.M. LIEUTENANT YEOMAN OF THE GUARD. participators in that supreme event don the richest garb to which they are entitled. Conceive the preparations, the cost, the rehearsals, and the hours of ceaseless anxiety which it entails. From the moment when the Sovereign reaches the Abbey at Westminster until the banquet in West¬ minster Hall is over, and the styles of his rank proclaimed in Latin, French, and English, when he is permitted to retire, it is one constant .succession of brilliant pictures, of which the costumes worn by those who take part in them are by no means the least important portion. “ But Court is always May, buds out in masques, Breaks into feather’d merri¬ ment, and flowers In silken pageants.” Though these lines may savour of poetical licence, it is only in the surround¬ ings of Court life that the full glory of such “ silken privy councillor.

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Robes oe State, 3^)9 pageants ” can be seen. The anxiety to enjoy them to the full is shown by the patience with which the spectators have waited in their places throughout the previous nights, at the coronations which have taken place in England during the present century. Ijf)RD HIGH STEWARD CARRYING THE CROWN OF ST. EDWARD. The two most important personages on whom the arrangements on these occasions naturally fall, are the Lord High Steward and the Lord Great Cham¬ berlain. The Lord High Steward walks next before the King in the procession to the church, where the ceremony of coronation is performed, bearing tlio Crown of St. Edward. He wears a white satin and gold under-dress, and a long red robe, and tippet of ermine. He appears with his coronet and his white staff; a new one for the occasion, for on the death of a Sovereign he breaks this said staff over the l^ody. These white staffs are carried by all the high officers of the Household; the Comp¬ troller of the Household dis¬ playing a gold key sewn to a rosette placed upon the coat- pocket. According to an Abstract of Claim of James II.^s time, the duties of the Lord Great Cham¬ berlain are ‘‘ to carry the King his shirt and clothes the morn¬ ing of the coronation, and with the Lord Chamberlain of the Household to dress the King ; to have forty yards of crimson velvet for a robe, also the King’s bed and bedding and furniture of his cham¬ ber where he lay the night, with his wearing apparel and night-gown ; also to serve the King with water before and after dinner, and to have the basins, towels, and cup of assay.” Many of these fees have been compounded for ; but after the coronation of the “ first gentleman in Europe,” we hear that Lord Gwydyr, the then Lord Great Chamberlain, paid a visit to the Sove¬ reign, clad in the splendid under-dress the King had worn at the coronation, this being part of the claims accorded to him by the Court of Claims. At the cere¬ monial this functionary wears his robes of State of velvet and ermine, his coronet and white staff. The procession, as it passes to the Abbey, embraces the greatest display of State robes to be seen at any time in England. It is one moving mass of scarlet, gold, and fur. Banners of crimson damask embroidered and fringed with gold float overhead, being borne by trumpeters in the most brilliant liveries, with silver trumpets ; the drummers in royal liveries presiding over drums covered with crimson velvet and gold. There is the Messenger of the College of Arms, in a scarlet cloak, with the arms of the College embroidered on the left shoulder ; the High Constable of ’West¬ minster, with his staff, in a scarlet cloak ; the six Clerks-in- Chancery, in gowns of black flowered satin with black silk loops and tufts upon the sleeves ; the Chaplains, those who are doctors, in scarlet habits, their square caps in their hands. The Lords of the Bed Cham¬ ber, the Comptroller of the Household, the Treasurer of the Household, and the Vice-Cham¬ berlain wear blue dresses slashed with white, crimson velvet cloaks laced with gold, white silk trunk- hose, and black hats turned up in front with three white fea¬ thers ; ruffs at the throat, and swords with blue scabbards and gold hilts. It is difficult to realise that in our day any such garb can be according to regu¬ lation ; it takes us back at least a century or so. The Master of the Robes has a white dress slashed with crimson, a crimson velvet cloak, white trunk-hose, a sword with crimson scabbard, black shoes with crimson rosettes, and a black hat with three feathers ; LORD GREAT CHAMBERLAIN. 744

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370 Robes of State. the Sergeant of the Vestry of the Chapel Royal, a scarlet robe with gilt verge ; and the Sergeant Porter, a scarlet robe with a black ebony staff. Twelve children of the Chapel Royal are in surplices, and scarlet mantles over them ; and thirty-two gentlemen of the Chapel Royal are in scar¬ let mantles ; the Sub-Dean, in a scarlet gown. The Dean of Westminster’s cape is of purple velvet with gold and silver. The Judges and Barons of Exchequer wear scarlet robes ; the Solicitor- General and Attorney - General, black velvet gowns ; the Lord Chief Justice and Lord Chief Baron further displaying the collar of the SS. The bearers of the Sovereign’s heavy train have white satin dresses, crimson velvet cloaks laced with gold, white silk hose, and hats with three feathers. The Privy Councillors are in similarly made dresses of blue satin, and cloaks to match ; and the Privy Purse wears the same slashed with white. The train-bearers to the Royal Dukes are in white satin and gold with no colour what¬ ever ; the Clerks -in -Council are all in blue, even to the hose, the shoes being white with blue ro¬ settes, their hats having but one feather. The Gentleman Usher has his blue dress edged with spangled gimp, and wears one black feather in his hat; the Gentlemen of the Household have blue dresses with spangled gilt edging, slashed with white, plain blue satin cloaks, white shoes with blue hose, and one small feather in the hat. The Knight Marshal has a scarlet dress slashed with blue, a scarlet cloak, blue hose, and a white hat and black feather ; the Royal Apothecary, a blue dress slashed with scarlet, trimmed with gimp, scarlet cloth cloak, blue stockings, and red shoes ; the Gentlemen of the Privy Chamber, scarlet dresses slashed with blue and gold, a blue sur- coat, blue stockings, white shoes, and hats with two black and one pink feather in front. Barons of the Cinque Ports wear scarlet dresses puffed with blue, with blue and gold edging, blue surcoats, scarlet hose, and white shoes with red bows ; and the Sergeant-at-Arms, a scarlet dress slashed with blue, blue surcoat, blue stockings, A PAGE. white shoes, and a hat with four feathers — one blue, one red, cock-feather, and eagle-red. We have yet to speak of the heraldic officers and of the Champion, who still more carry us back to remote ages. The former are arrayed in tabards or surcoats, on which the Royal Arms are richly embroidered. The word “tabard,” which in parts of Germany and Belgium still signi¬ fies a gown, here denotes a sleev'e- less coat with wings, which fold over the arms ; on every part of which the Royal Ensign is seen in proper colours. The different materials used, denote the rank of the wearer, the Kings -of- Arms having velvet and cloth of gold, the Heralds damask, the Pursui¬ vants satin ; all lined with silk and tied with ribbons. The Champion makes his appearance before the second course of the Coronation Banquet, on horse¬ back, in a complete suit of bright armour, in the midst of his retinue, and proclaims his chal¬ lenge and throws down his glove, the last remnant of the days of chivalry. His helmet is of polished steel surmounted by an ostrich- plume, white, blue, red, and black ; the suit of armour covering the body entirely. The Lord High Chancellor plays an important part in State ceremonials, when he ap¬ pears in a wig, red robes, and an ermine cape about his neck ; he is accompanied by his train-bearer, the Seal of England being borne before him in a crimson cover embroidered with the Arms of England. He it is who, now that the Queen has ceased to deliver the Speech on the opening of Parliament in person, reads it to both Houses in the presence of the Speaker, who wears a rich black brocaded satin robe, which also requires a train-bearer. His insignia of office is the Mace, that huge golden sceptre with a crown at the top, which plays so con- / spicuous a part in the proceedings of the House of Commons. The Ministers’ State robes are gold em¬ broidered dress-coats, the collars coming high up in the neck. No State ceremonial of the day seems com- treasurer, h.m.’s household. LORD HIGH CHANCELLOR, BEARING PURSE WITH GREAT SEAL.

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371 A Sorry Joke. plete now without the Beefeaters or Yeomen of the Guard, who wear still the quaint Tudor garb which was in vogue when Henry VII. first raised the corps at his coronation. The scarlet-skirted coat, trimmed with black and gold, has the Crown of England and the Tudor emblem embroidered on the breast ; red, blue, and white rosettes appear on the shoes and at the knee, the same ribbons are twisted round the low- crowned black velvet hat, and a ruff is worn about the neck. Their name of Beefeater is attributed to a vagary of Henry VIII. In the disguise of one of these Guards, the burly monarch feasted, after a day’s hunt, with the Abbot of Reading, who, amazed at his ap¬ petite, declared he would give a hundred pounds to be so hungry. Accordingly, a few days after, the King caused him to be imprisoned and kept a day or so on bread and water, until he was able to do justice to a joint of beef. While he was enjoying it the merry Sovereign demanded the hundred pounds, which were duly paid. They line the rooms and staircases of the Palace at Drawing Rooms, &c., aided by the Gentlemen-at- Arms, a corps instituted by Henry VIII., disbanded during the civil wars, but subsequently reconstituted. Their uniform is crimson and gold, with gold helmets and white waving plumes, and they carry small battle-axes covered with crimson velvet. Such are some of the outward symbols of Court splendour. It was the great Napoleon — who, un¬ accustomed to them in his early days, might be supposed to value them the more — that wrote ; “ Melancholy as grandeur.” SUCCESS. t <Tj|E carved his name, both clear and high. Upon the old oak-tree. Ambitious, that the passers-by The characters might see. He laboured long : and high and clear He carved a lasting name, That woke applause, each fleeting year, From trumpet-tongues of fame. The years in swift succession ran : Once more in that old wood, His boyhood past, and grown a man, With thoughtful looks he stood. The letters bold had been effaced By sun, and wind, and rain : Then, with resolve his mind he braced, And sought the world again. Yet, not the less the grey-haired man Recalled the hope and joy That brightly shone when life began. To bless the careless boy- Who carved his name, both deep and high, Upon the stately tree. And thought, with pride, the passers-by His handiwork would see. J. R. Eastwood. A SORRY JOKE. H ! what fun ! Howl wish I was there.” “ So do I ; but there is no chance of it.” The speakers were two girls of seventeen and nineteen re¬ spectively, who were standing in the deserted schoolroom of Miss Ashby’s select academy for young ladies. Lessons were just over for the even¬ ing, and the younger girls had been sent off to bed, while the elder ones were enjoying a little recreation after the day’s labours. Eleanor Barlow and Kate Neville were firm friends ; they had almost passed the pupil stage, but Kate, who was nearly two years older than Eleanor, had decided to stay on at school until her companion had finished as well. They were both orphans, and Kate, who was well off, was allowed to do pretty much as she liked ; so no one interfered when she announced her intention. They were both to leave, hqwever, at the end of the half-year, and much of their time was taken up in arranging their future plans. Kate had received a letter during the day from her cousin, who was staying at Cannes, describing the fun that she and her sisters were having, and inviting Kate and Eleanor to come and join them as soon as they left school. “ I can’t see why you should not come,” said Kate resolutely ; “it is absurd, Eleanor ! I know your uncle would let you if you asked him properly.” “ My dear Kate, you have never seen my uncle,” said Eleanor drily ; “ if you had, you would know at once that it is useless to think about it.” “ But I will think about it!” exclaimed Kate, throw¬ ing back her short dark locks in a way peculiar to

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372 A Sorry Joke. herself. “ When I take a thing into my head I always do it, as you might know by this time, Nelly.” “ But you do not always think of such mad things as this,” persisted Eleanor. ‘‘ Mad or not, it shall be done, my dear, and that this very winter ! ’’ No more was said on the subject just then, but when the two girls, who shared a room together, were going to bed, Kate began again : ‘‘ I have arranged it all, Nelly. Of course, if you were to tell your uncle that we were going together he would think that we were much too giddy to be trusted. Now, I will tell you my idea. You know my Aunt Matilda, at whose house you stayed one holiday. Well, I am going to personate her.” “ Personate her ? ” cried Eleanor, in wild amazement. “ Yes ; don’t interrupt. You must somehow get me an invitation to your house. I shall come in the character of Aunt Matilda, tell your uncle that I am going to Cannes, and ask his leave to take you with me.” “ What an utterly impossible scheme ! ” “Not at all. There is no such word as impossible, as Julius Caesar, or Martin Luther, or some of those old worthies used to say. You will see it will work out splendidly.” “ But how am I to get an invitation for you ? ” “ Well, I think you might manage that part of it yourself ; but if you can’t I will do that too. There is only one thing, though— if Aunt Matilda were to hear about it. But I tell you what : we must alter her name.” “ But if we alter her name it will not be her,” objected Eleanor, who was getting rather into a wood with all these complications. “ My dear little stupid, it will not be her, anyway. But if you are so scrupulous, I will tell you how we will manage. My aunt’s name before she married was Meryweather, so instead of calling her by her present name we will mix up the two, and call her “ Mrs. Meryweather.” “ You are absurd, Kate ! the whole thing is non¬ sense.” Eleanor had not been home long, however, when she received a note from Kate to the following effect “ Dear Eleanor, — Do you remember my aunt, Mrs. Meryweather, who was so kind to us one holiday ? She is coming to London ne.\-L week, but we cannot take her in, as our house is full. Do you think your uncle would put her up for a few nights, as she passes through Meriton ? She is old, and not very strong ; but you will not find her any trouble in the house, or I would not ask such a favour.” Inside this was a private postscript : — “ Come and meet me yourself, and don’t be surprised whitever I look like.” Eleanor felt rather alarmed at the dimensions the joke had assumed. However, she knew that Kate would never forgive her if she drew back now, so she carried the note to her uncle with a somewhat quaking heart. “ What’s this, my dear ? ” he said irritably^ as he read it. “ Mrs. Meryweather ! who is she, I should like to know, and what does she want ? ” Eleanor murmured something about “ Kate’s aunt,” and “ wanting to come for a few nights.” “ Nonsense ! ” said Mr. Barlow energetically. “ I don’t know what the world’s coming to ! I won’t have my house used as an inn, and so I tell you.” If her uncle had spoken less crossly, Eleanor would never have had the heart to carry on the joke ; but his words rather roused her temper, and so she per¬ sisted in her request. “Oh, well, have your own way!” said Mr. Barlow crossly. “ I suppose there will be no peace unless you do.” So the invitation was sent, and on the appointed day Eleanor went down to the station to meet the expected guest. She had not the slightest idea what to look for, but when the train drew up, the first person to alight was an old lady with white curls, a coal-scuttle bonnet, goggle spectacles, a large cloak, and a profusion of bags and parcels. “ Well, my dear child, how are you ? ” she said, coming up to Eleanor with wonderful agility. “ I am quite worn out with my journey 1 ” Eleanor’s amazement was so great that she could not make any reply, but as soon as they were safely ensconced in a fly she went off into such peals of laughter that Kate was really alarmed. “ Do be careful ! ” she exclaimed. “ If you are going to make a joke of it, Eleanor, I had better go back at once. How am I to play my part if you go on like this?” “ I am getting all my laughter over at once, don’t you see ? ” said Eleanor breathlessly ; “ but however have you done it, Kate ? ” and she went off into a fresh burst of merriment. By the time they reached the house, however, she had succeeded in quieting herself, and was quite ready to back Kate up in her proceedings. “ How do you do, Mr. Barlow ?” said Kate, as she entered the drawing-room ; “ it is really too kind of you to ask me here. Eleanor, dear child, do see if my bags are all safe.” This last remark was induced by an ominous twinkle in Eleanor’s eye, and she was only too glad to rush out of the room and leave her friend to her own devices. She stayed away some time, and when she came back, was amazed to find Kate evidently in¬ stalled in her uncle’s good graces. He was talking quite amiably about the weather, the crops, and the state of the country, w'hile Kate replied, adopted all his theories, and fell in with his views with a quickness that surprised Eleanor, well as she knew her powers of acting. “ Mrs. Meryweather seems a most respectable person, my dear,” he said pompously, when Eleanor came down the next morning. “ I am very glad to make her acquaintance.” This was such an enormous concession that Eleanor could hardly believe her ears ; however, there was no doubt that Kate had fairly taken him by storm. The next day passed uneventfully. Kate was too wise to open her campaign at once, but in the evening, when they were sitting round the fire, she began.

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'n 'y 3/0 A SoRRV Joke. “ There is no place like old England, after all ! ” she said sentimentally. ‘‘ Quite right, ma’am/’ said Mr. Barlow ; I am glad to hear you say so. People now-a-days always want to be gadding about.” “None at all. It is a great pleasure, however, to have such a taste of English comforts before I start.” The subject was dropped after this, but the next night Kate went another step. “ I suppose you don’t know any pleasant young girl “ ‘ IS THERE NO WAY OUT OF IT?’ “ That is one of the saddest signs of the times,” said Kate, greatly to Eleanor’s astonishment ; “ it grieves me more than I can say. To people like you and me, exile from the comforts of home is indeed a punishment. I know you will sympathise with me, Mr. Barlow, when I tell you that I am obliged to go to the south of France in a few weeks’ time.” “ Dear, dear ! I’m sorry to hear that ! Is there no way out of it ? ” who would like to go abroad for a few weeks, Mr. Barlow ? It is dreary work to go alone.” “No, I don’t; but I will think of it. It is not fitting that you should have to travel by yourself. Could not Miss Neville go ?” “ Ah ! dear Kate. I am very fond of her, but she is a sad, giddy girl ; I never know what she will do next. I want someone more like your own little niece, Mr. Barlow, but of course you could not spare her.”

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374 A Sorry Joke. Eleanor longed to put in a word at this point, but Kate frowned to her to be silent, and again the matter was left to simmer in Mr. Barlow’s mind. Nothing more was said until the day before Mrs. Meryweather’s departure, but as she was sitting alone with Mr. Barlow, having signed to Eleanor to leave the room, she looked pensively at her white woolly knitting, and said — ‘‘ I suppose there is no chance of your allowing Eleanor to go with me ? ” ‘ ‘ I really don’t know,” said Mr. Barlow doubt¬ fully ; and Kate knew at once that her point was gained. ‘‘ I should so much enjoy having the dear child with me ; she is a good little thing, very helpful and obedient. Of course, all her expenses would be my affair.” A few objections were raised, but they were an¬ swered far more easily than Kate had anticipated, •and in a short time she was triumphant. “ You are going, Nelly ! ” she cried, in excited tones, very different from the measured utterances of the drawing-room, and locking the bed-room door, Mrs. Mery weather proceeded to relieve her feelings by dancing ecstatically round the room — white curls, .goggle spectacles, and all. “Now my task is done, I had better go,” she remarked, as she sank down in a breathless heap on the floor ; “ if I stay any longer, I shall spoil it all. Pick up my cap, there’s a good girl.” The next morning, accordingly, saw her departure, on the understanding that Mr. Barlow was to bring Eleanor up to meet her in London in a fortnight. The day arrived at last, and Eleanor, in a perfect fever of delight and agitation, was handed over to ]\Irs. MeryweathePs care at Charing Cross Station. “ 1 hope you will have a pleasant journey,” said Mr. Barlow, as he stood on the platform. “ Be a good girl, Eleanor. She’s a tiresome little minx, Mrs. Meryweather. I hope you will not repent of your bargain.” The girls’ spirits knew no bounds when they were once off ; but their ardour was rather quenched during the crossing. As soon as they were on their way to Paris, how¬ ever, Kate, who had taken a reserved carriage, began to dismantle. “ I don’t want my cousins to know anything about this,” she said; “Aunt Matilda would be awfully angry. Your uncle never goes to London, and she never leaves it, so there is no chance of their coming across each other, and I will prevent any other trouble.” She took off her curls,^pectacles, and bonnet as she spoke, and tying them up in a bundle with her white woolly knitting, dropped them out of the carriage window. “ There,” she said, ‘‘ that is gone ; and when I get to Paris I shall change my dress, and leave this old one behind, and then Mrs. Meryweather will have ceased to exist.” She drew out a jacket and fur hat, which she had packed in readiness among her travelling- rugs, and declared that she felt comfortable once more. “ So you have brought Eleanor Barlow, after all,” cried the two girls who met them at Cannes. “ What fun ! we thought her uncle would not let her come.” “He gave leave just at the last,” said Eleanor demurely. Kate’s cousins were staying at Cannes with their mother, and the four girls entered heartily into all the fun that was going on. The days seemed to fly by, and Eleanor was quite unable to believe that five weeks had already passed since she left home. “ Fancy Uncle Hervey writing to say I must come back ! ” she exclaimed dolefully one day to Kate. “ Never mind ; wTite and tell him how much you are enjoying yourself, and he will relent.” Eleanor accordingly sat down, and wrote a glowing account of the delights of Cannes. “There ! I’m sure after that he will let me stay,” she said, as she show^ed the letter to Kate. A few days passed by, and the two girls were out walking one morning, when Eleanor suddenly stopped, and clasping her companion’s arm, exclaimed, in tones of dismay — “ Look, Kate !” “ What ? ” asked Kate. “ My uncle ! ” It was indeed Mr. Barlow. Eleanor’s description of Cannes had been so enchanting, that Mr. Barlow thought he could not do better than come out and see for himself. Perhaps, also, the thought of Mrs. Mery- weathers pleasant society stirred him up to such an unwonted resolution. He arrived at the station early in the morning, having determined to take them by surprise, and driving straight to the hotel, inquired wfliether Mrs. Meryweather was in. “Mrs. Meryweather? No such name here !” said the official at the door, in English. Mr. Barlow, however, thought that he had been misunderstood, so raising his voice, w’ith the English¬ man’s usual idea of making himself intelligible by shouting, he roared out — “ Mrs. Meryweather, I say ! ” The man could not resist laughing, much to Mr. Barlow’s indignation. “ There is no such name, no such person ! ” he said. “ What does the lady resemble ? ” “Rather short, wdiite curls, blue spectacles, large bonnet and cloak,” said Mr. Barlow, enumerating the most striking points of Mrs. Meryweather’s attire. The man shook his head. “No,” he said, “ Mon¬ sieur is mistaken.” “ Mistaken ! ” shouted Mr. Barlow, “ how can I be mistaken ? The lady is a friend of mine.” “ Mistaken to think she is at the hotel,” said the man civilly, but Mr. Barlow was too much enraged to listen further, and walked away, muttering something about “ foreigners ” under his breath. He had only gone a few steps when he espied Eleanor in the street, and hurrying over, he began to pour out his vexation.

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375 A Sorry Joke. “There, I knew the man was an idiot. Here you are, after all ! Where is Mrs. Meryweather ?” He took no notice of Kate, who was, however, quite ■equal to the emergency. “You must let me introduce myself, Mr. Barlow,” she interposed. “ You have often heard Eleanor speak of Kate Neville.” Mr. Barlow shook hands rather grudgingly. “ What are you here for ? ” he asked. “ I thought your aunt .said she didnk want you. Where is your aunt, by the way ? ” “ My aunt left us a few days since,” said Kate. “ And are you and Eleanor here alone ?” said Mr. Barlow, in great wrath. “ Oh, no,” said Kate sweetly ; “ I have another aunt and two cousins staying at the same hotel. It is fortunate that you arrived to-day, Mr. Barlow, for we were all thinking of returning to-morrow.” Her manner somewhat mollified Mr. Barlow, and Kate continued : “I am sure you would like to take your uncle for a walk, Eleanor. I will return to the hotel, and see if I can secure a room for him.” “ 1 wish you would,” said Mr. Barlow ; “ for if I like the place I don’t mean to race all the way back to England again to-morrow.” The speech rather relieved Kate ; she knew that her .aunt and cousins had decided to leave, and she thought that she could easily manage matters for one day ; by dint of keeping Mr. Barlow out of doors as much as possible, and carefully turning the conversa¬ tion whenever it came round to Mrs. Meryweather, she could keep things straight for a few hours. She •exerted all her powers to amuse Mr. Barlow, and suc¬ ceeded even beyond her hopes. “ You really are some¬ thing like your aunt,” he said during the evening ; *“ perhaps when you come to be her age you may be nearly as good-looking ” — a speech which caused Kate the most exquisite delight. She was very glad, notwithstanding, when her aunt and cousins were safely out of the way, and the three were left to take care of themselves. “When will Mrs. Meryweather return.^” was a ■question that Mr. Barlow frequently asked, and Kate’s ingenuity was taxed to the uttermost to silence in¬ convenient inquiries. “ I really don’t see how it is to end,” she said to Eleanor one day. “ What are we to do when we get back to England ? I begin to wish that I had never •embarked in the scheme, for I really see no way out of it.” When Kate acknowledged that she saw no way out of a difficulty, Eleanor might well feel in despair ; she could only hope that her friend’s powers would return to her aid. “ Have you heard from Mrs. Meryweather ? ”■ asked Mr. Barlow, as they sat at breakfast the next day. “No, I have not heard since she left.” “ You must really write and see what has become of her ; it is getting serious.” “ It is indeed,” said Kate. “ I don’t know what we shall do.” But nothing was heard of the missing lady, and Mr. Barlow became impatient to get back to England. It was not till they were in the train that Kate plucked up courage to say anything more, but she felt then that it could not be postponed. “ I have something to tell you, Mr. Barlow,” she said : “ Mrs. Meryweather has not been heard of since she left us. She has disappeared.” “ Disappeared ! ” cried Mr. Barlow. “ Impossible ! Why, where has she disappeared to ? ” “If we knew where she had disappeared to, she would not be lost,” said Kate. “ But steps must be taken ; the police must be set to work ; the Channel must be dragged ! ” “ I fear that it is of little use,” said Kate sadly. “ Mrs. Meryweather has some eccentric habits, and I believe myself that she has disappeared of her own accord.” “ I don’t believe it ! ” shouted Mr. Barlow. “How can a respectable lady disappear, whether with her accord or without it? We must have detectives, and send telegrams to all parts of the world.” “ I am quite sure that all will be of no avail,” said Kate, who began to be rather alarmed at the turn that things were taking. “ Then we will advertise,” said Mr. Barlow, who had all an Englishman’s belief in The Times. “We will describe her, and offer a large reward for her recovery, whether lost, stolen, or strayed.” Kate was silent ; she felt fairly puzzled. If a re¬ ward was offered, no doubt numbers of fictitious Mrs. Meryweathers would turn up to claim it ; and then how would it be possible to keep the affair a secret ? She had often got into disgrace over her practical jokes, but this was more serious than anything that had ever happened before. She felt that she must do all she could to prevent the story from coming out ; for when she thought of it calmly, it did seem indeed an unfair return for all Mr. Barlow’s kindness to his orphan niece. But while she paused, undecided, a word from Eleanor upset all her ideas. “ Oh, Kate !” she cried, “ we had better confess.” Kate’s warning exclamation was unheard, as Mr. Barlow sprang to his feet. “ Confess ! ” he shouted angrily. “ What do you mean ? What have you two girls been up to ? Tell me directly, I say — tell me directly ! ” Eleanor burst into a torrent of sobs and tears ; her feelings had been wrought up to such a pitch of ex¬ citement during the strain of the last two or three days that she had lost all control over herself. The more her uncle stormed the more hysterical she be¬ came, while Kate sat by, the image of pale despair. At last Mr. Barlow stopped a moment from sheer exhaustion, and Kate, seizing the opportunity, gave him a brief narration of their^oings. “It was not Eleanor’s fault,” she said when she had done, “ so you had better scold me. I thought ' of it, and I plan;red it, and I persuaded her to do it. You can be as angry with me as you like, but you must forgive Eleanor.” “ Indeed, it was my fault too,” protested Eleanor amid her tears. “ I gave in to her, and helped her ; so I was just as bad as she was.”

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Pictures of the MoxNths. 376 The two friends seemed only anxious to screen each other, but Mr. Barlow was far too angry to listen to either of them. His pride was hurt at the thought of the girls daring to play him such a trick, and his affections were wounded too, for he was really fond of Eleanor, and did not think that she would have de¬ ceived him. “No explanations can make any difference,” he said. ‘‘You have both behaved shamefully, and you must bear the consequences. This is the last time that you and Eleanor shall ever meet ! ” Kate was thunderstruck. She had never expected such a catastrophe as this. If it was ever found out, she had imagined that Mr. Barlow would be angry at first, but that when he saw the ingenuity with which they had carried out their scheme he would be amused rather than otherwise. But to part with Eleanor altogether— twenty trips to France would not repay them for such a punishment as this ! As a general rule, she hated to ask for pardon, but Eleanor’s tears softened her pride, and she begged Mr. Barlow to forgive them. For a long time the old man would not give way ; he considered that they de¬ served punishment, and he meant that they should have it. But at last his anger abated a little at the sight of the girls’ distress. “You are a bad companion for my little niece. Miss Kate,” he said severely, “and I ought never to let you speak to her again ; but if you try to do aR in your power to show your sorrow, I may, perhaps, allow you to see her again at the end of two years. You are not to write to each other in the meantime, but I shall keep my eye on you, and if you behave well I may withdraw my prohibition then.” Kate would have thanked him, but he silenced her sternly. “ No, don’t think it is any merit of your own ; there are no words bad enough to describe your con¬ duct. It is only for your aunt’s sake that I listen to your excuses.” Kate nearly laughed in the midst of her anxiety— to be pardoned for personating someone for the sake of her own personation had something very funny about it ; but she was careful not to risk her newly won for¬ giveness. She shook hands gravely with Mr. Barlow when they arrived in London, sadly kissed the tearful Eleanor, and went away to spend her time of proba¬ tion in useful repentance. Many years have passed since then : Kate and Eleanor are better friends than ever, though the re¬ membrance of the sad consequences of their practical joke is still fresh in their minds. But though Mr. Barlow is to all outward appearance the same, there is a hidden sorrow in his heart — a sorrow of which he never speaks to anyone ; for in that dim and silent temple, unrecked of and unknown, is still enshrined the image of the never-to-be-forgotten Mrs. Mery weather. PICTURES OF THE MONTHS. May. •fpHE hawthorns are laden with fairy snow. And the bee works late in the sunset lands ; The nightingale warbles now high, now low, Two lovers listen with clasping hands ; For she sings of love without change or stir, And the song is their hearts’ interpreter.

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WHAT TO WEAR IN MAY. CHIT-CHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR LONDON AND PARIS CORRESPONDENTS. The favourite colours are heliotrope, lichen-green, a pink of the blotting-paper tone, and fawn. Plain cloth is mixed with the stripes and checks. Silk stripes appear on many of them, especially in herring-bone. Plain homespuns suited to summer are cheap and comfortable wear. Worsted is the new revival, which comes with the admirable recommendation that it wears well. A white surface is sometimes thrown on, so that the mixed colours beneath are seen, as it were, in a mist ; and another fashionable kind has a silk mixture. Mottled, flaked, and Mouchete cloths are all well worn, and also lace stripes in Jacquard weaving — white on a colour. If your purse is full, however, order one of the new panel gowns — “ bordure treil- lage/^ as they are called. They are very handsome, and about one and three-eighths of a yard are required. They are composed of silk and velvet, and some display a design laid on the surface, as though worked with purse-silk into a sort of network — red on white, or black on white. Some of these handsome designs are like old - rose point lace, and others have lace-like patterns of another character. Voiles are being used extensively for summer dresses, with borders ; and some printed with flowers come under the same head, for they will bear contact with waiting. the wash-tub as well as, if not better than, cottons. Fancy grenadines, the old bareges, and many gauzes of long ago have been resuscitated ; and if we have but a warm summer, there are plenty of suitable materials. They are striped, and some have floral brocades in bright colour¬ ings. Copper is the favourite tint in this class of goods, and it looks extremely well. Tartans have been brought out this spring, as they are most springs, but I do not see that anybody has benefited much thereby, and. their patrons are few and far between. There is a curious rough woollen cloth that has found favour at many of our smartest open- air gatherings, which is uncommonly like a horse¬ cloth, and as yet this is the only tartan that I have seen well to the fore. Mohair is one of the serviceable materials that always look well to the end ; alpaca I call it ; the broche mohairs are really delightful wear, and the colours good. Foule in reseda, grey, heliotrope, WHEN LESSONS ARE OVER. I. — FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. Silks this season are either extremely cost¬ ly and handsome, or very simple. Fashionable wo¬ men given to dinner-par¬ ties, and those who attend the Drawing Rooms, will naturally purchase the sil¬ ver tinsel brocades and all the many lovely conven¬ tional designs which show such exquisite colouring ; but the world in general will be content with the printed sunshiny silks and the much-improved Surahs, and foulards printed in admirable colourings, and now often strengthened with satin stripes. The satin foulards are being made up into summer fete-dresses and dinner-gowns. They are all to be had in dark serviceable tones, as well as in light ones. Besides the floral patterns, spots and interlaced rings are worn. Silk sleeves are introduced into many woollen dresses, and, not¬ withstanding all that is said to the contrary, it is certainly a wool year, when wool gowns will be in the majority ; and there are some striped silks, the stripes formed of cord, with spots, rings, or bro¬ cades. between, which are only intended for mixing with soft woollen fabrics. Tweeds and Cheviots of decided checks are worn almost all the year round ; they suit our climate.

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378 What to Wear in May. electric, and fawn is charming ; and casimir, a very fine diagonal woven cloth, makes up into the surplice bodices and the high fashionable sleeves to perfection. This mohair, like all other fabrics, is forty-four to forty-eight inches wide, for narrow widths are no use at all for draping. Those women who like washing dresses can have pretty ones ready-made this year at about half the usual price. The fashion of loose bodices makes it easy to secure a good fit. The cottons are pretty and durable, dark printed sateens and firm zephyrs. Printed de-laines will be extensively worn. Mousquetaire gloves, embroidered and scalloped at the top, are new ; and there is every shade of kid now to be had — greens, blues, and pinks included. I have just seen a pretty lawn-tennis frock for a child, made in blue woollen stuff, but printed all over in white with shuttlecocks, balls, and racquets. Wash¬ ing silks, especially spotted ones, are much used for children. The yokes, the plain skirts, the many runners at the waist, and the high sleeves are the points which indicate the current modes. Children’s mantles take the form of full coats, the fulness gathered at the waist beneath a pointed velvet belt, and set into a yoke. Parasols are made of chiffon muslin and crepe de Chine, either bouillonne all over, or kilted in two deep flounces. The handles are now made shorter than last season, but generally of natural wood, and cherries or plums are hung from cherry-wood or plum- wood handles. Eft tout cos are useful, for they answer a double purpose, and it is always difficult to know on leaving home in the morning what the weather will be two hours hence ; so most women will be glad to learn that en tout cas are the height of fashion — in plain silk of all colours. The pretty hat worn in our initial letter shows the prevailing style, with the crimped back and crinkled brim. There is a WTeath of flowers carried round the front, a bouquet beneath the velvet-lined brim. The bow of bordered ribbon is supplemented by three upstanding pleats, edged by a straw plait, through which ribbon is run. It is made in fine Tuscan. The child’s frock in our third picture is a pretty com¬ bination of white embroidered muslin and soft silk, with Pompadour sprigs. The back of the skirt is formed of the silk, and the sleeves and the front of the skirt of the embroidery, and half of the bodice ; the silk crosses it diagonally, the folds being secured at the waist by an ornament. The pointed collar-band is new, and notice how plain and simple the sleeves are. The mantles of to-day are much shaped to the figure, as in the third illustration, where soft lace folds disappear in a corselet bodice of beads, edged with fringe, which widens at the point in front. The collar-band is high, and the rounded yoke is of bead work. The sleeves of velvet stand up exceedingly high, and are of an ob¬ long form, trimmed with beads and passementerie. II.— FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. Bright colours are asserting their sway in Paris, and .if they make their way, and keep their hold on English taste, they will greatly enliven your social gatherings. I am always saddened by the black which English¬ women persist in wearing so generally ; it is not even banished from weddings. 1 do not know how long it will last, but Parisians are favouring pearl- grey gloves, almost to the exclusion of others ; and a great quantity are being sent to England, sewn with black, and white gloves are treated in the same way. The mousquetaire is preferred to the trouble of many buttons. The tones in woollen gowns are so fresh and charm¬ ing, we forget how fragile they are — such as greys, fawns, and heliotrope; but it is not called heliotrope now ; peach or clover is the new nomenclature. The rough knickerbocker threads appear on most of the new woollens. The skirts are plain, simply hemmed with many stitchings ; in some, almost imperceptible folds at the side of the front breadth are introduced to prevent undue flatness, and the back is gathered. The loose jacket, with lapels open to show a vest, is often made with a braided plastron ; the collar high, a pointed belt set beneath the waist. Seamless bodices are a fad of the hour, but, like the pride that apes humility, they are a snare and a de¬ lusion, for they are simply placed over a well-boned, many-seamed lining. I have just seen a light blue and tobacco-brown woollen dress — the skirt with one seam only down the centre of the back ; in the mode of arrangement the stripes are straight in front, but fall diagonally at the back, where the fulness de¬ scribes a duck’s tail. Yes, that is the name it used to be called, and it fairly describes it. The bodice was simply joined under the arm — or, rather, fastened there —but the lining fitted closely, and some white muslin pointed embroidery defined the neck, waist, and cuffs. The vest I have just been describing had the same well-shaped under-bodice. Of course, when darts are done away with, it is necessary to gather the bodice at the waist in the middle of the front. The old polonaise appears again in the Princesse dress, which is closely allied to it. It is a little draped at the side, and generally has high sleeves, plastron, and collar of silk or velvet. 1 have seen many such gowns in the new light pink tones. This is of the nature of vieux rose, but brighter and mellower. The old-fashioned blue-pink we wore thirty years ago has come in again for evening toilettes. The most curious point in the new gowns is that sometimes not only are sleeves, collar, &:c., of con¬ trasting material, but of contrasting colour. Grey and mauve, old rose and peach, blend in current modes. The silver and steel work introduced upon cloth dresses are fine specimens of embroidery ; and cloth bodices for evening are to take the place of leather* They look like soft velvet, and adapt themselves marvellously to the figure. It will take some time to accustom ourselves to such vivid contrasts as dove and dark blue, blue and pink, but they are of French inspiration. Every kind of soft fabric is in fashion, and mousse¬ line chiffon is draped not only over plain silks, but over Louis XV. brocades.

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What to Wear in May. 379 Parisians seem to be using more flowers on their evening dress than is the case in England ; loops of flowers adorn the front breadths, and keep the frilled chiffon in its place. Chiffon is now made with a border, which does away with the trouble of hemming. Flower fans are most popular ; and I re¬ commend to the notice of young girls those which have a straight line of heath carried down each rib of ivory, this same ivory co¬ loured to match the flower and the bows on the handle. Pink and mauve are the two prettiest colourings, and they have the merit of folding up into a pretty form, showing all the flowers massed together. French hats are set well back on the head, so that they form an aureole round the face ; and the upstanding brim is trimmed with flowers and lace. As often as not, there is no crown at all. Very few of the bonnets have any crowns; the loops of hair now placed on the head are drawn through the aperture, which is surrounded by roses or ribbon or other blooms. Bright pink roses are intermixed with apple-green, narrow rib¬ bon velvet, which forms the universal strings. The mushroom form is a favourite one for summer hats, and its name tells its own story. Great balls of jet form the head of pins used for fastening two bows standing up at the back of the crown. Crinoline is now a favourite mate¬ rial, which is pleated into open designs, or more frequently crocheted. It is thus applied to red gauze or crepe, forming the edge ; for most hats and bonnets are bordered, the latter frequently with rows of leaves. Dragon-flies and butterflies hover over many of the millinery triumphs of this season. The butterflies are mostly made in wired lace, which must be good in quality, or they look most shabby. Green is certainly the favourite colour in millineiy^ —light, vivid, summer-like, and spring-like greens ; and with green gauze, yellow forget-me-nots are blended. Green wheat and black wheat are employed for trim- ming, and you cannot do wrong in having either a Tuscan hat or a Tuscan bonnet. It is a beautiful straw, bending with a touch of the hand. Mimosa is largely employed on Tuscan hats, and the flower-maker is most successful in reproducing this light and beau¬ tiful bloom. Yellow is next in favour to green — from the lightest tinge of primrose to deep vivid melon. We are no longer particular as to whether the flowers we wear are in season, and might be gathered in our gardens. Nasturtiums and dahlias divide the honours of the moment with “ the flowers that bloom in the spring.’^ Magenta has come back to us— harsh, crude, and unrelenting, but blessed with the merit of brightness. The plain make of the skirt encourages much em- THE FIRST PEEP AT THE GALLERY. broidery, which, as in the illustration, appears chiefly on the front. The gown is of a light spring green cloth, opening over a copper-coloured panel at the side. The sleeves and bodice are green. The sleeves are hidden by embroidery, and a pink spray graces the front of the bodice, which opens at the side, and discovers a glimpse of the copper. It fastens with four buttons and loops at the waist. The style of dress worn in the picture is exactly suited to light materials. In the original model it is made in blue and pink; the front of the skirt and bodice is pink ; the former has some six flounces and a pointed tunic. The bodice is full. The sleeves and revers are blue, likewise the collar-band, as well as the rest of the skirt. The wide belt and buckle are dis¬ tinctive, so are the pretty loops of ribbon at the side, carried down to the rosettes. The hat matches, only the front is straw ; all the rest is blue, but the pink is recognised in a spray of apple blossom on the front.

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380 THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars re^specting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge himself to notice every article or work submitted. _ _ A Sea-Weed Nursery. The marine station at Kiel is a veritable sea-weed nursery, lor by means of forcing aquaria, warmed by hot - water pipes, even tropical forms are success¬ fully propa¬ gated. Rooms for studying the various productions of the establish¬ ment, and a herbarium of dried speci¬ mens, are also attached to the station. Our figure shows a wire basket, de¬ vised by Prof. Reinke for growing sea- weeds under the water. The wire pouch hangs from a strong frame, which is equally capable of standing on three legs or of being sus¬ pended below the surface from a wooden buoy. In this submerged aquarium the sea-weeds flourish amid their native element, and can be removed from it at will. It is proposed to hold a public exhibition of the products of the establishment. Advances in Electric Lighting. An electric lamp made to resemble a wax candle has been brought out by a London agency. The FIG. I. candle part is formed of clouded glass, and the wick of a flamboyant spiral filament of carbon en¬ closed in a glass bulb. Such a lamp is adapted for chandeliers or candelabra of the Louis Seize pattern. While upon this subject, we may men¬ tion a new electric light-holder, which permits of the light being tilted, so as to shine either in a vertical FIG. 2. or horizontal direction. It is the invention of Mr. W. S. Boult, of Liverpool, and is shown in Fig. i. A brass boss with three radial arms is screwed to an ordinary lamp-holder. Three cords run through eye¬ holes in the ends of the arms, and also through a block attached above to the flexible conductor, as shown. By means of this tackle, the lamp and its reflector can be inclined as illustrated. Another lamp-holder recently introduced is shown in Fig. 2. It consists of an ornamental reflector, from which is suspended a bouquet-holder, which can be filled with orchids or other flowers. Sometimes the rim of the reflector is fitted with a fringe. We may remark that white silk makes a very good reflector of electric light. Japanese Lacquer. This material is chiefly an exudation from the bark of the young tree known to botanists as Rhus ve7'nici~ ^era. The sap is greyish at first, but darkens to black. Sometimes perilla oil is added to it as a drier. The sap contains urushic acid, associated with an albuminoid substance, a gum, and a poisonous volatile acid. The lacquer hardens by the oxidation of the urushic acid. To form the best black lacquer, iron or a salt of iron is added to the juice. Coni-

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The Gatherer. ?8i g{ / 1 T / p. IJ , , 1 1 /] / J i / J I 1 • I K r i / 'll A 1 1 1 t: 7^ 1 1 1 1 1 i T ) / r 7 / / / n r , — J / / i 7 V N / t \ N ■ - - 7 1 7 s — 1 7^ X / / / _j 1 2 i ^ 3 ^ _ H f K a M “c will know best how to ap¬ preciate an ingenious little device which Mr. F. J. Jones has just patented. This is one of those ideas which are so simple, and so obviously useful, that we can none of us imagine why in the world no one ever thought of that before ! In the reel on which the thread is wound, a very diminutive knife is inserted across such a nick as is generally cut to hold the loose end of the thread. By means of this, even stout thread, which cannot possibly be broken off in the ordinary way, may be readily cut ; and as the knife does not project beyond the surface of the reel, there is no new element of danger introduced into the work-basket. PICTURES BY TELEGRAPH. — FIG. ferous wood is usually that chosen to be lacquered, and before the coating is applied, all joints and holes are filled up with a putty made of inferior lacquer and rice-flour. Pictures by Telegraph. A method of transmitting drawings by telegraph has been devised by Mr. H. Rickinson, and is illus¬ trated herewith. Fig. i represents an original sketch which it is desired to repro¬ duce at the other end of the telegraph line. The drawing is crossed with equidistant lines forming squares, by means of which any point in the sketch can be localised. The squares are lettered and numbered, as shown, and the proper letters and numbers are telegraphed for every important point in the delineation. When the points are all plotted on a corresponding sheet, the out¬ lines are filled in, and the pic¬ ture is shaded according to the directions verbally telegraphed. Fig. 2 exhibits the final stage in the process. The scene is a view of Whitby Harbour. In time of war, or as a means of detecting criminals, this de¬ vice might prove of service. Cutting Stout Thread. Those persons who have to work much with stout thread How to keep up Bedroom Fires. The following method of keeping up bedroom fires through the day and night with little trouble and at small cost has been found very successful. The fire should be made up every night, at nine or ten o’clock, by placing four or five pounds of coal evenly on the top of it ; over this about seven pounds of very small coal, or coal-dust, should be spread ; and over the whole about four pounds of fine coal-ash should be strewed, and patted PICTURES BY TELEGRAPH. — FIG. 2.

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The Gatherer. 382 flat with the shovel. Such a fire will burn all through the night without any attention, and in the morning the resulting cake of ash and coal-dust can be broken up, producing a bright blaze. The addition of a little fresh coal, with a light strewing of ashes on the sur¬ face, will keep the fire in throughout the day. It is calculated that by this method fourteen pounds of house coal and seven pounds of coal-dust, or pit screenings, will keep a large bedroom at an average temperature of 58*^ for twenty-four hours. Another advantage is that almost smokeless fires result, since the layer of super-imposed ashes appears to filter the smoke which passes through it, retaining all the particles of solid carbon. A Wood-Wool Machine. “Wool” made from wood is now much used for packing purposes by glass-makers, cutlers, and con¬ fectioners. It is clean and diy, besides having a good spring or resilience. The machine which we illus¬ trate is designed to make this wool from waste wood, and is intended for private use. It requires very little attention, and all the parts can be renewed. A Bee and Forage Plant. The Phacelia tanacetifolia is a honey plant very common in California, where it is much frequented by bees, besides serving as fodder for cattle. It bears a blue flower about eight weeks after sowing, and grows to a height of about two feet. Trials of the plant by beekeepers have been made in Germany, and it is found that cattle readily eat it, roots and all, whether green or dried. If used as green fodder, this should be done before it flowers, and the portions of the crop reserved for the bees and for seed-grain may be utilised as dry fodder afterwards. Coal in Kent. It is over thirty years since Godwin Austen, the geologist, pointed out the probability of there being coal-beds in the South of England. Mr. Francis Brady, the engineer-in -chief of the South-Eastern Railway and Channel Tunnel Companies, has, as everyone knows, at length verified this prediction by boring in. the neighbourhood of Shakespeare’s Cliff, Dover. The coal has been struck at a depth of 1,180 feet, after the boring tool had passed through 20 feet of clay, grits, and blackish shales resembling those found in the Somerset coal-fields. The shale-beds are horizontal, a fact which will facilitate the working of the coal- seams. An Asbestos Balloon. It has hitherto been supposed that the Montgolfier balloon, which, as is well known, is inflated with heated air, is unsuitable for tropical countries ; but Mr. Percival Frost recently made a successful ascent with one at Secunderabad in India. The balloon is rendered uninflammable by asbestos, and was inflated by burning methylated spirits inside. The aeronaut descended from it in safety by means of a parachute. A balloon voyage over the top of the flowering forests of the Himalayas is, perhaps, one of the trips of the future. A Fire-Escape Belt. The figures illustrate a simple fire-escape, which is- utilised as shown. It consists of a stout leather belt, which goes round the body under the arms, and is suspended from a ring by three straps. This support is allowed to descend to the ground by means of a rope, at the will of the occupant. The rope is fast* ened to the burning house through a pulley-block and chain, which is secured to an eye-bolt perma¬ nently fixed under the sill of a window, inside. The friction of the rope, running through the eyelet of the V

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The Gatherer. 583-. belt, acts as a brake, and by inclining the rope this can be so controlled as to stop the descent at any point. It can be used by women and child¬ ren, the belt making them se¬ cure. If through excitement the grip on the rope be lost, it can easily be recovered, as it runs alongside. Moreover, the occupant can descend at any angle to the burning house, if someone takes hold of the lower end, and keeps it on the slant. Immediately one person is lowered, the escape can be hoisted to fetch another. The Titanotherium. Our illustration represents the skeleton of a Titanoihe^'iuin robusium, an extinct monster allied to the rhinoceros, whose bones are found in the Brontotherium beds of the Miocene formation in Dakota. A finely executed model of the skull of this animal has been presented to the British Museum by Professor O. C. Marsh, of New Haven, United States. The titanotherium seems to have been about the size of the existing elephant, and its skull differs from that of the rhinoceros in having two large processes of solid bone projecting over the nose above each nostril. In the rhinoceros there is one, and sometimes two horns above the snout, but placed one behind the other, and having no bony connection with the skull itself The processes of the titanotherium were probably sheathed in horn. A Non-Magnetic Alloy. Dr. J. Hopkinson, F.R.S., has announced the formation of a nickel-steel which, like manganese- steel, is practically non-magnetic, although all the ingredients are strongly magnetic. The new steel contains 24-5 per cent, of nickel, and 0-85 per cent, of manganese, and its magnetic permeability or power of being magnetised is represented by the low figure 1*4, whereas pure steel runs up to many thousands. Folding Furniture. Furniture which folds up for transport, and passage through doors, is one of the latest American novelties. Our engravings show a table which is made on this- plan : the table being in two parts, the top and legs. The top is made in two leaves that are hinged to¬ gether in such a way as to fold in the manner shown. The furniture is a contrivance of Mr. Zeffro Massa,. and is partly of wood, partly of iron. China Clay, The porcelain clays of China differ from those of Europe in containing a large percentage of white mica, or, as it is called, “muscovite.^’ According to a recent analysis of M. Georges Vogt, the “yeou- ko’^ clay, a fusible sort, used for glaze, consists of 52*9 parts of quartz, 31*3 parts of muscovite, 13*4 of soda felspar, 2 of carbonate of lime, and i of hydrated silica. Petun-tse clay contains no less than 40*6 per cent, of muscovite, which, indeed, is a com¬ mon ingredient of the soil in the Flowery Land. Its presence in porcelain clays evidently helps to account for their translucency. Wattle-Bark for Tanning. A recent United States consular report of Mr. Merry points out that the bark of the Australian, wattle-tree is an excellent substitute for oak-bark tan¬ ning. There are two varieties of the tree, which belongs to the family of acacias, namely, the black and the broad-leaved wattle, both of which flourish on a poor soil in a dry climate. Hides can be tanned in 47 days- by the black wattle-bark, which contains from 30 to 32 per cent, of tannic acid. The broad-leaved wattle-bark contains from 26 to 28 per cent, of this tanning prin¬ ciple. The latter variety has a little less of the tannin, but it is a finer tree than the black wattle, and can withstand a higher degree of frost.

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384 The Gatherer. A “Wimbledon Meeting” at Home. Corporal T. E. C. Green, of Exeter, has hit upon the happy idea of adapting the scores and termin¬ ology of the National Rifle Association Meeting to a parlour game, played by means of a pack of cards, which is published by Mr. James Townsend, of Exeter. The game is very readily lea>rned, and pro¬ mises to aflbrd plenty of amusement both for young and old. A Handy Revolving Book-Case. No doubt many of our readers possess the complete set of two hundred and eight volumes that have been issued in Cassell’s National Library, and will be glad to hear of a case, specially made to hold them all in such a way that they shall always be readily accessible and available for use. Our illustration shows the case, which is made to revolve, and is provided on each of its four faces with an alphabetical list of the volumes to be found on the adjoining shelves. As our illustra¬ tion suggests, the top of the case may well be used for a lamp-stand, or for similar purposes. For Wives and Mothers. A veritable encyclopaedia of household lore is Cassell’s “ Book of the Household,” of which the second volume is now before us, and may well be commended to wives and mothers. Such divers subjects as home dressmaking, cookery, the manage¬ ment of income and domestic book-keeping, the arrangement of the garden, spring cleaning, and home surgery and medicine, to say nothing of chapters on etiquette and entertainments, will be found here dealt with in a practical and direct manner. There are hints in the volume that could only be of service to those with large houses and corresponding incomes ; but, on the other hand, those who are not so fortu¬ nately situated may glean from almost any page of the volume many a wrinkle as to how their home may be made brighter and more comfortable. There is in the volume one very useful chapter on weddings, and wedding-presents are naturally dealt with under this head. It would be difficult to select a more useful present for a young bride than this work itself. A Book for Gardeners. We have heard much of recent years, and more especially in the South of England, about the advis¬ ability, or the reverse, of fruit-farming. Possibly that accounts for the increased interest in the subject. Not farmers alone, but all those who possess gardens, and especially those who have an orchard, large or small, should gladly welcome a little booklet recently issued by Messrs. Eyre and Spottiswoode, under the title of “Our Hardy Fruits.” It is written by Mr. Brian Wynne, F.R.H.S., and gives practical hints, not only on the selection and cultivation of the fruit-trees and shrubs that are suited to our climate, but deals further with the insect enemies to which our fruit-trees are particularly subject. Eggs and Egg-Collecting. It is satisfactory to know that in the preface to “ Birds’-Nests, Eggs and Egg-Collecting” (Cassell) Mr. R. Kearton expressly declares that his book ‘‘ is in no way intended to encourage the wholesale and useless collecting of birds’ eggs, which simply means the destruction of one of the greatest charms of county life, but is intended to convey a better know¬ ledge and thus a higher appreciation of the beauty and poetry of bird-life.” Mr. Kearton’s acquaintance with his subject was gathered, we believe, principally in the “ county of broad acres,” where he had many oppor¬ tunities of studying, which he has turned to good account. We are sure that no one could deprecate more strongly than our author the wanton and cruel emptying of the nests of our woodland and hedge-row songsters that used to be so common. Doubtless, if the study of bird-life is to be continued on practical lines, it will still be necessary to make collections of the eggs, and Mr. Kearton shows how this may be done without cruelty to the birds. In the preservation and classification of specimens Mr. Kearton’s book and its beautifully coloured plates should serve as a vade viecuin; indeed, the plates are so good and so full, that we are almost led to hope that in many cases they will serve the purpose, with naturalists, of the eggs they so faithfully represent.

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385 WOMANLIKE. By the Author of “A Man of the Name of John,” “King or Protector?” &c. &c. “ Womanlike, taking revenge too deep for a transient wrong.” CHAPTER THE FIRST. E Mortimers had been giving a very successful evening party. Their parties were always con¬ sidered successful, but on this occasion they had made it go off even better than usual. Alice, the eldest daughter, had de¬ vised a new plan of arranging and deco¬ rating the room, which had given great satis¬ faction; and Bertha, the musical one, had arranged the music most judiciously, while setting her mother free to entertain her guests with a quiet mind. It was a pleasant house to visit at, people always said. Everyone felt welcome there, no one was ever neglected, and there was a general air of pros¬ perity about the house that was very conducive to social success. Mrs. Mortimer felt proud of herself and her daughters, as she stood in the rapidly emptying room discussing the events of the evening with a few inti¬ mate friends. She had been complimented on Alice’s looks and Bertha’s music, and assured that little Dickie’s violin solo gave signs of great promise. Two or three new sets of acquaintance had come to-night for the first time — people whom she had been wanting to know for some time — and they had parted on most friendly terms. She felt that the evening had been a decided step in the social scale. “ We have fairly made our mark in the musical set now,” she thought to herself. “ And if Alice is mar¬ ried by ne.Kt season the other girls will really have a fair chance at last.” Alice came slowly back into the long, empty rooms, from saying “ Good-bye ” to some special friends. She was a pretty girl, with fair brown hair, a delicate complexion, and refined features. She looked pleased and excited, and the flush on her cheek was very be¬ coming as she moved up the room with her soft, primrose-coloured gown trailing behind her, humming a phrase from the last song of the evening as she went. Two young men were watching her eagerly as she approached the piano. One was a neat, dapper little man, with a black moustache carefully waxed, who had been in close attendance on her all the evening, and now looked on with a superior smile, while a young fellow at least six inches taller than himself promptly began tq help her in collecting and' sorting the music. “Alice, I have something I want to say to you,” he said, in a low voice, while he handed her a book of songs. “ Stay up with me when the others go down to supper, will you ? ” Alice nodded and laughed. She and Roger had been friends from babyhood, and he always told her all his secrets. Probably it was some story about the bank that he wanted to tell her to-night ; or, perhaps, as he looked so very radiant, he had had a promise that his salary should be raised at Christmas. Presently there was a general movement in the room, and gradually everyone straggled downwards except a little girl, a picturesque child of twelve, who came eagerly up to her sister. “ Mother said I was to go to bed, Alice,” she said coaxingly. “But I may stay and talk to you and Roger for a little, mayn’t I ? ” “Not to-night, Dickie,” said Roger good-humour¬ edly. “ I want to talk to Alice myself particularly. Look here— if you’ll go off like a good child, I will bring you a large box of chocolates next time I come.” Dickie looked most unwilling. “Are you going to talk secrets.^” she asked, putting her head on one side with the air which, together with her bright eyes and colour, had gained her the nickname of “ Dickie bird.” “ Yes, we are going to talk secrets,” answered Roger promptly, while Alice stroked the child’s dark hair, laughing. “ Will you bring a very big box ?” “ Huge ! ” answered Roger, shamelessly corrupting her morals by bribery ; “ chocolate creams, too ! ” “Very well,” said Dickie,. sighing ; “then I will say ‘ Good night.’ ” Half-way to the door she paused. “ You needn’t mind about the chocolates, Roger,” she said, in her clear, childish voice : “ I am not going for them, but because I like you.” “ How like Dickie ! ” said Roger, laughing, as the door closed behind her. “ Yes, wasn’t it said Alice. “ She is a dear child, but she is very childish for her age, I think.” “ All the better,” said Roger ; “ I like children. Shall I turn some of these lamps out, Alice ? ” “ Yes, do,” said Alice, moving to a sofa and be¬ ginning to unbutton her long gloves. “ How tired I am ! But I think the party was a success.” Roger went to and fro, putting out the lamps and candles. He was evidently accustomed to be made use of in this house. Alice sat watching him idly, and waiting to hear what he had to say. “ Well,” he said at last, as he came back and threw himself down by her side, “ now, do you want to hear my news ?” 745

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Womanlike. 386 He had left a lamp burning just behind her, that threw into relief the outline of her graceful figure, and just tipped with deeper colours the cluster of yellow and brown chrysanthemums that she wore as a shoul¬ der knot. She made a pretty, harmonious picture as the light brought out the golden tints of her hair and caught the gleam of the Indian necklace round her throat. To Roger she was a vision of beauty, an angel — in short, the girl he loved, and had loved ever since he could remember. He was a fine-looking fellow, with fair hair, true blue eyes, and a face that was wonderfully simple and boyish for his five-and-twenty years. He had a happy disposition, that enabled him to make light of the worries and anxieties of life, and, though he declared he detested his position as bank clerk with ^150 a year, he made such fun of it that most people thought the detestation feigned. Still, life held something more than careless content with its scantiest gifts for a man with such a mouth and jaw as Roger Haughton’s. Like most things that are worth developing, he was slow of development ; but dissatisfaction with the present was beginning to work already, and bringing out new traits in his character that he scarcely knew he possessed. I suppose you are going to have your salary raised for being a good boy ? said Alice, as she toyed with her fan, his gift. ‘‘ Not a bit of it ! Besides, what is the use of rais¬ ing one’s screw ten pounds a year ? 1 shall be ninety before I can set up house, at that rate,” returned Roger, laughing. “No, I will tell you something far more thrilling than that. Do you remember Ainslie, an old Winchester chum of mine ? ” “ I remember his name very well,” answered Alice. “ He went to Ceylon to plant tea.” “ Exactly. And he has planted it to such purpose that he has come home to look for a partner to help him in the business and put some capital into it. He wants a man with a couple of thousand pounds who will go out with him, and eventually take charge of the plantations, while he comes home to work the sales of tea here.” “ I should think anyone would be glad to join him,” said Alice. “ Ceylon is a very healthy climate in parts. I should rather like to go there.” Roger sat up suddenly very straight. “ / want to go there, Alice,” he said. Alice gazed at him in amazement. “ You, Roger ? ” she cried. “ Yes, I ! I am thoroughly sick of the bank and the office stool, and being kept there till one o’clock in the morning because some fellow has forgotten to enter a halfpenny ! I hate the life ! I detest top hats, and black coats, and omnibuses, and everything con¬ nected with the City,” cried Roger, stretching his long limbs. “ I didn’t know how much I hated it till I got a chance of freedom. I can’t go back to it. I’ve made up my mind to one thing: if I don’t go to Ceylon, I’ll go somewhere else, but back to that hateful bank I will not go ! ” said Roger, with deter¬ mination. Alice was completely taken aback at this new view of Roger’s character. Roger talking of throwing up his post — steady-going old Roger ! She felt very much as if her well-brought-up sisters had suddenly defied their governess. “But, Roger, how can you possibly go to Ceylon she said. “You have not got two thousand pounds.” “No, I haven’t,” said Roger ruefully ; “ I wish I had. But I mean to try and borrow it,” he added more hopefully. “ Who from ?” demanded Alice. Both his parents were dead, and as far as she knew he had no rela¬ tions. “ From an old aunt of mine who used to stay with us years ago, and tipped me occasionally in the good old days,” he answered. “ She was my father’s aunt, and rather a queer-tempered woman, but she is rich, I know, and surely she won’t refuse to lend me the money ? I shall offer her good interest* of course ; and I have been into the whole thing carefully : it is as safe as the Bank of England. Simply as a matter of business she ought to be grateful to me for investing her money so well.” “ What do you suppose that you will get out there, Roger ? ” asked Alice meditatively. “He guarantees me four hundred pounds the first year, and when the new plantation he wants to buy begins to pay I shall get a great deal more. Oh, it is a splendid chance! I shall never get such another 1 ” cried Roger. “ And Ainslie wants me to go out with him. He will do everything he can to make things easy if I can only get the money.” “ Do you know, Roger, I can’t quite believe it all,” said Alice, looking at him frankly. “It is so unlike you to come out with these sudden new ideas. Just think how we shall miss you if you go 1 ” “ Shall you ? ” said Roger eagerly. “ Shall you miss me yourself, Alice ? ” “ Why, of course I shall,” she answered, laughing. “ Then won’t you come with me ? ” said Roger quickly. “ There ! I know I ought not to have said it,” as Alice started in surprise. “ I expect your mother will be annoyed with me. But you know, Alice, 1 have cared for you all my life, and I could not go away to Ceylon without telling you so. I meant to have waited till all this was quite settled, but I could not bear to see that little ape Hunt dancing attendance on you all the evening, and I felt I must speak first. Alice, if all goes well, and I make you a home in Ceylon that is fit for you to go to, will you go out with me if I come home and fetch you ? ” His whole soul was in his words as he pleaded ; he leant forward and took her hand in his, and waited eagerly for her reply. Alice was strangely confused and embarrassed. She had known well enough for a long time that Roger loved her, but she had put the knowledge from her, because she knew also that the faintest hint of such a thing to her parents would banish him from the house. And now she was suddenly called upon not only to entertain the idea, but to respond to it without a moment’s warning.

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Womanlike. 387 “Roger, I don’t know what * may say,” she fal¬ tered slowly. “ I would go with you willingly — I can’t quite imagine life without you, Roger ! ” she broke out, her natural feeling finding vent, in spite of herself. “ Oh, I should like to go abroad so much, and with you, Roger ! But I don’t know what mother will say— whether she would listen to it.” “It is a very good prospect, really,” he answered eagerly. “And if only I thought you were coming out to me, Alice, I know everything \vould go right. You are such lucky people. Everything you touch always prospers. Tell me you care for me, dear, tell rne to succeed for you, and I know I shall get the money, and be a rich man in time.” She could not resist his voice and looks. This pleading manly lover was a very different man from her old playfellow, and one far more attractive. She felt in the ardour of the moment that she could pro¬ mise anything, bear anything, for his sake. They might have to wait, but a long engagement even seemed a mere trifle to-night, and Roger was sure it would not be a long one. He painted their future in glowing colours, and she listened and believed, her prudent suspicions lulled to rest. Many had been their confidential talks on that old sofa ; this was the sweetest, the happiest — and the last ! There came a fumbling at the door-handle at last, and May Mortimer came timidly in. “ Mother sent me to say you were to come down to supper, Alice,” she said rather reproachfully. “She is very tired; and Mr. Hunt won’t go, and - ” “ Oh, all right, May ! ” said Roger impatiently ; and May fled. “ Then to-morrow I go down to see my aunt,” he said to Alice as they rose. “And on Thursday I will come and tell you the result. You will tell your mother everything I have told you to-night ? ” “Yes, I will,” said Alice fervently. “ Oh, Roger, I hope she will listen to us ! I know she is so fond of Leonard Hunt.” “ Oh, hang poor Hunt ! ” said Roger, with good-, natured contempt. “ Alice, I cannot imagine what you were thinking of to-night,” said Mrs. Mortimer severely, detaining her daughter in her own room for a few last words that evening. “ You made yourself so conspicuous with Roger that Mr. Hunt was quite annoyed. It must not happen again.” “ Oh, mother dear, I am so sorry ! ” said Alice gently. “ He had so much to say to me.” Mrs. Mortimer glanced at her daughter’s face, and jumped to a conclusion in a moment. Here was a blow to her plans ! What could be more annoying ? However, she said kindly enough— “ What has he been saying ? Tell me all about it, my child.” So Alice told all, making the most of Roger’s prospects, and dwelling little, poor girl, on her own feeling for him. Mrs. Mortimer looked grave when all was said. “ I do not think that Roger should have spoken to you to-night,” she said slowly. “ His affairs are in too unsettled a state to justify him in doing so. Of course, if all goes well, and his prospects are what he represents them to be, since your heart seems set on it, we should not prevent your going to Ceylon. But 1 need not tell you how much I should have preferred Mr. Hunt as a son-in-law.” Alice sighed. “ 1 like him well enough, but he is not Roger,” she said. “ I wish you could have liked him best. But you must promise me, Alice, that if Roger’s hopes are disappointed, you will not throw over Mr. Hunt in a fit of pique. I do not ask you to accept him at once, but I leave you to consider whether it would be right to refuse such a home as he can offer because you cannot gratify your first fancy.” Alice shivered a little ; the words fell on her as something physically cold and hard. “ Good night, mother ; I am very tirod,” she said wearily, and went slowly away. “ Poor child ! How dreadfully unfortunate ! ” thought the mother, left behind. “ I would give any¬ thing that this had not happened. It is too bad of Roger. If he had not spoken she would never have suspected that she cared for him. I hope he won’t get that money ; then, if I give a hint to Mr. Hunt to be patient, everything will go well, after all.” I CHAPTER THE SECOND. The November rain was falling fast, as Roger Haugh- ton journeyed slowly in a rickety, rattling, station-fly through the muddy streets of Slowborough. The station itself lay in a new suburb, a barren desert of bricks and mortar, that had not prepossessed him in its favour, but even that was cheerful compared to the gloomy street of old-fashioned houses along which he was now' driving. It was almost dusk, though the fact was hardly perceptible, so thickly did the heavy grey clouds veil the sky, and the small paned windows were already closely shuttered, lest a gleam of fire or light should cheer the passers-by. Everything looked grey and dull and dead, as though the little town had fallen asleep till winter should be over. Roger looked; about him undepressed, and almost amused at his first experience of the Midlands. What an awful hole to live in ! he thought, with good-natured pity, and wondered what kind of people could pos¬ sibly live here, as he contrasted his surroundings with a mental vision of that Eastern home to which he hoped soon to take Alice. They stopped at last before a severe-looking house, half covered with dripping ivy, having two windows on each side of the door and five windows above. It stood a little back from the pavement, behind a low wall surmounted by high iron railings, and a flagged path led between two patches of rank grass from the grim gate to the front door-step. The flyman got down and pulled the bell, while Roger sat waiting with a little shudder. What a damp, mildewy place, highly suggestive of rheuma¬ tism and the blues ! He began to be afraid that it

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Womanlike. 388 might not improve his aunt’s temper. An austere- looking female answered the bell, and marched down in the rain to unlock the gate, retreating silently to the doorway again. Roger paid the flyman, took up his Gladstone bag, and entered the house with a feel¬ ing of adventure that was almost exciting. The woman shut the door, a proceeding which reduced them to almost total darkness, and then for the first time spoke in a stiff, starched voice. “ This way, sir. Miss Haughton expects you,” she said, as she opened a door to the right, and admitted a feeble glow of light into the hall. Roger stepped through the open doorway with a feeling of intense curiosity. He had but a vague re¬ membrance of his great-aunt, and her gloomy sur¬ roundings led him to expect someone of an unusual, or even original, type. The room he entered was but dimly lit by two can¬ dles on the mantel-piece, and the small fire that lin¬ gered, rather than burned, in the grate. Yet he could distinguish that it was one of those old-fashioned drawing-rooms that are now rarely to be seen. There was the large round table, with its piles of unread books and a stereoscope and slides, the tall glass cases on side tables, and the chairs set in rigid pat¬ tern, that most of us have seen in our youth. A straight high-backed sofa, covered with a striped chintz and crochet antimacassars, was drawn up at right angles to the fire, and in one corner of it sat bolt upright a little old woman wrapped in shawls, with keen bright eyes that glittered in the firelight. To Roger’s fancy the nutcracker nose and jaw and shining eyes, in that dim shadowy room, might have belonged to some old witch luring him into an un¬ canny cave. But he shook off the impression with a smile at his own absurdity, and advanced up the room with outstretched hand. “ How do you do. Aunt Maria ? ” he said, his cheer¬ ful manly voice sounding strange in the dismal still¬ ness. “ I hope you are quite well ? ” ‘‘ So you are Roger ? ” said the old lady, in a sharp thin voice, holding out a skinny hand. “ It is a long time since I saw you last.” “ Oh, I remember you very well. Aunt Maria,” said Roger in his hearty way, as he drew a chair forward with an ease of manner that seemed almost presump¬ tion in this stiff, formal room. “ You were very kind to me when I w^as a little chap, and you used to come and stay with us in Harley Street.^’ ^‘That was a long time ago,” said the old lady briefly, and fixing him with her piercing glance. “You are not a bit like your father, Roger.” “ So 1 am always told,” he returned. “ And a good thing, too. Your father was the most extravagant man 1 ever met ; it is to be hoped you don’t take after him,” she said severely. The accusation was true enough. If Roger Haugh¬ ton the elder had not invariably lived up to, if not beyond, his income, his son would have been in a better position now. But, like many other extravagant people, he had been kind-hearted and indulgent, and Roger w^ould not hear him found fault wfith. “ He w^as my father, and he is dead, i\unt Maria,” he said with spirit. “ We will speak good, or nothing, of him, if you please.” Perhaps the old lady rather enjoyed the unusual sensation of being opposed. At ail events, she took the remark in good part. “Well, well! tell me all about yourself, boy,” she said. “ But mind ” — shaking a long forefinger at him — “not a word about business ! I know wdiat young men’s business is : it means borrowing money. So not a word of that till to-morrow, if you please.” Roger was rather entertained by her shrewdness, but he set himself to humour her, telling her all he could about himself — which was a great deal more than he guessed — and endeavouring to convey an im¬ pression of his own steadiness and business capacity. It was a curious scene : the stiff, old-fashioned room, with its feeble illumination, and its little old mistress in her corner, with her hag-like face, and wondrous cap that cast such strange shadows on the wall behind. And opposite to her the tall broad- shouldered young man on his spindle-legged chair, who looked so thoroughly out of keeping with his surroundings, and as if he could have nothing in com¬ mon with her. There was no extravagance permitted in this house¬ hold, evidently, he reflected, as time crept on. The fire burnt lower and lower, but the old lady would not have it made up. She drew her shawls more closely round her, for it was decidedly chilly, but she would have no more coal consumed than was absolutely necessary to keep the fire alight. Roger was cold and hungry, for he had hurried off after a scanty lunch, but five o’clock tea seemed to be unknown in this establishment. His thoughts turned involuntarily to the cheerful drawing-room in Crom¬ well Road, where he knew a cosy party would be assembling just at this time, after their afternoon walk. A little discomfort was well worth enduring for Alice’s sake. Some day she would make tea for him in her own drawing-room, and they would laugh together over this odd experience. “ We dine at six,” his aunt suddenly remarked, as the old clock with Arabic figures rang out the quarters. “ If you will ring the bell, Dawson shall show you to your room. We don’t dress here.” Roger could not help rejoicing at the prospect of food, however unfashionable the hour. He was quite awake to the ludicrous side of everything as he crossed the hall, and ascended a narrow staircase behind the austere Dawson, who carried a candle in dignified silence. What an amusing story it would all make for Alice to-morrow ! At the head of the stairs Dawson pushed open a door, handed him the candlestick, and turned away without a word. Roger entered his room, and putting down his candle, threw himself on to a chair, and putting both hands in his pockets, burst into a fit of laughter. His gay laugh echoed through the room with an almost mournful sound. It was so long since the old walls had heard anything so cheerful that they had lost the power of responding to it.

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Womanlike. 389 “ Well, this is the coolest reception I ever met with, upon my word ! ” said Roger half aloud. “ I am starving, and half frozen, and completely ne¬ glected. Oh, Alice ! what sufferings I endure for thy sake ! ” He sprang up and began to unpack his bag, whis¬ tling as he did so, and surveying the room at intervals. It had a general aspect of white dimity and highly polished, but scanty, furniture, which was distinctly chilling in the rays of his solitary candle. Presently Roger went back to his room to wait again, rather cold and cross. Even the drawing-room was better than this. “ I hope I have not kept Miss Haughton wait¬ ing?’’ he said in a reproachful voice to Dawson, when she brought him some hot water a few minutes later. “ Miss Haughton goes to bed at six o’clock, sir,’' answered Dawson severely, for she thought him sin¬ fully luxurious. “ Miss Elizabeth will dine with you.” "‘do you want to hear my news?’” (/. 385). he discovered that they had forgotten to bring him any hot water. ‘‘Another little point in my dear aunt’s warm welcome ! ” he said to himself as he seized the long embroidered bell-pull. He pulled in vain : there was no reply. Twice again he tugged at the bell-rope, and then he became con¬ vinced that the crank at the top did not work. In comic despair he opened his door and looked down the*corridor. To his joy a maid was approaching, with a candle in her hand. “ Could you get me some hot water ? ” asked Roger hastily. “ I have rung my bell three times, and cannot get an answer.” The girl started violently, and blushed a vivid scarlet. She was a dowdy-looking young person in a plain brown gown and black apron, carrying a large work-basket. “ I — I think the bell in that room is broken ; I will see that you have some hot water,” she said in an odd confused voice, and passed on quickly. “Miss Elizabeth? Who on earth can she be?” thought Roger to himself as he hastily completed his toilet. “ Some relation of my aunt's, I suppose. Good gracious — suppose that were she I met just now ! But no, that girl could not be a lady.” Still he felt an uneasy qualm at the thought of the dowdy girl in brown as he turned the handle of the drawing-room door and walked boldly in. To his great relief he thought for a moment that the room was empty. Then a kneeling figure, who had been spread¬ ing her hands over the dying embers, rose quickly, and the supposed servant-maid stood before him, shy and awkward. “ How do you do ? ” said Roger heartily, taking the bull by the horns. “ I am afraid you must have thought me very rude just now, but the tact is I was getting quite impatient, and was only too delighted to see someone to pounce upon.” The girl muttered something about its not matter¬ ing, and subsided quickly on to the sofa.

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390 W OMANLIKE. “ The fire is nearly out ; shall I make it up ? ’’ asked Roger, looking for the coal-scuttle. “ Oh, no ; pray don’t ! ” said the girl in evident alarm. “No one sits here in the evening ; the fire always goes out.” “ But you are as cold as ice,” said Roger, who still felt the touch of her frozen fingers. “ Oh ! it doesn’t matter ; I am used to it,” answered the girl in a low indifferent voice. Roger sat down and tried to make conversation. He felt sorry for the poor girl ; she had a forlorn air in spite of her extreme neatness, and her surroundings were such as to excite pity. He glanced at the little table by the sofa, where two serious-looking books bound in calf, and some coarse knitting, showed his aunt’s tastes, and then at the utter absence of elegance, or even comfort, in the room. What sort of life could this poor thing lead in such an atmosphere ? She seemed quite unaccustomed to entertaining young men, and when dinner was announced she took his arm with obvious embarrassment, and crossed the hall in silence. The dining-room looked a little more inviting. The fire was better, and the table was laid out with good solid old plate, though there was less light than was pleasant or cheering. But not even Roger’s spirits could hold out against the frugal dinner that followed, and the silence of his companion. No subject ap¬ peared to interest her, and all his efforts failed to elicit more than a dull “ Yes ” or “ No.” He came to the conclusion at last that she could have absolutely no mind, and must be quite content with her life, and at that point he began quite to dislike the pale plain face opposite to him. She was really very plain, with her dull brown hair, pale grey eyes, and rather heavy features. Her face was so utterly expressionless as to remind him of a Dutch doll : a resemblance which her style of wearing her hair plainly parted and brushed down each side, and the general awkwardness and angularity of her movements, suggested still more strongly when the idea had once occurred to him. Every moment that he looked at her she appeared to him more grotesque, and he could hardly keep from telling her so. Never was he more thank¬ ful than when she rose at last, after a good deal of nervous hesitation, and said in her monotonous voice : “It is seven o’clock now ; I must go and read to my aunt. Will you keep the fire up here as long as you like ? Good night,” and safely conveyed herself out of the room. Roger flung himself into an arm-chair and poked the fire vigorously. He did not quite like the look of things. Was his aunt poor, or was she merely an awful screw ? She did not live as if she had a couple of thousand pounds loose at her banker’s to lend to anyone. Suppose she refused his request ? Roger did not know how firmly he had built his castles in the air, till the idea of their foundation proving insecure turned him sick with fear. But it would never do to unnerve himself beforehand like this. All his life he had heard of her as his rich old aunt ; it must be merely eccentricity that made her live in this way. Roger made an effort to throw off the depression that had threatened him, and started up¬ stairs to fetch his pipe and a book, and the portrait of Alice that stood on his table, and smiled him the only welcome that the old house afforded. CHAPTER THE THIRD. Roger wore a very grave and business-like air next morning, when he was summoned into the old lady’s presence again. The light of a frosty sunshiny day had revealed to him very clearly the poverty of his aunt’s home. Everything in it, though marvellously clean and well kept, was shabby and old-fashioned to a degree that spoke plainly of her inability to replace worn-out furniture. The scanty breakfast— over which Elizabeth presided, plainer and dowdier than ever in her grey morning gown — showed that rigid economy prevailed in the housekeeping ; and in reply to his modest inquiry after a newspaper she informed him that they did not take one : it was too expensive. Roger strolled up to the station, to get a paper and learn something about the trains, in a very hopeless state of mind. It was evident that he had been com¬ pletely deceived ; his aunt was not rich, and probably it would be out of her power to lend him the sum he wanted. In that case, what would become of his cherished plans, of his whole future, in fact ? He would not think of it ; he clung desperately to his old impres¬ sion that his aunt had mone^. Perhaps after all she was merely stingy. He had such faith in the Mortimer luck that he felt convinced that, as it was Alice for whom he wanted to borrow, the loan would be effected somehow. Still it was with a sinking heart that he followed Dawson into the drawing-room, where his aunt sat in the corner of her sofa, just as he had seen her on the previous night. There was something very un¬ pleasing in her face as seen by the full light — it was so wrinkled and yellow, and wore an eager, almost cun¬ ning, expression that impressed him painfully. “ Well,” she began in a quick sharp tone, almost before he had had time to wish her good morning, “ and what is your business, Roger ? Tell me all about it.” Thus adjured, he proceeded to unfold it at length — doing his best to present his plans in their most favourable light. His aunt surprised him by the way in which she entered into it all, asking questions with a shrewd penetration, and making rapid calculations before he had time to explain them for himself. His hopes revived at the sight of her interest ; surely she w'ould not listen so attentively if the matter had nothing to do with her. “Hum!” she said doubtfully at last. “So you want me to lend you two thousand pounds without any security. It is a very large sum— a very large sum — and I don’t call five per cent, very good interest.” “ It is as high a rate as one can expect with reason¬ able safety,” said Roger, with outward calm.

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Womanlike. 391 Perhaps — perhaps/’ said the old lady, nodding her (head. “Well, Roger, I don’t mind telling you that I Jiad intended to remember you in my will, though I have very little to leave, for I am very poor — very poor indeed. You can see I am very poor, can’t you, my boy ? ” She leant forward and placed a skinny claw-like hand on his knee, while she looked up at him beseech¬ ingly, and spoke in a wheedling tone, such as one might use to a child. Her nephew, rather taken aback, could only answer that she appeared to be so. “ So I am,” she answered, sighing. “ A poor old woman ! Still, Roger, it will be a great sacrifice, but I will lend you the money.” Roger started with surprise at the unexpected con¬ clusion. In the joy of his sudden revulsion of feeling (he could have embraced his aunt on the spot. “ But on one condition,” she went on, pointing a lean finger at him. “ You have seen my niece Elizabeth ? — she is a distant connection of mine, but I call her my' niece. She is rather a care to me now that she is growing up, and I can’t provide for her, so I have thought of an excellent plan. I will lend you the Iwo thousand pounds, and leave it to you in my will, on condition that you promise to marry Elizabeth.” Roger fairly sprang up from his chair. “My dear aunt, you are joking ! ” he cried in amazement. “No, I am not,” she returned, moving her hands nervously. “ I don’t ask you to marry her now ; I only want you to give me a written promise that you will marry her some day.” Roger could hardly help laughing. “ But I am already half engaged to a girl in London, who will marry me if 1 go to Ceylon,” he explained. “ Half an engagement is no engagement,” said the xDld lady testily. “ Don’t be ridiculous, Roger.” He privately thought her ridiculous as he explained again and again that her proposal was quite impossible. “ Was Elizabeth herself to have no voice in the matter ? ” he asked, and was answered that Elizabeth would do as she was told. He began at last to doubt his aunt’s sanity, as she urged the scheme upon him, with her cracked old voice rising higher and higher, and her eyes glittering with passion, while her features worked with excitement. His only idea at last was to put an end to the scene as quickly as possible. “If there were not another girl in the world, I would not marry Elizabeth ! ” he exclaimed in impatient, yet decided tones, as he looked down at his aunt with contemptuous indignation. Her furious glance was fixed on him. Neither heard a timid touch on the door-handle, or saw the door gently open for a few inches and softly close again. His angry words died away, and a dead silence succeeded. “ Then if you came to me on your bended knees, and implored me for sixpence to save: you from beggary, I would not give it you ! ” screamed the old lady at last. “ I will never lend nor leave you a penny as long as I live ! ” Roger looked at her one moment with a sort of pitying repulsion. She was certainly mad, he thought. Then he strode out of the room without a word of farewell. Ten minutes later he was on his way to the station, too angry as yet to realise what had hap¬ pened. * # * * * About five o’clock on the afternoon of that same day Alice Mortimer sat idly dreaming in the firelight, waiting with happy expectation for Roger’s arrival. She had obtained a promise from her parents that, if all went well, they would not oppose her going ■ to Ceylon, and with the sanguine hope of youth she looked on her future as assured. Her mother and sisters were gone to an afternoon party, and she was sure of a peaceful hour or so with Roger when he should arrive. Tea was ready, for she was sure he would need it after his journey, but she would not have the lamps brought in to spoil the delicious hour of gloaming. So there she lounged in a softly cush¬ ioned chair, gazing into the fire, and thinking of the golden days to come. At last came the knock and ring that she knew well, and then — surely that slow heavy footfall on the stairs was not Roger’s? He always rushed up at a bound, too impatient often to let the servant precede him. Alice sprang to her feet with that sudden impulse that always makes us stand to receive bad tidings. Roger came slowly in. He noticed all in a moment : the air of preparation, his favourite chair drawn forward, the gown he liked her in best, his violets at her breast, and Alice’s face, half glad and half alarmed. He almost groaned as he crossed the wide dim room. Taking her hand in his, he stood on the hearthrug and gazed into her face with such sad, hungry eyes, that her own fell before him. “ What is it, Roger ? ” she faltered. “ I have failed,” he said, in a dull dead voice. “ She will not lend me the money.” “ Roger ! ” she cried, incredulous. “ Roger ! is there — is there no one else ? ” She hardly knew what she was saying. It was his manner rather than his words that impressed her so. “ No,” he said quietly ; “ there is no one else.” He let her hands fall, and sat down wearily in the chair she had placed near her own. “ Will you give me some tea, dear ? ” he said, in a more natural voice. “ I am dying of thirst.” Alice was busy at the tea-tray in a moment. This was more like Roger. The man who had looked so strange a moment ago had almost frightened her. Alice was no heroine ; the sense of an impending crisis alarmed rather than nerved her. She brought him the tea, and he drained the cup feverishly, but shook his head at the offer of food. “ Come and sit down, my darling,” he said gently, as he rose to lay down his cup. “ Let us talk it over just this once, and see if there is any hope.” There was something almost solemn in his tone. He seemed as though he felt privileged by misfortune for the time to say and do what would hitherto have been impossible to him.

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392 Womanlike. She sat down half trembling, and he took her hand, gazing into her face with a strange appealing look on his drawn white features. “ We must put the idea of Ceylon aside once for all,” he said. “ That is quite impossible. I am to blame that I spoke to you before my affairs were settled, but, since I have spoken, let us face matters just this once together. Alice, I love you with all my heart and soul. Do you love me ? ” Awed, and half frightened, she murmured, “ Yes.” “ If you did not, dear, here should be an end. I would go away, and never trouble you more. But since you do ! — Alice, I know I am very selfish, I ought not to wish to bind you, but I love you so, my darling ! Could we not wait for one another “ Wait ? ” said Alice gently. But for how long ? ” “ Ah ! ” he said despairingly. “ How long, indeed ? I ought not to have said anything to you. I ought to have borne the burden alone. But now, now that you know what I feel, and I know that your heart is mine, I cannot go back to the old life. These last two days have opened a gulf that divides the past from the present for ever. I could not bear to come and go as of old, and know you were beyond my reach ; it would try us both beyond all bearing.” “neither Alice shook her head sadly. “ No,” she said, “ things can never be the same again.” “ Never ! ” he said. ‘‘It must be one of two things now. Either we must agree to wait, and I will go and move heaven and earth to make money for you — or we must part ! ” “ But, Roger, surely you will go back to the bank now ? ” she said anxiously. “No, I told you I could not,” he answered. “In any case I could not do that. But I know a man who wants to find someone to go out to South America for him, and though he offers a high salary, the climate is so bad, and the risks so great, that so far he has not found anyone to suit him who will take the post. 1 shall offer myself, and I know he will be only too glad to have me.” “ But, Roger, what is the use ? Would there be any prospect for you out there ? ” she asked. “Who knows Men get strange chances in those foreign lands sometimes, and I should work — I should s/ave, if I thought there was any hope of your waiting for me at home,” he answered desperately. “ Will you wait, Alice? Do you love me as I love you, dear? — But, no ! What am I saying?” he broke off sud¬ denly. “ I have no right to suggest such an idea. I have nothing to offer you, no¬ thing ! I may be dead of fever in six months. How can I ask you to wait on such a chance as that ? ” He got up and paced restlessly about the room. Presently he came back, and leant against the mantelpiece, white as death. Alice had broken down, and was sob¬ bing quietly. “ Don’t cry, dear,” he said calmly, folding his arms reso¬ lutely, as though to overcome the temptation to take her in them. “ You make me feel such a brute to have made you cry. I had no business to come this after¬ noon. I ought to have written and so spared you. Your father will be angry with me, and justly so. I cannot go to Ceylon, I have nothing to offer you ; I had no right to trouble you like this. I am going out to South America as soon as possible, and you shall forget that I was ever anything more than your old friend.” “ I can’t do that !” sobbed Alice. “ I do care for you, Roger, I do, indeed ! But it is impos¬ sible for us to wait, quite impos¬ sible.” “ I know it,” he said ; “ forget what I said, dear. It was selfish of me to come.” She checked her sobs and sat upright. S.A.VV THE DOOR GENTLY OPEN FOR A FEW INCHES AND SOFTLY CLOSE _ AGAIN *’ (/. 391).

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Womanlike. 393 “It isn’t as if I were free,” she said sadly. “But, Roger, when mother promised that if all went well she would let me go to Ceylon, she made me promise that if you could not offer me a home I would — accept — Leonard Hunt, if he asked me.” The words dropped slowly from her lips, but with a steady intonation that sounded in his ears the death-knell of his hopes. There was a dead silence. “ I suppose she is quite right,” she went on slowly, at last. “ You know we are not nearly so rich as we seem. Mother makes a great show in society, on purpose to give us advantages, she says. We live up to our income ; if my father died to-morrow, we should have almost nothing.” “ 1 know it,” said Roger, in a muffled voice. “ And there are three of us out already, and Connie growing up,” continued Alice. “ I am nearly three- and-twenty, and I know the younger ones think it is very hard 1 should still be at home and spoil their fun. May grumbled the other day that she hadn’t her fair share of gaieties ; and it is true. Mother can’t bear bringing on the younger ones while Bertha and I are still here.” Roger had nothing to say. He saw too clearly what the end of it all would be. “If I were married,” said Alice, sighing, “it would lessen expenses, and be so good for May. Then there would be another home and chaperon for the girls, too ; and it would make such a difference to us all. I don’t wonder mother wants me to marry, Roger.” Something in the very force of her reasoning drove him into one more vain appeal. “ But you don’t care for Hunt, Alice ?” he said. “ Not as I do for you, Roger ; but he is desperately fond of me, and he would be kind to me, I know, and 1 like him very much,” said Alice, in self-defence. “ I don’t think it would be right of me to refuse him when everyone else wishes me to take him. It would be selfish to disappoint them all for the sake of my own feeling. Besides, I have promised,” she added. “ Oh, Roger ! if it had only been you who were rich ! But that is life all over : you can’t get what you want, you must want what you can get.” Her lover was faintly conscious that there was a hollow ring in her speech. Since he could not get what he wanted, he would have nothing. He was only dimly aware that his fate was settled, that Alice would never be his— she would be Leonard Hunt’s. Well, it was no more than many men had to bear, and yet - He looked round on the pretty room where he had spent so many happy hours, the dumb ornaments and furniture that had each for him a voice which called him back into a past that now seemed almost unreal. He looked at Alice, now sitting calm and pale with abstracted gaze, and his great love and bitter pain forced a last appeal from his lips. “ Oh, Alice ! Is it no use ?” he cried. “ No, Roger, it is no use,” she said, rising up. It was a hard moment, but she must be brave and play a prudent part. “It would be wrong in me to listen to you any more. You cannot offer me a home, and they would be angry with us if we wished for a long, hope¬ less engagement. It would not be fair to either of us. We must be brave, and part now. Some day we shall meet again — as friends.” The girl was faithful to her teaching ; love was right, but it must be guided by common sense. If she could have married the man she liked best, she would have been fortunate ; but since she could not, she must not let him stand between her and a comfort¬ able, in time a happy, home. He had a blind belief in her that nothing could shake. What she decided must be right, he knew. His love was different from hers because it was more selfish, thought the poor, humble fellow. He took her in his arms and kissed her as he might have kissed her had she lain dying. “ F or the last time,” he said brokenly. “ God bless you, my darling, and make you happy ! Forget me as soon as you can. If you should hear soon that I am dead of fever in that unhealthy climate, you will know that I was very glad to go ! ” A lump in her throat choked her, her tears blinded her. She felt he was taking the flowers from her dress; then he left her standing there. She stood quite motionless till the hot plash of a tear on her hand woke her to sudden consciousness. What was she doing ? She could not let him go thus ! She flew out of the room and called, “ Roger ! Roger ! ” but the heavy slamming of the front door drowned her voice. She rushed back and tore aside the blind in feverish eagerness ; she watched the tall figure pass the lamp in the street below ; and then she dropped on to the floor and wept as though her heart would break. “Alice! Why, what is this The room in dark¬ ness, and the fire nearly out 1 What is the matter, child ?” cried Mrs. Mortimer, as she entered the room an hour later. “ We are so late ; I thought you would be dressed for dinner. We met Mr. Leonard Hunt, and he is coming to dine with us.” Alice rose, a limp figure, with her pretty hair pushed awry from a pale face, from a sofa near at hand. “ Is he, mother? ” she said, in a set, strange voice ; “then, I think I will go to bed.” “To bed? Are you ill, my darling?” said her mother, in real alarm. “ My head aches,” answered Alice faintly, as she laid an ice-cold hand on her mother’s. “ Roger has been here, mother, and he is going away to South America.” “ My poor child ! ” said Mrs. Mortimer fondly. In her secret triumph she could afford a little out¬ ward generous sympathy. END OF CHAPTER THE THIRD.

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394 MR. SMITH AND HIS FRIENDS. HINK it is hardly necessary to inform the readers of Cas¬ sell’s Magazine who and what Ml*. Smith is.* He has gained many friends from its pages already, and has earned a notoriety in his own and other neighbourhoods which he receives with the calm complacency of conscious merit. The friends of his, how¬ ever, of whom I propose to write at the present time are of another order than these, being the four-footed com¬ panions with whom he has enjoyed so many breathless scampers across coun¬ try — in other words, the horses. I have heard it said, even by possessors and lovers of horses, that they have but little individuality of their own : that they are not either intelligent or affectionate to any marked degree, and that, save in matters of idiosyncracy of temper, one horse is very much like another. In answer to such a statement, I can only say that the reverse has always been our experience, and that I consider it a libel on their sensibility and discrimi¬ nation, which seem to me remarkably sound. It is my impression that if it were practicable to have horses about us as we have dogs, we should find them just as intelligent and companionable and affectionate. We have had many horses in our stable, but never one that would not, after a very short residence there, whinny at the sound of our voices in the yard, and stretch out a soft nose towards us for a bit of bread or sugar, or simply a caress, just as the case might be. I do not mean that there have been no marked differences in the manner in which it is safe to respond to such * Cassell’s Magazine, July, 1886, and October, 1887. advances, for some horses in their eagerness will grab with their teeth at anything oftered, or indulge in a little horse-play that may not be all play to the recipient, however good-temperedly proffered ; whilst others will be gentleness itself, so that a child might approach them without the least fear. But what I do maintain is that any horse whose temper has not been hopelessly spoiled in youth will respond to kindness and gentle handling, and repay it by a friend¬ liness in stable and a docility out, which are certain indications of intelligence and good sense. It is not an easy thing to get suited with horses, as everyone knows, especially when they are wanted for saddle work as well as harness. We made several changes before we could suit ourselves to our satisfaction, finally settling down with a black thoroughbred Arab, called Sultan, and a strong handsome chesnut, whom we called Crusader, but whose name was clipped by the groom to ’Sader, and ’Sader he remained. Sultan was never very strong, and was always thin, though blessed with an excellent appetite, which never failed ; but his paces were perfect, and his mouth the same, and it was quite a treat to ride him. He was timid on the roads, and, at first, would rear at the sight of a train or traction engine ; but he soon got over this nervousness, and the boldness of ’Sader in the midst of any amount of tumult gave him great confidence. ’Sader was more spirited than Sultan in many ways ; but his nerves were of iron, and we never could find the thing that he feared. He would cross a rail¬ way bridge under which two trains were passing, letting off steam, without so much as pricking his ears : and a traction engine he did not take the trouble to look at. I have never come across a more thoroughly good-tempered, dependable horse. He was never naughty, never fretful or sluggish, and the only way he ever vented his excess of spirit was by holding his head up very high and going off at a tremendous pace, though without the least disposition to bolt.

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N I Mr. Smith and his Friends. 395 It need hardly perhaps be said what great friends Smith and these horses always were. People used to think that his barking and pirouetting round them at the start must be an annoyance to them ; but on the contrary, they always liked it immensely after the first few times ; and if Smith was for any reason left at home, the horses quite missed him, and kept look¬ ing back and gazing all round in search of their faithful attendant. For one thing, they always had great confidence in his opinion. 1 remember noticing this particularly one day, when there had been a hard frost which had knocked off the riding for a time, and we had availed ourselves of the first thaw to take the horses out again. We came to a hill with a slope to the north which had not yet melted, and which lay before us like a sheet of ice. The horses, not unnaturally, pulled up, and looked rather dismayed ; we thought it probable that the appearance was worse than the reality, as the roads we had already traversed were quite soft, and we thought that the ice would most likely break and crumble under the horses’ feet. Still we did not wish to run any risk either for them or for ourselves, and were hesitating for a moment whether or not to proceed, when Smith, who had been running on ahead, now came trotting back, and seemed at once to enter into the difficulties of the situation. He, however, was decidedly of opinion that we ought to proceed, and, placing himself a yard or two in front of the horses, he began carefully descending the hill again, planting his feet firmly, and looking over his shoulder with an expression in his eyes and ears that said as plainly as any words could do: “Come along — cheer up! It isn’t half as bad as you think 1 ” And the horses, plucking up heart of grace, moved on of their own accord, and copying his movements closely, reached the foot of the hill quite safely : finding it just as he had said, not half so bad as it looked. Anything new in the stable arrangements always excites Smith intensely ; and I think that the climax of his jubilation was when he first saw the horses put in double harness. We had had Sultan and ’Sader a year or more before we attempted this, as it was some time before we had anything but a dog¬ cart to drive in ; but as they were the same height and we had often long distances to go, it seemed a pity not to put them together : and in the end we did. The arrival of a hooded phaeton and double har¬ ness had been quite interesting to Smith. He had tried all the seats of the carriage and watched the piecing together of the harness with an interest that equalled our own. But until the final moment came, when both the horses were put in, he did not realise the innovation that was about to be introduced ; and when he did so, his excitement knew no bounds. We had not much attention to give him, however, for it was rather exciting to ourselves, as we had no idea how the horses would behave. Sultan showed a disposition to perform his part on two legs, whilst ’Sader pranced and held his head as high as his martingale would allow, and both felt excessively surprised. Smith simply yelled with joy. It was in vain that the groom, standing up in the back seat, ordered him to “ go and lay down ” — as is his favourite phrase, of which Smith never takes the slightest notice — in vain that from time to time we shouted to him to be quiet. His excitement and pride at seeing his mistresses driving the two horses together could be quenched by nothing short of an order to go home, that we had not the heart to give when he was enjoy¬ ing himself with such aba7ido7i of happiness. Our trial trip was to Winchester, which is about eight miles distant. Smith generally barks at the start and for the first quarter of a mile along the road, and is then quiet, unless a horse canters or mis- THE TWO PLAYFELLOWS WERE MADLY CAREERING THE WHOLE LENGTH OF THE KITCHEN GARDEN ” (/. 398).

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Mr. Smith and his Friends. behaves in any way, or unless we pull up and start again, in which case he breaks out for a few minutes. But on this occasion he never stopped barking the whole way there ; and on the return journey he began again with renewed vigour, and barked for about four miles, when his voice gave out. It had been growing thin and hoarse for some time, but at last the strain was too much, and it collapsed. Smith, quite un¬ daunted, did his “ level best ” to keep up his clamour, but before we got home there really was not so much as a squeak left in him, and it was days before he could use his voice again to any purpose. It is most amusing to see Smith and the horses when the latter are turned out, as sometimes happens in the summer months, when we are going away. Very near our house is a nice pasture — one or two meadows, with a pond in one, and several dykes and ditches intersecting them. This pond is the joy of Smith’s heart in hot weather ; he goes there frequently, alone or in company, for a bath. But what amused us greatly was the fact that when ’Sader was first turned out he too made straight for the pond, and, after a few wild flourishes with his heels, went splashing in, and lay down and regularly rolled and wallowed in the shallow water. Smith's excite¬ ment was great. He rushed down to the water too, and began a regular game with his big playfellow, a game that looked rather dangerous to outsiders ; for though ’Sader’s feet were shoeless, he pawed at Smith with a vigour that might soon have brained him, only that he is so quick in his movements that no one can ever catch him unawares. When they had done their game in the pond, they careered about the field like a pair of wild things ; and we finally left them to their play, which was renewed daily with the same gusto. What is particularly engaging about Sultan and ’Sader when turned out is that they will always come to us when we visit them ; trotting right across the field as soon as they catch sight of us : not just to get anything we have brought and then go a\vay, but to stay with us to be petted and caressed. As for ’Sader, he will let me mount his slippery back and walk me round the field as good as gold. Both will follow like a pair of dogs as long as we stay, and attend us to the gate at our departure. ’Sader is always a leading spirit, and other horses or colts turned out in the same field regard him as a natural leader and king. Once when he was out and the man went dovvn with his daily feed of corn, no ’Sader was to be found in the fields, and he was half afraid he had been stolen, but a labourer from the adjoining farm came out to tell him that ’Sader was in their straw-yard. They had wanted to catch one of their own colts, but could not get near the creature, who did nothing but tear about with ’Sader. So at last they had “made bold” to put the halter on ’Sader and lead him off, whereupon all the colts had followed him to the yard like a pack of sheep. Sultan was not so amusing in the field, as he did not take baths, and was more given over to feeding, but he was always tame and gentle, and liked a romp with Smith. He was also a very elegant jumper, and would career with Smith over ditches and low hedges in a way that was very pretty to watch. Sultan also, though quite pleased to be barked at out of doors, drew the line at being lec¬ tured in his owm stable. We observed one day that Smith ap¬ peared to fight shy of Sultan’s box on our visits to the stable, and asked the reason. The man told us that a day or two before, when Sultan was standing “he ran round to sultan's head and began .ARGUING WITH HIM IN SHORT SHARP BARKS ” {p. 397)-

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Mr. Smith and his Friends. 397 ready harnessed with his box open, whilst ’Sader was being groomed down, Smith had come in, and had begun his barking and jumping before Sultan con¬ sidered that the right time had come, whereupon he ‘‘went for him,’’ and chased him round the stable, and gave him such a scare that he had been much more reticent of expressing his opinions since — in stable, at any rate. ’Sader is a horse with a decided sense of humour. He quite enjoys a little joke on his own account, and will pick your handkerchief out of your pocket if you happen not to be looking, and he sees a pro¬ truding end. He will also steal a stable duster and hide it in his manger, and then stand looking the picture of meek innocence whilst the groom hunts for it. Indeed, he generally be¬ trays himself by over - doing his part, and looking altogether too good and humble. When new peat moss is laid down in his box he loves to roll in it, but he knows that if he does so in his day-rug he is scolded for it, so the moment he hears the ap¬ proach of a foot¬ step, up he scrambles, and gets right away up to the corner of his box, where he stands with drooping head and most di^'gCLge air, and though he and his rug are stuck all over with bits of peat moss, he looks quite reproach¬ fully at anyone who scolds him, as much as to say, “ How ca7i you accuse me of having done anything wrong ? ” If, when we are riding. Smith finds a bone in the road and declines to move out of the way for the horses, Sultan steps over him, as most horses would do, but ’Sader must have his little joke, so he just puts a large forefoot under his middle and throws him to one side quite gently and humorously, as if it was part of a game. I have never seen any other horse do anything the least like this. Poor Sultan’s end, as far as we were concerned, was rather tragic. He was looking wretchedly thin one winter and spring, despite all the feeding up we gave him, and though he did not seem at all ill in himself, we were not satisfied about him, but hoped that it was only the coldness of the season, and that he would pick up when the warm weather came. We were riding as usual one cold March day, and canter¬ ing along a piece of sandy lane, when all in a moment, without the least warning, down went Sultan on his head as if he had been shot. I had just time to slip off — luckily I was not hurt or entangled in any way by his fall — before he gave a convulsive roll, and then lay perfectly unconscious, his eyes glazing as if he were dead — as for a few moments we thought he was. Smith’s wrath was extreme. For any horse of his to behave in such an unseemly manner raised his ire to boiling point. First he ran round to Sultan’s head, and began argu¬ ing with him in short sharp barks, the vehemence of which propelled him backwards at every utter¬ ance. Finding remonstrance un¬ availing, he ran round and nipped him in the flank, returning to his former position to see the effect of this method of persuasion, which he repeated three times before we realised what he was doing. After about five minutes, how¬ ever, during which we hardly expected to see him move again, Sultan began to come to, and after I had loosened all the straps I could get at, he struggled to his feet again, looking dazed and shaken. Luckily we were only two miles from home, and but half a mile from a friend’s house ; so to this stable poor Sultan was led, whilst ’Sader and his mistress went home with the news, and sent the groom to fetch the patient home. Of course, after such an experience, one felt that it would never do to mount the horse again, and we gave him away to a man who thought he might be able to cure him. He had one or two more fits, and then yielded to treatment, and was seen not long ago by our man, looking fat, sleek, and hearty, and making a desperate effort to get in at our gate, past which he was being taken ! ’Sader’s next companion was a chestnut mare, just his height and colour, but quite young and flighty in her mind, and only partially broken when we had her. She had very good paces and. a light mouth, but wanted a good deal of riding ; and we had to teach her all her harness work, as she had not had a collar on for a twelvemonth when we bought her, and all

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The Mistresses’ Union. 398 her breaking had been done in three weeks, a year before. ^Sader was simply invaluable at this time. The way he taught the mare her work, shouldered her round corners, pulled her past alarming sights, and made her keep straight and trot steadily, was a sight in itself to see. She simply adored him, and would make love to him so vehemently whenever they were pulled up that the man was quite ashamed of her. Phyllis is very gentle and engaging in her ways in stable, but not always so amenable on the roads, though she is very pretty, and has the making of an excellent horse in her. One day she gave us a good fright. We were sitting at lunch when the maid looked in with a scared face, to tell us that the new horse was running about the garden and could not be caught. Out we went at once, and out went Smith with us, unluckily, and the next moment the two play¬ fellows were madly careering the whole length of the kitchen garden to the tennis lawn at the extreme end, Phyllis kicking her heels, leaping the celery trenches, and disporting herself generally like a wild thing. She had escaped from the stable at the criti¬ cal moment when her rug and head-stall had been removed, and not a single piece of harness had been put on, and how to catch her was a puzzle. First Smith was ordered to his kennel, and reluctantly trotted off, but Phyllis did not at all see being de¬ prived of his company, and tore after him, capering and pawing, and sending our hearts into our mouths, for once or twice she seemed within an ace of dash¬ ing herself into one of the glass houses in her path. However she escaped doing herself an injury I really do not know, but she did get off with only a scratch or two, and by chasing Smith to the stable-yard, she enabled us to pen her in and catch her, though not without difficulty, as she was full of tricks, and delighted in her freedom. She was from the first, however, very responsive to our voices, and we succeeded in quieting her down at last. ^Sader once got out into the garden much in the same way, but he was perfectly good, and came trotting up as soon as we called him, and let himself be led by his forelock to the stable. For sense and spirit, combined with most engaging obedience and fidelity of disposition, I really doubt if our Smith and ’Sader could be easily matched. The only room for regret is that they cannot keep their youth for ever, and be the life-long companions of the mistresses they serve so well. Yet Mr. Smith, at least, appears to have the secret of eternal youth within him, and we will hope to keep him with us many years yet. He would like to be kindly remem¬ bered to all his unknown admirers, and hopes that this account of him and some of his friends may prove entertaining to them. Evelyn Everett-Green. THE MISTRESSES’ UNION ; OR, HOW WE SOLVED THE SERVANTS’ QUESTION. BY HENRY FRITH. I. RS. CAMERON was seated in an easy-chair in her artistically fur¬ nished boudoir, plunged in thought. Her face wore a serious expression and the contraction of her eyebrows indicated that she had a problem to solve. As she was pon¬ dering upon this puzzle, which was evidently of a domestic character, a knock at the door roused her, and, in reply to her per¬ mission, a servant, apparently the housemaid, entered. “If you please, ^m, may I speak to you a minute.^” said she. “ Certainly, Anne. What is the matter ? ” “ If you please, I should like to leave with cook on this day month.^’ “ Very well, Anne. But may I know the reason ? Cook has been given warning for incompetency — she cannot cook anything properly ; but why do you wish to leave ? “ Well, ’m, I think I can better myself, and the work is heavy, ’m." “ Heavy ! why, do you know what you are saying ? Heavy work ! Myself, and your master, and Miss Cameron are the only three people in the house for whom you have anything to do. Kate waits on us exclusively, and your master is - “ Yes, ’m, but I don’t like Mr. Cameron bein’ called my ‘ master,’ and if you please I will go when cook goes. You will give me a character, ’m ?” “ I will give you a character, certainly, and say why you left my service ; but I do not think you need apply for a second character to me.” Anne retired, but in a few moments ushered in Miss Cameron and her friend. Miss Bitterfont. They perceived that Mrs. Cameron was in some dilemma. “ What is the matter, mamma ? ” asked Constance Cameron. “ Has Anne been worrying you ? I thought she looked a little upset.” Mrs. Cameron explained the situation, and appealed to Miss Bitterfont for her opinion. “They are all alike,” she concluded. “ Our servants have no grati¬ tude ! ” “ Well,” replied Miss Bitterfont, “ I cannot agree with you. I must say that my servants are by no

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The Mistresses’ Union. 399 means bad specimens. Your condemnation is too sweeping, Mrs. Cameron. I speak of people as I find them.’' “ You cannot say that Anne has behaved well, I’m sure ! ” retorted Mrs. Cameron. “ No, she may be wrong ; but surely she has a right to leave when she pleases ? She has given warning in the terms of her contract. You cannot fairly blame her. Her remark about Mr. Cameron is ridiculous, but if she does her work until her service expires you need not complain, I think.” ‘‘You will next tell me that Mrs. Jennings-Brown has been well treated, Miss Bitterfont, or that Mrs. Deacon should be grateful.” “ I am not acquainted with the particulars,” replied Miss Bitterfont calmly. “ Why, Mrs. Jennings-Brown’s nurse gave warning because her mistress would not permit the nurse’s young man to have beer in the kitchen ! Ridiculous ! And Mrs. Deacon, who is proverbially kind to her domestics, who dines early on Sunday, and has cold meat on that day, was last week informed that ‘ Cook wouldn’t eat the cold meat ! ’ She actually warmed it again for herself and her fellow-servants ! ” “After declining to cook it hot for Mrs. Deacon ! ” added Constance. “Yes,” replied Miss Bitterfont ; “those are isolated cases. Take mine. My nephew was seized with scarlet fever. Both my servants are young, and not very strong, I should say. Did they run away ? No, they remained ; they attended on the nurse and me without a murmur ; they risked infection daily, and when I rewarded them at the end of the time they both declined the extra payment, until I actually forced it upon them. I could relate other instances. A great deal depends on the way you treat your domestics.” “ Not always,” replied Constance. “ N o, not always ; there are black sheep in every flock, and careless or unsympathetic servants can often be found as well as careless and unsympathetic employers. You must not imagine that you purchase a slave when you hire a servant 1 I have heard that employers of clerks often demand the ‘pound of flesh.’” “ There are numerous cases even in our own neigh¬ bourhood,” replied Mrs. Cameron. “We surely can find means to help ourselves. You remember Mrs. Faithfull, her sister, and Mrs. Ellice. They once co-operated and did very well. Both Mrs. Faithfull’s servants deserted her last month, without warning, on one afternoon while she was at the Botanic Fete, and when her husband returned ^there was no dinner, and no cook, no housemaid I There had been no com¬ plaints — it was a whim !” “My dear Mrs. Cameron, your friends are certainly unfortunate,” said Miss Bitterfont. “They should be cautious concerning the characters of those they employ. There are plenty of good servants to be had. We hear of the complaints sooner than of the praises in this world.” “ I am ready to admit that there may be, at times, faults on both sides. But the question of character is important. I have been thinking of forming a Union, and Connie has already seen Mrs. Faithfull and her sister Georgie. They will be here imme¬ diately with Mrs. Ellice and Mrs. Deacon, I hope.” In a short time Mrs. Faithfull and her sister appeared, and the suggestion having been explained, Mrs. Faithfull at once agreed, and appealed to “ Georgie,” who said — “ I am quite sure we can form a Union of our own, and if you will give me a week to arrange it, I will have the details formulated. We are all suffering in some degree from our ‘ domestic tyrants,’ as people call servants. Let us have a regular organised system and canvass the people. Mrs. Ellice and Lucy, and I and Connie, and Mrs. Deacon will begin. Mrs. Cameron can join if she has time, but we will com¬ mence to-morrow. Meanwhile we will discuss details, and let you know the scheme. I have thought of it before.” “ Let us hear your plan, dear,” said Mrs. Cameron, with satisfaction. “ My suggestion is to found a kind of local inquiry office in this neighbourhood, at which all candidates must appear. Our first step must be to secure the adherence of the residents.” “To be sure,” said the other ladies. “ Let us com¬ mence our canvass at once — this very afternoon ! ” After some further conversation the committee separated, having arranged to meet on the next day but one at Mrs. Ellice’s house in Barnabas Square, which, as everyone is aware, extends from Beverley Park Gardens to St. James’s Crescent. II. On the appointed day at the time named Mrs. Ellice, who had borne so prominent a part in the co¬ operative housekeeping in days gone by, was awaiting her friends. She had had unfortunate experience as a mistress of servants, and more than once had regretted the old days — her “ mother’s days ” — when servants came and remained faithful to their employers ! “It is education, and the many new employments for women, that prevent us procuring the same class of domestics,” she would say. “ Girls are too grand now-a-days to serve : they must be apprentices first; and young ladies after.” “ And why not ? ” asked her friend M iss Bitterfont, “ why not ? Surely girls may advance themselves.” “Yes ; but that is no reason why of/ier girls who make a contract to serve me should throw me over. If an employer be unkind, unjust, or arbitrary, let him suffer : but even his injustice is no excuse for the servants who break faith with me. I am not unjust nor tyrannous ! ” The arrival of the “ Committee,” as they designated themselves, put an end to this discussion. Miss Bitterfont was invited to remain. As a friend of young servants, her experience would be valuable. “ I consider if you treat servants with proper con¬ sideration they will consider you too,” said she. “ But what is proper consideration } ” inquired Mrs. Faithfull. “It means in some cases a weekly holiday

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The Mistresses’ Union. 400 at the servant’s convenience — not at yours — it means men in the kitchen in the evening, and late hours out of doors. If I am to be responsible for my servant’s well-being, I cannot in justice to anyone permit her to run wild.” “But,” continued Miss Bitterfont, “you interfere with her dress ; why cannot you let this girl wear her hair and dress as she pleases ? You wouldn’t like her to interfere with your gowns or hair-dressing.” “ Of course not ; but the parallel does not hold good. There can be no comparison. If my guests and myself prefer a tidy to an untidy servant, and a neat girl to an unkempt, fringed creature, surely, as I feed her and pay her wages, I may suggest a change ? 1 do not insist, I say, I prefer your hair tidy in my house. I prefer you clean : if you cannot conform, go elsewhere, but do not come into my service on false pretences, and then leave in dudgeon, when I point out the fault. That is my argument,” concluded Mrs. Faithfull. “ Now, Georgie, let us hear your scheme,” said Mrs. Ellice. “ We, most of us, agree with your sister, I think. What success have you had 1 ” “ Nearly everyone of our acquaintance will join us,” replied the young lady. “ Connie will tell you their names : she is secretary. We have interviewed Mr. Folio, the stationer, at the corner of Beverley Park Gardens Road ; he will open the office.” “ What office t ” inquired Miss Bitterfont. “ The Registry Office. My plan is this : in every district in London we shall have a registry office, perhaps two offices. We, as housekeepers, bind our¬ selves to engage no servant whose character will not bear investigation, and who will not consent to have her written character entered in a book which she will keep. In this book will also be entered the date of her arrival, her rate of wages, her general conduct, and the cause of her leaving, signed by her employer, with other particulars ; so that almost at a glance one may perceive, under undoubted authority, her fitness for the duty she is required to perform. “ (2) Every employer will engage to give a perfectly truthful character— good, bad, or indifferent— to any servant who quits his house ; and the deceiver, the thief, and the still more dangerous servant will not find employment again.” “ Then you prevent the poor girls from getting a living,” exclaimed Miss Bitterfont. “ How unjust ! ” “ Would not you prevent a thief from entering your premises at night?” asked Georgie quickly. “ Why admit a female thief by day with your eyes open ? People who tell falsehoods and slander you to your tradespeople are equally dangerous. And how unfair to the many honest and honourable servants ! ” “ Quite so,” said Mrs. Cameron. “ We have all agreed to found a Union — a Mistresses’ Union on proper terms— and to defend ourselves. We will on our part, when we want servants, furnish all parti¬ culars of wages, requirements, &:c., to our registrar. The servant who applies may take the place or leave it alone ; but having accepted it, he or she will be bound to remain and perform the duties properly for one month. If not, their character will be endorsed, and they will receive no wages. They will sign an agreement to this effect. Of course illness, or the wishes of parents, will be treated as exceptions, and the reason for their departure will be stated. By these means we hope to check, and finally eradicate, the unfair and mischievous habit of giving wrong characters to servants.” “ It’s only kind,” said Miss Bitterfont. “You may deprive a servant of a place, else.” “ And may saddle a lady with a most immoral occupant of her house : a mean, lying woman, or a thief and the companion of thieves 1 1 am sorry you advocate the statement of untruth and the suppression of truth. Miss Bitterfont,” said Mrs. Deacon warmly. Miss Bitterfont was not yet quite convinced. “ Let me say a few words,” she began. “ I am now in a manner advocating your scheme, though I do not altogether accept your reasons for it. You must not be one-sided. Servants are women with feelings, tempers, and anxieties, like other women. Instead of finding fault, and attributing mistakes to temper and wilfulness, cannot you try to ascertain the real reason — pain, trouble, worry — which may have interfered with your domestic’s performance of her duty ? Mind, I am not about to defend the bad and unfaithful ; I am only pleading for consideration for the majority ; de¬ precating sweeping assertions and wholesale accusa¬ tions. Get rid of the bad servants. But do not include all in your category. Be fair,” said Miss Bitterfont. “ They will learn better.” “ I hope so,” remarked Mrs. Deacon. “ For my part, I will gladly unite with you, and do all in my power to befriend my servants, if they will permit me. Some will not be ‘ interfered with.’ ” “ Let us come to some resolution,” said Mrs. Faith- full. “ We will bind ourselves by proper rules not to engage any servant whose character will not bear in¬ vestigation. We will not give false or misleading characters on any pretence ; and should any servant be foolish enough to bring us to book, we will defend the action in court, if necessary. On the other hand, we will pledge ourselves to treat our servants well, and give them every possible and proper indulgence ; hold¬ ing them as human beings like ourselves, with tastes and feelings which should be improved and considered. On these conditions our domestics will be engaged, and on no others. Is it resolved ? ” “ Yes : resolved,” replied all the ladies. Miss Bitter¬ font then expressing a hope that the rights of servants would not be interfered with. “ But surely employers have rights also ?” said Mrs. Deacon. “ Let us be candid. If we find that servants combine to protect themselves, why should not mis¬ tresses also combine for protection? Our Union is only intended to weed out the bad, slatternly, wickedly disposed servants, whom no one^if they knew the ti'uth about theni^ would employ. It is really an advantage to the servants as a class. The good are encouraged — the majority protected — by our Union. Only the bad need fear it.”

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401 A BROKEN ENGAGEMENT. “THEY WERE STANDING TOGETHER SINGING OUT OF SOME BOOK” {p. 403). jjHERE was a flutter of spirits in every cottage 55s,. of Sutton Byland when John Henshaw came Rectory. We al knew, though there had been nothing like c public avowal of it, that he was coming to carry away the light of our eyes. I am sure I speak the sentiments o: all the farm-lads. Lucy Vernon was to them a sort o: present divinity. To her uncle’s servants at the Hall she was doubtless more human, but hardly less dear ; and Humphrey, gardener and coachman at the Rectory, regarded her in some way as his own by right, and was jealous even to surliness of all other attentions bestowed upon her. To me, a y?)ung raw curate, town-bred, and somewhat bored with rural life, she had made existence first endurable, and then de¬ lightful ; but I never knew her thoroughly till I brought my wife home to the creeper-clad cottage which Lucy had so daintily prepared for us, and to the welcome which Lucy had ready as for her own sister. The squire and the rector were twin brothers and though the one was passably rich and the other always embarrassed, their fortunes were in other respects as like as their features. Each had been left a young widower with an only daughter. Each had shut himself up with his sorrow and his books in 746

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402 A Broken Engagement. the quiet village of their birth. Each had suffered many things of a long series of ladies engaged for the care of house and daughter. It thus came about that the two cousins, Lucy and Grace, were freed, at a very early age, from all control, save that of an easy¬ going and somewhat abstracted father. Lucy was emancipated soon after my arrival in the parish — my predecessor had fled from before her last governess, and she was popularly supposed to have followed in pursuit of him. Grace, though a few months the younger, had routed her last adversary about a year previously. I know nothing of the merits or demerits of the vanquished, but I am sure that the victor was wilful and wayward enough to have driven away her own good angel. How John Henshaw came to declare his love to Lucy Vernon I never learnt. He could hardly be called her equal in social standing, and the income of a hard-working country doctor would seem ridicu¬ lously small to most of her friends. She was away on a visit when he met her, and spoke his mind, and her answer was that he must come to Sutton Byland. The rural practitioner cannot take a holiday at will, and some little time passed before he could meet this delightful invitation. There were gossips in our village, as elsewhere, and by the time he came his errand was being freely canvassed. “I doirt like Miss Lucy marryin’,” said Humphrey, when he had ungraciously deposited the visitor at the Rectory door ; “ we shall all fall to pieces wi’out her.” “ Yes,” said Grace V ernon to a certain lady report¬ ing this speech, “ it will be a shame to waste so much sweetness on one man.’" Which being again reported to me with a little salt of scorn — “My dear,” I expostulated, “I don’t think Miss Vernon ever says a word that she does not mean.” Whereat the little lady tossed her head disdainfully, and I scented danger. John Henshaw did not return home the next day, nor the next, and so it was well known that his suit was prospering. He and I became great friends. There was a vein of exuberance in him that freed him from the shyness characteristic of his position. He loved a pipe, which the rector hated, and he found my little den of a study the very place to enjoy it. He loved a long tramp through the autumn woods, farther afield than Lucy cared to accompany him ; and my knickerbockers were a good deal worn that month, and a pair of old mountaineering boots made inti¬ mate acquaintance with English clay. My wife and I were more frequently than ever in Lucy’s cosy drawing-room. There were folding-doors that led into the rector’s study, and he would always have these open, though he seldom came into the drawing¬ room. We knew the passionate love that underlay his formal manner to his daughter, and I often thought of this open door as a sort of symbol of his yearning for a more perfect communion with the young girl than his sorrow-laden soul and book-bewildered mind could accomplish. We always talked in low tones, for we could see through the doorway in the clear lamplight his pale high forehead and full sweeping beard, as* he read intently in one of the weary volumes from* which he had been trying for years to borrow for-' getfulness. I can hardly imagine what John Henshaw’s rela-' tions with the rector were like. He seldom spoke of them, and the rector himself never made in my hearing the slightest allusion to what was passing. The young man stayed and stayed, but no engagement, was actually announced. My wife was, to be sure, in Lucy’s confidence, and I was in Henshaw’s ; other¬ wise we should still have been left to the gossips for all we might know. We knew that their love ran rippling on, a calm and untroubled stream, trending,, at some undefined future, to the rest of marriage. They were, perhaps, a rather uninteresting pair.. Miss Vernon at the Hall quite unreservedly pro¬ nounced them dull and commonplace. Before ten days had passed the affair was strangely familiar, and Henshaw’s presence seemed quite a matter of course. I sometimes wondered vaguely what his patients* were doing, but I could hardly imagine him returning to them. He \vas not a favourite with my wife. I beat down her objections to him one by one with surprising facility, but there always remained another behind. Some of them seemed a little contradictory. He was noisy, he was dull ; he was undemonstrative towards* Lucy, he treated her with too confident an air of possession ; he was too reserved with her in public, he talked too much about her in private (this must have been an answer to a feeble rejoinder of mine, for he certainly seldom talked to this censorious lady herself) ; in short, he was Z>r. Fell to her. There was one reason for distrust and dislike that she never mentioned. She never spoke of his growing attentions to Miss Vernon at the Hall. How did it begin ? How did it grow ? Alas ! for the weakness of love in its early days. It is a foolish notion that a young couple who have just fallen in love are more strongly devoted to each other than in after-years. Love is a tender plant at starting, and sends out its roots timidly to find a congenial soil. It is easily choked by rank weeds that grow vigor¬ ously from the first. It slowly establishes itself, and then grows into a stately tree, with roots grappling to the rock, and then it may defy the storms of passion, as well as those little trifling gusts of temper which swish the branches about so noisily. Henshaw’s love was no doubt a very tender plant, but it was rooted in as wholesome and fruitful a soil as could be found. I do not pretend to know why Lucy Vernon accepted his love ; but I had such trust in her truth and honesty that I knew she loved him with all her heart. No doubt she picked out what was noble in him, and set that up on a pedestal to worship, quite conscious of a very large ignoble part of him, but determined, like a sensible woman, to think aS little of that as possible. Unfortunately, this ignoble part began to be very con¬ spicuous indeed. I think he had known her about a

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A Broken Engagement. 403 year ; perhaps he had been in love with her for six months ; he had been her accepted lover for a fort¬ night, and here was a rank weed pushing aside the tender plant. Grace and Lucy Vernon lived like sisters. Their houses were barely a hundred yards apart, and they were equally at home in either. They were almost as much alike as their fathers were. There was honest love between them. My wife, who judges her own sex with their usual charity, may say what she will, I am sure that Grace was guilty of no treachery. To suppose her jealous of Lucy's fortune is ridiculous. Henshaw was a poor country doctor. Miss Vernon would as soon have thrown her handkerchief to the gamekeeper as to him. I think she rather resented her cousin’s choice. But she was a woman who in¬ sisted on adoration. She claimed homage from me ; and I tendered it with an easy indifference, touching on .contempt, of which the lady who held the leading- strings of my heart made many a jest. She claimed it from Henshaw. I cannot make a connected story of it. It was told us by subtle indications here and there, the meaning of which we hardly acknowledged to ourselves. There was a shade of sadness on Lucy’s calm face. There was an anxious, watchful look in my wife’s eye. The one and the other passed away, but it came again. There was a restlessness about Henshaw when he was with Lucy ; perhaps a shade of perfunctoriness in his attentions to her. But if I wrote down everything that we noticed there would be — nothing. The days that slipped by so rapidly began now to drag. I believe no more than five days passed between the first doubtful look that swept over my wife’s face and the catastrophe, but as 1 look back that time always seems to me the longest part of Henshaw’s visit. We were sitting in the parlour of our cottage late one afternoon, when Henshaw came hurriedly up the garden path. There was a hunted look on his face as he entered. He was an honest fellow, and remorse was behind him. My wife gave me a nod which I understood as well as if we had spoken fifty times on the subject, and made some excuse as if to go. “ Stay,” he said, “ Mrs. Malpas ; I know you don’t like me, and I don’t wonder at it ; you read me sooner than I read myself, I suppose.” She fell back in her chair, a little frightened at his fierce manner, so unlike his usual carelessness. I too was silent ; indeed, we did not know what to say. “ I have been a brute,” he groaned, and my wife’s eye kindled dangerously. “ At least. I’ve been a feeble fool ; ” and his head went down on his hands, and his whole frame col¬ lapsed. A flash of intelligence fired my wife’s face, and this wonderful woman positively went across to him and knelt down beside him. In the strictest privacy I asked her afterwards what she did this for. Why, you great stupid man,” she said, “ of course I saw then that he hadn’t made any mischief.” Now, how she saw that passes my comprehension, being only a man’s, but what she saw was true. His story came blundering out. He was never a reticent man, and remorse made him talk the more about himself. Some people are so constituted : they enjoy a little self-dissection. So he told us from behind his hands a good deal that did not interest us, as well as what made our hearts ache to hear. “ And 1 found it out all at once a quarter of an hour ago. . I went over to the Hall. I thought Lucy might be there, but I dare say that was not what took me. They were together in the library, and as I opened the door, a great blow came stunning me. They were standing together singing out of some book, and — and — I did not know which of them I loved.” He brought out these last words slowly, and in an awed tone, which revealed the honest feebleness of his heart. Then he sat silent, with his hands still over his face. The utter desolation of the man, and the desolation, more grievous still to us, that I foresaw elsewhere, took away all ridiculousness from his con¬ fession. I felt a sort of growing anger against his weakness. But my wife was full of pity. It is one of the delightful inconsistencies of women that they are so severe, so inflexible, against triumphant wickedness, so tender with wickedness that has a sense of failure. We superior men spurn it the more courageously for its imbecility. So 1 raged inwardly, and let the other two talk out their plans. Henshaw could not spend another night in the village, and late that evening he set out, wept upon by one good woman, to walk off his fever in eight weary miles, and catch the mail at Harbury. The burden of explanation was laid upon us. There were letters for Lucy and her father, but we were to deliver them only after we had told as much as could be told of the miserable story. With heavy hearts we went up to the Rectory in the morning ; and doubt¬ less our faces were not lightsome, for old Humphrey, as we entered the gate, looked up from his weeding, and after a short glance at us, grunted suspiciously. ‘‘ So he’s gone, is he? ” A message had been sent up over-night to the effect that Henshaw had been obliged suddenly to return home, and it was clear that the servants had been discussing it. My wife, feeling her heart like one great tear-drop, hurried to Lucy’s morning-room, and I found my way straight to the study. The rector was buried in his “ Loidis and Elmete,” one of his choice treasures — the “ large paper ” copy, with wide fair margins, on which, in his exquisite hand, he had traced many a genealogicak note. He was threading the obscurities of the Savile pedigree. “ My dear Malpas,” he exclaimed, bo7ta ho7'a ve7iistij you are the very man I want. You know all about Strafford, and can tell me whether his cousin, George Radcliffe - ” There was something in my face, I suppose, that checked him, and I blundered headlong into my subject. Of course I had planned out exactly how the conversation was to begin, and how the matter was to be led up to ; and equally, of course, I forgot all my arrangements. “ 1 have come to speak to you about Henshaw, Mr, Vernon,” I said.

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404 A Broken Engagement. The slightest possible stiffening of the eyebrows showed that the subject was not so pleasant a one as the Wentworth- Savile alliance. I became conscious of this at once, and learnt in that moment more than I had ever known before of the rector^s feeling towards Henshaw. He dis¬ liked him ; he was bored by him ; but the man to whom Lucy had given her heart, however unaccount¬ ably, was welconie to his house, and was entitled to a grave, gentle courtesy. But to have him intruded on him when absent — this was quite unnecessary, and most undesirable. This is what I read in his glance, and pretty correctly, I think. “ Ah, yes ; he has been called away. Some patient, I suppose. Well, now, tell me, was George Radcliffe - ” This was terrible. I put force upon myself, lis¬ tened patiently, and solved the problem in genealogy as well as I could. I have not the least idea now what it was. Then ! returned to the charge, my heart brimming over all the while, with thinking of what was passing in the morning-room. With some difficulty I made the rector understand what was amiss. I suppose he was so incapable of the kind of weakness in question that he could hardly realise its existence in anyone else. He seemed to think that Henshaw was accus¬ ing Grace of posing as Lucy’s rival, and sternly forbade the mention of such a thought. That a man should thus idly swing between two affections was a thing altogether incredible to him. I found myself slipping, against my will, into a sort of advocacy of Henshaw. We had been talking for some time, and Lucy’s interest in the matter did not seem to have occurred to her father ; he was wholly taken up with amazement at the worthlessness of her lover. Some stray word of mii^, looking her way, struck him. His face turned a shade paler. He asked, in what was for him a hurried way — “ What does Lucy know ? ” I told him that my wife was even then with her, and would use her womanly discretion in speaking. He sat silent for a while, then rose and went to the window. He opened it presently, and gave Humphrey directions about some bulbs. Then, with¬ out turning to me, he said — “ Thank you, Mr. Malpas ; you and your wife are more than friends to us. And now — I think I would rather be left alone.” I went out as one goes from a sick-room. I went, wondering what I had said and how I had said it. What passed between my wife and Lucy in the morn¬ ing-room I never learnt ; and my wife knows no more of what passed in the study than what I have written here. Neither do 1. When I saw Lucy, two days after this, her eyes were as clear and her smile as sweet as ever ; but the sadness of middle age had fallen upon her. I made no attempt to pry into family secrets. “There was some talk,” said the squire on one occasion, “ of an engagement between my niece and a Mr. Henshaw ; but there was something unpleasant. Mr. Malpas, the curate, behaved with great dis¬ cretion — with great discretion ; and we were much obliged to him.” Of course, I do not in the least know what passed between the two brothers, and it was only in accord¬ ance with her usual custom that Miss Vernon at the Hall went off just about this time on a round of visits. My wife may or may 'not have shared further confi¬ dences with Lucy, If she told me anything I am not going to betray her. In the following June, when Miss Vernon was keeping the London season with her aunt, a most sensible thing was done by the matrimonial powers. The Court Herald told the world that a marriage was arranged between the Hon. Percy Bourke, ninth and youngest son of the Earl of Courtmarch, who, as everyone knew, was serving his country in the Foreign Office, and Miss Vernon, who was known to all as the only child and heiress of Ralph Vernon, Esq., of Sutton Byland. Our village, of course, was buzzing with the news. We were discussing it one night in our parlour — my lady, to tell the truth, rather acrimoniously ; for, somehow, nothing that Miss Vernon could do had, for some months past, entirely pleased this censorious little person. We were discussing it, I say, when our slip of a maid announced, in an awestruck whis¬ per — “ Please, ’m, a gentleman as says he won’t send his name in.” And there entered, as I at first supposed, a stranger, who presently revealed the features of John Henshaw, but so worn and aged that it was no wonder he should not be recognised. My wife cast an inexplicable glance at the newspaper, and received him cordially. He was very constrained. We started, but without success, an ordinary topic or two of conversation ; and then he rose, and standing with his back to the light, said abruptly — “ Is this true about Miss Vernon ? ” A shadow of dismay ran over my wife’s face. “ The marriage ” I hastily said. “ Oh, dear, yes. I suppose you have seen it in the paper ” “ 1 don’t read the Court Herald^^ he said savagely ; “ one of my patients told me — a girl from here, who is in service in our parts. I wouldn’t believe it without coming to inquire. That’s all I want to know. Good night.” And out he went at once, and for the second time in his life John Henshaw tramped through the dusk to catch the mail at Harbury. We sat bewildered at his madness, wondering what meaning lay behind his words, dreading we knew not what disaster. His coming and going were unnoticed in the village. I do not know whether my wife spoke of it to Lucy, but I found myself wondering one day whether this was the cause of her deepening sadness — whether she had been cherishing some vain hopes of her lover’s return. We heard no more of Henshaw. The wedding came. Lucy was the sweetest and saddest of brides¬ maids. The bridegroom won the favour of all, even

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Pictures of the Months. of his most censorious critic. There was a tenants’ supper. The county paper had a column of descrip¬ tion, wherein I found myself credited with some sur¬ prising and original remarks. Before they appeared, however, we had already settled down to comparative repose. A morning or two afterwards my wife received a letter, over the address of which she puzzled a long time, wondering who the writer could be. The letter was too long for quotation in full, and too incoherent to serve as a model for style. It was a long rhapsody from Henshaw, pouring out his soul at my wife’s feet. Why he should have chosen her to receive it I can hardly say, for she had not treated him with particular kindness. Perhaps he thought that she would carry it elsewhere. He told her of his misery and repentance, and how in these long weary months his love for Lucy had recovered life and strength, till it was rooted in his soul beyond all dis¬ lodging. He had just begun to hope, faintly and fearfully, that he might one day recover all that his folly had lost, when he was told that Miss Vernon was going to be married. Either because of the way in which it was told him, or from a half-crazy dwelling on his own thoughts, he assumed that this was Lucy, and he hurried over to us to learn the worst. His 405 hurry and impatience had driven him from us, still under the same delusion, and what sort of impression could he have made among us ? So the letter ran its course over three good sheets, a large part of which I was for skipping ; but the lady to whom it was written said that every word was precious. It is astonishing how kind women will be to a man who does not mind showing that he has a heart, even though it be a very flabby organ, after all. I have spun my story long enough. Five years after this, when my dear old rector had been now a twelvemonth gathered to the dust that he had loved and mourned so faithfully, there was a quiet wedding in the little church of which I was now rector. The bride was a grave, sweet lady, who had been living with us ever since we came to the parish, and whom our children called Aunt Lucy. When we had said the last good-bye, and returned to the strange void that was in our house, I said very doubtingly — ‘‘ I do hope he will make her a good husband.” And my wife said confidently, with the tears run¬ ning down her face — ‘‘ She will make him one.” This sentence looks obscure and ambiguous on paper, but as spoken its meaning was unmistakable. Henry Malpas. PICTURES OF THE MONTHS. June. ^HE leaves of the forest make tender gloom, ^ They murmur with river-waters near; The butterflies poise on the iris-bloom. And the birds sing : “ Sweetest prime of the year Tis the fairest month for a nuptial day — And a bride and bridegroom pass this way.

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4o6 ^ of

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407 j

Page 422

OUR DELICATE CHILD. (a leaf from a young mother’s journal.) ULY I don’t know what we should do without Dr. Fuller ! He is such a friend ! He does not merely come, look at your tongue, feel your pulse, and write a pre¬ scription, but he makes a most careful study of each ; not so much with a view to curing us of our ailments, as to keeping us in health. He sometimes says, laugh¬ ingly, that of all the blunders the foolish public ever made, quite the most foolish is to fee its doctors for curing (or trying to cure !) disease. “ ’Tis for keeping our clients iii health that we should be paid! and that well, too.” Now, this is what he does for us — the fact that he is a family friend, no doubt, makes it the easier for him to look after us : he will come in the evening to smoke a pipe with John, but I notice he always manages to get here before the children are packed off, and one may see him glance round and take in the general condition of each. 1 thought that on Sunday evening he looked rather anxiously at Teddy, so I was not surprised when he ''ailed this morning. We had noticed a falling off. The child seems to get easily tired ; his lessons worry him ; he does not like to be teased ; does not eat a good dinner, and is looking thin about the eyes ; his flesh is not so firm as it was, either. We should have thought more of all this ourselves, only Teddy is such an eager little soul that the minute you think he is failing, up he is again with a sudden spurt, all agog about some new joy ; so we tried to persuade our¬ selves that our fears for our bright little son were fanciful. “The fact is, Mrs. Jervis, that boy of yours is a bundle of nerves 1 ” “ Oh, doctor ! ” and I had visions of disabled nervous sufferers, paralytics, and I don’t know what. It is marvellous how rapid thought is. “ What’s the matter ? I’ve not pronounced his doom. He’s not going to die, and, for the rest, nervous people do the work of the world. The child is full of brain-power, but the keen instrument is wear¬ ing the sheath, that’s all.” And enough too, I thought, as the fragile little body rose before me. “ Help us ; what must we do ? Ted is very precious to us.” “ Why, he’s precious to me ! A sort of professional investment. I’ve a great notion that Ted will dis¬ tinguish himself one day, and I mean to have a finger in the pie — “ This is the man that made the pills, 'I'hat cured the ills,” and so on. But we must look after him, or else — By- the-way, do you know my pet story about ‘ Or else’ ? ” “ Thank you, doctor, I know that tale ; and do not mean to be frightened about Ted, so you needn’t try to amuse me. I only want you to tell me what we’re to do for him. He must give up lessons, I suppose.^” “ H— m I that’s not so easily settled. The fact is, the worry about lessons, the knowledge that certain work, however little, must be done by a given time, is very bad for him. When the nervous system has lost tone, one can stand work, but not worry. The slightest feeling of anxiety, of responsibility, is not only dis¬ tressing, but damaging.” “Why, then, nothing can be easier. The child must give up work absolutely, and amuse himself as he likes. There will be plenty of time, afterwards, for him to make up ; at present, our only care must be to get him set right.” “ As usual, there are only two sides to a question, in the eyes of worn — (cough)— of a great many people. Now, here, it is not simply a case of ‘ Do, and it hurts you ; don’t, and it heals you.’ As a matter of fact, his lessons are a bagatelle to a child with Ted’s brain-power, and are nowise to blame for this little collapse. Does he never ask you odd questions ? ” “ Oh, the most puzzling, and, if one can say so of a child’s prattle, profound.” “Just the sort of thing I should have expected ! Now, don’t you see, a brain like that is never idle. It is for ever turning something over to find out the why, because, and all the ins and outs. You can’t keep it quiet. If a fly walk across the window-pane, that is enough for endless speculations and imaginations. ‘ If boys walked across window-panes.?’ will be so agitat¬ ing a problem, that he will slip on the floor with the notion that it is a perpendicular pane ! Now, the fact is— and here is what many persons fail to see — that the regularity, the very tediousness of task-work, is a most wholesome curb on the over-active brain. Pegasus must work in harness. But, on the other hand, how to get rid of the anxiety aroused by the fact that certain work must be done I ” “That is the difficulty with Ted; we can’t get the child to leave a single lesson undone ; and when he has prepared a task thoroughly and said it to us, at it he’ll go again, for fear he should forget it by next morning.” “Ah, that’s bad, and must be put a stop to. But how to avert this anxious scrupulousness is just the problem with overwrought brains of all ages.” Dr. Fuller walked up and down the dining-room in a brown study, forgetful of my existence, I do believe. How I kept quiet I don’t know, for no one knows like the mother of an ailing child what an oracle “ the doctor” can become. At last he drew up with— “ I have it 1 I wonder I didn’t think of that before. In the first place, the child must— live — out — of— doors. Nothing is so healing, and nothing is so feeding to shattered nerves, as pure, fresh, out-of-doors air. The very feel of the wind in your face is meat and drink ! I know, for ‘ I guess I’ve been there, top,’ as

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Our Delicate Child. 409 our American friends say. Believe me, there’s no nerve-restorer like air ; if that doesn’t answer, try more air ; and if that fails, more air still ! ” “Nothing could be easier! Ted can play in the garden all day ; luckily, the weather is suitable, just now, at any rate.” “Play in the garden all day! Much you know about nerves, my dear lady! or rather, I’m afraid you do know, but you do not apply your knowledge. Why, the poor little man, left to himself in the garden, would simply spend the time in devouring his own give themselves the trouble to find out with what desires and what powers children are made, and, con¬ versely, with what capabilities they are 7iot endowed. Now, the child comes to us endowed with inordinate, ravenous curiosity ; not a quality to be snubbed, by any means ; the play of curious thoughts in a child’s mind is like the play of the tentacles by which a sea anemone sustains its life. But all is not fish that comes to the child’s net ; there are things the knowledge of which is as meat and drink to his hungry intelligence, and there are things the knowledge of which is as saw- “llE DOES NOT LIKE TO BE TEASED” (/. 408). brain ! To think of all the matters for speculation he would turn up, the while he dawdles about in the idle way which only by a very broad stretch can we call play! No; that won’t do; he must hardly ever be left to himself ; you and his brothers and sisters must keep him constantly amused for months to come.” “ But would not that be to sacrifice all to one ? Why should the others stop their lessons? And as for amusing him, why, Ted gets tired in no time of games, picture-books, and that kind of thing.” “Naturally so; but has it never struck you that children were not made for books? and think of the cruel energy spent in the making of many books for their mortification ! ” “ I don’t think I quite see what you mean.” “ Very likely not ; nobody does ; people will not dust— sawdust of the mind. In our teaching we should follow the lines of a child’s curiosity ; depend upon it, that curiosity of his has not come by accident. Had he been born with a silver spoon in his hand, we should have guessed that he was meant to feed himself with it ; and Just such a silver spoon is the child’s restless desire to know. But what in the world is the use of a spoon if there’s no porridge? He has the spoon ; it’s our business to serve the porridge; porridge, mind you, good nourishing food, none of your sawdust.” “ I perceive that sawdust isn’t satisfying ; but what about Ted ? ” This brought him out of the clouds, with a great laugh. “ You have me there, Mrs. Jervis ! Trust a woman

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410 Our Delicate Child. for playing ‘ Quits. Once more, back to Ted. I know Tm a horrible bore once you mount me on a hobby. You tell me his appetite is falling off, just when we want him to eat well. Of course, I can keep him going with cod-liver oil, but poor stuff are all the substitutes for meals eaten with an appetite. Now, don’t be dismayed ; we must set Ted to work ; for man and boy it holds good, that if a man do not work neither shall he eat. But the work must be labours he delights in, and without the least shadow of anxious responsibility.” “ Poor Ted ! Tm afraid iPs not much work of any kind we shall get him to do just now. When he’s well, he delights, like other children, in invention and construction. ‘ Man is a tool-using animal,’ you know. But just latel)^, I can’t get him to take up any of his old joys ; he won’t even sow seeds in his bit of garden ; and 1 know how bad it is for him to mope ! ” “ Of course. Now, listen to my plan : I’ve been look¬ ing out a long time for a mother with sense enough to carry it out ; and now, here are you, the very mother of my choice, obliged to do it for the restoration of your most promising child ! Now, don’t interrupt, madam ; listen to my plan in detail, and then, when you have had time to take the whole thing in, if you see fatal objections, why, I must bear it, I suppose.” “ Please go on, doctor.” ‘WVhat does Ted want? Air, in the first place; unlimited air, free from every taint of humans, and fresh, in the sense of ‘ change of air ’ ; not that a single change of air will do— he wants frequent changes. What else does he want? Work, exercise for limbs and lungs. Well, fresh air such as I have in view, will make him run and shout with the bravest. He wants more — healthy work for his wits ; he wants to see, and touch, and know the reason why of all the moving things and growing things he will come upon away from man-defiled towns. Presto ! an appetite — and bread and milk to feed it upon. Three months of this, and Ted will be himself again and very much ‘ more so.’ ” “We must send him away, then? But I’m sure I don’t know where ; we have no friends whatever in the country, and I don’t like to trust the child amongst strangers.” {Sotto voce,) — “I knew I should not get a full hear¬ ing!” {Aloiidi) — “To send him away would not do at all. The one thing to be avoided is letting the child prey upon himself, think his own thoughts in a corner, and, worse than all, feel himself lonely and unloved. Do not be shocked; Teddy, just now, wants the entire devotion of his entire family — father and mother, brothers and sisters ; nothing else will do, and nothing less ; he’ll pay you all for it some day, if it’s only through the glorification of belonging to a great man.” “ Do you mean we should all go away ? It’s utterly impossible. Even if the children and I could go into the country, I cannot leave my husband ; and then, think of the expense of keeping up two households. Besides, don’t think me careless about my child — nobody knows v/hat Ted is to his mother — but I do not see that the other children should be sacrificed ; to lose three months’ lessons is a serious matter, especially with those who go to school.” “You must do as you like about the two seniors ; but, believe me, instead of a loss it would be pure gain in the matter of learning, as in every other way. As your husband lunches in town, I see no obstacle whatever ; but were it otherwise, why, in this case, his interests must give way to the child’s.” “ Well, but your plan, doctor ! ” “ Why, even living in the heart of London as you do, in half or three-quarters of an hour you can get out to commons or woods, where you can take in great draughts of air — relatively untainted. Do this every reasonably fine day, taking, at any rate, the three little ones.” “ But the expense ! We simply could not afford it ; and how could I neglect all household duties, and all the oversight necessary to secure my husband’s com¬ fort ? ” “ What if it cost a pound a week— not more, or ^lo in the three months ? What of that, if it prove the saving and the making of Teddy? Take it out of your savings if necessary ; but I doubt if you need do that ; many household expenses will be reduced ; the children will thrive on bread and milk dinners, and their clothes for climbing trees and tumbling about on the furzy commons will cost little enough. ’Tis my belief you would save. As for Jervis, I suppose we mustn’t curtail the prerogatives of his highness ; but don’t you see, suppose you left home at half-past nine, and got back by half-past four, you would get six clear hours in the open, suppose it took an hour to go and return, and you would still have an hour at each end to put things in trim for the evening meal of the wor¬ shipful head of the house.” “A neat calculation which does you credit, but what in the world should I do with the children in the ‘ open,’ as you call it, for six long hours — not once in a way, but every day ? ” “Now, that really is to take the wind out of one’s sails ! It isn’t only being in the air, but what you do when you get there that I care about. That’s your time for filling your children with field-lore. Do they know our common forest trees ? Let them watch ash and beech, elm and sycamore, through flower and leaf-bud to full summer foliage, and they will, though ! Let them make friends of the trees ; know one and all by bark and bole, by leaf and leaf-bud, by flower and fruit, by pose and contour, so that they can pronounce on elm or ash three fields off — and there’s knowledge worth the having ! ’Tis a disgrace not to know the names and the ways of all within reach of us, from ‘ shepherd’s purse ’ to ‘ lords and ladies ’ ; then, con¬ sider the fowls of the air, know them by sight and by note; and the lesser winged creatures. Why, there’s no end to what you may learn in the fields. But — no books ! Not a printed page! Learn your thing out of doors and find out its name at home, if you like, but that’s all ! ” “It sounds too delicious! I will talk it over with John.” Charloti'e M. Mason.

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4II ANOTHER EASY CONTINENTAL TRIR BY JAMES BAKER, AUTHOR OF “JOHN WESTACOTT,” ETC. more we board the Southampton steamer, and sail away in the night over the thickly studded Channel for St. Malo. We are bent on a westerly journey, amid scenes of high historical interest, of pleasant scenery, and genial people ; and where amusements such as picture galleries, and music, and gay sea-side resort, will fall to our lot far more than in the quainter and wilder Bretagne trip. English, too, will be more spoken, for we are more in the track of the ordinary tourist. The little run from St. Malo across to Dinard is soon accomplished, and here we can linger for a day for some capital bathing on the soft, light brown sands. From Din¬ ard to Dinan the route is charmingly picturesque, be road or river taken to arrive there. The country on all sides is thickly wooded, and very different to the flat, level plains and straight roads of Nor¬ mandy, along which we shall soon be passing; and as the road rises and falls we can easily see how the Vendeans could hold their own against the armies of the republic, and admire the wisdom of the Prussians in leaving this district (although they swarmed over Normandy) iintrod by their soldiers. The road entrance into Dinan was through the old Porte St. Malo, a fine specimen of a mediaeval gateway ; and if it be harvest-time men may even now be seen threshing their corn with the flail in the road over which carriages drive ; the horses’ hoofs treading out the corn. Or at the doorways may be seen sitting aged women spinning with the wheel, as our great¬ grandmothers did in England. The streets, in spite of some modern improvements, are still most pic¬ turesque, the houses being built over the pavements and supported by pillars. A stroll out to the castle, and the Eglise des Moines ; and then a calm, peaceful walk by the side of the little river Ranee, out to the picturesque viaduct that spans wood, and river, and CAEN.

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412 Another Easy Continental Trip. charming Ranee Valley, that is so well seen by those arriving by steamer ; and then up the steep street to the centre of the town — will almost embrace the whole of the principal features of Dinan. This walk, too, may be made to include a visit to the abbey of Lehon, the picturesque situation of which reminds one of Tintern, but its walls are entered by a high Norman arch, although the greater part of the work is of the Late Pointed order. At Saint Esprit, above this village, the view of Dinan on its steep height, and the richly wooded country behind it, forms a charming landscape. From Dinan to Dol is an easy walk of rather more than half a day, and the pedestrian would see much of the real peasant-life of the Norman. But there is not so much to interest him in these roads as in those of Brittany, and as the rail now supersedes the diligence, many who walked or drove will now go by steam. The country around Dol brings forcibly to mind the tors of Glaston¬ bury and Wells ; and the isolated eminence of Mont Dol is worth ascending to get a view of the whole district round. The town itself is a very dull one, consisting of little but one broad street ; but the cathedral is a good piece of work, and many of the houses are quaintly carved. But with Mont St. Michel ahead of us we soon tire of Dol, and press on to Pontorson, from whence a road across the sands leads to the famous mount. The drive across the sands on a hot summer’s day is a fearfully dusty one, ancj to add to this, generally they are carting the sands away, and a slight wind carries them across the track in blinding showers. But ahead of us is the picturesque isolated mount, rising out of the sea ; more peaked and conical than our Cornish St. Michael’s Mount, and the walls that for¬ tified it making it look more mediaeval. Ere we reach it we must dismount from the land conveyance and be carried through the shallow water to a boat, in men’s arms, and then be pulled across to the island landing- stage. This mode of arrival is now modified by a long dique stretching out to the island. As we climb . the stony, narrow street, where hardly two can walk abreast, we see how impregnable must have been this fortress in the days when cannon was in its infancy ; but the beauty of the building is in the ecclesiastical part of it, and wonder succeeds to admiration as we rise slowly up through the succes¬ sive chambers that are cut out of the solid rock ; up through refectory and dormitory, and the glorious Salle des Chevaliers^ up to the beautiful cloisters. The capitals of the pillars here are most delicately and richly carved, and the sensation of rising slowly up through dwelling-rooms, and knightly hall, and church, to these covered walks, is very strange and striking. One tiny carving of the Passion is very noteworthy ; another is of the kiss of Judas. The one illustrating the Crucifixion has the souls of the two thieves issuing from their mouths as two children, the one being received by an angel, the other by a devil. Far down beneath all this massive pile of care¬ ful architecture, where monk and knight prayed or caroused, or walked in calm meditation beneath the cloisters’ arches, are dungeons, perhaps the most awful extant. Down into the solid rock to the sea-level one goes, into dens that are terrible in their cold, dank sliminess ; but beneath these there is a more awful depth, and within this more av/ful depth are black cachois or holes in the rock, into which priso ners were forced, where they could neither lie, nor stand, nor sit. One half-hour in these awful dens was sup¬ posed to drive the prisoner mad ; and yet so late as 1848 they were used, and one Barbay confined here. To put one’s head volun¬ tarily within them sends an awful chill and shudder through the whole frame. The chains that held the prisoner to his doom still lie on the rock-floor, never¬ more to be used, let us hope. To ascend from these torture-cells, up above all the buildings, and to look out over the wide view to be seen from the platform above the cloisters, gives one a piercing idea of the value of light and freedom. The view is very exten¬ sive, and includes the lies de Chaussey, Point de Galles, Avranches, and the whole surrounding country. Those who do not stay on the island for the night must not miss the tide for their return. It flows so quickly that the fisher-folk are often overtaken by it, and on one visit there we saw two poor women caught by it and surrounded, and rescued only by being sighted in their danger from the walls of St. Michel. If the water was out, a guide waded in front of vehicles to show the driver the route lest he should drive into the

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413 MONT ST. MICHEL. quicksands. So it was before the dique, now just completed, was built. But if the approach is im¬ proved, there is not the same care bestowed on pre¬ serving the building from decay. From Pontorson to Avranches is but a short ride, or now the rail may be taken ; but the drive or walk is an agreeable one, and the climb up the hill gives a lovely retrospect of the country just passed through ; all the coast-line is seen, and the blue sea beyond ; a river winds through a thickly wooded country to lose itself in the sands, out beyond which, in the clear water, rise up the walls and church of the holy mount. This little town of Avranches is very pleasant, and a great resort of English people, quite a little colony residing here. A pleasant promenade is on the height in front of the Prefecture, covering the same view we have seen in entering the town. In the open place at this spot is a tiny heap of carved stones, and pieces of pillars ; and this is all that is left of the once cathedral of Avranches, as an inscription upon it states. At another corner of this place is a small piece of a granite pillar, said to be the spot where our Henry II., on his knees, received the Pope’s Legate, after the murder of Thomas k Becket. It is pleasant to walk from here around the old walls of the town, that speak of its former importance, and to note the contrast in the gay, light life that now peoples it. The little journey from Avranches to St. Lo may quickly be made. St. Lo itself is a quiet town, with¬ out the gaiety and the English element of Avranches. The one thing here to be seen is the cathedral, but the surrounding neighbourhood is very pleasant and pastoral, and a quiet walk, or a row along the river Vire, gives a good view of the town lying on the hill crowned by the two spires of the cathedral. As we pull away from the town the calm increases, and we are soon amid quiet green fields ; a row of trees on one side reflected in the stream, on the other cattle quietly browsing. Scarcely a sound breaks the still¬ ness, save that now and then the note of a church bell calling to prayer is borne along the breeze. The building of the cathedral is interesting, and has been rich in coloured glass, some good remnants of which still remain. The west front is sadly disfigured ; at one time it must have been very rich, but every statuette is broken to pieces ; in fact it looks as though every fine bit had been carefully gone over and destroyed. On the exterior of this building is a curious external pulpit built in the flamboyant order with a canopy reared above it. There is a good deal to occupy one in and about the cathedral, and to those who like a quiet French life St. Lo will have many attractions. But as English tourists we are now in too close proximity to an important relic of our own history to linger longer here. The railway soon runs into the quaint old town of Bayeux, where, until very lately, oil lamps still swung across the street in lieu of modern gas, and many another sign of eighteenth-century life might be seen. We will keep the visit to the Bibliotheque as a bonne bouche^ and pay a first visit to the cathedral, that, like that of St. Lo, l;as suffered terribly from mutilation. The richness of the work and its grotesqueness deserve much time to f'? given to it, and this remark applies to both interior and exterior ; to the decoration of the fine Norman pillars in the nave, and to the Gothic

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The Stronger Will. 414 choir. There is a quaint bit of cast work over an altar in a north chapel, with the tree of life, the apple, a well for the water of life, a ladder stretched up to heaven, where God as an old man crowned holds in one hand the earth, whilst the other He raises in the act of blessing. But we must leave particulars and dates of this building to guide-books or fuller histories, and pass on into the Biblioth^que, where lies “ the tapestry that England’s fall depicts.” Ask nineteen people out of twenty what the Bayeux tapestry is like, and the answer will be, “Why, needlework hanging from the wall;” and thus the first sight of this interesting and precious tapestry is highly disappointing. For it is not what is generally termed tapestry, but a long strip of needlework about two-thirds of a yard deep — to be exact, twenty inches wide by 227 feet long. But the fact that this is a rude pictorial representation of the conquest of England, worked at the time of the event by the \vife of the Conqueror, makes it a unique historical relic of the highest value. Quaint and rude enough are the pictures, fifty-eight in all, here seen, each marked off in a square to itself. From Bayeux to Caen is but a “ little step,” and after studying this tapestry that portrays the valour of William, it is a fitting sequel to visit the church where his remains were buried. Caen is the most important town in this trip, and here the tourist will be enlivened by good music, and amusements, and he will also find in Caen a very good picture-gallery. But the churches here also will probably be the first places visited, for Caen is very rich in beautiful churches. The church that once held the remains of the Conqueror is that of St. Etienne, or the Abbaye aux Hommes ; but nought rests there now, as twice the grave has been violated, and one can only stand before the stone that marks the spot where once lay William the Conqueror. The coup d^ocil of the nave, with its three tiers of fine pure Norman arches, is very effective ; but the details of work will not detain one so long as in the cathedral of Bayeux. The most beautiful church in Caen is that of St. Pierre ; and in and around this one can spend much time ; the view of it from the exterior at the east is especially good, and the interior is exceptionally rich in carving, both good and grotesque. There is one little church that has lately been restored that is a little gem ; but for a long time it was used as a storehouse for the paving- stones of the town, and subject to every desecration. A grand rose window over the west door is said to have been destroyed by the English, but enough was left of the design to see its beauty and wherewith to restore it. This little church is called St. Etienne le Vieux. The main square of Caen is a pleasant open space full of life, and very different to the calm and quiet of Bayeux or the other towns we have been visit¬ ing ; and there is much more here than we have hinted at to entice the traveller to remain for many days ; but we have yet to reach Havre, where we end this “ easy trip,” and so, by way of a change from walking, or riding, or railway carriage, we take a pas¬ sage in the early morning on the steamboat that runs down the canal and the river Orne, and then crosses the “rough and tumble” mouth of the Seine for Havre. The first part of this little journey is between fields and lines of trees ; and soon after starting a capital view is had on looking back of Caen and its many spires and towers. Then the river becomes wider, and we soon gain the mouth of the Orne, and pass the little port with the Saxon name of Ouistreham, and the little steamer is quickly in the roll and lift of the on-sweeping Channel billows that are breaking on the Seine bar, and soon make the tender traveller feel qualms of mal de rner^ and many of the French lady passengers to talk volubly of the horrors of the sea. But with the journey from Havre to South¬ ampton in store for us, this little passage in the bright sunshine is enjoyable ; and we feel a pang of regret when we set foot on Havre jetty and look out for the English steamer that in a few hours lands us once more on English earth. THE STRONGER WILL. By EVELYN EVERETT GREEN, Author of “Monica," &c. . CHAPTER THE TWENTY-THIRD, THE MARCHWOOD POST-BAG. LNESS is a master that teaches us many things ; and the sharp attack that had prostrated Mr. Cadwal- lader in the early spring had left its traces upon him in many visible ways. During the tim t that he had lain in bed, unable to read, unwishful to talk or exert himself in any way. shut up with his adopted daughter as his sole companion, he had had much time to think and to weigh matters in a fashion somewhat new to him ; and with the natural softening which weakness and sickness produce, these musings had taken a new complexion, and one that surprised him not a little. When he gained a little strength, it was the children who were oftenest admitted to his room, and they were never long without introducing the name of “Brother” into the conversation; and upon the smallest encouragement would pour out strings of stories, all illustrative of his kindness and their love for him, and Ethel would end up with a long sigh, and an ardent wish that he would come and see them again.

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The Stronger Will. 415 The invalid would lie and listen and think, and when Florence sat beside him he studied her face intently. The name of Rudolf seldom passed her lips. Her smik was as sunny as ever, her manner as bright and loving. Yet deep down in those grey eyes that were so full of light there lurked a shadow as of patient waiting and watching. It was not sadness exactly, but it bespoke a certain unsatisfied longing, not unmingled with hope. Mr. Cadwallader saw it, and, with the intuitive per¬ ception of a deep love, he traced it to its right source. He had read Florence's secret long ago, and had gradually brought himself to accept it and make up his mind to the consequences ; but the silence between them had not yet been broken. Perhaps he wished to have all his plans completed before he broached the subject to her. It was not his fashion to do things by halves or to be generous grudgingly. The silence was broken at last by Rudolf himself. One morning the post-bag brought three letters to Marchwood in his handwriting : one for his mother, one for Florence, and one for Mr. Cadwallader. He had never in his life written to his uncle except the few lines he left behind on his abrupt departure from Marchwood ; never at all before to Florence ; and they both felt that something unusual must have happened to induce him to do so now. Florence made no attempt to open her letter at the breakfast-table. Mr. Cadwallader’s face as he perused his was quite inscrutable ; but Mrs. Freer broke into astonished e.xclamations. ‘‘ Rudolf is going to Australia ! " she cried ; “ going next week ! How very, very extraordinary of him ! He has resigned his secretaryship, and has taken' an appointment out there, which Sir Arthur Morrison has obtained for him. Well, I do call that odd ! And to make up his mind in such a hurry, too ! Oliver, don’t you think it’s very odd? He wants me to take the children to say ‘good-bye.’ Why doesn’t he come here himself, I wonder? I don’t understand it at all. Next week, too 1 Why, however can he be ready in time ? ” And so Mrs. Freer talked on, repeating herself again and again, whilst Florence sat still and silent, and rather pale, and Mr. Cadwallader appeared to take no notice of anything. Florence escaped as soon as she could, carried her own letter into the garden, and opened it there. “ I am writing you a few lines, Florence (if 1 may call you so this once), a few lines of farewell before I leave this country, perhaps for ever. I feel as if I wished to tell you my real reason for quitting England, for on some subjects I can speak more freely to you than to anyone else. I find it is just as I said : this half-and-half life will not do for me. I am trying in what I do to act for the best. I want you to approve the step — I want to feel that I carry away the friendship, the goodwill, and the sympathy that I have received at your hands, and that has been more to me than I can possibly tell you. I would thank you, if I could find words, for what you have been to me— for your goodness to me and mine ; but if I begin, I fear I should say too much, should repeat words that I have no right to address to you. Florence, farewell ! God in heaven bless and keep you, and make you happy, as you have made others happy around you. In this world I believe we shall meet no more— hard as it is to say it, I believe it is best so— but your image will be always in my heart : the image of the one woman I have loved ! Well, I have said it now, and it shall stand, for it is true, and I think you have known it. All love brings pain with it, if it is worth calling love, and I would not part with my share of pain at the cost of never having known you ; for if at times the pain seems almost to outweigh the joy, it is not really so, even in the present, and will be less so as time goes on, and I learn to picture you happy in the well-loved home which, despite all, seems like a home to me. Once more, adieu ! and if in the future I can -serve you ever so little, you have but to command me. My greatest happiness through life will be to think that you will still let me call myself your friend. “Rudolf Stanhope.” Florence read her letter once through, then put it aside and went through her daily round of duties with a calm, untroubled face, and with a quiet light of resolution shining in her eyes. When all was done, she took her letter in her hand, and bent her steps towards Mr. Cadwallader’s study. “Uncle Oliver,” she said, coming and standing beside him, “ I have a letter I want you to read.” “And I,” he said, “have two that I wish to show you. Take this one first. Howard has just sent it over. It is from a medical friend of his in town— the one, I believe, whom he brought here to see Rudolf last September.” Florence took it, and read : “ My dear Howard, — You will, perhaps, think it rather odd of me to write to you on such a subject, and it certainly is no business of mine, but I know you are on intimate terms with Mr. Cadwallader and young Stanhope’s relations, and I cannot help appeal¬ ing to you to see if something cannot be cone for him to save him from throwing himself away in sheer mental and physical depression, owing to causes that are probably only temporary. I have seen a good deal of him of late, and I am convinced he has a future before him ; but he has run down sadly both in health and spirits lately. Pie is certainly in great need of rest and change, and I could not say he was wrong in giving up a post that tried him beyond his present reduced strength, but he is not in the least fit to go off alone to the Colonies. What are his friends thinking of to leave him alone to fight his battle out unaided ? All he wants is just to be taken home and looked well after for a few months or a year — in plain words, to be made happy, and to be well cared for. He is not ill ; he has a splendid physique, but he has overtaxed his strength, and — as I firmly believe— been crossed in love as well. If he is left alone to go into exile with his trouble weighing him down as it now is, I should not like to answer for the consequences. He has a mother — a well-to-do uncle — why does not

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The Stronger Will. 416 somebody interfere I* It is no business of mine, but really I feel it my duty to speak before it is too late. “ Yours very truly, “Thomas Grey.” “ Here is the other one/’ said Mr. Cadvvallader, as Florence finished perusing this communication. The second was from Rudolf himself. “ My dear Sir, — I am leaving England next week, most likely for many years, possibly for ever ; and before I go there is something I wish to say to you. I suppose, when a chapter of a man’s life has closed for ever, he is able to look more dispassionately upon the past, and undoubtedly the sense of approaching separation from my kindred and native land throws a new light upon many things that have gone before. I, at least, in looking back, see very much to regret in my conduct towards you, very much to feel grateful for in yours towards me and those dear to me. Will you allow me to express my sense of regret for past misunderstandings, and accept my best thanks for the ample provision you have so generously made for my mother and young brothers and sisters ? As it hardly seems likely that I shall rise to a position that will enable me to do much for them, it is an immense relief to feel that they are placed beyond any possi¬ bility of want. “ I am sorry to think that when I parted from you last it was in anger and irritation. I have often recalled that interview, and have felt a keen sense of regret at my own language and bearing on that occasion. I can only say in excuse — and I am aware that it is no excuse— that I was desperately tired and in some pain, and on that account frightfully irritable. I hardly knew what I was saying, and I have been heartily ashamed of myself many times since for my want of self-control and for my intemperate words. I believe, however, that, with your unfailing generosity, you will condone the past, and let me feel that we part as friends, although we shall not meet again. “ I want to ask you, sir, not to invite me to March- wood, as I feel you might possibly do, in your kind hospitality, to say my farewells to my own people there. I want to see them again, but there are reasons why I must not come to Marchwood, strong as is the temptation at times. Perhaps you understand my meaning. I cannot help loving one there who is nearest and dearest to you — and, I think, to all who know her — and I dare not see her again, even for the one last look I sometimes crave for unspeakably. I have tried to conquer my love, but I fear I never shall. I began to hope I had mastered it, but the sight of her during those days she spent in town broke down all my defences, and I have never been able to build them up again. I believe the only cure is to put the sea and half the world between myself and her, and so I am going ; not, I think, to forget, but to try and bear my loneliness and my loss like a man. Some¬ times I feel that to stay within an hour or two of Marchwood is beyond the limit of my powers of en¬ durance. “ I have been frank with you, sir — franker than I meant to be when I commenced writing. May I feel that I carry away with me into exile your goodwill and forgiveness ? In closing for ever this page of my life, I want to feel that all ill-will and misunderstand¬ ing have been blotted out entirely. “ Yours very faithfully, “Rudolf Stanhope.” Whilst Florence was reading this letter Mr. Cad- wallader was reading the one she had brought. At the close of the perusal they looked up, and Florence asked — “ Uncle Oliver, are you going to let him go ? ” No, Florence, I am not.” Then she knelt suddenly down before him, put her head upon his shoulder, and almost for the first time in her life burst into tears. He held her in his arms, soothing her as he had soothed her in her childish outbursts of grief. “ Florence, little Florence, my own precious one ! And did you think that I would really stand deliber¬ ately in the way of your happiness ? ” “No, no!” she answered; “no, no!” and then drawing herself a little away, and wiping her eyes, whilst her smile began to shine out like sunshine after rain, she said, “ 1 always knew. Uncle Oliver, that it would all come right. I told you so once, did I not } I told myself so every day of my life. But you know certainty is so very sweet — and I am just a little bit excited and upset to-day. I am very silly, I know, but oh, if you knew how happy you have made me ! ” She put her arm about his neck, and he held her very close to him again. “ So Uncle Oliver has been superseded after all, has he.^” said he half-playfully, half-sadly. “ He will have to take the second place now that he is growing an old man, and see someone else in his ? ” But Florence’s arm clasped him even more closely. “ Uncle Oliver knows better than that,” she said very softly and tenderly. “ Uncle Oliver knows that his own place is quite unassailable. My dearest, only father, you know your child better than that : you know that in my heart there will be no thought of first or second, only a perfect love for both.” “ I know it, my darling, I know it. Do I not know you, and love you ?” And then by-and-by came a soft whisper — “ And when are we to fetch him home “ To-morrow, if you like ; but are you certain that you can induce the obstinate young fellow to come?” “ I think I can promise that.” “ Good ; but let the young Jackanapes fully under¬ stand that he only comes back to Marchwood in the following character — that of Miss Tenant’s affianced husband and Mr. Cadwallader’s heir.” CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FOURTH. FLORENCE. It was a stifling evening in May. Even in the open country the air was heavy and sultry, and the young leaves hung down languidly in the great heat, whilst

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The Stronger Will. in London the atmosphere was intolerably oppressive, and seemed to weigh down the inhabitants like a solid tangible load. Rudolf lay full length upon his sofa, looking white and worn, and utterly cast down. The struggle of the past weeks had been terrible. He had done, in the end, what he considered right and best, but what it obstacle might be raised by mother or uncle against his going — some loop-hole offered him of escape from the exile from which his whole soul shrank ; although he told himself again and again that his only chance of recovering his peace of mind was to put half the world between himself and Marchwood. But no answer to any of his letters had been re- “he looked up, but the dream did not vanish” {p. 418) turned, and his vague hopes had died away in despair. They would not have missed a single post had they meant to interfere. The air was terribly oppressive ; the last of the sun¬ light slanting in quivered in the dusty atmosphere, and showed the dancing motes rising and falling with the imperceptible currents of air. The hum of the traffic below and the distant roar from Piccadilly came up in one loud continuous murmur ; and in the distance a brass band was playing one of Strauss’s haunting melancholy airs. Everybody knows the undertone of sadness that lurks in such music ; it was nothing new to Rudolf, yet he had never felt it as he had cost him no one knew, though the lines upon his face when at rest told an eloquent tale of their own. And now the irrevocable step had been taken : he had cut adrift from his old moorings. The last page of his past life was all but turned. In another week he should be on his way to a strange land to live — or die — amongst strangers. There were moments when Rudolf found it in his heart to wish that death, not life, might be his portion. His letters to Marchwood had elicited no immediate response. He had awaited with an almost sicken¬ ing anxiety the morning’s post that day, with a sort of wild hope that Florence would write, that some 747

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The Stronger Will. 418 did to-night. It seemed like a farewell to all hope, all joy, all happiness— he could not get the music out ot his head— he heard it long after the band had moved away— it mingled now with other strains, the deep tones of an organ and the sweet notes of a woman’s voice, but the sadness was always there— the haunting rhythm of a long farewell. He felt upon his brow the soft pressure of two cool strong hands. The touch thrilled him strangely, but he kept his eyes fast shut, lest the dream should vanish. His thoughts flew back to that hot evening in August, after his broken arm had been set, when Florence had stood behind him, and laid her hands upon his head. The same sense of restful well-being and content had fallen upon him now, the languid •dreamy sense of ease after pain, of calm after strife. He knew that he was sleeping, he dreaded inex¬ pressibly to wake, and yet he felt impelled to open his •eyes. He looked up, but the dream did not vanish. There was Florence standing over him, looking down at him Avith the old, sweet, fearless look he knew so well. The sunlight slanting in behind fell upon her hair, framing her face in a golden halo. She wore a soft white dress, laced and pointed with amber. She looked like some painted angel from a church window •or from the canvas of an old master. Rudolf knew that he was dreaming, and he wished he might go on dreaming thus for ever. He fixed his •eyes upon her face, but neither spoke nor moved, lest the spell should be broken. Yet as he looked, suddenly the sweet face changed .and quivered, the beautiful eyes seemed to sparkle through a mist of tears. “ Rudolf,'’ said Florence softly, “ I have come to lake you home.” At the sound of her voice he sprang to his feet, and found himself face to face with Florence. He did not speak— he could not. He stood still gazing at her, every drop of blood seeming to ebb away from his face as he did so. “ Poor boy ! ” said Florence, the dew still clinging to her eyelashes ; “ and you thought we should let you go alone to the other side of the world ? He sat down suddenly ; the revulsion of feeling was almost too much for him. He did not attempt to utter a word. He was not certain even now that all this was not a feverish dream. “ Lie down again,” said Florence gently. “ We will talk presently.” “You will — not — go?” “ No, certainly not ; ” and she sat down near to him, and full in his sight. Gradually the mists seemed to clear away from his •eyes. He became aware that it was no dream, but a wonderful, a blissful veality. He was confused, shaken, bewildered ; but he was beginning to feel that the darkness had not yet swallowed him up. He raised himself on his elbow, and asked— “ What does it all mean ? I do not understand.” “ It means,” answered Florence, with her sunniest smile, ‘‘ that you are to be taken home at once— that you are not to go to Australia at all. Foolish boy ! Why did you ever dream of such a thing ? ” “ Home ! ” he repeated half sadly, half incredulously. “Where is home?” “ Marchwood is your home,” she answered softly. But he looked at her and shook his head. “That can never be.” “Why not?” His eyes were very sad, but very brave and patient. If he suffered keenly at this moment— as Florence knew he did— at least he gave no outward sign of pain. He spoke quietly and steadily. “ You are all very kind ; but it cannot be. Believe me, I have judged best for myself. I have a reason — ” Florence had turned her head away for a moment. She turned it back now, brave and smiling, yet with tears shining in her eyes. Suddenly she knelt down before him, putting both her hands in his. With the perfect simplicity and trustfulness of a nature too noble and womanly to shrink from the whole truth, when its utterance only could smooth the way for him, she spoke out fearlessly “ Rudolf, will not that reason cease to exist when I tell you that 1 love you ? ” He looked at her in breathless silence, as if he could not trust the evidence of his senses. He rose slowly, and she did the same, and they stood gazing at one another as if a spell had been cast upon them. Florence was the first to speak. “ You have twice told me of your love, Rudolf ; but I think you would never have asked for mine. You see, you have made me give it you unasked ; yet I know you will not prize it less for that.” Then he took her in his arms and kissed her— that wonderful first kiss that can never be repeated. All the strong young manhood that had seemed torn and ^ buffeted out of him by the blows of adverse fortune returned as in a flood, as he felt the pressure of Flo¬ rence’s lips on his. The happiness of that moment was perfect. “ And now, Rudolf— most proud and impracticable and obstinate of Rudolfs— you know the whole history of my position at Marchwood — my unalterable deter¬ mination, ever since I was old enough to understand the question, never to be the means of supplanting the rightful heir— my conviction that its owner would in time view the matter as I did, and not throw upon me a burden I could not feel justified in bearing. You are Mr. Cadwallader’s heir— he admits it himself now, and has made you so legally as well as morally. Rudolf, he is fond of you. He is anxious it should all be forgotten, and a new era begun. It is easier for you to be generous, because you have been the in¬ jured party ; more difficult for him, conscious as he is of past intolerance and prejudice. I am quite sure that I have not trusted in vain to your generosity. I know that it is more difficult to accept than to give, but I think I know you well enough to be very sure that when I ask it as the greatest happiness you can bestow upon me, you will not hold back from a perfect and entire reconciliation.”

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The Garden in June. So said Florence, concluding a long and earnest conversation she had had with Rudolf, in which many things had been explained, many difficulties smoothed away, many secrets brought to light. At first, it is true, his pride had risen up against the proposed ar¬ rangement, but when Florence had gently asked if he intended to let his pride spoil her life as well as his own, he had been silenced, and had listened to her more calmly and reasonably. In the light of the beautiful new love that had flooded his life, the past as well as the future looked changed. Love after all, not pride, should be the mainspring of action, and when Florence talked to him of her deep steadfast love for one who had been the tenderest of fathers to her, he felt that for her sake he could love his uncle too, and submit to be treated as a son. ‘‘If only it were not despoiling you, Florence - ” he began ; but she laid her hand upon his lips. “ Whatever is yours is mine now, Rudolf, and what¬ ever is mine is yours. We need not trouble ourselves over a matter so profoundly unimportant as legal ownership. We are to be as son and daughter to Uncle Oliver, to watch together over his declining years, to make life happy and peaceful for him to the very last. We have him, and we have one another ; is not that enough ? Rudolf, my Rudolf, I know you better, I think, than you know yourself. That is why I came so confidently to fetch you home.” Rudolf laid his hand on Florence’s head. She fan¬ cied that his hand trembled a little. “ If only you knew how sweet that word sounds to me ! ” he said very quietly, rather as if he were afraid to trust his own voice. “ To-day I believed that I should never know a home again — for I knew that no place could be a home to me without you, Florence.” And so Rudolf came home to Marchwood to take up his abode there as its future master. The stronger will had triumphed, and he was acknowledged as his uncle’s heir. What a joyous reception met him there from the 419 children, what glad congratulations from his mother ! and what a happy meeting later on with Violet, when no shadow rested upon her mind, and she saw what the design of Florence Tenant had been throughout, and mistrusted her no longer ! As for Vernon, after the first shock of disappoint¬ ment had passed, he had the grace to be heartily ashamed of himself ; and when he found that East- lands was settled upon him, and that his mother would require his presence there to manage the property during her lifetime, he felt that he had more than be deserved, and resolved to grow up to something better than a life of mere scheming and idleness. And before Mrs. Freer migrated to the new house Rudolf’s strength had returned. Rest and happiness and freedom from care had restored him to his wonted vigour ; and he and Florence were married amid the rejoicings of the whole community. Now little pattering footsteps echo along the corri¬ dors of the quaint old house, and there is a babble of baby voices in the familiar rooms. Mr. Cadwallader is as proud of his “ grandchildren,” as he invariably calls them, as the most devoted of the race of grand¬ parents could be ; and they tyrannise over him in a fashion which plainly shows that they deserve the name of “ Stanhope-Cadwallader ” which they now bear. Little Oliver makes grandpapa a complete slave, and the liberties that Flossy takes are appalling to witness. Strange to say, the old gentleman likes it amaz¬ ingly, and sometimes, as he sits watching the fair young mother, with her beautiful children clinging about her, he says, with a roguish twinkle in his eye : “ Strange, what a trouble it was to settle who should be heir of Marchwood with such a simple solution of the puzzle under our hands ! It all comes of bringing up a woman to think and act for herself. She is sure to turn round in opposition at last — and the worst of it is that the chances are she will triumph in the pos¬ session of the Stronger Will ! ” THE END. THE GARDEN IN JUNE. T is, perhaps, somewhat em¬ barrassing in a month when everything in the garden is clamorous for atten¬ tion at once, to know which is the best course to take. And this is just the case with us gardeners in June, when we certainly cannot afford to show partiality or favouritism in the garden ; for what would hap¬ pen to us if, say, our devotion to the roses allowed us altogether .to neglect the strawberry runners, the thinning of the wall-fruit, the weeding of the early vegetable crops, and the mowing of the lawn ? It may be well, then, this month, when a vigorous sap in the whole veget¬ able creation is making everything push on with giant strides, if, forsaking our custom of late which has been the study of some one particular plant or flower, we give a few hints in ..detail upon the main operations necessary in June fin each department of the garden. We can better afford to discuss the merits of individual plants in the dead period of the year than we can now, but at all events we can afford to make June an exception to our rule. Yet, in this month, something too may with advan¬ tage be said about the lawn — an item, perhaps, too

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420 The Garden in June. often passed over in the garden. Where it is large enough, its popularity from May to September is notorious enough, for in our times, when sport of all kinds seems to have turned the heads of the majority of us, tennis certainly lays claim to a very consider¬ able share of our attention. The writer once knew a gentleman who had an old country house for dis¬ posal, which was on his hands for some time. The lawn in front of it was studded with a few flower-beds of the ordinary kind, but the standard roses upon it were in rather an exhausted state, and would have wanted renewing. This being the case, the space oc¬ cupied by the old standards was, upon their removal, simply turfed over, when soon afterwards a gentleman in search of a house entered the garden, and on seeing the lawn exclaimed, “ Tennis 1” and in twenty- four hours more the property was disposed of. The THINNING OUT WALL FRUIT. net was put up, and the first match ever played upon the lawn was a “single” between the vendor and the buyer, won amid much excitement by the vendor. Hardly a story, perhaps our readers will say, for a gardenitig paper, since the roses had to make way for the net. Nevertheless, the lawn is a very neces¬ sary adjunct for a good garden, and be it remembered that twenty-four hours’ work can at any time tians- form a tennis lawn into a flower garden by a little removal of the turf for some beds. ^ What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander,” and if the rosea had to give place to the net, so also at any time can the net give way to the flower-beds. Briefly, then, let us say that where a lawn is much worn from what¬ ever cause, whether by tennis or by anything else, it has of late years been thought that to have it re-sown with good grass seed is better than having it re¬ turfed. Early in March is, perhaps, as good a time as any for sowing a lawn, but a windy day should not be chosen, as the seed is liable then to be blown away. Cover afterwards with a little finely sifted leaf-mould, but take care that no stones are thoughtlessly allowed to find their way on to the lawn. In very badly worn places, an old tennis net horizontally laid over the ground at a very slight elevation, will also afford an additional protection against the birds : then again, if the ground be at all wet, avoid walking on it just after it has been sown, as the seed would pro¬ bably cling to the soles of the feet. Regular rolling and mowing with the machine is all that a lawn rec^uires, but dandelion roots should be drawn like a tooth, and in time, with this careful attention, it should be all that can be desired. In the fruit garden, we are careful in the months of May and June to get away the strawberry runners : this is of the utmost importance if we are to look for any proper crop of strawberries. Similarly, if they are blooming during a prolonged drought, and more particularly when the fruit is, as we say, just setting, the berry will perish if, in a very dry season, no water is given. On the other hand, experienced gardeners will tell you that in some parts of the country, when water is getting scarce, it is very hard to lavish so much on the strawberries, which, by the way, are never content with a little, if any is given to them at all. In a heavy fruiting season, thin¬ ning the wall-fruit is another operation that ca7i?iot be neglected. Use extreme caution in getting away those that you are removing : have no branch over-weighted, and be particularly careful not to damage either the stalk or the fruit of those that you allow to remain for ripening. The gooseberries and currants if troubled with the caterpillar must mstcmtly be attended to. Do not be deceived into supposing, because the cater¬ pillar only devours the leaves, that therefore the fruit is safe. If you do nothing you will find in the middle of Tuly that the leaves are all gone, but that the iruit

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Aerial Photography. 421 is still green and hard. The usual remedies, then, must be applied forthwith. In a good season, we mean in the absence of caterpillars, sometimes when the foliage is thick, some may be thinned out a little, so as to allow the sun and air to get a little more readily to the fruit ; but then we are again unhappily confronted by the bird difficulty, when netting must be used, and here the old tennis nets are again of the utmost service. Similarly vvill they also be useful for the protection of our wall-fruit a little later on. By the end of the third week in May, our bedding out, and all summer arrangement of the flower garden, should be over : yet, perhaps in the course of the month of J une we may find a good many handsome and luxuri¬ ant plants still on the stands in our greenhouse. Many of these we can with advantage either plunge in our flower-beds, or we can decorate the sides of our gravel walks with them, and thus acquire an empty greenhouse, or one nearly so, when the opportunity can be best employed for any necessary painting, or if not, then any plants requiring special care or high temperature can, of course, be tended at a time when there is plenty of room for them. In the kitchen garden, even as early as June, you will find that there are crops to be cleared, while it is hardly necessary to state that you will always find crops to be weeded or to be thinned. Indeed, the kitchen garden alone could occupy us in June, for there are peas and beans to stick, potatoes and celery to earth up, and successional crops to sow. A dressing of salt may be given to the asparagus-bed, while in the middle of the month the chief planting of broccoli may be made. Cut the herbs, too, just before they flower, and hang them up in a thoroughly dry room. AERIAL PHOTOGRAPHY. BY WALTER E. WOODBURY. ERONAUTS and others have for some time past endeavoured to produce photographs from a balloon, and have met with very considerable success. Students of geodesy have long looked forward to the time when photo¬ graphs could be made from which plans and maps could be constructed. But besides this, photographs taken from a height have many other uses. For war purposes they would be invaluable, showing the position and movements of the enemy. For explorers, too, they might be the means of preventing the loss of life, and for the ad¬ vancement of scientific knowledge there is no end to their utility. Probably in no branch of science have such rapid strides been made as in photography, extending its application to every branch of science, art, and edu¬ cation. The difficulties which first beset the experimenter in aerial photography have been very much smoothed down by the introduction of the gelatine dry plates, with which photographs can be made in a fraction of a second ; and this is, as will be seen, very essential. It would be difficult to say who was the first to make photographs from a balloon, but there is no doubt that M. Nadar, of Paris, has done more in this direction than anyone else. Some very satisfactory results were obtained by him by means of a camera attached to the side of the car. But the idea of sending a camera alone up into the air was one that occupied the attention of scientists. ELEMENTARY AERIAL PHOTOGRAPHY.

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422 Aerial Photograpeiy. simply sending a current through these wires, could work the movements of the camera as easily as if it were in his own hands. The operation was this ; he touched one button and sent a current to one electro¬ magnet, which brought a plate into position. By means of a telescope the behaviour of the balloon could be seen. Directly it was in a steady position a current was sent, by pressing another button, through the second electro-magnet ; this released the shutter, and the exposure was made. When the four plates had been exposed the camera was drawn to the ground, the plates developed into negatives, and by means of a magic lantern their image was thrown on to a screen or large piece of paper. With a piece of chalk the outlines were sketched out, and the position of the enemy’s fortification, their strength and position, could at once be seen by all the officers. Notwithstanding, however, the possibility of taking pictures from a height in the of a second, it was absolutely necessary that the balloon should be perfectly steady. This at first was not the case, until the following movements were overcome : — ist. A swinging movement in the direction of the wind, parallel to the surface of the earth. This was at length overcome by my father, who was indebted for the idea to an observation during a rough nocturnal passage across the Channel of the behaviour of the saloon lamp, which was attached by four india-rubber cords at its four corners to the ceiling. On unfastening the cords the lamp commenced to swing furiously, but on refastening the cords it was perfectly steady. He adopted the same idea in attaching the camera to the balloon, with successful results. The second move¬ ment to be overcome was a rotary one. This was at last got rid of by a canvas drum acting as a kind of rudder. This will be seen in the accompanying sketch of a balloon camera ascent at Wimbledon, made in 1880, some very good results being ob¬ tained. The third difficulty to encounter was an oscillation by which the balloon deviates from its vertical direction. Some few years back a German, named Meydenbauer, was attracted by the difference between the be¬ haviour of balloons and kites. It Avill be noticed that a kite v/iil remain suspended motionless in the air for hours. They do not stir, nor do they revolve, but keep their level correctly. He found that this was due to the manner in which the cords were attached and the position of the centre of gravity. With balloons we have the motive power of the wind, the ascending power of the gas, and the retaining cord. Meyden- bauer’s idea was to suspend them in the same manner. Instead, for the reason that it obviated the necessity of sending up aeronauts, and, in consequence, a much smaller balloon would be required.. For war purposes the practice of sending men up in a balloon for the pur¬ pose of making photographs would be a highly dan¬ gerous one. A well-directed shot could hardly fail to bring the whole lot to the ground. Whereas a small camera attached to a captive balloon of small dimen¬ sions would be a very difficult object to aim at, and if struck but little damage would be done. In the year 1881 my father, the late W. B. Woodbury, invented and patented a balloon camera of this kind. The principal part of the apparatus is a drum holding four sensitive dry plates ; this drum is wound up, and by means of a small electro-magnet a catch was released, and the plates could be brought into position successively. The lens was covered with an instantaneous shutter, opening and closing the lens in the -^o^h part of a second. This also was controlled by a small electro-magnet. The wires connected with these two magnets, and one for the return current, were enclosed in the rope that held the balloon, so that the operator on terra jirma^ by PHOTOGRAPHING FROM A CAR.

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Aerial Photography. 423 therefore, of constructing the balloon of stuff and leaving it free, only held by the cord net¬ ting enclosing it, and to which the camera is suspended, he constructed a globular balloon, pierced i-n the cen¬ tre by a strong bamboo cane, from the ends of which a strong twine netting enclosed the bal¬ loon. At these ends are also attached two cords joined some distance from the balloon to the retaining cord. The camera was placed inside the balloon, the lens only being uncovered. From a recent number of La Nature I have copied a sketch of a photographic kite recently invented by M. A. Balut, of Enlaure. As has already been stated, a kite is far more steady than a balloon when suspended in mid-air. For this reason M. Balut uses a lozenge-shaped kite, provided A PHOTOGRAPHIC KITE. with a long tail. To the kite is attached a small photographic camera by means of a triangular support fixed to the backbone. The camera is pro¬ vided with an instantaneous shutter actuated by means of a slow match. Before flying the kite this match is lighted, and when combus¬ tion has proceeded so far as to set fire to a small thread, it releases the spring of the shutter, and the exposure is made. Another very novel feature of this ingenious apparatus is the use of a registering aneroid barometer attached to the kite, so that the operator can find out the altitude which the kite has as¬ cended above the ground. This barometer is combined with a photographic registering appa¬ ratus, which operates at the same time as the camera. It is enclosed in a light, tight box, and the instant that the shutter of the photo¬ graphic camera is released, and the exposure made, an aperture closed by the shutter is un¬ covered through the burning of the match. At the moment the aperture is uncovered the luminous rays strike the dial and print the shadows of the two needles (mechanism and index needles) upon a piece of sensitised paper with which the dial is provided. To the thread attached to the shutter, and which gives the exposure when burnt, is fixed a piece of paper, which at the same time detaches itself and falls to the ground, indicating to the operator that the exposure has been made. The kite is then hauled in and the plate developed. Another curious form of aerial photographic apparatus is being developed by a French in¬ ventor, M. Denesse. It consists of a photo- A BALLOON CAMERA.

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424 To BE Given up. graphic camera attached to a rocket. An umbrella¬ like parachute is also fixed to the rocket-stick. When fired into the air this is closed, but as soon as the rocket begins to descend it opens out, and the whole returns gracefully to the earth. In this the camera is cylindrical in form, and has round its circumference twelve lenses — a sensitive plate is in the centre. The lenses are provided with a shutter which opens and closes instantly on the camera commencing to descend. It is then drawn back to the operator by a cord at¬ tached before the firing of the rocket. The principal advantages of this form of apparatus are cheapness of operating and freedom from risk. Having now described the different methods of ob¬ taining photographs from a height above the earth, we have next to consider how to make them of practical utility. Their use for war purposes has been already alluded to, but the service they render to students of geodesy requires some little explanation. We will suppose, then, that by one or other of the means described we have succeeded in obtaining views of the country taken from a height above the sur¬ face of the earth. How is a plan or a map to be constructed from this? Dr. Frank Stolze says that it may be confidently assumed that during the exposure the sensitive plate on which the photo¬ graph is made has hardly ever been horizontal enough to allow the plate to be considered as analogous to a parallel projection of the natural landscape ; it is much more likely to be always more or less perspectively foreshortened. There exists, however, a particularly simple and reliable means of finding proper geometrical projections from the perspective projection. This is done after the fol¬ lowing manner : — An exact square of large dimensions — say 600 feet— is described upon a flat part of the ground to be photographed, and the four corners marked distinctly, so that they shall be plainly seen in the photograph. From the now perspectively fore¬ shortened image of the square we can find with ease all the constituents of perspective distortion, so that it is possible by working out the perspective back¬ wards to find for every point of the picture the corre¬ sponding point of the geometric construction, which is then, when we have to deal with level ground, a comparatively easy matter. But when, however, the ground is hilly and undulating, the matter becomes a more difficult and complicated one. It is then neces¬ sary to take as auxiliaries some ordinary photogram- metric views in order to find out the difference of levels, and to reduce all the data on the photograph to the same horizontal. Notwithstanding this, however, the work will be far easier than when one has to trust to terrestrial photogrammetry ; and it may, indeed, be stated that views taken from a height and used in this manner far exceed in simplicity and ease all that has yet been done in the way of special views taken for purposes of geodesy. In fact, views taken from bal¬ loons, parachutes, kites, or rockets, are undoubtedly the geodesic views of the future. Many able scientists are working in order to im¬ prove upon the present methods of aerial photo¬ graphy, none of which can be said to be perfect. Government has taken the matter up, and many successful experiments have been made at Chatham and elsewhere by Major Templar and other great military scientists. For my own humble part, I hope very shortly to construct a camera which will supersede all that has hitherto been attempted in this direction. TO BE GIVEN UP. By KATE EYRE, Author of “For the Good of the Family,’ “A Step in the Dark,” &c. &c. CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FOURTH. “ CAN IT BE TRUE? ” LONG awkward silence fell on the little group after Clare had asked her pertinent question. “ My dear Clare, Mrs. Robin¬ son, I am sure, had no idea you were just behind her when she spoke,” put in Mrs. Littledale, in a deprecatory tone. ‘‘ And she therefore felt at liberty to malign Mr. Dacre since there was no one present to take his part?” replied Clare quickly, with her angry eyes still fixed on Mrs. Robinson. “ Oh, Clare, how can you talk like that ? ” ‘'Aunt, I must have an answer to my question. If Mrs. Robinson has not the courage to repeat in my presence what she had evidently been only too eager to say in my absence, I must beg you to supply the information.” “ My dear, I know nothing whatever about it.” “ But you must know what Mrs. Robinson has been saying, aunt ? ” “ I think. Miss Eastabrook, it would be better, per¬ haps, to drop the subject. Any further discussion will, I am sure, only be exceedingly painful to all present,” said Mrs. Robinson at length, with a great assumption of dignity. “ You try to take away a man’s character behind his back, and then, when one who loves him asks you to repeat what you have been saying, you lack the courage to do so. Once again I ask you of what has Mr. Dacre been guilty that should, in your opinion, necessitate my breaking off my engagement ? ”

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To BE Given up. 425 Clare looked so fierce as she spoke that Mrs. Robin¬ son quite cowered beneath her gaze. “ The rumours about which I have been speaking to your aunt have probably reached you as well as me, Miss Eastabrook.” “ Some rumours have reached me, but as I know them to be entirely groundless, I have treated them with the contempt they deserve. Still, I must ask you to repeat the rumours to which you allude, Mrs. Robinson.’^ •‘Oh ! Clare, my dear, do let the subject drop. You are only distressing yourself and all of us by per¬ sisting in this way,’’ urged Mrs. Littledale, in much distress. “ Aunt, you are driving me mad. Tell me what has been said, that I may know the worst — the worst that calumny can fabricate.” “Well, my dear, he is extravagant, you know ; even you must acknowledge that.” “ And because Mr. Dacre is pronounced extravagant by those who do not know what his means are, I ought, in Mrs. Robinson’s opinion, to break off my engagement to him ? ” Mrs. Robinson merely smiled the smile of one pos¬ sessing superior knowledge. “ Mabyn, perhaps you will tell me the truth ? Of wEat is Philip accused?” “ All that Mrs. Robinson has at present said amounts to little more than that Mr. Dacre is considered ex¬ travagant,” replied Mabyn, trying to speak calmly. She was almost as much excited as Clare, but was even more anxious not to appear so. “ Then, Mrs. Robinson, if it is your opinion that I ought to break off my engagement to Mr. Dacre sim¬ ply because those who have no means of knowing what his resources may be are pleased to declare him extravagant, I beg to state in the most emphatic manner that I totally disagree with you.” “ Unfortunately, however, Miss Eastabrook, 07ie of Mr. Dacre’s resources is known— at least, that is what is being said very generally,” replied Mrs. Robinson, with a cruel smile. At first she had been terribly startled by Miss Eastabrook’s unexpected appearance upon the scene ; now, however, having recovered from the shock, she was prepared to thoroughly enjoy the humiliation of one whom she so cordially disliked. Mabyn, her pulses quickened by expectation, bent eagerly forward to listen, watching Clare’s face intently as she did so. Miss Eastabrook was very pale, and her eyes were still flashing defiance ; but to those who, like Mabyn, knew her every expression, the compression of her lips was sufficiently indicative of the agony she was suffering. “ Speak out plainly, if you please, Mrs. Robinson ; innuendo is lost upon me.” “Well, Miss Eastabrook, since you wish me to speak, people are saying that the Fancy Fair in which you took so deep an interest has not proved so great a financial success as those best able to form an opinion on the subject are convinced it ought to have done. Of course, I am only repeating what I hear on all sides.” “What can the financial success of the Fancy Fair and Mr. Dacre’s extravagance have to do with each other?” “ I should have thought, Miss Eastabrook, you could have traced the connection for yourself, seeing that we were speaking of Mr. Dacre’s resources.” “You mean to insinuate that Mr. Dacre has ap¬ propriated part of the proceeds of the Fancy Fair to his own use ? ” “It seems to me that is what those who are talking the matter over so freely must mean. Mind, I am only repeating what I hear on all sides. I should be very sorry to venture on an individual opinion.” “ Oh, surely, Mrs. Robinson, they must be making some terrible mistake. I know Philip Dacre is rather extravagant — from the very first I always said so ; but apart from that, both the doctor and myself have always thought him such a very nice young man. I do think there must be a mistake somewhere;” and the tears gathered in Mrs. Littledale’s eyes. “ If so, it is one into which many have fallen, for all Dursington is talking about it,” put in Miss Robin¬ son, who, like her mother, was glorying in Miss Easta¬ brook’s humiliation. “It is very, very sad, and I am sure nobody is more grieved about it than I am ; but still, as dear Maude says, everyone is talking about it, and I really fear there must be some foundation, or the report would never have spread so rapidly.” “It is one of the foulest lies that were ever breathed ! ” All turned hastily to look at Mabyn, who, with flushed face, trembling lips, and tightly clasped hands, had thus given vent to her indignation. Her vehe¬ mence surprised them greatly ; she was generally so very quiet. Miss Eastabrook flashed a look of gratitude towards her cousin. “Of course, Mabyn,” she said, still speaking calmly, although she too was trembling with agitation, “ it is a lie : a foul, wicked, despicable lie ! I would go from house to house denouncing it as such were it not that, as Philip Dacre’s future wife ” — here she drew herself up proudly — “ it would be undignified for me to attempt to disprove so utterly ridiculous a charge.” “ I am sure people must be making some dreadful mistake, and it will all come right presently,” again exclaimed Mrs. Littledale. This unpleasant scene in her own drawing-room was thoroughly upsetting her, and her anger was greatly kindled against Mrs. and Miss Robinson for being the cause of it. “ Do sit down, Clare dear,” continued the poor lady, drawing the most comfortable of easy-chairs towards her niece. “ You have been standing ever since you came in.” But Miss Eastabrook would not sit down. “I can stay only a minute or two, aunt,” she said ; and then she entered into a little domestic matter which she declared to be the purport of her call. Mabyn listened to her in astonishment. She ap¬ peared as calm and self-possessed as if nothing had occurred to agitate her in the slightest degree. Only a very keen observer could have seen that the muscles

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To BE Given up. 426 round about her mouth were not quite under her con¬ trol ; but Mabyn, who knew her sufficiently well to be able to estimate the extent of the suffering of which this was a sign, pitied her from the very bottom of her heart. Then, her business completed. Miss Eastabrook wished her aunt and Mabyn good-bye, bowed haughtily to Mrs. and Miss Robinson, and left the room, by the open window, walking down the carriage-drive with stately step and head erect. That afternoon, as the London train stopped at Dursington, Philip Dacre sprang on to the platform. His face was pale and drawn, his eyes full of restless anxiety. With rapid strides he walked away from the station in the direction of Southfields : selecting, however, notwithstanding the hurry he appeared to be in, the longer route, that which did not lead past The Fountains. But from one point, as he proceeded on his way, a view of the back of the house could be obtained. Here he paused a moment. Then, with a long-drawn sigh, he pressed on again. Arrived at Southfields, the door was opened to him by Sophy, who was evidently expecting him. “Will you come upstairs at once, Philip?” she asked. “ Yes, there’s no time to be lost,” he replied, hanging up his hat. Then he followed his sister up the stairs into their mother’s room. Mrs. Dacre was lying on a sofa, looking more fragile than ever. Julia, in the most elegant of tea- gowns, was leaning back in an easy-chair, leisurely sipping a cup of afternoon tea. Philip kissed first his mother, and then Julia, rather hurriedly. He was evidently ill at ease. “Won’t you have some tea, Philip?” asked Sophy, preparing to pour him out a cup. “ Thanks, no, dear.” Then turning to Mrs. Dacre, he said: “Mother, you know what I have come about ? ” “ Yes, my dear, yes,” and the poor woman burst into tears. “Mother, mother, don’t,” he urged. It was pain¬ ful to see how his face worked as he witnessed his mother’s grief. “ It is only natural that dear mamma should be dis¬ tressed,” observed Julia. “ Do be quiet, Ju 1 ” said Sophy, in an angry aside to her sister. Julia finished her tea in silence, and then sat twisting a diamond ring round on her finger— Bevan Dudson’s gift — looking the picture of resignation. Presently Mrs. Dacre dried her eyes. “ I am quite ready to sign anything you want me to now, Philip.” Then Philip moved a small table up to the side of his mother’s couch, and on it laid a bundle of papers, which he had brought down with him. Dipping a pen into ink, he handed it to Mrs. Dacre. “ Will you sign your name there, please, mother,” he said, indi¬ cating the exact spot with his finger. Mrs. Dacre took the pen, but her hand was trembling so violently that she could not write. Sophy poured some cordial into a glass and gave it to her mother. “ Do try to calm yourself, mamma dear,” she whispered. “ Poor Philip is so miserable.” Meanwhile, Philip looked on with his lips firmly pressed together, and an expression of unspeakable sorrow in his eyes. At another time he would have caressed his mother, and administered the cordial himself. But now, when he was asking a favour at her hands, he would not have recourse to soft touches and endearing words. Nevertheless, his heart ached for the fragile suffering woman who was so incapable of controlling her grief. The cordial had the desired effect, and Mrs. Dacre was at length able to affix her signature to the docu¬ ment before her. “ Here, Philip,” said Sophy, handing her brother a piece of blotting-paper. It was the most trivial of actions, but the kindliness in her voice and eyes touched Philip deeply. If ever a look expressed love and confidence in another, Sophy’s did then. “Where shall I sign, Philip? You must tell me the exact place, or else I shall be making a mistake ; and Sophy took up the pen with a great assumption of cheerfulness. Philip pointed out the spot, and Sophy was in the- act of affixing her bold dashing signature when Julia, observed, in her carefully modulated tones — “ I suppose, Sophy, your husband knows about this ? ” “ Now, don’t you trouble yourself to look after Ted’s interests, Julia; that’s a care you need not have.” “ But you have asked Ted’s consent, Sophy ?”askedi Philip anxiously. “ I don’t know that I asked his consent. I told him what I was going to do, and that amounts to¬ rn uch the same thing.” “Now, Julia, it is your turn to sign,” and Sophy handed the pen to her sister. Julia hesitated. “ I suppose you realise, Philip,, that this will diminish mamma’s income ? ” she said at length. “ How stupid you are, Julia ! As if a solicitor wouldn’t think of that ! ” observed Sophy. Philip bit his lips to keep his vexation from finding expression in words. “Oh, Julia 1 you know how welcome he is to it.. Everything I have should be his if it would only put matters right ! ” exclaimed Mrs. Dacre, her eyes again- filling with tears. “It is absurd to say that, mamma ; of course, Philip can take only the share to which he is en¬ titled;” and Julia still kept her pen poised in the- air. “That’s just it, Julia. But one would think, from your manner, Philip were asking for something to- which he had no right whatsoever,” said Sophy indig¬ nantly. Then Philip spoke, with an angry light gleaming in/ his eyes.

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To BE Given up. ‘^For your own sake, Julia, for your mother’s, for all our sakes — sign ! ” Very reluctantly she did at length write her name at the foot of the document in her delicate, lady-like hand. “What an unfortunate family we are!” she complained. “ First of all Sophy sets everybody talk¬ ing about us, and now - ” “ / do,” said Philip, finishing the sentence for her with a ring of defiance in his voice ; and then he began folding up the papers preparatory to replacing them in his pockets. “Are you going now, Philip ?” asked Sophy. “Yes, I must catch the 6.15 back to London. Good¬ bye to you all.” But Mrs. Dacre held out her arms imploringly. “ Oh, Philip, my dear, don’t leave me like that ! ” He was on his knees by the side of the sofa in a moment, with his strong arms round his mother’s wasted form. “ Will it all be right now, Philip she whispered. “As right* as a wrong thing can be, mother.” “ Oh, my dear, dear boy ! ” she wailed. “ Mother, I can’t explain matters to you, but think the best of me — the best of me as regards this terrible business.” His eyes sought hers unflinchingly as he spoke, although the words were uttered in too low a tone to reach any ears but hers, and his demeanour was that of a man bowed down with grief. Then, having kissed her again, he hurriedly left the room, accompanied by Sophy. “ Oh, Philip, it has been dreadful for you I ” said Sophy sympathetically, when they had reached the hall. “Yes, it’s been pretty bad,” he acquiesced. “Still, it’s over now. Good-bye, dean 1 shall be home as usual on Saturday.” “ Philip, will you have to sell Fairy ? ” asked Sophy anxiously, putting her hand on his arm to detain him as she spoke. “ I’ve done so already.” “ And the dog-cart, too ? ” “ The one wouldn’t be much use without the other,” he replied, trying to make light of the matter. “ But why couldn’t you have asked mamma for more ?” “ Five hundred was as much as I thought she ought to advance.” “ I do call it hard on you, Philip.” “ Grumbling won’t mend matters, dear.” Then he kissed her ^.nd ran down the steps. She stood watching him until he reached the high road. Then, with a sigh, which, coming from her, sounded strangely out of place, she closed the front door. “ After all, Julia needn’t have made herself so dis¬ agreeable. He only asked for his own, poor dear fellow!” she soliloquised. By the provisions of her father’s will, Mrs. Dacre’s fortune was, on her death, to be equally divided amongst her children ; but any one of them could, either on coming of age or subsequently, have a sum down not exceeding half that which would constitute 427 his or her share of the whole, provided Mrs. Dacre herself and all the children who were of age at the time agreed to the arrangement. It will therefore be seen that the method by which Philip had raised money was perfectly justifiable, the only real objection to it being, as Julia had pointed out, that it slightly diminished Mrs. Dacre’s income. Philip came down to Dursington on the Saturday^ as he had told Sophy he intended doing. And on that occasion he did go to The Fountains, and did see Miss Eastabrook. But to her he said nothing about his visit to Southfields earlier in the week. CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FIFTH. FATHER AND DAUGHTER. “ Such a subject as that should never have been made a party question.” These words were uttered with much energy by Miss Eastabrook, as she and her father sat at break¬ fast one morning, about a week after the scenes nar¬ rated in the last chapter had taken place. The father and daughter were, as usual, discussing, the various items of news contained in the daily paper as they sat over their morning meal. Clare took a keen interest in the topics of the day, and Mr. Easta¬ brook was ever ready to talk them over with her. To¬ day, however, he seemed unusually pre-occupied, and his observations fell more than once very wide of the mark. Clare, on the contrary, was discussing the subject on hand with even more than her wonted energy. But her father, who was watching her nar¬ rowly, noticed how pale and worn she was looking,, and that although she made a great pretence of enjoy¬ ing her breakfast, she ate hardly anything. The farce was, however, kept up between them, until the meal was nearly over. “ Have you finished, my dear “ Oh, yes, father,” replied Miss Eastabrook, rousing herself with an effort. Mr. Eastabrook rang the bell, and then returned to- his seat at the breakfast-table. “Are you busy this morning, my dear and as Mr. Eastabrook put the question, Clare noticed he was crumbling a piece of bread — always a sign of nervous- agitation with him. “ Not so busy but that I can do anything you want done.” “ I wanted to speak to you about — about something, my dear.” The blood mounted to Miss Eastabrook’s face, then suddenly retreated, leaving her even paler than before. “ Shall I come into the library, father ? ” “ If you please, my dear.” Mr. Eastabrook rose, and held the breakfast-room door open for his daughter to pass out. When they gained the library, he placed a chair for her by the side of his writing-table. Then, having carefully closed the door, rearranged the screen, and poked the fire into a blaze — it was a bright morning in October, and although the sunlight came streaming

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To BE Given up. 428 into the room, Mr. Eastabrook liked to see the fire burning brightly — he seated himself at his writing- table, and leaning back in his chair, began toying nervously with a paper-knife. All this time Clare sat still and calm. True, her “Yes, father.'*’ She was so far the calmer of the two ; and yet, as Mr. Eastabrook watched her he felt convinced that she knew all he had to tell her. “ But first of all, my dear, 1 should wish you to under¬ stand that I am speaking to you merely as a friend— HE WAS ON HIS KNEES BY THE SIDE OF THE SOFA IN A MOMENT” {p. 427). face was almost colourless and her lips compressed, but she showed no other sign of suffering. “ Yes, father ? ” she said at length, more with a view to helping Mr. Eastabrook begin than because she was at all curious about what he might have to say to her. “ My dear, something has occurred, something of a very distressing nature ” — here Mr. Eastabrook balanced the paper-knife on the thumb and little finger of his left hand with great nicety — “ about which I feel I ought to speak to you.” “ As a friend, father “ Yes, my dear, as a friend to whom your welfare is the first consideration in life. What I mean is that I do not wish you to listen to anything I may say as if it bore the weight of parental authority. My idea is to put all that aside. I feel I ought to offer you what advice I am capable of giving, but in offering it, my dear, I should wish you to clearly understand that you are perfectly free to accept or reject it as your own conscience may dictate.”

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To BE Given up. 429 “ Father dear, you have always been the best and kindest of friends to me.” Her eyes were humid now, and her calmness threatened to forsake her. With a supreme effort, however, she regained it ; and sat with her eyes fixed inquiringly on Mr. Eastabrook, waiting for him to speak. “ For some time past there have been certain rumours — my dear, have they reached you ? ” “ Yes, father, yes.” “As long as they were only rumours, Clare, my darling - ” Here the paper-knife was placed in such an impos¬ sible position that it resented the absurdity by falling to the ground. “You treated them with the contempt they de¬ served?” said Clare, finishing her father’s sentence for him with much energy. “ Yes, yes, my dear, just so.” Then there was a painful pause, during which Mr. Eastabrook recovered the paper-knife. “ And now, father ? ” asked Clare, and then she did clasp her hands tightly together, as if she were nerving herself to hear some terrible revelation. “ 1 don’t know, my dear, if— if Philip has ever broached this subject to you at all ?” “ Never.” “ Did he not tell you he had sold Fairy ? ” “ Yes, he told me that last Saturday— in answer to a direct question on the subject.” “ He did not mention his object in selling him ?” “No.” “My dear, do you know what that object was?” Here, with his kindly eyes fixed inquiringly on his daughter’s face, he bent the paper-knife so far back that it snapped in two. “ Severed for ever as I am from all hope of happi¬ ness,” thought Clare bitterly. “ I think I can guess the object,” she said at length, in reply to her father’s question. The blood mounted crimson to her face as she spoke. To admit Philip’s shame was the sorest humiliation she could have been called upon to bear. “ I mean that I think I can guess wEat people are saying must be his object in raising money just now,” she corrected herself by adding, feeling that in her first reply she had admitted far, far too much. There was another long pause, each feeling that so much remained to be said, but not knowing how to say it. “ Father, it cannot be true ! Oh, say it cannot be true ! ” She put her arms on the wTiting-table, rest¬ ing her chin on her clasped hands as she gazed long and anxiously into her father’s face, as if therein to read her fate. “ My poor darling ! My dear, dear daughter ! ” “ It is true, then?” It never so much as occurred to her to doubt her father’s word. He was so kindly- natured, so liberal-minded, that if he could see no loophole of escape, none could, she felt, possibly exist. “ That a considerable amount has been misappro¬ priated from the hospital funds, and that that amount has now been refunded by Philip Dacre, are facts which, painful as they are, I fear, my darling, we must accept. But that is all we actually know, and the whole affair may admit of an explanation reflecting no discredit on Philip. 'We must be careful lest we con¬ demn a man unheard, Clare.” “ Father, if Philip has paid that money himself— paid it without mentioning the circumstance to me —such conduct can admit of but one explanation.” “ That money, amounting to upwards of eight hun¬ dred pounds, has been paid into the hospital funds by Philip Dacre is, so 1 have been told on good authority, a fact.” “ By whom were you told, father ? ” “By one of the directors, in the strictest con¬ fidence.” “Then his degradation is not known, nor likely to be known, to all Dursington.” “ No, my dear, no ; the whole affair is to be hushed up as far as possible ; in fact, nobody seems really to know much .about it now, it is so enveloped in mystery.” “ But, father, surely the proceeds of the Fancy Fair could not have been sufficiently large to admit of such a sum being deducted ? ” asked Clare, a ray of hope lighting up her face. “ It is believed that the fraud has been going on for some time.” “ Then part of the subscriptions and donations to the hospital have been misappropriated as well as the proceeds of the Fancy Fair ? ” Clare questioned her father with feverish energy now, for she had not suf ficiently realised the extent of the blow that had fallen on her to be stunned by it. “ My darling, I fear it is so— I fear it must be so. But even while we admit this, we are certainly not justified in saying that Philip Dacre is a guilty man.” “To my mind, his having paid in the money himself is sufficient evidence of his guilt.” Mr. Eastabrook anxiously studied his daughter’s face. He would rather have seen her give way to the most violent ^rief than hear her speak so bitterly and with such unnatural calmness. “ Take time to consider it well before attempting to arrive at a decision, my dear. Do nothing rash. Remember, Clare, a false step taken now may mar your happiness for life — yours and Philip’s.” Clare was listening to a repetition of almost the exact words the palmist had — as a mere coincidence, but a strange one — addressed to her some months before ; but in the excitement of the moment she did not recognise them as such. “ Father, what would you have me do ? \ou would not wish to see me the wife of a man who could feign an interest in the suffering poor so that he might fill his own pockets with the money subscribed for their relief? And I thought him so good!” Her voice broke as she spoke of her lover’s goodness, while her mouth twitched painfully. “ I would have you be very careful, Clare, lest in your heart you should condemn an innocent man. But if— if Philip has done this dastardly thing, then I think you would be justified in breaking your promise to him. But this is for you to decide. You are a

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430 To BE Given up. woman now — twenty-three, are you not ? — and quite old enough to know how to act for yourself. I can only point out what would, in my opinion, be the right •couise for you to pursue, leaving you absolutely free to consult your own heart and sense of duty. And remember, my darling, whatever the decision may be at which you arrive, it can make no difference between you and me. You must always remain what you now are— my dear, my very dear daughter.” “Father, 1 cannot realise it.. It is too dreadful to be true. 1 have watched him day by day so narrowly, and in everything he has ever seemed to me to be an honourable gentleman. I think it was his goodness that first made me love him.” “ Even if he has succumbed to temptation, Clare, and in so doing has wrecked your happiness as well as his own, we must not judge him harshly. A man maybe guilty of a crime, and yet be - My darling ! my darling ! ” She had broken down at last, and with her face buried in her hands, was sobbing out her grief. “ Father, it will kill me ! Not my body— that will live on to suffer— but all hope will be crushed out of me for ever. Oh, father I father ! What shall I do ? What can I do.^ My hero that I worshipped so blindly ! ” He did not attempt to speak to her, but stood by her side, gently stroking her hair, and looking down on her with yearning pity in his eyes. “Father,” she said at length, raising her tear- stained face to his, “ I will ask him plainly if— if he has done this thing— this cruel, mean, despicable thing— and if he cannot deny it, then I will stay here with you always.” CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SIXTH. ACCLTSEK AND ACCUSED. In saying that Philip Dacre had merely admitted having sold Fairy without mentioning his reason for so doing. Miss Eastabrook had adhered to the truth more in the spirit than the letter. As a matter of fact Philip had said out at once that he wanted to raise money ; but he had added no word as to the use to which he intended putting the money thus raised. It was not that he purposed keeping the distressing posi¬ tion in which he was placed a secret from Clare ; on the contrary, he meant eventually to take her fully into his confidence. The subject was, however, ex¬ ceedingly painful to him, and, not unnaturally, he shrank from broaching it. However, on the Saturday after Clare’s interview with her father, Philip, as he made his way as usual The Fountains, did determine to lose no more time in apprising Clare of certain painful details of which he felt she ought to be informed. Never before had the distance from Southfields to The Fountains seemed so short. Philip could hardly believe he had actually reached his destination. And yet, there was the house, with which he had of late grown so familiar that it presented quite a home-like aspect, rising up before him. He gave his usual knock and ring, but was obliged to repeat the process before the front door was opened to him. Miss Eastabrook had, since their engagement always made a point of letting Philip in herself, and the housemaid was too well aware of her mistress’ practice to attempt to forestall her. At the sound of the second knock, the girl did, however, obey the summons, \yondering much, as she did so, what Miss Eastabrook’s capriciousness might mean. “Is Miss Eastabrook in?” And for the first time in his life Philip half hoped the answer would be in the negative. Yes, sir. Then, as Philip entered, the girl added, “ Miss Eastabrook is in the drawing-room, sir,” and immediately disappeared, leaving Philip to announce himself. Having made a desperate effort to steady his nerves, lie at length opened the drawing-room door. Aliss Eastabrook was standing to receive him, with hei hand resting on a settee, placed in the middle of the room. Throughout the interview, she maintained this position. One glance at her was sufficient to assure Philip she knew all, and that they stood towards each other m the relative positions of accuser and accused. All the pride that lay dormant in his nature was aroused : she had condemned him unheard. And then, as he stood face to face with her, he remembered his own comparative poverty, and her wealth. “ Your reception of me is so — strange, Clare, that I think I am justified in asking for an explanation,” said Philip at length. Neither had attempted a word of greeting. When a crisis is imminent, the observ¬ ance of small forms and ceremonies is forgotten. “ Certain rumours have reached me concerning you —rumours of so grave a nature that I feel I must ask you for an explanation.” She spoke slowly, weighing each word before uttering it; while even the mere mechanical action of forming the words seemed to cost her an effort. “ May I beg you to be more explicit.” He, too, spoke quietly, but his face was very stern, and his eyes very angry. “ It is said that money, subscribed to the hospital funds, has been misappropriated ; that that which should have been used for the relief of the suffering poor has been stolen— you asked me to be explicit— by someone who professed to be their friend.” She had raised her voice a little now, and it rang with scorn, while her eyes were ablaze with indignation. And yet all the time, though she was firmly convinced of Philip’s guilt, and deeply impressed by the enormity of his crime, she was filled with a great pity for him. It was her tenderness for the man, her lamentable weakness, as she termed it, that caused her so to steel her heart against him. “Is that all that rumour has told you ?” “No, not quite all. It has added that a sum, cor¬ responding to that which has been misappropriated, has now been paid into the funds— and by you. Philip, is this true ?” “ Perfectly.” He drew himself up proudly as he spoke, and his eyes sought hers boldly.

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To BE Given up. A slight tremor ran through her frame ; but she checked it instantly. Before him she would exhibit no sign of suffering. “ rhen it must all be over between us.” No touch of feeling softened her voice as she announced this her final decision. “ I am to understand that you deem me unworthy to become your husband “ Yes. My husband must at least be without re¬ proach in the eyes of other men. The standard is not a high one.” As she spoke she drew off her engagement ring and held it out towards him. He had to advance a step or two nearer to her in order to take it from her hand. Their eyes met. Clare ! ” he murmured, in a tone of passionate entreaty. Had she shown the slightest sign of relenting, the barrier of pride that was separat¬ ing them might have been broken down. But not a muscle of her face relaxed. Then he stopped abruptly — while his features became as rigid as her own. C2uietly he took the ring from her and placed it on the little finger of his left hand. She was rich, and he was poor ; she had judged him harshly, and con¬ demned him unheard. So his pride said, “ Let her go.” And he did. A few minutes after he walked proudly from her presence, having said not one word in his own de¬ fence. “ I thought her so staunch, so true ; now I know her to be as capricious as the most frivolous of her sex. She could never have loved me as I loved her, or she would not have had the strength to cast me off without a word of regret, or a look of sorrow,” he reflected bitterly, as he turned his back on The Foun¬ tains. And as the front door closed upon him, the woman who had sent him away from her side for ever threw herself on the settee, and wrung her hands in agony of spirit. “ I have done it ! I have done it ! But, oh ! what it has cost me ! It has been as the plucking out of my right eye, and the cutting off of my right hand.” “ I am going back to London to-night, mother,” announced Philip that evening, as he entered Mrs. Dacre’s room. “I have come to say ‘good-bye.’” “ Philip, have you seen Clare ? ” “ Yes, mother, I have seen her — perhaps for the last time.” “ Then it is all over between you ? ” “ Yes.” “ Philip, we must not be too ready to blame her. We do not know what pressure may have been brought to bear on her. Oh, my poor, poor boy ! ” Nothing that Mrs. Dacre could have said would have soothed Philip more than did these words, although they implied that an adequate reason did exist for the breaking off of the engagement. “No one shall blame her in my hearing.” “ Poor, dear girl ! it must have been a terrible shock to her.” 431 “ It seems to me that we are all playing at cross¬ purposes,” said Philip wearily. “ Cross -purposes, Philip?” And Mrs. Dacre looked up into her son’s face with a ray of hope in her eyes. “ There, there, mother ! don’t let us talk about it any more.” “ But, Philip, if you have anything to tell me — any¬ thing that will remove this terrible load from my heart, for pity’s sake, don’t keep it from me. I have tried to bear it patiently, but it has been terrible — terrible ! ” He looked down at his mother with yearning pity, and his voice trembled as he answered — “ I have nothing to tell you that would lessen your grief. Were I to be more explicit, I should only add immeasurably to your sorrow. Believe the best you can of me, and try to dwell as little as possible on all that has happened during the last week or two.” “How can I help dwelling on it, lying here hour after hour? Sometimes I think it will kill me. I shouldn’t mind so much if people didn’t know.”. “ They don’t know ; at least, they do not know the whole truth.” “It is so terrible for all of us. Poor Clare, too ! My heart bleeds for her.” “ We must all try to live it down, mother ; there is nothing else to be done. Good-bye, dearest.” “ Good-bye, my dear, dear boy.’^ She raised her¬ self to twine her arms about his neck. “ Are you going away for long, my darling?” she asked very anxiously. “ For some time, mother dear ; it will be better so. My presence here would not, I am sure, conduce to domestic peace.” She could not gainsay him. All the week Julia had been expatiating on the hardness of her lot in being dragged down by the wrong-doing of those belonging to her, until Mrs. Dacre had grown weary of listening to her. And the previous day she had left home to stay with an old schoolfellow, declaring that for the present she really could not bring herself to meet Philip. “ I shall miss you so dreadfully,” sighed the poor mother, feeling that she dare not urge him to stay. “ If ever you really want me, mother, you have only to send for me, and I will come.” She clung to him for a minute or two longer ; and then at last she did let him go. In the hall he met his father. “ What ! Are you off again, Philip ? ” “Yes, I’m going up by the last train. I shall probably not be home again for some little time.” “You find the attractions of London ttoo irresis¬ tible ? ” “ Or those of Dursington not sufficiently so ” “ Ah, well ! it wouldn’t do for all to like the same place. What is one man’s meat, you know, is another man’s poison.” “ That is precisely my experience, sir,” replied

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432 To BE Given up. Philip quickly, thinking how very bitter the poison had in his case been. A^ell, I won’t keep you talking or you will miss your train. Good-bye.’^ “ Good-bye, sir.” And so necessary did Philip find it to hurry away, that he did not pause even to shake hands with his father. And yet, when he reached the station, he had upwards of a quarter of an hour to wait. _ CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SEVENTH. TWO SIDES OF AN ARGUMENT ARE ADVANCED. “ Clare, is it really true ? ” “Is what true, Mabyn “ That you have broken off your engagement ? ” “ Who told you I had done so ? asked Miss Eastabrook rather coldly. Clare, who had never discussed the subject with anyone but her father, was rather inclined to resent what she mentally termed Mabyn’s interference. And so when Mabyn asked her if it were true that she had broken off her engagement, Miss Eastabrook, instead of giving a direct answer, merely inquired from whom Mabyn had heard the news. “Sophy Dacre — Sophy Charrington, I mean— told me so. I have just met her in High Street.” “Did she tell you anything else?” asked Clare, who evidently preferred playing the part of interro¬ gator. “ She told me Philip had returned to London last Saturday evening, not intending to come to Dursing- ton again for some time, as you had broken off your engagement to him. But, Clare, surely that isnk true ?” “ That Philip does not intend coming to Dursington again for some time ? I cannot say, I am sure. I know nothing of his movements.” “ Then it is true ? Oh, Clare ! what made you do it?” Miss Eastabrook did not reply for a moment. That: Mabyn should be deeply interested in her affairs seemed only natural, so that the intense anxiety dis¬ played by her cousin did not in any way arouse Clare’s suspicions. She was, however, in no humour to discuss her own sore trouble. Ever since she had cast Philip off, she had never ceased to severely criti¬ cise her own conduct in having done so ; and the longer she thought it over, the less certain did she feel that she had acted wisely. And the more she doubted the wisdom of her own decision, the more determined did she become to adhere to it. If the man were guilty, then, indeed, she had done well to throw him over ; but if he were innocent, if he were in very truth the Philip that she had always fondly imagined him to be — but such an alternative did not bear dwelling on ; it was at once suggestive of a joy too over¬ whelming and a humiliation too crushing. He coiild7'i!t be innocent ! Had he not unhesitatingly admitted having refunded the money himself? And throughout the interview, had he not abstained from uttering one word in his own defence ? Certainly she had not asked him straight out if he had misappro¬ priated the money ; she wished now that she had done so. Still, had he been innocent, surely he could have embraced one of the opportunities she had given him to say so. And now here was Mabyn raising her voice to de¬ nounce the part her cousin had played in the tragic little drama. Clare could have found it in her heart to tell her cousin to mind her own business, only that, taking into consideration the nature of their friend¬ ship, to do so would be to act in a most unprecedented manner. Wild thoughts did chase each other through Clare’s brain of stating the whole case to Mabyn, and then asking her opinion on it. But such an acknow¬ ledgment of weakness was more than Clare could bring herself to make. And then, had she not already been advised ? Did not her father — her dear, kind, generous-minded father — say that if Philip were guilty, then would she, in his opinion, be justified in break¬ ing her promise to him? Ah ! but there was that per¬ plexing “ if” again ! Meanwhile Mabyn was waiting for an answer to her question. “ Clare, whatever could have made you do it ? ” she repeated. “ Did not Sophy tell you my reason ? ” “ I did not ask her. I did not like to question a third person as to what you had done, Clare.” Mabyn’s loyalty touched Clare, and in a far softer voice she said — “ In my opinion, a certain lamentable event which has recently occurred rendered it imperative that my engagement =■* to Philip Dacre should be can¬ celled.” “You mean this affair about the new hospital?” “ Yes,” answered Clare ; and the blood mounted to cheek and brow. Then Clare watched Mabyn’s face narrowly, to see if in it she could read condemnation of her own hasty judgment. “ Mabyn, don’t you think I acted rightly?” Miss Eastabrook did at length bring herself to ask. “ No, Clare, I don’t ; I think you were altogether in the wrong,” replied Mabyn, with far more energy than she usually displayed. “ Why was I in the wrong ? ” asked Clare, bending forward to await her cousin’s reply with feverish eager¬ ness. Might not Mabyn have some fresh light to throw on the subject ? “ Because you had pledged yourself to be Philip’s wife ; and so solemn a promise as that should never have been broken.” Miss Eastabrook sunk back with a disappointed air ; such an argument as that carried no weight with her. Had Mabyn told her she should have hesitated to break off her engagement because Philip’s guilt was not clearly established, then would she have listened with the gravest attention to anything her cousin might have to say. But she was in no humour to discuss the subject from a purely sentimental stand¬ point. It never, however, so much as occurred to Mabyn but that Clare must have been firmly convinced of

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433 HE HAD TO ADVANCE A STEP OR TWO NEARER TO HER, TO TAKE IT FROM HER HAND” {p. 431). Philipps guilt before taking so grave a step as the cancelling of her engagement to him. And what to Mabyn seemed such unmistakable evidence of Clare’s conviction in the matter, did much to crush the linger¬ ing hope she herself entertained of Philip’s innocence. But his guilt or innocence was not the problem on which her mind was now engaged. The point which she had been considering ever since her meeting with Sophy was whether, accepting Philip’s guilt as proved, Clare was justified in breaking off her engagement to him on account of the crime he had committed ; and she had at length decided against her cousin. Had she been in Clare’s place, she felt certain that no con¬ sideration whatsoever would have induced her to de¬ sert her lover at such a time. Therefore, she argued, since Clare had done so, it proved clearly that she had never really loved Philip. “ I cannot understand you, Clare ; I thought you loved him,” said Mabyn at length, seeing that Miss Eastabrook did not seem disposed to reply to her former observation. Clare’s eyes flashed angrily. “ Mabyn, never dare to say that to me again. I loved Philip — the Philip I believed him to be when I promised to be his wife — with all the strength of my nature. That Philip I love still. If any sacrifice of mine, no matter how great a one, could cleanse his honour from the foul stain that now adheres to it, then indeed should he be stainless. I am not exaggerating ; I really think I could endure any torture that human ingenuity could devise, if by so doing I could make Philip in very truth the man I once believed him to be. Never dare to say again I did not love him.” All Clare’s soul was in her face, and her love for 748

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434 To BE Given up. her lover, although she spoke oi it in the past tense, shone from her eyes. And yet she did not hesitate to allude to Philipps guilt as if it were a deplorable fact, established beyond the possibility of doubt, so deep an impression had been made on her mind by the manner in which Mabyn seemed to take the commis¬ sion of Philip’s crilne for granted. And yet, as we know, Mabyn was far from firmly convinced on the point. Thus, although both women were racked by doubt, each quite unintentionally did much towards satisfying the other of the certainty of Philip’s guilt. “ Well, but, Clare, if for instance Ralph were to do such a thing, I - ” ‘‘ That is not a parallel case. May,” said Miss Easta- brook quickly. “If my father had committed such a crime — although the supposition seems almost too ridiculous to entertain even for the sake of argument — I should cling to him only the closer. But when the delinquent is one’s future husband, then, to my mind, it is quite a different matter.” “ But why is it different, Clare ? ” “ When a woman marries a man, he becomes the head of their joint household, the one whom all of that household should be taught to look up to with re¬ spect, and to obey implicitly. How could a woman teach others to do this if the man had forfeited her respect? Or how would it be possible for her to perform the full measure of her own duty towards him if she had ceased to reverence him ?” “ But, Clare, if men must be such paragons of virtue before women ought to marry them, what stagnation there would be in the matrimonial market were women to wake up to a sense of their duty in this particular ! ” “A man need hardly be a paragon of virtue to abstain from appropriating to his own use money sub¬ scribed for the relief of the poor,” replied Clare sharply, more in defence of the course she had pursued than in condemnation of Philip’s conduct. Then she added, suddenly realising the harshness of her own words, “ But oh, Mabyn, what made him, what could have made him do it ? If he were in pecuniary difficulties, why did he not come to me ? I would have helped him, oh ! so gladly. All I had should have been placed at his disposal. Did he think me so un¬ generous that he hesitated to confide in me?” Her face was lined with pain now, and hot tears of resentment filled her eyes. She was no longer a severe judge, but rather a generous woman, cut to the quick by the want of confidence towards herself, dis¬ played by one whom she loved. Probably, of all con¬ siderations in connection with this painful affair, this was the one that distressed her most. She would have been so ready to help him ; and yet, rather than apply to her for aid, he had committed a dastardly crime. When we fancy ourselves to be taking a high moral tone, we are so often merely influenced by some small personal consideration. “ Well, in my opinion a woman’s whole duty to¬ wards her husband is to love him ; and if trouble, or even disgrace, assail him, she should cling only the closer to him.” “Yes, I agree with you when the man is her hus¬ band. But I do not think a woman ought to marry a man after he has forfeited her respect.” “ I would not draw so fundamental a distinction between the making of a solemn promise and its ful¬ filment. A woman should not engage herself to marry a man she does not respect ; but having once promised to be the wife of one she loves, she should never go back from her word.” And there, although they talked on long after this point had been reached, the matter finally rested. During the conversation that followed Mabyn tried to administer what consolation she could to her cousin, but she soon saw that her efforts in this direction were not appreciated. Miss Eastabrook might long to be told she had committed a grievous error of judgment, but she was certainly not anxious to hear Mabyn say she pitied her. Nor were Mabyn’s sympathies very actively aroused on Clare’s behalf. As a matter of fact, however, it is only too probable that had Mabyn not loved Philip herself, she would have taken a very different view of the case ; and that in blaming Clare, she was too much influenced by the consideration of her having lightly thrown away that which she would have given her own life’s blood to possess. Nor was the evidence of Philip’s frailty without its bitter sting to Mabyn. She, too, had made a hero of him, and in proportion to the intensity with which she had believed in his heroism did she now grieve over his fall from that high estate. On the whole, it was a relief to Mabyn when, a few days after the foregoing conversation had taken place, Clare announced that she and her father were about to travel for some months. Directly Clare had told Mr. Eastabrook her engage¬ ment was cancelled, he had suggested the advisability of spending Christmas on the Continent. Clare had not at once expressed her approval of the plan : in fact, at the time Mr. Eastabrook had fancied it was rather distasteful to her than otherwise. However, a day or two after she again broached the subject, and seemed anxious to leave Dursington as soon as pos¬ sible. Mr. Eastabrook was delighted. Amid fresh scenes, and away from all painful associations, would she not stand a far better chance of speedily living down her sorrow ? Mr. Eastabrook would, perhaps, have felt less hopeful had he known that Clare’s desire to leave Dursington arose solely from a dread lest her presence there should drive Philip away from his home. Philip, however, did not avail himself of her absence to visit Southfields. Week after week passed by, and still he remained in London. Meanwhile the hospital scandal was fast dying a natural death. Philip had, of course, retired from the committee of management, and his father had fulfilled general expectation by following suit. The whole affair had been kept very quiet, and although all sorts of extravagant stories had at first been freely circulated, only a few members of the committee knew what had really happened. The Dacres had ever been much given to the^exercise of a far-reaching hospitality, the consequence being that

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To BE Given up. 435 they were not unpopular in the neighbourhood ; and the men who had on so many occasions freely par¬ taken of Mr. Dacre’s good cheer felt that in return they owed it to him to throw the cloak of silence over his son’s wrong-doing. Even when the damaging rumours about Philip were most rife, it was mostly women who had helped to spread them. Nor was it generally known that Clare’s engagement was broken off. In fact, as Philip never now came to Dursington, .some people went so far as to boldly announce that he was travelling about with Mr. and Miss Easca- brook. And all this time Mabyn was still endeavouring to come to some decision on the knotty point of Philip’s guilt or innocence. Every thmg seemed to point to but one conclusion, nevertheless she could not bring herself to believe in his baseness. She had done her best to draw Mrs. Edward Charrington out on the subject. At first Sophy had been loud — very loud — in her brother’s defence ; latterly, however, she had maintained an ominous silence. But then, in many respects Sophy was no longer her old self. Some¬ times Mabyn fancied she could not be happy in her married life ; but she had only to see her and Ted together to scout this idea. Nor did she imagine the explanation to lie in any pecuniary trouble, for Fred Charrington still continued to look after the young couple with fatherly care. At length, Mabyn was driven to believe that Sophy’s very evident distress was entirely attributable to the state of affairs at South- fields. Mrs. Dacre had caught a cold at the beginning of the winter, and did not seem able to throw it off, while Mr. Dacre’s health had been far from satis¬ factory for some time ; in fact, it was said very gene¬ rally that he had never been the same man since the rumours of his son’s disgrace had spread abroad. Latterly, he had not even gone to the bank — with him a very grave sign, for he was an exceptionally ener¬ getic man of business. One afternoon, about six weeks after Clare and her father’s departure for the Continent, Mabyn was returning home from an expedition which had taken her some little distance out of the town. She had been walking for some time without meeting anyone, for the muddy country lanes were not much frequented in the winter, when a sharp turn brought her almost face to face with Fred Char¬ rington. Latterly they had seen a good deal of each other, and, having greeted her, he turned to walk back with her quite as a matter of course. Mabyn cordially liked Fred Charrington, and had got quite into the way of speculating as to what he would advise her to do under various circumstances. He had always struck her as such a pillar of strength : a man on whose opinion it would always be so safe to rely. She had observed this characteristic in him with special reference to Ted and Sophy. Did a domestic mishap, no matter how trivial, occur at The Dovecot, nothing could be done without consulting Fred. Mabyn was often amused, and perhaps some¬ thing more, at the patience with which the big stal¬ wart man would listen to long accounts of smoking chimneys, flapping slates, rattling windows, and the dozen and one petty annoyances which distress young housekeepers so much. The conversation now turned on The Dovecot and its master and mistress. “ I don’t think Sophy is looking well, do you ? She hasn’t seemed to me to be a bit like herself lately,” remarked Mabyn. She hasn’t been in her usual spirits, certainly,” admitted Mr. Charrington. “ I think she must be fretting about something, and yet 1 can’t imagine what it can be. Do you think she is anxious about her father, Mr. Charring¬ ton 1 ” “About his health, do you mean. Miss Littledale ?” “Yes. I called at Southflelds yesterday, and Julia told me he hadn’t been to the bank all the week.” “ I fear he is breaking up.” “ Do you really think it is as serious as that ? ” “ He is not a young man, you know, Miss Little- dale.” “No; but it seems so sudden.” “ Don’t misunderstand me ; I don’t apprehend any immediate danger.” “ But you don’t think he will ever be well again.” “ 1 fear not.” “ Mr. Charrington, do you think it is worry that has brought on his illness ? ” ^ “ Worry, Miss Littledale ? ” “ I mean, do you think he has taken it to heart about Philip ? ” “ I. think it is that which is killing him.” “ Oh, Mr. Charrington ! ” “ It is one of the saddest cases that I have ever heard of.” “ I can’t understand it ; I can’t bring myself to believe that he ever really did it.” “ He must have been assailed by the fiercest temptation. I have no doubt but that he was pressed for money on all sides, and then he took it, probably intending at the time to put it back again.” “ But, Mr. Charrington, how was it, if he were so hard pressed for money, that he was able to procure the full amount so easily when he was called upon to refund it 1 ” Mr. Charrington stopped short, and turning round, faced Mabyn. “ What do you mean. Miss Littledale 1 ” he asked, in astonishment. END OF CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SEVENTH.

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436 J^HE mountain stands there dim and high. ^ A cloud is on its breast Just in the hollow where 1 lie So often down to rest — A little cloud that soon will rise To journey homeward to the skies. — There would I follow soft and slow, Up far beyond the peaks of snow, And on and on, past morn and noon, To meet the stars and crescent moon. Then in between the fleecy ways Of highest clouds Td go. Till far beneath were nights and days, The sunshine and the snow ; — Till darkness and the light were one, And separate no more. But, married by the glorious sun Beside the heavenly shore. Had knit so close that they had made A land of softest light and shade — A land wherein we know at last The meanings of the things long past. Oh, little cloud! would 1 might strL.y Till I forgot the downward way. Lucy Clifford.

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437 WHAT TO WEAR IN JUNE. CHIT-CHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR PARIS AND LONDON CORRESPONDENTS. L— FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. Tea jackets are just one of the most convenient inventions of mo¬ dern civilisation as far as dress is concerned. They meet a generally felt want, for they are slipped on in a moment in place of stiffer bodices with more bones, when the walk of the day is over, with¬ out the trouble of removing the skirt. They are made in a great variety of ways and in many materials, but the one heading our chapter gives a most fair and faithful impression of the best style. It is made in silks of several kinds — plain, striped, or brocaded ; satin and velvet are not out of place, but light plain woollen stuffs can be employed to advantage,- or fine cloth. There is a range of fabrics that are not at all expensive and yet most suitable, consisting of stripes composed of tiny flowers in natural colourings, and the Pompadour style on plain grounds. The jacket requires but little material, and many a piece of brocade laid by might be used to advantage. Indian stuffs answer quite well, indeed, the more uncommon they are the better. The back is plain and tabbed at the waist, the collar is high, and from beneath the material comes a full front of sprigged net muslin or chiffon, or sometimes mousseline de soie. This is bordered with lace, and long looped bows are introduced at the throat, and fall below the waist. The frill of lace comes from beneath the basque all round, and the sleeves are very high on the shoulders but large and loose, ending between the elbow and the wrist, the elbow bow appearing in the bend of the arm. A frill of lace is carried down the front. A garment of this kind answers well for home dinner wear. The printed voiles are also used largely for all this class of jackets and tea-gowns, being thin and light, with floral designs printed on them in almost natural size and in natural colours. Peach is a very favourite tone. Pinked-out silk is largely used inside the hems of tea- gowns and dinner-gowns, and as almost any pale tint will do, old treasures laid by can be brought to light with advantage. Valenciennes is the best-worn lace in white, Chan¬ tilly in black. Square collars much betrimmed with lace appear on many tea-gowns and jackets, but whatever else is omitted - the high sleeves are im¬ perative. Some are pleated perpendicularly from the shoulder to the wrist, and a zouave or bolero jacket is a portion of many, for you can select either ; the former falls in a square end, the latter has a short rounded front. Feather stitching in silk of the same tone as the vest is introduced on a great many, and is a pretty addition where there is a frilling of lace. For dress just now, all the attention seems to be directed to the bodice, skirts are very simple. The figure in the illustration with the double jacket and double revers is a case in point. The wide revers, forming a square collar at the back, is a revival from the Incroyable period, and gives great breadth to a slender figure. The dress is made in a light greyish - green woollen, the skirt absolutely plain as far as drapery is concerned. It is gathered at the back, and, above, the hem is bordered with a rich embroidery, into which a few threads of a deep ruby-red are blended with much effect. These are intensified by a wide sash at the side, of red velvet, bordered with a deep fringe having a knotted border. F ringes with knotted bor¬ ders are very popular, and heavy makes of silk are likely to be extremely well worn for some time to come. Undue flatness in the front of the skirt is obviated by carrying three pleats on either side into the waist. The waistcoat is made of brocade in which the resdda blends with red ; it fastens down the front, which is uncommon now that the modes of fastening are so often hidden. The outer jacket is made in the plain material, and so is the deep revers collar which ap¬ pears on the outside ; but the under one is all in the brocade, matching the cuff’s. The flat toque is made 671 suite with a red bow in front. It is not by any means a necessity now that dress and bonnet should match ; they must accord and not form any violent contrast, that is all. Velvet is likely to be worn throughout the summer unless it proves unusually hot, but it is mingled with most of the fashionable woollens, and velvet sleeves are so much worn that they run a risk of becoming common. The pretty wearer < of the large hat is arrayed in brown voile blended with velvet. The skirt is so curiously arranged that the centre of the front seems to have twisted round to the side, but this is not so, it is purposely arranged in that manner, and four kilt-pleats of velvet are introduced at the side. The velvet sleeves are very high on the shoulders and tight at the wrists, and a triple fold of velvet in the centre of the bodice-front forms the trimming. The novelty, however, is the straight line at the waist combined with the quaint fastening of four buttons below, with what is part of the actual bodice and yet has the aspect of a deep waist-band. Brown of a light tobacco tone was the tint of the original model, and the hat was velvet with large brown bows peeping above the brim in front, and resting on the hair over the forehead. In Paris no trimming would

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438 What to Wear in June. “ GOOD-BYE.” seem to be so fashionable as feathers, which are employed to border dresses and mantles. At a recent wedding in Paris one of the guests wore a redingote composed of Impeyan pheasants’ feathers, and a muff to match — a truly wonderful notion. Englishwomen seem to be adopting the Parisian fashion of having only a wreath of flowers for a bonnet. There is one advantage in them, they need merely the slightest possible foundation of twigs and are quite easily made. They have no strings, but a white veil leaves no uncertainty in the mind as to whether an evening head-dress or a bonnet is intended. The bonnets are small, but the hats grow larger and larger. They are loaded with flowers, have barely any brim at the back and a very high one in front, with all the fringe or puffs of hair well to the fore, for they rest only on the back of the head. Guipure trimmings are made in exquisite designs, and are used for millinery a little, but principally for yokes and bands and epaulettes on gowns, when they look exceedingly handsome. Figaro vests are made entii:ely of them and answer every purpose. Princess dresses and Princess polonaises are in vogue. There is one decided revolution in dress : short gloves with only two buttons are beginning to be worn in the morning, on account of sleeves being, so tight at the wrist. II.— FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. Children’s fashions become a matter of import¬ ance to a large section of the community now the bright June sunshine is upon us. The lithe young, limbs are in unison with the gaiety of summer and movement is a necessity of their being — not always conducive to the maintenance of tidy frocks. The two frocks sketched on page 439 are easy to make, and not at all cumbersome. In both,, the skirts are quite full and straight all round, the waists as long as possible. The striped dress is a happy combination of pink and white, and is bordered with a ruche en coqiiille^ which does re¬ semble a shell, as its name implies. This effect is produced by a treble box-pleat, close and full. A similar ruche borders the cuffs, and is carried straight across the front of the full bodice to simulate a yoke. Bodice and skirt are sewm to¬ gether, and the union is hidden by a band of black velvet, tied in the front ; there is a straight collar- band, and the sleeves are high on the shoulders, but, happily, not so preposterously high as they are worn by adults, which often amounts to a de¬ formity. The hat is straw, with a band of black velvet, and a feather poised in front— for, curi¬ ously enough, feathers are more used in children’s millinery than flowers. The brim is shallow at the back, and very wide in front ; but it does not shade the face, which is really essential in sunny weather. The other little figure wears a bright red poplin- frock, bordered with a ribbon galon, interwoven with a design. This edges the hem and borders the collar, and also forms a V in front, the full sleeve having a turn-back cuff bordered with the galon. The bodice is closely gathered into a point in front, and is edged with a sash which ties at the back, and has a netted border at each end. The hat turns up with a wide coronet front. A new idea for a lawn tennis dress for children is a blue material printed all over in white with balls, bats, net, «&:c. It is made up into a tucked skirt and full blouse bodice, with blue yoke, feather-stitched. Washing silks, with spots and other devices, are a favourite material for little girls, and guipure lace of a heavy make serves for cuffs, yokes, wide turn¬ down collars, and other necessary additions. The guipure made of silk and cloth is much used also, and heliotrope is as much in favour for the children as for their mothers. Many of the little skirts have some half-dozen horizontal runners just below where they are joined to the bodice. Tartans are used for children, but, hap¬ pily, only the smaller designs. Check stuffs are mingled with plain, the front perhaps plain, and the bodice, the back, and the sleeves checked. Pointed

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What to Wear in June. 439 belts are introduced on the fronts, sometimes made of velvet, sometimes of silk on a woollen frock. Yokes of all kinds are fashionable for children, and velvet sleeves, which for girls of twelve and thirteen are further carried out by side panels on the skirt. Printed muslins, as well as thicker makes in .white, are used for lighter dresses, with the most charraing frilled fichus tacked down on to the shoulders. The mantles and jackets have much that is pic¬ turesque about them when designed for young people. Some are made with yokes and high upstanding sleeves, the material fulled on to the yoke and com¬ pressed at the waist by a band, so that though loose and ample in dimensions, they come under the head of coats. The collars are nearly all high, and many have double sleeves : one tight to the wrist, one full, and hanging to the elbow. Others, as cloaks, have yokes and frilled collars, the bulk of the material pleated to the yoke and flowing to the feet. But the decided novelty is the Louis XIV. coat, in coloured cloths. These coats are quaint, are long in the basque, indicate the figure, have wide mousquetaire cuffs and flap pockets, and the tones in which they are mostly made are snuff-brown, a deep myrtle-green^ a dark china-blue, and puce — the tints, in fact, in which the beaux appeared at Ranelagh, with the Belindas of those days. They are, many of them, braided, and some have capes, like the riding -coats of a later period, which seem to need the pointed beaver hats of the same era. Many of the fronts of these jacket-coats — for they savour of both — are trimmed in front, en Brande- bourg^ and some are double-breasted, fast¬ ening at the side. There are very light-coloured green cloth jackets, which are well worn by child:;en, trimmed with checked velvet cuffs and collars ; and others, in light terra-cotta, have soft silk vests in front, and hoods at the back. The very youngest children, just emerg¬ ing from babyhood, wear jackets with the flap-seams ; and some of them in dust- coloured cloth are exquisitely made. Gold braiding is introduced on many of the new outdoor garments for children. All-round cloaks in soft pongee silk are capital wear as dust-cloaks and wraps ; and with four capes— as some of them have — they are, indeed, most bewitching garments. The hats are large and picturesque— made in lace or straw, and trimmed a great deal with bunches of baby ribbons in all colours blended. The Leghorns and Tuscans often have lace crowns, and gauze ribbon is a favourite trimming. The small hats of the Tam o’ Shanter order, made with a double brim like a pansy, are peculiarly well suited to young faces. Daisies are used much, and form a fringe, falling from the crown. Some¬ times they are tacked on to the frill of lace sewn on to the brim of the hat. You see by the accompanying sketch that grown-up people are wearing tartans ; but they are the darker greeiis and blues, the 42nd, the Macduff, &c., not the brighter reds. They are cut on the cross for the skirt, and fall in soft folds at the side. The bodices, fastened beneath the arm, are stretched over the figure, also on the cross, and show no seams whatever ; but there is an under-bodice very well boned beneath, and any superabundant fulness is gathered in at the waist, back and front, a sash-band of the material outlining the waist-line. The jacket worn over this bodice shows one of the newest shapes. It fastens only at the neck, and forms an elongated point in front, with a turn-down collar, flap pockets, re vers at the edge of the front, and the sleeves all made in silk. It is cut to the figure at the back, and is very easily slipped on and off. The small toque is made to match, and is only raised in the front, just covering the top of the head, which appears now to be all that is expected in the way of headgear. We can only hope that neuralgia will not be on the increase, as we might justly expect it to be. THE children’s HOUR.

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440 NINETTE’S IDEAS. T was eleven o’clock on a hot morning in July, and the High Street of Glemsbury was in its usual condition of quietude. A dull street, in a dull town of a small Midland county, there was never much excitement to be found on its pavement ; but to-day, within the bow- windowed shop of “ Miss Clay, Milliner,” was being fought a battle. Mounted on a short pair of steps, and armed with the bright steel tongs from the best parlour, Miss Clay lifted from the stand whereon it was placed a little bonnet, and holding it at arms’ length, while she emphasised each remark with a shake of the un¬ lucky article, she exclaimed in shrill tones — “ It is a disgrace ! an insult to my name and my customers : a thing made out of a bunch of forget-me- nots and a wisp of lace to be put in my window beside my goods ! How could you dare to allow it, Susan.?” and as she said the last word Miss Clay, with a dexterous whisk, deposited the bonnet in a large dust-pan at the other end of the shop. Her sister. Miss Susan, limp and tearful, was sobbing behind an enormous pocket-handkerchief, as she sat amidst a heap of head-linings, wire edgings, and other disagreeable materials appertaining to the drudgery which was her share of the millinery busi¬ ness ; while framed by the doorway leading to the parlour stood a lovely girl of eighteen, whose large eyes were bright with angry tears, and whose flushed cheeks and tightly clasped hands betrayed the pas¬ sion that was agitating her, although she managed to steady the voice in which she said vehemently — “ Aunt, you are wrong, you are cruel ; chapeaux like that are pretty : we have sold many while you were away, and everyone has admired them.” She spoke with a foreign accent, but her tones were refined and clear, and she gazed at the angry lady on the steps without flinching from her wrath. “ Be silent, Ninette ! ” was the reply, “ how can you dare to argue with me ! For thirty years I have made bonnets for the whole neighbourhood, of the host materials and in the first fashion, and now directly my back is turned you- concoct a quantity of rubbish, which you put in 77iy window, and have the audacity to tell me it is ‘ pretty ! ’ ‘‘ But, aunt - ” Ninette was beginning, when Miss Susan, lifting her head from her handkerchief, said — ^‘Do go to your room, Ninette ; you must not answer your aunt ; go away, dear,” she continued imploringly, and the girl, with a look of affection and pity at the tear-stained face, stooped and kissed it, then gently lifting the abused bonnet, turned and went to her sanctum at the top of the house. Left alone with her sister. Miss Clay continued her scolding ; rearranging the desecrated window the while, until the entrance of a customer put an end to her objurgations. The Misses Clay were spinsters of uncertain ages, but Miss Susan was greatly the junior of the apple¬ cheeked, bewrinkled old lady with the sharp voice and the black eyes, who held despotic sway over everyone beneath her roof. She did not even allow her customers to have their way about the fashion of their headgear ; and yards of lace, ribbon, and velvet, nosegays of flowers, and handsful of feathers were piled wholesale on the heads of the weaker- minded of the townspeople. Miss Spink, the sister of a departed rector, had been heard to declare that she could make two whole bonnets, or trim three shapes, with the materials presented to her on one work of art by Miss Clay. When therefore Ninette, the orphan daughter of her brother, Robert Clay, was sent by her mother’s relatives to the care of her aunts at Glemsbury, Sarah Clay thought only that she had another pair of fingers to use in her service ; and her astonishment was great when she found the head to which the fingers belonged entertained entirely different ideas from her own on matters of taste, and that her niece often met her most cherished dicta with flat contradiction. Skirmishes had taken place all through the spring, in the dull red-bricked house facing the open space where stood the great church of St. Giles, in the High Street of Glems. bury ; for Ninette wished to use a third of the materials expected to be worked up by Miss Clay, and with dexterous fingers would so manipulate and rearrange the bonnets and hats constructed by her aunt, that when that lady saw them on the heads of their purchasers she very frequently could not believe they had been sent from her emporium. She had been from home for a few days, on an annual visit she paid to town, whence she professed to return laden with the newest materials and the latest ideas, and during her absence Ninette had worked unceasingly at the production of a stock of fairy-like hats, caps, and bonnets, which she had placed in the large win¬ dow on a carpeting of black velvet. Owing to the near approach of a flower-show, and the advent of market day, these had been sold with great rapidity, while orders for more of the same style flowed in apace. One specimen of her skill only had remained, and Miss Clay, on the morning after her return, going into the street to see if her sister had properly attended to the ‘‘ dressing ” of the shop-front, beheld it with wrathful eyes, and had taken prompt measures for its destruction. Poor Ninette ! her life was rather a sad one, and at present she was entirely out of favour with her severe

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441 “‘I CANNOT— I WILL NOT PROMISE,’ SAID POOR NINETTE” (jZ). 442). aunt. Miss Clay believed she had many reasons for the dissatisfaction she felt : to begin with, her niece was the daughter of a ‘‘ foreign woman,” and when she first came to Glemsbury she spoke English but im¬ perfectly ; then her ideas had been adopted by many customers at the bow-windowed shop, and her sug¬ gestions had even been approved more than once by the ladies who belonged to the country families, who occasionally employed Miss Clay for themselves and their children. Another great cause of offence to Aunt Sarah was that Ninette had a lover — a French¬ man — and for him the uncompromising Englishwoman felt a positive aversion. Poor Achille Durand ! he was such a harmless young fellow, so hard-working and steady, and his devotion to Ninette would have touched any heart less hard than that of the elder Miss Clay. He had left his beloved France, and taken up his abode in this triste town of Glemsbury, solely to be near Ninette, and without the least idea that any of her relatives would scout him for his nationality, or despise him on account of his trade, which was that of a confectioner. Day after day the ^Q\\c?itQ patisserie he made enlivened the shop of the chief baker of the town : John Smith’s customers had nearly doubled in number since Achille had been his assistant, and he valued and almost loved the young foreigner who helped him so cheerfully and success¬ fully. Of all subjects, surely the mystery of caste is one of the most difficult to understand, and to Ninette her aunt’s attitude was simply bewildering. Her father had been a hard-working assistant to a chemist, and had spent all his spare time, as well as all his available cash, in useless and wasteful dabbling in scientific experiments. Her aunt made and sold millinery for the decoration of the heads of their townswomen ; why they should consider the man who twisted and rolled delicious morsels for the gratification of the palates of these same people a person of lower rank, was a refinement of analysis Ninette felt to be beyond her. But the unhappy fact remained that she had been forbidden to invite her compatriot to the house, and that Miss Clay wished

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[ Ninette’s ideas. 442 her to promise to hold no communication whatever with him. This, however, she stoutly refused to do, and occasionally, when she was very unhappy, she allowed herself the solace of a walk, and a chat in his own tongue, with her friend: always informing Miss Sarah that she had seen him, and taking the con¬ sequent scolding with what patience she could. Miss Susan's tender heart was touched, and her romantic mind rejoiced in having a real love-story to interest her, instead of the make-belief productions of the circulating library ; and she was Ninette’s firm ally. It was she who told Achille when he might expect to meet his beloved in the meadows down by the mill, and when a walk to the Castle woods, or on Glems- bury downs, would find its reward ; and she proved a most kindly chaperon in these expeditions, finding amusement for herself while the lovers chatted un¬ disturbed. On the day when Ninette’s bonnet had been so un¬ ceremoniously handled by Miss Sarah, Achille had arranged with his kind friend that they should have a stroll in the woods in the evening ; and accordingly after tea, which was such a feature amongst the meals of Glemsbury, Miss Susan, arrayed in her newest bonnet, and Ninette, dressed in a charming cambric frock, with a hat which would have made the fortune of a discerning milliner, issued from the red¬ brick house, where the shutters veiled the glories of Miss Clay’s bonnets, and took their way through the sleepy streets, rendered quieter than usual by the ‘‘ early closing,” which took place on that particular night of the week. When Ninette and her aunt returned from their walk, they were met by the announcement that supper was ready, and that meal was partaken of during a dead silence, which Ninette knew was the calm that preceded a storm, and accordingly she felt no surprise when, on the removal of the cloth, her Aunt Sarah inquired in her hardest tone — “ Where have you been to-night ? ” “ In the Castle woods with Achille Durand,” was Ninette’s unhesitating answer, as she lifted her grey eyes and looked steadily at her aunt. ‘‘ So I expected,” was the rejoinder ; “ but you have had your last walk with that worthless young man whilst you live here. Do you understand ? You are not to continue your acquaintance with this Durand, or, if you do, you leave my roof at once.” “ I cannot— I will not promise 1” said poor Ninette, as she rose from the table, and stood with her little hands grasping the back of one of the chairs : “ it is too much ! Achille is worthy, he is industrious, he has been my friend, he was also my father’s — why should I renounce him ? ” “ I have given my orders,” said Miss Sarah, all the little flowers and bows with \vhich her cap was adorned, shaking with the vehemence of her anger, while Miss Susan’s stammering sentences of deprecation and en¬ treaty passed as unheeded as a puff of wind. “ Go to your room,” at last said Miss Sarah, “and tell me your decision in the morning : either you give up Durand, or you quit my house.” Ninette retired to her attic, where she passed a miserable night ; she was so lonely, and so friendless, that it was small wonder she felt the impossibility of quitting the only shelter she knew, and that although her pale cheeks and swollen eyes testified to the wretchedness she felt, yet when she entered the little room where breakfast was prepared, it was to say in a voice half choked with sobs — “ I agree to obey you. Aunt Sarah, and I will write and tell Achille I can never see him more. I have no home, no refuge, but this, and I am forced to do as- you desire.” And the poor child took her place at the table, and endeavoured to carry a brave front. Miss Susan did not attempt to check her tears, and they rolled down her face and dropped into her tea-cup, but Miss- Sarah vouchsafed no observation whatever, merely giving a loud sniff when Ninette’s faltering voice, announced her determination, and proceeding with her meal in her usual manner. After breakfast it seemed but a small addition tcy Ninette’s troubles that her aunt brought her a large quantity of trimmings, which she ordered her to put on a bonnet intended for Miss Spink ; and she sat down, feeling numbed and heart-broken, and piled up the adornments in the fashion her aunt commanded. Miss Susan’s fingers seemed all wrong, and the mistakes she made caused her sister’s wrath to be- poured on her in one continual stream, so that soon the sound of her subdued sobs added to the dreariness- of the atmosphere pervading the workroom, which was the back part of the shop. Though the ancient town of Glemsbury was small and quiet, it boasted a fashionable neighbour in the shape of the gay little health-resort of Bemerton, whence occasional visitors would drive over in smart victorias- or neat flies, and after seeing the old church, the quaint hospital, and the remains of the Castle, would drive back through the High Street, wondering how anyone could be found to spend the year through in such a. staid and sober town. It was not surprising therefore that a smart carriage should pull up before the open^ door of Miss Clay’s shop ; but before that lady had time to exclaim, “Someone from Bemerton!” a tall, elegant personage walked up to the small counter and, scarcely noticing Miss Sarah’s salutation, said — “ I come for a chapeau I saw two days ago. A. bonnet so lovely 1 — a 7'eve — a confection of the most delicate 1 Of lace and forget-me-nots ! Where is it ?' Who made it ? ” Ninette’s white face flushed as she heard her handiwork thus mentioned, and she listened anxiously for her aunt’s reply. “ That — rubbish, madam, was made by my niece ; I am sorry you should encourage her by admiring it 1 “Your niece?” queried the imperious stranger;. “ where, then, is she ?” N inette rose and modestly presented herself. “ It was I, madame, who made the bonnet,” she said in French. “You?” replied the stranger, in the same tongue.. “ Where, then, is it? Is it sold ? ” i

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DRAWN BV AulCE HAVERS GENTLE AND TRUE. 187

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Gentle and True. ‘‘ No, madame,” said Ninette, while Miss Susan sniffed audibly, and Miss Sarah coughed uneasily. NHmporte^^ continued the guest, '^voyo7isj^^ and merely saying “ Pardon, madame,” to the astonished Miss Clay, she opened one or two boxes, and taking therefrom a handful of lace, a bunch of tiny yellow roses, and a wisp of grass, she cleared the table at which Ninette was sitting with one sweep of her arm, and, placing the materials in front of her, said, “ Tiens / I give you one hour ; compose a bonnet, and then I talk to you.” She watched the girl take up her needle and commence, and then turning to her aunt, and calmly seating herself, she continued : “ Madame, I was driving through your town when I beheld some dream-like fabrications in your window; I said, ‘The maker of those must come and work for me.’ I re¬ turn ; the bonnets are gone — all but one. I come to say that I will offer your demoiselle a good position if it is true she made those toqices^ those caps, those bonnets, which I saw. I live in London ; my name is Delafosse — you know it, no doubt Then, seeing denial in Miss Sarah’s grim countenance, she said with a smile, “Ah! yes; truly Bond Street is far off. Well, I suffer — ah 1 how I suffer in that h'iste city, because of my workgirls ! If they are English, they are clumsy and stupid ; if they are French, they are impertinent, and will not stay in this melancholy country ; and I am ill, quite ill with worry, for I have a great business. Three weeks ago my forewoman left me, to return to France. I know not what to do. But,” she continued, turning to where Ninette was busily manipulating the lace and flowers, “ if cette demoiselle is geittille^ is steady and clever, she shall come to me, she shall have one hundred pounds a year, she shall live in my house, and in time she may share my business. Voila I Consider, madame; you cannot object.^” she in¬ quired, as Miss Clay remained immovable, while heavy frowns gathered on her forehead. “ Girls who can make things like those are many,” and she pointed to the array of Miss Sarah’s bonnets de¬ corating the window, “ but like the other, no 1 there is not one in a thousand. I go. I will return in an hour,” and so saying, and amidst a rustle of silk and 445 lace, the visitor deposited a card on the counter, went back to her carriage, and drove rapidly away. Wrath, astonishment, and indignation held sway over Miss Sarah for a time, but the entreaties and representations of her gentle, unselfish sister at length prevailed so far, that she promised to make inquiries about Madame Delafosse, and, if the information received proved satisfactory, agreed she would let Ninette decide for herself as to her acceptance of the offer. Ninette worked on, greatly touched by her Aunt Susan’s pleading, and stitched happy visions of her future amongst the lace and flowers, which perhaps helped to make the scrap of millinery the elegant trifle it became. When madame returned, Ninette put on the bonnet to show its effect, and the charming appearance she presented with her sweet face surrounded by the filmy lace, and with the little rose¬ buds let in after the fashion somewhat of the bows on a baby’s cap, while a tiny bunch tied with grass rested on the strings in front, so delighted Madame Delafosse that it was with difficulty that she was prevented from taking Ninette away with her at once, and was per¬ suaded to wait while due discussion, inquiry, and deliberate arrangements were carried out. Achille Durand never received the tear-stained epistle Ninette had written him, and the leave-taking he was permitted was not a very melancholy one, as he quickly made up his mind to follow his lady-love to the great metropolis. Two years have passed since the melancholy morn¬ ing which ended so brightly for Ninette, and she is now Madame Durand, and partner in the business of Delafosse et Cie., whose wares are the admired of all beholders. Achille has a domain of his own, where the dames and damsels of London can enjoy delicious tea, coffee, and chocolate, and partake of his wonderful confectionery, in the midst of artistic decorations and multitudes of fresh flowers. The heads of the Glemsbury ladies are still protected by Miss Clay’s bonnets, and she rarely comes to London now, but Miss Susan is to be seen very frequently in the Bond Street show-rooms, and is never tired of ad¬ miring the results of “Ninette’s Ideas.” M. R. L. GENTLE AND TRUE. HO is she that shall command All my heart’s devotion ? She who’s famed for beauty’s dower ? Beauty lasteth but an hour, Wrecked so soon by storms that lower O’er Time’s cruel ocean. Who is she then that shall reign. All my heart enchaining? She whose gifts are of the mind, Intellect and will combined? Nay, in such I cannot find Any rest remaining. She that’s tender, gentle, true. While her love fails never. Like a sunbeam o’er the land, Showering good on every hand ; This is she that shall command All my heart for ever ! G. Weatherly.

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444 THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars respecting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge himself to notice every article or work submitted. _ A Combined Spoon and Fork. A Sheffield manufacturer has just introduced a new table- fork, which combines some of the advantages of the spoon with those of the ordinary four¬ pronged fork. It is intended primarily to meet the difficulty ordinarily attending .on the eating of such vegetables as peas and the like, but it is easy to see that there are many cir¬ cumstances under which this combination might prove useful. Our illustration shows the head of this new table accessory. “ Influenza Colds and Whooping Cough.” With reference to the Family Doctor’s article under the above title, in our April number, we are informed that the result of the combination of oil of vitriol and common salt (suggested on page 273) would be the production of muriatic acid, or spirits of salt, a gas whose antiseptic properties are very feeble. The most powerful antiseptic or germicide known is chlorine, and this may be produced by treating a mixture of common salt and binoxide of manganese with oil of vitriol. Sulphurous acid — the germ-killer mentioned by our author — is readily prepared by burning a little sulphur A IVlagazine Indicator. An indicator for the use of public libraries, and other institutions having numbers of magazines in cir¬ culation, has just been devised by Mr. Alfred Cot- greave, the librarian of the Guille-Alles Library, Guernsey. It consists of a frame like that of the ordinary library indicator, and filled with a large num¬ ber of minute shelves. A certain number of blocks bearing the titles of the various publications are arranged in alphabetical order about the frame, in such a manner that as many divisions are left after each title as experience shows will correspond with the number of back parts of the publication in circulation. A large number of small slates in metal frames are supplied to fit the shelves of the indicator, and these slates are lettered, at one end in red and the other in blue, with the names of the various months. If the blue lettering is exposed the number for that particular month is known to be “ in.” And if the librarian gives it out, he makes a note on the block of the borrower and date, and reverses the slate so that the red lettering is exposed to show inquirers that the number is “out.” When the magazine is returned the record is easily rubbed off the slate, and the blue label exposed again. A great advantage that this system seems to offer is that the arrangement of the indicator can be varied to meet any demands for an unusually prolonged circulation of a particular num¬ ber of a publication. The Bell Rock Fog Signal. The Bell Rock Lighthouse which lies off Arbroath, far in the North Sea, has two bells which ring in foggy weather ; but recently an explosive signalling apparatus has been added. A metal rod having a hook at the end, and rising 18 feet above the lantern of the tower, is the firing point. By a simple mechanical arrange¬ ment the rod can be bent over, and the hook provided with an explosive cartridge of tonite or gun-cotton. The rod is then restored to its upright position, and the cartridge fired by means of the electric spark. A sig¬ nal is fired every ten or fifteen minutes during fogs. A New Reflecting Shade. Our engravings illustrate a new shade for electric lamps, which has been introduced from America. Ti e shade is conical and the upper part is of clear glass silvered to act as a reflector, while the bottom is ot rounded and frosted glass, so that when the electric glow lamp is inserted the light is reflected out through the frosted base in a soft and bright beam. The glowing filament of the lamp is thus withdrawn from the eye, and the light is both agreeable and strong. Such a lamp is well adapted for desks, and will be prized by literary men, and all who have much reading or writing to do.

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The Gatherer. 445 pressure which counteracts or equal¬ ises the lifting tendency of the trace, or gives a slightly increased pres¬ sure if found necessary. By this means it is obvious that the horse is exerting two forces — one hori¬ zontally through the trace, and another vertically through the com¬ bination of levers at G. These two forces cause the best inclination of trace, which is automatically deter¬ mined by the load and the state of the road. Good News for the Horses A new method of attaching horses to vehicles of all descriptions, by which the labour of draught is largely reduced, has recently been introduced by Mr. T. H. Brigg. The inventor contends that draught can only be fairly and with due economy attained when a proper proportion of the weight of the vehicle is trans¬ ferred on to the horse’s back, whenever any gradient is met, or any obstacle encountered, which has to be surmounted by the wheels ; and that as at present harnessed to all four-wheeled vehicles, a more or less serious waste of power inevitably follows, for the reason that the weight of the vehicle is improperly distributed. This principle is commonly understood by drivers of two-wheeled traps up-hill, who recognise almost by instinct that the horse is enormously re¬ lieved if the occupants sit well forward, or if part of the load be shifted forward, and that, necessarily, weight at the back of the trap is peculiarly irksome to the horse. The questions to be considered are : (i) what proportion of weight must be transferred so that draught may be most easily effected ; (2) by what means transference can most easily take place ; and (3) what saving of labour can be thereby obtained. The inventor claims that the first two of these ques¬ tions are answered by his Draught Attachment, which acts aiitoinatically ; and that the saving of labour is proved to be not less than 50 per cent. The transfer of weight, owing to the continual changes in the gradients traversed, must be momentarily varying, and this is effected by a combination of levers which work automatically according to the necessities of the moment. The accompanying diagram will help to make the process clear. Instead of allowing the shaft. A, B, to rotate as usual at B, the fore-carriage is so constructed as to carry the point of rotation to C. The position of C, together with the length of the shaft, is mathematically determined, so that the vertical pressure at G is in exact proportion to the power applied by the trace at E. It is this vertical A Radial Scale Thermometer. The thermometer which we illus¬ trate in Fig. I is designed for use in homes and elsewhere, and has the scales arranged like vanes radiating from the bulb, so that the temperature can be read all round the instrument. This con¬ venience allows it to be hung from a chan¬ delier in the middle of the room, or any support away from the wall, which is a bad position for a thermometer since it may have a tempe¬ rature different from that of the air in the room. The radial scales also serve to protect the tube from injury. Fig. 2 shows a new metal holder for the lens-fronted clinical thermometer introduced by Mr. S. G. Denton. It is made of thin metal, and the top, which pulls off, is securely fastened by a spring catch. Fig. 3 is a diagram of the ther¬ mograph now employed at Kew for recording the indi¬ cations of the dry and wet bulb thermometers, and FIG. 2.

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446 The Gatherer. thus obtaining a continuous record of the temperature of the air and of evaporation. It consists of a cylinder covered with photographic paper and revolving once in twenty-four hours. The light from a lamp after passing through a condenser is reflected from a mirror through a small ^4.,. «ifr^ air bubble in the mercury of each thermometer, and the ray after ^ passing through Cylinder covered with sensltlted paper & revolt^ inf once in 24 Hours. Screen interposed once every 2 Hours. FIG. 3. id/np'^ alensisfocLissed on the sensitive paper, as shown in the figure, and care is taken to keep the two photographic traces on the paper from crossing. That of the wet bulb is below that of the dry bulb. To eliminate errors and facilitate calculations, a screen cuts off the rays for four minutes every two hours, thus making periodical gaps in the record. To tabulate the results of the record, a sheet of plate glass divided by horizontal lines into times and tem¬ peratures is laid over it, and the actual values read off by this transparent scale. The recording apparatus is all placed within the observatory, but so arranged that the bulbs of the thermometers are outside, and the stems of these are bent so as to keep the bulbs at least two feet from the face of the wall on the north side of the building and nine feet above the ground. Zig-zag Lightning. A study of lightning photographs reveals the fact that flashes of lightning resemble rivers of fire which meander through the sky, either downwards towards the earth or along from cloud to cloud. Meteorologists have therefore concluded that the zig-zag flash of con¬ ventional art has no real existence ; but according to a recent paper of Mr. Bruce, M.A., read before the Meteorological Society, the reflection of a flash on certain cumulus clouds sometimes presents a zig-zag appearance. A Telephone Cable. The first submerged cable for telephonic messages was recently laid across the River Plate, as part of the new telephone trunk line between Monte Video and Buenos Ayres. It was made from the designs of Mr. W. H. Preece, F.R.S., the Post Office electrician. The whole line is over 200 miles long, and is a practical proof that telephony between London and Paris or London and Dublin is quite practicable, provided the sea portion is not too long. Indeed the question of telephonic communication with Paris is likely to be realised now that the Channel cables have come into the hands of the Governm.ent. We may also add that trials of the Wheatstone telegraph apparatus between London and Rome have recently been made, and a speed of 120 words per minute attained. It is ex¬ pected that this figure will yet be improved upon, high as it is, by dint of further experiments. Atmospheric Dust. Mr. John Aitken, the well-known authority on the action of dust in the atmosphere, has communicated the results of his latest observations to the Royal Society of Edinburgh, where he exhibited the appa¬ ratus which is to be used for dust researches at the Observatory on Ben Nevis. Mr. Aitken shows in his paper that the quantity of dust in the air dimin¬ ishes, as a rule, when the wind increases, and augments during calms. As dust increases the radi¬ ating power of the atmosphere, and causes it to cool quickly, the consequence is a fog, which may thus be regarded as a suspended dew. He believes that dust condenses the moisture of the air before the latter becomes saturated. Mr. Aitken finds that some elevated parts of Switzerland, such as the Righi, exhibit very few dust particles in the air. In the wilder parts of Argyleshire, too, the proportion is as low as about 200 particles per cubic centimetre ; whereas in Paris and London it rises sometimes to nearly 200,000 particles per cubic centimetre. Transliteration from the Russian. The following notes of English and Russian equivalents have been compiled, with the help of Madame de Novikoff and Mr. N. W. Tchakowsky, for the use of students and men of science in translating from Russian into English, or mce versdy and have been approved by the directors of some of the leading museums. It should be remarked that has been adopted in preference to ^ for the letter P since this letter is also the equivalent for h. The semi-vowels ‘b and b must be indicated when present by the sign ‘ placed above the line, except at the end of a word. Where proper names have been Russianised, it is desirable to keep them in the Russian form. This system is to be adopted at once in several important catalogues — for instance, that of the Natural History Museum — and the proceedings of learned societies such as the Royal Society, the Institution of Civil En¬ gineers, and the Agricultural Society. Fragrant Ferns. At a recent meeting of the Royal Botanic Society, a sweet-scented fern grown in the Society’s gardens was exhibited by the secretary, who remarked that it might be cultivated for its perfume, which resembles that of new-mown hay, and continues after the fronds are dried. This specimen was a little-known exotic ; but at Mussorie, in the North-West Provinces of India, during or after the rainy season, the oaks and rhodo¬ dendrons are covered with ferns, one of which resem¬ bles the “ hart’s tongue,” and emits from its spores behind the leaf a delicate scent like that of new-mown hay. A correspondent in Folkestone has identified it

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The Gatherer. 447 as the Phymatodes 7ior7nalis. Scented ferns are also to be found in this country — for example, Xht Nephrodmm ^midum^ or “hay-scented buckler fern,’^ sometimes classified as the Lasirea recurva^ owing to the pinnules being bent back. It is found in Devonshire — for instance, near Totnes. On rubbing the frond the 5cent is very perceptible. We may add that a species of club moss in Mexico has the power of reviving, after it is apparently dry and dead, by exposure to moisture. Some specimens of it sent home by Mr. A. Gudgeon, after being several months in the dried state, became green and flourishing in a moist place. The Poly¬ podium mca7ium of Arkansas, in the United States, has the same property, which indeed is already familiar to us through the plant known as the Rose of Jericho. A New Spirit Kettle and Lamp. Our illustrations show a new spirit kettle and lamp, which has just been patented, and is admirably adapted for bedroom use or under other circum¬ stances when hot water or food is required at short notice. It scarcely needs explanation. When the contents of the kettle have been heated to the re¬ quired point, all that it is ne¬ cessary to do is to press down the kettle upon the lamp, which is then extinguished without danger. With reasonable care this kettle-lamp should prove very serviceable. Oxygen in Gasworks. Mr. Valon, gas engineer to the Ramsgate Corpora¬ tion, has introduced a new mode of purifying gas with the oxygen obtained by the Brin process. The oxygen is employed to revive the oxide purifiers which are used to absorb sulphuretted hydrogen from freshly manufac¬ tured gas. When the oxygen is mixed with the crude gas, before it passes into the purifier, the reviving pro¬ cess accomplishes itself there and then. Oxygen also enables lime purifiers to absorb sulphuretted hydrogen as well as carbonic acid. The latter is oxidised, and the spent lime has no evil odour. The improvement also enables a less extensive plant to be adopted. An Inclined Plane Railway. The Cincinnati Inclined Plane Railway has its main terminus in the centre of the city, and is worked by electricity. From the central station the cars, to the number of seventeen, run by means of electricity to the base of a steep incline. They are hoisted to the top of this incline by an elevator, and again connected to the electric circuit, after which they travel to the other terminus at the Zoological Gardens, six miles out of the city. Some of the grades on the line are very heavy. A steam-engine of 150 horse-power works the whole system by means of Edison dynamos. The consumption of coal is about 37} tons a day. In a small town of California they have another curious tramway with some heavy grades. Two mules draw the car up these grades, but in going down the mules are mounted on a stable-tender attached to the car, which runs to the bottom by means of gravity. Another New Heat Indicator. The recording thermometer or thermograph of Dr. Daniell-Draper, of America, of which a front view is given in our illus¬ tration, consists es¬ sentially of a bi¬ metallic thermo¬ meter — that is to say, a slip of two different metals which, by their un¬ equal expansion with change of temperature, curve more or less to one side. This sensi¬ tive member is the penholder, p, of the thermograph. A pen filled with gly¬ cerine ink, which does not readily freeze, is attached to its point and draws a line on a dial of the graduated paper, G, turning before it by clockwork. As the pen is moved more or less by the changes of temperature during day and night, a wavy line is marked upon the paper, which, being in reality a scale, shows the temperature at any time during the twenty-four hours. A New Diving-Dress. A diver’s dress consists of the helmet, the breast¬ plate, and the body covering of waterproof fabric. He gets into it by the opening of the neck as though it were a sack, and the mouth is then fitted to the edge of the breastplate, which sits upon his shoulders like a

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44« The Gatherer. tippet. As this junction has to be watertight it is usual to hook the mouth over studs on the rim of the breastplate, and then cover the margin of the cloth with brass plates screwed up tight. But this plan is troublesome, especially in cold weather, and when the diver has to come up at frequent intervals for relief from the pressure of the water on his frame. In the new dress of Mr. Alfred E. Stove the neck opening is made of india - rubber, and smaller than before, since it stretches to al¬ low the man to enter. There is a projecting flange or fillet on the edge of the mouth, which fits into a correspond¬ ing groove in the collar, not the bottom, of the breastplate, so that when the helmet is put on its lower edge secures the fillet and makes a watertight joint. There is thus only one such joint, whereas in the older dress there are two, namely, one between the helmet and breastplate, and one between the latter and the waterproof. The figure illustrates the new device, the helmet and breastplate being cut away in part to show the joint in section. In this, a is the neck of india-rubber with its projecting fillet, which fits into a groove of the neck of the breastplate b, and is secured by the bottom of the helmet which screws into the breastplate. Nickel Steel. Steel containing 25 per cent, of nickel possesses some peculiar properties. On heating it to a dull red it becomes non-magnetisable, so that the same metal may be magnetic or non-magnetic through a range of temperature from below the freezing point up to 580° Cent. The nOn-magnetic steel is softer than the mag¬ netic. It breaks with a stress of about 50 tons per square inch after elongating about 30 per cent. The magnetic steel breaks with a stress of about 90 tons per square inch after elongating about 7 per cent. The non-magnetic would, therefore, be useful as a mild steel were it not that on exposure to a hard frost it becomes a hard steel and remains so until heated to a temperature of Cent. Coldness and Weather. The researches of M. I. Vincent, a Belgian meteoro¬ logist, show that the sensation of cold as experienced by the human body bears no constant relation to the rise and fall of the thermometer, but depends rather on the temperature of the skin. Wind produces a cooling effect even in hot weather, as voyagers in the tropics are well aware. Again, in polar regions, so long as the air is still the cold is bearable, though insuffer¬ able when the wind rises very high. Moreover, if there is little or no wind the sunshine produces a sensation of warmth, though the temperature of the air, as shown by the thermometer, is quite low. “ Games of Patience.” It will, perhaps, surprise some of our readers to learn that there are forms of the game of “ Patience ” which are also games of very considerable intricacy and skill. In her little book on “ Games of Patience (L. Upcott Gill), Miss Whitmore Jones gives par¬ ticulars of some seventy different games, the great majority of which are well worth trying. The great advantage of games of patience is that while there are plenty of good games for two or more players in¬ cluded in the classification, there are not a few which can be played by a single player, to the whiling away of what would have otherwise been a tedious hour. In the belief that many of the new forms will be welcome to our readers, we commend the book to them. It would be an armoury of recreation in a seaside home. “Healthy, Wealthy, and Wise.” Sir Edwin Chadwick, K.C.B., is one of the greatest of living authorities on national health and all ques¬ tions pertaining to sanitation. His great work on the subject, “ The Health of Nations,’Ms too seiious an undertaking, and too expensive, for the general reader. So his friend. Dr. B. W. Richardson, F.R.S., has prepared an abridgment of it for popular use and instruction, under the title of “ National Health ” (Longmans), and the result is a manual that should be in the hands of every citizen. The construction, arrangement, and drainage of the dwelling-house and school ; the prevention of epidemics and the sup¬ pression of intemperance ; length of life, unhealthy employments, and the health of the future— these are only some of the topics treated of in this admirable little volume, and needless to say, treated well. “The Adventures of a Younger Son.” Mr. Fisher Unwin has opened his Adventure Series” with Trelawny^s “Adventures of a Younger Son,” edited by Mr. Edward Garnett. So far as re¬ corded “ adventures ” go, it would be difficult to find a better opening for the series. But our editor gives us permission to treat a good many of them as somewhat apocryphal, to say the least of them. Making all allowances for these outbursts of a very powerful ima¬ gination, however, there is no doubt that Trelawny led a remarkably varied life in many lands, and met with many strange characters under surroundings so un¬ usual as to give good ground for many of his stories, and an air of reality to the others. There are pas¬ sages in the book that, to our thinking, the editor would have done well to omit in these days ; but, apart from these, the work is very readable, and it is the first of what promises to be an interesting series.

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449 TO BE GIVEN UP. By KATE EYRE, Author of “For the Good of the Family,” “A Step in the Dark,” &c. &c. CHAPTER THE TWENTY-EIGHTH. TEMPTATION. f ABYN looked up in- q u i r i n g 1 y into Mr. Charrington’s face as he, with such evident anxiety, asked her to explain her meaning. She felt that a crisis was coming : that the mist which had ob¬ scured her mental vision was to be swept away. “ I mean that I cannot understand how Philip Dacre could ever have done anything so - foreign to his nature as the rob¬ bing of those worse off than himself,*’ she faltered. “He was always - ’’ “ Miss Littledale, disabuse your mind of that idea once and for ever ! ” exclaimed Mr. Charrington, inter¬ rupting her unceremoniously. “Philip Dacre liter¬ ally couldii't have done such a thing if he had tried.” A glorious light came into Mabyn’s eyes, which Mr. Charrington was not slow to observe. “ He had no more to do with the taking of that money than you or I had. Throughout the whole deplorable business he has acted in a manner deserv¬ ing of the highest commendation,” Mr. Charrington continued, his face aglow with honest admiration, al¬ though, as Mabyn well knew, he was speaking of his successful rival. “ Oh, I am so glad — so glad ! ” murmured Mabyn softly, with tears of joy shining in her sweet grey eyes. Somehow she did not mind Mr. Charrington seeing how deeply she was moved. Then they walked on in silence for a minute or two, as people will who have much food for reflection, and are thoroughly at home with each other. “ You can’t think what a relief this is to me, Mr. Charrington,” Mabyn at length observed. He smiled down on her with that grave look in his kindly eyes that she knew so well. “ I think I can,” he said very gently. “ I would have told you the truth before had I known you were labouring under a misapprehension. But I made sure Sophy would have talked to you about it, as you and she are such close friends.” “ Does Sophy know for certain, then, that her brother is wholly blameless in the matter ? ” “ Yes, she has known it for some time now, poor girl ! ” “ Why do you speak of her as a ‘ poor girl ’ ? ” asked Mabyn quickly. “ Because she is very unhappy just now.” “But, Mr. Charrington, if Philip Dacre did not take the money, who did ?” “ His father.” “Oh, Mr. Charrington ! surely that isn’t true?” “ It doesn’t admit of a doubt.” “And did Philip know it all the time ? ” “ Yes.” “ Then he must have allowed himself to be wrong¬ fully suspected in order to shield his father ?” Mabyn paused between each word, as if she were endeavour¬ ing to take in the situation. “ That is precisely what he did do.” “ Oh, Mr. Charrington, whether he was mistaken or not, wasn’t it noble of him ?” “Yes.” Then he added, more to himself than to Mabyn, “ He deserves her — he well deserves her ! ” Mabyn’s mind was in such a whirl that she did not pause at the time to consider the meaning of these words. Afterwards, when she thought over the con¬ versation, she remembered them, and wondered if Mr. Charrington were in ignorance that the engage¬ ment between Philip and Clare had been broken off. “But why is Sophy so unhappy about it? Surely it is not much worse to know one’s father is guilty than to feel that one’s brother is generally suspected of being so ? At least, one seems almost as bad as the other to me.” “ She blames herself for the manner in which she behaved to Mr. Nightingale. Her father owed him a large sum. Had Mr. Nightingale not thirsted for re¬ venge, and threatened, unless he were paid in full, to lay the matter before the directors of the bank, Mr. Dacre might never have been tempted to take the money.” “ But Sophy did not know this at the time?” “ Certainly not. Still, had she behaved in a more straightforward manner towards Mr. Nightingale, he would probably not have proceeded to extremities with her father.” “ You do think she was to blame, then ?” “ I am afraid I do.” “And is she very unhappy about it ? ” “ She is taking it to heart terribly.” “Poor Sophy! It was so dreadfully hard to be forced into marrying that horrid Mr. Nightingale.” “ Don’t misunderstand me, Miss Littledale. I am not blaming Sophy for having refused to marry Mr. Nightingale. In my opinion it was a shameful thing to attempt to force her into a marriage so utterly dis¬ tasteful to her. Still, I do think that both she and Ted might have been more straightforward.” “ Is it very generally known about Mr. Dacre ? ” “ Oh, no. Being on the committee myself, and having always taken a great interest in the finances of the hospital, I was one of the first to discover what was going on. I doubt if all the committee-men even now know the ins and outs of the affair. The money has been refunded, and they think that is all that really concerns them.” 749

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To BE Given up. 450 “Then some of the committee-men still believe Philip a guilty man ?” “ They all know that Philip Dacre refunded the money, but I fancy most of them think it looks like Queer Street about the father, and so refrain from asking awkward questions.” “ I suppose Philip thought that if the true state of affairs was known, his father would lose his position at the bank ? ” “ That was just it. If the directors had got an inkling of the affair, they would have called upon Mr. Dacre to resign at once, and that would have meant ruin and disgrace to the whole family. Now, Philip was in quite a different position. It was not at all likely that a little bit of Dursington scandal would reach a London firm, so that in allowing himself to be suspected, he did not risk much.” “ It was very, very noble of him.” “Yes, I admire him for it immensely. And yet. Miss Littledale, I think he was in the wrong. The truth, at any price, seems to me to be the right course for all of us to pursue.” “ But Philip never said he was guilty, Mr. Char- rington.” “ And because he did not proclaim his guilt on the housetops, therefore you think he did not dally with the truth? Pardon me. Miss Littledale, but I don’t fancy you really believe in the doctrine you are ad¬ vancing,” said Mr. Charrington, smiling down on his companion, who was looking up at him with such a glad light in her eyes. “Anyhow, he did it for the best, and was ready to suffer himself that others might escape punishment. Mr. Charrington, I think it was noble of him.” “ We are both agreed as to the unselfishness of his conduct and the purity of his motive. Miss Little¬ dale.” “ And was there no truth whatever in all those discreditable stories that were so freely circulated about him ? ” “ There is never smoke without fire ; but in this instance the flame was fanned into life by those who envied him his signal good fortune. I think at one time Philip Dacre did live a thoughtless, extravagant life, but I feel convinced he was never a vicious man. But the pass to which extravagance has brought his father will, if I mistake not, be a severe lesson to him.” “ Do you think Mr. Dacre’s affairs are in a very bad way then — apart from this hospital business, I mean ? ” “I much fear they are. Fortunately Mrs. Dacre has a small income, which is settled on herself and her children. I doubt if Mr. Dacre will leave any¬ thing but debts behind him.” “ Oh, Mr. Charrington, is it so bad as that ? Is there no hope of Mr. Dacre’s ultimate recovery?” “Very little, I afn afraid. He saw a physician last week, who reported very gravely on the case.” “And Mrs. Dacre will be left very badly off, then ?” “There will be nothing whatever for her so far as I can see, except what she has of her own.” “ How very, very dreadful ! ” murmured Mabyn. “No wonder poor Sophy has looked so worried lately ! ” “ Yes, it is a most distressing case. Of course, what I have said to you is in confidence, although I am afraid there is not much hope of keeping matters quiet for long. I don’t quite know why 1 have told you all this, unless it is that it seems so natural to be talking to you about it.” Mabyn looked up with a pleased smile. Although she was heartily sorry for the Dacres in their severe trial, the confidential tone which Mr. Charrington had assumed when speaking to her was very gratifying. “ I think you may trust me, Mr. Charrington,” she said very softly. “ I am sure I may,” he replied unhesitatingly. Alone in her own little room that night, Mabyn thought over the foregoing conversation long and deeply. That which had separated Philip and Clare had in truth turned out to be a mere chimera. Did Clare but know of Philip’s innocence, she would be ready to humble herself before him, and a complete reconciliation would in all probability take place. It would matter to her not one jot that Mr. Dacre was guilty, so long as she was firmly convinced of her lover’s innocence. And Philip, although his pride had received so terrible a wound fiom Clare’s readiness to suspect him, would never withhold his forgiveness from the woman he had loved so long and so well, should she deign to ask for it. A word from Mabyn would, therefore, bring the lovers together again ; and it almost seemed as if Mabyn were the only one from whom that word could come. Miss Eastabrook was hundreds of miles away, and the nd\vs of Mr. Dacre’s guilt, even if it were generally known in Dursington, would be very unlikely to reach Clare unless someone made a point of com¬ municating it to her. And who would be likely to do that? It was possible Fred Charrington did not even know that the engagement had been broken off, for the Dacres and the Edward Charringtons did not often allude to it, and, as before stated, most of the Dursingtonites believed Philip to be travelling with Mr. and Miss Eastabrook. And even if Mr. Charrington did hear of the estrangement, he would never guess its cause. Philip, to save his father’s good name, might let Dursington suspect him of a despicable crime, but he would certainly make a point of putting himself right with the woman he loved. Such would undoubtedly be the conclusion at which Mr. Charrington would arrive, and any others who might interest themselves in the affaii. Sophy, of course, knew exactly how matters stood, but she would hardly be likely to write to Miss Eastabrook, telling her that Mr. Dacre, not Philip, was the guilty man, for she would naturally be incensed against Clare, and w’ould very likely imagine that in the proud young beauty’s eyes the father’s guilt w^ould be almost as insurmountable an obstacle as the son’s. It was, therefore, clearly Mabyn’s duty to have written off to Clare at once. But she did not do this. She did not say to herself in so many words, “ Philip

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To BE Given up. 451 and Clare are estranged now : i will let them remain so, and perhaps, in course of time, Philip may turn again to me, his first love.” And yet that was the gist of her reflections, while all the time she knew full well that she was being untrue to her better self, and acting in a way that, had Mr. Charrington been aware of it, would have caused him to regard her conduct with the gravest disapproval. And Mabyn had of late grown very anxious to merit his approbation. CHAPTER THE T\V E N T Y- N I N T H . “I’VE GOT INTO A REGULAR MESS ! ” Four months had elapsed since the day on which Mabyn was told of Philip’s innocence. Much had happened during the interim. Mr. Dacre was dead, and Southfields had passed into other hands, Mrs. Dacre, Julia, and the younger child¬ ren having left Dursington. They had nothing now to depend on but Mrs. Dacre’s income and the help that Philip could afford them, Mr. Charrington’s prognos¬ tications having proved only too true. Nor was there at present any likelihood that Julia would leave the maternal roof, for Bevan Dudson had fairly cut and run. In consequence of the pressure which had been brought to bear on the young man by Sir Bevan and Lady Dudson, and the series of shocks he had re¬ ceived in connection with the discreditable revelations as to the state of Mr. Dacre’s affairs, his manner towards his betrothed had grown colder and colder. Julia, however, had been conveniently blind to this, and had been careful to give her lover no excuse for breaking off the engagement. And so matters had con¬ tinued for some time, Bevan simply lacking the courage to tell his Jiajicee that he no longer wished to fulfil his part of the contract, so much did he stand in awe of her anger. And yet, although he had been so effec¬ tually held in check by the severity of her eye, he had felt every day that the prospect of making her his wife grew more appalling. In fairness to the young man, it must be admitted that it was not the poverty, nor even the disgrace that had befallen her family, which had alone influenced him. These disadvan¬ tages had, indeed, induced Sir Bevan and Lady Dudson to vigorously oppose the match, while they undoubtedly had had some weight with the bride¬ groom-elect. But had Julia been a woman in whom closer acquaintanceship served to reveal only noble traits of character : had she, in very truth, loved Bevan, instead of being attracted solely by his wealth and social position, then it is more than probable he would have braved the parental storm by marrying her. At length, however, the climax had come. He had kept away from her for several days. On the even¬ ing when he again visited her the whole family had noticed how ill at ease he appeared. But her glance had been more searching, and her manner even firmer than usual, while she had been careful to give him no opportunity of speaking to her alone. Perhaps it was best so i it saved a scene. In the morning she had received a letter from him, in which she learned that he had left for the Continent, never more to return to England as the JiancQ of Julia Dacre. He had then gone on to say how deeply he regretted the false hopes he had raised in her bosom ; and had added, making the statement as delicately as possible, that he had placed two thousand pounds to her credit in a well-known bank, and that he should esteem it a great favour if she would accept this sum as an ex¬ pression of his deep contrition. She had abused him roundly ; had posed gracefully as the broken-hearted victim of a worldly-minded lover ; and had unhesitatingly appropriated the money to her own use without even acknowledging the gift. Clare and her father were still abroad. Beyond the bare fact that Mr. Dacre was about to pass through the Bankruptcy Court had not death saved him from this last indignity, they knew nothing of Dursington gossip. All this time had Mabyn kept silence.' Philip was free now to proclaim his innocence from the house¬ tops. If, therefore, he desired Miss Eastabrook to know of it, could he not write to her himself.^ So argued Mabyn to quiet her own conscience, although she was well aware that pride would effectually pre¬ vent Philip from adopting such a course. Meanwhile Ralph’s affairs had been going from bad to worse. Much to his own astonishment — for he had really worked hard this time — he had failed in his second attempt to pass his final. That he had done exceptionally well in surgery, afforded him but little consolation in face of the discouraging fact that he had been plucked in medicine, or, to use the more polite phraseology of the medical examiners, had been referred back to his studies for three months. One or two really unfortunate questions had brought about this unhappy result. Dr. Littledale, however, refused to listen to any such explanation. He had never failed in an examination himself, and could not under¬ stand why his son should do so. In face of the paternal wrath, Ralph had lacked the courage to mention his engagement to Matilda Jen¬ kins, nor could he bring himself to make a clean breast of the debts he had contracted, although they had now amounted to a really alarming sum in pro¬ portion to his means of meeting them. Again and again had Mabyn implored Ralph to release her from the promise she had made him not to mention his engagement at home. But the more she urged him to allow her to tell Dr. Littledale, the more angry did he become. He must wait, he stoutly declared, until he had passed, and then he would see about it, Mabyn was sorely puzzled what to do. She did not like to break her promise, and yet she felt that in keeping so important a fact from Dr. and Mrs. Little¬ dale she was acting in a very indiscreet manner. Ever since the beginning of the new year Mabyn had been in London, staying with Aunt Emma, whose law business was detaining her longer in town than she had anticipated. Mabyn had, therefore, many

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To BE Given up. 452 opportunities of studying Matilda Jenkins, and the more she saw of her, the less did she think her a suitable wife for Ralph. Speech may be as silver, and silence as gold, in many cases; but with Mabyn the converse of this held good. If only she could have spoken out boldly to her parents about Ralph, and to Clare about Philip, her conscience would have been at rest. As it was, however, she was wretchedly uneasy. And yet there were times when she was feverishly happy. Philip, it will be remembered, when in London, lived near Bed¬ ford Square ; and since Mabyn had been staying with her aunt in Montague Street, she had seen much of him— almost as much as in those sweet spring days before Miss Eastabrook had come to Dursington. And his manner towards her, although it was not that of a lover, was still full of kindly solicitude, while there was no doubt that he sought her society. In time, what might not happen ? Poor Mabyn ! She felt she was erring so grievously, and yet she could not cease to do evil, and learn to do well. After all, she argued, why should she go out of her way to reconcile two lovers, who were so ridiculous as to be kept apart by groundless suspicion on the one hand, and unjustifiable pride on the other } Thus did Mabyn try to quiet her conscience, while her eyes grew bright with dawning hope. “ Mabyn, Tve passed at last,” announced Ralph one afternoon. The brother and sister were resting on one of the lounges in the Dore Gallery, having at length grown weary of looking at the pictures. Oh, Ralph, why didn’t you tell me before ?” “ Well, I knew it only yesterday.” “ Have you passed well?” “ Yes, Pve come out with flying colours. It’s a case of better late than never.” “ Papa will be so pleased ! And so am I ! ” “ Oh, it’s not much to congratulate a man about after he has failed twice.” All’s well that ends well, you know.” “Yes, I suppose so;” and Ralph heaved a sigh, while he took to studying his boots intently. “ You will be coming home for good then, now, Ralph?” “ Yes.” “ How soon? ” “ In the course of a few days. There is nothing to keep me in London.” “And, Ralph, you will tell them at home about Miss Jenkins ; won’t you ? ” “ I shall have to, I suppose.” “ Was she very pleased at your success ? ” “ Don’t know, I’m sure ; she was out last night, and I came away before she was down this morning ;” and Ralph, as he spoke, looked anything but the proud and happy lover. “ Then you haven’t seen her ? ” “ Haven’t I just said so ? ” “ Didn’t you mention that you had passed, then, at all in Bedford Square ?” “ Oh, yes, I told Mrs. Jenkins I had. Old Jenkins was on at me last night. He says we’ve been engaged quite long enough, and that it’s time I thought about getting married.” “ But, Ralph, how could you marry at present ? I am sure papa wouldn’t listen to such a proposition,”’ exclaimed Mabyn, much startled. “ That’s just what I told him. What have I got to marry on, I should like to know ? ” “But surely Miss Jenkins herself wouldn’t wish it.”" “ Oh, I don’t know. Girls are mostly mad to get married. They like to boast about it, I suppose.” “ I don’t think 7Ztce girls are over-anxious like that, Ralph,” answered Mabyn, with quiet dignity. “ I know Tve got into a regular mess,” said Ralph despondently. “ Ralph, do you really care for Miss Jenkins?” “ I should like the girl well enough if she were not thrust down my throat. She’s something to look at, you know,” replied Ralph, with the manner of a man who was determined to make the best of a bad bar¬ gain. “ But, Ralph, it is not her fault that her parents tiy to urge on your marriage.” “Whether she or her parents are at the bottom of it, they may save themselves the trouble, for I’ve no¬ intention of marrying yet awhile. It’s simply out of the question.” “ But you will tell papa about your engagement ? ” “ Yes, I suppose I shall have to do that.” “ And the sooner the better.” “ Well, there’s no hurry for a day or two.” “ Ralph, if I were you, I would - ” “ What’s the matter ? ” asked Ralph, as Mabyn stopped short. “ Why, bless me, Dacre ! who would have thought of seeing you here ? ” exclaimed Ralph, as Philip came up to them. “ I called in at Montague Street, and Miss Little- dale told me you had come on here ; so, as I hadn’t seen D ore’s collection for some years, I thought I would join you.” Then turning to Mabyn, he shook hands with her. “ You have had a pleasant afternoon, I see,” he remarked, evidently misled by Mabyn’s bright looks. “ What a pity you didn’t come earlier ! I must be off in a quarter of an hour, for I have an appointment at five o’clock,” exclaimed Ralph. “Perhaps Miss Littledale would like to stay a little longer, and I could see her home ? ” suggested Philip. “ Yes, that would do. You are not tired yet, are you, Mabyn ?” And Mabyn answered, truly enough, that she was not feeling in the least fatigued. And as Ralph glanced at his pretty, ladylike-look¬ ing sister, in whose eyes was so bright a light, and on whose cheek was so delicate a bloom, he felt, with a pang, that Matilda Jenkins was not of his world. Had Ralph brought her to the Dore Gallery, how smartly she would have dressed herself for the occasion, and how loudly she would have criticised the pictures, ex¬ hibiting her ignorance and want of breeding at every turn.

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To BE Given up. CHAPTER THE THIRTIETH AT THE DORE GALLERY. While conversing with Ralph about his engagement, Mabyn was greatly distressed. Her fears on his behalf were aroused not so much b)^ the words he spoke as 453 should have thought of all that before asking her to be his wife. When, however, Philip Dacre came upon the scene, Mabyn’s face brightened, and she forgot everything but the joy of being in his presence. by the manner in which they were uttered. There was no doubt that he had, as he himself admitted, got into a regular mess ; but the question that arose in Mabyn’s mind was whether she ought to tacitly sanction his paying the full price of his folly, or advise him to make good his escape while it was yet day. If he married Matilda Jenkins, to find in her an un¬ congenial companion, how long and bitter a repent¬ ance might be his ! But then, so argued Mabyn, he As soon as Ralph had left them together, to keep his appointment, they commenced a systematic in¬ spection of Dord’s masterpieces. Philip knew some¬ thing of the canons of art, and under his tuition Mabyn observed beauties which she had hitherto failed to notice. She did not talk much herself— it was not her way ; but she glanced up at Philip from time to time, so that he was well aware he had an appreciative listener.

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454 To BE Given up. But when at length they sat down on the very lounge on which Ralph and his sister had formerly rested, Mabyn’s thoughts did revert to the dilemma in which her brother was placed. “ I suppose Ralph told you he had passed, Mr. Dacre Mabyn remarked, v/ith a vague idea of seek¬ ing counsel from Philip. “Has he, though? No, he never said a word to me about it.” “ It was only yesterday that he heard. He has passed so well ! ’’ “ I wonder why he didn^t mention it just now ? It is not like him to keep quiet about anything. He seemed rather down, too, I thought.” “ I am afraid he is very much worried just at present.’’ “About being a little behind with his bills, you mean ? ” “ I do not think he is troubling about that alone, or even principally.” “ But now that he has passed, and passed so credit¬ ably, too, Dr. Littledale will let bygones be bygones, surely ? ” “ Mr. Dacre,” said Mabyn, with her eyes fixed earnestly on Philip, “it isn’t that Ralph is afraid of papa. It is his engagement that is troubling him.” “His engagement to Miss Jenkins, do you mean ? I did not think that was to be taken seriously.” “ Not taken seriously, Mr. Dacre ! Can such an en¬ gagement be taken in any other way ? ” “ Certainly not when it has been entered into with due consideration on both sides. Miss Littledale.” “ And has not this one ?” “ As far as I know, I should say not.” “ I don’t think I quite understand you.” “To speak plainly. Miss Jenkins strikes me as being a young lady with her wits well about her.” ‘‘Which means that she has - ” “ Entrapped poor, unsophisticated Ralph.” “ Oh, Mr. Dacre ! ” “ I am sorry to have to enlighten you on such a point. Miss Littledale, but it is not a very uncommon occurrence for a young fellow like Ralph to get en¬ tangled with a woman some few years his senior, occupying an inferior social position to himself.” “ Mr. Dacre, I think you are being unjust to Miss Jenkins. Both she and Ralph told me about the engagement as if it were a recognised thing.” “And yet you fear that Ralph is worrying over it?” “Yes, I can’t understand it. For one thing, Mr. Jenkins is urging him to marry at once.” “ My dear Miss Littledale, move heaven and earth to keep him from such folly as that ! ” exclaimed Philip, with much energy. “It is quite out of the question, of course. At present he has nothing whatever to marry on.” “But apart from that. Miss Jenkins is not the wife for Ralph.” “ I am afraid I must agree with you.” “ And it would therefore be far better for the en¬ gagement — that is, if any formal engagement really exists — to terminate.” “If Ralph thought so, surely he would put an end to it himself.” “ I am not so sure of that. The truth is, Ralph owes the Jenkinses money, and as long as he is not in a position to pay them he hasn’t the face to turn his back on the fair Matilda.” A pained expression came into Mabyn’s eyes. She did not like to hear Philip speak so lightly of what was to her a very solemn matter. “And you really think, Mr. Dacre, that Ralph doesn’t — doesn’t love Miss Jenkins ?” “ I am firmly convinced that he does not. If I thought he did, or if I thought Miss Jenkins was really attached to him, then I should regard the affair in a very different light.” “And matters being as they are — or as you imagine them to be — what course would you advise Ralph to pursue ? ” “ I think he should make a clean breast of his misdoings to his father — debts, engagement, and all.” “ I am afraid he will never have the courage to do that.” Then he will live to bitterly repent his cow¬ ardice.” Mabyn looked perplexed and unhappy. “ After all,” continued Philip, “ what has he done ? Lived a little beyond his allowance, and allowed him¬ self to be entrapped by a woman who might well have succeeded in taking in a man with twice Ralph’s experience. Dr. Littledale might expostulate rather freely with him at first, but he is too wise a man not to ultimately help him well out of the dilemma.” “You seem to have a very bad opinion of Miss Jenkins, Mr. Dacre.” “ Pardon me. Miss Littledale, but I haven’t. On the contrary, I am quite ready to admit that she possesses many estimable qualities, besides being a really handsome girl. But I think she has set her cap at poor Ralph, and so far she has succeeded.” “ And you think, therefore, that he would be quite justified in breaking faith with her ? ” “ I think he would be justified in looking after his own interests, seeing that she is so well able to pro¬ tect hers.” “ But, Mr. Dacre, what if we should be mistaken ? What if she really cares for Ralph ? ” “If she really cared for him, would she consent to be a millstone round his neck, as she must necessarily be were they to marry immediately ? ” “But it is Mr. Jenkins, not Matilda, who is anxious to hasten on the marriage.” “ I don’t think the father would do so unless the daughter were agreeable to the arrangement.” “ Any way, I quite agree with you that Ralph ought to tell papa all about it. All the same, I am afraid he won’t.” “ In which case. Miss Littledale, I think you should take the matter into your own hands.” “ But I promised Ralph I wouldn’t mention it at home.”

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To BE Given up. “ How long ago is it since you made that promise?” About six months.” “ And did you intend your promise to remain bind¬ ing for an indefinite period ? ” “ Oh, no. Ralph promised that he would break it to papa as soon as ever he had passed his final.” “Then, now that he has passed, surely you are exonerated from your promise ?” “ I doubt if Ralph views it in that light.” “ Well, tell him plainly that if he does not speak, you must.” “ Oh, Mr. Dacre, I don’t know what to do ! I am so terribly afraid that Tilly may really and truly care for Ralph.” An idea suddenly occurred to Philip, suggested by the eager sympathy in Mabyn’s face. He remembered that offer of marriage he had made her, and the doubts he had entertained at the time as to whether or not she had really loved him. He had so seldom thought of it between then and now ; so many other interests had been crowded into what was, as we measure time, only a few months, although to Philip it had seemed almost a lifetime. Was it not more than possible that she had loved him in the past : that she even loved him still ? To him all hope of happi¬ ness was past : so, at least, he had told himself over and over again with the impetuosity of a young man. But still, he must live his life ; must endeavour to improve his worldly position ; would, in all proba- bility, grow to be an elderly, then an old, man ; and the chances were that he would marry some day. It was the sort of thing that was expected of a man, and there was no particular reason why he should depart from the time-honoured custom. He would have no romantic love to give his wife : that must always remain buried with his memory of Clare ; but still, he might choose for a helpmate a woman of whose good¬ ness he felt assured, and bestow on her a full share of calm affection. That was what most men did, and he would prove no exception to the rule. And if Mabyn loved him, why should she not be the woman thus selected? He had not thought to marry for some years to come ; still, there was no particular object to be gained by delay. In reality, however, Mabyn was not then influenced by the recollection of her own sorrow — not con¬ sciously so, at least. In a certain sense it was always present with her, stimulating her sympathy and enabling her the better to enter into the sorrows of other women. But for the time being she had almost forgotten Philip’s individuality, so anxious was she to see a way in which Ralph might extricate himself from his difficulties. “ But even if there is any foundation for your fears. Miss Littledale, still nothing is to be gained by keeping Dr. Littledale in ignorance of what is going on,” urged Philip, restricting himself well to the sub¬ ject under discussion, although his thoughts had wandered so far away. “Yes, I think you are right, Mr. Dacre; papa ought to know, either way, and if Ralph won’t tell him, 1 must.” 455 And now that this business of Ralph’s was so far settled, Philip turned and regarded Mabyn with a gaze so long and wistful that her own fell be¬ neath it. “ Mabyn, do you remember that walk we had to¬ gether one evening last summer when I met you in' Mill Lane ? ” In speaking of Ralph’s affairs, Philip’s manner had been vigorou.s, almost stern ; but now he spoke with so much gentleness, that it might easily have been mistaken for tenderness. “Yes, Mr. Dacre, I remember,” answered Mabyn hurriedly, while the agitation so painfully visible on her downcast face showed that Philip’s question had recalled the whole scene to her mind. “So much has happened since then ! '’ She waited for him to proceed, still keeping her head bent, while she nervously stroked the fur of her muff. “Since then my hopes in life have been raised to the highest pitch of anticipation, and then suddenly dashed to the ground. But all that is over and done with now.” “Yes, Mr. Dacre,” she murmured, seeing that he was waiting for her to speak. “ Over and done with ! ” he repeated. She glanced up at him now as if she would satisfy herself as to the effect the fiery ordeal through which he had passed had had on him. She noticed that the lines on his face had deepened, that his mouth had become more set, and his eyes had lost much of the buoyancy of hope. Yes, he had suf¬ fered ! “ You remember the question that I put to you that evening ? ” “Yes,” she answered almost inaudibly. She was terribly agitated now. “ Were I to ask you that same question once more, Mabyn, would your answer still be the same ?” He was so calm — so much too calm for the oc¬ casion ! “ Mr. Dacre, I do not know ; I cannot tell. You have taken me altogether by surprise.” “ I do not wish to hurry you.” He stretched his hand out to take hers under cover of her muff. He had taken off his gloves to mark the catalogue, and as his hand now sought Mabyn’s, she observed the ring on his little finger. She had often noticed it before, but hitherto its significance had never come home to her with such crushing force. “ Was not that Clare’s ring — the one you gave her ? ” she asked, touching it lightly with the tip of her glove. He drew his hand away as if he had been repulsed, and answered quietly — “ Yes.” “ You loved her the7i ; do you not love her now ? ” Mabyn trembled at her own audacity in having asked the one question to which, of all others, she most dreaded to hear the answer. “ I loved the Clare who lived in my imagination,

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456 ‘AND PHILIP WAS WHOLLY INNOCENT? OH, MABYN 1’ ” (/. 458). the woman who I fondly believed loved me, anid I still love the memory of that Clare.” He spoke slowly as if he were trying to express intelligibly precisely what he felt. Mabyn listened in silence. To her mind the dis¬ tinction between the living breathing Clare and the Clare who reigned supreme in Philip’s imagination was not at all clear. He loved Clare still, but feeling that she was no longer within his reach, he was pre¬ pared to console himself with Mabyn. Such was the light in which Mabyn regarded his admission. But, Mabyn, need Clare’s memory make any dif¬ ference between you and me ? I would try to be very good to you, dear ; your happiness should always be my first consideration.” ‘‘ It must always make a difference ! ” she cried passionately. “ I don’t want you to be good to me ; I want you to - Mr. Dacre, give me time to think it over. You have taken me by surprise, and I am talking wildly.” He was promising her to be good to her as a duty ; that was what he offered her in return for her great love. It seemed such an inadequate return. And yet it was that to which she had looked forward ; she had never expected, never even hoped for, more than that. “ Shall I come for my answer in the morning ? Do not let the shadow of a lost love stand between us, Mabyn, for I am very lonely, and I need you greatly to comfort me.” He had touched the right chord at last. If he needed her, then how gladly, how joyfully, would she

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To BE Given up. 457 come to him, bringing with her all the wealth of her woman’s love to help him on his way ! ‘‘Yes, to-morrow — to-morrow,” she murmured hur¬ riedly. “I am not myself now. In the morning I - ” “ Will be the dear little Mabyn with whom I always feel so quietly, so peacefully, happy : the Mabyn who is going to be my better angel, my own dear wife.” She looked up at him with swimming eyes, but her lips remained mute. “ Shall we go home now, dear he asked gently. Then he drew her unresisting hand through his arm, and together thus they walked to Montague Street, saying hardly a word. CHAPTER THE T H I R T Y- FI R S T . MISS eastabrook’s return. “ Mind, to-morrow morning,” Philip said, gently pressing Mabyn’s hand, as he wished her good-bye at her aunt’s door. “ Yes,” answered Mabyn, with downcast eyes and a strange flutter at her heart. And then they parted. She had not asked him to come in ; nor had he seemed to expect her to do so. She wanted to be alone, so as to linger over every word he had said to her. But when she entered the room in which Aunt Emma was sitting, she found that lady in a state of the greatest excitement. Soon after Mabyn had gone out— almost immedi¬ ately after, as Aunt Emma kept insisting, with much emphasis — a telegram had come from Mr. Eastabrook, stating that he and his daughter would be in London that night, and that, if possible, he should like rooms to be engaged foi* them in the same house in which Aunt Emma was staying, as Clare was so anxious to be with Mabyn. It was some time before Mabyn could escape to her own room. Aunt Emma had so many things about which to consult her. At last, however, she ran swiftly upstairs, and locking the door of her room, sat down on the nearest chair, to think. Clare was coming that very night to that very house. She, Mabyn, would be welcoming her during the very time Philip had given her in which to decide if she could be his wife. She felt as if she could not meet Clare, as if her treachery would be written all over her face as she came forward to greet her cousin. All the evening she was in a state of nervous dread. Every time she heard the wheels of an approaching cab she held her breath until it had passed by the house. She felt that when she stood face to face with Clare, she would be tongue-tied by a guilty conscience, and that Clare would at once divine that they were meeting as rivals instead of long-tried friends. But when at length Clare did arrive, it was all so different from what Mabyn had expected. Clare came forward, wrapped in furs, a tall, stately, handsome woman, her eyes shining with the joy she felt at being with Mabyn once again. She folded her in her arms, and kissed her again and again, as a mother might have kissed her child. Caresses were rare with Miss Eastabrook, and Mabyn was dumbfounded at the warmth of her welcome. “ Mabyn dear, how good it is to be with you again ! There, let me look at you,” she continued, holding her cousin for a moment at arms’ length. “Ah ! just the same little, quiet, gentle face that I have tried to recall so often. How strange it is that when we love a person very dearly, we can never picture that person’s face, although we know every feature by heart, while we can conjure up the faces of our mere acquaintances at will. Oh, I have hungered so for a sight of you ! ” And this was the woman whom Mabyn wished to supplant 1 At first Mabyn thought that Clare was not much changed, her face was so radiant with the pleasure of her return ; but a closer inspection revealed little lines about her mouth which were not there before she went away. All the evening she talked brightly, even gaily ; but Mabyn noticed how carefully she avoided all allusions to Dursington. Even if Mabyn had been induced by the brightness of Clare’s manner to imagine that neither her health had suffered nor her spirits flagged in consequence of her estrangement from Philip, the smile of satisfaction with which Mr. Eastabrook watched his daughter talking so volubly would have undeceived her on this point. At length that never-to-be-forgotten evening came to an end, and Mabyn was alone in her own room, having retired for the night. She leant against the frame of the window, and looked out. It was very bright, very quiet without, for the moon’s pale rays seemed to have hushed the world to sleep. She remembered the night on which she had stood on the verandah at Southfields, while Philip and Clare were sitting side by side in the drawing-room. Then, as now, all around her had been very calm, while the tumult raged within her heart. But on that memor¬ able occasion she had just realised the loss of that which she most prized ; while now she knew that happiness — at least, that which she had persuaded her¬ self would constitute happiness — was within her reach ; for she firmly believed that were she once married to Philip, her great love for him must eventually inspire an adequate return. She had only to put her hand into his when he should come to her in the morning, and say, “ I will be your wife.” After that, Philip would not go from his plighted word, however fully he and Clare might come to understand each other ; Mabyn knew the man well enough to feel assured of this. Yes, happiness was well within her reach ; but at what a price ! How could she decide to play so treacherous a part with Clare’s good-night kiss still warm on her cheek ? And then she thought of how Fred Charrington had come to her on that night when, life had seemed all bitterness. How tender he had been to her, ignoring

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To BE Given up. 458 his own pain as he tried to soothe hers ! What — oh, what ! — would he think of her now if he knew she was contemplating taking advantage of another woman’s ignorance, and that woman one whom she professed to love ? “ I can’t do it — I daren’t do it ! ” Mabyn murmured, and she fell on her knees, praying to be delivered from temptation. “ Clare, may I come in ‘‘ My dear child, how is it you are not in bed ? ” inquired Miss Eastabrook, as she admitted her cousin. Mabyn walked straight to the fireplace without speaking, and stood with one arm resting on the mantelpiece ; while, drawing her dressing - gown closer round her, Clare resumed her seat by the fire. “ Clare, have you heard from Philip Dacre since you have been away ? ” Mabyn asked with startling abruptness. “ Of course I have not heard from him. Why should I ? He and I are nothing to each other now.” “ You know that Mr. Dacre is dead ?” “ Yes. I saw a copy of the local paper in which his death was announced, and a paragraph appeared speaking of his pecuniary embarrassments. But why need we allude to that now ? It is a painful subject, about which I would rather not speak.” “ But we must speak of it. Clare, it is said in Dursington that old Mr. Dacre took that money, and that Philip allowed suspicion to fall upon himself rather than permit his father’s guilt to be published abroad.” Never did Mabyn forget the expression on Clare’s face at that moment. “And Philip was wholly innocent? Oh, Mabyn ! ” “ Wholly.” “Mabyn, Mabyn, what have I done? Will he ever forgive me ? Can I ever forgive myself? Oh, but I am glad I glad ! ” “ You have suspected an innocent man of a trea¬ cherous crime when the evidence against him was far from convincing.” At this moment of her supreme self-sacrifice, Mabyn could not be tender to her cousin. “ What can he have thought of me all this time ? Mabyn, I must humbly beg his pardon ; I will kneel before him and ask his forgiveness.” She rose to her feet, as if she wished to carry out her intention at that very moment. “ You will have an opportunity of doing so in the morning, for he is coming here,” said Mabyn coldly. “ Yes, I must wait till then,” and Clare sank back in her chair. “ Mabyn, don’t look so harshly at me. You don’t know what I have suffered all the long, long months I have been away. I have been punished for my wickedness ; indeed, indeed, I have. And all the time I was believing him guilty, and trying to kill my love for him, he was not only innocent, but a hero in disguise. Oh, my darling ! My poor, poor darling ! ” and Miss Eastabrook wept aloud. “ You can make amends,” said Mabyn, still speak¬ ing in the cold hard voice she had used throughout the interview. “Mabyn, why are you so harsh to me? What have I done to you that you should look at me so coldly ? ” “ I am not harsh, Clare ; at least, I do not mean to be so. But I am very tired, and I think I will go to bed.” “ You have saved me ! you have saved me ! ” mur¬ mured Mabyn when she had gained her own room, while in imagination she pictured Mr. Charrington’s grave face looking down on her with tenderest sym¬ pathy. “ You would be so sorry for me if you could know what a terrible struggle it has been. Never mind ; I have conquered ; only the victory is yours, not mine.” _ CHAPTER THE THIRTY-SECOND. ‘‘ AND THEY ALL LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER.” The next morning Philip made his way to Montague Street, his thoughts busy with the object of his journey. He seemed to have lost his identity, so difficult did he find it to realise that he was about to woo a woman other than Clare. She had reigned supreme in his heart for so long ; and now she was to be dethroned for ever. He must dream no more of her : must no longer attempt to draw that subtle distinction between the woman who had lived in his imagination and the one who had been so ready to believe evil of him. On arriving at Montague Street, he was shown into an unoccupied room, there to await Mabyn’s coming. The morning sun was streaming in through the windows, but somehow it did not have the effect of making him feel cheerful. He flung himself into an easy-chair, and fell into a reverie, instead of looking round the room for any little tokens of his darling’s presence, as a more ardent lover would surely have done. He felt that his last moments of freedom had come : the last opportunity he would have of dreaming of Clare without being guilty of faithlessness to one who had a claim to his devotion. Panoramic pictures passed rapidly before his mental vision. He saw Clare, as he had seen her so many years ago, a young trembling girl in clinging garments, coming towards him in the corridor of the hotel in Paris ; he saw her as she came out of the darkness into the blaze of the Southfields drawing-room, a stately, handsome woman, clothed in flowing white ; he saw her yet again as she advanced towards him with stern, forbidding aspect, on the last occasion they had met ; a loving woman transformed into a relent¬ less judge. A slight sound, the opening of a door, aroused him from his day-dream. She was coming towards him once again, with love- lit eyes and supplicating gesture ! He sprang to his feet with a startled exclamation. He did not even know she was in England. To his excited imagination it was as if his thoughts had taken bodily form. Spell-bound he . stood, with his

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To BE Given up. burning eyes fixed on the approaching figure, while his lips formed the one word — “ Clare ! “ Philip, forgive me.” She made a gesture as if she would have fallen at his feet, but he caught her in his arms, and strained her to his heart. Then did he know that it was no phantom which had appeared before him, but his long-lost love who had been restored to him. ***** Half an hour later the door again opened, this time to admit Mabyn. The lovers were sitting with clasped hands. Philip started guiltily. He had forgotten Mabyn’s very ex¬ istence. Mabyn came forward with a pleasant smile. “ Philip has forgiven me,” said Clare simply. “ I am very glad to hear it,” replied Mabyn, in her quiet little voice. Then their eyes met — Philip’s and Mabyn’s. “ The pleasure you feel in this reconciliation will, I trust, more than compensate you for a slight disap¬ pointment that is in store for you. I find, on second thoughts, that it is quite impossible for me to accede to the request you made yesterday, as my time will be otherwise engaged.” “ Mabyn — Miss Littledale ! ” stammered Philip. But I don’t think it need inconvenience you much, as you can so easily make other arrangements.” She spoke so unconcernedly that she might have been alluding to some unimportant commission which Philip had asked her to undertake. Then Philip asked no further question. He under¬ stood now that the cloak of silence was to be allowed to fall over that little scene in the Dore Gallery. For a moment he felt rather small, deeply thankful as he was for his deliverance. But he glanced at Clare’s dear face, and again he was the proud and happy lover. Mabyn busied herself about the room, putting some books straight, and re-adjusting the blinds, &c. &;c. She overdid it just a little, but Philip and Clare were too absorbed in each other to notice this. A third time the door opened, and now it admitted Ralph Littledale. “ Holloa, Mabyn ! Why, Clare, you here ? And Philip too ! ” “ Clare and Uncle Nat came back last night. We were so busy preparing for them that we had not time to let you know,” explained Mabyn. “Well, I never ! ” exclaimed Ralph, but it was very evident that his surprise was not occasioned solely by the unexpected return of his uncle and cousin. “Are you not going to congratulate us, Ralph.?” asked Clare, smiling at his thinly disguised astonish¬ ment. “ I suppose you two have made it up, then ? ” re¬ plied Ralph, speaking as if he still found the situation perplexing. “ Yes, we have made it up,” said Clare, smiling at the childish expression. “ Philip was so good that 459 for a long time I was not capable of appreciating him. But we understand each other better now.” “ Well, if you’ll forgive me for saying so, Clare, I always thought you rather a flat for throwing him over in the way you did.” Strange to say. Miss Eastabrook looked rather pleased than otherwise at this uncomplimentary re¬ mark. “ I don’t know but what it is almost worth the pain of being thrown over to experience the joy of being set up again,” observed Philip. “ You certainly do look uncommonly jolly, old fellow,” replied Ralph, shaking Philip warmly by the hand. “ I’m most awfully glad you two have settled it all so satisfactorily.” “ It seems rather out of place just now,” observed Ralph, a few minutes after, “ but now that I’ve con¬ gratulated you. I’ve got to ask you to condole with me.” “ Condole with you, Ralph.?” exclaimed Philip and Mabyn simultaneously. “Yes, condole with me. I've just been jilted.” “How’s that?” asked Philip, while Mabyn, whose thoughts had at once flown to Matilda Jenkins, ex¬ claimed involuntarily — “ Oh — Ralph, I’m so glad ! ” “Well, that’s a nice sisterly remark,” observed Ralph, but he certainly did not look particularly crest¬ fallen’. “ But how did it all come about, old fellow ? ” asked Philip. “ Why, it was only yesterday we were talking about it,” observed Mabyn. “ Yes ; I told you, if you remember, May, that Tilly was out the previous evening, and that when old Jenkins heard I had passed, he was on at me about getting married almost at once. Well, yesterday evening he began again, and then, after a bit, he sent for Tilly. I fancied she seemed rather su'odued, but I thought that, perhaps, she didn’t like her father inter¬ fering in the way he was doing. Well, the old fellow kept on nagging at me and appealing to Tilly, until at last I said, ‘Look here, Mr. Jenkins, if you don’t leave me alone and let me fix my own time, I shall be off the job altogether.’ Then Tilly up and spoke, declaring that it didn’t matter to her whether I was on the job or off it, as she didn’t want to have anything more to do with me. It appeared she had seen Tom Jackson the previous evening — he left Bedford Square two months ago — and that, he had told her he had had a substantial rise, and then matters were patched up between them.” “ Ralph, you can’t think what a relief it is to me,” exclaimed Mabyn. “And you actually want us to condole with you ?” laughed Philip. “ It’s the rise that’s done it, though. Tilly would never have looked at Jackson otherwise,” insisted Ralph, who did not like to have it thought that he was less attractive than his successful rival. “ I don’t mind what has done it,” sard Mabyn.. “ Oh, Clare, she was such a horrid girl ! ”

Page 475

To BE Given up. 460 “ I don’t know what you mean by calling her a horrid girl, Mabyn. She’s uncommonly good-looking, and worlds too good for a cad like Jackson,” re¬ marked Ralph, with a ring of regret in his voice. He, too, was very much relieved, but it is only human nature to prize a thing more when it is passing out of one’s possession. “I suppose the wedding-day is fixed?” asked Philip. “ Yes, they’re to be married on the fifteenth of next month.” “ Well, you won’t mind telling papa about the money you owe now, Ralph ; will you?” said Mabyn, who was anxious to bring her brother’s mind back to the difficulties by which he had been beset in the past, so that he might the better appreciate his pre¬ sent deliverance. “ I shan’t care much for the job,” grumbled Ralph, who was beginning to fancy himself rather an object of pity. “ What money ? ” asked Clare. “ Do you owe much, Ralph ? ” ‘‘Well, I owe the Jenkinses a good long bill, and there are one or two other little things as well.” “ The length of the bill he owed the parents ac¬ counted in a great measure for the attention he paid the daughter,” explained Philip. “That’s all very well, Dacre, but Tilly wasn’t a bad-looking girl, I can tell you.” “How much do you owe altogether, Ralph ? ” in¬ quired Miss Eastabrook. “Well, altogether, I suppose it isn’t far short of a hundred pounds.” “ Is that all ? ” asked Miss Eastabrook in surprise. “ All ! Yes, and quite enough too, I should say. I know the pater ’ll look pretty glum when he hears about it.” “ Do you really think he will mind very much ?” “ Mind ! Why, of course he will,” replied Ralph, thinking that after all Clare was not such a sensible young woman as he had always believed her to be. “ Ralph,” said Miss Eastabrook, fixing her eyes •earnestly on her cousin’s face, “ you must let me pay your bills for you. Such a small amount as that will be a mere nothing to me.” Ralph opened his eyes wide in astonishment. “ You pay them, Clare ! What an idea ! ” “Why is it an idea?” asked Clare, with the smile that the happy mortals on whom she bestowed it always found so irresistible. “ It will have to be more than an idea : it must become an accomplished fact.” “But I couldn’t think of such a thing,” said Ralph rather lamely. “Look here, Ralph: I can’t have Uncle James worried about such a trifle. If you will make out a schedule of all you owe, I will give you a cheque for the amount. You can consider it in the light of a loan, if you prefer to do so, which you can repay when Fortune smiles on you.” “ But, Clare, I really don’t like taking it from you.” “That’s all nonsense! It isn’t as if we were strangers. Where would be the use of being cousins at all, if we couldn’t do each other a kindness ?” “ Oh, Clare, it is good of you 1 ” exclaimed Mabyn. “ Well, now, that’s settled,” said Miss Eastabrook, in the somewhat peremptory tone she sometimes as¬ sumed, “ and we can talk of something else.” “ I say, won’t I get Tilly a jolly wedding present now ! ” exclaimed Ralph in much glee. “ Mabyn, you must help me to choose it. Girls always know what other girls like.” # * * * * It is all over at last, the wedding at The Fountains, which has caused such a commotion in Dursington. There has been a very large gathering at the breakfast, many of our old friends swelling the number. Dr. Littledale has been present with his wife, who wore a handsome silk dress, an unexpected present from her husband. Mrs. Dacre has also been there, looking pleased and comparatively strong ; and Julia, with a handsome and wealthy widower to whom she has recently become engaged. It is said that the gentleman has a will of his own, but at present Julia has not discovered this. Of course Mr. and Mrs. Edward Charrington have graced the gathering. But although Sophy appeared to be in the highest of spirits, those who knew her well could see she was rather uneasy at times. “ I’m enjoying myself immensely,” she found an opportunity of whispering to Mabyn, “ but I can’t help feeling anxious about baby ; he always frets so, poor little fellow, when I’m away from him.” And now the all-important moment has arrived for the bride and bridegroom to say farewell. It is just the customary scene with which we are all more or less familiar : hurried embraces ; murmured blessings ; stifled emotion ; pent-up tears ; mirth that would be silly, if its object of dispelling the gloom were not so apparent ; slippers, and rice. And now, as the carriage containing Philip and Clare starts on its journey, Mabyn Littledale and Fred Charrington stand side by side to see it dis¬ appear. But before the vanishing point is gained, Mabyn has ceased to watch it. A magnetic influence has caused her to look up at Mr. Charrington, to find that his eyes have already wandered from the carriage to fix themselves on her face. Thus as Philip and Clare enter upon the threshold of their new life, they leave Fred Charrington and Mabyn Littledale together. THE END.

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Caroline Islands, which are now re¬ cognised as belonging to Spain, though the Germans tried to annex them a few years ago, form one of the largest archipelagoes of the Pacific, covering a sea area of more than two thousand miles, and comprising over five hundred sepa¬ rate fragments of land. Some of these islets are mere rocks, many are uninhabited, and a few are very populous. Excepting those at the eastern end of the chain, and the large island of Jap at the western end, they have been rarely, some of them never, visited by white men, unless in the dubious form of “ beach-combers.” With the Mariannes, the Gilbert, and the Marshall Islands, the Carolines make up that section of the Pacific which is known to geo¬ graphers as Micronesia. The problem which we have to present to our readers concerning these islands, however, refers neither to the present nor to the future, but to the dim and distant past. And it is one which has as yet received scant attention from either geographers or ethnologists. It concerns, also, two of the groups only, for it is only on the islands of Kusaie and Ascen¬ sion that the evidences of it have been observed, although as so many of these five hundred islands are absolutely unknown, it is hard to believe that other evidences do not exist in some of them. Kusaie, sometimes called Strong Island, is about fifty miles in circumference ; is of basaltic formation ; has a large extent of high ground, and boasts of two excellent harbours. The people are reputedly indus¬ trious and peaceable — for South Sea Islanders and they have a king of their own. They belong, to all appearance, to the Polynesian race ; but travellers have declared that they seem capable of a higher civilisation than the average Polynesian. It is re¬ markable that the chiefs communicate by signs and speech not understood by the common people. This island is covered by massive ruins ot very ancient date. Early voyagers used to suppose that these were the work of the old Spanish buccaneers ; but this has been shown to be impossible, apart from the signs of much greater age. The ruins bear, in many cases, the outlines of fortifications. They are composed of stones', measuring eight and ten feet in length, squared upon six sides. These stones are of a different geological character from any other stone found on the island. Therefore, they must have been imported, and some of the blocks are even double the size above stated. Stones of such dimensions were beyond the powers of the Spanish buccaneers, either to convey by their vessels, or to erect into buildings, with the manual labour they possessed. The trans^ porting and erecting of these massive blocks required mechanical appliances of extraordinary strength and ingenuity, and such appliances the Spaniards had not. The general plan of the buildings which can still be traced reveals a design of great intelligence. Ascension Island, now usually called Ponape, is larger than Kusaie, and is not so hilly, although geolo¬ gically of the same formation. It has a considerable area of level ground reputed the most fertile in the COLOSSAL FIGURES FROM EASTER ISLAND, AT THE BRITISH MUSEUM. whole group, and it has numerous fine streams, as well as three good harbours. The inhabitants cluster round the shores, having a superstitious dread of the interior, and they are said to number about seven thousand. Unlike Kusaie, instead of being under one king, the people are divided under the rule of five independent chiefs. On this island exist similar ruins to those on Kusaie, but much larger. On the shore of one creek, for

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t Some Mysteries of the Pacific. 462 instance, there still remains a massive wall, three hun¬ dred feet long and thirty-five feet high. It is built of huge basaltic blocks in the form of prisms, and has a gateway opening on to the creek, supported on enor¬ mous basaltic columns. Passing through this gate¬ way, a large court is reached, enclosed by walls thirty feet in height ; and all round the inner wall of this court there is a raised terrace, eight feet high and island there are to be found the ruins of nearly a hundred stone houses, built in regular lines and facing the sea. The walls of these houses are five feet thick and over five feet high, built of layers of flat stones and lined inside with flat slabs. Internally the houses measure about forty feet long by thirteen feet wide, and they are roofed over with slabs overlapping like tiles. The inside walls are painted in three colours ANCIENT STONE BUILDING ON EASTER ISLAND, IN WHICH ONE OF THE COLOSSAL FIGURES WAS FOUND. twelve feet wide.. In shape the court is square, and has been evidently subdivided into three parts by low walls running north and south. In the centre of each of these divisions there is a closed chamber fourteen feet square, built of basaltic columns and roofed over. The outer walls are twenty feet thick at the base and eight feet at the top, and some of the stones used in its composition are twenty-five feet in length and eight feet in circumference. All the concerltrated intelligence of all the Caroline Islanders of to-day could not devise a method for moving and raising such enormous masses ; and all the machinery at the command of the early Spanish navigators could not have managed one of them. So much for the Carolines ; and now, if we traverse some few thousand miles of ocean to the very eastern outskirts of Polynesia, we shall find something even more mysterious. It is the little island called Easter Island, which is barely ten miles long by four miles broad ; which has no trees, no running water, and very little about it to attract settlers. It is of volcanic origin, and one of the extinct craters is over a thousand feet high. Yet this physically uninteresting island, peopled by Polynesians of the fair type, such as are found in the Society Islands, is the greatest mystery of the Pacific. It is covered with remains of some prehis¬ toric people of whom every record but that preserved in stone seems to have vanished. At the south-west end of this little — red, black, and white — with figures of birds and mystic beasts and faces, and geometrical figures. In one of these houses was found a curious stone statue, eight feet high, and weighing about four tons, which is now in the British Museum. The sea-cliffs near this ancient settlement are carved into grotesque shapes not unlike the paintings on the walls, and the coast is marked with hundreds of these strange sculptures. Again, on each headland of the island there is an enormous stone platform, built of hewn blocks of great size fitted together without cement. They are built on sloping ground, presenting on the seaward side a wall-face twenty or thirty feet high, and two or three hundred feet long, and on the landward side a wall of about three feet in height rising from a levelled terrace. These platforms have evidently had to do with the REMAINS OF TERRACE, EASTER ISLAND.

Page 478

463 religious practices of the early settlers, whoever they were ; for upon all of them are large stone pedestals which have supported images, and on some of them broken images are still to be seen. On one platform fifteen images were found, in size ranging from three to thirty-five feet in height. They are of human shape, representing the upper part of the body only, with arms and hands close to the sides. The heads are cut fiat to allow of crowns being placed on them, which crowns seem to have been made, not of the same material as the statues, but of red tufa. This has been traced to an extinct crater within a few miles of the houses, and on the brink of this crater a large number of crowns were found, finished and ready for removal before some strange fate depeopled the island of these ancient worshippers. The images themselves are made of grey lava, which is only found at quite another crater at the other end of the island. At this crater — called Otouli — there are several finished and partly finished images, just- as they were left by the workmen. The head of one of these measures twenty feet from the nape of the neck to the crown. The faces of the images have well-defined features, with thin lips, broad noses, ex¬ panded nostrils, and a general disdainful expression. It is believed, from the appearance of the eye-sockets, that obsidian eyeballs were intended to be inserted. The ears are very carefully carved, and are prominent. There are also, in different parts of the island, wooden tablets covered with curious carvings and strange hieroglyphics, which no one can explain. It is remarkable that the present natives have small wooden images carved out of a hard, dark wood ; but these images are hideous, and differ altogether from the dignified statues of the platforms. The present inhabitants are simply tattooed sav¬ ages who are more than suspected to have a taste for cannibalism. They live in long, low houses, in shape like an upturned canoe, with only a single opening about two feet square, wholly unlike the massive stone village we have described. There may have been wood on the island at one time, for the natives are well provided with clubs and spears, and they also use a double-headed paddle which has not been observed elsewhere in the Pacific. But, on the other hand, they may have brought these implements with them, for they have a tradition that their great-great-grand¬ fathers emigrated from the island of Rapaiti, about two thousand miles away, and just south of the Austral group. Be this as it may, they call their present abode Rapa-hui, or ’Great Rapa, to distinguish it from what they call their former home. At Oparo, or Rapaiti, Captain Vine Hall found a temple, or castle, in five stages, surrounded by walls which enclose stone houses ; and also square plat¬ forms of stone on the sides of one of the hills, similar to those on Easter Island. The traditions of the natives of Oparo— which is an island of only some twenty miles in circumference — are full of warlike struggles, and there is reason to suppose that these struggles were with strangers who may have been entrenched in this castle. If these strangers were compelled by the natives to fly to their boats, after some fight, they would certainly have drifted to Easter Island. But who were these strangers ? The reputed origin of the Easter Islanders throws no light upon the stone houses and statues and sculp¬ tures. The present islanders know nothing about these remains, and clearly have no sort of connection with them. They are the relics of an ancient people with intelligence far beyond anything now found in the Pacific ; with notions of architecture and sculp¬ ture and painting and engineering, and with some distinct and elaborate form of paganism. Who were they? That is the great mystery of the Pacific. But looking first at the ruins in the Caroline group, and then at those on the small, remote Easter Island, it is possible to imagine that these islands were the sacred and reserved spots of some ancient civilised race which once overran a portion of the South Seas. The position of Easter Island would lend support to the supposition that this ancient civilisation may have had its origin on the American continent, and we know that in Central America there are evidences of a civilisation of a vast antiquity. The problem of the Pacific, still to be solved, how¬ ever, is : — Who built the forts of Kusaie and Ponape, the stone houses and platforms of Easter Island, and who worshipped these sphinx-like gigantic images ?

Page 479

464 POCKET-HANDKERCHIEF WORK. First catch your hare,” says the famed Mrs. Glass in her cookery book, and as I head this paper “ Pocket- handkerchief Work,” I feel much disposed to echo her direction re pocket-ha n d k e r c h i e f s. The most beautiful little table-cloths can be made out of the common stamped cotton pocket- handkerchiefs used by country people, if you are so fortunate as to get the right kind The wrong kind, I may as well begin by saying, are very easily had at any linen- draper’s, particularly one in a village or country town. These are simply red cotton, with a sprinkling of white spots, wafer-like, over them. These are of no use ; very small ones also are useless. The right kind are about twenty-eight inches square, larger if you can get them, and the patterns vary as well as the price. From about eightpence to a shilling good ones can be had, and it is worth the few pence difference to secure them, as they bear the work upon them better. I must admit that I have found some difficulty in getting the right kind ; but, still, perseverance has been rewarded by success, and a country town or village shop has generally produced PORTION OF A HANDKERCHIEF, SHOWING A “pine” PARTLY WORKED. TABLE CLOTH IN HANDKERCHIEF WORK. HOW TO FINISH OFF THE EDGES. what a larger store has not thought it necessary to keep in stock. The best to work upon are of a large pine or Eastern pattern on a coloured ground, blue or red — being generally the latter. The patterns are often singularly beautiful : the curves so perfect and the general arrangement so very artistic. Having the hand¬ kerchief before you, study the pattern and then work over it, according to your own fancy, in filo¬ selle silks. Use two or four strands, as you think best ; but two I generally find sufficient. Of course you are not supposed to cover over the entire handkerchief, but simply to allow the pattern to guide you in your work. For example : in a handkerchief before me now a pine figures in many parts. Suppose you work the centre thick (as shown in our first illustration), simply satin-stitch all the way up in one colour, and the small pattern that gives off it in another colour. Chain-stitch or rope-stitch round the entire pine. Vary the colouring and stitches as much as possible. As for the stitches that can be used, they are so numerous that I can hardly attempt to do more than enumerate some of them. Feather-stitch, coral -stitch, herring-bone, satin-stitch, rope-stitch, chain-stitch, can all be used with advantage. Often, as you will notice in working, it is well to leave a good deal of groundwork apparent, at ‘Other times “pine” pattern, FITTED IN WITH PLUSH.

Page 480

Pocket-Handkerchief Work. 465 CORNER OF A POCKET-HANDKERCHIEF BEFORE BEING EMBROIDERED. to cover as much as you can of the outlines. Another method which can be used as well as the aforenamed — for you cannot have too much variety — is (I will again instance the pine) to cut it out entirely. Then take any end of plush, silk, velvet, or satin, and lay it under the opening caused by the piece you have cut out. Tack this down very carefully, so that the piece of whatever material you have is quite flat. This arrangement may be seen in the illustration on the opposite page. Then buttonhole-stitch the edge of the cotton on to the material — I have instanced plush in the above — and you have the entire pine upon which to work. Embroider on it anything that takes your fancy, the queerer it looks the better : a little spray of flowers, a beetle, a ring, a dove, anything you like, much after the mode of doing the crazy-work, upon which this pocket-handkerchief work is a great improve¬ ment. Some people introduce beads; this, how¬ ever, I do not admire, nor do I care for gold thread, unless it is very fine indeed. A small piece of the finished work is shown on this page. Whether it be a pine or any special part of the pattern that you care to select, so long as it is not too large a piece, you can cut it out and treat it in the same way. To ap¬ plique a round or pine on the stuff itself is not so successful. The handkerchief when done can be cut out at the edges, for usually the pattern lends itself well to this, as in the specimen shown at the head of the second column on the opposite page, the portion marked * being self-coloured. Cut the latter away, and lay the handkerchief itself upon whatever you intend to make a lining of— the border, however, you can make of plush or any material that you may fancy — the work being buttonhole-stitched down upon it as was the pine, and on the same principle. On the plush itself, if you like it, you can em.- broider a running or occasional pattern ; and finish off the entire cloth with fringe of any kind. The work is very handsome when completed, and the size of the table-cloth can be regulated by the depth of border. It is, besides, an excellent way of utilising ends of silk and material, for the more variety you can get into your work the better. A suggestion for a small table-cloth is given in one of our illustrations. Very handsome borders for tables or anything else desired can be made by cutting up two or more handkerchiefs, taking only the borders, join¬ ing them neatly, and working them on the same principle, finishing off with fringe or cord. Very often from the corner or one side of a handkerchief you can take enough to nail on a bracket, and it is astonishing how well suited many of the patterns are to things of this kind. Another use for these handkerchiefs is to cut out any set pattern, such as groups of leaves or palms, and, having worked them, to appliqii'e them on to any material preferred. These would make very pretty couvre-pieds, or table-covers. When the work is completed, few, excepting the initiated, would imagine that the richlyl coloured, beautiful piece of work has for its foundation a common cotton pocket-handkerchief ! JosEPHA Crane. CORNER OF A POCKET-HANDKERCHIEF AFTER BEING EMBROIDERED. 750

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466 NELL’S NOBLEMAN. A STORY IN THREE CHAPTERS. BY THE AUTHOR OF “ HIS OWN PROPERTY,” ETC. ETC. PRELUDE. HE summer sunshine slipped softly be¬ tween the leafy branches of the old walnut-tree on the Manor lawn, and dappled the turf below with flicker¬ ing shadows. Three girls were gathered on the rustic seat that encircled its noble trunk, laugh¬ ing, and discussing their future in the idle way that girls love at fourteen or fifteen. “ I shall be a great artist ! ” announced Winnie, a tall dark girl, with decision written on every line of her face. “ I shall be a hospital nurse,” said pretty, fragile Ruth, with her fair complexion and dreamy eyes. “ And I shall marry a nobleman ! ” cried golden¬ haired Nell, waving her racquet in the air. “ I will be called ‘ My Lady,’ and go to Court with a long train, and — Oh, Jack, you horror ! ” for a derisive shout of laughter betokened that the boys had stolen on them unawares. ‘‘Grand! Grand!” cried the irrepressible Jack — “ Nell will marry a nobleman ! I say, Basil, won't we go to the wedding ? ” It was in vain to defend one’s self with such a boy ; the only thing was to drop the subject with dignity, as Nell promptly did, and trust that he might forget it. But when Ruth and Winnie Vernon had gone home to the Vicarage with their cousin, Basil Deane, the wicked Jack must needs revive the idea, and cover poor little Nell with blushing confusion by announc¬ ing in the drawing-room, later on — “ I say, mother, what do you think is Nell’s latest ? She says she is going to marry a nobleman I ” CHAPTER THE FIRST. Seven times had the old walnut-tree put forth its leaves again, and now the three girls were gathered once more under its shade in the golden summer after¬ noon. Winnie sat in state on the rustic seat, by right of her matronly dignity ; for she had never bloomed into a great and original artist, but had accepted the more common-place destiny of becoming the wife of a country squire. Ruth was no hospital nurse ; rather she stood often in need of nursing herself, for her chest was delicate, and even on this lovely afternoon she had flung a soft lace scarf round her throat as she lounged in a low- cushioned chair. And Nell? Well, she was much at one-and-twenty what she had been at fourteen — dainty, winning, im¬ pulsive, not much older-looking, though the golden hair was coiled on the pretty head now : and not much wiser, in spite of her brother’s unceasing admonitions. She was holding a foreign letter in her hand as she reclined on a gay-striped rug, and exclaimed as she turned the last page — “ So he was to start by the next mail ; then, pro¬ bably, he will be here next week. Dear old Basil 1 How delightful it will be to see him again ! ” “ It seems years since he left, instead of eighteen months,” said Winnie, gazing on her wedding-ring. There had been no talk even of her engagement when Basil sailed on his expedition round the world. “ I dare say it does — to you !” laughed Nell. “ He will be amused to meet Mrs. Marshall. Horrid boy ! He wants to know if I have met my nobleman yet ! ” “ Here he comes,” said Ruth, with a lazy twinkle in her eye, as two young men issued from the house, arrayed in tennis flannels, and came lightly across the broad lawn. Nell’s nobleman was a family joke that had never been allowed to die. “ Her Ladyship ” was a favourite way of speaking of her, and to ask whether she would be content with anyone under a marquis a constant form of chaff. Lately these jokes had become rather dangerous, since Jack had returned from India on leave, bringing with him a brother-officer. Lord Hurstham : a pleasant young fellow, who, having no sisters of his own, was very glad to be made free of Jack’s family circle. He had skated with Nell in January, escorted her to Henley during the season, and was now staying at the Manor for some cricket- matches, and apparently enjoying his stay immensely. Nell and he were great friends, but it was quite an open question whether either was inclined to become something further. He was very poor, but that would matter little to Nell, who was something of an heiress — thanks to an old aunt ; and apart from that, there was no fault to be found with the young fellow, with his boyish face and merry blue eyes. At all events, Nell had not yet arrived at the pitch of resenting such remarks as Ruth’s, and contented herself by throwing a tennis-ball at her in return, with the observation, “ Stale joke, very ! ” “ Are you ready for tennis, girls?” called out Jack, as he drew near. “ Hollo ! Have you heard from Basil ? When is he coming home ? ” “ Next week,” answered Nell, as she sprang to her feet. “Isn’t it jolly? Now, Jack, you are to play with Winnie, and we’ll beat you.” “We” seemed to include Lord Hurstham, who spun his racquet and invited Jack to call without more

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Nell’s Nobleman. ado. ‘‘Who is this Basil you all seem so excited about ? ’’ he asked, as they moved towards the court. “The Vernons’ cousin, Basil Deane. He was brought up with them, and is just one of ourselves. We are so delighted he is coming home, for he has been away more than a year,” said Nell, hitting balls over the net in a whirl of pleasurable excitement. There was a cricket-match on the private ground at the Manor the following week, in which Nell was keenly interested. She kept the score diligently, and was sitting late in the afternoon outside the ladies’ tent, absorbed in her work, while her side was fielding its best to save the match. The sunlight fell on her pretty hair and white dress, and Lord Hurstham stole admiring glances at her between the overs. He was bowling particularly well, and was delighted every time a wicket fell to see the excited clapping of two little hands and the smiles on the eager face. A certain young farmer, who was a noted slogger, had defied his efforts for an hour or more, and was running up a tremendous score, when suddenly a crafty ball slipped under his bat and sent his bails fly¬ ing. The successful bowler turned cjuickly for Nell’s applause, when, behold ! she had not even seen his ball. Note-book and pencil were cast aside, and she stood, flushed and excited, with both hands in those of a tall stranger, with a grave, powerful face, who had suddenly made his appearance. “Hollo! There’s Basil!” cried Jack, and flew to meet him. It was very unreasonable, but Lord Hurstham felt distinctly annoyed. Basil Deane came up from the Vicarage after dinner to join the party at the Manor. He found most of them wandering about the garden, but Winnie and Jack had awaited him on the terrace. “Where’s Ruth ? ” they asked. “ She thought it too damp to come out,” he said. “ Who is that prowling round with Nell “ Oh, that,” said Jack, laughing, “ is Nell’s nobleman in the flesh.” “ Do you mean they are engaged ? ” demanded Basil quickly. “ No, not yet ; but I should say they are likely to be. He is Hurstham of Ours,” explained Jack. “ He and Nell are great chums, and she gets frightfully chaffed about him.” “ What a shame ! ” said Basil, sitting down leisurely. “ Now, Winnie, tell me all the home news.” And while Winnie held forth. Jack slipped quietly away to the Vicarage. _ CHAPTER THE SECOND. “ Nell, have you the least idea what is the matter with Basil ?” Jack and Nell were enjoying a stroll round the home farm, and as he spoke they were leaning over a gate, watching the sleek Alderneys cropping the rich meadow grass. “ Is there anything the matter with him ? ” in¬ quired Nell, twirling her parasol with ostentatious carelessness. 467 “ Of course there is ! You don’t mean to say you haven’t noticed it ? ” said Jack. “ He has never been himself since he came back from Australia. There’s something on his mind.” “ He’s in love !” said Nell promptly. “ He denies it, if he is. No, I don’t think it is that. I wonder - ” said Jack hesitatingly — “I hope he hasn’t got into trouble out there.” Nell faced round upon him furiously. “ How dare you suggest such a thing. Jack? Basil ! Our Basil, who has been like a brother to us all our lives ! ” “Well,” said Jack, in self-defence, “you know his father was not exactly a man to be proud of, and those things are hereditary sometimes.” Yes, Nell knew that Captain Deane had borne a bad character as a racing man and a gambler, and not a strictly honourable one, and many people thought it had been a mercy for Basil to be consigned, in his orphaned childhood, to the care of his uncle, the Vicar of Holmelea. But to suggest that Basil, straight¬ forward, upright Basil, had taken to such evil courses as his father before him was a perfect insult. And yet she knew, though she would not own it even to herself, that there was a change in her old playfellow ever since his return home. He wa’s so grave, so absent-minded, and, strangest of all, had seemed to shun her company instead of seeking it. She was glad to see him presently come wandering up the sunny fields with Ruth. That meant that she would get him to herself for a little while — for the first time since he came home^ — and it would be hard if she could not then find out what was the matter with him. Yet, when they were strolling alone together she was not much nearer her desired object. She made him talk of his travels, but he did so in a very dull, uninteresting way, and at last she turned the conversa¬ tion to his Yorkshire home, which he had just been to visit. Over the plans for his estate and his tenants, which they had discussed so often, surely he would relapse into his old confidential strain. ‘‘ Have you settled anything about the new schools at Scarthwaite yet, Basil?” she asked. He was silent for a moment ; then he replied deli¬ berately, “ Yes, I have settled not to build them.” “ Not build them ! ” cried Nell, unable to believe her ears. “ Basil, why not ? ” “ For the same reason that will prevent my carry, ing out any of my plans up there,” he said coolly : “ I cannot afford it ! ” Nell looked up in dismay at the determined face beside her. To turn Basil from his purpose was acknowledged to be a hopeless task. What could have come between him and the carrying out of his most cherished schemes ? She knew that after his long minority the property had completely recovered the dn m of his father’s extravagance ; besides, he had inherited money from his mother. Could Jack’s hints be founded on fact ? Had he gambled away his fortune ? Could he be in debt ? Unluckily at that moment he remarked, “ You need not publish that fact just at present, Nell.” “Of course not !” said Nell indignantly. Then he

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Nell’s Nobleman. 468 had something to be ashamed of. A storm of vexation and disappointment raged in her heart as she marched on proudly by his side, unconscious of the hurt and wounded look in his eyes. It was almost with relief that she saw Lord Hurst- ham strolling down the garden as they neared the private grounds. His open expression and sunny smile were more than usually attractive just then. There’s your nobleman looking for her Ladyship ! said Basil, attempting to joke. And Nell tossed her pretty head, and let her noble¬ man absorb her for the rest of the afternoon. As time went on, it was not only Jack who began to inquire what was the matter with Basil Deane. He was completely changed from the high-spirited young fellow who had set out on his travels into a stern-faced man, who looked ten years older than his age — which was but five-and-twenty — and as if he had all the cares of the world on his shoulders. He was so odd, too, in his conduct. Instead of remaining quietly at Holmelea, and enjoying the country summer gaieties, he was always rushing up to London. And when he was at the Vicarage he per¬ petually pleaded business as an excuse for withdraw¬ ing himself from the party at the Manor. “ I cannot think what has come to Basil ! growled Winnie Marshall, as she sat at her easel on the last morning of her stay. “ I asked him to buy my sketch of Ruth for the benefit of our Cottage Hospital, and he said he had plenty of portraits of her already. I am sure it was only that he did not choose to spend the money. It is so unlike him, too ! He used to be so generous ! ” “Do you know,” put in Jack, “that when he goes up to Town he travels third class “ Oh, Jack ! Impossible ! ” “ He does,” repeated Jack ; “and, with his income, I call it defrauding the company.” Further comment was put an end to by the appear¬ ance of Basil, who opened the door for Nell with her hands full of letters. “ Winnie, everyone has been so good ! ” she cried. “No one has refused me. I have all the money now but five pounds. Whom shall I ask for the rest } ” “ What are you collecting for?” asked Lord Hurst- ham, through the open window. “ For a poor girl who is left an orphan, and wants to join her cousins in Canada. I have nearly enough for her expenses now,” said Nell. “ Basil, you haven’t given me anything yet.” There was a slight pause after her appeal ; then Basil said quietly, “ No, Nell ; and I am afraid I can’t this time.” “ I will give you the five pounds if you will let me. Miss Ashton,” broke in Lord Hurstham cheerfully. Nell turned on him swiftly. “Oh, no, I could not let you,” she cried, and glanced at Basil again. He deliberately crossed the room to inspect Winnie’s painting. “ Indeed I should like to do it. I shall go and write you the cheque now,” cried the impulsive young soldier, and he was gone without more ado. Basil Deane looked up from Winnie’s canvas. “ You won’t miss my trifling subscription with such a generous substitute, Nell,” he said, watching her keenly as he spoke. Nell vouchsafed no reply. She threw herself down on the sofa by Jack, and ostentatiously demanded to see the cricket news. Basil paused for a moment, and then went quietly out on to the lawn. “ I do think Basil must be mad ! ” exclaimed Jack> long before he was out of ear-shot. CHAPTER THE THIRD. As the summer waned slowly into autumn. Lord Hurstham still lingered in the neighbourhood of Holmelea. He was asked from house to house, and accepted every invitation with alacrity, but everyone knew where his real attraction lay. “Nell’s noble¬ man” was more than a jest now. It was shrewdly suspected that the time would soon come when the laughing girl would take up with dignity the position of “ My Lady.” The breach between her and Basil had distinctly widened. Jack and the vicar had both endeavoured in vain to find out what was on his mind, and, retiring baffled after their efforts, mutually agreed that there was no doubt the poor fellow had begun to follow in his father’s footsteps. Much as they deplored the fact, since he withheld all confidence from them, they felt justified in fearing the worst. One afternoon late in September, Jack and Lord Hurstham came in early from shooting, after a cold and wet day’s sport. They were glad to gather in Nell’s old schoolroom, where she and Ruth had lit a fire to welcome them, and prepared a cosy tea. Lord Hurstham was paying a farewell visit to the Manor,, where he was quite a son of the house now, and was delighted to help Nell in making hot buttered toast in reminiscence of her childhood’s days. It was a noisy, merry tea altogether, worthy of schoolroom days, and it was just coming to an end, when Basil walked calmly in after one of his periodical absences. He looked tired and worn, and his presence seemed to cast a damp over their mirth. He with¬ drew shortly to the window-seat, and watched the others from a distance, as though unwilling to intrude on them more than was absolutely necessary. “ I say, old fellow ! ” called out Jack suddenly, with intent to bring him into the conversation again ; “ when are you going to ask us down to Scarthwaite for some shooting, eh ? ” Basil drew himself up and folded his arms. He glanced rapidly round the room, and his eyes rested on Nell as he answered quietly — “ Never, I am afraid now. I have sold Scarth¬ waite ! ” A bombshell could not have created a greater sen¬ sation in the room. “ Sold Scarthwaite ? Why, man, it has been in your family for generations !” cried impetuous Jack. Ruth chimed in with exclamations of wonder.

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Nell’s Nobleman. Surely he was joking ! He couldn’t mean it. It was impossible ! At last Nell spoke. “Why did you do it ? ” she asked briefly. Basil s brows were knitted, and his reply was curt. “ For good and sufficient reasons,’’ he said. With Lord Hurstham in the room, no further in¬ quiries could be made just then ; perhaps that was why Basil chose that moment to impart his news. Certainly, having done so, he turned the subject at 469 said Jack, administering a little brotherly admonition as an antidote to emotion. Ruth had her arms round the girl in a moment, asking anxiously if she were hurt. “No, not at all— thanks to you !” said Nell, look¬ ing at Lord Hurstham with scared, yet grateful, glance. “ I am afraid you have burnt your fingers.” “No,” he answered eagerly, “not at all; it was no¬ thing.” If there was a blister or two he rather liked them than otherwise. But Jack and Nell insisted on NELL WENT SOFTLY UP TO HIM.” once, and coolly began to ask Ruth about all kinds of parish news. Jack sat and whistled to himself absently, and Nell, taking no notice of the conversa¬ tion, crouched down by the fire, playing with the dogs. Suddenly there was a sharp exclamation as she sprang up, with her pretty apron a sheet of flame. She had donned it to protect her dress, and one of the dogs leaping on her made her lose her balance, and sent the light cambric floating against the bars. Basil and Lord Hurstham sprang forward at the same minute, but Basil suddenly checked himself and held back, while the other man tore off the blazing apron, regardless of his hands, and trampled it out upon the hearth-rug. “ My dear Nell, if you want to make a holocaust of yourself you might choose a more fitting moment ! ” his going to have his hurts attended to by their old nurse, and the party broke up, not unwillingly, after two such sensations in one afternoon. “ Do open the window, Basil ; there is a horrible smell of scorching,” said Nell petulantly, as she passed him. “ I must go and change my gown.” Ruth was off at the idea of an open window ; but when Nell had changed her dress, for some reason, instead of following her to the cosy library, she re¬ turned to the deserted schoolroom. Not quite deserted, though : Basil was still there, in the old window-seat, with a hard, dreary look upon his face. Nell went softly up to him. “Basil,” she said gently. He turned and looked up at her as she leant against the deep window-frame.

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470 Fruit as Food. “ Basil, I am sure you are in trouble,” she said earnestly. “ Can’t we any of us help you ? ” “ No, Nell, thank you,” he said, with dreary calm. “ Did you sell Scarthwaite because you wanted money?” she asked. “ Yes, I did.” “You used to tell me everything, Basil,” pleaded the girl. “ Can’t you tell me why you are in such want of money ? Jack thinks it was her last effort, and she put it desperately upon her brother — “ that— that,” faltering, “ you are ashamed to tell us.” Dead silence. Then he said slowly — “ Jack is right. I am ashamed to tell you.” Nell had nothing more to say. He had condemned himself out of his own mouth. And he was condemned yet more utterly when it was known that he had sold his property. The fact in itself was proof enough that he had fallen into bad ways, and he was soon made to feel that Holmelea was no place for a man labouring under such suspicion. Even Jack could not honestly defend him, and Basil was fain to leave a spot which he could no longer look on as home. ' The day after he tos gone Lord Hurstham asked Nell to marry him. And then, to his surprise, she burst into tears, and vowed she could not. I have behaved very badly to you, I know,” she sobbed. “ I thought— I thought I liked you ; but I am afraid I don’t— at least, not well enough to marr}^ you, I mean.” Lord Hurstham was terribly disappointed ; but he bore the blow manfully, assuring her she was not to blame, and went away quietly like a gentleman, though a very heartsore one. Jack, who had just set a good example by becoming engaged to Ruth, was furious, and abused Nell roundly. He told her she was an abominable little flirt, and ended by saying he was disappointed in her and Basil, and would never trust anyone again. “ Don’t abuse Basil because you don’t understand him I” retorted Nell, to his amazement, and fled out of the room. Nell was very miserable ; she blamed herself for her conduct, and wished, in her youthful impatience, that she had never been born. One dull November afternoon she was wandering slowly round the garden, watching the fallen leaves with a kind of sad pleasure in the mournful world around her, when a quick footstep behind her made her turn, to find herself face to face with Basil. “ So I have found someone at last,” he said. “ Every one is out at the Vicarage, and I thought I should have to go away without saying ‘ Good-bye,’ after all. ’ Good-bye ? Where are you going to, Basil ? ” “ I am going to China as secretary to a company,” he answered coolly. “ It will be a splendid place to send you a present from when you marry your noble¬ man, you know.” In spite of his jesting tone, Basil looked perfectly wretched. Nell burst out fiercely : “ I hate that stupid joke. And as for Lord Hurstham, I refused him weeks ago.” Basil’s whole manner changed. “ Nell, he said, after a moment’s pause, “ I will tell you the reason of my money troubles if you will keep my secret. Some time ago I learnt that, amongst his other sins, my father made off with the whole fortune of a girl to whom he was sole guardian and trustee. No one knew it except the lawyer who had charge of the securities and trust deeds, and he was a scamp who was kept quiet by hush-money. I met him in Australia, and he told me the whole story, adding that it had weighed on his conscience ever since.” Nell was silent ; she saw it all. “ I traced her out ; I found her a poor parson’s wife, with a large family. Well, she has her money now j but she only knows that it is an act of restitu¬ tion from someone,” said Basil. “ My father has too much to blacken his memory already; I could not blazon it abroad that I had discovered something fresh. So you will keep my secret, Nell, and I will go to China.” ^ “ Basil,” and she laid her hand on his arm, “ don’t go. We should miss you so. And— and we have misjudged you so. I will go bail for your chaiacter henceforth, only — don’t go ! ” He looked down into the pleading face. “ Will you come too, Nell?” he asked, with his rare smile. “ Anywhere,” she said fervently, “ with you.’ “No, I won’t take you to China,” he said. “ I dare say I could find employment at home ; but I wanted to get as far as I could from you and your nobleman. ’ “ You can’t,” she said proudly. “ My noble man is here ! ” FRUIT AS FOOD. BY A FAMILY DOCTOR. Ip^l^lHE question whether or not it would pay to cultivate fruit to a much larger extent than is now done, it is not my province to discuss. I have my own ideas on the subject, how¬ ever, and can only say here that the want of means of transport, and that alone, prevents thousands of farmers in the farther-off counties from laying down fields with the bushes, trees, and herbs from which rich fruits are culled. Steam road-traffic may yet meet the difficulty. Railways are made for passengers, and gardeners’ pro¬ duce gets left, and is good fca' nothing ere it reaches the great metropolitan markets. But so convinced am I of the extreme value of fruit in the animal economy, that 1 hope to live to see the

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Fruit as Food. 471 time when the green embankments along our railway system shall be blooming orchards, and tracts of land that now lie fallow and unprofitable, turned into straw¬ berry and gooseberry fields, so that a large part of Southern England shall be all one smiling garden. I am more than convinced that a far too large proportion of meat is eaten in this country : the man who should bring about a change in this respect would be one of the greatest reformers Britain ever saw. There would be ten times less distress in the country, ten times less sorrow and sin. The change would benefit the health, purify the blood, and strengthen the hearts of this great people, and we should be ever more brave, more moral, and take a higher place among the nations of Europe than we do now. Now, I will tell you what I claim for fruit as food : that is, for fruit as a complement of one’s daily diet. First, that it is exceedingly palatable ; secondly, that it causes, owing to this very palatableness, an in¬ creased flow of saliva ; thirdly, that it thus assists us in digesting other food, both bread and meat ; fourthly, that fruit is itself easily assimilated by the system ; fifthly, that it keeps the system free and in good working condition ; sixthly, that from its acids, salts, and essential oils the blood is purified and disease- germs destroyed ; and seventhly, that from its sac¬ charine matter the body is nourished and the animal heat kept up. It would seem like a paradox to say that fruit both warms and cools the body, but such is the case. In summer its acids temper and equalise the heat, in winter its sugars warm. Sugar and acid, in fact, are so equally balanced in this food, formed in the great laboratory of nature, that neither preponderates un¬ duly or to the detriment of the other. We may take the testimony of the birds as to the healthfulness of fruit. And who so bright, cheerful, and happy as they ? The blackbird knows well what to treat himself to in the sweet summer time, and flutes all day in the groves, and the greater part of the night as well ; yet in winter, cowering for shelter under the dwarf pine-trees, he does not let down his heart. On the contrary, he is content if he can scrape up a few grub-worms from among the withered leaves, and obtain a hip or a haw to assist in digesting that worm. The Arabs form a good example of a nation that to a large extent lives on fruit. We are apt to claim courage as characteristic only of the British soldier. This is simply our insular ignorance and arrogance. Who can be more brave than the Arab, or who possess more e/an and dash ? ‘‘ Give an Englishman his beef and his beer,” I fancy I hear someone remark. Yes, and he looks well on his food, that I willingly admit. Too well sometimes, from a medical point of view, for we know that it is your fleshy men that fall victims most speedily to inflammations, and that in such men those inflammations are most likely to lead to a fatal ter¬ mination. I say let him — the Englishman — stick to his beef, for such food may suit his country and clime, but what I in all respectfulness suggest is that he moderate the quantity of flesh, and have recourse to good, wholesome fruit. Let anyone try this plan for three months, and he will be surprised at his lightness of mind and increased powers of exertion. “ To what extent,” it may be asked, “ would I propose cutting meat from the dietary 1 ” “ To the extent,” I reply, “ of just one-half.” If nothing else could be claimed for fruit, except its power of aiding the digestion of other food, it would still be worthy of our best con¬ sideration. It is indigestible or undigested food lying in the alimentary canal that causes people so much uneasiness, to say nothing of actual suffering. Fer¬ mentation takes place, and if the system is unable to disburden itself of the load, there is hardly a portion of the animal economy that does not come to grief. The liver is sorely distressed, the stomach chimes in with its sad complainings, the heart flutters or palpi¬ tates like an overdriven beast of burden, the blood is overheated, and brain and nerves are affected. It is well if this last but for a night, and restlessness with bad dreams be the only results ; but how seldom is this the case when, night after night, the same effects follow the same indiscretions! No wonder the liver at last gives up the unequal struggle, or that the soured blood stores up its salts in joint or muscle, developing all the misery of rheumatism or gout. There is at least one other virtue to be claimed for fruit. It assuages thirst. And what a blessing this is ! Let us take but a mild example ; and I am talk¬ ing from experience. It is a blistering hot summer’s day, and you are away on your cycle seeing the scenery, hearing the birds sing, and inwardly thanking heaven you were born in so lovely a land. But oh t it zs hot ! You are damp with perspiration, and drink you must. You are modest in your order at the little country inn that you soon glide up to. Beer you know to be heating, and spirits were madness soda and milk you think will best suit. But it does not always. It puffs you up, and you even perspire the more. A lemon or lime, or even an orange or two, would have met the requirements of the case, checked the perspiration, cooled the blood, and cooled the head, to say nothing of the saving of the pence. As a general rule we are on the safe side to eat the fruits of our own country while in season, though foreign fruits, if in condition, may be eaten whenever we can get them. Your very early forced strawberries, for instance, are not so good nor so wholesome as those that ripen under the sunshine in the open air. But have we not fruits fit to eat all the year round ?' In spring-time we still have our own home-grown apples and pears, with delicious oranges, lemons, and limes from abroad. Summer comes — as a poet would say— tripping o’er the flowery lea, lap-laden with all sorts of delightful fruits : king of these is the straw¬ berry. And here comes Polly the milkmaid with the delicious cream, and Sarah Jane with the powdered sugar. Ay, and let me tell you, as you sit there en¬ joying the feast, that that same dish of strawberries- and cream is not only food but a prophylactic against

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472 On the Art of Accompanying. many ana many an ailment of the blood. Then we have cherries : a dozen different sorts at least, and all as good for the system as they are lovely to look at. But here are gooseberries in glorious profusion, of every size and colour ; goo3, every one of them. And summer brings currants too, white currants and red, like clusters of miniature grapes, and black as well. But autumn is even more profuse in her gifts of fruit, with her apples and pears, plums, greengages, melons, &c., not to say a single word about the wild fruit, such as the cranberry and bilberry. Nor in winter need we want a delightful assortment of fruit on our tables. Nuts of many kinds grow in this country and come to us from abroad, and, considering the enormous amount of nutriment they contain, I do not hesitate to say they ought to form part of our diet daily. When our own nuts fail us, we may have resort to the foreign ones, and their name is legion, from the dear delicious little pea-nut to the cocoanut as big as a baby’s head. Not sufficient advantage is taken in this country of the dried fruits which come to us from other lands, such as dates, raisins, apples, prunes, figs. The prune, by the way, is both food and physic. Surely from even such an incomplete catalogue as I have here given everyone’s appetite may be satisfied, every palate pleased. But I am not quite done yet. There are jams and jellies. We can always have these, and spread over bread they are not only cheaper but even better for our little ones than butter. But more delicious than all are fruit syrups, and they are well adapted for summer drinks. But the manufacture of these is not sufficiently studied in this country. These fruit juices, such as that of the lime or the lemon, with soda water or lemonade, form drinks fit for the noblest in the land. I aver then that, in summer especially, we should eat more fruit and nuts and far less meat ; that fruit is food in the truest and purest sense of the word ; that we should eat it ourselves and give it to our children ; that we should not only eat it but drink it in wines, syrups, and juices ; that it forms the best food for the sick ; that it should be eaten in season au natiirel ; that, how¬ ever, the fruit should be ripe and not over-ripe ; and that fruit as food tends to banish disease and lessen the death-rate. These are all facts worthy to be pondered over by every paterfamilias and mater- familias in the kingdom. ON THE ART OF ACCOMPANYING. SEW soloists have not, some time or other, been martyrs at the hands of an accom¬ panist ; and perhaps there is nothing much - more trying to the temper than having a solo spoilt for oneself and one’s audience, after spending upon it endless hours of study, and after having reached, as one fondly hoped, some degree of perfec¬ tion in the execution thereof. Yet is not this a matter of common occurrence ? Who does not know the agony of singing breathlessly through a song with the piano half a bar ahead, or of losing all concern of anything else in the one vain effort to drag on the accompanist who is several beats behind? And it is not only from the player at sight that ohe. suffers ; indeed a moderately good reader will follow your rendering as well at first sight as after practice, given the necessary qualifications of a:n accompanist. It is the person who plays without accompanying — the 7iote player — in short, whom you have to dread ; and alas ! note players, accurate enough in their way, are not by any means rare, whereas iniisic players are scarce, and accom¬ panists very black swans ! It is not unusual to hear the remark : “ To accompany well, you must be a born musician,” but, although I grant there is some truth in this assertion, I am un¬ willing to conclude that it decides the whole matter, having known so-called “ born musi¬ cians ” who have been anything but good ac¬ companists, and having been accompanied by pianists laying no claim to that title who have satisfied my most exacting demands. But first of all, what is generally understood by the term ‘‘ born musician ” ? I conclude it to mean one who, possessing a faultless ear and sense of rhythm, is able instinctively to har- “ THANK YOU SO MUCH ! IF YOU WILL BE SO KIND ! ’’

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On the Art of Accompanying. 473 THE BATTLE MARCH — A TRIFLE SLOW. monise correctly a given air ; who takes to music as a duck takes to water, and who welcomes gracefully and accepts easily all the difficulty and drudgery of learn¬ ing an instrument. Such an individual ought to accompany satisfactorily, but, as a matter of fact, this is far from being the case. What, then, is the abso¬ lutely necessary qualification, the sine qud no7t of a successful accompanist ? Surely there are two indis¬ pensable qualities, which, when fully developed will go far to take the place of great musical talent in this neglected art, and which, when allied to a good ear and nimble fingers, produce the zenith of perfection. First and foremost we must have an intensely sym¬ pathetic nature, eager to merge itself in others, and full of the true artistic longing for perfection, not of parts but of the whole ; a real sense of har¬ mony, not only of mere sounds but of heart and mind. Secondly, a quick connecting action be¬ tween the ear, eye, brain, and hand, so quick as almost to divine what is in the soul of the singer or instrumentalist, and to come down with the accom¬ panying chord at the same time, and in the same manner, as the note produced by the soloist. A slow phlegmatic person will never make a good accompanist ; an impatient careless person even less ; while as for the man or woman who desires merely to show off his or her brilliant manipulation of the instrument instead of accompanying the solo — a character whose name is Legion, I fear — it is quite unnecessary to state one’s opinion of such individuals. The worst one can wish him or her is, that their after-life may be spent in playing violin solos to the accompaniment of performers as vain as themselves ! But no, poor things ! that is too fiendishly cruel a fate to wish them. Perhaps, on the whole, one really suffers most in this world from the well-intentioned people ; and we can, at least, forgive them if we cannot forget the agonies they have caused us to suffer. But oh ! defend me from the steady, accurate, well-mean¬ ing accompanist who regularly comes down with the resolving chord in the middle of your last long note or cadenza, and looks hurt and surprised when you descend hurriedly and with¬ out effectiveness two beats later ! Or the solid file who invariably grinds along about half a bar behind you, loses his place altogether if you accelerate the tcnipo^ conscientiously stops at the sign and forgets to play the next chord until so long afterwards that your audience has forgotten what key you were in ! It is the same person who always persists in playing very slowly — about half time — all the symphonies in a song, especially such a song as “ Should he Upbraid,” spoiling your finish by a very tame meek rendering of the last line, ar.d quenching, as it were, all the life and fire out of the whole with a douse of tepid milk and water ! Is there such a possibility as the cultivation of accompaniment? I think if players would try very hard to put themselves e7i rapport with the soloist they are attempting to accompany, if they would strive to forget themselves and think only of the grand end to be realised — perfection of completeness — holding every nerve tense to catch the slightest inflection of the voice or instrument, subordinating every pulse-throb to the one desire for pure sympathetic harmony — in short, if they would throw themselves into a veritable exalted ecstacy of self-effacement, they would find their reward not only in becoming highly successful accompanists, but in the refined enjoyment which such musical reciprocity obtains : a real pleasure not to be lightly esteemed, as all who know it can asseverate. As I said before, to make this possible one must have THE CRADLE SONG— A TRIFLE FAST.

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474 The Merchant Prince. qualities of sympathy and quick nerve action ; but, given these indispensables, even in a moderate degree, there can be no reason why a very ordinary player should not become such an accompanist as to share with the soloist the honour and applause of the audi¬ ence, and earn the heart-felt gratitude of the former. I know full well that singers and instrumentalists are exasperating sometimes. They appear selfish and ask a licence which you may think unwarrant¬ able. They make you nervous with anxiety about this or that particular passage, and scowl at you if your trembling fingers refuse to come down upon an extra chord which they have inserted, not too legibly, on their crumpled music. But you are on that music-stool to accompany, and if you do not accompa7iy but simply play notes, you are a failure — that is certain. And who wishes to be a failure? I f you play loudly with your foot on the forte pedal, in strict barrel-piano-organ time ; if you interpolate what you consider skilful and graceful arpeggios, or original harmonies, where the composer has omitted them ; and if you wonder whether the audience is noting how brilliantly you play, or m e thinking about something entirely foreign to the work in hand — then be sure that you are making an ignominious fiasco of your business, spoiling your soloist’s solo along with his temper, and desperately irritating your audience ! If you have no sympathy and are slow and rather stupid, however fond of music you may be, and how¬ ever many examinations in harmony you may have passed, don’t attempt to accompany, for you cannot do it. Rather be a soloist and a sufferer yourself. It is true you can never make a great artist without that thrilling magnetic gift which links human souls in the eternal harmony of the universe, and which we call sympathy ; but you can please by accuracy and the swing of rhythm the ear that delights in jingles ; and that is better than torturing delicately strung nervous and artistic organisations by lack of musical intuition. If self-glorification be the motive that tempts the con¬ scious “born musician” to mount the concert platform, let him enjoy his position as long as he may, by all the meretricious tricks he can master ; but let him not attempt the fine office of accompanist unless he can sink self in the ocean of a higher longing — a longing for “ the perfect whole.” Rendered. THE MERCHANT PRINCE. A Story in Three Parts. By J. BERWICK HARWOOD, Author of “What the Coral Reefs Gave Me,” “Paul Knox, Pitman,” “ Lady Elavia,” &c. PART THE FIRST. SI went, lingeringly, for what I felt was the last time over the dingy, dear old house, my heart was heavy indeed. A stranger might have smiled at the idea of any > sentimental attachment on the part of a young man like me to a gloomy red- '■(ij) brick mansion in Russell Square, grim with London fogs and London smoke for many a winter past. But I had been born in that lioiise : had enjoyed within its walls such of the un¬ forgotten pleasures of childhood as fell to my share ; and I was fond of the old home, and sorry to leave it for ever ; and I could almost have fancied, as I went from one familiar room to another, that the house too was sorry, in its dumb way. Go I must. The house from the door of which, but six short weeks ago, my father’s funeral had set off, was sold now, furnished as it was, and I, Here ward Weston, reared in comparative luxury, had but a poor fyioo with which to face the world. So long as my father lived — it was eight years since my mother died — we had seemed to be well off, but at his death his affairs were found, like those of many seemingly prosperous City men, to be hopelessly entangled, and when all liabilities had been cleared off, there proved to be very little left for me. What matter? I was young, strong, and well educated, and willing to work. How to find employment was my first care, however, and on this account I de¬ termined to take counsel with my only near relative, Uncle Gudge. ' Uncle Gudge and my own family had not been on intimate terms. Twice, or at the most thrice, had I seen the stubborn grey hair, beetling brows, and hard features of that uncompromising old gentleman. He was, in truth, uncle, not brother, to my late mother : was known to be, in City parlance, a warm man, though his manner was cold and his habits almost miserly ; and lived alone in a big villa — The Yews, Highgate — which might have been mistaken for a penitentiary. Early on a bright spring day I walked out to High¬ gate, and found Mr. Gudge ready to give me his advice — and nothing else. “ Ahem, nephew ! ” he said, as, sitting by his library table, he listened to my statement. “ Your case, hard as it may seem to you, is not an unusual one with those who have been taught to consider themselves as born with a silver spoon in their mouths. Well, avoid idle¬ ness, debt, drink, and an imprudent marriage, and you may thrive yet. You are twenty-three, though, and without place or profession, and that’s bad. People in England get into their groove betimes. Any objection to travel, or to a hot climate?” he added, after a moment’s thought. I told him blithely that I would go anywhere or do anything, within the compass of my powers, for a livelihood. “Then I think I can help you,” said Uncle Gudge, turning over a pile of letters, and selecting one. “ This

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The Merchant Prince. 475 / is from a rich merchant, an old friend, established on the Pacific coast of Mexico. He wants, not a clerk, J but a secretary, at a salary of two hundred pounds a ( year, and writes to me to recommend him one. A scratch of my pen, and you can have the situation if you like.” Of course I jumped at the proposal, shook my uncle warmly by the hand, and thanked him for his kindness. He took my thanks, as he had hearkened to my story, with the imperturbable stoniness of a male sphinx. Then he proceeded to write the promised letter of introduction, to enclose it in an envelope, and to seal it with a griffin’s head. “ If I post this,” he said hesitatingly — “ but no, I think you had better take it with you.” 1 was startled at first at the proposition that I should set off on so long and costly a journey without an assured position at the end of it, but Uncle Gudge brushed away my doubts as if they had been cobwebs. “I know Marmaduke Millingham,” he said, “and he has been, ahem ! under considerably obligations to me before he went abroad. He’ll take you, and it will be your own fault if you don’t get on in life. Milling- ham, who has a great business, has branch houses in Acapulco, and Mazatlan, and Vera Cruz, and you may get the post of manager of one of them after a few years, if you do but please him, stick to the desk, and save all you can. He lives at Cholatzlan, on the western coast, himself, and you had better lose no time. Let me see ” — he glanced at a newspaper lying near — “ the packet from Southampton, Flymg Dittch- man^ sails on Saturday, 15th.” “ But this is Thursday ! ” 1 exclaimed. “Then you had better look sharp,” was Mr. Gudge’s remark, as he handed me over the letter. “ You’ll be in Mexico as soon as the mail. The inland journey you will find easier than i^ once was — rail part of the way, and then a diligence. Talk some foreign lan¬ guages, eh ? ” “Only French and German,” I answered modestly. “Neither of them worth a straw out there,” com¬ mented Mr. Gudge ; “ but one tongue does help, some¬ how, in the acquisition of another, as I found when out in China, and the more glib you become in Spanish the more useful your employer will find you. Go, then, and good luck to you. Remember, young man, that a sixpence saved is a sixpence gained — a ser¬ viceable thing to bear in mind as you go through life.” Uncle Gudge certainly practised what he preached, since I verily believe that his anxiety for my prompt departure was caused by his reluctance to pay postage for the letter of which I was to be the bearer, while he offered me no luncheon, though 1 dare say I looked, as well as felt, hungry after my long walk to the confines of Hampstead Heath, and our interview had lasted till one o’clock was indicated by the tall clock on the black marble chimney-piece. However, 1 was grateful to him, since the introduction he had given me was invaluable to me, and I expressed my thankfulness in the best words at my command, and, faint and weary, trudged back to Russell Square, feeling as if I owed It to my uncle and benefactor to follow his precepts. and deny myself even the cheap comfort of an omni¬ bus. Two days later Flyrng Diitchma7t,h\xst\mg down Southampton Water under a full head of steam? numbered, among the passengers outward bound for the West Indies and Mexico, Hereward Weston, high in hope, as many an adventurous young fellow has been before him. The voyage was uneventful enough, and so, but for an alarm as to robbers, which came to nothing worse than a glimpse of unshaven faces, long guns, and peaked hats during the diligence transit across the mountains, was the journey by land. Cho¬ latzlan was reached : a white crescent-shaped town, spreading itself along the shores of a splendid bay, overlooked by blue and densely wooded hills. There was a cathedral, all too large for the worshippers, and a commercial street, where half the shops and taverns had American proprietors, a theatre, a bull ring, and sundry villas outside the town, each nestling amidst gardens glorious with tropical vegetation, and one of the most sumptuous of which belonged to Mr. Milling- ham, by whom, on presentation of my credentials, I was at once received as his secretary. Mr. Millingham, who was, I found, reckoned as one of the principal residents of the place, was a stout, pompous personage, whose florid complexion con¬ trasted with the countenances of the sallow Yankees and swarthy Spaniards among whom he lived, and who had a trick of rattling his heavy watch-chain and bunch of trinkets as he bragged of his money and his own cleverness in having made it. He had two sons, one of whom was leading but a useless, spend¬ thrift life in London and Paris, sure of a fortune when his indulgent father should die ; while the other was a married physician, in good London practice. Only the two daughters lived at home : Charlotte, who was much the elder, plain and unobtrusive, and Leonora, then twenty years of age, and who was simply the most beautiful girl that my eyes had ever beheld. That 1 fell in love with her — no passing fancy, but the deep, heartfelt passion that lasts for life — is perhaps not to be wondered at, since we were thrown much together, especially in those delicious evenings when the fiery sun that had poured down his scorching beams all day had plunged, a blood-red ball, into the turquoise-blue of the Pacific, and a light breeze fanned the air and fluttered the flags that had hung so droop- ingly from the mastheads of the shipping at anchor. Before I had been six months at Cholatzlan I had made much progress, both in learning the details of the business and in earning the goodwill of my employer ; while, having a natural aptitude for picking up languages, I was already fluent in Spanish, and therefore a favourite with the solemn-eyed Dons who came to the counting-house and villa for social or business purposes, and who spoke no language but their own sonorous Castilian. I had acquired also a smattering of the tongue spoken by the Indians : foresters and fishermen for the most part, who had not entirely adopted the speech and garb of their white conquerors, and .who visited the town to sell their fish and game, or to bring in mule-loads of fire¬ wood and charcoal. Life, on the whole, passed not

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THE IxXDIAN AND THE SHARK {p. 478). unpleasantly at Cholatzlan. There were several wealthy Mexican families settled there, and these, and the best of the foreign mercantile colony, and the Consuls, and the Governor, who dwelt in a great ruinous palace built by a Spanish Viceroy, were hospitable enough. There was music, too, in the summer evenings in the shady Plaza, near the white marble fountain, with its cool splashing water, and often a display of rockets soaring above the tree-tops, and of lamp-lit gardens, where the fireflies vied with the illuminations, and where ices, and sweetmeats, and chocolate were handed on silver trays by bare¬ footed servants, Indian or Mulatto, to dark-eyed senoras, whose fans, and lace veils, and mantillas were as national as if modern fashions in dress were unknown. I have said that I fell desperately in love, within a short time of my arrival, with Leonora Millingham. I was not rash enough, however, to make any avowal of my feelings, which could scarcely, I thought, be reciprocated, since how was it possible that one so lovely, so sought for and admired, and the favourite daughter of a man who had all the advan¬ tages of wealth at his command, could deign to think of a poor secretary like myself? But, somehow, when months had gone by I began to fancy that my love was returned. I scouted the notion at first as pre¬ sumptuous and vain, but it would recur, and trifling signs, such as a downcast glance, the quivering of an eyelid, the trembling of her little hand when it met mine, at last convinced me that my employer’s beauti¬ ful daughter-really did care for me. And then — then succeeded one of those periods of halcyon calm such as we can enjoy but once in our lives, when two young people, loving and beloved, are much together, yet with their lips sealed by the apparent necessity for keeping secret the attachment that has not as yet been openly confessed — a season during which the most trivial words and actions are glorified and endowed with a special charm by the magic of love : when life itself is a sweet dream, from which it is painful to awake even to a happy morrow. Some days, even weeks, went by thus peacefully ; and at last, in the verandah, overgrown by tropical creeping plants with strange great blossoms, red, and pink, and white, and which commanded a view of the broad waters speckled by sails, the moment came when further reticence was impossible. “ Leonora, my dearest, I love you ! ” The words were said, the dream at an end, the spell dissolved, and I can never forget the mingled look of timid joy and tender reproach that came from those dear glorious eyes as they met mine. A minute more and her head was resting on my shoulder, and our hands were locked together, and our troth-plight complete. At first we were so intent on what we said on the world-old, tireless tale of love, and faith, and trust, that we almost forgot the network of circum¬ stances that surrounded us, and which were certainly unpropitious from a worldly standpoint. That dread¬ ful old dragon of a papa, the purse-proud merchant : how would he bear to hear that his daughter had smiled on a penniless aspirant like myself? Yet I telt that my only straightforward course was to go at once to Mr. Millingham, be the consequences what they might. I had learned in boyhood from my own father, who was the soul of honour, that frankness was the only policy by which to win, not perhaps success, but the approval of one’s own conscience, which is better worth having. ‘‘You scamp ! You scoundrel ! Presumptuous young puppy ! *’ roared the merchant, thumping his heavy fist upon the table till it echoed again ; how dared

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The Merchant Prince. 477 you, sir, .betray my confidence, and steal away iny daughter’s heart? — but I’ll put a stop to that. You’ll please to understand, Mr. Herevvard Weston, that you are no longer in my employment.” I can but submit, Mr. Millingham,” I replied, with a bow. “ And your pretended engagement with my daugh¬ ter is over also ! ” shouted the angry man. But this, I told him with respectful firmness, was a very dif¬ ferent matter. I had Miss Millingham’s promise. I could only take my dismissal from her own lips. It was in vain that he tried to bear me down by mere imperiousness, that he bade me go, and forbade me to exchange another word with Leonora. Say what he would, I insisted on my right to a parting interview with her I loved ; and though he roared at me like an angry lion, when I left the room I went straight to Leonora’s presence, and we bade one another farewell, and renewed our vows to be constant and true, and to wait and hope. I was to do my best to grow rich enough to come back and claim my bride, while Leonora would care for none, think of none, but me, and reply to my letters, and look forward to my return. Neither of us ever thought of disobedience to her father so far as marrying without his consent was concerned. But it was agreed that we should write to one another, and hold to our betrothal firmly, and hope that happier days might be in store. And so we parted, with fond caresses and sad, loving words, and two hours later I had left the merchant’s house, and had the world to begin again. As to ways and means, I was nearly in the same financial position as when I called upon my Uncle Gudge at Highgate, since the salary I had received from Mr. Millingham about compensated for the breach made in my patrimony of ^200 by travelling expenses and sub¬ sequent outlay. There was a certain Don Alvaro Guizman, an elderly Spaniard, who dealt in cochineal and logwood, and the like, and who had taken a fancy to me, perhaps because I was a good listener, and hearkened to the stories which his family pride induced him to recount of old victories over the Moors, of bygone favour at the king’s court won by his ancestors. Don Alvaro, who was a merchant, was also a landowner — as in Mexico is often the case — and had a large neglected estate some¬ where along the coast, for which, as he had more than once hinted, he should like to find a manager. I offered my services in that capa¬ city now that I was no longer in the employment of Mr. Millingham, and was promptly accepted. “ In the way of actual pay, my young friend,” said Don Alvaro, lighting a fresh cigar, and sleepily eyeing the smoke- wreaths as they curled upwards, “ I cannot offer you much. From Senor Millingham you had a thousand dollars a year. I can assure you of no more,, in hard cash, than four hundred. But at San Antonio you will live for nothing, since mutton and chickens and tortillas are not likely to run short, and you will find the cellars of the tumble-down old house not quite bare, while, as the factor there will teach you,, a manager has his legitimate perquisites in the col¬ lection of rent and tithe and tribute, which foreigners generally learn before acquiring our language, Don Here ward, in the admirable manner that you have done.” I gathered that my new employer wished me to put a little Anglo-Saxon energy into the task of reforming the management of an estate that brought in meagre returns in proportion to its acreage, and that he pre¬ ferred that I should pay myself, as it were, by a per¬ centage on the annual yield of the property. It was not exactly the career I should have selected, but 1 was too sensible of Don Alvaro’s kindness, and of the . chance afforded me, to decline ; and on the following day I started, in company with a caravan of muleteers,. ATHUALMANCO (/. 478).

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The Merchant Prince. 478 one of whom undertook to convey my scanty baggage, for San Antonio. It was towards the evening of the second day, and as we were nearing the village which, as well as the mansion of its owner, bore the name of San Antonio, that 1 espied a small coasting schooner— American, as her rakish masts and trim build indicated as clearly as the stars and stripes on her flag — lying moored in a rocky cove that afforded a natural harbour, while her crew, grouped on a projecting headland, were laughing and talking loudly as they peered over the low cliff at some floating object that seemed to afford them intense amusement. When I got near enough, I could discern that this was an overturned canoe, bottom upwards, to which clung an Indian lad, scantily attired, and with limbs as graceful as those of a bronze statue, trying, with a brandished fish-spear, such as I had seen the natives use, to repel the assaults of something in the blue water below, that I readily conjectured to be a shark. A shark, do I say ? The pellucid, shallow sea was alive with the monsters, trails of phosphorescent light following them as they swam around the destined prey, while now and again a hideous shovel-shaped snout was thrust above the surface in the effort to reach the boy, who held on to the keel of the canoe while bravely opposing the prongs of his barbed spear to the grim jaws that essayed to close upon him. “ The young beggar was fishing,” explained one of the sailors, in answer to my inquiry, “ when we hove across and fouled the canoe. There was another Injun aboard, but him the sharks gripped before he rose, for we saw the water crimson and all over bubbles in a twinkling ; but that varmint was spry, and scrambled up and showed fight. A dollar to a cent. Mister, the sharks make their supper of him before IVe smoked out this pipe of old Virginny.” “Do you mean,’’ asked I, with a gasp of half- incredulous horror, “that you don’t intend to help the boy? Do you mean that he is to be left to perish here before your eyes ? ” There was a growl and a laugh. “ Colonel,” said the mate, with an air of superior wisdom, “ it’s pretty plain that you hail from the old country, and a Britisher can’t tell, as we can, the worth of a pesky Injun. I hate the colour of them, and being a Texan, I know enough of the Red snakes to make me wish there were but one of them left, and I’d the scalping of him. Let the young wretch save himself, if he can.” I thought differently, however, but it cost me much persuasion, and the expenditure of some sixteen or eighteen dollars in the way of bribery, before I could procure the loan of one of the schooner’s boats, and the assistance of a couple of the men, in rescuing the boy from his position of peril. A few thrusts of a boat-hook drove back the sharks that beset the over¬ turned canoe, and in five minutes’ time the Indian lad was ashore, and expressing to myself, in broken Spanish, but with a modest dignity of bearing that surprised me, his thanks for the life I had saved. A handsome stripling he was, with faultless limbs and well-shaped head, and his attire, picturesque and scanty, suited well with the pale bronze hue of his com¬ plexion. At his back hung a short bow and a quiver of panther’s skin, embroidered with beads and porcu¬ pine quills, and containing arrows, while he still grasped the barbed fish-spear that he had used so gallantly in his defence. His long black hair was tied back by a fillet or thread of crimson, studded with very small spangles or flakes of gold, and a necklace of similar materials encircled his throat. His buskins, too, were adorned, like his belt and quiver, with beads and coloured quills, and there was a graceful pride in the very carriage of his head that would have become a youthful prince. “ He tells me that he is a young chief, the grandson of a cacique,” said the muleteer whom 1 had hired, and who spoke the Aztec tongue fluently, after a brief col¬ loquy with the rescued lad ; “ and, Senor, I see no reason to doubt it. Even the threads around his head and neck would show his rank. The man who was with him in the canoe, and who perished, seems to have been a peon, or servant ; and the boy lives, he tells me, in the forest hard by San Antonio, whither we are bound.” We Parted, taking with us the Indian lad, since I noted the unfriendly glances with which some of the American sailors regarded him, and therefore deemed it safer that he should travel under our protection. And on the way the muleteer, who was an intelligent man, informed me there were still among the long- subjugated Indians a few families whose lineage extorted deference, and even loyalty, from the rest. “ Chiefs, nobles, princes of /os barbaros before the Spanish Conquest, Senor, were those from whom they descend,” explained the carrier ; “ nor do they forget what they once were.” As the sun was setting we came in sight of the straggling village of San Antonio, with its church, and tiny harbour that sheltered a few feluccas ; and the muleteer pointed to a large house, the white walls and flat roof of which were discernible through the dark green of the magnolias and coffee bushes, and which stood on rising ground. “ That is the Casa Grande,” he said, “ the villa of Don Alvaro, who is lord of many a league of lands hereabouts.” Ten minutes more, and we had reached the house; Don Alvaro’s letter, sent by a mounted messenger, caused the grey-headed and knavish old factor to fawn upon me with obsequious politeness, and to welcome me to the huge and ruinous dwelling that was to be my abode, and through many of the glassless windows of which the owls and vampire bats fluttered freely. My spare baggage was brought in, and I paid and dis¬ missed my guide, who, with a hearty “ Buenos noches, Senor,” went off to rejoin the other arrieros at the village inn. But young Athualmanco, as I had learned that the Indian boy was called, came gracefully for¬ ward, and kneeling on one knee on the discoloured marble of the porch, took my hand, pressed it to his breast and forehead, then kissed it, and rising, stood before me with folded arms and a look of proud humility in his speaking eyes. “ It is their method of giving thanks and pledging

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\Draxvn bv Ai.ice Havkrs.] “T W O A R E 1 88 c O M A N V I {See pa_s:e 479 )

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The Lord Chancellor’s Work. faith,” whispered the steward, observing my sur¬ prise; and I held out my hand to Athualmanco, inviting him to enter the house with me ; but, with a slight negative motion, he turned away, bowed his head in sign of adieu, and disappeared among the trees. “Yes, it was the young cacique : I know him very well,” remarked the factor later on, as he bustled to and fro, giving orders to his dusky subordinates as to the preparation of my very indifferent supper of stevved beans, garlic soup, and starved chicken. “ He and his grandfather live near here, in a hut, though they do say that the old man might be richer, if he chose, than the wealthiest hidalgo in the State. These half-heathen dogs, Caballero,” he added, by way of explanation, “ very often know of buried trea¬ sures that have been hidden since the Conquest, and that would gladden the heart of many an honest Spaniard like myself. But here, Senor, are the 479 frijoles, and the olla, and the chicken, if your Excel¬ lency would deign to sup.” When I was inducted, after supper, into a great ghostly bedroom, hung around with gilded leather, and furnished after the fashion of a bygone century, I fell asleep, and dreamed that I was groping through the semi-darkness of a cavern, guided by a lithe slender form bearing a spear, with the point of which he presently struck the rock, causing it to divide and open, letting in a flood of light, by which I could dis¬ cern that the floor of the cave was thickly strewn with yellow gold dust, while all around lay gleaming heaps of the precious metal ready to hand, to which young Athualmanco, smiling, pointed with his spear, as if offering these piled-up hoards to me. So vivid was the impression of this vision that I did not shake it off till long after I was awake and astir, in broad daylight, to begin a new life in my new home. END OF PART THE FIRST. ‘‘TWO ARE COMPANY!’’ HERE’S a little nook I know In a garden quaint and old. Where the young folk often go. And tales of love are told ; And I softly steal away When I see them lingering there. For it’s just as true to-day As when I was young and fair — True as aught beneath the sun : “ Two are company, three are none I jj And in that little nook Sometimes I love to stay. And down the years I look To a time long passed away. When a lover proud and true Lingered ever by my side. And neither of us knew That the world held aught beside Just ourselves beneath the sun, When two were company, three were none ! G. Weatherly. THE LORD CHANCELLOR’S WORK. EY EDWIN GOAD BY. i^HE Lord High 'Chancellor of England W0% still remains the most picturesque as he was formerly the most powerful functionary of the State. Time has robbed him of some of his former grandeur by creating new rivals and by changing our administrative sys¬ tem. The powers of the State are more specialised. There are more officials, they are in less personal contact with the Sovereign, their powers are more accurately defined, and there is individual as well as collective responsibility. But the majority of Ministries are essentially of modern creation, and there is none of the glamour of ancient history about them. W^'e can understand their work without much reference to ancient custom, or the interpretation of an older system of government. The Lord Chancellor, however, is an historic monu¬ ment. His powers and duties are not of yesterday. He is one of our oldest officials. It maybe literally said of him that he came in with the Conqueror ; and unless we understand his ancient position we cannot comprehend the true nature of his modern functions. It is doubtful whether there were any Chancellors prior to Maurice, William I.’s Chaplain, except such as were ordinary clerks, secretaries, and roll-keepers. The two functions bestowed upon Maurice continue to the present day, although there has been a revo¬ lution in many other duties formerly a part of the Lord Chancellor’s position. Lord Halsbury is still Keeper of the Sovereign’s Conscience and of the Great Seal, though that new functionary, the Prime Minister, has assumed many of the powers belonging to his early and even modern predecessors. Maurice

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The Lord Chancellor’s Work. 480 received the title of Chancellor, and was placed at the head of a College of Royal Notaries, which consisted of the King’s Chaplains. He thus became Arch-Chaplain and the Keeper of the King’s Conscience, and also Grand Notary and the Keeper of the Great Seal. Confessor, adviser, and chief administrator, the Lord High Chancellor truly was, as Shakespeare makes Henry VI 1 1, say to Wolsey, ‘‘the prime man of the State.” He was the older Premier, in direct touch with the Sovereign, acting through the Privy Council, and a veritable despot. No man had more power or patronage, more attendants, or more personal glory. He ruled the country ; he was England’s Viceroy. For a long period he was generally an ecclesiastic, because laymen were not sufficiently skilled in public affairs. Of late he has always been a lawyer, partly because he gradually became head of a special court, and partly because he answers to what in other coun¬ tries is the Minister of Justice. ‘ The work of the Lord Chancellor is of the most diversified kind. It is much lighter than it used to be ; but if Lord Halsbury has less to do than Lord Eldon or Lord Westbury, he still finds the duties of his office to be of an arduous and a very absorbing nature. The official labours of State all tend to increase ; and if changes are made in one direction, there is augmentation in another. The Judicature Acts of 1873 1875 have been of considerable benefit to the country, if they destroyed the old Court of Chancery, and restricted the judicial duties of the Lord High Chancellor. “This morning I lit my fire before the clock struck five,” wrote Lord Westbury to one of his daughters. He had so much THE WOOLSACK. THE RIGHT HON. LORD HERSCHELL, EX-LORD CHANCELLOR. {From a Photograph by Messrs. Maul I and Fox.') to do and to read that he found it better to work in the morning light than by candle-light. Lord Halsbury is relieved of this intense labour. He need not toil so terribly, but his sense of anxiety and responsibility may be still as great. His judicial functions include a general supervision of all the divisions of the new High Court of Justice. He is President of the Chancery Division and of the Court of Appeal, and also of the Supreme Appeal Court of the House of Lords. All writs of summons for actions in the High Court are issued in his name. The changes here indicated were not made without some resistance. It was said that they destroyed the dignity, prestige, and power of the great Court of Chancery, and that they endangered the existence of equity jurisprudence. The work of the Chancery Courts, however, had outgrown the powers of seven judges, and the evil was still increasing. The Lord Chancellor’s Parliamentary work is that which now most meets the eye. When the Great Council of the realm sat as one body, he probably presided as the delegate of the Sovereign, and this function he would have continued to him with the division of Parliament into Lords and Commons. He is the Prolocutor of the House of Lords by pre¬ scription, but he has no official residence. Lord Westbury complained of this defect. “It is a great shame that the Lord Chancellor has no official residence,” he wrote to Sir Robert Phillimore, on arranging for an official levee in the Middle Temple Hall. “It detracts much from the dignity, and much more from the emoluments of the office.” The Lord Chancellor’s official position manifests itself in many ways. He issues the writs for summoning and

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The Lord Chancellor’s Work. 481 proroguing Parliament. On the first day of a new Parliament he and four other Peers usually constitute the Royal Commission, and sit on the woolsack in cocked hats. The Clerk then reads the roll granting power to the Commission, each commissioner taking off his hat as his name is read. The Lord Chancellor then rises, and informs Parliament that as soon as members have been sworn the cause of the calling together of the two Houses will be declared. The Commons are then ordered to repair to their places and choose “some proper person” as Speaker, and submit him on the morrow for “Her Majesty’s royal approba- tion.” After election, the Commons are again summoned to the House of Lords, and the Speaker, pre¬ ceded by the mace, appears at the Bar, ad¬ dresses the Lords Commission ers, notifies his elec¬ tion, and submits himself, “with all humility, for Her Majesty’s most gracious approba¬ tion.” The Lord Chancellor there¬ upon “ confirms ” him as Speaker ; and the Speaker claims for the Commons all their “ ancient rights and privi¬ leges,” which his Lordship concedes. The Lord Chancellor’s part in this ceremony discloses his old power as the officer of State more connected with the Crown than any other. It is now almost the only pictorial display. His official coach, in which he used formerly to ride to Westminster, was used once during the present reign, after a long interval, but has now ceased to exist. The cavalcade of lawyers on horseback which used to at¬ tend him to Westminster Hall is also a thing of the past. The functions of his Lordship in the Upper House are peculiar. He presides by prescriptive right. He can sit on “ the woolsack ” as soon as he has received the Great Seal from the Sovereign, whether he has been ennobled or not. Technically, the woolsack is out of the House. Some singular customs follow. Any noble Lord sitting on the woolsack cannot vote in a division. The Lord Chancellor himself is not addressed by the Peers, and when he wishes to speak to the House, standing order No. 19 sets forth that “ he is to go to his own place as a Peer ” : that is, he goes to the left of the Chamber, above all Dukes not being of the Blood Royal. “ He is always to speak uncovered.’’ Up to the middle of last century he is always r e p r e- sented with his hat on ; and the present three- cornered hats date from Queen Anne’s time. The hat is now dis¬ continued even by judges, except in sentencing to death. As Keeper of the Great Seal, or Seals — for there are two, obverse and reverse — the Lord Chancellor is an important official. The seal itself is a silver mould, designed by the late Ben- jamin Wyon, R.A. The Lord Chancellor is the only person who can affix it to Royal Charters and Letters Patent, and at the express com¬ mand of the Sove¬ reign, with his assent. There is no disputing the authenticity or validity of any document duly sealed. A distinct record is kept of the movements of this important instrument. It has had a wonderful his¬ tory. “ It has seen much service in foreign lands,” says Jeaffreson. “When the Crusaders stirred all Europe, it started in pomp and glittering magnificence upon the road for the Holy Land ; it has smiled at the feast of kings, and starved with hunger in the garrets of Continental cities ; in vain have earth, fire, air, and water banded together for its destruc¬ tion ; it has sunk to the bottom of the sea, and has risen again to the top of the waves ; men compassed its death by hurling it into the Thames, but it asked help of a fisherman — through whose timely aid it THE RIGHT HON. LORD HALSBURY, LORD HIGH CHANCELLOR. {From a Photograph hy Messrs, Elliott Fry.') 751

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The Lord Chancellor’s Work. 482 was restored to the King’s House ; thieves have stolen it, melted it down, and sold it for old metal ; it has been buried beneath the ground, but friendly hands exhumed it and reinstated it in honour ; over and over again ruffians, armed with murderous instru¬ ments, have broken it into minute pieces ; but still the Great Seal is with us, entire, sound, beauteous, flawless as ever.” The Seal, called by Coke “the key of the realm,” used to be carried on the left side of the Lord Chancellor on official occasions, either when in the Sovereign’s presence, at audience, or when acting as the Sovereign’s delegate or commissioner. He is now only burdened with the bag in which he received the Seal in the first instance. This he holds in his band, a purse of crimson velvet about twelve inches square — emblazoned with the Royal arms, and with bullion fringes. Sometimes his purse-bearer carries it ; in the Lords or elsewhere, it lies before him as the symbol of his duty and authority. It used to be renewed yearly, and every Chancellor who held office for a year claimed the purse. Lady Hardwicke hung her State bed-room at Wimpole with twenty such purses. When a Seal is worn out and “damasked” — or touched for destruction by the Sovereign — it becomes the property of the Lord Chancellor for the time being. It is part of the Lord Chancellor’s work to personally •draft legal bills for Parliament ; and Lord Chancellor Westbury has given us an amusing insight into the method. There are no persons or funds avail¬ able— or were not a few years ago— to assist in making researches. “ If any amendment of the law seem to me desirable,” he wrote, “ I must beg for the approval of the Plome Secretary, and, through him, the Chancellor of the Ex¬ chequer. My secretary writes to Sir George Grey, requesting him to move the Chancellor of the Exchequer to con¬ sent that the Lord Chan¬ cellor may have a small sum of money to pay die gentlemen he may employ •CO effect the ne¬ cessary reform. .\fter weeks of delay, an offi- cialletter comes from Mr. Peel, or some subor¬ dinate, doling •out some nig¬ gardly sum as if it were a fa¬ vour, and often with the most absurd stipu¬ lations.” Of THE LORD chancellor’s ROOM IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS. late, we believe, a little less parsimony has been exhibited. The Lord Chancellor is officio a member of the Privy Council and the Cabinet. The former right enables him to interpret the wishes of the Sovereign ; the latter gives him, under our Cabinet Government, a large amount of political power, second only, perhaps, to that of his virtual supersessor, the Prime Minister. Lord Palmerston’s letter to Lord Westbury over the Edmunds case, saying, “We cannot spare you,” may be taken as an indication of the value an active Lord Chancellor must always have in a Cabinet. As the head of the legal system of the country — the point to which ambitious lawyers may all aspire — the Lord Chancellor is always full of work. All com¬ missions under the Great Seal are issued by him ; and to him the Lunacy and Charity Commissioners make their annual reports. He is the guardian of infants, idiots, and lunatics. The Common Law judges and the County Court judges are nominated by him— subject, of course, to Her Majesty’s approval. He selects the justices of the peace for boroughs and counties, in the first instance, upon recommendations made to him by political parties, in which nice ad¬ justments are constantly required, and position and occupation have to be considered. Any magistrate. County Court judge, or coroner can be dismissed by him for improper behaviour. In the exercise of these duties an incredible amount of correspondence and interviewing takes place.

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Some Summer Savouries. The clerical patronage in the Lord Chancellor's hands has been diminished by Lord Westbury's legislation, though it is still considerable. It arose in the old days when he had a College of Chaplains about him, or Clerks in Chancery. This will account for the smallness of many of the livings. In 1863 there were 720 small livings in his gift, which have since been reduced by upwards of 300, and of the former number 150 were under £iSo per annum. No doubt Lord Halsbury could tell some good stories about the excuses made by applicants. Eldon sent a short note to an applicant : “ 1 cannot to-day give you the appointment for which you ask.” The recipient was asked to ‘‘ turn over,” and there he read the words “ I gave it you yesterday.” Westbury once received a letter in which a lady laid her husband's death at his door. He had applied for a living, but could not wait for the answer, went down to view the place, slept in a damp bed, caught cold, and died ! Another Chancellor had a living claimed in a ro¬ mantic manner. When simply an aspirant for political 483 preferment, he blessed a baby-girl, and whispered over her cradle that if she ever married a clergyman, and he himself became Lord Chancellor, he would give her husband a living. The bride-elect claimed it of him in person as necessary to marriage, and received its promise with blushes. But “giving agreeable girls away” like this is seldom the good fortune of the Lord Chancellor, unless they happen to be his wards. The power of a Lord Chancellor is great, and so is the extent of his work. Incessant appeals and com¬ plaints reach him from all quarters by nearly every post. He need be a Briareus to satisfy everybody. If he reward competent relatives, he is sure to be accused of nepotism ; if he essay to be too scrupu¬ lously impartial, he will do them an injustice by passing them over. Partisans and opponents lead him a nice life. The burden upon his time and his attention is immense and unceasing. It is only in the far-off Elizabethan days that it could be said — “ My grave Lord Keeper led the brawls, The Seals and Maces danced before him,” SOME SUMMER SAVOURIES. N presenting the readers of this Magazine with the following recipes and suggestions, I have made special provision for dwellers in house-boat or tent, as well as for picnic parties and holiday-makers generally, the hot dishes being easily and expeditiously cooked (as in some cases the tiniest oil or spirit stove will suffice), while those which are intended to be served cold will, 1 hope, commend themselves to one and all at the present season ; to the latter kind I will give first attention. A nicely made meat pie is, I think, a generally liked dish (but people who begrudge a little time and trouble in its preparation will be wise to turn their attention to some other branch of cookery^, and I confidently recommend the undermentioned, the crust for all of which is known as “French raised crust,” and is less difficult for beginners than our English raised pastry. It is also very delicious, keeps well, and retains its crispness. The flour used must be good “ pastry whites,” warmed and passed through a sieve ; to one pound, six ounces of fresh butter should be added, and rubbed in until very fine, with half a teaspoon fill of salt, and a fourth as much pepper. The unbeaten yolks of three eggs, the juice of a quarter of a lemon, and enough cold water to form a smooth, stiff mass must next be added, the whole being lightly mixed with the tips of the fingers ; it requires very little kneading, and should be rolled out once only. Have in readiness a tin pie-mould, round or oval, about three inches high, and well buttered, line it evenly with the crust — reserving a portion for the lid — then pack in the meat, about a pound and a half for the foregoing proportions, and press the lid on, first brushing the inner edge with a little beaten egg ; ornament the top with leaves cut from the trimmings, taking care to make one or two holes for the escape of the steam. The oven must be steady, and of a moderate heat, a little quicker at first to “ set” the crust. When done, let the pie stand for half an hour before filling up with the gravy, as it allows the meat to sink, and the better to absorb the liquid. Now for a few suggestions as to the meats for our pies : — 1. Veal, with a fourth its weight of ham, and a couple of hard-boiled eggs, and a half-teaspoonful of mixed sweet herbs to each pound of meat, a morsel of grated lemon-peel, and a pinch of grated nutmeg being a further improvement. 2. Chicken, with ham, &:c., as above, or cooked tongue, may be used in either recipe ; the ham should be raw, but will be improved by soaking awhile in tepid water if it is hard or too salt. I would, how¬ ever, suggest good bacon in preference tp inferior ham. 3. Pigeons, with a third their weight in veal or beef¬ steak, with boiled eggs as before-mentioned ; the livers of the birds to be pounded, and mixed with the ordinary ingredients used for veal stuffing, the force¬ meat being formed into small balls, and interspersed

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Some Summer Savouries. 484 amongst the meat. I say ordinary ingredients, but there is one exception, viz., butter must be used in place of suet. The meat in all the recipes must be carefully freed from skin and gristle, and cut into dice, or passed through a chopping-machine. The approximate quantity of seasoning is a teaspoonful of salt and a fourth as much pepper for each pound of meat. For gravy for Nos. i and 2, the bones of the veal or chicken should be stewed until the liquor is strong enough to ‘‘jelly” when cold, or in very hot weather, as a further precaution, a little gelatine should be added. For No. 3 a veal bone and a morsel of glaze may be used in addition to the bones of the pigeons. During the boiling, the stock must be frequently skimmed, and strained through a clean cloth before being poured into the pie. I will next detail Mock Foie Gras Gateau, a novel and excellent dish, though inexpensive, trusting that any who may try it will carry out the recipe carefully. The ingredients required are a callus kidney, and its weight of bacon and calf s liver, and twice its weight of veal cutlet. The liver needs washing and drying, so does the kidney, and from the latter all the hard inner portion must be removed. After mincing them all up very small, the following should be well mixed with the mass : — Two eggs well beaten, a gill of strong stock made from bones, a generous teaspoonful each of salt, chopped thyme, and red currant jelly, the rind of a lemon (carefully grated to avoid ^^e bitterness of the white pithy part), a brimming cJ^sert-spoonful of Worcester sauce, mushroom ketchup, and chopped parsley, and half a teaspoonful of pepper. The whole ought to be pounded in a mortar, as the ingredients need perfect amalgamation, but a strong bowl and the end of a rolling-pin may be used as substitutes. To cook this gdteati, press it very tightly in a buttered pie-dish and twist a sheet of buttered paper over the top ; cover it also with an old dish or baking- sheet, then bake it in a very moderate oven for two hours. . Remove the tin or dish, but leave the paper until the gdteau is cold, when it may be turned out and served as a breakfast or luncheon dish, or, if thinly sliced, will furnish material for delicious sandwiches. Moulded Calf^s Head will provide a dish suitable for any meal. The head should be boiled in the ordinary way, but with a good allowance of herbs and vege¬ tables, and as soon as the meat will slip from the bones it must be cut up while warm, and thoroughly seasoned with a mixture of salt, pepper, a suspicion of grated nutmeg, the grated rind of half a lemon, and some parsley scalded and chopped. It should then be very tightly packed in a mould with alternate layers of boiled ham in thin slices, a cupful or thereabouts of the liquor mixed with half an ounce of glaze being poured over by degrees. The glaze is a great im¬ provement ; it gives colour and flavour, and renders an otherwise somewhat insipid dish very appetising. The tongue may either be skinned and cut up with the meat for the mould, or served hot with a sauce made from the brains ; or the latter will make a delicious little dish, if they are boiled and beaten up while hot, then mixed with bread-crumbs, herbs, and seasoning, and a beaten egg to bind them. They can be shaped as desired, and browned in a Dutch oven, or fried ; in either case they should be coated with “frying batter,” or a beaten egg and bread-crumbs. The stock from the head may be converted into excellent Soup, with the least possible trouble, as follows ; — Put back the bones, and boil them till there is only a quart of liquor ; strain it through a clean cloth, and add some of the vegetables cut into shreds, and the pulp of a few ripe tomatoes. Thicken with two ounces of corn-flour or rice-flour mixed with cold water, then return the whole to the pan, boil it for ten minutes, season, and serve. For this, and many other dishes, “ tomato pulp ” in tins (a recently in¬ troduced article) will be found very convenient when fresh tomatoes cannot be readily obtained, as it is excellent in colour and flavour ; from the same medium I recommend an appetising Sauce, good with cold meats generally, and particularly good with cold fish : the required ingredients are a gill each of tomato pulp and plain brown vinegar, a dessert¬ spoonful of finely chopped capers, a salt -spoonful each of white pepper, mustard, and salt, and a small teaspoonful of castor sugar. The proportions of the seasonings can be varied to suit individual require¬ ments, but the omission of the sugar will spoil the sauce. A dish of Fowl Scallops is a little luxury, and economical withal, being one of the best methods of re-serving the remains of a boiled or roasted fowl. For half a dozen scallops, take about nine ounces of the whitest of the meat, free from skin, and mince it very finely ; meanwhile stew down the bones and skin in water, until there is rather more than a gill of stock, which must then be blended with an ounce and a half each of butter and flour, and boiled up well, previous to mixing with the minced fowl, and half a gill of boiling milk or cream. White pepper and cayenne, salt, a hint of nutmeg, and a few drops of lemon-juice are suitable seasonings, but one or two button mushrooms cooked in the stock and minced will be found a great improvement. Now fill the shells with the mixture, sprinkle some browned bread-crumbs on the top, and heat them in a quick oven ; they are intended to be eaten while hot, but are very good cold. Fowl en F7'itu7'e is another little dainty, or any other cooked white meat can be used in the same way, veal being very nice. Whatever is used — about half a pound— should be thinly sliced and freed from skin, and laid in the juice of a lemon for an hour. A flat dish should then be buttered, and sprinkled thickly with bread-crumbs mixed with a little thyme and chopped parsley, the meat being next added in a single layer, over which a batter is poured. Ten to fifteen minutes in a hot oven will cook this and delicately brown the surface. For the batter put two ounces of flour in a bowl with a good pinch of salt and pepper ; add the yolks of two eggs and the third of a pint of milk, beating well all the time from the centre of the flour

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Pictures of the Months. to avoid lumps ; then stir in the whites of the eggs, first whisked until stiff. I may mention that the chief reason for coating the dish with crumbs is to avoid undue hardening of the meat ; this should always be guarded against in re-cooking meat of any kind, otherwise it becomes not only flavourless, but indigestible ; hence, if crumbs are not handy, some cold potatoes in slices (or any other vegetable) may be substituted, I will next ask my readers to make trial of Scalloped Beep a*;suring them of a treat if they carry out in detail the directions. First, assuming that a couple of rib bones — with enough meat on them to fill a breakfast- cup after being scraped from the bones — are at hand, they must be chopped up, covered with water, and boiled for several hours until there is a teacupful of good gravy. Into a small stewpan put an ounce of butter, and brown it well, then fry in it a small onion, chopped ; remove the onion, add a table-spoonful of flour, and let that brown also ; then a teaspoonful of anchovy paste, the same of mushroom ketchup and brown vinegar, then the strained stock ; boil up, and off the fire mix the meat in, which is preferable if underdone. Grease a flat dish and spread it with bread-crumbs, lay the meat on, and put crumbs in a layer a quarter of an inch thick on the top, with an ounce of butter, broken into bits, here and there all over it. A sharp oven is necessary, or a Dutch oven 485 is useful, as the baking should not take more than ten minutes. I will close with a Fish Souffle, a real delicacy, that will be appreciated by most people — indeed, it is the bon7ie botiche of the present collection. A lobster is required, and half a pound of white fish (sole or plaice), two ounces each of flour and butter, a quarter of a pint of milk, the same of fish stock, and a couple of eggs. The white fish must first be divided into small pieces— the dark skin and bones being rejected — and thoroughly mixed with the minced lobster, then blended with the butter, milk, stock, and flour, first boiled well together and left till cool, when the yolks of the eggs, with a good seasoning of salt, pepper, and lemon-juice, and a few drops of essence of an¬ chovies, are to be added, and last of all the whites of the eggs beaten to a stiff froth. Forty minutes’ steaming in a buttered mould covered with buttered paper will cook this, if the operation be carefully per¬ formed — i.e., care must be taken that the water is kept gently boiling, and that it does not come within an inch of the top of the mould. It should be turned out and served with white sauce flavoured with lemon-juice, or with shrimp or anchovy sauce. I may remind my readers that a tinned lobster — if of the quality- - does as well as a fresh one ; the dish is then a practical illustration of the fact that nice cook¬ ing does not always mean costliness. PICTURES OF THE MONTHS. July. J^HE rose-leaves scatter in scented showers ^ O’er the velvet turf where the warm sun lies In still white light stand the garden bowers. And the sky is a sapphire of wondrous price : And life is singing a sweet home tune. For the pair here dreaming through golden noon.

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486 WOMANLIKE. By the Author of “A Man of the Name of John,” “ King or Protector?” &c. &c. “ Womanlike, taking revenge too deep for a transient wrong.” CHAPTER THE FOURTH. Good morning, Wilson ! Have you heard that old Miss Haughton is very ill?” The Vicar of Slow- borough, on his way to pay a series of parochial visits, stopped short as Dr. Hawkins thus accosted him from his high dogcart. “ Miss Haughton ? No, indeed I You know she has not let me in¬ side her doors for these three years past. What is the matter?” ‘‘ She had a paralytic stroke in the night, and to tell the truth, I don’t think she will last long,” an¬ swered the doctor. “ She has nearly starved herself to death, and has no strength to rally. My object in telling you was to ask if your wife would not go in and see after that poor girl while the old lady is up¬ stairs.” “ Dear, dear ! Poor Elizabeth ! Has Miss Haugh¬ ton any relations, do you know ?” asked the vicar. “ None, I believe.” “ Then what will become of that poor child ? ” The doctor shrugged his shoulders. “We shall see all in good time,” he said. “ ThaPs a very queer old lady. Well, good-bye, vicar ! I have no time to lose,” and he drove rapidly away. The vica^ turned to retrace his steps in thoughtful mood. Miss Haughton was a very unsatisfactory parishioner, but for Elizabeth he felt only sincere pity. Mrs. Wilson must see after her at once. Mrs. Wilson accordingly soon appeared at the Red House, a busy bustling little woman, whose heart overflowed with kindness and sympathy, and whose tongue with offers of help. But Elizabeth needed neither, it seemed, and so her would-be friend withdrew, baffled by the girl’s manner, and setting her down as hopelessly shy and dull. Elizabeth had no fears as to the issue of the illness, though Dr. Hawkins warned her that it might be serious. Her aunt was just the same as usual, help¬ less it is true, but quite conscious, and economical as ever. “You needn’t have a fire downstairs, child, as that tiresome Hawkins insists on having one here,” was one of her aunt’s first remarks. “If you are cold, you can go and get warm in the kitchen. I can’t have coals wasted.” So Elizabeth sat in the dreary room, and watched the sharp face under the shadow of the great four- poster, and was even glad of the nursing to occupy her thoughts for a little. So passed three days ; and then Dawson came to her bedside in the grey dawn of a November morn¬ ing, with a face a shade more severe than usual, and spoke in an awestruck tone. “ Miss Elizabeth, your aunt’s gone ! ” she said. “ Gone ? Where ? ” cried Elizabeth, only half awake. “ She’s been took in the night, sudden,” explained Dawson. “ 1 never heard a sound, though I sleep so light that a breath would wake me ; but this morning 1 found her cold and stiffj poor thing ! ” Elizabeth understood now. “ My aunt is dead ! ” she said in a dazed way. She felt much as if the world had refused to turn as usual to greet the rising sun. “ I think you had better send for the doctor,” was all she could find to say. Dr. Hawkins came, and said it was just what he had expected, and perhaps, on the whole, it was a mercy. Then the vicar came, and bade her not fret, for all was for the best, and he would communicate with Miss Haughton’s lawyer for her. And then Mrs. Wilson came, and begged her to come down to the Vicarage, and suggested a dressmaker. And at last all were gone, and evening was come, and Elizabeth sat over the fire alone in peace. She was occupying the same armchair in which Roger had smoked his pipe only a few days bef@re ; but she did not lean back, for lounging had never been permitted to her. She sat upright, with her clasped hands resting on the arm of' the chair, lost in thought. A glorious fire leaped and roared in the wide old grate. That was Dawson’s extravagance ; she was not so austere as she seemed, and she thought it would comfort Miss Elizabeth. She was right. Yhe unusual luxury, and the sense of perfect warmth, were very soothing to the poor girl ; and in the dancing light that cast soft flickering shadows over the straight formal furniture, the room itself seemed to have gained a new charm and mystery, and to suggest that something lay hidden beneath its usual cold bare exterior. Elizabeth was not grieving for her aunt ; she was not even regretting the life that had so suddenly come to an end. That was impossible. Her life had always been so cold and dull and grey. She had never known a mother’s love, never known the tender care and caresses that form a golden back¬ ground to our childhood, when we look back on it in after-years. Her aunt had given her food and clothes and shelter, but nothing more. All her life she had craved for something more, hungering with unsatisfied longing, she hardly knew for what. What a dreary life the girl must lead in that old house with

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Womanlike. her old aunt ! the outside world had said ; and even the outside world hardly knew how dreary it had been. Yet in all those 4ong monotonous years she had found one unfailing source of pleasure. Little as anyone suspected it, Elizabeth was gifted with a keenly susceptible nature, and a vivid, almost poetic, imagination. The one was crushed by her surround¬ ings, the other lifted her far above them. Up and down the old house were scattered old books, An calf or vellum bindings, worn and rubbed with age and use. Unknown to her aunt she had revelled among them from her childhood, while they were invested with the delicious charm of friends who could only be visited by stealth. She had done what most people only talk of doing, she had read Shakespeare and Milton till she loved them, she had let Dante, with Cary’s helping hand, lead her from Hell to Heaven, and all the myriad knights of the “Faery Queene ” were her own personal friends. Modern books she had none, but in the old world of poetry and romance she dwelt content, fancy¬ ing herself Rosalind or Portia, Una or the Lady in “ Comus,” till she hardly knew which life were the real or which the visionary one. She knew that the girls of her own age looked askance at her, and derided her dress and appear¬ ance ; but she cared, little while she could creep away to a quiet corner and fancy herself her reigning heroine. And even her long hours of sewing, or the still drearier hours spent in utter idleness between the lights, were all too short, while her mind had roved far into the magic land of romance. So she lived a curious dreamy double life, till a sudden sharp awakening came at last. She had been secretly much interested in Roger’s arrival. The young men she saw occasionally in Slowborough, but never spoke to, were none of them heroes of romance. But this stranger from the dis¬ tant world of London, she thought, would be of far finer metal, and she was prepared to see in him her own ideal knight. Full of her fancies she came down the long passage in the dusk, her heart beating high with excitement — and he took her for a servant ! In a moment her dreams were shattered to fragments. She realised with startling certainty that she was in a cruelly matter-of-fact world, plain Elizabeth, with no charm to recommend her. All her shyness was but a cloak for bitter mortification and wounded pride. How she hated herself as she left Roger that evening, to resume her dreary attendance on her aunt ! And then she had received another blow. In the passage Dawson had met her and bid her wait a a moment. “ I’ll show you something pretty, miss,” she said with satisfaction. She vanished into Roger’s room and reappeared with Alice’s portrait. Elizabeth could see it still as she gazed into the crackling flames : the pretty smiling face, the fair hair curling over a low fore¬ head, the rounded throat and arms set off by the soft folds of her evening dress. So that was the kind 487 of girl whom Roger was accustomed to meet h That was how people looked in the real world that she knew nothing of! She gave it back to Dawson with a word of thanks, and went to read to her aunt as usual. But when she went to her own room that night, she locked the door timidly, and drew near the glass. She loosened her long brown hair, and hurriedly brushed it off her face, and gazed eagerly into the glass. No use 1 She had revealed a high white forehead, which would have spoken of intellect to wiser eyes than hers, but she could not change her features, or bring the light of youth and joy into her eyes. She turned away sick at heart. Poor child ! She had cherished, almost unknown to herself, a dream of breaking some day from this cage of dull homely duties, and soaring like a bird to a higher atmosphere. But now she felt her hopes were vain ; she had suddenly seen herself as she was, and she hated Roger for having torn away the veil that had wrapped her from her own view for so long. What evil destiny led her to the door next day to hear those cruel words : “ If there were not another woman in the world I would not marry Elizabeth ! ” She could not forget them. They showed her too clearly the gulf that lay between her and other girls. She took his hasty speech as deciding her Lite for ever. She was so ugly that she must renounce the common hope of womanhood. It would never be hers to inspire love. She tried to return to the old dream-world, but the spell was broken. Her old visions mocked her, the passionate love-scenes left her' miserable and jealous. She had lost all that made her life bearable, and she rebelled against her fate in vain. And now that hard narrow life was at an end, and she was free. Elizabeth sat gravely facing and con¬ sidering the future. She knew that she must earn her own living, and with a sudden thrill of joy she decided what she would do. Little children always liked her ; they care only for a kind face, be it plain or beautiful. She would be a nursery governess, she thought ; and as her fancy woke again she felt little hands pulling her gown, and heard little voices calling her dear Elizabeth, while the flames died down, and the fire burnt clear, and silence deepened in the dim shadowy room. She was left much to herself till after the funeral. Mr. Murray, her aunt’s solicitor, came to and fro, and rummaged among her aunt’s papers, and bade her not fret, for he would take care of her. She had known him from childhood, and she was sure he would approve of her plan, so she waited till he should be at leisure to discuss it with her. It was not till the afternoon, when the funeral was over, that he came to talk over the future with her. He found her sitting in the great armchair, and looking very young and desolate. Yet her black dress had more dignity than her old gowns, and the sense of resolute purpose made her seem less timid and insignificant.

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Womanlike. 488 “ I wanted to talk to you about your future life, Elizabeth,’’ said Mr. Murray kindly, after a few preliminary remarks. “ Have you any ideas on the subject ?” “ I know that I must earn my own living,” she answered. “ Then I suppose that your aunt always gave you to understand that she was very poor.?” he asked tentatively. ‘‘ She was very poor,” said Elizabeth simply. “ She had nothing to leave me, she often said so.” ‘‘ She has left you all she had,” he remarked. Do you know, my dear child, 1 think she was under a delusion with regard to her income. She was better off than she imagined.” Elizabeth looked up in surprise, but the kindly look on her friend’s face reassured her. “ Was she really ? ” she said earnestly. “ But what a pity she did not know it ! We might have been so much more comfortable.” “It was a great pity. I fear her mania entailed most trying results,” said Mr. Murray, speaking slowly and gently. “ Far from being poor, she was in reality very rich.” “ Rich ? My aunt rich ? ” cried Elizabeth. “ I always thought her well off, but till I came to look into her affairs I really had no notion how extremely well off she was,” went on Mr. Murray, much interested in the picture above the mantelpiece. “ I have only been able so far to make a rough calculation, but as she has left you everything that she possesses, I think you will have about five thousand a year.” “ Five thousand a year !” said Elizabeth in a low stunned tone. The idea was beyond her grasp. “ Quite that,” said Mr. Murray carelessly. “ And I am executor and sole trustee, so I must see you do not waste it. After you are of age you will have entire control of your own fortune, however.” Elizabeth could say nothing. She looked back upon long years of grinding poverty and petty econo¬ mies, a life made hateful for want of a few shillings — and all the time her aunt had been rich, and she might have been like other girls. It was cruel, it was unjust ! And in a sudden flash of revengeful thought she longed that Roger might know that the girl he had so despised was now an heiress. “ The question is,” said Mr. Murray kindly, “ what would you like to do for the present.? Have you any idea where you would like to live ? ” Elizabeth rose, as though to breathe more freely. She stood before him, erect and stiff. “ I should like,” she said abruptly, “ to go to school.” “ To school ?” he said, greatly relieved by such a sensible proposition. “ That is a very good idea, if you would like it.” “ I want to go to a good school,” went on Elizabeth, carried away by her feelings as reserved people are when they once break into speech. “ I should like to be where there were only a f^ew kind girls, who would be good to me and not laugh at me, and a lady who would teach me — teach me everj^thing ! I know nothing ! ” she said with passionate intensity — “ nothing at all ! I want to learn like other girls, I want to dress like them, I want to look like them ! Let me go where I can be like other girls ! ” Her colour came and went, her eyes grew larger as they shone with expression, her features lit up with long-suppressed emotion. Mr. Murray was completely astonished. He was old enough and critical’ enough to see what promise lay beneath this unformed girlish exterior. It dawned upon him that she was tall, and only awkward with the angularity of youth. K-er head was well set, her face had something rather fine in it ; some day she would be a very unusual woman. “ Don’t distress yourself, my dear,” he said in a fatherly way. “ I know the very school for you ; but I fear you will never learn even there to be like other girls.” ‘‘ Sha’n’t I .?” she said despairingly. Ob, why was I born so unlike everyone else .? ” “ Why, that you might be something better and higher than everyone else,” he answered boldly. “ The time will come when other girls will wish they were like you.” Elizabeth looked at him with a sudden strange thrill of joy and hope, and his eyes met hers unflinchingly. “ Oh, how kind you are ! No one was ever so kind to me before ! ” she said, and stretched out her hand to him with a great sob. _ CHAPTER THE FIFTH. “ Are you going down to see the cricket, Betty ? ” “ I promised to go, but I have been so long over my letters that I am afraid they will have ceased play before I get there.” “ I hope they have, for they have been at it since ten o’clock, and it is too much for Maud; but Dickie is so energetic that there is no stopping her. I am not quite sure that I like this ladies’ cricket,” said Mrs. Adair doubtfully. “ I am quite sure I don’t,” answered Betty with a smile. “ Shall I say you hope they will not play any mdre this morning .? ” Mrs. Adair was a modern mother, properly brought up, and in bondage to her daughters. “ Oh, no ! ” she said hastily ; “ but if you could suggest an adjournment to the kitchen garden or any¬ thing of that sort — I have every confidence in your discretion.” “ Very well,” answered Betty smiling, as she stepped through the open French window. She crossed the wide lawn, which opened out still wider lower down, dotted with trees and clumps of rho¬ dodendrons, and came to the iron railing that divided the lower path from the park. Beyond the small, well- timbered park, the brook, that gave Wraysbrooke its name, first fed a noble pond — by courtesy called the lake — and then flowed on to join the unseen river. The view was bounded by hanging woods on a low range of hills — a fair prospect enough on this brilliant August morning, so thoroughly English and homelike. In the immediate foreground an effective bit of colour was supplied by the party of cricketers, who

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Womanlike. 489 were playing energetically on the smooth-shaven pitch. They were chiefly of the fair sex, but there were two or three young men in flannels among them, engaged in the congenial occupations of coaching and umpiring. Betty Darell leant against the low railing and watched them for a moment or two. She was a tall exclaim with relief, when ’her boys and girls had plunged her into some fresh worry. Just now, as she stood motionless under her white sunshade, Betty was debating how to prevent delicate Maud Adair from knocking herself up, while her brother Jim encouraged her to go on playing, insti¬ gated by their energetic little guest, Dickie Mortimer. “the other two were left standing by the tennis-net” (/. 492). graceful girl, with singularly upright carriage, and an air of calm strength about her that was very repose¬ ful. Women always admired her, and called her fine intellectual face handsome ; but most men thought her cold, if not uninteresting, and heiress as she was, she had arrived at the age of five-and-twenty without having received a single offer. At Wraysbrooke, where she had now been a con¬ stant visitor for years, she ranked almost as one of the elders. Mrs. Adair confided her maternal troubles to her, and often took her advice. ‘‘ You are so cool and sensible, Betty,” the much -enduring woman would Just as she was about to advance towards the gate leading to the ground, however, a cunning ball of Dickie’s took a stump out of the ground, and amidst loud applause the -team deserted the pitch and came straggling up to the grateful shade of the garden. The triumphant bowler made her way towards Betty, and seated herself skilfully on the rails. “ Well,” she said, “do you think we are improved.^” She was a pretty dark-haired girl, very young still, whose rosy cheeks and bright eyes irresistibly sug¬ gested a robin, and, combined with a comic habit of putting her head on one side, easily accounted for the

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490 Womanlike. nickname of Dickie-bird having superseded her proper name of Mary. She was dressed, like most of the other girls, in a gay shirt with a stiff front, and a knowing little tie, and wore a plain sailor hat with a red ribbon. Trying as the costume was in itself, on her it had an oddly piquant effect that was not un¬ becoming, as Betty felt, though she disapproved the style. “ 1 only saw the last few balls,” she said ; “ but I thought the fielding had improved. Have you ceased play for to-day ? ” “ / want to go on again,’^ announced Dickie, as Jim Adair came up, a tall, handsome young man of mili¬ tary bearing, who looked down on her admiringly. ‘‘ We can’t play again this afternoon, though we should have some more girls, because the Gordons are going to bring some stupid man with them who wants en¬ tertaining, and Mrs. Adair said we mustn’t all go off to cricket.” ‘‘ We’ll go and play single wicket, you and 1,” said Jim in her ear. “ I think it would be just as well if you didn’t play any more, Dickie,” said Betty confidentially. “ Maud looks so tired, and you know she will never give in, but it would be far better for her to rest now.” “ Oh, dear ! ” said Dickie with a grimace, as she tossed the ball from hand to hand. I wish people wouldn’t get tired ; / never do. \Vfeit are you going to do, Betty ? ” “ 1 want to go into Riversdale for some stamps and postal orders,” answered Betty, who held a handful of letters. “ Well, I will come with you and remove myself from temptation,” said Dickie heroically. “It is an awfully hot, dusty walk,” objected Jim ; “ you had much better come and see the gooseberries with me.” “ I say, you others !” called Dickie, rapidly climb¬ ing the fence — “you may all adjourn to the kitchen garden, for I am going into the town with Betty. As it is too hot and too far for you, of course, you won’t come?” she added derisively, turning to Jim. He only answered by vaulting the railings after her — and, undisturbed by shouts of “ Lazybones ! ” and “ Defaulters ! ” from the rest of the party, they pursued Betty, who was taking her quiet way across the lawn. Perhaps she would as soon have walked along the dusty road without her two companions, for Jim did nothing but grumble at the heat, and Dickie chaffed him unceasingly. Sultry and dusty it undoubtedly was, but if she had been alone, Betty would at least have enjoyed the summer sky, and the view of the picturesque little town with its scattered roofs among the trees, in peace. She left her friends to wander up and down the broad High Street, while she transacted her business in the Post Office. When she came out, Dickie, gloveless, and apparently alone with Jim, was chatting affably with a friend in a smart little pony-cart — a lady who was well known to be one of the best-bred and most fastidious women in the neighbourhood. “ Poor child ! How little she knows ! ” thought Betty, as she went up to exchange greetings with Mrs, Aylmer, who was a great friend of hers. Jim seemed in a better temper when they started homewards, and was just beginning one of his best Indian yarns when Dickie remorselessly interrupted him. “ Good gracious ! ” she cried loudly. “ Do look at the Gordons’ dog-cart ! ” “What on earth is the matter with it?” demanded Jim, as the well-appointed cart rattled past, driven by grey-haired Major Gordon. “There’s nothing the matter with the cart,” re¬ turned Dickie with emphasis. “ It is the people in it !” “Well, what of them ?” said puzzled Jim, who had caught a glimpse of a man with a lean, sun-burnt face, beside the driver. “ They were only the major and the distinguished stranger.” “ Only ! ” returned Dickie contemptuously. “ Why,, it was Roger! Dear old Roger Haughton, whom 1 have known since I was a baby 1 I should have known him anywhere 1 Oh, can’t we go back and speak to him ? They’re stopping at Sturt’s.” Dickie was in a state of wild excitement, and stood still to look back. Betty was suddenly as white as- Dickie was flushed ; perhaps the heat of the sun had tried her after all. “ Don’t be foolish, Dickie, dear,” she said firmly,, but kindly. “ You will see Mr. Haughton this after¬ noon ; you cannot go after him down the High Street.” “ Oh, to think of its being Roger — Roger, whom 1 haven’t seen for years and years 1 ” said Dickie, fol¬ lowing her friend reluctantly. “ Why didn’t some¬ body tell me who it was ? ” with a reproachful glance at Jim. “ I am very sorry, I quite forgot his name, though Major Gordon was telling me all about him the other day,” said Jim apologetically. “ How could I know you knew him ? ” “ I haven’t heard anything of him for years,” said Dickie, as they turned from the street down the Wraysbrooke road again. “Tell me all you know about him at once. Hasn’t he been in South America ? ’’ “ Yes, lucky beggar ! He went out there as poor as a church mouse, and he has come back in seven years absolutely rolling in money,” said Jim. “He is one of the partners in Kerrison and Co., the house Tom Gordon is in, you know ; so the Gordons are doing the polite to him with a view to Tom’s future benefit.” “How did he make his money?” asked Dickie with interest. He went out as a common or garden clerk,”' answered Jim carelessly, “ and he found the managing agent at Buenos Ayres was robbing the firm right and left. He was ’cute enough to discover it before he 'was sent up the countiy, and got the fellow nabbed as he was on the point of absconding. Of course the firm was very grateful, and made him manager in the other man’s place. Then he worked very hard and

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Womanlike. 491 extended the business, so it ended in his being a part¬ ner ; and now he has come home with his pockets full of money to enjoy a holiday.” “Fancy, Roger with lots of money ! ” said Dickie, with a merry laugh. “ He always used to growl about being poor. He used to bring us schoolroom children lots of sweets, though ; we were awfully fond of him. I say ! Do you think he will expect to find me in a pinafore still ?” “ I should say so,” answered Jim teasingly ; “that is about your form still.” “ I hope he won’t have got too old to speak to me,” said Dickie reflectively. “ He did look very old and grave, didn’t he ? I suppose he must be quite forty. 1 know I thought him very old when he went out.” Her tone completely laid to rest Jim’s suspicions of a probable rival, and they discussed Dickie’s childish memories all the way home in great content. They were too much taken up by their own conversation to notice that Betty had never spoken a single word since they left Riversdale. Betty was invaluable to Mrs. Adair that afternoon ; she helped to entertain the elder ladies, and sacrificed herself nobly in taking a worthy, but prosy, old gen¬ tleman all round the grounds, and even into the stables. “ I don’t know what I should do without you, Betty,” said her grateful hostess. “The other girls think of nothing but their tennis. I wish they were more like Frances.” Frances was the eldest daughter, Betty’s friend, who had first brought her schoolfellow home with her, but was now married and gone. “ When they reach my mature age they will care less for tennis,” answered Betty, with her encouraging smile. “ Meanwhile, I am glad to be a worthy sub¬ stitute for Frances.” “ Have you had any tea yet ? ” asked Mrs. Adair. “ No ? Jim ! do get Betty some tea at once ! ” Jim was hanging about looking rather disconsolate, but he escorted her to the tea-table with alacrity. “I say, have you seen Dickie yet?” he asked eagerly. “ She is quite mad about this old new friend of hers, and tore him off to be introduced to you. Didn’t you meet ? ” “No, I have not seen her. I was not on the lawn when the Gordons arrived,” answered Betty. “ But I dare say I can survive the loss.” “ Goodness knows where she has got to,” grumbled Jim. But Betty did not seem to care, and began to ask about the play that afternoon. Shortly afterwards she joined a set, and began to play tennis, without troubling her head any further about Dickie. It was, very strange to Roger Haughton to be strolling about this quiet English garden after his lo^ig wanderings amidst tropical scenery. And yet stranger was it to have at his side little Dickie Morti¬ mer, who was at once an old friend and a new ac* quaintance. Fie had not recognised her in the least when she first came up to him, but he had been heartily glad to see her when he found out who she was. She was an interesting study, too, in her rapidly changing moods. At one moment he was vainly trying to trace any likeness to the child he had known ; and at the next some family trick of speech or manner reminded him of Alice, and brought back the old days with startling vividness. The thought of those old days had long lost all sting for him. He had never blamed Alice for giving him up so readily ; but when he first found himself getting on in the world it had been a bitter trial to him to feel that, if she had had courage to wait, they might have been haj^y together. Yet as time went on even this feeling died out. He realised that a girl who cared so slightly for him as she must have done, could have had but a shallow nature, and would never have made him happy or satisfied. And gradually, as his work grew more and more absorbing, he ceased to think of her at all. It was a long time now since he had had thought to spare for such suyects. He was even glad, when his duties took him to unhealthy spots amidst manifold risks and dangers, that there was no one to be anxious for him, no one to grieve if he died at his post. He had only been in England a fortnight, and yet already his mood had changed. He had been seeking out old comrades, and he found them nearly all mar¬ ried, and with their children growing up round them. “ You must marry and settle down now, old fellow,” they said ; and he acknowledged to himself that there was no reason why he should not marry. And to the homeless man the thought of a wife and a settled home was very sweet. The only thing against it was that he could see no one whom he could imagine mistress of his home. Was he grown old-fashioned ? he wondered, or were girls really so much altered since his day ? They were all so masculine, so independent. Some openly ran after him, some coolly announced that they despised the estate of matrimon)’’ ; all alike puzzled this stranger to modern ways. Here in the country, perhaps, he thought, time had not moved so fast. Surely here he should find some unaffected English girls, such as he used to know. And here was even Dickie, his old pet and play¬ fellow, dressed in imitation of . a man, full of the exploits of her cricket team, and using slang that would never have been permitted to her elder sisters. Most of her companions seemed to him of the same stamp, and it was with a sigh for his vanished illusions that he let Dickie lead him whithersoever she would in search of her particular friend. “ There she is, playing tennis ! ” cried Dickie at last, as they emerged on to the lawn again. “ We will go and watch her ! ” Roger glanced across the lawn, and saw a tall, graceful figure in pale blue, skimming hither and thither in the furthest court. There was something attractive about the sight, and he followed Dickie to gain a nearer view with some interest. Betty played tennis well, but with more skill and judgment than activity. .She looked her best as she sent the long lov/ strokes skimming over the net, for a

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492 W OMANLIKE. touch of animation became her. Roger watched her graceful movements with a soothing sense of repose, while Dickie applauded and encouraged. He was almost sorry when the set was ended, and Dickie seized upon her friend. “ Now, Betty dear, I must introduce Mr. Haughton to you ! Mr. Haughton — Miss Darell,’^ she cried triumphantly. The next moment Jim had carried her off to play with him, and the other two were left standing by the tennis-net. Roger, who was well accustomed to “ After so many years’ absence from England it is very delightful to meet one’s old friends.” “ Do you find her much altered ? ” asked Betty. ‘‘Yes. indeed ! From a child into a woman. But, apart from that, I should not have recognised her. I am afraid I have not a good memory for faces if they alter at all, and she has completely grown away from the child I knew.” “ She must have been an ugly child, if tradition says true that ugly children grow up the best-looking men and women,” said Betty smiling. “ROGER OFFERED TO CARRY THEM TO THEIR PLACES” {p. 494). reading faces, took in Betty’s at a glance. The broad level brows, the steady grey eyes, and the well-moulded nose and chin, all told the same tale of quiet force of character, but he drew a conclusion that would have surprised her. “ She has herself in splendid control,” he thought, “but, if she once let herself go, how she would love — or hate ! ” For her part she noticed that his face was worn and lined by toil and anxiety, that his eyes had a curious power of seeing straight through you without appearing to do so, and that he had an air of command that sorted well with his grave features. Long intercourse with Spaniards, and the lethargic dwellers in tropical climes, had perhaps given that suspicion of stately deliberation to his manner. What¬ ever the cause, the effect was as striking as it was unusual. “ It was a great and unexpected pleasure to me to meet little Dickie here to-day,” he began pleasantly. “ Oh, I don’t believe in that. Dickie was always pretty — or, rather, I should say picturesque,” he answered. “ So I should imagine,” said Betty. “ Will you excuse me ? for I see some of my friends are going, and I must say good-bye to them,” and with a cour¬ teous bow she left him. _ CHAPTER THE SIXTH. Betty Darell was one of those few women who are superior to the charms of midnight gossip. When the other girls paired off for a last talk at night — as girls almost invariably do, however much they may have seen of each other by day — she went to her own room alone, and no one as a rule thought of disturbing her there. She was therefore surprised to hear by-and-by a subdued knock at the door, and Dickie’s voice asking, “May I come in ? ”

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Womanlike. 493 “Come in !” answered Betty at once, and Dickie entered the room. The candles were extinguished, but the room was lit by the full moon that shone in at the open window. And leaning out upon the window-ledge stood Betty, still in her evening dress, gazing out upon the silent summer night. “ Isn’t it glorious ?” she murmured, as Dickie nestled up to her. “ Hark ! you can even hear the brook falling into the lake. It seems a waste of time to go to bed on such a night.” Dickie listened and looked for a few moments in silence ; then she began half reproachfully: “Betty, why are you so vexed with me ? You did not like my going into the town with you this morning, and you would not come near the piano to-night though I played all your favourite tunes. Why are you not nice to me now as you used to be at Christmas ?” Betty was silent for a moment ; then she said quietly, ‘‘ Because you are not the same little Dickie that I used to know at Christmas.” There was no reply, and Betty turned to glance at the face beside her. Dickie looked so childish in her white dressing-gown, with her dark hair falling in curling waves upon her shoulders, that Betty’s heart smote her, the more so as the childish face looked sad and troubled in the clear moonlight. “The Dickie 1 used to know did not spend her time in running after young men, or in letting young men run after her,” she said more kindly. “It’s only Jim,” said Dickie plaintively. “He wasn’t back from India last Christmas.” “ And if it is only Jim,” said Betty gently, “ do you think your mother would like you to make yourself as conspicuous with him as you do, Dickie dear ? ” “ Mother knows,” said Dickie quickly. “Jim was in town all last season, and always at our house. That is why they let me come here this summer in¬ stead of going to Alice,” she added. Betty was surprised and disappointed. There was something worldly about Dickie’s assured tone that was out of keeping with her youth. It was an hour for confidences, and she determined to speak out. “ Do you mean, Dickie,” she said gently, “ that you really care for Jim? because I can see plainly that he really cares for you.” “ I don’t know about caring for him exactly,” said Dickie doubtfully. “ I like him very much.” “ But would you like to marry him, Dickie ?” At the suggestion of marriage Betty could feel the child give a slight shiver. “We needn’t be married,” she said quickly ; “ we need only be engaged.” “ And what is the object of being engaged to a man whom you don’t want to marry ?” asked Betty. Dickie was silent for a time, then she burst out suddenly, “ It’s all very well for you, Betty, you have everything on earth that you can want, and nothing to marry for. But if you were as poor as we are, you would feel differently.” “ I did not know you were poor,” said Betty quietly, for she had seen Dickie’s home. “No one knows how poor we are!” said Dickie vehemently. “ We keep all our best for outside, and no one knows. But ever since papa was so ill, six years ago, and had to take Mr. Wilmot into partner¬ ship, it seems to me that we have had less and less money to spend. And I hate shams and nit.,naging. I should like to be well enough off not to pretend any more.” “ So you mean to marry Jim Adair for his money ? ” said Betty quietly. “ And at your age, you poor child I Dickie, if I were you I would rather sweep a crossing ! Dickie did not like the turn the conversation had taken. She had an intense admiration for Betty, and could not lightly disregard her words so earnestly spoken. She gazed out into the moonlight without reply, and at last she rose, saying she was very sleepy and must go to bed. Half-way to the door she paused : “ By the way, how did you like Roger ? ” she said. “My dear Dickie, you know I never get on with men,” said Betty without turning her head. “ But I thought you would have liked him, he is so nice,” said Dickie in a disappointed tone. “ I had no childish memories to cast a glamour over him, you see,” answered Betty apologetically. And Dickie sleepily took herself away. But Betty lingered long gazing into the night, and seeing , old faces and scenes rise before her as she gazed. And amongst them was the face of Roger Haughton as she had seen it seven years ago That midnight conversation had succeeded in dis¬ turbing the minds of both girls. It was a revelation to Betty that Dickie, whom she looked on as a mere child scarcely aware of the extent of her own flirtation, should be a worldly young person quite alive to the advan¬ tages of making a good match. They had only met the previous Christmas, when Dickie, just emancipated from the schoolroom, was enjoying her first experience of social gaieties. Betty had taken a fancy to the frank unsophisticated little thing, and Dickie had reciprocated it with the ardent admiration that a girl of eighteen feels for one some years her senior, who is kind without being condescending. When they met again Betty was disappointed to find the change in her little friend, but she only showed it by withdrawing quietly from their former intimacy. To-night she doubted if she had done rightly. It was evident that she still had an influence over Dickie, and if she had exerted it sooner perhaps she might have saved the child from becoming so deeply involved with Captain Adair. As she looked on the matter in a new light she became convinced that his parents were helping him on, and that the affair was looked on as almost settled. How blind she had been ! and now that her eyes were open what ought she to do ? was her last mental question that night. Dickie for her part felt extremely uncomfortable as Betty’s words rang in her ears, “ So you mean to marry Jim for his money?” It was very unkind of Betty to say such a thing ; no one had hinted at it before.

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494 Womanlike. She had enjoyed Jim’s attentions and the flowers and trifles he sent her all the season, and she knew that it was owing to him that she had been pressed to make such a long stay at Wraysbrooke. Her family had said, of course she must go, and her mother had kissed her most tenderly at parting, and said significantly she hoped she would be very happy there. She liked having handsome Jim at her beck and call, and feeling that everything was always being arranged with due deference to her wishes, and beyond that lay a vague prospect of being some day mistress of the old house and park. But no one had men¬ tioned the word marriage, certainly not marriage for money, and the very notion suddenly presented to her made her feel as if she had been running reck¬ lessly into debt, and then had the bill sent in with a peremptory demand for payment. She felt quite shy of Captain Adair next morning, and was very glad that he was going to a cricket match directly after breakfast. When the dog- cart had driven away, she betook herself to her usual con¬ solation, and began to practise her violin vigorously to drive all unpleasant thoughts out of her mind. She was completely absorbed in her music when Mr. Haughton was announced. Dickie was unfeign- edly glad to see him, the more so as he said he had come over on purpose to have a quiet talk with her. Everyone else appeared to be out, so Dickie estab¬ lished herself with him in the cool library, and pro¬ ceeded at her leisure to acquaint him with their family history for the past seven years. “There’s Betty !” said Dickie at last, as she gazed out over the sunny lawn. Betty was coming slowly over the turf, a basket full of flowers in one hand, her left arm full of sunflowers. She made a pretty picture as she came up on to the terrace, and stood framed in the library window. “ Why, Dickie, all alone?” she said; “won’t you come and help me ? ” It was always Betty’s pleasant duty to relieve Mrs. Adair of the task of filling the flower-vases, an occu¬ pation for which her daughters had no time. “Roger is here,” said Dickie, laughing ; “we will both come and help you.” Half dazzled by the sudden change from sunshine to shade, Betty had only noticed the gay little figure in the rocking-chair, but now she saw beyond her a tall, sunburnt man rising from his seat. “ I beg your pardon ; I did not know anyone was here,” she said quietly, as she tossed Dickie a spray of heliotrope. “ I suppose you are discussing ‘ auld lang syne ’ ? ” She passed on through the room, but Roger opened the door for her, and with Dickie followed her across the hall into the long dining-room. Betty sat down in one of the high-backed chairs and went to work in earnest. Dickie leant against the table, chattering and pretending to help, while she really hindered. Roger sat on one of the window-seats, and watched them both with the attentive air of a man to whom English girls were still a new study. Dickie looked very pretty as she played with the fragrant flowers, and talked bright, attractive non¬ sense. But there was a more subtle charm about the grave face outlined against a dark oak background, and the full, quiet accents that answered the other gay little voice. By-and-by, as the tall vases and jars were filled, Roger offered to carry them to their places, and under Dickie’s guidance made perilous journeys across the polished floors. “How beautifully Betty puts up flowers!” said Dickie, as they placed a slender vase in position. “ Do you think she is handsome, Roger ? ’’ “ I think she is quite charming,” he said in his slow measured way. “I admire your taste, Dickie. 1 like her name, too, it is so quaint and old-fashioned.” “There you are quite mistaken,” laughed Dickie. “ It is quite the latest thing in names 1 All the Bea¬ trices I know call themselves ‘ Betty ’ now.” Roger was rather sorry to hear it ; he would have preferred to think of the name as belonging only to that one Betty with her wide hat covered with flowers, and her simple pale blue gown. He stayed to lunch with very little pressing, and made himself extremely agreeable, seeming nowise disconcerted at being the only man present. After¬ wards, the girls gathered round him on the terrace, while he spun yarns for them in a lazy, unimpas¬ sioned way that made his adventures seem far more thrilling. Finally, Dickie boldly insisted upon his coming to play cricket with them, and he was last seen surrounded by an eager group whom he was assuring solemnly that he had quite forgotten which was the off side. “You’ll come and look on, Betty?” said Dickie breathlessly, as she fled into the house for her bat. “ I am afraid I can’t ; I promised to drive with Mrs. Adair,” answered Betty. She had no idea that anyone would miss her, for she never played cricket, but one of the players felt it hard to be deprived of such a quiet, graceful spectator. Betty meanwhile set off on a long drive to pay a necessary call, in company with Mrs. Adair. They were on too friendly terms to think it necessary to talk all the way, but when they had driven for a mile or so Mrs. Adair said suddenly — “ I wonder what made Mr. Haughton come over again to-day.” “To see Dickie. She is a very old friend of his,” said Betty. “ You don’t think she is anything more ? ” . “ Or that he has fallen in love with her at first sight ? No, I certainly don’t,” said Betty smiling. “ They were with me for a long time this morning, and I could see that he treats her as a sort of little sister, while she looks on him as a perfect patriarch.” “ I hope it is so, but one can never tell,” said Mrs. Adair uneasily. “And I should be so annoyed if anyone came between her and Jim.” “ Don’t you think that Dickie is very young to be thinking of such things in earnest ?” suggested Betty quietly.

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The Garden in July. “ Perhaps she is. But I know her mother would be very glad she should marry, and Jim is five-and- twenty and old enough to take care of her. I can’t say, my dear Betty,” went on Mrs. Adair confidentially, “that she is the wife I should have chosen for him: but he is so desperately fond of her, and we are so anxious that he should take a wife with him when he goes back to India next year, that his father and I have decided not to raise any objections. She is a nice little thing, and I dare say will improve and steady down when she is married.” “ I shouldn’t have thought India was a very good place for a young wife to steady down in,” Betty could not help remarking. “ Oh ! Dickie has very good principles, and Jim will make her very happy,” said the fond mother. “ I wonder if he will. It is my private belief that girls of eighteen don’t know who will make them happy,” persisted Betty. “ Oh ! my dear child, you must not judge from your¬ self. You never were like other girls,” said Mrs. Adair laughing. “ Most girls of eighteen would be happy with any man they married, provided he were not a brute.” Betty said no more, but she clung to her own opinion. And watching Dickie narrowly she came to the conclusion that Jim did not make her happy at present. He made her restless, excited, pleased to feel her power over him, but he did not make her happy. Why he postponed speaking to her, Betty could not divine ; s^ could only suppose that he felt so sure of his prize that he was in no hurry to secure it. He was not jealous of Roger Haughton, though on pretence of seeing Dickie that gentleman was over at Wraysbrooke at least four days a week, and brought his old friend all manner of pretty presents from foreign 495 lands. Dickie looked on Roger as being of another generation from herself, and accepted his attentions as those of an elder brother. Very elder-brotherly, too, were the little lectures he occasionally administered, which she took in good part, and with excellent effect. She was a very bewitching little damsel in those days, and yet in one man’s eyes not to be named in the same breath as unobtrusive Betty, who slipped out of half the tennis parties and flower-shows, rather avoided men’s society, and was much addicted to solitary strolls and sketching. For some days Roger Haughton had been endea¬ vouring to get a few words alone with Betty, and at last one afternoon he succeeded in finding her solitary in the garden. “Miss Darell,” he began almost immediately, “you have a great deal of influence over Dickie. “ Will you give her a few words of warning which I cannot give ? ” “ Certainly, if I can,” answered Betty in surprise. “ Then warn her that Jim Adair is in earnest.” “ I have done so, with the result that she never now comes near me except in the presence of a third person,” replied Betty quietly. “ Do you think she cares for him ?” “No ; but I think his people and hers will persuade her that she does, poor child.” Roger’s face was very grave and stern. “ I have known Dickie for years, and I cannot look on and see her sacrificed for money,” he said. “ I cannot save her alone. Will you help me ? ” “ To think that we should ever make a friendly compact together ! ” thought Betty, as she answered quietly, “If I can.” END OF CHAPTER THE SIXTH. THE GARDEN IN JULY. HEN our garden is all a blaze of beauty — which it certainly ought to be in July — and not only so, but when the strawberries and currants are redder than the roses, and the cherries are ruddier still : when, too, the scarlet runners are having a colour match with one or two stray poppies that have found their way into the kitchen garden, we are a little at a loss, in all this brilliant ^ danger-signal ” beauty which surrounds us on every side, to know what to attend to first. Still, though very naturally in July everything is clamouring for exclusive notice, we must be a little partial in our attentions, while on the other hand, sometliijig at least can be said as to our gardening duties in general adapted to the time of the year. To rush then at once in medias res : what a charming flower is the heliotrope — the “cherry- pie,” as we used to call it in the days of our childhood : and a by no means inapt simile either, in so far, at least, as its fragrance is concerned. And perhaps it is its pungent cherry-pie aroma that makes it so popular a favourite, so we will say something more about it and its varieties. Its personal appearance is unquestion¬ ably not, however, in its favour — a very decided ob¬ jection to its culture, as the fair sex will undoubtedly declare ; still, we are fascinated by its modesty and by that wonderful scent which possesses quite a charm for our nasal organ. Not to mince matters then, the heliotrope is an untidy flower; growing as it does some two feet in height, it is a little too tall for any border that has a very sharply defined edge, and very often, if ,ve do bed it out at the end of May in a fairly good

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496 The Garden in July. soil, it rambles about apparently in search of some¬ thing to support it. Indeed, some gardeners say that it. simply spoils any design in a flower-bed because of its being too tall to match the surroundings and too weak to hold itself up properly. As to its culture, then : we will recommend that the tops of forward plants be struck in May : these you will find will bloom, earlier and shorter than cuttings taken from side shoots. Afterwards put them in “forty-eight” sized pots, using for a compost two- thirds of loam and one-third of sand. They may when struck — or even immediately in a genial season — be stood out on boards in the open garden path, where they will get both sun and air. Water will be very essential for your young plants, particularly as the compost is somewhat poor : your plants will then be of stunted growth and show early for bloom ; shortly after¬ wards they can in June be planted out in your flower¬ beds, but do not disturb the ball of earth ; merely put it whole as it is carefully in the flower-bed, having each plant about six inches apart. When the head has bloomed it can be cut off, and then your whole plant must be carefully pegged down to the soil, just as we do when bedding out any plant that is at all disposed to grow high ; by this means the side shoots will come up and rapidly fill the bed. Or again, say that you have a pot of heliotrope grown in the ordinary way : you will observe that it has attained a height of perhaps two feet before the top, on which the bloom is coming, has quite fully developed, while all up its side are to be seen growing young shoots coming out at nearly every joint. Now, if you simply take the plant from its pot and place it almost sideways in a small hole that you make for it in your flower-bed, the whole length of the plant will of course be almost parallel with the surface of the soil. Then peg the whole length down, and you will soon find that every side shoot will push up some few inches and show for bloom. Another pleasing way of growing your heliotrope is to fill a small circular bed with it in any part of the lawn in the following manner : — Have your bed cone- shaped — that is to say, a foot or so higher in the centre than it is at its edge. Then take your collection of heliotrope from the pots and plant them out in a circle, be¬ ginning some six inches from the edge for your ^rst circle, and so on again in a second circle, the second circle being of course some eight or nine inches nearer the centre, and carry on your circles if necessary till you come at last to the centre. Every side shoot as it lies along the surface of your bed will quickly come into bloom, and the whole will have a very good and pretty effect. A few varieties of the heliotrope might here be named with advantage ; there is, for example, the Heliotropium peruviamnn^ generally known as Voltaire’s heliotrope. This is half hardy, requires a rich loamy soil, and can be freely propa¬ gated by cuttings ; the foliage is decidedly tinged with purple, the bloom very fragrant, and also of a deep clear purple. Next, we may name the Heliotropiitm incanum, the hoary-leaved specimen : it is of a half- shrubby kind, with wrinkled leaves and white flowers, but its scent is not so pleasant as that of the Helio¬ tropium periiviajmm. Another specimen, the Helio¬ tropium corymbosum^ is a stove evergreen shrub which has lilac flowers, while a large number of other sorts are white. ' We can now do little more than hint at some of the many leading garden operations that overtake us this month. The strawberry harvest is engrossing us by the second week of the month, and all the old precautions must be borne in mind as to gathering when dry, slug¬ hunting in the evening, giving water in a drought, and BEDDIxXG-OUT.

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497 What to Wear in July. SO on. Then, again, the gooseberries, currants, and raspberries are also at the same time occupying us, and by exercising a little observation we shall find that all need by no manner of means be gathered, while the re¬ moval of a first crop greatly facilitates the ripening and swelling of* those we allow to remain on. A good number of white currants may be allowed to hang on for a while, or they should perhaps be netted, particu¬ larly in a dry season, because of the birds ; some few gooseberries also should be permitted to remain to swell to the size of the typical August gooseberry. Then the flower-beds will need a constant examina¬ tion, and faded flowers should be removed, and their place supplied by some hardy annuals which we have always recommended to have at hand in pots ready to supply blank places. The dahlias, again, will be rapidly coming on, as the following month they should be in their perfection ; what they want now is occasional liquid manure, a watch kept against the earwig, and their stakes and supports all in good order. The kitchen garden work, of course, this month is overwhelming ; weeding, successional sowing, clearing off used-up beds, &:c., giving us daily work. Indeed, this department alone could easily engross us the whole month. WHAT TO WEAR IN JULY. CHIT-CHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR LONDON AND PARIS CORRESPONDENTS. 7.— FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. [■ N bright summer sunshine we are apt to discard mantles, and our initial sketch gives not only an easy mode of making a bodice, but one that would look extremely well out of doors. It could be made in any washing material, as well as in soft mousseline de laine, and in the many Oriental silks now in vogue. The range of colour for this class of mate¬ rial is greatly in creased, and now there is a decided tendency to adopt much more brilliant colouring. The model from which this dress was taken was made in light heliotrope, with velvet trimmings of a darker tone. There is really nothing new in it — indeed, it is altogether a revival of the styles of twenty years ago. It is a bodice made full back and front, ending at the waist, with the skirt sewn on to it ; the union of the two is con¬ cealed by a narrow slightly pleated band of velvet, which fastens invisibly, by hooks, under the arm. The fulness is simply drawn towards the back and towards the front, for there are no side seams either to the back or the front, and the material is so cut that it adheres closely to the figure, save where this fulness seems to fall natu¬ rally. But the lining must fit most exactly, and be well boned. The only trimming is a soft closely pleated frill of chiffon muslin the exact tone. This is so managed that it turns down fron: AT THE florist’s. 762

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498 What to Wear in July. The hat worn with it is a novel shape and quite original. The brim turns up at the side, and stands out straight in front, like the canopies which overshadow Italian market-stalls. “CAN YOU SEE THEM?” the neck and forms a double cascade on the front of the bodice, diminishing to a mere nothing at the waist-band. It is by no means open at the neck, but it is not cut so high as bodices are mostly worn. The sleeves are a revival of the same period ; only, and here lies the skill of the dressmaker, the fashions of old days are adapted to the modes of the present. There are five puffs in all, the smallest at the wrist, and the largest on the shoulder, which is so drawn up tlnit it stands very high, as sleeves are now worn. Each of these puffs is divided by bands of velvet, and a frill of the material falls over the hand at the wrist. The skirt is as simple as the bodice. It is made up on a foundation ; and, if the material used is wool, it pays to have silk, and this should be bordered all round with a thick ruche at the hem. Over this the skirt shows a wide bind of velvet, and is cut fairly full, just sufficiently so to be caught up in a sort of double box-pleat at either side into the waist-band, and to be gathered very full at the back. I recommend this style to home dressmakers ; almost any young girl clever with her needle, and accustomed to make her own dresses, could carry out successfully a gown of this description. i ne top is niaaen wnn nowers (^ac least, the top of the brim) ; the crown, which is much less in size, is left untrimmed. The parasol matches exactly — indeed, is made of a piece of the material, with a bow of velvet on the handle and at the top. During our London season, for fetes and full-dress occasions, huge parasols have been the fashion — military tents, in fact — draped and swathed in diaphanous mate¬ rials, which have added greatly to their size. These have been extensively trimmed with frillings, so cleverly managed that the selv¬ edges did away with any necessity for hems ; and very curious mixtures of colour have been seen in these parasols, mauve and green being the most notable. By far the prettiest have been pure white — not cream, but pure white — in mousseline chiffon, and these have been much affected by young girls ; while for ordinary everyday use en tout cas have been chiefly carried. Our second illustration shows more elabo¬ rate makes of gowns. In one the skirt is plain all round ; in the other it opens in the centre of the front, to show a tartan material with which it is intermixed. I will first de¬ scribe the dress which is made with the two bands of muslin embroidery carried round the skirt. There is a gathered flounce at the hem, and it is attached to the waist in a fashion which is not difficult to carry out. Across the front it is as plain as the figure will admit ; and there are three kilt-pleats on either side, wide and deep. It is gathered at the back ; but in the present day skirts are of secondary consideration, the bodice is much more elaborate. The sleeves— cut in a “leg of mutton” form, with only one seam under the arm- stand up wide and high on the shoulders, and become narrow at the wrist ; here they end in a band of material, with a frill of kilted lisse falling over the hand. The actual bodice joins the skirt at the waist, and forms a point at the front. Plain fronts open over pleatingsof the material, which widen on the bust and diminish at the waist, where they are ornamented by a stomacher trimming of the muslin, consisting of three points, the centre one the lowest. Then, again, these folds open at the throat to show a neck-band and very short vest of muslin embroidery over silk. It is, I assure you, a very effective little dress. The hat worn with it is more of a paysan7te order, made of straw, the brim turning down towards the ears, and the crown surrounded by roses. The make of the dther dress I should be in¬ clined to recommend to those who are preparing for summer holidays ; of course, it depends greatly on what material is used. In the darker tints it

Page 515

499 What to Wear in July. •would be most useful for travelling or sea-side wear, while in lighter shades it could be worn in London. The model is in plain grey ladies’ cloth, intermixed with a check of blue and white. The cloth opens at the side with a black pointed galon carried down the entire length ; the bodice is cut much after the orcTer of an Eton jacket, opening wide in front, and bordered with the same black pointed trimming. The front vacuum is filled in with two crossing draperies of the check, forming a vest, opening just sufficiently at the neck to show a pointed piece of white cloth em¬ broidered with grey roses. The sleeves are close- fitting, with the black trimming at the wrist; and quite at the top, through a rounded aperture, peeps the blue- and-white check. This can be worn with a toque or a bonnet. The bonnet in the illustration shows just the close small shape universally worn, and is tied beneath the chin with a bow of velvet without ends. Millinery becomes more and more curious as the weeks fly by ; it would seem hardly possible to have a bonnet too infinitesimal, and the most quaint and curious flowers have been introduced — especially dan¬ delions — both in flower and in seed. Still, roses are the universal flower. All through the London season ball-rooms and dinner-tables have been almost ex¬ clusively decorated with them ; and pretty posy bouquets which women have been so fond of carrying have been principally of roses. 1 have seen a good many bonnets composed, not only of natural flowers, but of real roses. A shape is made of the stems, and fresh flowers are fastened on them as required. This is a useful little hint for dwellers in the country, who might improvise their millinery for smart occa¬ sions at very little cost. One noted firm of florists has made a specialty of bridesmaids’ bonnets in real flowers, and has scored a great success. It is a pretty idea to wear natural blooms, and a poetic one, but it requires skill and knowledge when and how to wear them. Some of the prettiest ball-gowns have had ruches and flounces of real blossoms ; and when these were chosen with care they lasted well, but otherwise they soon become faded, and most untidy in appearance. Gentlemen are wearing large button-holes ; those which women affect are rather smaller this year. The best plan for using real blooms on evening bodices, is to place the stem in moss sewn up in oil-silk, which must be hidden among the folds or bows. Thus treated, they last the entire evening, instead of droop¬ ing all too soon. II.— FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. There is a marked difference between dress in England and in Paris. Whereas at home you are all trying to see how scanty your skirts can be, how high your sleeves, and how bizarre the cut of your bodices, the leaders of fashion in Paris have only adopted the violent changes in the mode with some little reserve. You will hardly believe, as you read it, how glaring are the contrasts which are now considered in good taste by the women who not only know how to dress, but do dress weU. Imagine a bright blue muslin — of the colour you used to call “royal blue,” and were wont to associate with the Princess of Wales when she first came over to you as a bride. (By-the-bye, this colour is exceedingly fashionable in velvet, and last May I saw several dresses being sent over to England, for Queen Victoria’s Drawing Rooms, made with trains of this royal blue velvet.) But to return to the muslin. This particular one had white marguerites printed all over it, and was made up over yellow silk. It sounds alarming, but it really was a very elegant dress. I will give you another instance of the prevailing mixture of colour — an evening gown, made with a black train and light blue petticoat, both brocaded in the same pattern. The front of the petticoat was draped with silver fringe, and over this was an apron of brilliant red silk, while at the hem of the train was a rouleau of Hark blue. All these amalgamations require skill to be successful, and should not be attempted, save by a real artiste in dress. In our third illustration are shown two simple dresses which appeal to the wants of the moment. Printed mousseline de laines and foulards are most in request just now. Black-grounded foulards with large wafers of colour upon them have had a great success, and, reversing the order of things, light colours — such as pink or blue — have the design in black. Materials like this serve admirably for the picture of the young girl with the becoming straw hat with large bunches of roses. The material is light pink, covered all over with heart’s-ease in black ; and at the foot, in lieu of the universal ruche, there is a quadruple bouillonne, placed on the hem of the front breadth, and the front breadth only. This is cut on the cross, and the effect is produced by gatherings at intervals. The skirt is perfectly plain, as so many of these skirts are, and has neither fold nor pleat in front ; but at the back, where it just touches the ground, there is no lack of material. The bodice is very charming ; half only of it is made of figured material, the rest plain, matching the sleeves, which are cut efi gigot^ showing considerable fulness on the shoulder. A band of black ribbon encircles the waist, and is fastened at the side by a bow ; above which are two other straps and bows coming from beneath the arm, which confine the fulness of the half of the bodice that is of plain material ; the other half — fastening apparently diagonally over it— is in figured material, and any redundant fulness is drawn towards the centre at the waist. Where the one material overlaps the other, there is a full falling frill of white lace. It starts from the left side of the collar-band, goes round the back of the neck, and across the bodice, disappearing beneath the bands of velvet, and falling in one long end, the frill always turning downwards. The other figure shows what is being worn in Paris at the present moment by the rising generation who have not as yet attained even the important age of fifteen. The frock is one which in England would be considered almost smart enough for a fete or party dress, for nowadays little people rarely wear low dresses. The skirt is made of a soft woollen material, with three bands of wide yellow velvet. Over this is

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500 A Song without Words. an Incroyable coat of the same fabric, falling over the back of the skirt, which portion is cut in one with the bodice. This coat-bodice, unlike the usual style, is cut low at the neck, in a rounded form, showing a white chemisette beneath, set in a wide upstanding band of embroidery. The coat fastens with one button only, flying open in the front to show this full under-vest, confined to the waist by a broad sash-band. There are two large ornamental buttons on each front, and the sleeves — which come barely beneath the elbow — are bordered tvith pleating, slashed on the outside of the arm ; the slashing is filled in with puffings of muslin. Baby fashions do not alter very much ; but just now pelisses and frocks for infants are embroidered all over with sprigs, and two or three capes are not considered too much. Where expense is no object, thin embroi¬ dered silk is the material used ; but it is far too fragile for such wear. I rarely discover anything very new in under-linen. There is nothing wears so well as the embroidery wrought on the garment itself — work which is carried out in the Vosges mountains, and has a ready sale here ; but they are more useful than beautiful. A pret¬ tier class of under-garments is liberally trimmed with Valenciennes and clear muslin, and any insertion ot any width through which ribbon can be run (a rather tiresome process for washing garments). Matinees and breakfast-jackets are made with wide sailor collars and very deep trimmings of lace. Printed muslins are worn a great deal, not only for dresses, but for all this class of raimen*- and they are fairly serviceable. Benedetto Palmierl f) M ^ ( y 9—1 1 Andante nn osso. r— 1 - - - — I— — 1 p, — 1 unga. - i - ! - r- p legatissii — i - "M - ^ - no ed espress — i - ■» - T?- *1 ivo. ~J - ^ - if -ij; ^ J - J*— - > > ( 1- • - t= — ! - “ -

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501

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502 THE SACRIFICE OF MARY SOMERVILLE. (THE CHRONICLES OF CARDEWE MANOR.) BY LUCY FARMER. CHAPTER THE FIRST. TRIED BY PAIN. HEIR name is Somer¬ ville, Charley ; Pve found that out,’’ said I as my husband came in to his tea — “ Somer¬ ville.” “ The girl is a fine strapping lass,” re¬ marked Charley, ‘‘and, unless I’m mistaken, a good sensible young woman into the- bar- She has a head on her shoulders.” “ Well, you wouldn’t have her without a head, would you ?” said I ; “though they do say the sign of the ‘ Good Woman ’ has no head. But how do you know she’s sensible ? You haven’t spoke to her.” “ Yes, I have, Lucy, and to her old father likewise. I suspect all the young fellows will be after her, par¬ ticularly as the old lady had a bit of money.” It is queer how curious Charley is. Never a thing happens but he must know the “ins and outs ” of it. Now, when I ask questions I do so gradually, not direct and plump like him ; and I didn’t know there was any money, for all my questions. “If anyone gets the old woman’s money it will be John Cummings, then,” said I. “ What ! that discontented animal ? Why, he isn’t fit to black Mary Somerville’s boots ! ” exclaimed Charley, with his mouthful of cress (he likes water¬ cress with his tea). “That wretched, untidy creature ! Bah ! Lucy Farmer, bah 1 ” “Not being a sheep, Charley P'armer, I can’t oblige you ; but I’m not a goose neither, and Mary Somerville will make it up with John, you’ll see if she doesn’t ! ” Then I poured out the tea, and Charley amused himself with the bread and butter, vvith little Charley beside him on a chair. I couldn’t sit like that, quiet, saying nothing ; so I remarked— “ What have you against John Cummings, Charley “ Not much ; only he’s an idler by nature, and wants others to come down to his level. He’s just the man to bring the miners into mischief, and he has not a good temper either. Halloa, there’s Mary Somerville herself ! ” . Charley, for a married man, is really very fond of the society of young women ; and he jumped up as the girl passed. She saw him and me, and paused, look¬ ing into our patch of garden, which wasn’t at its best then, either. “ Good evening,” I said, quiet-like, while my hus¬ band nodded and waved his har^d behind my back. “ Miss Somerville, isn’t it ? ” “ Yes, Mrs. Farmer,” she replied, as quietly as my” self. “ I am admiring your garden. How industrious- you must be ! 1 wish I had your taste ! ” “Now that is kind of you,” said I ; “but my hus¬ band does some of it.” (“ Some ! ” muttered Charley behind me.) “Won’t you look in. Miss Somerville.^ come in, do.” “Yes, come in,” cries Charley. “Have some tea, miss ? Do make yourself at home.” She came to the door quietly, moving with a dignified step which we didn’t often see outside the Manor. She was pretty tall, and well shaped, with a quantity of brown hair tied up behind ; a fine smooth forehead, a firm mouth, and a pair of sweet blue eyes. Charley was right this time ; she had a head on her shoulders, and a fine head it was ; she was as self-possessed as a pet cat, and just as gentle-looking, but her mouth meant “ I won’t ! ” if she didn’t want to. This was my first meeting with Mary Somerville, but in a few weeks we got quite intimate, and I found out all about her, which was a comfort. She was a great favourite in the place and round about, particularly among the young men, who w'ere all wild after her ; but it wasn’t till one evening in the autumn that we really discovered about her and John Cummings. It was this way. There is a cross-road in our little town— in the middle — a kind of open place, and here the miners used to meet at times. There were a good many men about, as Major Henry had turned his business into a Company as they call it ; and many of them used to watch Mary Somerville going home, and speak to her. One evening Bob Cresset, a harmless young fellow, offered his arm, and told her he wanted to marry her right off, when up comes John Cummings from the “ Miners’ Arms,” pulls Mary away, and threatens to beat Bob if he didn’t behave. Bob turns to Mary, and says he, “Is this your mate, miss? If he isn’t I’ll tackle him.” Then says she, “He is my friend. Bob Cresset, and don’t you interfere, please.” Then Bob touches his hairy cap, and Cummings stalks off with Mary Somerville. When I told this to Charley on his return that same evening he looked annoyed. “ I’m sorry for it,” says he. “ Lucy, I’m very sorry that Mary has taken up with John. He’s not the man for her, and trouble will come of it.” “ I hope not, Cnarley, for she’s a good girl, and sensible,” says I. “No girl in love is sensible, Lucy,” says he, with one of his looks, which are sly. “No one. She can’t see how this Cummings is undermining the workmen, and stirring up discontent. I’ve no patience with loafers who never do a fair day's work, and yet tr>^ to prevent others working. He’ll upset the whole place some day, and there will be a fight.”

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The Sacrifice of “ But he will sufter with the rest, Charley. So what good will he gain ? ” “ Not he ! He’ll have an allowance from the strike fund, and live ‘ like a fighting-cock,’ while the others can hardly subsist. That’s his game ! Mary’s father is as bad ; he’s an old hand, and encourages John Cummings, so I suspect there will be a ‘ mess ’ over it.” Charley was generally pretty right in such outside matters, so I was afraid there would be a disturbance ; and, indeed, it came. In less than a fortnight Mary came running in to me while I was getting up Char¬ ley’s washing, and cried out — “Oh! Mrs. Farmer, will you advise me? I’m a’most torn in pieces between them, and I’ve no mother to go to.” “ My dear,” said I, “there’s no one you could come to here that could wish you better than me, and I’m not the one to let your secrets out.” “ Oh ! I’m afraid it’s no secret,” she cried — arid to tell the truth I felt a trifle disappointed— “at least it won’t be soon. There’s going to be a strike, and John Cummings is at the head of it.” “Well, dear?” I said, encouraging-like. “ Oh I Mrs. Farmer, we’ve quarrelled, and father is against me. I tell John if he has any real grievance let him tell Major Henry and his Company ; but he won’t. The men will all quit the mine to-morrow, and there may be disturbances. And what are the wives and the poor children to do?” “Ah, my dear, the likes o’ them agitators don’t think o’ wives and children. It’s themselves they think of, and many of them ain’t worth it. Well?” “Well,” she continued, “the truth is, John and I have split. I told father I wouldn’t marry any man that goes on upsetting people. I told John so weeks ago, and father says he will turn me out o’ doors if I don’t keep it up with John. But, Mrs. Farmer, I woiiH! I don’t want to fly in father’s face, but I ain’t going to fly into John’s arms either.” I knew she had a spirit of her own, and I comforted her. Then I said — “We must obey our parents, Mary ; but there is a choice left us in most things. Do you stay firm here. If your father turns you out o’ doors come you here. Charley and I won’t let you starve, and you must not be in the men’s way at present. I will see your daddy over this.” So I did, but got well snubbed. The old heathen had the audacity to say that I was a meddling, pry¬ ing old cat, and his girl shouldn’t darken his doors until she brought John Cummings with her ! Nice language for a Christian o’ sixty-four, living on the edge of the grave on his dead wife’s savings ! I had a mind to give him a taste of my claws if I am a cat ! But he isn't worth minding. ^ Cat, indeed ! Prying, too ! As if ever I pryed into people’s business ! Highty, tighty ! Then Mary said she would remain a while, and while we were arranging matters and discussing our rooms and flie children, who should come up and knock at the door wildly but John Cummings him- Mary Somerville. 503. self. We could see him, and as Mary said she would talk to him in my presence, I let him in. “ Mary’s here, ain’t she ? ” said he as I opened the- door. “ Yes,” said I, “ she is.” “ Then,” said he, pushing past, “just you tell her that I’ve come to bring her home. Look alive, old lady 1 ” The idea of such impudence ! I gave it him ! “Look you here, John Cummings, you’re not with, your deluded miners now. Mary Somerville has done with you and your ways, and won’t leave this. She is too sensible to keep company with a loafer who can’t even earn his daily bread ! ” “ I don’t want to hurt you, old lady,” said he.. “ Where’s Mary — 7ny Mai*y ? ” “Your Mary isn’t here. Miss Somerville is in my parlour yonder, and - ” “Then get out o’ the way,” he cried, and with a push and a shove he passed in before I could stop him. He found Mary, and cried out — “ Come, lass, come home with me. Old man wants ye.” “I am ready to go home,” says Mary ; “but, John,. I told you once, and I tell you again, that I won’t marry you if you persist in your conduct.” “ My conduct’s my affair ; you’ll have to marry me,, my lass, so come along.*” “ I won’t,” she replied, rising and clenching her hands. Her eyes flashed, and I think Mister John thought he had met his match. “Ye won’t come home?”’ says he slowly. “Then I’ll have to take ye.” “ You would dare to offer me any violence ! Be¬ ware, John Cummings, how you treat me. I can find ten men in five minutes to make you behave yourself Go ; I will not leave this. A pretty lover vou are indeed ! ” * ’ “ Lover ! Don’t you talk 1 You’re all for flirtin’ and junketin’ yourself You never loved me. No, you didn’t ; and ye don’t ! Yer a humbug ! ” “ John Cummings, that you know is untrue ! Give up your idle ways, and I will marry you. Go to work,, and let others work. Then you will see whether I love; you or not, lad ! ” John Cummings made use of some terrible language,, and said words to her which no man should ever say,, and which every woman would resent, if she had to pluck out her heart first. “ Very well, John,” she replied, calm and as pale as death; “ very well ! If you think so lightly of me you would never marry me. You’d best go.” “Yes, you leave my house !” I cried ; “you're a disgrace to your manhood ! Go out ! Here’s my husband and Major Henry. You’d best clear 1 ” “Aye, I’ll go, but you’ll repent this. Yah, pale-face ! ni marry you when I please. Here, stand aside, you 1 ” Then, pushing me rudely, he rushed out, and, without facing Charley and Major Henry, ran off down the road in a “tearing” rage. Then I minded poor Mary, who was nearly in a faint with sorrow and in¬ dignation. So that business was over, anyhow.

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r w 504 CHAPTER THE SECOND. TRIED BY FIRE. What’s all this about?” cried Charley, as he came in, for Major Henry went on to the village. “What’s the matter, Lucy? Mary Somerville crying! Have you been quarrelling ? ” “ Quarrelling 1” I exclaimed. Oh, no, Mr. Farmer,” said Mary ; “ it’s all my fault. John has been here, and very violent. That’s all ! ” “That’s all, is it?” said Charley, looking at us in turn. “ Well, I’m glad if it zs all : for the men are out in the town, and inclined to riot. They do say — so the major tells me — that the fellows have declared they will fire the mine unless their demands are met by the Company.” “Oh, Charley! Fire the mine! No wonder the major looked put out.’^ “ They’ll have more than him to put out,” said Charley grimly. “It’s a terrible thing;, the men are very noisy, and I hear that the magistrates have tele¬ graphed for the soldiers.” “ I hope not,” said Mary Somerville. “ They will fire on the men.” “It’s the men’s own fault,” said I. “Why don’t they remain quiet ? They can only blame themselves.” “ They are led away like silly sheep,” said Charley, “and never look ahead. They just follow a leader blindly, and suffer for it. Well, I can’t help them ! ” Then the conversation turned on Mary herself, and then tea came. Nothing more important happened that day — the night was rather disturbed ; but next morning a tremendous crowd assembled outside the “ Miners’ Arms,” and demanded higher wages. Major Henry and several other gentlemen addressed the men, and inquired their terms. They told them, and the Company said they would consider. They did, and at dinner-time nothing had been arranged. I wouldn’t let Mary Somerville out ; but as I had to do some shopping I went into the little town, which was full of people, for many of the shops were shut, and the crowd was going in the direction of the rail¬ way station. But no one molested me, nor anyone.

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The Sacrifice of Mary Somerville. 505 There was a swaying and a pushing, certainly, but people must expect such in a crowd. I did my little business in the High Street, and something pulled me to the railway. Here the crowd was thick — mostly women and civilians, not miners or workmen — waiting for somebody or something. “ Whatever is it ? ” I asked a woman in the crowd. “ The soldiers are cornin’,” she replied, ‘‘ and there will be bloodshed this day ! ” “Heaven forbid!” said I. “They won’t let the army loose on us, will they.^” She made no answer, so I pushed my way home again, and told Mary the news. But the red-coats didn’t come outside the railway station. They re¬ mained with their guns stacked up, shrugging up their packs, and smoking in the yard, laughing and chatting, and sometimes eating and drinking. But never a gun was fired, and they seemed to be enjoying themselves very much — sitting, standing, or lying about, or walking in pairs. Finding there was no disturbance, I made my way, with many other people, to the open space, and here were dozens of men waiting. I saw a man come out and read something in the middle of the street. After he had finished there was a yell from the men, and others poured out of the public-houses and side streets. I wished myself at home then, but I could not get away. People came pressing me on, and the policemen bade me stand back ; so between them I was nearly wild. Then I saw John Cummings standing in a cart and shouting, waving his arms, and pointing at the Com¬ pany gentlemen. Every time he paused there was a roar, and I could see that the men were very excited. Suddenly some policemen made a dash at the cart, but the men formed up and resisted them, and a scrimmage began. Some stones were thrown, and then the police began to use their sticks. But the miners drove them back, and there they stood facing each other, hot and angry. “ Mercy on us ! ” cried a woman with a child in her arms. “ They’ll have the soldiers out, and my man may be shot ! ” “Go home,” said I ; “mind your baby. You’ve no call here ! ” But she only shook her head ; and I couldn’t blame her, because neither of us could stir an inch. Then a gentleman on horseback — Major Henry it was — rode out into the space, and said something ; but he only got hooted at. He then read a paper, but hardly had he finished when some man threw a brick-bat at him, and it hit his hat only ; but that was enough. The police charged the men away from our side, and we fancied all was over, when a perfect hail¬ storm of stones came flying about, and we in the crowd were in danger. The police came running back, some helped by others, many bleeding from hits, and all very excited. I couldn’t help looking, but wished myself miles away. Suddenly a regular trampling was heard, and amid cries and calls and shouts, the fringe of people at our right-side street opened up, and out came the soldiers, their bayonets gleaming, as steady and serious as possible, and not a bit like the same men whom I had seen at the station lolling about in untidy fashion a couple of hours before. They came into the open space, and formed themselves in front of us, and a little sideways, in two lines ; but I could still see the men opposite. The miners set up a yell when the red-coats came, and didn’t seem afraid. In front of the rioters I could see the tall figure of Mary Somerville’s father, and I was thankful that she wasn’t out. Then the police made another attempt to catch hold of Cummings and pull him out of the cart, but he and his men fought desperately, and the poor policemen retreated. Stones came flying amongst the soldiers ; other men were coming up at the sides armed with bludgeons, pressing through the crowd. Then Major Henry said some¬ thing to an officer on horseback ; he called out, “ Load ! ” and then “ Shoulder arms 1 ” sharp as a needle ; and the soldiers all put up their guns or muskets. Then he said, “ Ready ! ” and every man looked at his weapon ; and I shook like an aspen-leaf. “ There will be murder ! ” said I ; and the people near me cried, “ Don’t fire I ” Still the stones kept flying, and some soldiers were hit. John Cummings was in his cart defying the mili¬ tary, and encouraging his men to “ smash the whole lot,” and “ burn the houses,” with such-like words. There was a swaying at the edge of the side, and a commotion. Something would surely happen. Then the movement was nearer John’s cart, when suddenly the people broke out — someone rushed forward. At that minute the officer shouted, “ Present 1 Fire ! ” and a volley rang out. No one fell but two people from the cart — one was a female, the other was Cummings, of course. But who had climbed into the cart? I had just caught a glimpse of someone pulling John Cummings away in the very road of the bullets ; but it was all so sudden and terrible that I had hardly time to remark it. There was a terrible commotion. The miners ran away as fast as they could, and in five minutes men, women, and police were all mingled, and all talking at the same time, except the soldiers, who stood as quiet as lambs, as if they never had killed their fellow- creatures. Someone said, “ Cummings and his girl are shot ! ” I was wondering what soldiers could be made of, when Charley found me, and made me come home at once. He insisted. “ Well, 1 am glad I never saw any human beings killed before ! Oh, Charley I it was awful,” I said, as I sat down in our own room. That poor John — dead — and ” “ Dead ! Who’s dead ? ” inquired Charley. “Why, John Cummings and somebody else. I saw them killed ! Oh, it was terrible ! — murder ! ” “Nonsense!’’ cried Charley. “The soldiers only fired blank cartridge! John is hurt, and so is Mary Somerville — but ” “ Mary Somerville ! ” I exclaimed, jumping up from the easy chair. “ She there ? ” “Yes; she saw — as she thought — John’s danger, and rushed in front of him to save him. She did save

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The Gatherer. 506 him so far, but his .eg is hurt. She pulled him down out of range. A noble girl, and worth her weight in gold ! said Charley. “ And he said she didn’t care for him ! Oh, Charley — isn’t she splendid? She risked her life for his, as she believed.” “ Yes, we all thought he would be shot ; but this will teach him and the others a lesson. The soldiers behaved splendidly, too.” ‘‘ Well, I am glad they did not shoot anyone. I felt dreadful, Charley, when I fancied the people were killed. But find out about John.” Charley went and made inquiries at the hospital. John Cummings’ leg was broken, and Mary Somer¬ ville had received several bruises ; but the leg would mend, and Mary would be out in a couple of days,, they said. It was more than a couple of days, though, for she had fever, and many weeks elapsed before she came round. At length one day she and John came to our cottage, looking well and happy. They thanked us heartily, and John was more particularly gracious to me. “ Mrs. Farmer,” said he, “ I humbly beg your pardon, as I have Mary's here. She is a precious jewel, ma’am, and I have learned to value her, I hope. She’s one in a thousand. She’s pointed out to me my errors, and if ever I get on in life it’ll be her doing. She’s an angel ! ” THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars respecting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge himself to notice every article or work submitted. - A Portable Electric Bell. The portable bell which we illustrate occupies a space of 3^} inches square and contains a dry battery, so that it can be packed in a portman teau. it can be used as a table call- bell, an in¬ valid’s bed-bell, or a burglar and fire alarm. To adapt it as an intrusion alarm, the bot¬ tom part which holds the battery is detached, and a flexible conductor connecting it to the rest of the apparatus uncoiled. The press-button of the bell is then placed against the door or window to be protected, so that when the latter is opened the circuit will be closed and the bell will ring. A fire alarm under the gong is so made that it can be, adjusted to ring the bell at a predeter¬ mined temperature, thus giving notice of a fire. The other uses of the bell require no explanation. Natural Soap. “ Wyoming Soap” is a mineral occurring in the Blue Ridge, about 35 miles west of Soudance, in Wyoming Territory, United States, at an elevation of 5,000 feet. A wet variety is found in sink-holes and in the neigh¬ bourhood of springs. It is a pasty mass resembling moist soap, and of a yellowish-grey colour. It has a clayey odour and a saline taste. A dry variety is found in veins of the earth, like coal, and when wetted becomes similar to the other. The ranchers and cow¬ boys of the vicinity employ it as soap for removing grease and making hard” water. Its chemical con¬ stitution is very complex, including as it does seven oxides, namely, of silicon, iron, aluminium, manganese,, calcium, magnesium, and sodium, with water and sul¬ phuric acid. A Simple Flash-Lamp, An American photographer gives the following simple method of making a flash-lamp to photograph by (see the figure). Take an ordinary clay pipe and wrap a wad of absorbent cotton round the bowl, tying it with a piece of string. Draw a piece of bulb rubber tubing over the stem so that you can place the tube in your mouth and blow through the pipe. Then weigh out the quantity of magnesium required for the flash, and place it in the bowl of the pipe. Take some alcohol and saturate the cotton with it. When the subject is focussed, and the light wanted, ignite

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The Gatherer, 507 the alcohol. The flame will rise six inches over the bowl of the pipe. Blow through the pipe-stem, and the magnesium will rise with a flash. Kolatina. The Kola nut is used by the natives of the West Coast of Africa as a stay during long journeys, like the CLica or mate chewed by the Indians of South America. It is a stimulant, like tea or coffee, but is almost free of the tannin which is an ingredient of tea, especially that from India. According to Professor Haekel, it contains caffeine and also a principle called kolaine, which prevents rapid waste of the tissues during six teams of horses and three men is capable not only of excavating, but of embanking from 1,000 to 1,500 cubic yards of earth, or of loading from 600 to Soo waggons with it, in ten hours. A Home-made Filter. Professor P. T. Austen, F.C.S., gives the following plan for making a simple and serviceable filter. A little alum in water containing carbonate of lime forms a flocculent precipitate which entangles germs and suspended matter, though these will pass through an ordinary filter. Professor Austen, therefore, takes a long, narrow-necked bottle, such as a Florence oil A NEW GRADER. fatiguing exertion, whilst, the caffeine stimulates the muscles. The German War Office has ordered thirty tons of kola for the use of the army ; and it is reported that Major du Rocher, a French officer, and his orderly, walked forty-eight miles in fourteen hours, and resumed their military duties, without having slept, under the support of kola. It is, therefore, worthy of mention that kola has been prepared as a beverage by a London firm, in the shape of kolatina, and kola chocolate, both of which are said to be more nutritious than tea, coffee, or cocoa, and also more digestible. A New Grader. The Austin Manufacturing Company of Chicago have introduced a track-cutter, or grader, for making canals, roads, or railways, which we herewith illus¬ trate. The machine consists of a series of ploughs, or diggers, which loosen the earth and deliver it from a shoot seen on the left of the figure. It will work in any soil where a plough can be used, and with flask, and cuts off the thick end. This can be done by tying a string soaked in kerosene round the bottom, at the place where the severance is to be made. The string is then set on fire, while the bottle is held bottom up, and when it is burnt out, the bottle is plunged into cold water. The sudden contraction of the heated glass causes the end to break off ; and asperities can be removed by filing the edges of the break. The bottle is then thoroughly cleaned, and put neck downward in a support — say a hole bored in a shelf A handful of cotton-wool, properly soaked in water, is dropped in shreds into the bottle, until a layer two inches deep rests evenly on the shoulders of the glass.' A cup or two of clean water is next poured .in, and the bottle tapped, to consolidate the filter-bed. Alum, to the extent of two grains to the gallon, is added to the water to be filtered. It is best to add it in the form of a strong solution, say one grain of alum to a teaspoonful of water. This solution is easily made by dissolving 128 grains of alum in 16 oz. of

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The Gatherer. 508 distilled water. After mixing the alum with the water in a clean basin, it should be allowed to stand for ten minutes, then poured by a clean dipper into the filter. The first half-pint of water which runs through ought to be rejected. Such a filter-bed will last a day ; but a fresh one should then be substituted. Of course, this preliminary alum treatment can be applied with advantage to any of the filters now in use. The filtered water should be kept in corked or stoppered bottles. A Porcelain Siphon-Head. The figure shows a section through a new siphon-head for aerated water bottles. One fea¬ ture of it is that the water does not come in contact with metal, as the internal fittings of the head are made of porcelain, and hence there is no corrosion. The porcelain is pro¬ tected on the outside by an armour of metal. The piston is sheathed _ in ebonite, and the valve is made of a rubber material. The device is also applicable to gasogenes. adapted for steady progression, since it allows the joints and muscles of the foot to rest in the intervals between the steps. He condemns the military posi¬ tion, with the toes turned outwards, as much more fatiguing, by keeping the joints and muscles in con¬ tinual strain. What is called “ flat-foot ” is a defect which tends to disappear by the spring from heel to tip-toe in straight toe-and-heel walking, and by the act of dancing. In this connection we may point out that the North American Indians walk with a straight forward foot, or with the toes turned slightly inwards, instead of outwards, whereas the white man tends to turn his toes outwards. Since the red man has lived by the chase, it would seem that the white man’s habit is a physical shortcoming produced by civilisa¬ tion. The most valuable part of Mr. Ellis’s book is that in which he applies his principles to foot-gear. His opinion is that as much mischief is done by wearing ill-made stockings as badly fitting shoes. A stocking should have a separate stall for the great toe, and a straight inside line. In order to make a fitting shoe or boot, not only the length and girth of the foot should be measured, but it is desirable to obtain contour-lines of the foot. For this purpose the author has devised a foot-stand and pedistat which are illustrated in his work. From these measurements a last can be made which represents the foot as it stands on a level surface. Photographing Colours. It is stated on good authority that Herr Verescz, of Klausenberg, in Transylvania, has partially suc¬ ceeded in directly photographing the colours of nature. At present only the shades of red and orange have been fixed, and but for two or three days ; however, the experiments are still in progress, and the dis¬ coverer of the process is hopeful of complete success. W'e may add here that the automatic camera, by the addition of a flash-light which renders it independent of the weather, promises to be useful on the Continent, where season ticket holders by the railway sometimes have their portrait on the ticket. With one of these instruments in the booking-office, a traveller s likeness can be obtained while the ticket is being written out. A New Tea. Germany has found a new industry in the collection of the young leaves of the wild strawberry, which, when carefully dried, are said to form an excellent substitute for Chinese tea. Young bramble and woodruff leaves are occasionally added to improve the flavour A New Primary Battery. The Weymersch primary battery is shown in the accompanying figure, where E E are plates of zinc, alternating with plates of carbon, D D ; the whole being connected up by a line of wires and terminals, F G. Two fluids are used to excite the current, and the carbon plates are each contained in porous cells. The liquid for the zincs is merely acidulated water, and that for the carbons is kept The Human Foot. A valuable work on this subject has been written by Mr. Thos. S. Ellis, surgeon, and published by Messrs. J. and A. Churchill. The author points out that both feet when brought together form one pedestal support¬ ing the body, and each foot by itself is only a half of this complete support. In some ancient statues the second toe is longer than the great toe, and Mr. Eilis says that while this feature occurs in nature it is not the rule, for in general the great toe is longest. This phenomenon, like the difference in length be¬ tween the ring and the index finger, is dierefore a “variation.” As regards walking, he thinks the mode which keeps the inner borders of the great toes almost parallel to each other, is that best a secret. The fresh solutions are supplied to the battery by charging pipes from elevated reservoirs (not shown), and the spent solutions are drawn off by the taps, A B. A six-cell battery of this type yields

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The Gatherer. 509 15 amperes at a pressure of 7*8 volts for eighteen hours at a stretch. For this a charge of I5 gallons of the secret solution is required, at a cost of is. The consumption of zinc is stated to be about ten per cent, above the theoretical consumption. The internal re¬ sistance of the battery is o’o5 ohm per cell. In feed¬ ing glow lamps, the cost of the battery is estimated at o*4d. for a light of ten candle-power during an hour, and for arc lamps one-sixth of that. For small or temporary installations such a battery may prove serviceable. An Earthing Device. There is a risk of ‘‘ transformers,” or converters,” which alter the current from a dynamo into the con¬ dition fit for the supply of electric lamps in houses, breaking down, and the high “pressure” current from the generator thereby finding its way to the lamps and destroying them, or causing fire, or even en¬ dangering life. Hence the “earth¬ ing” device of Major Cardew, R.E., which we illustrate herewith. It is essentially a means of connecting the secondary circuit of the transformer to earth, whenever the elec¬ tric “pressure” in it reaches a certain intensity, say 400 volts. This is effected by attaching a metal disc to the secondary circuit, and another to the ground, with a foil of aluminium between them, so placed that while it makes contact with the latter disc, it is not in con¬ nection with the other until attracted to it when its pressure reaches 400 volts. Then the metallic path between the secondary circuit and the ground is esta¬ blished and the current in the secondary escapes to earth, leaving the lamps and installation uninjured. The apparatus is automatic, and is said to act very well. It is also intended for protecting the eye from dangerous currents. Another appliance of the kind is that of Mr. Killingworth Hedges, which, however, is a variety of the well-known vacuum lightning guard introduced by Varley The Green Ray. The flash of blue-green or emerald light shot forth by the sun’s upper limb, on sinking in the sea or behind a mountain, has also been observed when the luminary sank behind a cloud, and Professor Schonke considers it an effect of refraction, the vanishing light refracted by the atmosphere showing the blue or more refrangible rays uppermost. Professor Michie Smith, however, dissents from this view, and regards the phenomenon as an effect of absorption by the atmo¬ sphere, and akin to the green sun occasionally seen — for instance, in Southern India, September, 1883. A moist atmosphere, with dust particles in it, is sufficient to cause the appearance ; the green sun of 1883 being, it was thought, an effect of the volcanic dust dis¬ seminated by the eruption of Krakatoa. Perhaps, however, the green flash and the green disc are different phenomena, one being due to refraction, and the other to absorption. There is room for further observation on the matter. New Fire-Pails. It is customary in America to keep a number of pails ready filled with water in case of fire. They are made of galvanised iron of extra thickness to resist the tendency to collapse, and evaporation is prevented by covering the mouth with tin-foil or waterproofing easily broken. Solutions of low freezing-point are also used instead of water, in glass-lined pails. Some¬ times the pails are hung on hooks fitted with a spring, by which when the pail lightens through loss of the fluid an alarm bell is rung ; and there are ingenious ways of keeping the buckets always full. A Study of Dreams. Dr. Julius Melson, of New York, has made an in¬ teresting study of his dreams, having registered and criticised no less than 4,000 of them. He finds that the evening and nightly dreams were more or less connected with the events of the day, those of the night being the more alarming or terrifying. The morning dreams were the pleasantest and most vivid, perhaps because the phantasy has then rested and is more composed. His dreams appear to fluctuate regularly in a period of twenty-eight days, and to vary with the seasons : those at the end of the year, in December, being the most vivid, and those of March and April the dullest. Not long ago a German investigator found that sleeping on the left side was apt to cause bad dreams. A Self-closing Tap. An automatic tap for water at ordinary pressures lo shown in section by the figure. The tap is opened by pressing on the knob with the thumb, but as soon as this pressure is withdrawn the double piston, B, follows the hand, the knob moves outwards, and the valve is closed. The area of c, the inner piston-head, is greater than that of D, so that the water drives it out¬ ward until it closes the escape. The arrows indicate the stream of the water ; and A is a cataract chamber, which, when the piston recedes, discharges its water back into the supply pipe.

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The Gatherer. 510 Testing Polluted Wells. The following method of testing the water of wells suspected of pollution from infiltration has been successfully employed by Professor Blake, of Kansas University, U.S. Dissolve an ounce of chloride or carbonate of lithium in a quart of water, and pour it into the suspected source of pollution. After a week draw a quart of water from the well and boil it down to half an ounce, then dip a platinum wire into it, and hold the wire in the flame of a Bunsen burner. Ex¬ amine the flame with a spectroscope, and if lithium is present in the water, that is to say, if the suspected source filters into the well, the bright red band of colour, characteristic of lithium, will be visible towards the red end of the spectrum. A* Tablet-Holder. Artists, authors, and all who write on pads or tablets will be interested in the tablet-holder of Mr. A. W. Tuer, which is illustrated in the woodcut. It is simply a board or square of wood on which the tablet is placed, and having on the left, at side and bottom, an edge or frame which may be level with the surface of the pad if desired. Standard Resistances. The use of German silver as the wire in standards of electrical resistance has been discontinued at the Physico-Technical Institute of Germany, owing to the liability of such wires to increase in resistance with time or use. It has recently been proved that copper conductors become brittle by the continued passage of electric currents through them, especially alternating currents, and some such secular change may take place in the German silver. An alloy of nickel and copper has been adopted in its stead for the standards of comparison. The alloy has also the advantage of varying very slightly in resistance with change of temperature. Alloys of copper and manganese, espe¬ cially those having under 30 per cent, of manganese, are also adapted for resistance coils. The Health of the Skin. The skin has long been regarded, and rightly, as a species of popular health-barometer. And it is fair to suppose that if the skin be out of order, there is some weak spot in the system which requires attention. How to care for the skin is the subject of Dr. E. B. Shuldham’s little booklet, “ The Health of the Skin, and its Nervous Affinities,” just published by Messrs. Cassell. The book is written for the perusal and the guidance of lay or non-medical readers, and it is one which we commend to every paterfamilias. What we Teach now. Nothing is more marked than the improvement that has taken place during recent years in the books in¬ tended both for the recreation and instruction of the young. Take, for instance, the school-books of twenty, or even ten, years ago, and compare them with those in vogue to-day, and what a wonderful change is to be seen ! The books of to-day are aimed at more directly and specially equipping their scholars for their walk in life. Before us is a new “ Smaller Commercial Geo- ,graphy,'^ by Mr. George S. Chisholm, M.A., B. Sc., just issued by Messrs. Longman. How different from the old dry-as-dust geographies of a score of years ago, that, indeed, surveyed mankind from China to Peru, but in such an arbitrary, spiritless fashion that a tyro was wont to get lost among the endless capes, seas, and gulfs, and apt to wander in darkness as to the products of the various lands, and to come away with very hazy notions indeed as to the lands from which specific objects are drawn. All this is changed in Mr. Chisholm’s book, and even schoolboys, who {pace Lord Macaulay) have generally a good deal to learn— in this respect, at any rate — may soon be expected to know where our merchants are most likely to find competition in any particular direction, and whence fresh supplies of raw material may most naturally be expected. As in geography, so in other branches of learning. Messrs. Cassell have just issued, for the use of the Young People’s section of the National Home Reading Union, a little text-book of the Science of Every-day Life,” in which Mr. John A. Bower, F.C.S., explains the common laws of mechanics, the properties of air and water, &c., while in a companion volume, intended primarily for the reading of artisans in con¬ nection with the same Union, “ Science as applied to Work’^ is expounded, with equal thoroughness and simplicity. In the very collections of poetry for young readers there is a change, too, as witness the third edition of “The Illustrated Poetry Book for Young Readers,” just issued by Mr. Fisher Unwin — a book as far above the old wishy-washy collections as is a mountain above a mole-hill. It is representative, in¬ deed, of the poetry of our day in its highest aspect. Nev\^ Music. Songs for school concerts that are at once good and attractive are certainly much required. We are glad, then, to welcome “ Lollipop Dick,” a most amusing and attractive miniature cantata, suitable for school concerts, children’s gatherings, &c., published by the composer. Dr. C. J. Frost. In the same connection it is interesting to note Mr. Myles Birket Foster’s “A Daring Adventure,” and “A Pastoral,” just published by Messrs. Weekes & Co., and in which both words

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The Gatherer. and music are far above the average. A good and original song from the same publishers is a seidng by our contributor, Mr. R. Ernest Bryson, of Mr R. Meyrick’s words, ‘‘A Song of Long Ago.” Messrs. Weekes also send us a new and not unworthy setting of Lord Tennyson’s '‘Break, Break, Break,” by Mr. Arthur Ray; a “Japanese March” for the piano, by C. A. Ehrenfechter ; and “The Quaint Gavotte,” by Oliver Cramer, for the piano ; besides “ Six Album Leaves,” for violin and piano, by C. E. Lowe, and a new edition of Emilie Norman’s “ Tarentella.” All these works are easy and original, and well suited to the capacities of young performers. Messrs. Pater¬ son & Sons, of Edinburgh, send us No. 2 of their “Waverley Collection of Vocal Trios,” which is “ Bonny Kilmeny,” by Hamish MacCunn, well printed and cheap. Another work, by the same composer, which has already made its mark, is the ballad “ The Cameronian’s Dream,” which Messrs. Paterson send ns. It is very clever, although essentially Scottish in character. Three more songs from the same pub¬ lishers call for something more than passing notice. The first is a setting, by Louisa H. Grant, of Mr. Begbie’s words, entitled “ Light and Shade,” to which the composer has given us a pretty popular melody, with an attractive rhythm. “ Easter Eve ” is, as its title implies, a sacred song, the music by Charles Gounod, and the words by C. Armstrong ; the de¬ votional effect of this really beautiful song is greatly enhanced by the addition of organ and violin ac¬ companiments. The third and last is “ Singing a Lullaby,” a taking song, of which both words and music are by R. W. K. Edwards. Four Kindred Games. The latest volume of the Badminton Library (Long¬ mans) is devoted to what may well be called the four kindred games of Tennis, Lawn Tennis, Rackets, and Fives. As one of the authors says of the game of Tennis, it is notoriously difficult to make the game intelligible to a looker-on who has never played it. To some extent this is true of all the four games which are the subject of this volume. All of them are remarkable for the enthusiasm they arouse among their votaries, and probably the publication of this volume will lead to no little discussion between ad¬ herents of the four games as to which is best. Each game is dealt with, not only historically, but critically ; and remarks and suggestions are made which are admirably calculated to aid the player in the course of actual playing. The illustrations are very helpful and suggestive. No lover of any one of these games should be without this complete and comprehensive vacie me cum. A Book about Russia. The Russian Empire takes no small share, not only of the map of the world, but of the attention and interest of the world’s newspaper-readers, and yet how little the average reader knows about Russia ! Not long ago Sir Mackenzie Wallace gave us his account of Russia as it is, and an admirable account it was ; but of the history of Russia we have hitherto been left to a great extent ignorant. Mr. Fisher Unwin has just added a volume on Russia, by W. R. Morfill, M.A., to the “Story of the Nations” series, in which it is very wonderful to notice how comparatively recent are the steps which have placed Russia among the foremost of European Powers. Almost to the end of the last century the Russian Court and people were practically Oriental in constitution, customs, and even dress. We are bound to say that Mr. Morfill often seems to take for granted a wider acquaintance with the elements of Russian character and history than we are prepared to find in the public mind, and we regret this all the more because we feel the need there is of a book like his, which shall be at once attractive and instructive. It is a strange story that he has to tell, and one that is obviously a very difficult one to tell adequately for the general public. Considering the close commercial relationship that has so long existed between the two countries, Englishmen ought to know more than they do of the history of Russia, that they may rightly appreciate the aims and endeavours of her people. We have in Mr. Morfill’s book the means of gaining, at any rate, some idea of the growth of this mighty empire. More New Music. Mr. Alphonse Carey has just issued three more books — Nos. 7, 8, 9 — in his admirable series of Volun¬ taries for organ and harmonium. The collection consists of useful and well-written pieces, and includes some really charming items. He sends us at the same time, under the title of “ Treasures of Melody,” a series of moderately difficult pianoforte pieces for young players, one of which, the “ Doll’s March,” is a quaint and attractive little composition. We are glad to see that in “ The Young Violinist,” by E. Polonaski, issued by the same publisher, there are some useful exercises and melodies arranged for two violins. Messrs. Duff & Stewart have sent us a very good song, “Two Dreams,” in which the words are by H. L. D’Arcy Jaxone, and the music is by Mr. Henri Loge. In Mr. J. Ploffmann’s setting of Mr. Oxenford’s “ Silver Bridge,” small choral societies will find a good and easy cantata, that ought to prove very useful. It is published by Messrs. Hutchings & Co., who also send us a new setting, by A. Scott Gatty, of Kingsley’s “Soft, Soft Wind,” with a violin obligato, the whole evidently being the work of an accomplished hand. From the same publishers we have also received “ Wavelets,” an effective transcription for the violin, with pianoforte accompaniment, by Tivadar Nachez. From Messrs. Swan & Co. comes “ Far from Thee,” a setting quite of average merit of words by S. J. Adair Fitz-Gerald, from the hand of Miss Scal6, whose pianoforte piece, “ On the Village Green,” our readers must remember. Messrs. J. Curwen & Sons send us, in two books, “The Violin Player,” by S. D. Gray, arranged on an excellent method, giving full and clear instructions on every point and detail connected with the art of violin playing. At the .same time they send us an effective song for contralto or bass, by Adam Geihel, under the title of “ The Watcher.”

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512 BEACHY HEAD. A SONNET. Like some grim giant who has dared to fight And conquer two stern foes — Time and Decay, Rugged and scarred through ages passed away, Its huge cliffs rise in bold majestic height, In storm or sunshine gleaming ever white ; And, strong in knowledge of security, It even dares to laugh to scorn the sea That lashes it at times with angry might. O guardian beacon of our British coast. Live on, live on, as in the bygone past. Fit type to us (whate’er the threat’ning host) Of England’s glory, hard to overcast. Of England’s strength— no infant of an hour, But giant-statured, giant-like in power. G. Weatherly.

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513 WOMANLIKE. By the Author of “ A Man of the Name of John,” “ King or Protector ? ” &o. (See. “ Womanlike, taking revenge too deep for a transient wrong.” CHAPTER THE SEVENTH. )ETTY could ' hardly help smiling to her¬ self, serious as the matter was, when she thought of the position in which she had placed herself. She had under¬ taken, at the in¬ stigation of a man whom she had hardly known for a fortnight, to en¬ courage Dickie Mortimer, who was no relation of hers, to rebel again st her mother’s under¬ stood wishes. Yet at the same time she did not regret her promise. Betty held ideas of her own with regard to marriage. She held it a very solemn thing, not to be lightly entered into for the sake of worldly advantages, and a state for which, as a rule, girls of Dickie’s age were hardly ft. She did not agree with Mrs. Adair that anyone could make a girl of eighteen happy. She was sure that Dickie had plenty of character, though it was still undeveloped, and that a year or two hence she would never choose such a husband as Captain Adair. Handsome he undoubtedly was, and pleasant — courteous no young man is expected to be in these days — but his wits were decidedly inferior to Dickie’s. If they were ever married, Betty felt firmly convinced that it would turn out to be a mistake. He would tire of her when he found her mind outgrowing his own, and she would weary of him when she discovered her own superiority, as she must infallibly do in time. Meanwhile, what was to be done ? She felt a traitor to Mrs. Adair when she formed a third on occasions when Jim evidently thought that two were company, or dropped hints to Dickie which that young lady was quite sharp enough to understand. Though she slipped out of every chance of finding herself alone with Betty, Dickie knew quite well what her friend was aiming at, and it gave her an uncomfortable sensation which she tried to forget by throwing her¬ self eagerly into every amusement that was going forward. The ladies’ cricket-match, for which they had been practising so long, was at last fixed for the 27th of August — as it happened, Dickie’s nineteenth birthday. There was to be a grand supper for the other eleven, and a good many of the spectators, afterwards ; and some genius had suggested that fireworks on the island in the lake would be most appropriate in the evening. Dickie immediately declared that she loved fireworks, and so, of course, they were to come off. “ I do wish the match was over,” grumbled Maud Adair to Betty, two or three days previously. “ I am getting so tired of this perpetual cricket, and I am quite sick of Jim’s philandering after Dick. I asked him the other day if he ever meant to speak to her, and he said it was no good while she was cricket- mad ; he should wait till after her birthday. I want to have it all settled and done with.” “You take it for granted 'that Dickie will accept him,” remarked Betty. Maud burst out laughing. “ Of course she will ! She won’t refuse a good offer, and she dare not if she wanted to. Those Mortimers are a worldly lot, and she knows when she is well off. Jim might do much worse, though ; I like the little Dickie-bird, and she is no fool — an important qualification in Jim’s wife.” “ I wonder sometimes, Maud,” said Betty medita¬ tively, “ how you and Frances came to be sisters.” “ We younger fry didn’t have the privilege of being brought up by Mrs. Ward, you see,” laughed Maud. “ Our schooldays were very different from yours.” “ More is the pity,” said Betty, sighing. “If you thought Mrs. Ward such a marvellous person, it is a pity you secured her as your chaperon,” said Maud teasingly. “ The life was becoming too much for her ; she had grown too old for teaching,” answered Betty quietly. “ I wish for your sake and Dickie’s that she had not.” “ Don’t waste your pity on us. We enjoyed our school-days immensely ! ” returned Maud. “ And we are quite content with the result, though I know you are not, you dear, prim old thing !” Betty let the subject drop. She was almost glad the crisis was approaching, though she doubted how it would end. And she wished she had Roger Haughton to consult, but he was gone away for a few days. The night before the match he arrived after dinner in company with one of the young Gordons, ostensibly to ascertain some details about the morrow. His friend soon joined the group round the piano ; but Roger sat talking to Mrs. Adair, and looking in vain for the tall head, with its simple shining coils, that always rested his eyes after contemplating the toil¬ some puffs and bows into which the other girls tormented their hair in the evenings. Presently, 753

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514 Womanlike. seeing that his hostess was quite occupied by her work, he slipped away on to the terrace outside. It was a warm dark night, the sky hazy with clouds, but amidst the dusk his keen eyes soon espied a white figure moving slowly to and fro on the lower path. Betty, pacing in silent reverie, was almost startled by his quiet “ Good evening, Miss Darell !” a moment afterwards. “You quite startled me!” she said; and he wondered in the dark if she were smiling her sweet, calm smile. “ 1 thought you were still away.” “ I have been to Eastbourne for a few days,” he answered. “And I lingered, hoping to accomplish my business ; but I failed.” “ I am sorry for that,” said Betty politely. “ I went to see Dickie’s sister, Mrs. Hunt,” he said. “ I hoped to enlist her on our side, and to persuade her to send for Dickie from here.” “ And she would not ? ” “No ; though she owned that Dickie had written both to her and to her mother, hinting that she did not care much for Jim, and asking them — though not in so many words — to rescue her from her compromising position here. They tell the poor child not to be foolish, and point out the advantages of the match, by way of reply. Alice evidently thinks that Dickie will throw away her best chance in life if she fails to accept Adair for want of a little judicious pressure.” His tone expressed astonishment at any woman holding such an opinion, and Betty, fully sympathetic, asked — “Then, what will happen if Dickie should refuse him?” “ At last I obtained a promise from Alice that if she should be so unutterably foolish, she may seek a refuge at Eastbourne till her mother’s first wrath is overpast. It was not much, but I was grateful. How people alter!” went on Roger musingly. “I should never have recognised the Alice I used to know. She is charming and very pretty still, and, I hear, a most excellent wife and mother, but worldly to the heart’s core. Her mother over again.” “ I doubt if she has altered ; she has probably only developed,” said Betty. “ I do not believe in people altering their whole characters when once they are past childhood.” “ I do,” said Roger. “ It is seven years since I left England, and I do not believe that one atom of the man who went away then has returned to his native land. They say we have new bodies .every seven years ; I think we have new minds as well.” Betty made no answer. He hardly expected any. He never could get her to talk to him, except on the most superficial subjects ; and yet everything she said had a charm for him, and indicated how much more she could say if she found a congenial spirit to listen to her. Till he was away from her he hardly realised all that she had become to him. Till he had compared her with Alice Hunt, he had not felt all her superiority to other women. He knew now that ne was deeply im love with her, but he was quite aware also that his> wooing must be long and patient if* he would hope* ever to win her. “I think that Dickie’s musical talent is very un usual,” remarked Betty, after a pause. “If they are really so badly off, why does she not try to earn for herself, either by playing or teaching ? ” “ Mrs. Mortimer would never speak to you again if you suggested such an idea.” “ What a pity ! for she is musical down to her finger tips. If she were to give up the violin, which requires genius, and concentrate her energies on the piano^ with proper training she would be fit to play in public in time, and I think she would be a success,” said Betty. “The very idea of such a thing would turn her mother’s hair grey. Mrs. Mortimer looks on playing, the piano as a means of obtaining social advancement merely,” answered Roger. “ Poor child ! How hard it is for women to with¬ stand the pressure of home life ! ” said Betty, sighing.. “If she were independent, as a man would be, she* would only marry where she loved, as a man would do.” “ Men cannot always do that,” said Roger quietly. “Then they have only themselves to blame,” repliedi Betty, as she turned her steps towards the house. The morrow dawned brilliant as an August sui> could make it. The dew glistened on the lawns, and) a soft haze hung over the lower end of the park and the lake. It would be a broiling hot day by-and-b}v said everyone. Dickie was wild with excitement and pleasure. Her plate at breakfast-time was loaded with gifts ; among them a diamond ring froiii I.Ir. and Mrs. Adair, which seemed completely to overpower her — with pleasure, some people thought, but Betty was not of their number. It was fortunate for Dickie that the duties of the captain of the home team might be allowed to absorb her mind for the day. She left her pretty things heaped carelessly on a side table, ring and all, and flew off at the earliest opportunity to inspect the ground, which was being marked out with flags, and the marquee Avhere they were all to lunch. Hers was the only brain capable of remembering all the places of the field and the principles of changing them according to the bowling, and to this she owed her proud position as captain. “ I believe I am square-leg half the time and long- on the other half,” said Maud Adair confidentially to Betty, as they strolled down to the ground. “ But I haven’t the faintest idea, really. All I do is to stand where Dickie tells me.” “ What an enthusiastic cricketer you are ! ” laughed Betty. “ What does it matter ? Dick knows all about it, so I shan’t trouble. To tell the truth, I am tired of the whole thing,” said Maud emphatically. At eleven o’clock the other team drove up in a great brake, all 'in white, with pale blue ribbon on their hats. They looked too bright and pretty a group of girls to

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Womanlike. be displaying themselves in such ungainly attitudes as was presently their doom, when the match had begun in serious earnest, and Dickie and a Miss Gordon had gone in first to set a good example. “ This is a most curious sight, to my mind,” re¬ marked Roger Haughton, as he came up to Betty, sit¬ ting at her ease in the shade in a low basket-chair. “ When I left England, men used to play cricket, and the girls used to look on ; but now it seems to be all the other way ; ’’ and as he spoke he glanced at the group of young men who were keeping the score, and break¬ ing into shouts of laughter at intervals. “It is such an odd thing to me,” said Betty, “ that girls can care to do in public what they can never do well. I hear that Dickie is a splendid bowler, and Miss Reeves a first-class bat ; but it strikes me that an average public school boy would hit the one all over the field, and send the stumps of the other flying in a single over. I cannot see the pleasure of exhibiting the inferiority of our sex in this way.” “ There seems rather a lack of dignity about it too,” remarked Roger, as one of the field rushed after a ball, stooped for it inelegantly, and threw it in so badly that Dickie at once stole another run. “ I think it is ridiculous for anyone promoted to long gowns to attempt to play,” said Betty. “But my opinions are very heterodox, so pray don't repeat them.” “ 1 am silent as the grave," returned Roger - “ Well hit, Dickie ! ” he cried the next moment, as he applauded her with hypocritical fervour. After being in for an hour, and seeing five wickets fall, Dickie was run out, and came up to Betty, to fling herself exhausted at her feet. “ I never was so hot in my life ! ” she declared, tossing off her hat, regardless of her dishevelled hair. “ Roger, do go and see what 1 have made, and bring me something to drink, or I shall die ! ” Roger obeyed, and as he returned with a glass of lemonade, and the intelligence that she had made thirty-three runs, he mentally contrasted Dickie, untidy and scarlet with heat, with Betty in her cool white gown, and wondered again at the modern young lady. Dickie's eleven made sixty-five, and the other side only forty-two, in their first innings, which were both over before lunch. The Wraysbrooke team were triumphant and lazy, as they sat about in the shade, not particularly anxious to go out again into the blazing sun. “We shall give them a horrible licking, and there’s no hurr)^," said Dickie carelessly. “ Pride goes before a fall, Dickie,” said Roger. “Nonsense I We field much more smartly than they do, and they don’t pretend to have a respectable bat except Miss Reeves, and she's a fraud, for she made a duck’s egg,” said Dickie. “All the more reason why she should not make another,” said the hero of many matches ; but Dickie laughed him to scorn. The demon of restlessness seemed to inspire Dickie this afternoon. All the neighbourhood were gathered 515 to see the match, and inspired by an enthusiastic public, she hit and ran and had hairbreadth escapes, till the total for five wickets was seventy-two. Then, in defiance of her umpire’s advice, she declared the innings of her side at an end, and challenged the others to go in and win — if they could ! “ Dickie is fey, I think,” said Betty anxiously to Roger Haughton. He had been near her all day. The attraction of a common interest had drawn them together, and more than one person had made remarks about the distinguished-looking couple as he attended her about the ground. “We will hope the evil consequence will be con¬ fined to a bad headache, which she will certainly have to-morrow,” answered Roger, as excited Dickie ran up to ask details about the score. At first her confidence in her side seemed justified, as the first three wickets of the other eleven fell for seven runs. But then the despised Miss Reeves went in — a tall, powerful girl, whose nerves had become gradually steadied as the day went on, and she proceeded to show how her fame had been won. In cricket phrase, she completely collared the bowling ; and Wraysbrooke, repenting its presumption, gave itself up for lost. Not even the break that was caused by a general adjournment for tea could disturb her, and when the last batswoman went in there were only ten runs to make to win. Four of these Miss Reeves hit off at a single stroke ; and then Dickie, in despair, took the advice Roger had proffered during tea-time. For¬ saking the overhand bowling that had been the admiration and envy of her sex all day, she began to- deliver slow lobs, and at the third ball, to her intense joy, caught out the champion when there were only three runs to make. Shouts of applause rent the air, and Dickie was warmly congratulated on all sides. But amidst the general excitement her face seemed strangely out of keeping with the scene, and presently she broke away from the crowd and came up to Betty. “ Come indoors with me,” she said. “ I don’t feel well.” Betty put an arm round her and led her away. The child was white and trembling, and when led into Betty’s room, and laid gently on the sofa, she turned quite faint. Betty gave her sal-volatile, and bathed her forehead with eau-de-Cologne, and after a while she began to revive a little. “ You are over-tired, Dickie dear. I shall not let you go down again to-night,” said Betty kindly. “ Oh, it was only the cricket and the sun,” said Dickie hurriedly, in a weak little voice. “ I shall be all right presently. You won’t let anyone come, will you “ None shall come near you,” said Betty decidedly. “ I shall keep you here, and you must go to sleep.. You will be quite ill if you are not taken care of.” Dickie said nothing, but presently she began to cry hysterically. Betty was vaguely alarmed, but trusted it was only the effect of fatigue, so she soothed her lovingly and tenderly till Dickie had sobbed herself to sleep, and then she stole away to seek counsel and to report.

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Womanlike. 516 In the hall she came upon Captain Adair lounging restlessly on a bench. “How is Dickie?” he burst out, springing up. “ I didn’t frighten her, did I ? ” “She is over-tired with her long hot day : that is all. She is asleep now ; but she must not come down again to-night,” answered Betty, in her dignified way. And in her heart she determined that Dickie should not go out of her sight again till they had had some explanation together. She made the same report to everyone, and it was received with regret ; but she kept her room clear of all anxious inquirers, and left the child still sleep¬ ing when she went down to the supper, where Dickie’s bright presence was greatly missed. The long crowded meal came to an end at last, and every¬ one streamed gladly into the cool night air to see the fireworks, whose great promoter would miss them after all. Betty ran up to her own room to fetch a shawl, intending, if Dickie were awake, to sit and talk to her for a while. Dickie was not there. She hurried to the child’s own room. No Dickie ! But her cricket shoes had been changed for her walking ones, and her covert coat was missing from its peg. Evidently Dickie had gone out into the grounds. CHAPTER THE EIGHTH. In the soft darkness of the moonless night it was difficult to distinguish anything when Betty first stepped out from the confusing brightness of the house. A light or two in the distance showed the whereabouts of the lake, and as she made her way down the path leading to the waterside, she began to make out groups of figures all sauntering slowly in the same direction. As she hurried by them she scanned each face in turn, but though more than one covert coat and sailor hat had attracted her notice, there was no sign of Dickie. At length she reached the gate leading into the park, and leaning against the white bars stood a tall dark figure that she recognised at once. “ Mr. Haughton, have you seen Dickie?” she asked earnestly. “Dickie? No, indeed, I have not,” he answered. “I was waiting here to catch you, and ask how she was.” “ I left her in my room asleep, and she has flown, taking her hat and jacket with her. She must be out here somewhere,” said Betty anxiously. “ She ought not to have come. If she catches cold in this damp, after all her fatigue, she will certainly be ill — besides, I am afraid Captain Adair is with her.” “ You are sure she has come out ? ” “ She must have come ; but I have not passed her in the walk. Where can she be ?” “ I will go and look for her. Don’t come on to the grass : it is wringing wet,” he said quickly, as Betty was pressing through the gateway. “Very well. I will wait here. If you find her, do beg her to come indoors again. Tell her I am quite anxious about her. For all I know, she has had nothing to eat,” said Betty, as he turned away. There was a dark crowd gathered on the water’s edge, and groups of more prudent people patrolled the walk. Lights flashed to and fro on the island, and a subdued murmur of expectation pervaded the air. Betty, impatient and anxious under her outward calm, leant against the gate-post and waited. Whizz ! Bang ! The first rocket was off, soaring high into the cloudy heavens, and reflecting its golden glory in the water below. Betty started as it flew on its fiery way, and scanned the excited upturned faces of the crowd, which was increased by the villagers who had been bidden to the show ; but in that momentary flash she saw no sign of Dickie. The fireworks flashed and flew till the air seemed alive with fiery sparks, and the lake an enchanted scene of changing colours — gold, and crimson, and green. The trees stood out dark and vivid against the general blaze, and under their shadow goblin¬ like figures frolicked and capered ; while shouts of applause and delight rose at every fresh wonder. Betty alone had no heart to admire the fairyland effect ; the sight of Dickie was all she asked. “ I cannot find her anywhere,” said Roger’s voice in her ear at last. “Is she on the island ? I saw some girls there.” “No; I have been over to see. We must catch her here as she goes back to the house.” He stood near Betty, in a calm unconcerned attitude, admiring the fireworks. He had done all he could, and it was not his way to worry over the impossible. “ Perhaps she is in the house, after all,” said Betty. “ I think not. Everyone is asking for Adair.” There was a sudden lull in the roaring and banging, and the last few sparks of golden rain fell slowly into the quivering water. Then someone lighted a brilliant white light while a set-piece was being prepared. “ There she is,” said Roger calmly, for there were people near. “ Where ? ” asked Betty as quietly. “ There : under the willows, in a boat. I dare say you cannot see them. Adair let the light fall upon the side of the boat for a moment, but they are in the shadow again now.” Betty could see nothing. But while a gorgeous illuminated cricket device was being vociferously ap¬ plauded, she strained her eyes in vain — gazing into the darkness. At last the end came. A shower of rockets and Roman candles wound up the display, and the excited crowd began lustily to sing “ God save the Queen.” “ 1 think,” said Roger, “ that if you were to go in now you would escape the rush to the house, and 1 will tell Dickie you are expecting her. She will certainly be knocked up after this last exploit:” “ Tell her that I expect her in my room,” said Betty, “ and that I am very anxious about her. Perhaps she will come up to me then, and I shall persuade her to go to bed quietly.” But as she spoke she knew that her anxiety was

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WOxMANLIKE. 517 more about Dickie’s mental than her physical con¬ dition. What had the child been led into promising under the willows, while the glamour of the scene around her affected her already over-strained nerves ? She slipped away — a soft white figure in the sur¬ rounding gloom, and reached the house in peace, while she could hear excited voices and steps behind her in the distance. Betty went up to her own room, and waited patiently for Dickie to follow. She was used to quiet waiting, and it was, perhaps, as well, for she waited long to-night. Voices and footsteps came and went under her window for what seemed an interminable time ; then there were sounds of wheels on the distant gravel and cheers from the other side of the house. The visitors were evidently departing. At last came flying steps along the passage, and a hasty knock at the door. Betty opened it herself. “ Come in, Dickie dear, she said warmly. I have been so anxious about you. How could you go out again like that, you bad child ? “ I am sorry that I am so late,” returned Dickie hurriedly. “ Have you been expecting me ? How awfully good of you ! You see 1 was out in the garden till the last minute, and then Mrs. Adair made me have some more supper before I came upstairs. Dickie’s eyes were bright and her cheeks flushed. Her hair was dishevelled with the damp, and her shoes and skirt were wet with dew. Betty was half afraid she had caught a chill already, and scolded her gently for her imprudence, while she insisted, against Dickie s will, on her changing her damp raiment for the dry dressing-gown and shoes she had previously fetched on purpose. ‘‘ 1 am sure you don’t want to go to bed without a gossip with me,” she said ; “ and I should not let you stay one moment in that wet gown.” Dickie yielded, for she was far too excited to think of sleep yet, and curled herself up on Betty’s sofa, chatting quite eagerly about the match and the fire¬ works, and looking more like a bird than ever. ^ Presently there were sounds of good-nights being exchanged in the corridor, and then a voice called out, “ All right ! ril be down in a moment. I only want to fetch my cigar-case.” As the familiar tones of Captain Adair’s voice fell on her ear, Dickie suddenly faltered in the midst of a voluble sentence. She glanced up, and caught the steady look that she had hitherto steadfastly avoided. With her vivid colour faded to a sudden pallor, she turned away, and hid her face among, the cushions with a sob. “ What is it, Dickie dear ? ” said Betty, kneel¬ ing beside her, and smooth¬ ing the rough dark little head. “ I don’t know what to do, Betty : I don’t know what to do ! ” moaned a despairing little voice. “ Can’t I help you, dear ? ” “ I know you think I ought not to marry him be¬ cause I don’t love him ; and mother and Alice say that if I am engaged to him the love will come,” sobbed little Dickie helplessly. “ I don’t know what to do. What shall I do, Betty dear ? ” “ Has Jim asked you to marry him ? ” asked Betty. “ Yes,” said Dickie in a stifled voice. “ I knew he would, but I did hope he would have let me enjoy to¬ day in peace first. But when I won the match he said something about being glad I had won it the same day that he was to win something, and that it would be the happiest day of our lives. I was so stupid that it frightened me, and made me feel quite queer. I think that was what made me feel so faint, really, Betty.” “ Yes, dear, very likely,” said Betty soothingly. “ But why did you go down again and meet him, then?” “ Because he sent me up a note to say he hoped “ HE WONDERED AGAIN AT THE MODERN YOUNG LADY” (/. 5 1 5.)

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Womanlike. 518 that I was better, and would come out as I had pro¬ mised,’’ explained Dickie. “And I did feel better when I woke up, and after I had had some dinner ; so I thought I had better go and get it over. Besides, I wanted to see the fireworks.” There was something pathetic to Betty’s mind about the childish admission ; but she only said gently — “And where did you go then ?” “ I went down to the boat-house, and got the out¬ rigger, as we had arranged, and pulled into the willows. And then he came down, and we were there all the time. No one saw us.” “Mr. Haughton saw you.” “ Did he ? ” eagerly. ‘ ‘ What did he say ? ” “ What about ? ” “About me. What does he want me to do.?” “ He doesn’t want his little friend Dickie to grow into a hard worldly woman.” “ Like Alice,” said Dickie calmly. Her sobs had ceased now. She raised herself a little on the cushions, and took Betty’s hand in hers. “ Betty dear. I’ll tell you something I never told to anyone before,” she said. “ I believe Roger wanted to marry Alice himself.” Betty started perceptibly. “ What makes you think so ? ” she said. “ He always was so very fond of her ; and I re¬ member so very well an evening just before he went abroad, when we had had a musical party, and he offere^i me a box of chocolates if I would leave him and Alice alone in the empty drawing-room after¬ wards. Two days after that I was in the hall one afternoon— our school-room was on the ground-floor, and we were always popping out to see who the visitors were — and Roger came rushing downstairs.” Dickie paused a moment. “ I shall never forget his face,” she said. “ He looked as if he had seen a ghost. I didn’t dare speak to him. He flung on his coat and was just going, when he saw me. ‘ Why, Dickie,’ he said, ‘ I promised you some chocolates, didn’t I ? Take that and buy some.’ His voice was quite quiet, but not a bit like his own, and he kissed me — a thing he never did — and rushed away. Betty,” said Dickie solemnly, “ he gave me a sovereign. I have got it still. I didn’t dare show it to anyone for months, and then I got so fond of it that I couldn’t spend it. It was the only bit of Roger I had left.” “Did you never hear anything more.?” asked Betty. “ No ; but I remember Alice going to bed with a head-ache that night, and she was ill and .miserable for some time afterwards, and we were told that Roger was gone away. Then Leonard Hunt came about again, and it ended in Alice’s engagement. But I believe she wanted Roger, and only married Leonard because he was so rich. I don’t believe that she is really happy, either,” went on Dickie plaintively. “ So I don’t see why she should be so hard on me.” “ Isn’t she happy ? ” “ She says she is ; but I don’t call it being happy. She and Leonard wrangle and dispute so : and I shouldn’t see any fun in being rich if I mightn’t spend my money as 1 liked : and she can’t do that ; he is awfully particular,” said Dickie. “I don’t believe May is really happy, either. At least, I suppose she is, because she always was content with everything, and she said she couldn’t expect a grand husband, because she is neither pretty, nor clever, nor musical ; so she is quite content with Tom. He is awfully loud and noisy, but he is rather a good sort, I think.” Betty sighed. Dickie’s cool way of talking depressed her beyond words. She was such a curious mixture of child and precocious woman ; or, rather, the true Dickie burst every now and then through the artificial crust of worldliness that her training had produced. “ It would be very nice to be rich,” said Dickie. “And Jim is nicer than either Tom or Leonard.” “Dickie dear, let us put this into plain words,” said Betty desperately. “Do you love Jim Adair.?” “ I do care for him a little,” owned Dickie hesi¬ tatingly. “And your mother and sisters tell you that it is your duty to accept him, and that by-and-by you will care for him a great deal .? Do you believe them, Dickie .?” Dickie’s eyes fell before the clear grey ones fixed on hers. “They ought to know,” she said nervously. “ I suppose I have no right to say anything against your mother’s wishes,” said Betty gravely, “ but if you ask my opinion I must give it you. I do not see how you can shift your responsibility on to her. It is you, not she, who will have to live with Jim. It is your whole future, not hers, that you have to decide. Have you decided it already, Dickie?” breaking off suddenly. “No, no! I said he should have an answer to¬ morrow,” said Dickie. “ Then think what you are deciding. Will you give up your free life— you, a child only just out in the world — for the cares and responsibilities of matrimony ? Will you give up your home and family to go away to India with the first man that asks you .? Do you feel that life has no interest without Jim?— that you could follow him to the end of the world ? — that if he were poor you would wait for him gladly all the days of your life ? ” “ No, no, Betty ! No one ever feels all that in real life,” cried Dickie, trembling. “Frances Benson did. She said to me once that you had not found the man you could live with till you had found the man you could not live without. Dickie dear, if you care for Jim in your heart, if you think that with a little patience on his part you could learn to love him, tell him so,” said Betty earnestly. “ But if it is only that you are tempted by the fine things he can give you, and are flattered by liis caring for you, do not marry him. Riches may take wings and fly away, but you would be tied to Jim for all the rest of your life.” “ Betty, you do talk so solemnly,” said Dickie, half- frightened. “ Because marriage is a solemn thing, and you are too young to realise it,” answered Betty. “ But mother will be so angry if I tell him I cannot marry him,” faltered Dickie.

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Womanlike. 519 “ Better a few weeks, or even months, of her dis- Ipleasure than life-long misery with Jim,” answered Betty. “For if marriage is not heaven, Dickie, it must be the most terrible thing on earth. Before you go to bed to-night read the marriage service through, and ask yourself if you can take those vows with Jim Adair by your side. And then pray that you may be guided to a right decision to-morrow.” “ I did not know one could pray about one’s love affairs,” said wondering Dickie. “ What would you pray about if not about a decision that affects yo-ur whole life ? ” asked Betty, with her !sweet smile. Dickie flung her arms about Betty’s neck by way of .answer. The grave kind face and shining eyes seemed ito her like the face of an angel. “ Oh, Betty, you are good ! ” she said. “ I love you tfar better than Jim ! ” _ CHAPTER THE NINTH. Everyone was very kind to Dickie next day. She Hooked white, and said she had a headache, and Mrs. .Adair petted her, and said of course she was overdone. She tried to persuade the child to come and rest in the ilittle boudoir sacred to the mistress of the house, mean¬ ing that Jim should find his way thither. But Dickie proved rebellious. She felt a hypocrite while she •endured Mrs. Adair’s kind solicitude ; and saying that the fresh air would do her more good than anything •else, she went off into the garden with Betty. They were picking sweet-peas in the kitchen garden when Jim came down the broad grassy walk. Ever .after Dickie hated the scent of sweet-peas ; but she let Jim entice her away, though with a scared look on her face that made Betty’s heart ache. Half an hour afterwards Captain Adair came up to Betty as she stood in the shrubbery among the ferns. Do you think it is fair,” he said angrily, “ for you ;and Haughton to have set that child’s mind against jne?” “ Do you think it is fair to accuse me of doing so ?” .“she answered, facing him, erect and calm. “ You have persuaded her to say that she cannot .marry me.” “ I have known you too long, Jim, to suppose that •you would want to marry a child who could not give you her heart,” replied Betty quietly. “ She is very young, and did not know what she was doing when she •first listened to you. Be just to her, for no one else will be, and some day you may thank her for being too honest to marry you for the sake of what you could jgive.” She looked, he thought vaguely, like Dickie’s guardian angel, as she stood there in her white gown, with the sunshine falling softly on her through the Heaves overhead. “But I love her so ! ” he said passionately. “ I know J could make her happy.” Betty shook her head. “ You have been about in rthe world,” she said. “ How many marriages have •you seen turn out well where the love was all on one .side?” He had no answer to make ; and Betty, outwardly untroubled, went quietly back to the house. She put down her flowers, and went straight up to Dickie’s room. The child was there on her bed, and crying bitterly. “ Oh, Betty dear, I want you so ! ” she sobbed. “It was so dreadful ! He did beg me so to say ‘ Yes,’ and I couldn’t ! I thought last night of everything you said; and I felt that if I were right away in India all alone with him I should die ; so I knew it wouldn’t be right. But I am so miserable, and everyone will be angry ; and oh ! how my head does ache ! ” All Betty’s tenderest ministrations were needed both for mind and body, and at last she was obliged to leave the poor child speechless with headache in a darkened room, when she went to see how the land lay elsewhere. She found Mrs. Adair in her boudoir, upset and hurt beyond all words. Nothing was too bad to be said of the girl who had dared to wound her boy’s feelings, and none of Betty’s pleadings would she hear- “Are you sure that Mr. Haughton is not at the bottom of it ? ” she asked suspiciously. Betty hesitated. “ When I said I was sure he and Dickie were nothing to each other but old friends, I believed it,” she said. “ Since yesterday I have not been sure.” “ It is disgraceful of him ! What right had he to come between them before matters were settled ? ” cried Mrs. Adair. “Would you rather he had come between them afterwards ? ” asked Betty quietly. Mrs. Adair was so angry that she actually told Betty sharply not to talk nonsense. In fact, if it had not been for Betty’s full sympathy with the wounded maternal feelings they must infallibly have quarrelled. At last she announced her ultimatum. Dickie must go at once ; that very day if possible. “ Her sister at Eastbourne will take her in to¬ morrow,” answered Betty. “ I will write to her to¬ day. Dickie is too poorly to do anything.” But not even Dickie’s headache could awaken pity in Mrs. Adair’s breast, and Betty went away to write to Mrs. Hunt : feeling it a strange fate that she should be the one to write to her on such a subject. In the evening, when Dickie was free from pain, though still weak and languid, she was told her fate. “ I shall see you through town,” said Betty in her decided, helpful way, “ and then you will be all right. I shall enjoy the excuse for coming down with the Bensons, who are coming to-morrow, you know.” Frances Benson, who might have been her sister-in- law, thought Dickie, with a faint smile. But she was too worn-out to do anything but acquiesce gratefully in all Betty’s arrangements. “ I am so glad I am going to Alice. She won’t be very nice to me, but it will be better than mother,” she said feebly. “ How kind you are, Betty ! ” “ It is Mr. Haughton’s doing,” said Betty. “ Dear old Roger ! Give him my love when you meet him next,” said Dickie. She lay and watched Betty’s maid packing for her

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520 Womanlike. with skilful fingers, with a sort of dreamy interest. But when the maid had finished her work, and Betty drew near for a few last words, she found Dickie softly crying. It is only to see my bat strapped up,’’ she sobbed. “ The cricket and everything was so jolly, and now I don’t think I shall ever be happy again.” Poor little Dickie ! She felt herself disgraced for Maud rushed up to say a hasty “ Good-bye,” before starting with the rest of the party for a picnic, and so there was no one to see them off when’ the two girls drove away, an hour later. Dickie looked back sadly at the old red house she had been so glad to see again only a month ago. How long would it be before she next saw it ? They passed no one on the dusty roads ; there was no one they knew at the station. Perhaps “A PKETTY GROUP MET HIS GAZE’* (/. 521). life. But for all that, Betty noticed that she did not appear to regret her decision. She breakfasted in her own room next morning ; and Betty persuaded Mrs. Adair to come and bid her a . few words of farewell before they started. But when Dickie faltered out something about being so sorry, Mrs. Adair could not help being touched by the childish woe-begone little face, that two days ago was so bright and smiling. She murmured something about hoping she had done right, and left Dickie a little comforted. Dickie had honed to see someone for the last time, for as they sped swiftly towards London, alone in their first-class carriage, Betty saw that Dickie’s tears were falling fast. Very sorry was she to leave the child in a hot, crowded third-class compartment ; it seemed to mark so clearly what she had given up. And yet Betty had an idea, not many hours old, that perhaps after all there might be luxuries in store for little Dickie. Two days afterwards Roger Haughton rode over to Wraysbrooke, and asked if Miss Darell were at home.

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Womanlike. 521 She was in the garden, he was answered, and he went to seek her there. Childish voices attracted him on to the lawn, and there a pretty group met his gaze. A trim nurse sat sewing under a great horse-chesnut tree, and on a soft shawl at her feet a baby kicked and crowed. Betty stood laughing and looking on, with a child of two in her arms, and a golden-haired boy clinging to her gown. In Roger’s eyes she was absolutely beautiful, as she came towards him through the flickering shadows, with a smile of love and satisfaction on her face that he had never seen before. “ How do you do ?” she said, with a ring of proud possession in her voice. “ These are my nephews and niece — Mrs. Benson’s children. This is Sonnie, and this is May. Shake hands, children.” But both children feigned to be shy, and beguiled their grave elders into a game of play, of which neither would have believed the other capable. ‘‘ Now, babies, you must sit and make daisy chains,” said Betty, as she put her little charge down. “ Make a very long one, Sonnie, and I will wear it round my neck. Mrs. Adair is somewhere in the walks,” she added, turning to Roger. “ Shall we go and find her ? ” And they moved off, she kissing and waving her hands to the children as Sonnie cried, “ Don’t be long. Auntie Bet ! ” “Well, how have Dickie’s affairs prospered asked Roger, as they turned into the path leading to the lake. “ I had a note from Mrs. Hunt to-day, telling me that I should doubtless be glad to hear that Dickie was with her, so I came over to make inquiries.” “ Poor little Dickie ! ” said Betty sighing. She was glad to tell the story to someone who would sympathise with her, for she had had the pleasant task of constantly defending Dickie for the last two days. As her tale drew to a close they passed out into the park, and drew near a bench, placed in a shady spot near the water’s edge. The current had carried an empty squib-case to the shore, and stranded it there. Betty noticed it as she seated herself on the rustic bench. “ Poor little Dickie ! ” she said. “ And all the fire¬ works were for her ! ” “At the present moment I think Dickie cares far more for fireworks than for Adair,” remarked Roger, gazing over the silver water shining in the noontide heat to the cool green woods beyond. “ She will live to be very grateful to you.” “ I hope she will,” said Betty gravely. “ But no one is very grateful at present. In fact, 1 am rather in everyone’s bad books for the part I played.” “So am I, I suppose ?” suggested Roger, smiling. “ Yes, indeed you are. I think if I were you, Mr. Haughton, I would avoid Captain Adair’s company, if possible, till you leave the neighbourhood,” said Betty. Roger fairly laughed. “ Is he jealous of me ? That is a good joke,” he said. And then he caught sight of Betty’s face of surprise. “ You know that that could only be a joke, don’t you ” he said, with a sudden return to gravity. “Yes, since you say so,” said Betty. “ But you never supposed that I cared for Dickie except as a little playfellow ? ” he urged. And then the utter lack of comprehension on her part drove him suddenly into doing the very thing he had resolved not to do for months to come. “You must know better,” he said, with emphasis, with his keen eyes fixed on hers. “You know that I never look at anyone else when you are by.” “ I ? Mr. Haughton ! ” said Betty, incredulous. “ Yes, you,” he said. “Is it possible that you are so much more modest than other women that you do not even know when a man loves you ? I know you are like no one else. I know you won my heart from the first moment I saw you, by being like the women I used to know — a type that I thought had ceased to exist. And ever since then I have learnt more and more that not one of them can compare ^yith you. I dare not say I know much about you, for you guard your thoughts and feelings from a mere acquaint¬ ance, instead of displaying all to the vulgar gaze, as is the modern custom. But what I know, I love and reverence ; what more there is to know, if it might be rny privilege to learn, I should be the proudest and the happiest man in England.” Betty had risen, and stood pale and dazed, while the deep, musical voice poured forth its stream of quiet eloquence. The deliberate impressive mannei only veiled, she felt, a passion that made her thrill in every nerve. “ I cannot understand,” she said, striving to be calm. “ You — love — me ? ” She laid a peculiar stress on the words, that was incomprehensible to him. “Yes,” he said quietly, “I love you. If I could ever hope to marry you, I should have nothing left on earth to wish for.” Betty drew herself up, and her voice gained power and passion. “ But you said,” she cried, “that if there were not another woman in the world you would not marry Elizabeth ! ” Roger absolutely recoiled a step. There rose up before him a bare, dreary room, an angry, storming old woman, a pale-faced ugly girl. And then the mist cleared, and he saw Betty standing erect and handsome, with her head thrown back, cold, and proud, and disdainful as himself in his hot youth. “It is not possible!” he said. “You cannot be Elizabeth.” “ I am Elizabeth Darell, your aunt’s poor relation — by adoption her niece,” she answered. There was a dead silence while these two stood facing each other by the quiet water-side. The leaves rustled softly overhead ; a water-vole sprang with a splash into the shining lake ; they could almost hear their own 'hearts beating in that sudden pause. Under all his sunburn Roger had turned pale, and his eyes had a look in them that she could not read as she gazed at him undaunted. “I think,” he said, breaking the silence at last, “ I think that if you knew all the circumstances that

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522 Concerning Canons and Canon-Singing. led me to utter those words, cruel as they seem, you would forgive me.’' “ There is nothing to forgive,” she said haughtily. I am only surprised at your change of opinion.” “ Pardon me, I disagree with you,” he said. “ Allow me to explain. I came to Slovvborough to beg my aunt to lend me two thousand pounds. If she had consented, I should have gone out to join a flourishing business, and taken with me the girl I then loved desperately.” “ Alice Hunt — Dickie’s sister?” she asked. ‘‘You knew that?” “ Dickie guessed it, that is all. Pray proceed.” “ My aunt offered me the money on the sole condi¬ tion that I should give in return a written promise to ■marry you some day. Can you wonder that I re¬ jected the idea in the strongest words I could find?” “ I wonder at your contemplating it afterwards.” “ I lost my promised wife and my appointment. I was half mad,” he pleaded. “ How can you wish to marry the cause of such disaster ? ” “ Have you no pity ? Can you not excuse the hasty words of a young man uttered under such strong provocation ? ” “ Why had you no pity ? Consider the life I led. My aunt was rolling in money, and we lived like paupers. My life had no pleasures : I never heard a kind word. You came down, the first young man of my own rank in life I had ever met. I thought you would at least show me the common courtesy due to a lady. You took me for a servant, and you despised me in your heart. Do you think I did not see through your efforts to conceal the fact that I was obnoxious to you ? You taught me a lesson I have never for¬ gotten. Men prize girls for what they have or seem, and not for what they are. Of their minds and characters they care to know nothing. I am not altered since we met seven years ago. My outward appearance is, and you say that you love me !” Betty spoke slowly without raising her voice, but her words fell sharp as hail upon her hearer, though he stood apparently unmoved. “ You are right,” he said, after a pause. “ You hate me still. I deserve it. But your hate cannot alter my love for you. Be content. I sinned, as you say, and my punishment is a bitter one.” “ I do not hate you,” she said. “ You mistake. I have never thought about you, or any other man. I shall never marry. I do not believe that I shall ever love.” And looking at her calm, proud face, he saw that she meant what she said. END OF CHAPTER THE NINTH. CONCERNING CANONS AND CANON-SINGING. Let us first ask ourselves the meaning of this term Canon in music. We must go back a long way — to that seat of much that is learned in musi¬ cal lore and origin, the home of the politest and most culti¬ vated of ancient races. The Greeks had Canomc, a species of musical arith¬ metic, as precious to them in its rule and order as the dogmas of Fux and Albrechtsberger are to the dry-as-dust theorists of modern days. Each pre¬ cept constituting this canon (Kavuju) : hence the rule are strictly enjoined in the composition of this peculiar form of the composer’s art — as anyone essaying the composition of Canons could soon discover ; but the vocal rendering also of these teasing compositions was in old times surrounded with an atmosphere of highest artistic import, not a little of which it was apprehended would be missed by a clumsy chorister, A NON-PROFESSIONAL MEMBER. Canonic was term Canon. a law, or Law and unless the copy was marked with directions and notes for his guidance. So it grew common enough to mark the old MS. music with these “ Canonic rules,” to be observed in view of a sound rendering. Whether these canons of singing gave the name to the thing itself, or it to the singing instructions, is not clear. Nor is the point of great import, since most people now-a-days comprehend that a Canon in music is some special form of composition, though they may be possessed only of a vague idea of what such form really is. We will ascertain. The inventive faculty in man has been put to a variety of uses. Music has not escaped him, and the field of theoretical art has offered as favoured an area for the exercise of theoretical redundancy as has the technical for more arrant conceits, vocal and instrumental. Not that all Canon writing should be so regarded. Amid much that is puerile, there is enough good work to command ad¬ miration for the genius and patience of many old theorists who have enriched the world with examples of remarkable counterpoint. The Canon belongs to the theoretical domain of musical art, and is allied more, perhaps, with the dusty “ professor ” than with the harum-scarum pupil who runs about in his work of musical gleaning, composing “ arrangements ”

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Concerning Canons and Canon-Singing. .and 7}iorceaicx as fast as an ambitious pen will carry him. It is essentially a form demanding much study and poring over books of the “ Counterpoint and Fugue” order on the part of those who would com¬ pose such. Canon writing implies musical erudition, and such an intellectual capacity as can give life and musical habiliment to the dry bones of the art — a tedious and thankless task which no wise man would ask his son to learn. It delighted the old fathers of the art to revel in the pedantry of musical scholas- fticism, and the Canon form of composition afforded an outlet for much of their theoretical exuberance. It :grew out of the old ‘‘polyphony” — a comprehensive term, which meant all such music as was of a fugal •character at a period when Canon and Fugue were practically one and the same thing. The annals of English music furnish us with the •earliest instance of Canonic writing known : viz., ‘“Sumer is icumen in,” composed about 1226 — 1230 fby John of Fornsete, monk of Reading Abbey. This is a very remarkable document (Harleian Collection, British Museum), discovered by an accomplished anti¬ quarian and musician named Wanley, in 1709. It is a Canon for six voices, these not confined to repeating 'detached phrases, but the four upper or Canonic •voices are built upon the two under bassi^ or “ pes,” .as this part is termed. It stands not merely a notable instance of earliest polyphonic writing, but is a priceless documentary proof of English musical invention in the earliest days of modern musical art. A century later Dufay [1380—1432], a Roman Chapelmaster, embellished his Masses with devices in imitation, such as the following : — Ex. a. 1 ~T - — 1 — ^ ~ •a - 1 - 1 - 4 - 1 - It was during the flourishing period of the Nether¬ lands School [1400—1600] that the art of Canon writ¬ ing reached its height. The Belgians were pronounced musical constructionists, and the Church music of the time abounds with evidences of their love of scholas- Jticism— a purpose which finally defeated itself, for the .greater intention of music became lost amid exces¬ sive tedious elaborations and theoretical twists and •conceits. This much-learning craze spread. Every imusic centre of Europe was affected by it — England not less so than other countries. Composers vied with -each other in inventing examples of their erudition, ’the merit of which appears to have been in exact vratio to the difficulty which their solution and exe¬ 523 cution presented. Indeed, the mania developed, until at last harmonious wags prepared elaborately con¬ structed scores, indicating learned Canons and imi¬ tations, which addle-heads fruitlessly sought to trace. And why for the simple reason that no Canon was there ! It was not an uncommon occurrence, moreover, for even the legitimate theorist to so over-reach himself that, after severely straining his ingenuity, his composition was really so wonderful that it could not be executed at all ! Little wonder that composers resorted to warnings, injunctions, and even versified rules to lead singers aright in the inter¬ pretation of these musical myths and mazes. This was praiseworthy in an age when the craze for device overcame the musical judgment ; for, while tonal architects persevered in elaborating far-fetched picto¬ rial as well as canonic conceits — after the manner of later epitaphists — they could hardly do less than vouchsafe to timorous choristers a literary finger-post or two to guide them aright in their circuitous jour- neyings. England soon took up the Canon parable, and ran the Flemish musicians hard both in fertility and in¬ ventiveness. In the Thirteenth century the Canon was not unknown to the English people, and the Endless or “ infinite ” Canon popular even to this day was invented by English musicians. Many years afterwards the Italians and French favoured Canons — some writers attributing its invention to these peoples. Tallis [1529—1585] incorporated the form into his well-known “ Evening Hymn ” — which later musicians

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524 Concerning Canons and Canon-Singing. only have discovered. It is a Canon of the “infinite’^ order at the octave below between the treble and tenor parts. Thus : — Ex. /3. - 1— ^ - 1 - r-j - □ — — — r-i z-d 22^ - ; ..«u ,1-J-p^— 4.. till -‘S’- i=^ - 1 -*-n SAW - - J J J ' " ■■ 'ill "S’-- J ^ J J 1 1 ' 1 *1 if*). *5 His pupil, Byrde [1543 — 1623], wrote the famous Non Nobis Domme — a Canon, so well known to all diners-out that it need not be reproduced here. Another pleasing example by this same master is the Canon, “Heigh-ho to the Greenwood” — three in one. Other English musicians have imprinted their genius upon this form. Purcell [1658 — 1695] adorned his B flat Service with Canons of various kinds ; Dr. Blow [1648 — 1708] composed many a Gloria Pairi in Canon form ; King [1687 — 1748], another Church musician, indulged in them ; Dr. Hayes and Webbe have also left numerous learned examples. Horsley (Wm.) identified himself with the Canon, and published a collection in which were several elaborate examples THE STOCK “ BOY.” of this form — including one where its author had con¬ sciously or unconsciously appropriated the “ subject ” of Non Nobis Domino. A Canon of some historical interest is the one called “ The Black Sanctus,” com¬ posed by J. Harrington, a musician of the time of Henry VIII. — which monarch used to sing this identi¬ cal Canon : — 7-s - i - rn— ^ - 1 f( 1 n ' rr ‘ ^ 'IF L . 1 L' • -H 1 1 No - va-cu - la! O tu qui dans O - ra-cu-la. ^ - - - ^ ^7 # 1 - 1 - 1 - ni - - - ^ .. • 1 -r' ^ • 1 - - dis cotem No-va-cu - la ! 0 tu. . . L - t- 1 - dJ — N , 1 f ' ■ 1 1 1 1 ' , *11 J*. ^ \ ^ .1 1 .n • r 4 ^ D - ra-cu*la seiii - dis cotem No-va- cu - la I O tu One of the best specimens of Canon by double augmentation is to be found engraved on Dr. B. Cooke’s memorial tablet in the Westminster Abbey cloisters. The great masters have all favoured the Canon, and time after time have drawn beautiful effects out of this pedantic form. Haydn falls back upon a Canon “ in the octave” in the minuet of the E minor symphony, and again in his quartet No. 76 ; in Mozart’s C 'min or quartet are a minuet and trio in Canon throughout ;

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Concerning Canons and Canon-Singing. 525 Beethoven supplies an example in his pianoforte trio Op. II ; Handel’s chorus, “ To our Great God ” {Judas Maccabceus), contains a Canon by inversion ; dementi adduces several in his famous work, the Gracilis ad Parnassum j Cherubini published a collection ; and Schubert applies Canon, two in one at the octave, to the words, ‘‘ Dreadful sea, so deep and boundless,” in the Song of Miriam. Few readers would suspect the several kinds of Canon. There is, for instance, the terminating or finite Canon, when the melody closes with a perfect cadence ; the end¬ less or infinite Canon, which always begins over again, and in which the parts leave off arbitrarily at a half caesure; the Canon by augmenta¬ tion ; the Canon by diminution ; the close Canon — when the coming in of the parts is only marked by signs, and the whole movement is written on, in one staff, without rests ; the open Canon, in which the parts are written one above the other, with the neces¬ sary rests before the appearance of each part, thus resembling something of a score ; the retro¬ grade, or Canon cancrizans — imitating the backward crawling of a crab ; the double Canon in four parts, the thrice double in six, and the four times double in eight ; the Canon climax, or circular Canon ; and finally, the numerical and enigmatic Canons, par¬ taking of the nature of a riddle, and more easy to invent than to solve. What an array of forms, and what scope for the subtleties of irresponsible genius ! It would be impossible in a short article to give examples of all these kinds of Canon. An amusing item, however, is furnished by Haydn. When the Oxford University desired to confer a musical doctor¬ ate upon the composer of the Creation., Flaydn sent in as his “exercise” the following six-bar Canon cancrizans to mark his appreciation of the honour : — Ex. h. THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.” - — r Thy voice, O Har - mo - ny, is di • vine « The doctors examined it, and found that whether the notes were sung in order or backwards, with bass as treble or treble as bass, the inorceau always presented correct harmony. It might have occurred to them also that inasmuch as it was more remarkable for ingenuity than beauty, it bore a striking resemblance to degree “ exercises ” generally. Something needs to be said anent the technicalities of Canon lore. The easiest constructible Canons, and consequently those most general, are in the unison or octave — in which each part repeats exactly the air which precedes it. These best illustrate the defini¬ tion of Canon, the nature of which composition com¬ pels that the opening voice part shall, after a brief rest, be repeated note for note by the next voice, and so on. The following few notes afford an example of a Canon two in one at the octave, so called because the two parts render the same notes an octave apart : — It furnishes also what is known as an “infinite” Canon, the singing of which might go on for ever if the performers so willed ; but composers, thoughtful lest some industrious minds might be seized with such a mania, often mark with a pause, the point at which the piece can be fully concluded. The opening part of a Canon is called its “ subject,” the answering part the “consequent.” A Canon by “inversion ” is when the subject is answered by the melody in an inverted form. In Canon by “augmentation,” the answer is given in notes double the length of the subject ; and ingenious minds have even perpetrated Canons by “double* aug¬ mentation,” wherein the notes are double the length of the second answer, and four times that of the first. Correspondingly a Canon by “ diminution ” is one in which the notes of the answer are half the

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A Chat on Good-Nature. 526 length of the subject ; and the “ double diminution ” Canons lessen by relative ratio. Other kinds of Canon are the ‘‘ strict,” the “ open,” the ‘‘ finite,” and the “ Canon polymorphus,” but the reader need not be burdened with definitions of these. The singing of Canons claims notice. Centuries back the Canon — more probably what we call a round — was the chosen vehicle for native musical expression. The art and science of music had not become the vast medium of culture nor the gigantic and profitable commercial enterprise it now is, but the innate love of singing led our ancestors to gather to the chimney corner, and give play to their natural capacity for harmonious weaving. The temper of the age afforded time for such pleasures ; besides which music was not scattered into directions as it now is, nor ex¬ hausted in the wide field of instrumental art. All was restricted comparatively to the single sphere of vocal art, and singers, with no eye to professional¬ ism, grew into learned and accomplished musicians, taking delight in the rendering and solution of the puzzles and enigmas in counterpoint which came in their way. It has to be regretted that this favourable condi¬ tion of things became affected by the march o^ sterner social and political conditions. Native art found a refuge only among a few cathedral musicians and choristers, who it may justly be said preserved it until the advent of the Victorian era. This age has witnessed the genesis of a vast number of musical societies throughout the kingdom devoted to the cause of native art, among which the Round, Catch, and Canon Club is closely identified with our subject. This society is pledged to the cause of native art, and the present writer can bear testimony to t*he excellent work done in perpetuating those thoroughly native forms of art which, like the Canon, come within the province of the club. Constituted of professional and non-professional members, it duly appoints officers, such as “ Librarian,” ‘‘ Chancellor of the Exchequer,” “ Clerk of the Records;” while the chairman is “ Mr. Speaker.” The institution dinner precedes the musical performance, and it is rare if some notabilities in society are not present. The sketches before the reader were taken upon the occa¬ sion of the last season’s meeting at Willis’s Rooms, London, when the leading singers of Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s Cathedral, with the stock “ boy,” did justice to a few examples from a delight¬ ful phase of native art — a phase which we should do well to encourage in these days, given over as the age is to musical productions of a frivolous cast. Frederick J. Crowest. A CHAT ON GOOD -NATURE. HILDREN and some grown-up people often express their dislike of an irascible or peevish indi¬ vidual by calling him a crab, a name too intimately associated with what is sour to require an ex¬ planation ; or they may be heard to vent their disapprobation of such persons by applying to them the more remarkable epithet of cross-patch, concerning which the etymolo¬ gist’s explanation is rather interesting. A patch, he tells us, means a paltry fellow, the name having been originally applied to a fool, on account of the patched dress worn by licensed fools. Hence a cross-patch is one who is cross, rendered less tolerable on account of insignificance. So much for a crab and a cross- patch. But these two words do not by any means exhaust the terms of dislike by which ill-temper, in its many shapes, is constantly greeted. Now, what are the names opposed to these What do we call the good- natured — those who are remarkable for geniality and kind-heartedness? Alas ! either my memory fails me, or else the world has shown less aptitude in signalising with honourable titles this virtue, than it has in ap¬ plying censorious epithets to its opponent. Perhaps it is that we are familiar with good-temper, so never think of exalting it with conspicuous titles. Perhaps, the more cynically disposed will suggest, men are quicker and more clever in framing their censure in apt expressions, than their praise. However this may be, matters little. ‘‘A rose by any other name would smell as sweet ; ” and if good¬ nature had no name at all it would still be beautiful. Is it not beautiful? It gleams and sparkles in happy eyes like summer sunshine. It tints the heart with warm soft rays. People like to bask in good-nature ; they like to sun themselves in it, and quiescently enjoy its charms. The effect of its beauty is not a studied effect; and people are delighted with it because they cannot help being delighted. Good¬ nature scatters happiness about as though it cost nothing ; the kindness that flows from it comes as from an original source ; not like a mere reflection, not like that kindness which has been compared to a cold mechanical echo, returning just what was given. Good-nature is beautiful ; and its beauty is not of that questionable kind which makes people wonder why they praise it. It takes colour from many things, and appeals for approval to many sources of admira¬ tion ; but its essential loveliness rests on that grand foundation of beauty — utility. The cheerfulness and k*ndly courtesy, which dis- ^

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A Chat on Good-Nature. 527 tinguish genuine good-nature in society, make it one of the most appreciated of guests. Society can make itself happy with a very limited degree of knowledge and but a spare amount of wit. Its happiness, indeed, is a thing difficult to understand : the elements which it includes appear to vary with its varying whims, and with the resorts which society frequents ; but of all the compounds that can administer happiness to people in groups, I venture to affirm that good-nature is an indispensable ingredient. Cheerful people are people whom we are usually glad to see. We may meet them without pleasure occasionally ; some people when they are melancholy like it to rain, and few of us, when we are sombre and given to grave reflections, can fully appreciate an exuberant overflow of happiness in others. There is something cf unsuitability in the matter that jars on us, and makes our gloom more gloomy by the contrast. But these are exceptional cases, and usually it is cer¬ tainly more advantageous to meet a cheerful person, even if the chatter we must listen to is occasionally flippant and uninteresting, than to have one’s arm secured by a gloomy companion, who considers one’s ear a fit receptacle for the complaints and troubles of which his family and intimate friends are wearied out, and which the newspapers obstinately refuse to entertain. Cheerful-tempered courtesy makes every path in life easier and pleasanter, not only for tfiose who possess it but for everybody they meet. The contrast between this outcome of good-nature and the required civilities and ceremonies of society impresses us whenever we have the good fortune to meet the dcbon7iai7'es^ who are at heart polite. “ Courtesies to noble minds,” says a good writer, “ are not only gifts but purchases that buy men out of their own liberty.” The courtesy which springs from disinterested kind¬ ness, the ^urtesy of good-nature, is an open sesame ” to every ifeart ; all men acknowledge it, and when they receive it, own themselves debtors to those who pay it them. Where then shall we go to study good-nature.^ Whom shall we take for our models? •Good-nature is ubiquitous as the sunlight. It softens with warm cheerful touches the elaborate apartments of extrava¬ gant wealth ; it tones down the sharp outlines which need leaves painfully exposed in the houses of the poor. Good-nature has nothing to do with caste, nothing with localities, nothing with nationalities. “ If a man,” says Lord Bacon, “ be gracious and courteous to strangers it shows he is a citizen of the world.” The good-natured and the sweet-tempered are a great and flourishing brotherhood, and the links that bind them together reach round the world. Their signs of recognition are not difficult to detect ; they are exhibited in kindliness, in geniality, in sociablility. These people are a fraternity continually drawing men closer to men ; while they are every¬ where breaking down the barriers of wealth and pride, and forming amalgamations of the good for every de¬ scription of advantage. But how is good-nature to be acquired ? We cannot assume it ; it is not a cloak we can put on for a particular occasion. Though we have occasionally- seen people trying to imitate good-nature, the effect that follows such efforts is usually as deplorable as that which rewards the attempt to copy good manners without good feeling and education. People cannot be good-natured for the occasion ; when they try there is usually something awkward and uncomfort¬ able in the attempt, which impresses us unfalteringly with the idea that they want something from us. Their smile deepens into the distressing malformation of a smirk. Their geniality expands into a flare of unmeaning amiability. Their mirth is uncontrollable when you accidentally say something that introduces the possibility of a laugh, and then wish devoutly you had not said it ; and when, in the climax of their hypocritical ebullition of sociability, they thump the table, or even slap you on the back, you begin to think that there is some truth in the saying that “Nothing so much resembles an honest man as a rogue.” No ! good-nature is not to be imitated ; but it is to- be acc^uired, and as the acquisition of all the ac¬ complishments and graces comes by instruction and observation, let us observe those who are singular for sweetness of temper, and let us instruct ourselves fron^ their conduct. Let us mix in their society ; and we shall be sure to catch something of their nature. “ That man is not bad whose friends are good ; ” and they are not likely to grow peevish who are continually observing the advantages of a good temper. Some people are full of good-nature — so much so as- to remind us of the little boy who protested he was- so full of happiness he could not be any happier until he had grown. They live upon things, somehow, that produce happiness, or at all events those qualities which make others happy. They absorb into their nature all the bright and sunny things of life, and give them out again in rays of warmth and comfort. In what exact manner they so nourish their good-nature-, it is not easy to say, unless the explanation of the little girl be received as satisfactory, who, when the- simlight fell upon her spoon at dinner and made it golden, put it quickly in her mouth ^nd said triumph¬ antly, “ Oh, mamma. I’ve swallowed a whole spoonful of sunshine ! ” What has been said of generosity might even more aptly be said of good-nature: “It is catching, and if so many escape it, it is in a small degree for the same reason that countrymen escape the small-pox — because they meet with no one to give it them.” Good temper is certainly infectious ; and if a man mixes in happy and cheerful society without showing any symptoms- of good-humour, it must be because he has been inocu¬ lated with the germs of incurable dissatisfaction. Such people often eventually forsake the genial side of life altogether, and learn to be cynics. They walk on the- shady side of the road in January, and comfort them¬ selves perpetually with that reflection, which to the- wise can only be beautiful in its season : — “There’s such a charm in melancholy, I would not if I could be gay !

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Life in a New Zealand Homestead. 528 But what good particularly is good-nature to those who possess it ? This, after all, is the most important question. It is not always selfishness, as selfishness is usually understood, to think of one’s own advantage. Our most unselfish impulses are associated in a subtle and wonderful way with our own interests ; and when we deny ourselves a pleasure or give ourselves pain for the sake of others, we are satisfying some impulses within us with an ulterior view to happiness. What, then, is the good of good-nature to ourselves ? Sup¬ pose we could be as good-natured as some people we know — what then It is true we should gain the little advantages that society is bound to offer those who are habitually agreeable ; but would there not be disadvantages connected with our success ? Affability is a snare, is it not, that leads people into the un¬ expected depths of familiarity, from which they soon wish to escape ? Is not a little surliness or crustine 5S a necessary safeguard against impostors, and also against those attractable atoms of society, which, having no distinct proclivities or inclinations, and consequently little to make them interesting or useful, attach themselves with indissoluble tenacity to any¬ body who happens to be near them No! no! Such suggestions are unworthy of us. Good-nature, being an essential element of Virtue, is its own reward ; it increases our happiness and our aptitude for happi¬ ness ; while, touching the drawbacks to which it is incident, good-nature will guard itself. “ Pride, ill- nature, and want of sense,” says Dean Swift, “are the three great sources of ill-manners ; ” and if people will learn wisdom with regard to these three particulars, their good-nature will not expose them to more incon¬ veniences than the just responsibilities of life incur. The general plan of most homesteads on large runs, and the ordinary occupations of their owners, are so similar, that a descrip¬ tion of one will give a fair notion of the many hundreds scattered throughout the coun¬ try. The homestead furnishing our illustra¬ tions lies some hun¬ dred miles north-west of Christchurch, in the South Island, among the New Zealand Alps, where the scenery is wild and beautiful. The first impression on reaching the cosy little one-storeyed house is of peace, and a conviction that the world is left behind. And this is a feeling not readily dis¬ turbed ; for perhaps, if the family is small, there will only be some dozen souls on a run of a hundred thousand acres, with no news but that brought by a weekly mail, the latter involving a ride of forty miles. It is not then wonderful that life remains pure and simple, and that one actually does escape from many of the worries of the outer world. To assert that the domestic life of a New Zealand sheep farmer and his household in the backwoods has in it little of hardship or discomfort will, perhaps, astonish the generality of English people. But such is the fact. The rooms of the house are spacious and cheerful, with a wide verandah outside, covered with creepers, honeysuckle, and roses. By the way, the rose-trees in this part of the world grow so high that at Christmas, when the sitting-room is decorated with ACROSS A SHINGLE ALP.

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Life in a New Zealand Homestead. 529 Marechal Niels, they are inaccessible without a ladder’s help. Though the life is principally an out¬ door one, even in winter, every com¬ fort is found within : from Liberty cush¬ ions and a Broad- wood to fine glass and damask. The mistress and her neighbours vie w'ith each other in making their homes pretty and picturesque. Outside, the sheds and stables are rude and rough, but in¬ doors comfort reigns supreme. Much thought is spent on the fare, and great efforts made to disguise the inevitable mutton, which is, of course, the pihe de resista7ice. The menus are, however, varied now and again by gifts from neighbours — so called, though the nearest is twenty miles away — and the sportsmen who bring in wild cattle, pigs, turkeys, hares, and all sorts of water-fowl. Still, the housekeeper can place no dependence on these, and her brain is exercised in veiling the monotony of the fare ; and very wonder¬ fully successful, as a rule, are her efforts. Home-cured hams, bacon, eggs, and cakes are the staple dishes, and supplemented by an overflowing dairy and kit¬ chen garden, it is surprising how much can be done with simple materials. Bread is baked at home, of course, unless one wishes to send seventy miles for it. The hours are only comfortably early at the station, unless there is extra work to be done. Generally, how¬ ever, one is up betimes ; for early morning is glorious among the New Zealand mountains : clear and fresh, with an exhilarating atmosphere, and a crisp feel¬ ing even in midsummer. It is a pleasure, moreover, which will bear frequent repetition, to watch the sky slowly brighten behind the dark mountains, with long, crimson rays stretching far into the intense blue, until at last the grand old sun bursts forth in full power. The breakfast-table is always laden with fruit, which has to be freshly gathered, the butter put in the snow stream to cool, and many other duties attended to. The poultry are cared for by the mistress ; and great is the cackling and fluttering at the first sound of her footstep. As a rule the egg returns are good, and broods flourish, except when the playful raids of collie pups result in wholesale massacre. Fruit-picking and jam-making are very important items of the summer, hundreds of pounds being made for consumption during the long winter months. Meanwhile, the gentlemen are engaged in the usual work of a farm ; the early summer being more ex¬ 754 AN UP-COUNTRY KITCHKN. — A MUTTON PIE. clusively devoted to the sheep, when the mustering, drafting, shearing, washing, and branding of lambs have to be done. Shearing is by far the hardest work, for all hands turn out at 5 a.m., and get through their twelve hours’ shift. The master is the first to stir, and usually rouses the twenty or thirty shearers, who sleep in the men’s “ whari^ ” ; in fact, the boss, if he is really hard-working, has few idle moments to fill up. In the evening, when work is done, the gentlemen repair to the river-bed for a bath in a deep pool shel¬ tered by a cliff, and fed by a tiny ever-flowing stream, cool and clear as crystal, with a marvellously invigora¬ ting power. The rivers are very treacherous, and so rapid and wide that a ferry or home-made bridge is out of the question. Astonishing are the escapes when fording on horseback or dog-cart, for the water often washes round the waist of the rider and into the carriage. There are few casualties however, and these occur from ignorance or lack of presence of mind. Rain and snow on the surrounding mountains always cause the rivers to swell suddenly, so that in a couple of hours what was a grey, flat, shingly river-bed, with its three or four shallow streams, becomes a rushing flood a mile wide, whirling indiscriminately down its course trees, cattle, and sheep at an awful speed. At such times, and for days after, the river is utterly impassable, and woe betide the unlucky traveller caught on the wrong side ! for there he will have to remain until the river subsides. Very exciting are the sudden gallops and hurried departures occasioned by the news that “the river is coming down.” After five o’clock tea, which is taken in the verandah, on the tennis-court, or in the fields when haymaking /

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530 Life in a New Zealand HowEbTEAD. and harvest are in full swing, all real work is over for the day, and amusements take their turn. Ten¬ nis, reading, needlework, and chit-chat are the rule. Everyone makes a change in dress for dinner, and the evenings slip away quickly under the soothing in¬ fluences of pipe and music, moonlight and yarns. Occasionally the quiet of the homestead is broken by a shrill ‘‘ K — E — A ! K — E — A ! ” from overhead. It is the cry of the gaily coloured hawk-like parrot so destructive to the flocks, and whose note acts on the shepherds like a red rag on a bull. There is a hurrying for guns by any who chance to be about, and a few cleverly imitated calls bring the stupid birds within shot. The pleasures of a station life are innumerable, especially to those with a fair amount of good health, and a determination to enjoy everything. Horse exercise is the chief feature : long rides, rough and tiring perhaps, but always interesting, and possibly, if you happen to ride a half-broken colt, exciting enough ; impromptu races over soft sweeping downs ; running in wild horses is good fun, in which the ladies often take part ; picnics in the beautiful bush ; or tennis tournaments, to which neighbours flock from far and wide. Expeditions, in the form of riding and driving tours to other parts of the island, are some of the amusements ; while the monotony of up-country life may be relieved at intervals by trips to Christchurch, for a spell of town gaieties. In the backwoods, as all the world over, pleasure and sorrow sometimes elbow each other in strange mingling. One day, a merry party from the home¬ stead, riding to a distant part of the bush, drew into a clearing where a young bushman had settled with his wife. Here the pathetic sight which met the riders hushed their jokes and laughter, subduing them with the presence of a great grief. Bush-robins warbled round, the mocky-mock trilled his sweet soft notes, and the flashing wings of brilliant parakeets lit the clearing. But the sturdy bushman would hear their songs no more. To him, and to the happiness of this quiet bush home, death had come— sudden and awful,, dealt by some falling tree or bough. Pitiful enough to the intruders seemed the young widow, bowed over the stump ot a tree felled by the hand that was stilled ; his axe lying idly by, and his dog, unheeded, offering the mute comfort of a shared sorrow. Silently the riders turned back, leaving one of their companions to give the sympathy and the help so needed. Something must be said of this bush— that mar¬ vellous place which defies description. For no words could make anyone who had not seen it understand the imposing grandeur of the immense trees, hun¬ dreds of feet high, with creepers falling from their very summits in masses ofgreen and polished twining ‘^supple-jacks,” or thorny “lawyer;” the sunshine flickering here and there, lighting up some grand old trunk of hoary growth ; or a laughing, sparkling cas¬ cade, coursing through giant ferns tall as a man. Often whilst resting in its shadows one hears mysterious voices and steps, which are but phantom sounds ; and it is no uncommon thing, when riding through, to turn in the saddle and wait for the horseman, the hoofs of whose steed are plainly heard, but never seen. One dark night, when a storm was gathering, a ball of blue fire appeared to settle on the indignant horse’s neck, and restlessly flew hither and thither, disappearing only on reaching the open. All firewood comes from the

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The Merchant Prince. bush, and it is a thrilling moment when some mon¬ arch tree crashes down, carrying everything before it, to lie prostrate until fetched by the bullock-team and kindled into glowing life on the open hearth. The team of ten bullocks is a curiosity in itself The Herculean work these mild but mighty animals achieve is extraordinary, obeying word of mouth and crackings of the whip. What country is without some slight inconveniences ? Here the strong wind is troublesome in summer ; so much so that walking is irksome, and its violence places umbrellas or big hats out of the Ciuestion. In riding it is especially felt, for the sun is so hot and fierce, one really requires extra shelter for the head and neck ; but the only thing possible for a lady to wear is the old-fashioned sun-bonnet, tied under the chin, and so easily kept in place. The sand-flies, too, are a pest, and particularly punish strangers. It is a minute fly, something like a midge, but its sting raises immense swellings, intensely irritable and not easily relieved. Earthquakes are perhaps the most serious trouble. They are rather frequent, sometimes severe, and very alarming. Imagine awaking at midnight to find the wall cracking from roof to floor, everything tumbling about the room, the bed heaving and trembling, and a hideous underground roaring, which is heard perfectly distinct from the stage thunder of the iron roof. This is a reality beside which nightmares dwindle. In the morning, too, it is vexatious, among other misfortunes, to discover that all the milk has found its level on the dairy floor. Sheep-dogs are important members of a homestead. Each “ hand ” has at least one or two, and the boss four or five. They are valuable items, more costly than ordinary horses, and all but human in sagacity. One dog was such a beauty, so perfect in points and 531 temper, that he was allowed the run of the house — a privilege permitted to no other doggie, but, alas ! this produced ill-will towards the favourite, shown by many a snap and snarl. One day the envied one was miss¬ ing, and search being made next morning, the poor dog was found literally bitten to death by his jealous companions. Neighbours are few, and therefore valued, the dis¬ tance from run to run being less hindrance to social intercourse than might be expected ; for to the colonial a saddle is as easy as an arm-chair, and to ride twenty miles in the morning for a picnic or tennis tournament, returning the same road at night, is not thought out of the way. One lady well above sixty rode seventy miles to her station against a howling nor’-wester ; and on her arrival made the beds and cooked the supper. If a particular store falls short, or the garden fails in any commodity, friends always supply the defi¬ ciency. One morning a _fine lake trout, weighing fifteen pounds, arrived in time for breakfast. It had been speared the night before, and sent twenty miles to be eaten fresh. Hospitality is unbounded, irrespective of the guest’s social standing. He is made equally at home in the drawing-room or kitchen, and the traveller is in no need of money. He and his horse may wend their way from homestead to homestead, always secure of a welcome, a meal, and a bed. ine rouna ot a year or so is none too long to appre¬ ciate the characteristics of so genial a people, or the enjoyments offered by a life in the backwoods. And when the visitor takes his unwilling departure, he may be sure of carrying with him a hundred pleasant reminiscences, and health infinitely refreshed by moun¬ tain breezes. Lily Carlon Davies. THE MERCHANT PRINCE. A Story in Three Parts. By J. BERWICK HARWOOD, Author of “What the Coral Reefs Gave Me,“ “Paul Knox, Pitman,” “ Lady Flavia,” &c. PART THE SECOND. HAD not come to San Antonio to eat the ^ bread of idleness, and that unjust steward, the , old factor, ivas perturbed in spirit when he - found how resolutely I set to work from the first to reform abuses and make the best of Don Alvaro’s splendid, but neglected, property. The estate had been sorely mismanaged, and sloth, and greed, and ignorance were rampant among those in whom my indolent employer had put his trust. Fertile tracts were being swallowed up by the en¬ croachments of marsh and forest ; the rents, which were mostly paid in kind, were shamelessly embezzled by the collectors, and roguery alone fattened ; while the copper-coloured peons who tilled the soil were ground down to the veriest pittance on which life could be sustained. In two months’ time I was able to apprise Don Alvaro that the landlord’s returns would be at least double what they had been, and that I had hopes of a far greater surplus at the end of the year, when maize, and cotton, and coffee, and tobacco, and indigo should have been fairly grown and sent to market. I became popular, too, with the Indian labourers, whom white men too commonly treated as Helots, or beasts of burthen, and whose humble standard of comfort 1 trusted to raise, while increasing the revenues of their employer. But a reformer cannot please everyone, and I was twice fired at from behind a thicket before three weeks were out, and found it expedient to arm with a Colt’s revolver, in discouragement of future attempts at assassination.

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532 The Merchant Prince. “ Mean critters, these cowardly greasers ! ” observed the lame old giant from Kentucky who had settled down as the village blacksmith, ^‘but you, Britisher, are clear grit, and they’ll scarcely dare to attack you when you’ve a six-shooter handy : no, nor when the young chief is at your elbow, for them Injuns can scent an ambush as a bloodhound sniffs the trail of a hurt deer.” And indeed Athualnianco, who had conceived a regard for myself that was nothing less than affec¬ tionate, was now my constant companion in the long wajks or rides which the extent of the property under my charge rendered needful. He could never be induced to enter the house, which stood, according to tradition, on the site once occupied by the dwelling of his forefathers, but he came every day to share my rambles, brought me frequent supplies of game from the woods, and in every way manifested the friendly feeling that gratitude had inspired. His command of the Spanish tongue improved with practice, while I picked up, in consequence of our conversations, a knowledge of the native language such as a foreigner seldom acquires. I was very glad of a sympathetic listener, and Athualmanco was soon cognisant of my short history, of my ill-starred attachment to Leonora, and of my vague hopes of one day being able to claim her as my wife with the consent of her worldly-minded father, for which end it was necessary that I should grow rich. It was on a sultry morning some three months after my arrival at San Antonio that I was in the act of mounting my horse, one of half a dozen wiry mustangs that grazed in the home corral, when Athualmanco, whom I had not seen for a day or two, came gliding up with the noiseless tread peculiar to his race. “ I would speak with you, Don Hereward, before you ride forth,” he said earnestly, and I at once divined that he was reluctant to converse in the presence of Miguel, the mestizo^ or half-breed, who held my stirrup, and whose ears were quick to drink in whatever might tend to his personal profit. Bidding Miguel, there¬ fore, walk the horse to and fro till my return, I ac¬ companied Athualmanco, who skirted the garden and turned into the forest hard by, threading the narrow paths until a clearing made by some accidental fire, as the charred stumps averred, was reached, and in the midst of this he turned and confronted me. “ You would be rich — most men would ! ” he added, with a sad smile. “ But in your case it is that you may marry her you love } ” Have you found a gold-mine, Athualmanco ? ” I asked carelessly. ‘‘ If so, and it is on Don Alvaro’s land, perhaps - ” “ It is on no land ! ” interjected my strange associate. ‘‘Hearken to me, Don Hereward. You wondered possibly that I came not these three days past. The reason is that under the palmetto thatch of our cabin there was sickness — ay, and death. My grandfather — you have heard of the old cacique ? — he is dead, and we have laid him in the earth as befitted his rank. / am master now, and the secret rests with me.” “ The secret ? ” I repeated wonderingly. “ Yes, the knowledge that is the heirloom of our race,” replied Athualmanco, with perfect seriousness ; “ and what it was not mine to give while my grandsire lived shall be freely yours, amigo mio. The boy you saved from the sharks has wealth in his gift, English friend, and he will make you rich, if you will, that you may wed the lady of whom you have told me.” I stared at him. Could it be a jest or a boyish blunder? No; Athualmanco never jested, and he was too shrewd and sensible to affirm what he could not make good. He seemed to read my thoughts. “ You are safe in trusting me, English lord,” he said gently. “For the moment we must part, for I have much to arrange, but if at moon-rise you will meet me on the sea-shore, where one tall black rock towers aloft beside a creek — you know the spot ? — I will show you how to win wealth that shall make you happy with her you love. When day is over, there is no risk from prying eyes.” We parted, and throughout that day I was haunted by Athualmanco’s words and the strange earnestness of his speech. Could it be that there was some truth in the legend of the buried gold, the situation of which was known only to the Indians ? I remembered my dream. How tardily the hours went by until the sun had sunk, and I could set out for the trysting- place ! Here I found Athualmanco standing beside a canoe, manned by dusky rowers, that lay among the bushes that fringed the creek. I became conscious as I drew near that the stripling was more elaborately attired than I had ever before seen him, wearing, as he did, a short loose mantle of dressed deerskin sewn with gold, while there were bracelets of the same metal encircling his arms, and the usual thread around his black hair was replaced by a golden fillet that supported an upright plume of feathers — the symbol, as I afterwards learned, of tribal sovereignty. The two Indian boatmen seemed to note his every gesture as dogs watch their master’s eye. Without speaking, the boy signed to me to enter the canoe, into which he followed me. The paddles were dipped in the water cautiously, and the boat shot out of the creek, crossed the track of silvery moonlight, and presently reached a rocky islet that I had often seen from the shore lying a mile to seaward. Here a larger canoe, with four or five men in it, lay ensconced behind a stone. Our rowers pulled in, and Athualmanco and myself landed. The islet seemed a mere cluster of bare rocks and thorny shrubs, the growth of centuries. Through the midst of these, Athualmanco, drawing from his belt the sharp and heavy cutlass, or machete, so much used in the dense forests of South America, preceded to hew a narrow path, so that at last we reached what seemed a kind of rude archway in the central rock, roughly blocked with fragments of stone. With a beating heart I aided the young chief to displace these, until a hole was made large enough to admit a man, though with difficulty. Athualmanco crept in, and I followed, to find myself to my surprise in a sort of grotto lighted from above, and evidently hollowed by human agency, since there were rude square pillars, and a cornice grotesquely carved with

Page 549

“THE BOY SIGNED TO ME TO ENTER THE CANOE ” {p. 532). the heads of animals. Through the crevices above the moonbeams fell, silvering the rough floor. The young cacique, with my help, pushed aside a jDroad thin slab of volcanic stone that occupied the centre of the floor, and pointed with his cutlass to what lay below. How like was the gesture to that I had seen in my dream ! And how unlike was the result ! Here was no gleam of yellow gold, no tempting glow of dust and nuggets to arouse cupidity. What met my eyes was a shimmering whiteness, a lustrous purity, as though the moon had poured her condensed rays into the cave, there to solidify and remain. At Athualmanco’s invitation, I thrust my hand into the mass that almost filled the hollow in the floor, and withdrew it full of something hard and slippery to the touch : something that lay heaped and glistening in my palm. Pearls, surely ! fine and white, and of purest water ; but who, since the world was a world, methought, had ever before seen so many collected together ? I looked inquiringly at Athualmanco, and met his calm proud eyes. “Yes, English friend,” he said, “I, the last of our line, make you welcome to what, in spite of menace, and torture, and death, we kept hidden from the greedy Spaniard. These are pearls gathered as tribute to the great Montezuma, and that no human eye save ours has beheld since the Empire of the Aztecs sank beneath the assaults of the conquerors. They are mine now ; nay, Don Here ward, they are yours : a free gift from him whose life you saved, and who loves you as his brother and his friend.” Athualmanco next proceeded to inform me that a pearl fishery, more productive than any in Mexico, was known to exist on that part of the coast, but that no native had ever, in spite of torments and imprison¬ ment, consented to point out to the new rulers of the land where it lay, still less to indicate the hiding-place of the accumulated pearls destined for the use of the Emperor’s Court, and which had been jealously kept secret by cacique after cacique of his own ancestry. So long as his grandfather, whose hatred for the white man was as strong as if Cortes were still battling with his nation, was alive, Athualmanco could make no use of this vast hoard which he now pressed on my acceptance, while at the same time offering to have the pearl fishery worked, under cloud of night, for my benefit. I remonstrated against what seemed to my English ideas a Quixotic act of generosity ; but the young chief would take no denial. “ Of what avail, Don Hereward, would the money these toys, if sold, would bring, be to me.^ I drink only water. Venison and fish, the fruits of the forest, and the roots of the garden suffice for my wants. I crave not for the luxuries or the pomp of the white man,” said Athualmanco ; “ but to see my friend happy would be a joy to me, for we Indians are grateful for good done, as we are resentful of injury. A refusal would be painful to me.” I scarcely knew what to do or say. After all, my young friend would be none the wealthier if I declined his princely present, nor was wealth, with his simple tastes and habits, the temptation that it is to the civilised man. I thanked him warmly, but was sorely abashed somehow, for this more than royal munifi¬ cence humbled as well as dazzled me. But the

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534 The Merchant Prince. youthful cacique was merely intent on carrying out his benevolent purpose. The first thing to be thought of was the removal of the pearls. My pockets and Athualmanco’s game-pouch had to be put in requisition, and my breath came gaspingly as I saw handful after handful thus stowed away, until at last the shallow cavity was emptied of its precious contents. Then we retired, replacing the stones in the archway, so as to avoid scrutiny if fishermen should land, and returned to where the canoes lay. In the larger of these we embarked, and, paddling to a spot within rifle-range, lay to, when one of the Indians, with a line made fast to his waist, and carrying a naked cutlass as some protection against the sharks so common in those seas, plunged boldly in, weighted with a heavy stone, and provided with a bag of plaited grass slung round his neck. About a minute elapsed, and then a jerk of the line was the signal to draw up the diver, who soon reappeared, breathless and dripping. The stone re¬ mained below, but the bag was nearly full of pearl oysters ; and the explorer reported that a bank of these molluscs, three fathoms broad, stretched away to left and right. A second and a third diver went down, and in each instance the result and the report were identical. Then a shrill cry from one of the rowers was followed by the apparition of a shark's back fin above the water, and by the glance of a harpoon, which Athualmanco had in readiness, and which was thrown with so true an aim that the silvery sea grew dark and red as the wounded fish plunged downwards, and was seen no more. Then the word was given, and the canoes made for the creek, where we landed. The Indians, after receiving the orders of their young chieftain, proceeded to stow away their light craft among the brushwood and reeds, while Athualmanco and I made the best of our way towards the Casa Grande, which on this occa¬ sion the youthful cacique consented to enter, and we were soon alone together in the suite of rambling rooms that I had selected for my own occupation. Here candles were lighted, and my first task was to bestow the pearls in a secure hiding-place. “ Let no eye behold them, Don Hereward,^’ whis¬ pered Athualmanco earnestly, “ since there are those at San Antonio who would take your life or mine for the value of a silver bell-button, should the chance occur.” And indeed, when the white glistening things had been carefully locked up in the drawers of an old ebony cabinet of Madrid make, the question arose, what was to be done next. The Mexican pearl fisheries, once the property of the Spanish Crown, had decayed in value for many years past, but were still supposed to appertain to the authorities of the Republic, by whom they were, in some cases, leased at low rents to specu¬ lators. Should rumour reveal the existence of that costly hoard of pearls, a swoop, under pretext of law, would probably be made upon them by some governor or general in command, while the fishery itself would be sequestrated by a Government decree. It was better, evidently, to keep quiet until, with the assist¬ ance of the British Consul nearest to us, I could obtain official permission to fish pearls on my own account. In the meantime, Athualmanco offered, with the help of his devoted vassals, to collect such of the treasures of the deep as could be raised in the night-time, and without awakening the suspicions of the covetous. “There is one man, English lord, whom I warn you to mistrust, ay, even more than the sly factor,” said Athualmanco at paiting : ‘‘one who has the ears of a listening lynx, and the greed of a cormorant, and the stealthy footfall of a cat— Miguel the Mestizo. He was in prison, both in Chihuahua and Durango, for robbery and murder, as I have heard, before he came here.” Don Alvaro’s affairs were somewhat neglected, I fear, during the next week or two, while I was scouring the country on horseback. I rode to the nearest port where a British Vice-Consul was to be found, and procuring from him the certificates of nationality that were to serve as an introduction, I visited the capital of the State, interviewed assessors, intendants, and the other functionaries who had a finger in the pie, and returned to the Vice-Consulate to register my lease of the pearl fishery of San Antonio. I was to pay a low fixed annual rent for the exclusive use of this, supple¬ mented by a royalty of fifteen per cent, on the gross produce of the fishery. And I believe that Govern¬ ment officials and Consul alike pitied me for the speculative folly that led me to risk my few dollars in such a business. The pearl fishing could now go on openly, and Athualmanco, whose influence over his own people was unbounded, placed four canoes and thirty Indian divers at my disposal. The long-neglected oyster banks yielded a crop that aroused first the wonder, and then the envy, of the indolent Spaniards dwelling near. Every evening the boats came back freighted gunwale deep with pearl oysters, while the women and children toiled to glean the pearls themselves from the great heaps of dead shell-fish. Very faithful, patient workers I found them, satisfied with scanty pay, and always cheerful and willing in their zeal to serve the friend of their chief A month more, and a respectable store had been collected, with which I determined to travel to the city of Mexico, where, at the same time, I could convert into money the great hoard of pearls that formed the cacique’s gift, and of the existence of which I flattered myself that no living soul, save Athualmanco and myself, was aware. 1 was to journey by diligence, such a vehicle passing periodically through San Antonio, and carrying not passengers alone, but specie belonging to Govern¬ ment, and it was therefore protected by an escort of carbineers. On the eve of my departure, Athualmanco — usually so impassive — was singularly nervous and melancholy. “ A wolf, Don Hereward, was howling near my hut,” he said, in answer to my inquiry as to the cause of his low spirits, “and thrice, as I went homeward yesterday, I heard the note of the mocking¬ bird on rny left hand, and these signs bode ill. You remember what I said concerning Miguel the Mestizo? Beware of that man ! But, my friend, should you be in sore need, here is what will summon aid.” And as

Page 551

The Merchant Prince. 535 he spoke, he drew from his game-pouch, which was of panther’s skin, like his quiver, a sea-shell of a curious shape, which he put into my hand, inviting me to apply my lips to the orifice. “ Blow, but cautiously ! ’’ said Athualmanco, in a low voice. 1 obeyed, and heard a low deep sound that seemed about to swell into a roar. “It is the horn of alarm,” whispered the young chief. “ Hide it, brother, hide it ; and should you have need of me and mine, fling open the window, and sound this call again and again. It can be heard for miles when the wind serves.’’ I must own that when my young friend was gone, and even¬ ing fell, 1 felt exceed¬ ingly uncomfortable. I am not, I hope, un¬ duly timid, but I knew already enough of the country to be aware how cheaply human life was held in it. And yet I could scarcely think that the few hund¬ red pounds’ worth of pearls I had osten¬ sibly collected would present an irresistible temptation to marau¬ ders. Also I thought Athualmanco a little unjust to poor Miguel — a brisk, active fel¬ low, by far the most civil and useful ser¬ vant about the place. That very evening, however, at supper, suddenly lift¬ ing my eyes, I beheld reflected in the great tarnished mirror opposite the image of this faithful servitor en¬ gaged in shaking out some white powder from a folded paper into the glass of pulque which he had been bidden to pour out for me. With a self-control that afterwards surprised myself. I said nothing, but pre¬ sently despatched Miguel to the kitchen on an errand. During his absence I emptied the beaker of pulque into the silver jug, being careful to leave a heel-tap at the bottom of the glass. Miguel looked keenly at me as he uncorked a bottle, but I went on unconcern¬ edly with my supper of stew and tortillas, then lit a cigar as I sipped my chocolate, and presently left the room and went upstairs. When I had reached my own apartments, had satisfied myself that no foe was lurking there, and had locked and bolted the doors, I could not but own to myself that Athualmanco’s prejudice was only too well founded. No doubt the wretch had sought to stupefy me by drugging my drink, so as to render me an easy prey. But who were his accomplices ? and what was his design ? Some impulse led me to examine my arms. These consisted of a heavy Colt’s revolver, a Derringer pistol, and a double-barrelled gun. It was as I had feared : treachery had been busy. The charges had been drawn, and replaced by soft plugs of cotton. Luckily my ammunition, in a locked cupboard, was out of harm’s way, so I promptly re-loaded my three weapons, but I felt forlorn enough at the idea of being alone against I knew not what odds. Before my usual hour of retiring to rest I turned down the kerosene lamp to a mere speck of flame, and extin¬ guished the candles. Then I seated myself in an arm-chair be¬ hind the curtain of the half-open window, with my arms lying on the table within reach, and waited. 1 had not to wait long —half an hour at the most — before I heard the jingle of spurs and the tread of booted feet on the garden path below. Cautiously 1 peered out, and espied in the bright moonlight two figures. One of these, on whose swarthy face the rays fell, was the treache¬ rous Miguel. The other, and taller, wore a slouched sombrero, a striped mantle dangling from his shoulder, and a gaudy jacket of coloured velvet heavy with silver buttons and lace. He had a gun in his hand, glistening with rings, and his sword clanked as he moved. Alto¬ gether, he looked the very type of a robber captain, such as are plentiful in Mexico. He was the first to speak. “ As if,” he said boastfully, “ I alone were not twice a match for a mere raw English youngster like your heretic here ! ” “ Not so loud, I entreat, worthy Don Ruy !” pleaded Miguel timorously. The bandit laughed. “If he did but swallow the stuff I gave you to put into his cup, his slumbers are sound enough by this. I have brought but three of the men, so as not to have to share among too many the Pesca Grande — the great prize. Are you sure, though, that the pearls yonder copper-coloured stripling gave him are really worth a king’s ransom, as you say they are “ They are worth thousands of gold doubloons, Don Ruy,” replied Miguel, in a tone of conviction; “and unless we l eap the good harvest to-night - ” “ WITH A SELF-CONTROL THAT AFTERWARDS SURPRISED MYSELF, I SAID NOTHING.”

Page 552

Love, where is thy Dwelling ? 536 Then the pair of confederates passed on out of ear¬ shot, and I was left alone with my own thoughts — no pleasant ones. Five to one were heavy odds, even supposing no local rogues were to assist the traitor Miguel. Clearly the latter had somehow learned the value of Athualmanco’s gift, and hence the plot of which I was to be the victim. How slowly the minutes crawled 'by ! I grew ab¬ solutely impatient for the crisis to come, so painful was the suspense. I had barricaded the two doors of my room as best I might, and had trimmed and shaded the lamp so as to show its feeble light on the anticipated assailants. Nearly an hour had elapsed, and at last I heard the cautious tread of feet on the wide staircase, and smothered voices, and then the handle of the door creaked as someone essayed to open it. The bolts groaned, but held fast. Then there was more talking, and next succeeded the rasping sound of a small saw at work. I remembered Miguel’s dexterity at carpentering, and had little doubt as to who was thus busy. It would never do to wait, presumably asleep, until my weak defences were demolished. I drew near, therefore, to the door — through the nearest panel of which already streamed the ruddy light of torches. “ Who is there ? ” I asked in Spanish. “ Begone, or if you remain it is at your peril ! ” “Inglese! stranger! dog of an Englishman!” re¬ plied a boastful voice, “the peril is to yourself. If you would save your skin, surrender at once, for if not—” The sentence was interrupted by the discharge of my pistol, which was followed by a roar of mingled pain and wrath, and then several shots were fired in quick succession through the door, but I had stepped back, and the bullets starred the window or flattened harmlessly against the wall. Next came an interval of silence, and then an outburst of angry voices and a clatter of iron, as with hatchet, crowbar, and chisel, the besiegers strove to force the door, which, like most of the interior fittings of the mansion, consisted of massive Honduras mahogany. I sent shot after shot from my revolvers amongst them, but without effect, as I judged from the fierce derisive laughter of the gang, as with savage threats and imprecations they toiled to break in. Most furious of all was the brigand captain whom 1 had heard addressed as Don Ruy, and who swore by St. James of Compostella and St. Rose of Lima that he would carry home the English heretic’s heart spitted on his spear-point, in return for the wound which my first fire had inflicted. The strong door groaned under the echoing blows. Clearly it must yield, and in a hand-to-hand struggle I stood no chance. Suddenly I bethought me of Athualmanco’s warning and of the rude horn he had given me, and, darting to the place where I had hidden it, I caught it up, threw open the window, and, putting the great sea-shell to my lips, blew with the full force of my lungs, producing a hoarse loud blast that startled the assailants, who paused for a moment, and then renewed their assault upon the door. Again, again, and yet a fourth and a fifth time did the roar of the shell-horn awaken the sullen echoes of the forest, and then it seemed to me that the blast was faintly answered from afar. Re¬ peatedly sounded the call, and now there was no doubt that it was heard, for similar notes pealed out from far-away spots in the brake. But the exultant clamour of my foes told that the door was yielding, and as it swayed to and fro on shattered hinges, I could see by the glare of the torchlight the swarthy and menacing faces of the ruffian band without. END OF PART THE SECOND. LOVE, WHERE IS THY DWELLING? I OVE, O Love, where is thy dwelling ? ^ Say, Love, say ! Is’t alone where sunbeams play. Where Life’s flowers are ever gay. Where the sparkling brooks are welling. Where the soaring larks are telling Forth their praises to the day? Love, O Love, where is thy dwelling ? Say, Love, say ! Love, is such alone thy dwelling ? Say, Love, say ! No, oh, no ! Thy cherished way Is wherever fond hearts stray. E’en though bitter tears are welling. E’en though solemn bells are knelling. E’en though care and want dismay ! Love, true Love, full wide thy dwelling. Now and for aye ! G. Weatherly.

Page 553

537 TWO LITTLE-KNOWiNT LONDON LIBRARIES. THE PATENT OFFICE LIBRARY. persons outside the circle of inventors and patent agents are aware of the existence of an excellent scientific library in the very heart of London — namely, the free library of the Patent Office in Southampton Buildings, Chancery Lane. Still fewer know of another which is also open to the public at certain times, and contains the best collection of electrical books in the kingdom. This is the Ronalds Library of the Insti¬ tution of Electrical Engineers, at 4, Broad Sanctuary, West¬ minster Abbey. The former is open every week-day from lo a.m. till lo p.m. ; and the latter is free to visitors uncon¬ nected with the institution, from lo a.m. till 8 p.m. on Mon¬ days, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and on Thursdays and Saturdays from lo a.m. till 2 p.m. This collection was a gift of the late Sir Francis Ronalds, the well-known tele¬ graph inventor, to the Society of Telegraph Engineers, now the institution above named, and it has been further enriched by a large donation of rare and valuable works belonging to Mr. Latimer Clark, F.R.S., the distinguished engineer. The Patent Office Library THE RONALDS LIBRARY : PRINCIPAL ROOM.

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A Crooked Spine. is really the chief technical library and reading- room of the Metropolis. It contains about 100,000 volumes of a scientific nature, including the best encyclopaedias and dictionaries, and the British and foreign patent specifications, all of which are acces¬ sible to the visitor himself, for they are simply arranged in groups according to the different sub¬ jects round the bays of the hall, and thus no time is lost by a visitor in consulting a variety of works bearing on the same topic. In the middle of the room the home and foreign periodicals of a technical kind are laid out upon tables for the benefit of students. Quite lately the accommodation of the reading-room has been much increased, for the number of readers is growing, and since the new Patent Act came into force, more space is required for storing blue-books and their indexes. The blue-books are kept apart from the library proper, and the indexes are filed on writing-tables in the middle, where they are consulted by those about to take out new patents and who wish to find out what has been already patented. Others again come to search the records for legal purposes, in connection with the law courts, where some tech¬ nical case is being decided. A few come to inquire into the validity of an invention. Within the reading- room proper, there are many inventors who like to read the technical press, to gather hints for some new apparatus, or merely to learn what is going on in the world of applied science. Occasionally, but not often, a well-known man of science pays it a flying visit in order to see some book which is not in the lists of the British Museum or the library of the Royal Society ; but for the most part the attendants are regulai habitues who have found out the merits of the place, and come there either in the course of business, or for their own self-improvement, it is certainly a boon to the evening student. A CROOKED SPINE. BY A B'AMILY DOCTOR. T is a generally received opinion — and one which is firmly ad¬ hered to — that the heart of a physician — and more espe¬ cially that of a surgeon — must be a hard one. And yet I take the liberty of differing from those who hold it. The very nature of a surgeon’s employment, his experiences in hospital wards, his fami¬ liarity with accidents of every sort, that appal all save him, his being constantly a wit¬ ness to the effects of pain and sorrow in others, to the contracted brows, the pale, pinched face of the sufferer himself, the tear- damp, anxious faces of the friends and relatives near him, would, it may be but natural to imagine, render his feelings callous, and blunt every sense of pity. Yet my acquaintance with some of the greatest operators of the day affords me proof that it is quite the other way, and that surgeons have as often as not to assume a sternness they are far from feeling, and hide the workings of their gentle natures under a cloak of grim imperturbability, which is, in nine cases out of ten, put off and on witli the gown in which they perform their unenviable duties. When ill, one expects quite a fund of sympathy from his family physician, nevertheless ; and seldom indeed is disappointment the result of such expec¬ tation. In the doctor standing or sitting quietly, thoughtfully by the bedside, something of the unselfish¬ ness, self-denyingness of the parson is looked for. Pie may be a man who has his own sad burden of troubles and sorrows to bear, but he must not show it by word or look. While listening to the patient’s plaint, he himself may be suffering pain — too often is, in these hard-worked times — yet his face must be as calm, though not so cold, as that of the Sphinx. Doctors, it should be remembered, are neither more nor less than human beings, after all, and therefore there are some plaints they listen to with more patience than others — for trouble must be genuine before it touches a chord of pity in the physician’s heart. Mere querulousness or peevishness is little regarded : a long story about aches and pains is more likely to weary him than elicit a word of sympathy. Perhaps there is no class of cases that appeals more directly to a physician’s best nature than that in which the patients are patient, silent, bed-ridden or chair-ridden children ; and many of these, whom we meet down at the sea-side in summer being wheeled about in their out-door cots, are sufferers from the trouble I have a few words to say this month about — a crooked spine. Well it is, indeed, for such young folks that tliey have kind friends about them, who can afford them the few luxuries their sad position in life demands, as well as the curative and palliative appliances which modern surgery has invented for their behalf. There are thousands of others, alas ! who are not so blessed. Yet, at their very best, the lives of such sufferers are woeful enough to think of. The sun may shine with joy-imparting brightness, but they cannot go and play as do other children ; the lawns may be green and daisied, yet the pleasure of rolling upon earth’s soft carpet is denied to them ; they cannot chase the butterflies nor gather the wild flowers, nor sit on the

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A Crooked Spine. 539 sand that looks so temptingly soft, and with which so much may be made and done ; and the waves that ripple on the beach in lines of silvery foam must sing to them a far sadder song than it does to the brown¬ legged, happy little ones who wade in the surf. In thsir lives those afflicted ones are utterly dependent on those around them. It is a blessing indeed that, with few exceptions, they are children of gentle dis¬ positions, sensitive enough as a rule, but very easily pleased, living in nature, and grateful for favours done : at times a little peevish and irritable — who can wonder but far more cross with themselves for being cross, than with those whose feelings they think they have hurt. Now, in this short paper, I desire to give no in¬ formation that can in any way clash with the duties and advice of the attendant surgeon or physician. Apart from this, however, there are many things that parents would do well to make themselves acquainted with as regards the real nature, the prognosis, and the rational treatment of what medical men term atigular curvature of the spine.* Indeed, I doubt whether more ignorance prevails amongst the general public about any other ailment than this. Well, there is no man— or woman either — I sup¬ pose, who does not know that the spine, or spinal column, consists of a chain of bones, movable the one upon the other in such a way as to render the whole flexible at will. 1 need not, therefore, I be¬ lieve, burden my article by giving illustrations of the spinal column, either in health or disease, otherwise than verbal. Imagine the “ back-bone,” if you please, to be represented by a string of buttons. The string itself would be the spinal marrow, connected with the brain, and giving off nerves for the government of movements in the trunk and limbs, and each button would be a vertebra. The vertebras are joined to¬ gether by ligaments, and between each is placed what is called a fibro-cartilage, which in youth is elastic ; and it is the semi-ossification of these that gives to old age the stiffness of back characteristic of that period of life. If the reader imagines a softish pad like, say, a corn plaster, to be placed between each button on the string, he has a rough but fairly good model of the human spine. Now, holding the buttons and pads pressed well down upon each other, it is evident you can bend the whole string gracefully, like a bow. This is what takes place when a healthy man or woman bends the back ; the curve behind is perfect — it is part of a circle. But suppose you apply some acid to the front portions, for example, of the few corn plasters about the centre of your string — something that will corrode or eat a part away, and perhaps even a portion of the buttons too-- is it not evident that the buttons will fall down to¬ wards each other at that side, and your string, instead of being a straight one when held up, will be deformed and angular 1 And something akin to this has taken * Lateral curvature is a deformity of the spine in young people caused by relaxation of the muscles, and treated by improving the health, by rest and mechanical support. place in the spinal column of our little friend who lies in yonder invalid-chair. The bones or intervening fibro-cartilages in his back are not whole : they are in part eaten or corroded away by disease, very likely the deposit of tubercle — yes, the reader guesses rightly : the same product, or one akin to it, which if deposited in the lungs would cause so-called phthisis, or consump¬ tion. 1 wish this fact borne in mind. The bones — say three — have become thinner in front at some particular part of the spine ; it may be three, five, or six that are affected. The cartilages I spoke of and compared to the corn plasters in the string have also been dis¬ organised and eaten away, and hence the curvature. Compression of the spinal marrow itself, I am happy to tell the reader, seldom indeed takes place : if it did so, we should have paralysis. Now a word or two about the symptoms, because, if treatment is to be successful, the sooner the nature of the ailment is discovered by parent or nurse, the better ; and this is most essential. Crooked spine, then, occurs for the most part in strumous children. When the curvature is so marked as to attract the attention of the parents, when it is really visible to the sense of sight, there is no mistaking the disease for anything else, and the belief is gene¬ rally expressed that the little one has had a fall or mischance of some kind, and has injured the spine. This may or may not have been, for although injury might encourage the deposition of tubercle in any par¬ ticular part, it is readily enough deposited in certain situations without anything accidental having occurred. But before the actual deformity is visible to the non¬ medical eye, other symptoms will be noted : the child will be pale, and soft, and sickly, and subject to pains about the chest and stomach. Sometimes a boy or girl in the earlier stages of this complaint will have an old or old-fashioned look, and the mind is often highly developed at the expense of the body. This is, of course, not invaria.bly the case. The child, however, early evinces a weakness in rising up from a chair or lifting itself up in bed. There is a peculiarity in gait too, the desire being to save all weight from resting on the spine. The hands will therefore be freely used to aid motion forward, the child catching at things for support, while the head even will be borne on one side. In addition to this, we have generally stunted growth, difficult action of bowels, coldness of extremities, and disturbed sleep. I may here warn parents, and I may add teachers, against the dangers of permitting delicate children to sit long in the same cramped position at the desk, or in any kind of position that causes weariness or back-ache. There always are a few of such children at every school, and they ought to be looked after kindly. I am describing the crooked spine as if it were wholly a disease of childhood, but it is not so, for angular curvature may take place in adults also. Here again let me give a warning. No one can form any idea of the number of men and women, young and middle- aged, who make a living in this country by bending over the writing-table. Cramped positions of this sort never fail to injure the bodily health in some way or

Page 556

540 Treasures under the Sea. Other, so that pen-people cannot be too careful to maintain as far as possible the upright position while at work. Where diseased spine has made a certain amount of progress we generally have the formation of an abscess, and the case has then assumed a far more dangerous character. The prognosis has reference to the continuance of deformity and to the danger to life itself. As to the first, if the reader will note what I said about the eating away or corrosion of the bones in front, it must be evident to him that the deformity is incurable ; and here I give a7iother way'nmg: — No one who has a crooked spine should attempt to undergo any straightening process by the use of apparatus without first consulting a doctor, or inflammation of the spinal cord and death may be the results. Secondly, as regards the danger to life from the disease. If the curve is very long, there is much decay of bones, and the danger is great. If the spine retains its straight position danger is also great, be¬ cause anchylosis, or a growing together of the bones, is impossible. The Treatment. — Luckily, we have many excellent hospitals in this country, and therefore the poor, suf¬ fering from acute diseases of the spine, have a chance of recovery. As to those in better circumstances of life, while informing parents that they must place their ailing one as soon as possible under medical treatment, I have also to tell them that the doctor and they must go hand-in-hand in the treatment, else all will be wrong. Early attention to the little patient’s trouble, as I have already hinted, is oi paramount importance. Having consulted a doctor, he will naturally turn his attention to means calculated to obviate or cure the blood condition of the system on which the de¬ formity depends. For this purpose he will prescribe tonics such as are suitable, with no doubt cod-liver oil and alteratives of some sort, and he will recom¬ mend residence in the country where the air is pure, or by the seaside where it is ozonic and bracing. At the same time he will enjoin rest in the prone or horizontal position. Rest is of the highest importance, and the position recommended will have to be maintained for many, many months. This seems sad, but then life is sweet. Even after the arrest of the disease, and when — anchylosis having taken place — the patient is at length permitted to get up and walk about, an ap¬ paratus must be worn to completely and perfectly support the trunk. This apparatus is of several different forms, and the choice must be left to the medical attendant. I hope, then, I have so far described the nature and treatment of disease of the spinal column as to show parents what they may or may not expect if one of their children should be afflicted with spinal com¬ plaint. Nor do I lay down my pen without giving hope. The ailment is dangerous^ I plainly tell you, but it is also curable. But so much, so very much, depends upon the per¬ sistency with which scientific treatment is carried out. Pray do not forget that. TREASURES UNDER THE SEA. “ Ivlethought I saw a thousand fearful wrecks ; A thousand men that fishes gnaw’d upon ; Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl, Inestimable stones, unvalued jewels, All scattered in the bottom of the sea.” HE above lines are from Clar¬ ence’s dream in Richard the Thirds and' were first published about 300 years ago. They form a theme on which many a vivid tale of shipwreck might be written. Few of us can form the smallest conception of the vastness of the treasures which the sea has entombed. Public opinion has, however been recently called to the subject by the successful floating of a company, formed for the purpose of re¬ covering treasure of two French ships, one UOrieiit.^ a line-of-battle ship, blown up by Nelson at the Battle of the Nile, and the. other \X\^ Maza Mimdo^ a large transport : both wrecks sunk in Aboukir Bay. The result of this adventure is being watched with deep in¬ terest, and if successful, will assuredly lead to many similar expeditions. It seems, therefore, a convenient opportunity for drawing attention to some curious par- ' ticulars concerning the recovery of specie and other valuables lost at sea by battle, fire, or tempest, together with some instances in which money has been left to the next-of-kin of persons believed to have been lost at sea. The first of the two ships above referred to {LiOriefit) is stated to have had on board specie of the value of no less than ^600,000, besides other treasure, the spoil of a raid on a Roman Catholic Cathedral at Valetta, and an immense quantity of other valuables.

Page 557

541 DIVERS MOVING A CANNON. The vessel had been despatched with money to Bonaparte, to pay the arrears due to the French forces. Captain Ponsonby, in some experimental efforts, recently succeeded in recovering from the deck of the vessel a French officer’s sword and several other interesting relics ; but of much more importance was the recovery, from the stomach of an enormous swordfish, of two wooden boxes, measuring eight inches by ten, filled with rough diamonds. This monster fish had caused a good deal of uneasiness to the divers, by its apparently rival researches around the wreckage. As an extraordinary fact con¬ nected with this wreck, it may be mentioned that a coffin was made from VOrienfs mainmast, which Captain Hallowell sent to Sir Horatio (afterwards Lord) Nelson, with the following letter : — Sivi/tnire^ August, 1798. **SiK, I have taken the liberty of presenting you with a coffin made from the mainmast of U* Orient^ that when you have finished your military career in this world you may be buried in one of your trophies ; but that-that period may be far distant is the earnest wish of your sincere friend, “ Ben Hallowell. “ Sir Horatio Nelson, K.B., Rear-Admiral of the Blue, &c.” Admiral Inglefield states that Nelson was so pleased with the gift that he caused it to be placed upright against the bulkhead of his dining-table on board the Yictory, and there it stood until used to convey the mortal remains of the hero to his last resting-place in St. Paul’s. A parallel case to nOrie7it is that of the Lutine^ a war-ship of thirty- two guns, wrecked off the coast of Holland in 1799. This vessel sailed from the Yar¬ mouth Roads on October 9th of that year, with an immense quantity of treasure for the Texel. In the course of the day it came on to blow a heavy gale ; the vessel was lost and went to pieces. Salving opera¬ tions during eighteen months resulted in the recovery of ^80,000 in specie. In 1814 further attempts were made to get at the wreck, which had become deeply embedded in the sand, but with very indifferent success — the result of seven years’ toil (1814— 1821) being the recovery of only a few pieces of silver. In 1822 several thousand pounds were spent in diving operations, but the result was absolutely nil. Next, Lloyd’s appeared on the scene, and, after much negotiation, the Dutch Govern¬ ment agreed to hand over half of any further salvage recovered to Lloyd’s. From 1822 to 1857 spasmodic efforts were made to fish up further specie, but the result was merely anxiety and vexation of spirit to those engaged in the venture. In 1857 a further agreement was entered into between the Dutch Go¬ vernment and Lloyd’s, and from 1857 to 1861 (sixty years after the wreck took place) great good fortune

Page 558

542 Treasures under the Sea. attended the efforts of the searchers, about ^25,000 being the amount of Lloyd's share. Some interest- ing relics were also found, including part of the ship’s rudder and her bell. In 1871 the Society of Lloyd’s obtained a special Act of Parliament for the purpose (amongst other things) of applying the said sum of ^25,000 towards further salving operations. These efforts appear to have been further successful, for only two years since a gun was salved and presented to the City Corporation. It is predicted that should the bed of sand now covering the wreck be shifted in a storm, the salving operations could be continued much more successfully. Another remarkable case of recovery of specie is recorded in 1806, when sixty-two chests of dollars, of the value of about ;^7o,ooo, were fished up by means of a diving-bell from the Abe7'gaven7ty^ sunk some years previously at Weymouth. The close of the last century seems to have been very prolific in wrecks. Here is another instance : — The British frigate De Brook, lost in a storm off Lewes, in the United States, in 1798, is stated to have had on board no less than 52,000,000 dollars’ worth of specie and jewels, taken from an intercepted Spanish fleet while on her voyage to Plalifax, and with it were also taken 200 prisoners. The latter were in irons on the lower decks when the vessel foundered, and all were lost. Many years afterwards (in 1881) search was being actively prosecuted by a Diving Com¬ pany for the purpose of recovering this specie, the result of which has not yet been chronicled. It would scarcely be believed that valuables have been recovered nearly 250 years from the date of the wreck, but nevertheless it is recorded that the good ship Harlcem, which was driven ashore in Table Ba)' in May, 1648, and became a total wreck, had on board many cases full of curiosities and antiquities for sale to European museums. These cases contained idols, rare china, glass, silver, &c. As lately as 1883 salving operations were rewarded by the recovery of several of these articles. The china was not at all injured by having been 235 years under the sea, but the silver articles had suffered considerably. Another very notable case — not only for the amount of treasure on board, but also for the big “ windfall ” for the salvors — is that of the Thetis, a British frigate, wrecked off the coast of Brazil in 1830, with ^162,000 in bullion on board. The hull went to pieces, leaving the treasure at the bottom in five or six fathoms of water. The admiral of the Brazil station and the captains and crews of four sloops-of-war were engaged for eighteen months in recovering the treasvre. The service was attended with great skill, labour, and danger, and four lives were lost. A good deal t)f litigation was the result, as disputes arose between the parties as to the amount of reward for the salvors. The Court of Admiralty awarded ;^i 7,000 ; the Privy Council, ^29,000, and ^^25,800 for expenses. In the reign of James 11. a very successful salving expedition took place. A rich Spanish vessel, which had been lost on the coast of South America, rewarded her salvors with no less than £^00,000, stated to have been forty-four years at the bottom of the sea. A medal was struck in honour of this event in 1687. One of the most recent cases of successful salving operations is that of the Spanish mail-steamer Ai/optso X/L, bound from Cadiz to Havanna, in February, 1885, and sunk off Point Gando, Grand Canary, in twenty-five fathoms of water. She had on board trea¬ sure valued at ;;^ioo,ooo. The underwriters who had insured the vessel organised a salving expedition, which was despatched to the scene of the wreck in the following May. It is reported that a few months later most of the specie was recovered. Two other remarkable cases of money or valuables having been recovered deserve a passing notice. The first, that of the finding of 3,800 sovereigns under a pier at Mel¬ bourne, part of 5,000 missing from the steamer Iboia ; the other, that of the recent recovery of a piano, lost in a collision between two steamers off Bognor. One of the vessels sank with all hands ; the piano, however, was some months afterwards cast on shore near Worthing, and the finder is sanguine that he will be able to make it again a tune¬ ful instrument.

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543 RIVAL DIVERS. An article on “Treasures under the Sea’’ would hardly be complete without a short reference to the “ Wreck Register.” It appears that between 185 5 and 1887 DO less than 90,168 vessels were wholly lost or damaged by storms, collisions, &c. During the same period it is sad to record that 23,831 lives were lost, and even this large total would have been doubled, had it not been for our glorious Royal National Life¬ boat Institution, and other means of rescue, which were instrumental in saving 23,939 lives. We have left but little space for the latter part of our subject— that of “windfalls ” for the next-of-kin of persons said to have perished at sea. Three instances may, however, suffice. The following advertisement appeared in 1783 : — “ If the next-of-kin, or any relations of W - F - , late part- owner and master of the merchant-ship Goiiti}iC7‘cc ^ who, with his wife and every person on board, was lost in the said ship, on her passage from Jamaica to Bristol, in a violent gale of wind, in September, 1782, will apply to ... . they will hear of something greatly to their advantage,” In 1882 a curious question was raised before the Civil Tribunal at Marseilles. A husband and wife perished in a boat accident, and on the question as to who was the survivor the disposal of £j^f)00 de¬ pended. A similar remarkable case was decided in 1767. The facts are these : — In October, 1766, General Stanwix, his second wife, and daughter, set sail in the same vessel from Dublin for England ; the vessel was lost at sea, and no account of the manner of her perishing could be dis¬ covered. The maternal uncle and next-of-kin of Miss Stanwix claimed the effects under a maxim of the civil law, that where parent and child perished together, and the manner of their death is unknown, the child is supposed to always survive , the parent. The nephew of the general, however, succeeded in making good his claim to be the administrator, in opposition to the uncle. In conclusion, it is curious to note that during the present year a reward of ^50 has been offered for an account of a shipwreck which took place in the Stiaits of Sunda in 1816. Sidney H. Preston.

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544 THE WOOING OF CHRISTABEL. By E, NEAL, Author of “ Witness My Hand,” “ My Brother Basil,” &c. CHAPTER THE FIRST. BROOKFIELD. “ Southward o’er Surrey’s pleasant hills.” — Macaulay. IRST, return, Brookfield — and look sharp, please ! ” cried a tall, well-dressed young man, throwing a sovereign on the little counter of the booking- office at Waterloo. He was fair and blue-eyed, and, without being handsome, was pleasant to look at : well set up, and, for all his careless manner, distinctly gentleman - like. He waited impatiently for his change, gathered it up without looking at it, and hurried on to the platform, where a long train was evidently on the point of de¬ parture. The engine was emitting dense clouds of steam with gigantic puffs, and snorts, and weird and un¬ earthly noises of various kinds ; one or two porters were running along, tapping the wheels of the car¬ riages, and supplying the grease-boxes with a vil- lanous compound, yellow as to colour and obnoxious as to smell, while others were shutting the doors with a bang, and touching their caps with a more or less satisfied air. Arthur Neville reached the last carriage just as the train began to move, and called to a porter to open the door. The man obeyed, pushing the tardy pas¬ senger in with a shove, and jumping down the next moment with half-a-sovereign in his palm, and an expression of delighted astonishment on his face. “ Wonder if he knew what he give me ! ” he mut¬ tered, looking after the vanishing train with a grin. ’Twere a near shave, sure — ly, and perhaps it were worth it to him.” The small gold coin was transferred to the ample velveteen pocket with a dexterous celerity worthy of a professor of legerdemain, and the happy receiver went off to other duties, while the unconscious bestower lay back in the well-cushioned seat, and wondered if the obliging porter had thought sixpence a big enough tip for his pains. If he ever discovered the mistake he had made — which was unlikely, as he kept no accounts — he was not the kind of man to trouble him¬ self about it. Money losses, business anxieties, the cares that bow some men’s shoulders and whiten their hair, sat too easily on Arthur Neville even to ruffle his brow, or cast a shadow on the bright boyish face. He had not counted his change at the ticket office, and he did not count it now. He leant back against the cushions and unbuttoned the light overcoat, that, light as it was, seemed overpowering in the stuffy carriage that hot June afternoon. Unbuttoned, it disclosed a low waistcoat and wide expanse of shirt-front, fastened by a single diamond stud, while the regulation white tie above them seemed to proclaim to all who might be concerned that Mr. Arthur Neville was going out to dine. There was only one other occupant of the carriage to profit by the information, and he was so far from profiting that he muttered something to himself about the follies of dandified puppies, and buried himself in the Times as if the sight of young Neville’s faultless attire were a positive offence to him. Neville, on his part, looked across at him with the smile no anxieties could dim. “You don’t object to a cigar, I suppose ?” he asked airily, pulling out a cigar-case with a silver crest upon it. “ Object, sir ! Of course I object,” returned the other, with asperity. “ I’ll be no party to breaking the company’s rules. If parties want to smoke, they should go in a smoking carriage.’’ “ Undoubtedly,” agreed Neville mildly, but men¬ tally setting the other down as a “ city brute.” ‘‘ But you see, I had to make a dash for it, and wasn’t lucky enough to light on a smoking carriage.” “Well, I’ll have no smoking here. If you do. Til summon the guard.” “ Don’t trouble yourself,” said Neville politely, re¬ storing the cigar-case to his pocket. “ I can exist without one for half an hour, I dare say ; but it never occurred to me that a gentleman would object.” If there was a sting under the level tones, the elder man was apparently unconscious of it. He grunted a surly acknowledgment, and subsided into his paper again, while Neville resigned himself to the situation and amused himself with looking out of the window and watching the flying panorama of housetops and domes and steeples, as it was gradually exchanged for villas with tiny gardens and smokerblackened trees, for brickfields and unfinished roads with build¬ ing materials and half-finished houses, and then for fields and hedgerows and glimpses of distant hills, till the sweet summer landscape unrolled itself before him, green and fair, and bathed in all the glory of a cloudless afternoon in June. Neville looked at it with unappreciative eyes. “Phew! How hot it is!” he muttered disconso¬ lately, as he stretched his long legs on the opposite seat, and glanced enviously at his surly neighbour, who had succumbed to the heat, and fallen asleep over his paper. He was a stout, elderly man, with a florid complexion ; and as he lay back, breathing stertorously, Neville decided that he liked him less than ever. K?ie'w he’d snore !” he thought vindictively. “I’ve half a mind to light up, but I suppose old Bruin would wake and make a row. I wonder what pleasure old men find in making themselves disagreeable ? There’s my grandfather never misses a chance, and this old

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The Wooing of Christabel. curmudgeon looks quite as bad — but no ! I won’t say that. It’s my firm conviction that Lord St. Ives could give long odds to any man for disagreeableness, and win in a canter. I wonder what he’d say if he could see me now, and knew where I was going.” He smiled with a sort of bitter disdain, and fell into a reverie, which was only broken by the train drawing up at a smart little station, where the white palings showed against a green hill-side, and the embankment was gay with the station-master’s flowers. “ Brookfield ! ” shouted the station-master and the one porter on duty with him, and Neville sprang to his feet, and saw to his surprise that the old gentleman was also rising to his. The next moment he got out, and as Neville followed him, he found himself wondering what he could be doing at Brookfield. He knew enough to be aware that there was no village worth speaking of, only cottages and a little country inn known and beloved of anglers, and of anglers only ; and this stout city man did not look like an angler. For the rest, Brook¬ field meant only the great house on the hill where Mr. Wendover lived, and where Neville himself was about to dine. Surely this dreadful old man could not be a fellow-guest ? The doubt vvas decided immediately. A smart foot¬ man approached, and after touching his hat to the stranger, whom he addressed as Mr. Slingsby, and informing him that the dog-cart was in the lane, he looked at Neville, touched his hat again, and inquired if he was the other gentleman for Brookfield. I suppose so,” said Arthur. “ At any rate, Tve got to get there in time for dinner.” “ Master sent the dog-cart, sir, being so hot, and a stiffish walk. If you’d please to come this way.” Neville followed him through the little booking office, outside which a well-appointed dog-cart was standing. The horse, a big handsome bay, was held by the porter, and Mr. Slingsby was already established next to the driver’s seat. There was nothing for it but to climb up behind, and Arthur found himself back to back with his late fellow-traveller, and driving up a steep wooded lane at a pace that only a thorough-bred could have achieved. “ Old Moses can do it !” he thought, with a half dis¬ dainful smile. There was not a drop of Jewish blood in Mr. Wend- over’s veins, but “ Moses ” (a name really far too good for him) was the sobriquet generally bestowed on him by the gilded youths who borrowed his money, and occasionally condescended to eat his dinners. The Directory was more respectful, and described him as ‘‘ Richard Wendover, Esq., Financier and Bill Discounter, of Mincing Lane, E.C., and Brookfield, Surrey.” ‘‘Brookfield” always meant Mr. Wend- over’s house now. It had originally been the name of the half-dozen cottages clustered round the “ Anglers’ Arms,” but since the great house on the hill was built it had taken the little hamlet’s name to itself, and had completely appropriated it and swallowed it up ; wherein some of Mr. Wendover’s clients professed to find an allegory, while others discovered one not 545 less apposite in his two very different addresses. Mincing Lane, E.C, and Brookfield, Surrey, had all the difference of extremes, and Mr. Wendover was a dif¬ ferent man in each. It really seemed as if he put on and off another nature with his office coat — a vener¬ able garment, that was the secret scorn of the most impecunious of his clerks. In it he was dry and hard and ungracious, keen and shrewd and suspicious, and utterly impervious to any considerations but those of self interest and the lust of gold. But when that brown and threadbare vestment was discarded, and the substantial and glossy broadcloth that replaced it en¬ dued, Mr. Wendover seemed morally and physically to expand. His mouth relaxed genially, his eyes opened confidingly, his manner became urbane, with almost a pathetic suspicion of tenderness and “ gush.” “ You’d think a babby might play with him,” one of his clerks had remarked to-day, as Mr. Wendover left the office, “ but if I was that precious infant’s mother. I’d insure it in five burial clubs before it tried ! ” Such was the man whom Neville was about to visit, and whom he had hitherto only seen with his office coat— and manner— on. He had never seen the pros¬ perous moneylender’s home, and he looked round him with a good deal of curiosity as the dog-cart turned in at the gates. A wide gravelled road led up to the house, with a plantation on one side, and wide sweeps of lawn, studded with costly conifers, on the other. The house itself was pretentious rather than imposing, and was too new and showy for Neville’s fastidious taste; but there were evidences of wealth in every detail, from the trim and well-kept garden and the lavish decorations of facade and portico, to the pow¬ dered footmen who appeared at the door as the dog¬ cart drew up before it. Mr. Wendover was in the hall, waiting to receive his guests. He nodded familiarly to the elder man, and shook hands with Neville with effusive cordiality. “ Delighted to see you, Mr. Neville : delighted to welcome you to my poor little place. Let me intro¬ duce you to my brother-in-law, Mr. Slingsby. Ned’^ (sw’elling with visible gratification), ‘‘ this is - ” “ Mr. Arthur Neville, at your service,” said Arthur, bowing stiffly. He had an unpleasant conviction that his host was capable of introducing him as “ Lord St. Ives^ grandson and heir,” and was determined not to be ticketed. “ Met before, haven’t we ? ” said Slingsby, with a sort of grim chuckle. “No offence, I hope.? You see, I couldn’t know you were one of Dick’s swell friends.” Arthur felt too unequal to replying to do more than bow again, and follow his host to the drawing-room, mentally execrating the folly which had induced him to accept the money-lender’s hospitality. If he had not been in such a particularly “ tight corner,” he told himself that nothing should have induced him to do so, but — Well, he was in a tight corner, and there was an end of it! “Lord St. Ives’ grandson and heir” sounded well, but no one was better aware than him¬ self that Lord St. Ives was the last man in the world 755

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The Wooing of Christabel. 546 to advance a farthing beyond his grandson’s allowance, or to forgive the fact that it had been exceeded. Mr. Wendover’s drawing-room was a big handsome room, gorgeous with yellow satin and plate glass, and adorned with massive ornaments upon gilded stands, under immense glass shades. Four large windows down one side admitted the full glare of the westering sun, and the conservatory at the end was a blaze of colour that was absolutely dazzling. There were only two occupants of the room : a young girl, whom Mr. Wendover introduced as “my daughter Christabel,” and a faded, elderly, but lady¬ like woman, whom he did not introduce at all. It was Miss Wendover who said shyly — “ Papa has forgotten, I think ; ” and then added, with evident effort, “ Miss Frost— Mr. Neville.” “ How shy she must be,” Neville thought, “to colour up so about an introduction ! ” He looked curiously at his host’s daughter, with a comical wonder how a man could have a daughter so totally unlike him¬ self. Mr. Wendover was short, and stout, and thick¬ set, with glossy black hair, and a manner that cer¬ tainly did not err on the side of shyness, while Miss Wendover was nearly as tall as Neville himself, with fair hair, cut short in front, and brushed plainly behind her ears, where it hung straight and lank, without any adornment of ribbon or comb, while her manner was so shrinking and nervous that he turned and addressed Miss Frost so as to cover the girl’s em¬ barrassment. Miss Frost was perfectly free from embarrassment herself, and her gentle manner and quiet self-posses¬ sion put Arthur immediately at ease. It was like coming suddenly on a civilised human being in the heart of Africa, he said afterwards, in his exaggerated way. She was evidently a gentlewoman, though her dress was old-fashioned, and neat rather than rich, and it was not long before Neville discov^ered, from her frequent references to “ my dear pupil,” that she was, or had been, Miss Wendover’s governess, and that she was very fond of her. “ I hope the great world will not spoil her,” the little old lady said, with a fond glance at the conserva¬ tory where Christabel had retreated. “ She is so shy now, she does not do herself justice ; but she is both •clever and good, and some day she will have what men care for more than either cleverness or goodness.” “Do you mean money?” Arthur asked, rather surprised at such frank cynicism in the gentle old governess. “No — although she will have that, of course. I meant beauty said Miss Frost. And once more Mr. Neville found himself utterly unable to frame a suitable reply. CHAPTER THE SECOND. CHRISTABEL. “ The pale, unripened beauties of the north.” — Addison. It was fortunate for Neville’s reputation for good manners that just at that moment dinner was an¬ nounced, and Mr. Wendover asked him, in his most unctuous tones, to take his daughter into the dining¬ room. She was in the conservatory still, half hidden by the flowers, but as Arthur advanced down the long room he saw her plainly, and could hardly repress a somewhat sarcastic smile. “ A beauty ! ” Well, this was what he saw : — Just a tall, overgrown girl — it is to be feared that the precise adjective which he applied was gawky — who might have looked all arms and legs, but that her head was thrust forward in the inevitable “ poke ” of overgrown humanity, as if dt were determined not to be left out. Her features were certainly not irregular, but the complexion was too pale, and the expression of the shy, serious face too severe. The firm-lipped, resolute mouth looked as if it seldom curved into a smile ; and Neville decided that he had never met a less attractive young woman. Nevertheless, he did his duty, and tried to find something to say that should not be absolutely purpose¬ less and inane — only what topic could he possibly discover that should hold any common interest for himself and Mr. Wendover’s daughter ? “ Do you like tennis ?” he asked, mentally reflecting that “ such a giraffe of a girl ” would probably have unusual advantages at a game requiring length of arm and speed of foot. “ I liked it at school, but I haven’t anyone to play with now,” said Miss Wendover. “I haven’t any brothers or sisters, you know.” “ But surely there are lots of girls about,” Neville began, and stopped awkwardly. He ought to have remembered how very doubtful it was if the money¬ lender’s daughter was on intimate terms with her neighbours. “ We don’t know the people round about,” said Christabel frankly. “ I wish we did. It seems so dull after all the fun I used to have at school.” “ You have left school, then ? ” “Yes, this term. Miss Frost didn’t want me to leave, but papa said he couldn’t do without me any longer.” “ Miss Frost seems very fond of you.” “ Yes, she’s a dear said- Christabel, her face light¬ ing up as she looked across at her friend. “ She has been staying here the last few days, and papa wants her to give up her school and live here alyvays, but I’m afraid she won’t. It would be too much to expect.” “ Do you mean that you think she would find it dull, too ? ” “Not exactly. But she is very independent, and very proud, in her way. I — I think, perhaps, she might not get on well with papa.” Neville remembered the careless omission to intro¬ duce the governess, and thought it extremely probable. How unlucky he had been in his well-meant remarks ! He wondered what safer topic he could find. “ I suppose you’re awfully fond of Brookfield ? ” he observed, after a little pause. “The country about here is so beautiful, and the house stands so well. Now at Ivethorpe the house is right down by the river, and we get no view worth speaking of.”

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The Wooing of Christabel. 547 “ Ivethorpe ? Is that your home ? ’’ “ It’s my grandfather’s place, and all the home I have. It’s never been much of a home to me, though, and never will while he’s alive.” “Oh!” with startled intonation, that was a little shocked, too. ‘‘ Isn't he — isn’t he 7iice ? ” “Anything but that, I should say. And now he’s ill he’s worse than ever.” “ Ill, is he ? What a pity 1 ” said Christabel sym¬ pathetically. “ What is the matter with him ? ” “ Age and aggravation,” said Neville sententiously, enjoying her shy disapproval. “ There are not many men as old, and I hope, for the credit of humanity, there are not many as aggravating. If I hadn’t the constitution of a horse, it would have finished me long ago.” Christabel laughed softly. “ You don’t look as if it had hurt you much,” she said, with an amused glance at the athletic figure beside her. And then, with quick contrition, “ I beg your pardon I I didn’t mean to laugh, and I quite under¬ stand how dreadful it must be. I know how I feel when papa is cross.” “ You don’t mean to say he is ever cross to you ?” “ Everybody is cross sometimes, I suppose,” said Christabel philosophically. “ And then, you know. I’m such a disappointment.” “ Indeed, I don’t know. A disappointment ? — How ” “ Well, you see, I’m a twin - ” “And was that a disappointment?” cried Neville, much amused. “ Not that exactly— but unfortunately I’m the wrong one.” “ What do you mean ? ” “ My little brother died, and papa has never got over It. It was such a pity, for he had always wished so much for a son. And after that mamma died, too, and he had only me.” “ I see,” said Neville, restraining the inclination to laugh. It was as impossible to do that in the face of her grave simplicity as to seize the opening she had left for empty compliments. “ Can you remember your mother ? ” he asked, by way of changing a subject that had turned out no better than its predecessors. “ Oh, no. She died when I was only a few months old.” “I suppose you are like her, as you are so unlike Mr. Wendover ? ” “ I am not at all like her,” said Christabel, in an offended tone. “ Mamma was a beautiful woman. You can see her likeness over there.” Neville’s eyes followed hers to the opposite wall, where there hung a half-length portrait of Mrs. Wend¬ over that abundantly justified her daughter’s opinion. Neville looked at it with an interest stimulated by the conversation with Miss Frost. ^ “ I see what she meant,” he said, as he compared the pictured face and the living one. But though Christabel asked for an explanation, she received none. Young as she was, it would have been a bold man who had ventured to pay personal compliments to Christabel Wendover. It was to little Miss Frost, after dinner, that Neville owned he had traced a distinct likeness in Christa- bel’s face to the beautiful woman who had been her mother. He had an agreeable consciousness that the confession was gratifying, but he could not help adding that the points of difference had struck him even more forcibly than the resemblance. Mr. Wendover and his brother-in-law were deep in political discussion at the further end of the room, and Christabel was at the grand piano, playing a difficult nocturne of Chopin’s with the correct and expressionless touch of well-taught immaturity. For conversational purposes Mr. Neville and Miss Frost were practically alone. “Yes, the points of difference are the strongest — luckily for Christabel,” said Miss Frost “ Luckily ? ” cried Neville. The word was out almost unawares ; but Miss Frost only smiled, while Neville felt that he should appear in a leading comic paper yet, as the utterer of something “ one would rather not have said.” “Very luckily,” repeated Miss Frost, with pro¬ voking enjoyment of the situation. “ Ah ! Mr. Neville, you are a young man, and I am an old woman. Is it very wonderful if our points of view are dif¬ ferent ? ” “ But — but this is a question of fact, isn’t it?” “ Well, I take my stand on the facts. Look at the two faces now.” Mr. Wendover had evidently appreciated his beau¬ tiful wife, if multiplication of likenesses might be taken as proof of appreciation. Just above the piano where Christabel was playing, with a strict attention to time and indifference to expression worthy of a metronome, hung a lovely water-colour drawing of her mother. It was a Greuze-like head, and the ex¬ quisite complexion and graceful pose were perhaps all the more striking from their contrast to Christabel’s duller colouring, and the “ poke ” that was emphasised by her attention to the music before her. Arthur felt that the little governess’s devotion rendered her im¬ pervious to argument, and he did not attempt the ungracious task of opening her eyes to her pupil’s shortcomings. “ Did you know Mrs. Wendover?” he inquired. “ I was governess too,” said Miss Frost. “And was she as lovely as her portraits?” the young man asked, with the instinctive desire to please which made Arthur Neville so popular wherever he went. He was not at all interested in the question of Mrs. Wendover’s charms — or her daughter’s either, for that matter — but he saw that Miss Frost was, and was ready to gratify her. “ Yes ; she was quite as pretty — or lovely, as you call it. Not beautiful, as I think her daughter will be some day ; altogether a gentler, simpler soul,” the old governess said, “and had the sweetest disposition you can imagine. Poor child ! she was only twenty

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The Wooing of Christabel. 548 when she died. You must forgive me, Mr. Neville, but I can hardly speak of it even now without a tear.’’ Perhaps Neville might be forgiven if he found him¬ self wondering what occasion there had been to speak of it at all. He was the last person likely to divine the magic of his own ready sympathy, or to understand how the mere fact of the polite attention to which she was so unaccustomed had loosened the old governess’s tongue. He looked compassionately at the exquisite picture of the poor young wife, and wondered what had cut the young life so short. “ Did she die of consumption ? ” he asked, looking at the delicate tints of the fair, flower-like face. “No,” said Miss Frost, with sudden passion ; “she died of starvation.” Neville almost jumped out of his chair ; but the old lady laid a restraining hand upon his arm. “ 1 did not mean it in that way,” she said quietly ; “but it was true in the sense I used the word. Her mind, her heart, her soul were starved, and her child, who might have saved her, came too late.” “ Do you mean that he was unkind to her ? ” Neville asked, looking across the room at the money-lender’s burly figure and vulgar, prosperous face. “ I dare say he did not mean to be. He did not understand her, that was all. Mr. Wendover’s wife was a lady.” Decidedly Miss Frost was an embarrassing old lady to talk to, especially when the subject of her conversation was in the same room. Neville made the cessation of the music an excuse to walk over to the piano and thank the performer. “ Do you care for Chopin ? Did you really like it.?” she asked, with a note of surprise that struck him as pathetic. Had no one ever praised her be¬ fore ? “ I adore Chopin, and I liked it very much.” “1 wonder which is true?” said Christabel, with a shy glance at the good-natured face smiling down on her so kindly. “ Both ! ” protested Arthur stoutly. “ Why do you look at me in that sceptical manner. Miss Wendover? Don’t 1 look as if I meant it ? ” “ You look as if you did, but 1 don’t see how you can^^ said Christabel, with the bluntness of a very shy person. “ I know how that nocturne ought to be played — I’ve heard Herr Zchwenkeldorff play it. I like Chopin, too ; but I don’t like to hear him spoilt, even when I do it myself.” “ And you won’t accept conventional thanks ? What a very uncompromising young lady you must be ! Well, Miss Wendover, may I say that if I’ve heard better playing, I never go into a drawing-room with¬ out' hearing a great deal worse ? 1 was quite sincere in thanking you ; and if you heard your favourite com¬ poser mangled and murdered as often as I do, you would know how to be grateful to anyone who at least plays the notes as he wrote them, and leaves none of them out.” How she blushed at the stinted praise that yet seemed more to her taste than fuller measure, and how her eyes fell under his ! They were grey eyes^ rather deeply set, and shaded by long black lashes that made them seem darker than they actually were. In Neville’s opinion they were the redeeming feature in a rather plain face, but he owned that there was something about Christabel Wendover, plain as she was, that sufficiently accounted for Miss Frost’s devotion. He had been inclined to doubt its sincerity, and to set the little governess down as more or less of a toady to her wealthy pupil, but after that fleeting glimpse of Christabel’s eyes, he did not doubt the genuineness of her friend’s attachment any more. Miss Wendover \vas plain, and painfully shy — those were, in Neville’s opinion, indisputable facts — but what an odd, sincere, original girl she was ! What a contrast with the girls he met in London drawing-rooms, and whose more or less delicately veiled adulation had already begun to pall on this un¬ grateful young man ! How much of it was for Lord St. Ives’ grandson, he wondered cynically, and how much for Arthur Neville ? He felt, as he looked at the shy, serious face of the girl who had refused to accept thanks beyond her deserts, that whatever look it might wear for him would be worn for Arthur Neville, and for him alone. He actually found himself wishing that he knew her better. It would be only an intimate friend who would have the power to draw her out, to win her con¬ fidence, to unlock the sealed lips, and bid the eyes reveal the soul within. Arthur Neville felt that, child as she was, it would be no ungrateful task. But his time was up if he wished to catch his train. He wished Miss Wendover a hurried good-bye, and went to take leave of his host, who received with artless satisfaction the conventional thanks for a pleasant evening. “ Enjoyed it, have you ?” he said graciously. “ Sir, you do me proud, and I hope you’ll come again. Drop me a line when you’ve a spare afternoon, and we’ll show you as pretty trout as you’ll find in any stream in Surrey. Why, every summer the ‘ Anglers’ Arms ’ has some young fellow in its best room for the fishing, and nothing else.” Arthur protested there was nothing he would like better, and Mr. Wendover fairly beamed with a satis¬ faction that seemed to his brother-in-law foolishly in excess of the cause. Mr. Slingsby was staying the night at Brookfield, and he watched Neville’s slight figure retiring down the long drawing-room with a supercilious gaze. “ What have you got to grin about from ear to ear ?” he inquired of the smiling Wendover, as that gentle¬ man returned from seeing his young guest into the dog-cart in which he was to be driven to the station. “Who is this Mr. Neville? Another aristocratic pauper, I suppose, and a precious dandified one, too ! I’ve no patience with his airs and graces, and I can’t think why you’re so civil to him.” “Can’t you?” said Mr. Wendover. “ ChVistabel, my lass, come ailfe give your old father a kiss.” It was not a direct answer, certainly, but it was the only one Mr. Slingsby received.

Page 565

The Wooing of Ciiristabel. 549 CHAPTER THE THIRD. MR. NEVILLE’S INTENTIONS. “What do you think of marriage ? ” — Webster. Arthur Neville received a good many invitations to Brookfield that summer, and those he received he he was able to engage it for himself. He was not an Izaak Walton, but he could throw a fly and land his fish with sufficient skill to make the sport a pleasure ; and anything was better than stopping with his grand¬ father, to be the target for an old man’s angry jibes. “NEVILLE LOOKED ACROSS AT HIM WITH THE SMILE NO ANXIETIES COULD DIM” {p. 544). generally accepted. Town was insufferably hot, and Lord St. Ives insisted on remaining there long after the rest of the world had betaken themselves to yacht, or moor, or German spa. Brookfield was a delightful change from Grosvenor Square, and if his host was not all that could be desired, his daughter went far to make up for his deficiencies, while the fishing was ex¬ cellent, and deserved all that Mr. Wendover could say of it. Neville thought himself quite in luck when the one spare room at the ‘‘Anglers’ Arms ” fell vacant, and especially when filial respect forbade him to answer them again. So Arthur announced his intention of going out of town for a fortnight’s fishing, and was not railed at as much as he had expected. Perhaps Lord St. Ives, who was suffering more than his grandson quite knew, was not sorry to be left alone, in spite of his in¬ eradicable conviction that when Arthur was out of his sight he was pretty sure to get in a scrape of some kind. Still, a fortnight’s fishing at an out-of-the-way

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550 The Wooing of Christabel. village sounded too harmless to justify fear, or even excite suspicion. So his lordship congratulated his grandson on the Arcadian simplicity of his tastes, and allowed him to depart with less anxiety than he might have felt had he been aware of the existence of Mr. and Miss Wend over. Arthur had certainly taken particular care that no hint of the money-lender’s connection with himself should reach his grandfather’s ears. Lord St. Ives possessed to the full what his heir was pleased to con¬ sider the unreasonable prejudices of his age on the subject (di post-obits, and there were the strongest rea¬ sons why his prejudices should be humoured. It was true that Neville was his grandfather’s heir, and that nothing could alienate the title from him, or the very small estate which went with it. Ivethorpe must one day be his, but it would be impossible to keep up Ivethorpe on the Ivethorpe rents. Neville knew that the greater part of his grandfather’s property was not entailed, and that it behoved him, as a matter of interest no less than of duty, not to offend the irascible old man ; so he said nothing of the Wendovers when he spoke of Brookfield, it being clearly impossible to mention old Moses in his grandfather’s hearing, and Christabel being in any case too unimportant for mention. Why should he go out of his way to inform Lord St. Ives that he spent his afternoons in playing tennis with a gawky schoolgirl, who played Chopin — villanously — and talked of Browning and Heine with a little more comprehension than most girls of her age ? Surrey’s pleasant hills were looking their pleasantest this summer, and there was no better place for enjoy¬ ing their beauties than the terrace at Brookfield that ran in front of the drawing-room windows and faced the western sun. What sunsets they saw from that broad gravelled walk, where the flower-beds vied with the sunset tints, and the peacocks spread abroad the feathered glories that seemed to eclipse them both ! Christabel always remembered one lovely evening that followed a day hot with the vivid heat of August, but tempered by a south-west wind that gave the sky the peculiar tender clearness that goes before rain. It was all over now, the vivid heat and supernal brilliance, and only the clearness and the tenderness remained. There were long shadows on the broad green slopes of the downs, and all around, on down and meadow, on river and wood, the soft mysterious hush that falls on the close of a summer’s day like a benediction of peace. The sun still hung above the western down, but the distant woods had lost their colour, and lay like patches of deeper shadow upon the swelling slopes, while down in the valley the Brook gleamed like a streak of silver in the shade, and glowed into gold wherever it caught the sun. “What a jolly view you have here !” Neville observed, leaning back against the iron seat, and stretching out his long legs with the ease of old acquaintanceship ; “and what a sunset, isn’t it ? Look, Miss Wendover it’s quite Turneresque. And how pretty the Brook looks, doesn’t it ? and how it winds about ! ” “ Yes,” said Christabel, “ I like to look at it from here. I wonder why one always looks at water, if there is any to be seen ? ” she said dreamily. “ I know 1 always do.” “Perhaps you’re thirsty?” suggested Neville, but Christabel only smiled at the matter-of-fact sugges¬ tion. “ No,” she said, in the same dreamy tones. “ I think it is because it reflects the sky.” “ What a fanciful child you are ! ” laughed Neville. “ Now, I like to look at the Brook down there because I know what capital trout are in it. That’s good enough reason for me.” The Brook, as it was always called, was too unimport¬ ant a tributary of the Wey to have received a name of its own, but it was one of the best trout streams in the county, as the young man gazing down at it now from the terraces of Brookfield had reason to know. Had he not landed half a dozen trout of exceptional size and beauty that very morning, and sent them up to Brook- fleld, addressed to “Miss Wendover, with Mr. Neville’s compliments ” ? Miss Wendover had duly returned her compliments and thanks — in a girlish unformed hand, whose vigor¬ ous downstrokes showed, nevertheless, that the pen had been held by no uncertain fingers ; and after this exchange of courtesies, Mr. Neville had put on his tennis flannels and sauntered lazily up the long white chalky road to Brookfield for the game of tennis that had become an almost daily institution during the fort¬ night he had spent at the Brookfield “ Anglers’ Arms.” The tennis was over now, like the day, but Arthur Neville showed no disposition to go. It was much pleasanter watching the sunset and the silver windings of the Brook from the terraces of Brookfield than from, the stuffy little parlour at the “Anglers’ Arms,” and Mr. Neville considered that when once the superior plea¬ santness of a given course was established there was nothing more to be said. The problem was solved,, and a satisfactory O.E.D. might be written against it with a light heart. As regarded the particular problem in question now,, there was certainly no reason why he should go if he preferred to stay. Mr. Wendover always made him welcome, and would, he knew by experience, condone- his flannels, and insist on his stopping to dinner ; and though at home Neville would as soon have thought of dining in his dressing-gown, he saw no occasion to- be punctilious at Brookfield. No one would be there to-night, he knew, and there could be no occasion to- dress for old Moses and his daughter, though she was- such a jolly little girl. This was how the young man phrased it to himseli,. though the terms were not strictly applicable to a young lady of Christabel’s height, or a face as earnest and serious as hers. It was certainly a pleasant face when it was lighted up by smiles, and perhaps- Neville had a not unpleasant consciousness of his own power to bring those rare and lovely visitants to the severe young lips, and an artistic appreciation of the result. His appreciation of results, however,, ended with their artistic aspect. That they could have any other scarcely even occurred to him. He knew — he could not help knowing — that Christabel

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The Wooing of Christabel. Wendover was like another girl since he came to Brookfield. Her whole nature seemed to have ex¬ panded and developed, and his was the magic touch that had wrought the change. He was pleased, as was natural, but he assured himself that his pleasure was purely artistic. It was the pleasure the painter feels as the picture grows beneath his hand, or the musician as he calls from the slumbering strings whatever strain he wills. Christabel was a human instrument, delicately responsive to his lightest touch, and swayed by every tone and look of his in a way that would have been flattering if it had not been just a trifle absurd, but as for any sentimental nonsense, it was out of the question. Old Wendover’s daughter ! If it had been anyone else, he might almost have been in danger of making a fool of himself, but with that fact well in view there was no fear of his losing his head — especially as, with all her appreciation of him¬ self, the fact remained that Christabel Wendover was, in Mr. Neville’s opinion, so undeniably plain. It came upon him, therefore, with all the greater surprise, when he was left alone with Mr. Wendover after dinner that evening, to find his host asking his “intentions with regard to Miss Wendover,” and to feel with sudden and exasperating conviction that he had given him some ground for doing so. “My— my intentions?” stammered Neville. “I — I have no intentions— I — why^ surely, Mr. Wend¬ over, you must see for yourself how absurd the idea would be.” “ I see nothing of the sort,” retorted Wendover. “If you will reflect on your own conduct, you will see that I am right. I will not insult you by supposing you capable of coming here and deliberately winning my daughter’s affections by way of amusement. I ask you, therefore, what your intentions are, and I mean to have an answer.” Mr. Wendover looked very determined, and even dignified. His smooth and oily manner had given place to a resolute directness of speech and look that reminded Neville oddly of Christabel in some of her moods, and as he sat waiting for the answer he had declared he meant to have, the young man felt very uncomfortable indeed. “Well, Mr. Neville,” said Wendover at last, “I may take it, I suppose, that you don’t see your way to an answer as straight as you would like ? I’ll put a few facts before you that may help you to a decision. I’m going to be quite frank, and I tell you plainly that having gone so far with Christabel, you must go further — having won her heart, you must take her hand with it— — ” Arthur burst into an uneasy laugh. “ You’re very good,” he cried, “ and Tm awfully obliged, but I don’t know what you mean by your hearts and hands. If you want to talk like a valen¬ tine - ” “ Hear me out,” said the other calmly ; “ there isn’t much like a valentine in what I’m going to say now. Perhaps you’ve forgotten, Mr. Neville, that I hold a good deal of paper of yours ? Pm afraid, unless we can agree on the subject in hand, you’ll And 551 it a rather awkward fact. Then there’s those post- obits - ” “ And pray, what have they got to do with it ? ” de¬ manded Arthur irritably. “ Simply this : that if you don’t agree to my terms, I send them to Lord St. Ives to-morrow morning.” Arthur sprang to his feet, but his heart sank within him. He felt— he knew that Wendover would be perfectly capable of carrying out his threat. If he did, Neville knew exactly what would happen. His grandfather’s solicitor would be sent for in hot haste to draw up another will, and Arthur would be cut off with a shilling — or, more likely, without one. Lord St. Ives was not a man to do things by halves. “What are your terms?” Neville asked sullenly. “ Are they such as a gentleman can accept ? ” “ Perhaps you are the best judge of that,” said Wendover coolly. “ I will tell you what they are, and then you can decide.” “ Well ? ” as the money-lender paused, and sat lost in thought. “Well, Mr. Neville, I’ve thought things over a good bit, and I’ve made up my mind. Your grandfather isn’t long for this world in the nature of things, and I’d be sorry on more accounts than one for you to quarrel with him. But unless you consent to marry my little girl, I tell you again those post-obits go to Lord St. Ives by the first post to-morrow. It would be a good bit of money out of my pocket, but I can afford it. You know best whether you can too.” CHAPTER THE FOURTH. MAN AND WIFE. We meet and part ; ’tis brief.”— Browning. Three weeks later, a very quiet wedding was solemn¬ ised in the quaint little country church of Orping- ham-cum-Bickerton, the parish church of Brookfield. Mr. Wendover had made it plain that it was the only means by which Neville could avert what was practically ruin in the present and the future, and the young man had found himself obliged to consent ; but having consented, the unwilling bridegroom played his part with more grace than might have been ex¬ pected. It was not Christabel’s fault, he knew, and he did not visit her father’s sins upon her. She, poor child, had done nothing — nothing but endow him with all the virtues of her favourite heroes, and then love him for the possession of these imaginary at¬ tributes with all the ardour and self-devotion of a girl’s first love. He was sometimes almost appalled at ti e depth of feeling in the shy, earnest eyes. How could he ever requite a love like this — he who was so painfully conscious that he could never return it ? Love? He hardly knew what it meant. He was not in love with anybody, and certainly not wfith Christabel Wendover. Neville was, indeed, not given to falling in love, nor even to fancying that he had done so. The spoilt and petted favourite of so many drawing¬ rooms was ungratefully indifferent to the charms of their fair denizens. Black eyes or blue were equally agreeable to him, so long as they looked kindly upon

Page 568

552 IF HE COULD HAVE KNOWN ON WHOSE EARS THE CRUEL WORDS WOULD FALL” { p. 555). him, and no woman’s eyes had ever looked unkindly on Arthur Neville yet. Of course he would marry some day, the young man used to think, but he had scarcely even troubled himself to picture the sort of wife he would select. She must be a lady, of course, and have a certain amount of beauty, or how could he fall in love with her ? — and be accomplished, he sup¬ posed, and distinctly well bred. So he had thought vaguely, with easy optimism ; and the end of it all was that he was to marry a plain, white-faced girl, who had been educated at a second-rate boarding- school, and whose father was a bill-broker and money¬ lender, of Mincing Lane, E.C. If under other circumstances he could ever have cared for her, he told himself that it was impossible now. The most he could hope for was that he might be able to conceal his feelings, and do his duty to his poor little bride as well as he could. Duty was not by any means a familiar word on Neville’s smiling, careless lips. Yet he meant it fully, though it was perhaps pity that moved him more than anything else. He could as soon have struck a child as have torn the veil from Christabel’s happy, adoring eyes. Let her think her love was returned, if she could, and let no word or look of his destroy the fond delusion. • The marriage was to be kept a secret till Lord St. Ives’ death, and though Wendover would dearly have liked a grand display, he was alive to the danger of exasperating the old lord. So the wedding was to be as quiet as it possibly could, the party consisting only of the nearest relatives on the Wendover side. Christabel insisted on white for herself — what young and happy bride does not? — but was happily indif¬ ferent on the subject of bridesmaids and guests.

Page 569

The Wooing of Christabel. “ If you are satisfied, it is all I care for,” she said to her bridegroom the night before. ‘‘ Oh, Arthur ! do you really love really ? ” with a break in her voice that made Arthur wonder guiltily what he had done, or left undone, in spite of all his efforts to play his part well. My dear little girl, don’t you think it is rather too late to wonder about that.?” he said gravelv. ‘‘If I hadn't - ” But he would not perjure himself to-night, whatever he might do to-morrow. He bent and kissed the trembling lips, and went back to the “Anglers’ Arms,” feeling himself a villain for the implied deceit. The wedding morning was as bright and beautiful as the happiest of brides could desire. Christabel drove to the little church with her father through lanes starred with bramble-blossoms, and bright with corn-cockle and ragged-robin, with creamy umbel and golden disc, while the ripening corn and whiten¬ ing barley on either hand swayed in a soft, delicious breeze ; the sun shone in an almost cloudless sky, where larks trilled and fluttered in the pulsing blue, as Christabel’s heart was singing and fluttering in her breast. “Child, how like your mother you look!” Mr. Wendover said. “ If that fellow does not treat you well - ” “Papa I” cried Christabel, in a tone he had never heard from her before. It was all she said, but her look silenced him. No dove, ruffling in defence of her young, could have shown a fiercer front. How absurdly fond of this young man she was, the father thought— a young man who, if she only knew it, did not care twopence about her who was marrying her from motives which even Wendover in his heart despised. Well, Christabel would grow wiser as she grew older, he supposed, and she and Neville would shake down together some¬ how, like other married folks. Christabel was like her mother, full of whims and fancies no man could under¬ stand ; but at least she would have a solid satisfaction when she was Lady St. Ives. He wished he had not given that ridiculous promise to Neville not to inform Christabel that rank as well as wealth would one day be hers. It might be wiser as regarded the secrecy they both desired, women being, in Mr. Wendover’s opinion, creatures of feeble will and indiscreet speech, with heads, moreover, likely to be utterly turned by the prospect of a title ; but it robbed the marriage of half its charms to Mr. Wendover to find himself tongue-tied about it, and unable to dilate, even to her¬ self, on the glories awaiting his daughter. Luckily, Christabel asked no questions. She was unworldly as a child, and a great deal less curious. She was ready to marry Arthur Neville whether he were pauper or peer, and needed no gaudy lure to tempt her to her fate. As she walked up the aisle on her father’s arm, the girl’s face was absolutely trans¬ figured with happiness and love ; but the tender radiance smote the bridegroom waiting for her by the worm-eaten rails with sharp reproach. If she knew the truth, would she wear a face like that .? And how 553 long could he keep up the comedy that was likely enough to have a tragic ending? Almost he could have told the truth even now, and set her free. But the service had begun, and an odd sort of shy¬ ness combined with more potent reasons of self- interest to make him relinquish the idea. When the time came, the bridegroom was apparently quite as ready as the bride to take the vows that would bind them together till death should them part. The church was empty, save for the little party at the rails, and a stout, comely woman, who evidently took a great interest in the proceedings, and cried gently all through, as some women do at every wedding they attend. Mrs Jobling cried, but she evidently enjoyed herself, in spite of her tears. She was the landlady of the “ Anglers’Arms,” and had succumbed, like the rest of her sex, to the fascination of her lodger’s pleasant manners and unfailing good temper. She had walked two miles in the August sun to see him married, and as she stood in the porch and watched him come down the sunlit walk with his bride, the worthy woman produced a grocer’s blue paper from her pocket, and showered rice upon them with smiling zeal, and then trudged back again to Brookfield with a comfortable conviction that she had done all that any lodger could expect. “ But there— they comes and goes, and I doubt if I’ll ever see his bonny face again,” said Mrs. Job- ling, wiping her heated brow as she neared her house, and stood for a moment on the step to get her breath. What a pleasant-spoken, good-looking young fellow he was, she thought, and how lucky Miss Wendover was to find such a husband ! She stood shading her eyes from the sun, and too much lost in thought to observe that a carriage was coming along the road from Brookfield station, till it pulled up at the door, and the worthy landlady turned round with a start that almost precipitated her down her own well- whitened steps. A young clergyman was descending from the shabby station fly, and looking at the startled landlady with a pair of keen dark eyes. “Is this the ‘Anglers’ Arms’ ? And is Mr. Neville within?” he inquired, in tones that betrayed excite¬ ment or haste; but Mrs. Jobling beamed upon him placidly, with a slowly broadening smile. “In now, sir? No! that he’s not! — nor won’t be again, I should say. Might you be one of the party, sir, and just come too late ? It’s no business of mine, of course, but I did think it a little strange to have never a friend with him, not even so much as a best man.” The brown eyes flashed impatiently. “ Best man ? I don't know what you’re talking about, my good woman. I want to see Mr. Neville, if he’s in, or to find him if he’s out. It’s a matter of life and death. His grandfather. Lord St. Ives, is dying, and has sent me for him ; and I assure you there’s no time to lose.” “ Dear sakes, now ! ” cried Mrs. Jobling, her smiles fading before this intelligence. “What a sad thing

Page 570

The Wooing of Christabel. 554 for the poor young man ! — and to-day, too, of all days in the year. A lord’s grandson, did you say he was ? Well, well, well ! There’s trouble for high and low alike — and him only married this morning - ” “ WhatV^ shouted the stranger, in a voice that electrified the landlady. “ What? We can’t be talk¬ ing about the same person. I am asking for a Mr. Arthur Neville— who has been staying here for the fishing - ” “That’s him, sir ! A tall, fairish young man, with a civil word for everyone.” A groan of assent seemed to endorse the descrip¬ tion. “ Yes, sir ; he were married this morning. I’ve just come away from the church.” “ You— you astound me ! ” said the gentleman, sitting down on the bench by the door, as if he really could not stand. “ Married ! I never was so astonished in my life ! I assure you he has not said a word of it.” “Dear now! you don’t say so?” said Mrs. Jobling vivaciously, scenting a mystery at once. “ I thought it were queer to have everything so quiet, and never a bridesmaid, or even a favour.” “ Can you inform me who the lady is ? ” asked the stranger. And Mrs. Jobling required no further invitation, but launched at once into the history of Neville’s courtship, as it was understood at the “ Anglers’ Arms.” He had come down, she said, a matter of six weeks ago, for the fishing ; but if he fished in the morning, he spent the afternoons with Miss Wendover, and it was not long before she (Mrs. Jobling) had seen that there was something between them. “Jobling, he didn’t think nothing of it— men doesn’t, as a rule— but I see it the first time as ever I see ’em together. Down by the Brook it were, and Mr. Neville a-fishing, and her a-standing by, looking a’most pretty, that she did, with a frock as had come from Lunnon, I’ll be bound, and the sun glintin’ on her hair - ” “But who is she?” interrupted Lord St. Ives’ mes¬ senger impatiently ; “ who is this girl that none of us have ever heard of before ? ” “ Miss Wendover her name is,” returned Mrs. Job¬ ling, with a sense of importance at being so much better informed than her interlocutor. “ You see that big house on the hill, sir ? that’s where her pa lives, and where, I make no doubt, the wedding breakfast is being eaten at this very minute.” “ Thank you — I suppose the man here knows the way. Wendover, did you say ? I’m afraid I shall not be a very welcome guest, but - ” He did not finish his sentence, but got into the car¬ riage and was driven away before Mrs. Jobling had recovered from her astonishment. “ I wonder what it all means 1 ” thought the good woman, and “ I wonder what it all means 1 ” thought the occupant of the carriage, as it crawled up the hill. “ I felt sure Arthur was in some scrape or other when he overstayed his time, but I never thought of this. He won’t thank me for interrupting his felicity, I sup¬ pose, but there’s no help for it. The poor old man is sinking, and he might to come.” The argument was conclusive to Bernard Falconer, Arthur Neville’s cousin, but he was quite aware that it might not be so to Neville himself. He looked, and in¬ deed felt, quite agitated and upset, as he rang the bell at Brookfield, and inquired if Mr. Neville was there. He had a sort of wild hope that he had been misin¬ formed, but the footman answered promptly that Mr. Neville was within, and then added, with a smirk — “ But he’s perticklerly engaged, sir ; I’m afraid he can’t see anyone this morning.” “He will see nie^" said Falconer very confidently. ‘‘ Give him this card, and say that I must speak to him at once.” The man bowed, and disappeared into one of the numerous rooms that opened from the spacious hall. Just for a moment Falconer had a glimpse of a table glittering with plate and glass and decked with flowers, of a girlish figure in bridal white, of Neville’s startled face as he looked at the card. And then . Neville came into the hall and faced him with glittering eyes. “Why have you followed me here? How did you know? What does it mean?” he demanded, before Falconer could speak. “I knew nothing,” orotested Falconer impatiently. “ I had to find you out. St. fves is dying, and wants you — so I came.” The two young men, one of whom w’as Lord St. Ives’ grandson and the other his near connection, always spoke of him by his title. “ Grandfather,” or the brevet “ Uncle,” that might have seemed natural ; in other circumstances, would have seemed weakly sentimental to anyone who knew the terrible old man who had dominated both their lives. “ I came to fetch you,” Falconer repeated. “ Of course I could not foresee how you would be engaged. If you can’t tear yourself away from your bride - ” “ Drop it I ” cried Arthur savagely. “ I can’t explain — I ought to have told you, I know, but - But come and tell me about St. Ives. We can’t talk here, but the library is empty, I believe.” He led the way to a room on the other side of the hall, and as they crossed it Falconer had another view of the bride. She came out of the room where the breakfast was, and as she passed them he heard her whisper to Neville, “I’m going to change my dress. Papa says the carriage will be here directly.” What a child she was, Falconer thought, as he watched the white-robed figure ascending the stairs. It was odd that a man of Neville’s fastidious taste should have been attracted by an unformed girl like that ! The library was large and handsome, like all the rooms at Brookfield, and furnished and decorated in the correctest (upholsterer’s) taste. But the taste of the room was the last thing in the thoughts of either of the cousins. Falconer was devoured with curiosity as to Neville’s proceedings, and what he meant to do, and Arthur was suddenly swept back into what seemed another life by the sight of his cousin, and the message he had brought. “ Of course I must go back with you,” he said, when

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1 The Wooing of Christabel. Falconer had again told him of Lord St. Ives’ desire to see him, and of the imminent danger which menaced the old man. “ I viiist come, and yet, how can I ? You see how I am fixed. I cannot leave Miss — I cannot leave my wife, and I cannot take her with me. I don’t know what to do.” He looked so anxious and haggard, so broken. Fal¬ coner thought : such a contrast to the gay and de- bonnaire Arthur Neville he had seen two months ago, that Falconer was moved with surprise and pity. He could not understand it any more than he could under¬ stand what he called the unfledged look of the bride. “ It’s rough on you, on your wedding-day,” he said sympathetically, but Arthur interrupted him as sav¬ agely as before. The wedding breakfast, with Mr. Wendover. in his oiliest mood, and the Slingsbys as principal guests, had been a severe trial to his temper, and the finding that all his precautions to ensure secrecy were in vain was a further exasperation. He turned on his cousin with the unreasonable fury which sometimes is displayed by very sunny - tempered people. “ I told you to drop all that, didn’t I ? Can’t you see that I’ve made a fool of myself? This isn’t a wife I could expect St. Ives to receive — that’s why I said nothing about it.” “ You mean - ?” said Falconer gravely. “ I mean nothing against her^^ said Neville, calm¬ ing down. ‘‘ It’s a miserable business, and I have been regularly let in. But it’s no fault of hers, poor child.” “ Can’t you tell me about it ? I’ve often got you out of scrapes before.” ‘‘You can’t get me out of this — you’re an hour or two too late,” said Neville, with a short, bitter laugh. Nevertheless, the old familiar cousinly sympathy was soothing, and before long Neville had poured out his troubles, and given a circumstantial narrative of his engagement, and of how it was brought about. “ You see I couldn’t help myself,” he said forlornly. “ It was too big a thing for you to help me, or I’d have asked you fast enough. And now, I suppose, it will all come out, and I’ve spoilt my life for nothing.” “ It will not come out through me — at least till I have your leave,” said Falconer. “And, Arthur, you say the girl is innocent ? It may turn out better than you think.” “How can it? My prospects, socially at least, are gone, and what else have I to look forward to, saddled as I am with a wife I do not love, and never shall?” If he could have known on whose ears the cruel words would fall ! Christabel had come softly in to tell him she was ready, and that the carriage was at 555 the door, and then had stood arrested in the doorway at the sound of her own name uttered in an accent of loathing that seemed to pierce and paralyse her heart. A large leather screen shut her off from view, but she literally could not stir. She tried to speak, but no sound came from the poor strained throat and quivering lips. She stood there as if turned to stone, and heard it all : the story of her lover’s difficulties, of her father’s conduct, of her husband’s indifference and despair. It was only when the cousins rose to leave the room that she found strength to creep away, a maimed, bruised creature, that only sought to hide her wound. But privacy is the last thing a bride can attain. Her father and uncle, the overdressed aunts and en¬ vious cousins, were thronging the hall to say good¬ bye, and clustered round her with effusive farewells. And then Neville and Falconer came out together, and took Mr. Wendover apart, and explained that Neville must go at once to his grandfather’s death-bed, and that he could not take his bride. Wendover indeed did not desire it. In a few hours perhaps all need for secrecy would be over, but till then nothing must imperil Neville’s standing with the fierce old lord. He might be dying, but dying fingers can some¬ times hold a pen. “We shall have some trouble with Christabel, I’m afraid,” said Mr. Wendover, but the prophecy was not fulfilled. She heard as much as they chose to tell her very quietly, looking at them v/ith dazed eyes that hardly seemed to understand. Only when her husband would have kissed her, she turned away her head. “ Good-bye,” she said coldly, holding out a hand that chilled him through her glove. She said no more, and when he had gone she shed no tears. But that night Brookfield was in confusion. Christabel had disappeared, leaving no trace of her flight, and no explanation but a letter on her dress¬ ing-table addressed to her husband. Her father did not venture to open it, but took it himself to the great gloomy house in Grosvenor Square, where a hatchment hung over the door, and the blinds were down, and Arthur Neville, Lord St. Ives, sat in the darkened library alone. He heard his father-in-law’s story with unfeigned surprise, and then he read the note. It was very brief : — “My Husband, — I know all. I am going away, and you must not try to find me. I love you too well to spoil your life. Think of me as dead, but believe that I did love you, and would not have married you if I had known. “Your affectionate Wife, “ Chi^istabel.” END OF CHAPTER THE FOURTH.

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556 I

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557

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558 WHAT TO WEAR IN AUGUST. CHIT-CHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR PARIS AND LONDON CORRESPONDENTS. I. — FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT HEN August comes, we realise the full beauty of summer, which has only one more month to linger with us. It is the season of harvest, when we reap what we have sown, and Nature rejoices with us in the sunshine and the glory of fruition. But dress has to be considered then as in all other seasons ; and the theme is a pleasing one, for it is a period when the most becoming clothes can be worn and shown to the greatest possible advantage. I am heading this chapter with a useful hat made by one of our best Paris milliners, which I think you would find useful in England for garden parties in the country, and for some of those delightful gatherings at the seaside, which, when I was last with you, I enjoyed so much. It is suited either to a very young woman or to one who has passed the hey-day of her youth, and it is so far useful as well as ornamental that it shades the face. It is made in fine Tuscan straw. The brim — except at the extreme edge, where are four or five rows of plain plait — is made of straw lace of an open-work design. It is very difficult nowadays to distinguish a hat from a bonnet. The received distinction has hitherto been considered to be strings, but in the present case I should not be prepared to call this headgear a bonnet, although some narrow velvet comes from the back, and is tied under the chin. It is quite shallow at the back, the brim being broad in front. On the top, near the edge, there is a bouquet of yellow marguerites, and some lilac-coloured vetch is mingled with dark heliotrope velvet. The back has a cluster of bows with a preponderance of the yellow blooms. A trail of foliage falls over the hair, which Frenchwomen now wear low, after the order of the Catogan. There is this distinction between French and English women — that the former rarely wear a veil if they can help it, and the latter always do. In the present style of headdress there is a great deal of difficulty in the arrangement of veils ; they should always now cover the mouth, and the material must be cut with liber¬ ality and then drawn towards the face and knotted at the back with pins, placed just where they are wanted ; and, moreover, plenty of time must be given — for dressing, to be well done, cannot be carried out in a hurry nowadays. Bodices require careful fastening, and hats thought¬ ful adjustment. The prominent idea in millinery now in the Parisian capital is the adaptation of the Greek headdress to our modern requirements. It is very becoming when on ; but off, its aspect is almost comical — for it is little more than a bandeau^ made either in velvet or of gold or silver ribbon gauze, with three ostrich tips rising at the back. The hair of the wearer fills in the vacuum at the lop, and to pretty women it is particularly becoming. Wreaths of roses are fashioned after the same order, but they are made more bonnet-like by soft-falling embroidered lace being brought in a point over the face, and bows of ribbon velvet replacing the feathers at the back, velvet strings coming thence to beneath the chin. The fashionable hats are enor¬ mously large as far as brims are concerned, but only appear in front, and the French milliners have a care¬ less fashion of drawing narrow coloured velvet through these brims without any definite plan whatever. This gives pretty little effects of colour, which are singularly artistic. Dark navy-blue and red are much worn together, and dark blue silver-spotted tulle and cripe de Chine are used as a cover-all in many ways in millinery. Most exquisite full-blown roses appear to be thrown on to these broad-brimmed hats, almost covering the crown ; but in truth this carelessness is much studied, and the Montabello roses are the most fashionable for the moment. Quite new, but not in the best taste, is the widow bonnet — made in light tulle with pink roses in front, and a long double veil of black and white tulle down the back, whence the headgear derives its name. The second figure in our sketch wears a more useful style of bonnet — a close-fitting capote with a bunch of flowers in front, backed by two or three loops of ribbon velvet. The dress is made in mousseline de laine, a capital revival for young girls, the material looking fresh and pretty, and lasting a long time, which is a great merit where allowances are limited. The dress is prettily made ; the ground is white, and is scattered all over with printed carnations and green foliage. The carnations are a deep red-pink in tone. The skirt is cut with a broad pleat in front, four kilt-pleats at the side, and a full gathered back. There is no drapery whatever. At the hem, across the front and side breadths, is a double-gathered ruche, pinked at the edges, of a vieux-rose tone, matching the carnations. The bodice has a full rounded lace yoke gathered into a silk ruche at the throat, and edged on the bust with a triple flounce of silk. Below this the bodice is gathered into points back and front, and simply edged at the waist, with a band of narrow ribbon falling in a loose bow at the back. Wide sashes hanging at the back are quite out of date. The sleeves are of the gigot form to the elbow, standing up very high from the elbow to the wrist. They are gathered into a tight gauntlet piece, the whole being made in the mousseline

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What to Wear in August. 559 de laine, and it is finished off with a narrow turned- back cuff of lace. The hat worn with this has a brim standing up well above the face — aureole fashion. A bow of coloured ribbon to match rests on the hair and on the edge of the brim, united by a band of the same, a few bows decorating the outside. The parasol — which should be white — also displays bows of vieux- rose ribbon, one on the tip and one on the handle, but made in a pyramid form, not in the loose tied bows of last year. The other dress illustrates two points of fashion which it would be well for you to bear in mind if you have in contemplation the preparation of gowns for future wear. First, it appears to be cut with the bodice and skirt in one ; and, secondly, there is the union of materials. It is an eau de Nil bengaline, trimmed with velvet of a darker tone, and a graduated band of embroidery — in reality, silk guipure lace worked in coloured silks. You must notice how this is applied in front ; it starts from the left side somewhat wide, narrowing at the waist, but continuing in an unbroken line to the hem of the skirt, where it becomes considerably broader. The bodice and the left portion of the front are cut in one, of the crepe de Chine, slightly pulled to a point at the waist, where it is outlined by a band of velvet pointed in front and placed under, not over, the lace embroidery at the side. The rest of the bodice is velvet, and so is the sleeve, which is cut away on the out¬ side of the arm and filled in with puffings of embroidered guipure, kept in its place by a couple of bands of velvet carried across it. The handsome embroidered trimming ap¬ pears at the hem on the left side of the skirt, which is composed of silk of the lighter tone, the back being a combination of velvet and crepe de Chine, gathered but not draped. There is a pointed yoke of darker velvet on the bodice, with a high upstanding collar. Bonnets in Paris accord with the dresses, but do not match them, and in this case it is black spangled with gold. II.— FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. The two pretty little damsels in our picture (on the next page) have arrived at the railway station of a well-known seaside resort, cele¬ brated for its exquisite scenery. While wait¬ ing for the rest of the party they are already beginning to enjoy its loveliness, and are doing their best to catch the distant view by means of a lorgnette. They are dressed, as you will perceive, in the latest fashions, and I am about to de¬ scribe to you the materials of which their pretty gowns are made. The figure to the left wears a fine ladies’ cloth, of a light fawn tone, opening over a front breadth of cream cloth. This is em¬ broidered in fawn and gold at the hem, and large s'prays of the same embroidery start at the waist in a broad shape, and diminish to a point half-way down the skirt. The full fawn cloth back is edged with three rows of narrow gold galon ; the sleeve is in the gigot shape — full and high on the shoulders, trimmed at the cuff with three rows of galon, having lace ruffles below. At the back, bodice and skirt are cut in one ; in the front, the former ends at the waist, the fulness being drawn in through a wide gold buckle quite seven inches long. It has a detachable cape, which is so ornamental that it can be retained indoors if the wearer pleases. It is made of a pointed piece of white cloth, entirely covered with the gold and fawn embroidery ; there is a straight all-round collar of the same, and no fastening whatever, but it is secured beneath the buckle, and opens in a slightly V-form to show the gold buttons on the bodice. This cape is bordered all round with a full frill of the fawn-coloured cloth, wide on the shoulders, narrow in front, pinked out at the edge in large scallops. The hat is a fawn straw with wild roses and fawn velvet bows. Her friend is arrayed in a new class of woollen stuff — a large electric-blue stripe on a white ground, with a white brocade, in the form of a large spray of AN EXPLANATION.

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What to Wear in August. 560 myrtle, thrown on to the check at each intersection. The skirt is quite plain and narrow ; it is ?ewn on to the bodice, and both can be slipped on together. There is a pointed waist-band of gold embroidery on white, duplicated on the collar-band. The sleeves are of plain white woollen — very full on the shoulders the tight gauntlet cuffs meeting the white, and made of the check, so sewn to it that the upper portion falls in a triple horizontal pleat. The large straw hat is crowned with poppies. The pinafore dress is a new cut that many girls could make at home. There is a close-fitting bodice; beneath and over- this back and front is a sort of pinafore bib, cut in one with the skirt, and slightly draped on the shoulders. A slashed over - sleeve, matching the pinafore, comes to the elbow, and there is a tight under one, in contrasting material, like the upper part of the bodice. You hardly see a bodice now which has not a Bolero jacket, and sometimes this same rounded piece is dupli¬ cated about the arm¬ holes at the back. Full bodices have quite come in again, but the fulness is generally drawn to a point in the front, and does not appear much about the shoulders. I will, however, more minutely describe a simple stylish bodice not difficult to make. It is plain at the back, the basque cut up into small, shallow, square tabs. The collar is covered by a broad band of passe¬ menterie ; a straight band of the same goes down the centre of the front, hiding the hooks ; and pieces of shaped gimp trimming are carried round the arm¬ holes in front, while between this and the centre passementerie the bodice is fulled from the shoulder to the waist, outlined by a band of the same trim¬ ming, the half of which has to be hooked on after the dress is fastened. Many of the full bodices start from the shoulders, apparently opening over a V-shaped piece, back and front, which has all the appearance of an under¬ bodice. Foulards and cotton gowns are frequently made with yokes of white muslin embroidery, over which the rest of the material is pleated, the pleats confined at the waist by a band, and ending like a shirt in an all¬ round basque. The sleeves are full and high on the shoulder. Perfectly fiat hats, literally carrying out the old saying, “As fiat as a pancake,” in both black and white straws, are much in favour for young people. They are crowned by wild roses, marguerites, and small blooms of that nature. Hats with crumpled crowns, made in white horse-hair, trimmed with white feathers and white vel¬ vet, are the height of the fashion. We do not like to think of rain in this summer season, but some days must be “dark and dreary,’’ and the water¬ proofs are now made as becoming garments, of shot silk, drawn into the figure back and front, with and with¬ out capes. A new shape, and very good one, IS on the plan of the old cir¬ cular, with a slit for the arm to go through ; but on the shoulders are a couple of capes, which give it shape without inter¬ fering with the comfort of the original easy cut WHERE IS THE BOAT?” * . Tricycle- riders will be glad to hear of a well-ventilated cape (cut sufficiently long to cover the handles in front), which can be stowed away in a waterproof case, and weighs from twelve to thirteen ounces. A waterproof-faced cloth is a capital invention, both for dresses and cloaks, and some of the brocaded silk waterproofs, being admirably ventilated, are fit for wearing on any occasion. There is a new driving- ulster, made double-breasted, with a coachman s cape, which certainly has many merits. But all this talk about waterproofs is only on the principle of “ fore¬ warned, forearmed,” for it does sometimes happen that our autumn holiday season is broken up by un- propitious weather.

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189 OUR HEAD G A R D K X I'. R.

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56i THE GARDEN IN AUGUST. E may say that it is in the garden as it is in the skies : for j ust as the sunset of a glorious day is very often charac¬ terised by that most ex¬ quisite and fantastic va¬ riety of colour in the western sky, that makes us eager to find a friend to share quickly with us our admiration and delight before the tinted beauties of the scene have faded into the grey and sombre twi¬ light, so is it that some of our gayest and most brilliantly painted flowers reserve their bloom for the wane of the summer. On the other hand, there are, of course, those who would maintain that an Easter sunrise, and the more unpretending and modest flowers with which we are familiar in the spring of the year, contrast favourably even with a rosy sunset and the gaudily coloured flowers of the early autumn. But, to a well-balanced mind, every season brings with it its own delights. Just now, however, our province is to talk of some showy August flowers, and one there is which will at once occur to many of us as in bloom this month : we mean the passion-flower, so called, of course, from the fact that its bloom in some of its features reminds us of Calvary. Now it is hardly necessary to say at the outset that every variety of the passion-flower is a climber, as also that the greater number require a considerable degree of artificial heat in order to attain anything like perfec¬ tion of bloom. From this we may at once infer that the passion-flower is hardly adapted for growing in pots. One class, however, there is which may almost be called a hardy, or at all events a half-hardy, climber. This is the Passiflora cceridea : many of us must have noticed this trained to run over the south wall of a house in some sheltered situation. Just at this moment the writer has in his recollection an extensive wall expanse of an old country house in Bedfordshire, in which the following climbers seemed to struggle for the mastery the wistaria, with its flowers like clusters of grapes, that blooms profusely in May and a second time, but slightly only, in August ; the mag¬ nolia, with its ponderous water-lily bloom, if we may so describe it ; the Jasmine, which scented the air and fascinated the bees ; and, lastly, the passion-flower ; of course all could not be grown over exactly the same spot, but at times they met, or some of them at least did. There are plenty of methods, then, by which we may make a wall look like a veritable flower-bed, which otherwise would resemble the side of a gaol. Passiflora ccemlea^ then, will flower freely, and cover for us a good space of brick-work. Of course, a severe winter will try it, even in a sheltered spot, and the points of some of the shoots may be killed, but then a little protection and painstaking in a trying time of the year will obviate many difficulties. Every¬ thing done well gives trouble, but if we do not shrink from work, we get our reward in the end. This surely holds true universally. Then again, whereas some specimens of the passion¬ flower are thoroughly stove plants, and want propor¬ tionate temperature and care in their cultivation, on the other hand the passion-flower can, if you elect to- make the experiment, be trained to climb over a portion of the interior of the greenhouse. One objection, however, experience will tell us, to this method, is that the passion-flower is rather disposed to serve as an umbrella to other plants that are along the TRAINING THE PASSION¬ FLOWER. 756

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My Strange Gift. 562 stands in the greenhouse ; and, in fact, the same difficulty is found to exist where the experiment is tried of growing grapes and flowers in the same house. It can be done, and has been done, but you will find that green fly, and mildew, and stunted flowers, and sometimes blighted grapes will eventually determine you to find more room and turn one of the two out. Very appropriately we call a garden a nursery, and domestic experience tells us that if we put too many children in one bed, one of them will probably fall out and hurt himself, while sometimes they all “ fall out,” only in another sense of the word, and we quickly separate them. The passion-flower likes a free soil of good peat and loam, and tolerably well enriched into the bargain. Then there is another fairly half-hardy specimen of which we may speak, and that is the P. incar7iata : this is a pink, flesh-coloured flower, and hence is so called. Again, the class that we must call stove plants is very large, and yet, after all, it must not be supposed that many of these require such heat as orchids, for example. Where, however, we intend to ripen fruit on them, a rather higher temperature will naturally be required, and this brings us to speak of the fruit-bearing class. This class is known by the name of the granadilla, and of these the best known is the P. quadrajigiilaris : this has ovate foliage, the flowers being very fragrant, white outside and red inside, the fruit being oblong, some six inches in diameter, and, when quite ripe, of a greenish yellow. Another class — the P. maliforinis — is the apple- fruited granadilla, with exquisite flowers, but of a more dingy yellow when the fruit is ripe. Two others may be here named— the P. edulis or purple-fruited kind ; and, lastly, the P. laiirifolia^ that is the laurel¬ leaved or water-lemon class ; of this last the fruit is about the size of an egg — yellow, and with white spots. A leap from the consideration of the passion-flower to outdoor cucumbers is certainly one from the sublime to the ridiculous, but such things in the garden are no matter of surprise. Perhaps, of the two, the ridiculous outdoor cucumber is the more practical subject. And at a time when our cucumbers in frames are some¬ what exhausting themselves, we sometimes turn our at¬ tention to the open-air specimen, or ridge cucumber ; these we do not sow until the end of May or early in June, nor will they bear before August or September. They are, of course, stronger, thicker, and coarser than those that we rear under our glass, but some may prefer their flavour ; at all events they will do for pickling. And what are we to say as to the rest of all our necessary gardening labours for August ? We can only here hint at what has to be done, and experience must fill up the outline. Important operations, then, are the taking of cuttings from our open flower-beds for the next year ; this we must not think of postponing later than the third week of the month. And next our new strawberry beds should be made from the runners, not later than the 12th. The wall- fruit will require a vigilant eye and protection from wasps, &c., and the early apple crop will also want attention ; lastly, the onion-bed must be carefully got up, exposed to dry for a time, and then housed. Our paper opened with a fragrant item, and we certainly conclude with a savoury one. MY STRANGE GIFT. BY MARY FORD. last we think the time has come when I may venture to write the story of the strange experiences which I underwent in my girlhood. My husband considers them in¬ teresting from a medical point of view, while I hope they may be useful to such young persons as are disposed to wish for exceptional or abnormal powers. I was a girl of eighteen, and my mother was dying of a fatal and agonising complaint. She was my only near relation, for I was an orphan, and had neither brother nor sister : my mother and I were all in all to each other. I have no wish to harrow my readers’ feelings with a description of what a young girl suffered in watching the progress of disease in such a case. I knew my mother’s state was hopeless, but dread of my impend¬ ing loss was, for the moment, swallowed up by the intolerable spectacle of her sufferings. It seemed as

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My Strange Gift. impossible to wish for their continuance as to desire their termination — a termination which would deprive me of all I loved on earth. Trained sick-nurses were little known or employed in those days. An old woman from the village came to relieve my watches, but it was on me that my mother relied ; and our old doctor used to call me his “ head nurse.’^ One morning I was alone by my mother’s bedside. She had passed a distressing night, and, though a little easier for the moment, I was looking forward with dread to the paroxysm of pain which experience had shown me was shortly to be expected. Too surely I noted the contraction of her features, and felt the nervous grip with which her hand tightened upon my own. A passion of pity possessed me ; my whole being went out in a cry, a fervent prayer — “ Oh ! that I could but bear the pain for her!” No sacrifice seemed to me to be too great to give her relief from the suffer¬ ing which I could realise so plainly, yet so help¬ lessly. And then gradually a strange feeling of pain stole over me. I had never felt it before, yet I knew it. It was the pain my mother had described to me, beginning slowly but surely, increasing in poignancy from moment to moment. I kept my eyes on her dear face, and as my pangs increased, so hers appeared to diminish ; her features relaxed, the hand 1 still held in mine grew soft and yielding, a delicious expression of repose passed over her face. “ How heavenly 1 ’’ she murmured, and then she sank into a peaceful sleep ; and I sat beside her, with lips compressed to keep in my groans, my right hand clenched till my nails cut into my skin, while I let my left hand remain quietly in hers, no tremor giving her a hint of what I was undergoing. An hour passed away, each minute dragging itself out to an intolerable length ; but I kept firm to my resolution, and not for an instant did I will to take my hand away from my mother’s, and end the agony I was enduring. I felt sure it was my influence which allayed her pain at the expense of bearing it myself I would not obtain my release by a renewal of her sufferings, and my strength held out till the time when the paroxysm usually began to abate. Then my pains grew less and less, and at the end of another half-hour they left me, trembling and exhausted, and yet free from suffering. I drew my hand away from my mother’s so gently I could not have disturbed her, yet instantly she opened her eyes. “ Oh, Mary ! I have had such a delightful sleep. What time is it, dear ? ” I told her. “ I have been wonderfully free from pain this morning ; but you look pale, my child. Go and take a run in the garden ; it will do you good.” I kissed her silently and left her, glad to be alone for a few moments to recover my strength, afraid of betraying what had happened. 563 I had not the slightest doubt as to how the morning’s respite had been purchased ; but if she suspected what I had done, I knew she would forbid me to repeat the experiment, and I felt a strange exultation from the knowledge that I could relieve her sufferings by my own. At our garden gate I met the old doctor, who had known me all my life. “ How tired you look, Miss Mary,” he remarked as he shook hands with me. “ I’m afraid your mother has been having a bad time.” “Not a bit of it, doctor. She has not had such a good morning for weeks.” We passed back together to the sick-room. Dr. Gray talked a little to my mother. She told him how free she had been from pain that morning. I felt it coming on,” she said, but, instead of getting worse and worse (as it generally does), it seemed to stop, and then began to go away. Such a strange, soothing sort of feeling came over me, and then I fell asleep.” The doctor was evidently puzzled, and as good as said so as I was showing him downstairs again. “You must not build upon this, my dear,” said he, placing his hand over mine as we stood at the bottom of the stairs. “ I fear it is but a temporary relief. The sudden cessation of pain at this stage is most remarkable ; yet all the other bad symptoms continue and increase. It is very perplexing ; but at least it is something to be thankful for, is it not ? ” I assented, and he took his leave without a suspicion of what had happened. The days passed on ; again and again I soothed my mother’s pain ; but the cost was a terrible one. As her complaint progressed, the torments it caused became more protracted and more excruciating, and it needed a firmer exertion of the will to sit still and endure them. The feeling that at any time I could put an end to my sufferings, the importunate demands of my over-taxed nerves, which cried out against the trial imposed upon them, the dread lest I should weakly fail in my self-appointed task, all added to the trial. I began to wish that I had no choice in the matter, that I could make my sacrifice for once and all, and have the possibility of drawing back taken away from me. But I knew the trial could not last much longer, and I hoped to persevere to the end. “It is strange that your mother should suffer so little,” said Dr. Gray to me again, about a fortnight later. “ I never met with such a case before. I confess I did not expect her to have lasted as she has done ; but really, now, I do not see why she should not linger on indefinitely. In these cases the patient generally dies as much from the exhaustion of the pain, as from the ravages of the disease.” “ Linger on indefinitely ! ” I repeated the words mechanically ; and then, as I heard the sound of my own voice, I felt a sudden shock as I realised that my first thought had not been one of gladness at the prospect of prolonging my mother’s life ; it had been

Page 581

My Strange Gift. a feeling of dismay at the idea of the protracted strain upon my endurance. I hated myself for the feeling ; I looked upon my¬ self as next door to a murderess ; I reviled myself inwardly for desiring my mother’s death. I was already exhausted with physical suffering, the added mental distress was too much for me to bear ; my head swam round, I reeled, and should have fallen, if Dr. Gray had not supported me. I remember his placing his arm around me, and then I remember nothing more. It was some hours before I recovered. My fainting fit had been an alarming one, and Dr. Gray had not left the house. My mother was my first thought; but when I men¬ tioned her name, the servants looked uncertainly at each other. “ I will go to her” I said standing up. “ She is very ill,” replied one of the maids ; ‘‘ but here comes Dr. Gray.” The kind old man was terribly troubled ; and, as gently as he could, he told me that my mother was rapidly sinking ; a violent paroxysm had come on while I lay unconscious, and it had left her too weak to rally again ; her moments were numbered, and she had asked for me. Dr. Gray led me to her bedside ; I sank into my usual place, and mechanically stretched out my hand to take hers in the old, familiar manner. But instead of letting her hand lie passively in mine, she drew it gently away, while a faint smile lit up her worn and pallid face. “ My good child,” she began in her weak and gentle voice, I know - She never told me what she knew, though I believe she had found out what I had been doing for her ; but strength and voice alike failed for further words, her voice died away in a gentle murmur ; she drew a sigh —more, it seemed to me, of relief than of pain— and then she was at peace. Dr. Gray was very kind to me ; and, after my mother’s funeral, he in¬ sisted upon taking me to his home, where his good sister. Miss Martha, nursed me back to health and life again. I was not left destitute ; my father had been in the Indian Civil Service, and I was entitled to a pension so long as I was unmarried, besides in¬ heriting my mother’s little savings. But I had not enough to go on living in our old home, and Miss Martha told me that it was better for me to be obliged to leave it. “You must go about, and see a little of the world, child,” she said to me. “ If my brother had not brought you away from the cottage you would never have re¬ covered your health, and if you don’t get a change from Freshfield, you’ll never re¬ cover your spirits.” Freshfield was the name of our village. I felt as if I would rather be unhappy at Freshfield than happy anywhere else ; and said something of the sort to Miss Martha. “ That shows what a low, AT OUR GARDEN GATE I MET THE OLD DOCTOR” (/. 563).

Page 582

My Strange Gift. morbid state you’ve got into ; and you want some¬ thing a little younger, and more lively, than Samuel or me to shake you out of it,” replied Miss Martha in her most decided manner. ‘‘Poor Mary has been shaken enough for the pre¬ sent,” said Dr. Gray kindly ; “ but Martha is quite right about our being dull company for you.” “ Oh, no ! Mother was fond of you,” 1 exclaimed. “Poor little girl! You were a good daughter to her, Mary. She told me on that last day that no one would ever believe what you had done for her. She even said that her remarkable freedom from pain was owing to you ; though, of course, that was a fancy.” “ Did she say how I had eased her ?” I asked. “ I could not quite understand what she meant. I suppose her mind wandered a little ; but she said you were sacrificing yourself for her, that she had been trying to live for your sake, but that now for your sake she wished to die. I suppose she feared you would lose your health in nursing her.” I did not share the supposition. I saw that on that last day my mother had discovered my secret, and perhaps the discovery had shortened her life. Had I done right or wrong? I had prayed for a preternatural power ; apparently it had been granted to me, but I inwardly vowed I would never try and use the power again ; was it not an unwarrantable interference with the nature of a fello w- creature ? Miss Martha did not leave me much time for brooding over these questions. She got me to help her in the house and in the village, where she acted as sick-nurse and cook to the poorest of her brother’s patients ; she took me drives about the pretty country around Freshfield, showed me the beautiful village churches with which that neighbourhood abounds, and even inoculated me with her latest hobby, the study of Gothic architecture. Miss Martha’s life was devoted to benevolence and hobbies, which she pursued with equal enthusiasm and success ; she was one of the best types of that almost extinct species — the cultivated country lady. Now- a-days, country ladies talk to you of the latest opera ; and it is you who tell them of the rare wild flowers to be found in their own fields, and inform them of the fine views to be seen in their own neighbourhoods. In my mother’s lifetime, I had stayed much in the house, her health had long been too delicate for walking out ; we read and talked together, and in my solitary rambles L generally carried on the train of thought which had engrossed me at home, wrapped up in my own fancies, and dead to the world around me. Miss Martha opened my eyes. I learnt to look at the world around me ; she taught me to see the dif- ference between goose-grass and woodruff, between marsh-tits and cole-tits. The village churches, which I had looked upon as commonplace little build¬ ings, acquired a new interest when Miss Martha had taught me to distinguish Decorated from Per¬ pendicular; while the Johnnys and Tommys, the Pollys and Sallys, whom I had only realised as untidy little objects, swarming out from the village 565 school, were discovered to be full of character and interest when posed as models for one of Miss Martha’s clever sketches, or when their tongues were loosened under the influence of her sympa¬ thetic talk. In fact, I believe I should have grown, straight off, into a sensible young woman, if I had had the good fortune to live a little longer with Miss Martha. But such was not to be my lot, and a new destiny opened to me, with Mrs. Singleton as my fate. Major Singleton, who had known something of my father in India, came to settle at The Mallows, a country house near Freshfield. He was a commonplace, well-meaning man, who might have settled anywhere without exciting much interest among his neighbours. He was safe to go to church on Sunday, pay his subscriptions, entertain his neighbours, express the sentiments which are becoming in an officer and an Ehglishman, and in short perform the whole duty of a country gentleman. It was his wife who took the neighbourhood by storm, the prettiest and sweetest-mannered woman I had ever seen, who appeared among us in a succession of the most becoming costumes, which she contrived should be fashionable and picturesque at the same time. She was generally accompanied by her only child, a beautiful little boy of four years old, whose get-up was the envy and despair of half the mothers in the neighbourhood. It is no wonder that I fell a victim to the universal adoration of Mrs. Singleton. I felt favoured beyond all other mortals when she condescended to accept the incense I offered up to her ; and when, with many pretty words about the interest she felt in my father’s child, and about the love I displayed towards her darling Cyril, she suggested I should come and pay her a long visit, and help her in forming the character and training the mind of her sweet little boy, I felt all too unworthy of the confidence she reposed in me. Besides, I was happy with Miss Martha, and thought it would be ungrateful to wish to leave her. It was Miss Martha who persuaded me to accept Mrs. Singleton’s invitation. Amid all her excellences. Miss Martha had one weakness ; the cleverest and most efficient woman I have ever known, she had a rooted belief that everybody could do things better than herself. “ Mrs. Singleton will be such a nice friend for you, Mary dear. So much younger and brighter than I can be, at my age, you know. And she knows so many people, and can take you into a little society. It will be just the change y^ou ought to have — besides,” she added, as I still hesitated, “ you can always come home to us again, whenever you like.” I went to The Mallows and began to help Mrs. Singleton in the training of Cyril’s mind. He was a dear little fellow, though his mother sometimes lamented that he had inherited his father’s matter-of- fact disposition, and had none of her own imaginative and sensitive nature. “ We should never be blind to the faults of those we love,” she used to remind me on

Page 583

My Strange Gift. 566 such occasions, and indeed I was surprised at the firmness with which she corrected Cyril’s faults at home, a firmness I should never have credited her with, from the general sweetness of her manners, and especially her caressing fondness towards Cyril himself. To me, she was kindness personified, overvaluing all I did for her child, and at last leaving him almost entirely in my care. Strangers actually credited me with being the dear little fellow’s governess, a mistake which amused us very much, and which she was kind enough to say proved how well I must manage him. I can't help hoping, however, that Mrs. Singleton was mistaken in attributing Cyril’s illness to my pressing him on too fast. Indeed, Dr. Gray was positive that he could not have been injured by learning to sing “ Ba ! ba ! black sheep ” and “ Little Bo-Peep;” but thought the sun might have injured his head at the garden party, where he went with his mother, and was found playing about without his hat. I had been to see Miss Martha that afternoon. And you know, dear, if you had come with me and looked after Cyril, it could not have happened, so you are responsible any way,” said Mrs. Singleton to me in her gentle tones. I was too much distressed at little Cyril’s illness to care to portion out blame or responsibility, but it certainly showed a very forgiving disposition on Mrs. Singleton’s part to trust the little fellow to my care again. Pie had such terrible pains in his head, poor child ; his mother could not stay and hear his screams, and I undertook to watch beside him for the night. As I sat beside him, and saw the sufferings of the innocent little fellow, through the carelessness of other people, the old longing to relieve him came upon me once more. I took his little fevered hand and held it in my own. I forgot my bid misgivings and resolves, conscious only of a fierce determination that his pain should cease. Again that strange experience repeated itself. My little patient grew calmer, those dreadful shrieks died away, and gradually a refreshing sleep came over him, while I sat quietly beside him, in spite of the madden¬ ing pain which had apparently transferred itself from his brain to mine. I sat there through the night till the morning broke, and still Cyril slept. At last his nurse entered the room. She was a kind-hearted girl, and had come to bring me a cup of tea. My mouth was parched with thirst, and I eagerly stretched out my hands for the cup. The charm was broken in an instant. Cyril awoke and began to cry, while I experienced an immediate sensation of relief, though so great was. my weakness that I could only just stagger to my room, the nurse staying to watch by Cyril till his mother should come to him. Again and again during Cyril’s illness did I exert the strange power I possessed. The child himself seemed to recognise it, and clamoured Tor me in¬ cessantly. “ I want Mary. Let Mary come. Mary makes me go to sleep.” ‘‘ His mind wanders, poor child ! ” said Mrs. Singleton. “ I don’t think it does,” replied the doctor. ‘‘ Miss Ford has a wonderful knack of soothing him. He always seems to pick up when she nurses him, and falls back again in the intervals when she is not there.” It was a young doctor who spoke. Dr. Gray was ill just then with an attack of bronchitis, and Miss Martha was nursing him. His nephew, John Gray, had come down to take his uncle’s practice for the time — Dr. John we used to call him for the sake of distinction. I was afraid when Dr. John turned his piercing eyes upon me. I had a horror lest anyone should discover my secret. “My aunt told me to be sure and let her know how you were looking,” said Dr. John. “I’m afraid I can’t give her a very good report.” “ Oh ! sick-nursing makes me look ill, but I shall be all right when it’s over,” I replied. His eyes rested on my face with a dissatisfied expression. “ You want some fresh air. I should like to drive you over to Freshfield to see my aunt.” “ I could not get back again,” I objected. “Oh, yes,” put in Major Singleton, who had en¬ tered the room in time to catch the end of our talk. “Do go, Miss Ford. We ought not to let you wear yourself out as you are doing. I am quite ashamed of myself. Drive over to Freshfield, and I will fetch you in the dog-cart at any time you like.” I passed a pleasant day at Freshfield, though Miss Martha startled me, when she first saw me, by exclaiming, “You look just as you did after nursing your mother, Mary.” Her remark seemed to interest Dr. John, and he asked as many questions as he could about my mother’s illness without being actually rude. I think he saw that he worried me at last, and then he left off with an apology. At five o’clock the dog-cart appeared for me, as agreed upon ; but instead of the major’s burly form, the box-seat was occupied by a stranger. He promptly introduced himself as Rupert Fanshawe, a cousin of Mrs. Singleton’s, whom we had been expecting on a visit. He explained that the major had been obliged to attend a magistrates’ meeting that afternoon. A brother-magistrate had 'a poaching case on, and, as it was not etiquette for him to sit and judge in his own cause, he had sent an urgent request to the major to put in an appearance, while Mr. Fanshawe undertook to come to Freshfield in his place. I had a pleasant drive to The Mallows. Mr. Fanshawe was very agreeable, and we had a common subject in our admiration for Mrs. Singleton, till he remarked- —

Page 584

My Strange Gift. ‘‘ Eveleen is the most charming woman I know. Her only drawback is her devotion to that spoilt little brat of hers.” ‘‘ Oh ! ” I replied, quite shocked ; how can you say so ? Cyril is a perfect darling.” Really ? Do you really mean that, now ? ” he asked. “ Of course I do,’^ I replied indignantly. “ How can you say such things of him, and when he is ill, too.^” ‘‘Poor little beggar! I’m sure I hope he’ll get over it. But I can’t, for the life of me, see what you women can admire in tiresome little boys. It’s very becoming to you, though, I must confess,” he con¬ cluded, smiling. I took up the cudgels for little boys in general and Cyril in particular, and pleaded their cause so well that, before we reached The Mallows, Mr. Fanshawe owned himself quite a convert to my views. I returned much invigorated to the sick-room. “ I’m so glad you’ve come, miss,” said Cyril’s nurse — “ I can do nothing with Master Cyril ; he’s been wanting you so.” I took my old place at his side, and soon soothed him off to sleep. He was getting better at last, and my task was becoming less painful. I had not the heart to let him suffer, so long as I was able to relieve him. When once he had begun to improve, Cyril grew rapidly well, and within three days of Mr. Fanshawe’s arrival he was pronounced to be convalescent. Unhappily, poor Mrs. Singleton was much dis¬ tressed by the preference the little fellow now showed for me. He actually preferred me to his own mother, which must have been very painful to her feelings. But I was somewhat surprised, as well as grieved, when she told me it would be better for me to leave The Mallows. She said my presence there distressed her, as I reminded her of all she had undergone during darling Cyril’s illness. Major Singleton, on the other hand, said he was sorry I was going ; he thanked me heartily for the little help I had been able to give them ; and was good enough to say that he could never repay me for what I had done for Cyril. Mr. Fanshawe was quite angry at my leaving, and distressed me by observing that Mrs. Singleton’s in¬ gratitude was unparalleled. I did my best to defend her from the charge, for of course she did not know the secret of Cyril’s preference, and I felt like a guilty creature who had robbed a mother of her child’s love. I was glad to get back to Freshfield again, and feel myself once more under Miss Martha’s sheltering wing. Dr. Gray was well again, and Dr. John had returned to London ; but Mr. Fanshawe often came to enliven us in his absence. I am lingering over my story, for my heart fails me when I come to the task of describing the two follow¬ ing years. I do not mean that they were years of misery ; indeed, when at the end of the first six months I 567 became engaged to Rupert Fanshawe, I thought I was the happiest of girls, and wondered what I could have done to deserve my handsome and brilliant lover. The only cloud in my sky was Miss Martha’s dis¬ approbation. Not that she ever expressed her dislike of Rupert, and her kindness to myself was, if possible, greater than ever ; but I knew she did not like my lover, and it troubled me. “ Don’t worry your little head about an old maid’s fancies, my dear,” she said to me one day. “ There is nothing very dreadful in my thinking that Mr. Fanshawe is hardly worthy of my little Mary.” “ But he is so much better, and cleverer, and hand¬ somer than I am.” “ Let’s say no more about it, dear. I had other hopes for you, and perhaps they make me unjust to Mr. Fanshawe so Miss Martha settled, as usual, that she was the person to be blamed, and left me in a serene belief in the perfections of my lover. He was often at Freshfield during the following months. His business as a barrister did not seem sufficient, as yet, to be much of a hindrance to his courtship, and when he was away from me his letters were almost as charming as his presence. Sometimes he stayed at The Mallows, and then the major’s good-nature seemed inexhaustible he was always ready to drive Rupert to Freshfield, and would sit with Miss Martha for as long as we pleased to wander about the garden. I suppose he remembered the days when he was courting Mrs. Singleton. It was at the end of one of these protracted visits that the accident happened which proved fatal to my kind old friend. His horse took fright at the noise- from a steam plough, gave a sudden swerve, and dashed the dog-cart violently against a post, so that Major Singleton was thrown out on one side and Rupert on the other, within a stone’s-throw of Dr. Gray’s door. The two men were brought into our house : the major had been killed upon the spot, and Rupert was severely injured. Of course I helped Miss Martha to nurse him, and I again exerted my strange power of relieving pain, still upon the old condition of bearing it myself. But on this occasion I had to exert this power under Miss Martha’s watchful eyes, and I thought she first seemed puzzled, and then suspicious. Her next move filled me with alarm; she sent for Dr. John, and my heart sank at the idea of hiding anything from his- piercing eyes. However, he showed no disposition ta interfere with me, except when his considerate kind¬ ness enabled him in any way to help me ; besides, he persuaded his uncle to try a fresh mode of treatment, and while I could only relieve my lover’s pain. Dr. John was able to improve his symptoms. My fears were completely laid at rest, when, one day as I was returning to my patient’s room, I heard Dr. John remonstrating with him. “You can bear the pain if you try,” he was saying— “you let that girl mesmerise you, and it’s killing her.’^ ‘‘She likes it,” returned Rupert, with a laugh; “it makes her happy to suffer for my sake.”

Page 585

My Strange Gift. 568 “ Yes, it does ! ” I exclaimed, as I ran into the room ; how well you understand me, Rupert ! ” ‘‘Too well,” muttered Dr. John, beneath his breath; but I do not think he meant me to hear him, and he walked away without further remark. Rupert and I had our own way throughout the rest of his illness. I soothed his pain whenever I was with him, till, once more, convalescence came to relieve me from the trial. Was it fancy on my part that as he grew stronger Martha is satisfied at last, now that I am married to her favourite nephew, and we often wonder how I could ever have been afraid of Dr. John’s eyes. We have had but one difference of opinion since our marriage. Once John was ill, and I wished to nurse him. “ Promise me, Mary, that you won’t try your old tricks upon me.” I hesitated. “ Promise,” he repeated, “ or I’ll have Aunt Martha and no longer needed me, a constraint arose on his side, and he began to grow weary of my presence ; or was it that, when he returned to The Mallows and found Mrs. Singleton grieving for her recent loss, an early feeling for her was again revived in his heart ? I cannot tell, and will not recall that painful time, but within six months of the major’s death Rupert had privately engaged himself to Mrs. Singleton, and was married to her as soon as her year of widowhood was completed. My husband has never spoken of him to me but once, and then he told me that Rupert had ceased to love me because he had behaved in such a cowardly manner towards me— John’s affection for me made him rather unjust towards Rupert, I fear. Miss to nurse me, and she shan’t let you come into the room.” Upon this threat I yielded, for John meant what he said. When he was better again I reproached him for his wilfulness. “Did you think I would risk losing your love, Mary ? or, even worse, my love for you ? If you had made me hate my self as a coward, what pleasure could we have had in one another ? ” I thought over the past — what good had my strange gift ever done ? It had deprived my mother of the very wish to live ; it had helped to alienate Cyril from his mother — even now the child does not love her — and it had separated me from my first lover.

Page 586

Mustakd and Cress. I knew that John had judged aright, and I promised him that I would never try to exercise that strange power any more. It was only last week that John had a sharp attack of neuralgia, and I observed how I wished I could bear the pain for him. He laughed triumphantly, in spite of the pain. “ You couldn’t bear it now if you were to try.” “ May I ” I asked. He stretched out his hand to me in answer ; but when I looked at his confident eyes, I felt the task was a hopeless one. I held his hand in mine, I threw my whole soul into my task, but my power had departed, and I could do nothing. “1 told you so,” said John; “you may be sure I was certain of your failure before I let you try. It is 569 worth a touch ot neuralgia, Mary, to have positive proof that you are cured.” “ Cured ?” I echoed in amazement. “My dear girl,” replied John, “yours was simply one of the most striking cases of hysteria I ever met with. You had a certain mesmeric power, which is not uncommon, and were able by that means to send your patients to sleep. Mesmerism is exhausting to any operator, and especially to a delicate girl like yourself. Having a lively imagination, you supposed the pains you relieved were transferred in some super¬ natural way to yourself ; all the pains you felt were simply the result of that impression, working upon a disordered nervous system.” “ Why did you never tell me this before ? ” I asked. “You would not have believed it.” I am not sure that 1 believe it now. MUSTARD HY do we always associate mustard and cress together.^ Because they both belong to the same genus: Sma- pis^ of the CrucifercB order. This is an order of plants which inhabits most of the temperate countries, and which embraces some re¬ markable members, as we shall presently see. Bo- tanically, they are charac¬ terised by their essential deviation from the ordi¬ nary symmetry observable in the relative arrangement of the parts of fructifica¬ tion. Linnaeus divided the order into two, and more recent further divisions have been made. But we shall not concern ourselves with details which any ordinary student of botany knows, or can readily learn. We are not going to write a botanical article, but one explanatory of some of the little-known lore of these exceedingly familiar plants. Let it just be noted passim^ that all the CrticifercE possess anti¬ scorbutic and stimulating properties, combined with an acrid flavour, and that the order includes — besides mustard and cress — turnip, sea-kale, radish, cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, as well as the stock, wall-flower, honesty, and candy-tuft. Mustard belongs to the Suiapis family of the CrucifeT^CB. The mustard-pot of the dinner-table is replenished by Sinapis nigra (Black Mustard of Europe), a plant which grows to a height of two or three feet, which has a bright yellow flower, and the powdered seeds of which form our familiar con¬ diment. The pungent properties of the mustard of commerce are not observable in the seeds before AND CRESS. crushing, but are developed by fermentation in the process of mixing. The ferment inyrosm exists in the seed, and is converted into viyronic acid by the mixture with water. This it is which gives the “ heat” to mustard. The Black Mustard plant grows to a much larger size in warm climates than in Europe, and thus it is supposed to be the mustard-tree referred to in the New Testament. But as to this, authori¬ ties differ, and the point does not affect our present purpose. It is the Smapis alba, or white mustard, which is grown along with cress for salad-making. Its seeds, also, when powdered, will produce rnyronic acid by fermentation with water, and are used for that pur¬ pose to some extent. But it is chiefly grown for its leaves, which are familiar in every kitchen-garden of the land, and more or less all over Europe. One of the first references to the use of mustard in cookery in England occurs in Venner’s “ Via Recta ad Vitam Longam,” published in 1650. It is there stated, by the way, that “ oysters are usually eaten a little before meate,” a gastronomic custom which most people have probably believed to be quite modern. But as to mustard, Venner names it as “a sauce in common use with sundry meats, both flesh and fish.” Muffet, who wrote a book called “ Health’s Improve¬ ment,” in 1655, also says: “I commend the use of mustard with biefe, and all kinds of salted flesh and fish.” Venner says that “ radishes are used as sauce with meat ; ” and Muffet that “ most men eat radishes before meat, to procure appetite, and help digestion.” According to an old edition of McCulloch’s “ Dic¬ tionary of Commerce,” it would seem that mustard was not known at table in this country as we now use it until the year 1 720. Previous to that, the seed had been rudely pounded in a mortar, and the integuments roughly separated. But about the year 1720 a happy

Page 587

570 Mustard and Cress. thought occurred to a good woman of Durham city, by name Clements. She thought it would be worth while grinding the seed in a mill, and treating the meal as carefully and tenderly as flour. She did so, and her mustard rose rapidly to fame, securing the special approval of His Majesty King George I. It was thus that Durham mustard came into fashion ; and Durham mustard remained a monopoly for a long time, for the simple reason that shrewd Mrs. Clements refused to part with the secret which was making her fortune. There are several references to mustard in Shake¬ speare, which have been carefully collated by Mr. Ellacombe in his well-known book. For instance, Falstaff says in He7iry IV, “He a good wit.^ hang him, baboon ! his wit’s as thick as Tewkesbury mustard ; there is no more conceit in him than in a mallet.” In explanation of this, we gather from an old writer. Coles, that “ in Gloucestershire, about Teuxbury, they grind mustard and make it into balls, which are brought to London and other remote places, as being the best that the world aflbrds.” This was before Mother Clements’ day, and it is sup¬ posed that in Shakespeare’s time mustard was used dry, as we now use pepper. There is, moreover, a passage in an Anglo-Saxon “Leech-book” which seems to indicate that Mrs. Clements’ discovery had been anticipated by some centuries. Thus it runs, in direct¬ ing how to compound an appetiser : — “ Triturate all together ; eke out with vinegar as may seem fit to thee, so that it 7nay be w7'0Hglit mto the for77i m which 77iiistard is te77ipered for flavourmg; put it then into a glass vessel, and then with bread, or with whatever meat thou chose, lap it with a spoon.” To turn now to Cress. It is very curious, sometimes, to hunt up the origin of common sayings ; one meets with so many sur¬ prises. Everyone can understand what is meant by laying up a thing or a resolution “in lavender,” but not everybody knows that an expression in the South of England, “ as dear as saffron,” has reference to an old belief in saffron as an infallible remedy for con¬ sumption. Again, who would suppose that the very common and very forcible phrase about anything being “not worth a curse” has an intimate connection with the humble herb with which the Londoner delights to furnish his tea-table ? It often happens, as that authority in flower-lore, the Rev. Hilderic Friend, remarks, that apparently vulgar sayings had their origin in something that was noble and expressive, but the meaning of which has by the corruption of language become obscured, or even totally altered. Thus in the case in point, the “curse” has, by a simple and quite common transposition of letters, taken the place of “ kers,” or “ cress.” Chaucer calls the cress “kers,” and he uses the word in much the same sense as “curse” is used in the proverb or colloquialism : “ Of paramours ne raught he not a kers.” Not to “care a curse ’’for anything or anybody is, therefore, simply not to care a cress-leaf. A name given to members' of the cress family, nas¬ turtium, has become corrupted almost everywhere in the country to “stertion,” and in the North of England we fancy it is more commonly “storshen.” But the real name, nasturtium, was bestowed for a real reason. It means “ the nose-twitcher,” and is applied to those members of the cress family which have sharp, hot, biting qualities, which irresistibly produce a facial contortion. It was long ago discovered by Pliny that some kinds of cress would put the nose into convul¬ sions. But it was of other kinds that the Greeks thought when they created the proverb, “ Eat cress to learn more wit.” We shall see presently about the medicinal or health¬ giving properties of cress, but here is a curious thing worth noting, especially in connection with the Greek proverb. The shamrock, which is the national emblem of Ireland, was said by all the early writers to be the water-cress, although the trefoil clover has been more recently adopted in order to support the story that St. Patrick selected the flower to prove to the people the doctrine of the Trinity. Now, there is a three-leaved plant of the cress family which in Arabic is called Sha77irakh, and which is held sacred by the Persians. This is apparently the same plant as that referred to in Pliny’s “Natural History” as one upon which serpents are never seen, and which will prevail against the sting of snakes and scorpions. Note the Arabic name, and the peculiar feat ascribed to St. Patrick of driving all the reptiles out of Ireland, and then we shall find in the floral emblem of Ireland a good deal to think about. To come back to the virtues of the cresses : it is remarkable that no family of plants has an older or a higher reputation. And another remarkable thing is that from the very earliest period of human history they have been esteemed alike by rich and poor, by ignorant and learned, for their agreeable character¬ istics and health-giving properties. The best known of the tribe is the water-cress ; and this is declared by the author of the “ History of Cultivated Vegetables ” to be really both the most agreeable and the most wholesome variety. And, as he somewhat magniloquently adds : “ This aquatic plant waits not for the splendour of the warmer sun, which produces various vegetable offerings as nume¬ rous as the friends who crowd about those on whom prosperity shines. It visits us singly in a dreary season, without requiring a return of attention or manure. It rides the driven flood, regardless of the piercing blasts of Boreas, and offers its abstersive leaves through the congealed waters.” Another medical writer assures us that the presence of the common water-cress is sufficient evidence of the purity of the water, and that, on the other hand, the water of a stream in which duck-weed or lentil is found should be avoided. The water-cress is easily cultivated, and it grows rapidly — so rapidly that some have supposed that the name cress is derived from cresce7is (growing) rather than from cross {Crttciferce), but that is a moot point. Perhaps it is not generally known that the water¬ cress can be grown in an ordinary garden without water, if a moist place, such as an old tank or pond-

Page 588

Pictures of the Months. 5/1 basin, can be utilised. All that is wanted is a gravelly soil, and the introduction of the garden-hose two or three times a day. In this country the water-cress is chiefly eaten as a salad, or as a relish with breakfast or tea. But in France they use it largely — dipped in oil and vinegar — as a garnish for chicken, and also in soup. But it is excellent when cooked like spinach, and Dr. Kitchener also gives a very good recipe for stewed water-cress. Its many excellent properties were well understood by the ancients. Pliny says that it “ purges the head of ill-humour, and, taken in a vinegar, it staveth the brains of them that be troubled in mind ; and drunk in wine, or eaten with a fig, it is singular good for the spleen.’’ Xenophon recommended the Persians to feed their children on water-cresses, that they might grow in stature and have more active minds. Pliny also said that it would make the hair grow on bald pates, and prevent the hair from falling out ; but we have never tested it for this. There is a large consumption of cress in Holland, where it is highly esteemed as an anti-scorbutic, and there is no doubt that it is a great preservative against scurvy ; only it is not procurable where scurvy is most prevalent — on ship-board, during a long voyage with salt meat. It is also a cure for in¬ digestion, although very apt to produce indigestion when eaten raw in quantity. For flatulence and heart¬ burn cress is much commended by French medicals ; and it is believed to have much virtue in disorders of the liver and kidneys. A French doctor says that emulsions made of the seed of garden-cress are effi¬ cacious in small-pox, and promote perspiration. Pliny said that it cured coughs, eased those who were short-winded, and relieved pains of the chest. Perhaps this was how it came to be regarded as a cure for consumption ; but we fear that our readers must not attach much value to it on that head. Still, in some medical works we have seen the use of water¬ cress recommended as a palliative in the treatment of pulmonary disorders. That the cress family are excellent purifiers of the blood is undoubted. They contain a volatile oil in combination with potash, phosphorus, iodine, and iron — the very elements which are needed for a healthy condition of the blood. The volatile oil, which is rich in sulphur, is called sulpho-cyanide of allyl. Mustard contains even a larger percentage of the same oil. Now, sulpho-cyanides are given out in the fluids and secretions of the human body, more or less according to the state of health. Mustard and cress supply the elements which pass off in natural waste, and which are necessary to a healthy condition. And this explains why the Criiciferce plants have always been appreciated as food, even more than they have been understood as medicinal plants. Nature, after all, is the best mentor and guide. PICTURES OF THE MONTHS. I'i A man and a woman stand grave and still, To watch the sheaves to their garner borne. They too have sown in the long ago ; But the harvest of life blends joy and woe.

Page 589

572 THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars respecting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge himself to notice every article or work submitted. _ A Gripping Grapnel. Submarine cables are apt to slip off the flukes of the grapnel while being hauled up from the bottom of the sea to the surface for repair, more especially if it is a loose or broken end which is being lifted. Hence Mr. Benest has introduced a grapnel with a gripping fluke, which holds the cable firmly, and prevents it from slipping away. It is shown in the illustration, where A is the shank of the grapnel to which the rope is at¬ tached for lowering it into the water ; B is the boss, and C is one of the flukes, which are all hinged after the manner of Jamie¬ son’s grapnel, so as to bend when they come in contact with a submarine rock. But besides this movable fluke there is a second movable jaw, D, so contrived that when the cable slips down to the base of the fluke, C, which catches it, the other jaw, D, presses upon it, and holds it there until the grapnel is hauled to the surface, and the cable delivered from it. A New Egg-Boiler. An ingenious device has just been patented, which combines with the old-fashioned sand-glass an auto¬ matic arrangement for sounding an alarm when the egg is cooked, and at the same time lifting it out of the water. By means of a simple counterpoise attached to the sand-glass, and capable of adjustment for two, three, or four minutes, the glass is made to swing round on its pivot at the expiration of the appointed time. This brings the hammer into contact with the bell and gives the alarm to the cook. And the bell, being con¬ nected with the trigger that holds down the tray in which the eggs are contained, releases this trigger when it is struck, and enables the spring below the tray to lift it out of the water with the eggs. By the way, could not some development of this device be adapted for the use of chairmen and presidents of debates, as an automatic and absolutely impartial regulator and recorder of the time allowed each speaker? A Self-Locking Easel-Peg. A new peg for black-board easels has recently been patented, which deserves the attention of all teachers and school managers, especially in view of the recent judgment in the action Crisp v. Thomas, tried be¬ fore Mr. Justice Charles in April. The easel-peg is provided with a spring catch similar to the catch of an umbrella, so that when it is pushed through the hole of the easel-frame it is automatically secured, and the danger of the black-board being knocked off the easel is consequently very slight indeed. This is just one of those inventions which are so useful, and whose advantages are so apparent, that nobody can under¬ stand how it is it has not been introduced before. The Insumgraph. None of the time-checks in use identify the person making the signal, and hence they can be misused. Mr. B. Warwick has therefore introduced his “ Insum¬ graph,” which is based on the signature of the person who makes the signal. It consists of a desk, having an opening at which a sheet of paper sufficient to receive the signature appears. The person writes his name on it, and passes into the works or hall as the case may be. The paper travels by clockwork, and the time of signature is recorded. An ordinary office clock can be adapted to the apparatus, which works by electricity. At certain times of the day currents established by the clock close the signature arrange¬ ment, so that late workmen cannot register their entry, or at least can only do so in the late list. The apparatus is so contrived that it cannot be tampered with, and a fresh sheet of paper is only required once a week or even less frequently.

Page 590

The Gatherer. 573 over the end of the dress-sleeve and are held there by a simple spring. The spring being closed, and a ring at the other end of the attachment slipped over the finger, the dress-sleeve is quickly drawn through that of the jacket without any creasing or inconvenience. The sleeve-holder may then be removed and transferred to- the other arm. Another novelty in ladies’ dress fit¬ tings is the “ Chic dress - suspender, which consists of three steels to be fixed horizontally between the foundation of the skirt and the dress material. The top steel and the middle one, which is to be set some four or five inches below it, are provided with hooks, on to which wide rings secured to the middle and bottom steels may be hung, thus raising the skirt at the back to either of two- heights as may be required. The rings and hooks are not at all bulky and do not at all disfigure a dress, yet they may be quite readily felt through the material and adjusted with the greatest ease. Another simple dress-suspender, work¬ ing without steels, has been patented by Mr. Harry Caslon. It consists of a single band of webbing, one end of which is sewn to the skirt-band, while the other is fastened by a ring to a number of shorter bands that are secured to as many different folds of the skirt as possible. Near the top of the main band is an open buckle, which automatically holds the band by means of metal eyelets, and thus affords a ready method of raising the skirt two, four, or six inches as may be required. It is easily adjusted with one hand, strong, and so simple that it cannot get out of order. Ladies who travel much will be glad to hear that strong light trunks for their use are being made of Spanish cane, a material at once lighter and stronger A Group of Novelties for Ladies. Inventors have been busy of late on behalf of ladies, and we have quite a long list of novelties to chronicle for their special benefit. First comes an ingenious little device called a “ Sleeve- holder,” intended to facilitate the put¬ ting on of sleeved jackets over dresses whose sleeves would otherwise be caught in the jacket- lining, to the great discomfort of their wearers and with disastrous results to the sleeves themselves. This device consists of a pair of grippers which readily close A MECHANICAL REPORTER. — FIG. 2. made purposely light for easy transport. The keys are about a dozen in number, and are played with both hands. The record is printed on travelling paper, as in the ordinary Stock Exchange telegraph. Part of the keys print the single letters of the alphabet, and the rest certain arbitrary combinations of these. An operator of ordinary skill can, it is said, register loo words a minute after six weeks’ practice with the machine, while from 200 to 250 words can be printed with the same number of strokes necessary in printing 40 to 50 words by the ordinary type-writer. While upon this subject, we may also mention the new Fitch type- writer, which is shown in Fig. 2. It has 26 keys of hard rubber, which register 78 letters and signs. The types are of hard rubber, and ink themselves in passing to the paper. The rest of the instrument is made of steel, and worn-out parts can be replaced with new ones. The types print directly on the paper, in full view, and any cor¬ rection can at once be made. A Mechanical Reporter. The shorthand type-writer of Mr. G. K. Anderson is illustrated in Fig. i. It is designed for the use of reporters in taking down speeches or lectures, and

Page 591

574 The Gatherer. than the popular wicker-work. As these trunks are thoroughly waterproof, they certainly merit a trial. Housewives ought to welcome the “ Ironer’s Friend” which has just been patented by a Birkenhead firm, for it is at once simple and useful. It consists of a long, shallow, level tray shaped somewhat like an old- fashioned knife-board, but having a baize-covered platform or cushion at its squared end. Into this tray is put bath-brick or emery powder, and the irons may then be quickly cleaned and polished on this powder, any surplus being brushed off on the baize cushion. All who have to deal with sick and delicate child¬ ren will be pleased to hear of a new preparation of extract of malt, made up in the form of sweetmeats under the title of “ Maltex Tablets.” The strengthen¬ ing and nutritious qualities of extract of malt are well known, but it is not to be wondered at that little patients should sometimes tire of the purely medicinal preparation, which they are hardly likely to do of this new and more attractive one. Lastly we would call attention to a novelty which ought to prove popular at this season of al fresco entertainments. This is a combination, in one readily carried ball, of tea, sugar, and milk, which only re¬ quires the addition of boiling water to produce a good cup of tea. For camp and pic-nic use this ought to be very serviceable. A New Damper for Stoves. Our illustration shows a new damper and ventilator for the flues of large cooking-ranges, which has recently been patented by Mr. J. Keith, Assoc. M.I.C.E, The diffi¬ culty in the damping and ventilating of large ranges, hitherto, has been that it was impossible to ventilate one flue without interfering with the draught in the others. In this new attachment, however, as will be seen from the illustration, two flaps are provided, working in the same Lame ; the inner one, or damper proper, working by means of a ratchet running through the outer flap or ventilator. The position of the damper in the flue is regulated by the teeth of the ratchet, and the ventilator is held at any required angle by means of a ratchet wheel at the side of the hinge on which it works. It will be seen that this arrangement will permit of the opening of the ventilating door, even while the damper is closed or partially closed. But further, as the whole framework may be lifted out with the greatest ease, a ready means is afforded of cleaning the flue either above or below the damper. This invention is a marvel of simplicity and thoroughness. The Audio-Telephone. The mouthpiece shown in the lower part of our figure is designed to en¬ able persons using the telephone to carry on a conver¬ sation without rais¬ ing the voice above its ordinary tone. It is simply a truncated cone clamped over the ordinary mouth¬ piece of a Blake transmitter. An indiarubber ring or washer is in¬ serted between it and the wooden case of the trans¬ mitter to prevent any loss of sound. The cone is a double one, and the outer shell is perforated with holes. The latter serves as a guard or protector to the inner cone. The Cost of Railway Travelling. Some curious and interesting figures were brought out in the course of a paper recently read before the Society of Arts by Mr. G. Findlay, of the North- Western Railway Company. Taking the returns of eight of the English railway companies, Mr. Findlay compares the percentage of working expenses with the gross receipts per class, and he shows that the mean proportion was only 53 per cent, in 1888, the last year for which full details are procurable. But, taking the average of the eight companies, for every ;£ioo received for first-class traffic, ;£to2 has to be spent in working expenses. Indeed, only three of the eight companies show any profit on first-class traffic, despite the high fares ; and on the Sheffield line no less than ^^211 has to be expended in return for every ;^ioo received from first-class passengers. Taking the average for the eight companies again, second- class traffic yields 100 for every ffc) expended in working charges ; and the third-class produces its fioo in return for the moderate expenditure of ;^4i. For the Protection of Restless Children. Ail mothers and nurses know the habit that child¬ ren have of throwing off the bed-clothes in their

Page 592

The Gatherer. 575 sleep, particularly when the little ones are feverish or restless. And the dangers which this practice in¬ volves are equally well known. To obviate this risk a Dumbarton firm have brought out a new attachment which they call “ Child Protectors.” It consists of a pair of light chains coiled in two boxes to be fixed at either side of the bed-head. These chains are coiled automatically by springs, sufficiently strong to keep the bed-clothes (to which their loose ends are at¬ tached by loops of tape) in position, but not too strong to admit of free movement on the part of the little sleepers. In children’s hospitals we should think these protectors would prove especially useful. Useful to Gentlemen. Moustache-cups are not always procurable, though by no means uncommon, so gentlemen who find their use advisable will be glad to heardhat a detachable moustache-plate, which may be readily fitted to any cup of ordinary size, is now to be had. In shape it is very like the plate fitted to moustache-cups, and answers its purpose admirably. As it may be carried in the vest pocket it is peculiarly adapted for travellers. Another novelty appealing particularly to “ the nobler sex ” is found in some pretty pipe-racks which have just been brought out by a Yorkshire inventor. They consist of o plush-covered frames fitted with plated racks that will hold the pipes either bowl or stem upwards. This last is a great desideratum, as all lovers of tobacco know. Dry Meat Diet. Scurvy is usually supposed to be due to the exces¬ sive use of a salt diet ; and a letter from Dr. Good, professor of clinical surgery in the Medical College of Manitoba, recently published in the Lancet^ affords a corroboration of the truth of this view. He states that servants of the Hudson Bay Company on the distant posts of the Athabasca Lake and Mackenzie River habitually live for years on a meat or a fish diet, without vegetables, and sometimes with but a pound of flour for the Christmas pudding once a year. Scurvy is unknown amongst them ; but on the other hand, the servants of the Company at York Fort on Hudson’s Bay are liable to attacks of scurvy in winter and spring, a fact which points to the constant use of salted goose-meat as the cause of the malady.. Fish diet is found still more wholesome than beef in the far north-western posts. Some New Labels. At this season, when all the world and his wife and family are travelling, new luggage labels have more than usual interest. One of the most recent novelties in this direction is a book of well-named “ Savetime ” labels, which are ready gummed and show on each a large and distinctive letter or figure on a boldly coloured background. Each book contains thirty-two labels, eight of each of four letters or figures, so that all the luggage of any ordinary party may be plainly labelled alike. Similarly marked counterfoils are pro¬ vided in the book, and one of these may be given to the porter or servant on arrival at your destination, and all your luggage may thus be quickly collected. Another novelty, particularly useful where the traveller is moving on from place to place, is the tablet-label, which consists of twelve labels mounted on a stout card, and only requiring the top label to be torn off before it is again ready for use. Most travel¬ lers have experienced the difficulty of not being able to procure a new label at the time it was wanted, and will be able to appreciate the advantage of this tablet. To tradesmen, rather than to travellers, a third new label should prove useful, for it comprises both label and envelope, and serves at once to direct and identify the package to which it is attached, and convey the invoice for its contents. Of course this combined label and envelope may not be used on packages to be sent by book post, but for parcel post or rail and road deliveries it seems likely to prove very handy. A New Lightning-Guard. Dr. Oliver Lodge has devised a new lightning- guard for telegraphs and telephones, which is perhaps the most efficient yet invented. It is based on the principle of reducing the discharge by degrees through a series of sparking points connected to the earth, with coils of wire possessing self-induction or “ imped¬ ance ” between them. Thus, in Fig. i, which shows a form adapted to preserve a submarine cable from a flash of lightning which strikes the land line in con¬ nection with it, the end of the cable is attached to the terminal marked “ cable,” and the end of the line to that marked “ line.” The circuit for the ordinary tele¬ graphing current is then completed through the inter¬ vening four coils of wire, C, and the binding screws, I, 2, 3, 4, 5. But at each of these binding screws there is a sparking point, P, which is brought very near to a central stud of metal, marked “ earth,” and in elec¬ trical connection with the ground. The ordinary tele¬ graphing current does not discharge itself by these points ; but the intenser lightning currents do, the more especially as they are impeded ” in their pro¬ gress from terminals i to 5 by the wires C. Fig. 2 represents the apparatus as actually made, with the coils shown in the interior of the box at C. The Telethermometer. It will be remembered that the late Sir William Siemens devised a thermometer for measuring the heat of furnaces by exposing a metal wire to the heat

Page 593

The Gatherer. 576 while an electric current was traversing it, and esti¬ mating the temperature by the variation of electric resistance in the wire which it produced. Metals increase in resistance with a rise of temperature, whereas carbon filaments decrease in the same manner. Dr. Puluj, of Prague, has therefore taken advantage of their contrary properties to gain sensi¬ tiveness in the electric thermometer. He balances the resistance of a filament of carbon against that of an iron wire in the arrangement known as the Wheatstone Bridge for measuring electrical resist¬ ances. When these opposed bodies are subjected to a change of temperature, their resistances vary in contrary directions, one becoming greater, while the other grows smaller, and the balance established between them is upset. The deflection of the galvano¬ meter of the bridge indicates the divergence from equilibrium, and hence the temperature which has produced the change. Both the carbon and iron are enclosed in a glass bulb filled with hydrogen gas, so that neither can be oxidised. The apparatus is said to be remarkably sensitive ; and it has this advantage, that the reading part or indicator can be placed in any convenient place, provided an electrical circuit connects it to the sensitive part or bulb containing the wires. A New Road Wheel. The spokes and nave of the wheel shown in the en¬ graving are of steel, cast in one piece, and the wooden felloe is attached to sole-plates cast on the ends of the spokes. An iron hoop is then shrunk over the felloes in the usual way. It is claimed for this wheel, of which an axial section and side elevation are repre¬ sented, that the expansion and contraction due to heating and cooling do not produce the loose joints observed in modern wheels after dry weather. It is also very strong, and no heavier than an ordinarv wooden wheel of the same size. A New Strainer. A new strainer for decanting the contents ot bottles has just been patented. It consists of a gauze tube of some three or four inches in length, headed by a rubber cone and a lipped metal funnel. The tube is pushed into the bottle-neck until the cone makes a tight joint, when the liquid may be poured through the tube and any sediment will be caught in the gauze. . The strainer should be rinsed when the bottle is empty, and it is then ready for use again. A Cycle Road-Sketcher. Road-sketching is at present done by military en¬ gineers on horseback ; but Lieut.-Colonel Marshall has devised an apparatus which enables the work to be done on a cycle. The invention is provisionally protected by patent, and we may not describe it fully, but it consists essentially of a drawing-board or tablet fixed before the cyclist, and fitted with a travelling pencil and other devices which enable him to make the sketch in accordance with the directions given. A road 16^ miles long has been sketched and “ con¬ toured ’’ by it in four hours, or about half the time required for sketching on horseback. A New Treasure for Children Is to be found in “ The New ‘ Little Folks ’ Painting Book,’’ just issued by Messrs. Cassell. It is full of outline pictures to be coloured by little fingers, and ought to prove a useful ally to worried mothers in the dread event of any wet days keeping the little ones to the house during their holidays. As there are a number of prizes offered for the best specimens of the book coloured by children, there is every induce¬ ment to them to take pains. The midsummer volume of Little Folks opens with a story by Mr. Clark Russell, and contains also another serial story for young readers, which runs through the volume, as well as quite a host of complete stories. The volume, with its plentiful illustrations and bright pages, should prove a mine of wealth to its little readers. Mungo Park and the Niger. Anything connected with Africa and its exploration is sure of a hearing just now% While we rejoice in the success of Mr. Stanley’s work in one direction, it would ill become us to lose sight of what was dared and done by his predecessors in the grand task of lighting the Dark Continent. The latest volume of Messrs. G. Philip and Son’s admirable series, “ The World’s Great Explorers and Explorations,” is appropriately devoted to the consideration of Mungo Park and the Niger,” by another African explorer, hardly less famous — Mr. Joseph Thomson, of Masai repute. It is most interest¬ ing to study the chronological series of maps which Mr. Thomson reproduces in this volume, and note how our knowledge of the Niger basin was acquired, step by step. The oft-told tale of Park’s disappearance is well repeated. He died before his self-imposed task was done, but he left the world richer for his labours, as any reader of this volume may see for himself.

Page 594

577 THE WOOING OF CHRISTABEL. By E. NEAL, Author of “Witness My Hand,” “My Brother Basil,” &c. CHAPTER THE FIFTH. IVEMINSTER VICARAGE. “ Three merry boys, and three merry boys, And three merry boys are we.” — John Fletcher. VEN years have come and gone, and Christabel has been heard of no more. Father and husband have sought her in vain. Detectives and lawyers have exhausted all their in¬ genuity, but Christabel has not been found. No expense has been spared, nor any means likely to bring back the self-exiled wife. Advertise¬ ments have been addressed to “ Christabel Wen- dover,” to “ Christabel Neville,^’ to “ Christabel ” alone, but all have remained unanswered. Pursuit has waxed faint now, but it was near being successful once : so near that failure seemed more bitter for the elusive hope. Arthur had remembered Christabel’s affection for her old governess, and suggested seeking her at Miss Frost’s, only to find that she had been there, and had gone away again. “ And you do not know where she is ? asked the new Lord St. Ives, with an accent of doubt. “ I do not. If I knew, I should not tell you,” said the little governess, with scornful candour ; “ but I do not know. We guessed you would seek her here, and though I hear from her sometimes, she gives me no address.” It was all they could get out of Miss Frost, but at least it laid to rest one awful fear that had haunted St. Ives since his wife disappeared. He remembered so well one day when she had been reading Browning to him, and the look in her eyes as she read : — “I, too, at love’s brim, Touched the sweet ; I would die if death bequeathed Sweet to him.” She meant it so entirely, he knew, and had she not written, “ Think of me as dead ” ? But at least Miss Frost was able to assure him that Christabel was alive, and not likely to be in want “ Her father sold her to you/’ said this uncompro¬ mising little person ; but at least he did his part of the bargain handsomely. There was enough in her purse to keep her from want for some time to come.” Yes, Arthur remembered all about now. Wen- dover’s ostentation was one of his most repulsive traits in his son-in-law’s eyes, and he had thought it a piece of vulgar ostentation when the money-lender asked for his daughter’s purse at the wedding break¬ fast, and put in it — with some joking remark that specified the sum— a crisp new Bank of England note for five hundred pounds. It had annoyed Mr. Neville then, but it comforted Lord St. Ives to remember it now. Only, five hundred pounds does not last for ever, and what would happen when the money was gone ? “Be easy,” said Miss Frost calmly. “Your wife is very well able to earn her bread. She would do it with her hands, if need be, rather than be beholden for a penny to her father or to you.” Beyond the assurance that Christabel was alive, and unlikely to want, there was nothing satisfactory to be obtained from the unpleasant interview. There was nothing satisfactory, St. Ives thought, in his position, looked at from any point of view. He went abroad shortly afterwards, seeking relief in change of scene, as other men have done before him, but leaving ample funds with his lawyers to prosecute the search he told himself he would never give up while life remained. Christabel’s flight, Christabel’s note, had moved him to the depths of a nature whose depths had been seldom or never stirred before. He longed to see again the poor child who loved him so well. Surely in the light of a sacrifice so womanly and yet so childish, so chivalrous and, alas ! so foolish, he would forget her plainness, her gaucherie, nay, even her parentage, and love her even as she had loved him. So he thought then, and so he thinks often now, but it may be doubted if events would Justify the thought. He would like her better than before, no doubt, but the difference betweenliking and loving is not of degree, but of kind. Apparently there is little fear of the problem being worked out. No faintest clue points to Christabel’s hiding-place, no whisper breaks the silence that en¬ tombs his living wife, and as the years go on they bring again the doubt if she is indeed living still. Could all effort to find her fail so utterly if she were ? Very few people are aware of the marriage even now. The Wendovers are not disposed to blazon abroad the fact of the bride’s flight, even for the pleasure of publishing her husband’s name. The uncles and aunts are as grimly silent as Wendover himself, and if the cousins chatter, the sound of their voices does not reach far. They are not in society, and society is all unaware that the man it still thinks of fondly as an eligible but, alas ! absent parti is, and has been for the last seven years, a married man. Lord St. Ives has not deceived his friends intentionally. The secret that was kept from the old lord is a secret still, simply because the subject is too painful to the new lord for voluntary mention. There is no one to whom he owes his confidence, no relatives near enough to claim it, unless it be the Falconers, and as Bernard already knew of his cousin’s marriage, it was / probable he would tell his mother and sister when the need for concealment was over. St. Ives did not know 757

Page 595

The Wooing of Christabel. 578 that his cousin considered his promise of silence bind¬ ing until he was released from it, nor did Bernard ask to be released. It was natural, he thought, that St. Ives should desire silence. Even if there had been nothing against the marriage, who would care to pub¬ lish on the housetops that his bride had disappeared on her wedding-day? So Bernard held his peace, and as St. Ives keeps not only out of the country, but out of the track of civilisation, there seems no reason why he should not hold it still. He seldom hears from his cousin, but wandering Britons come across him occasionally, with his rifle in one hand and his life in the other, and report that no hardships seem too great for his endurance, and no danger for his courage. He says very little of danger or hardship or hairbreadth escapes himself ; he says, indeed, very little at all, and that little Bernard Falconer considers unsatisfactory. One of St. Ives’ rare epistles has arrived this morning, and his cousin — whom he has lately presented to the living of Iveminster, the parish church of Ivethorpe — is sitting in his comfortable study, and poring over the thin foreign note-paper with knitted brows. It is not that the writing is illegible, or that there is much to decipher, but that the tone of the letter is opposed to all that Falconer would wish. What a bitter, disap¬ pointed man the easy, good-tempered Arthur has grown into, and all through a chit of a girl he did not care for, and who was unfit in every way to be his wife ! Falconer does not share St. Ives’ admiration for his wife’s conduct ; he regards it as a foolish escapade at best, and feels sure that the girl is dead, or she would long ago have appeared on the scene again as the least suitable Lady St. Ives whose pedi¬ gree can be found in that ancient and honourable line. His musings were suddenly interrupted. There was a scuffle in the hall, a Babel of children’s voices, shouts of laughter, mingled with shrieks and squeals that seemed to portend grievous bodily harm to some of the noisy crew, but that only made the Rev. Ber¬ nard Falconer shrug his shoulders and ejaculate — “ Oh, those boys ! ” He opened his study door and went into the hall, where three boys were certainly making noise enough for six. Their position was calculated to strike terror to any uncle’s heart. Kenneth, the eldest, a fine sturdy boy of ten, was hanging by his hands to the banisters that railed off the landing, while Flavius, the second, depended from his brother’s feet in like fashion, and little Marmaduke clung with the strength of despair to one of Flavius’s legs, and was being soundly kicked for his pains by the other. Though Mr. Falconer was a clerygman, he was a man of action rather than of words. He captured Marmaduke and set him on his feet, and then helped Flavius to the ground, coming in, however, for one of the kicks that young gentleman was always ready to distribuje with entire impartiality. Kenneth, released from his encumbrances, swarmed up the banisters like a monkey or a sailor, and sitting astride of the rail on the top, regarded his uncle with a patronising smile. “You needn’t bother. Uncle Bear. We were all right ; only Marmalade is such a baby - ” “I’m in an indignant aside from Marma¬ duke. “ You are !” and a kick from Flavius. “ Marmalade is a baby ! ” in a judicial tone from Kenneth. “ He ought to have been a girl.” “ I wish he had been. I’m sure,” said the much-tried uncle of three boys. “ I wish you had all been girls ! I should like to know what you were doing in that dangerous position ? If you had fallen - ” “ We hadn’t got to that,” said Kenneth. “ It comes at the end, you know.” “ At the end ? ” “ You know. Uncle Bear ! It’s in the Gradatim we did yesterday— the ‘ Green Cheese,’ you know. That mark on the floor is the green cheese, and Flavius and Marmalade are the Athenian and Corinthian, and I’m the Boeotian, and the landing is the bridge - ” “And the hall is the river, I suppose? Well, boys. I’m glad you found your construing interesting, but you’d better not illustrate it in that way again. You would have found the hall very hard water to drop into ! Why, you might all have been seriously injured, or even killed ; and then, what do you think we should have done ? ” “ Gone to our funeral,” suggested Flavius promptly. He was a round-faced boy of nine, with the yellowest hair and the bluest eyes that could be imagined, and a face so powdered with freckles that he looked as if he had just come out of a bran-pie and forgotten to dust himself. His real name was Bernard ; but, to distinguish him from his uncle, a nick-name was desirable, and the baby Bernard’s callow down had suggested Flavius to the classical mind. To the elder Bernard he was a perfectly incomprehensible specimen of the genus boy. Kenneth, if troublesome, was manly, and could be reasoned with ; Marmaduke could always be won by caresses ; but Flavius offered no points of approach. His manliness showed itself chiefly in contemptuous scorn of anything like petting, while it was impossible to reason with a boy who answered every appeal with a jest, and received warnings and exhortations with smiling indifference. His uncle looked at him now rather helplessly. He had, indeed, no experience of boys, and when his married sister, Mrs. Dickinson, asked him if she might leave her boys in his care when she and her husband went to India, he accepted the charge with a heart light in exact proportion to his ignorance of the responsibilities it would entail. Kenneth and Marma¬ duke were trying enough ; but Flavius - ! It was no wonder if Uncle Bernard wished that his nephews had been nieces instead. He dismissed them now, with many injunctions not to get into mischief, and returned to the stud3^ But he could not settle again to the sermon that had been interrupted first by the post, and then by those ob¬ noxious boys ; for a sermon is a species of compo¬ sition than which none looks more easy or is more difficult. How shall a man be orthodox and yet

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The Wooing of Christabel. 579 original, or reverent and not be dull ? How shall he be interesting to the critical and cultured occupants of cushioned pews, and yet intelligible to the uncultured and uncritical audience in the free seats? How shall he keep to the safe old paths, and yet find something to say that has not been said before ? Bernard Falconer was an excellent pastor and a very bad preacher ; but his sermons cost him infinitely more time and pains than the pastoral visits that were so much more fruitful of results. He sat nibbling his pen and knitting his brows, after the manner of those who cudgel their brains, and gazed at the wide, blank ceiling in vain for a new idea, and laid his pen down with suspicious alacrity as a gentle tap came at the door. It was not the boys this time : it was certain. That they had never tapped gently at any door in their lives, their uncle would have been ready to depose in any witness-box in the kingdom. He opened the door, with a smile waiting at the corners of his mouth, and creeping fully into view as he saw who was there. It was not Kenneth, not Flavius — not even Marma- duke. It was a girl, with a bright, clever face, and vivacious eyes that her friends called hazel and her enemies called green. Mr. Falconer considered, as an abstract principle, that a girl ought so to order her way and conversation — especially her conversation — as to avoid making enemies ; but if he had been in that imaginary witness-box, he would have felt sorrowfully obliged to admit that his cousin Annette had not so ordered hers. She had strong likes and dislikes, strong opinions, and what Falconer considered a per¬ fectly reckless way of expressing them. Yet, in spite of this — it did not occur to him that it might be be¬ cause of it — there was something interesting and sometimes even charming about her. She could, and did, feel strongly, love warmly, and hate fiercely, and was ready to do either with a promptness disconcerting to slower temperaments. But if Falconer disapproved, he owned to a good deal of affectionate admira¬ tion, and admitted to himself that Netta’s society was pleasantly stimulating when she was not too bewildering. Annette Delmar was cousin to Falconer on the maternal side, and was also cousin to St. Ives. Her mother was the youngest of three sisters, one of whom had married the Honourable Arthur Neville, father of the present Lord St. Ives. The second had married a clergyman named Falconer, and was now the widowed mother of the Vicar of Iveminster, while the third had married a London banker of considerable wealth. Both he and his wife were dead now, and though the bulk of the property had gone to the son, Annette had a very pretty fortune of her own, and might fairly be called a considerable heiress. Annette had lived with Mrs. Falconer since the death of her parents, seeing little of her brother, a dashing officer in the Bengal Cavalry, who seldom came home, and filling a daughter’s place to the aunt whose own daughter had been married out of the schoolroom. Between her and Falconer there was much of the camaraderie of cousinhood, shot sometimes with a subtle thread of more complex feeling. Falconer intensely admired and intensely distrusted Annette, while Annette did not admire Falconer at all, but felt a supreme trust in his integrity and goodness, and was always happier when, as now, he greeted her with a smile. She had brought a message from Mrs. Falconer concerning one of the sick villagers in whom she was interested, but she did not go when she had given it, nor did Falconer look as if he expected her to depart. She was always made free of his study when she chose, and as she came in and stood by the table, he gathered the loose sheets of sermon-paper together, and decided to leave the unsatisfactory composition till to-morrow. Netta did not notice him— whereby, no doubt, he escaped some stinging comments upon sermons in general and his own in particular. His cousin’s eyes were not on the blue-ruled sermon- paper, but on the thinner deeper blue that lay beside his desk. ‘‘You have heard from St. Ives? ’’she said, in a tone quite different from that in which she had de¬ livered Mrs. Falconer’s message. It was not exactly eager, but it was quickened with a personal interest that had been absent before, and that Falconer thought quite unnecessary now. “Yes,” he said soberly. “There is nothing won¬ derful in that, is there ? ” “Wonderful? No; but it is so long since you heard. Does he — does he say if he is coming home?” “No. I don’t believe he dreams of such a thing.” “ It seems very odd, don’t you think ? and not quite right. He is not like a man without duties or responsibilities.” “No, that he isn’t. You’re his cousin, you know, as v.'ell as mine ! ” “ Why can’t you be serious ? ” with a half-offended pout. “ I do think it is very strange he should stay away like this. It is no wonder people talk.” “ Talk ? What do they say ? ” asked Falconer, who, partly from his profession and partly from his earnest¬ ness of character, came little in the way of society gossip. “ They wonder — how can they help it ? And little Dicky Dawes told me some time ago that it was said St. Ives was so encumbered with gambling debts he couldn’t show his face in England.” “Well, if Dicky Dawes, or anyone else, says that to you again, you can tell them it isn’t true. You can say that I k7iow it.” Netta looked at him with startled eyes. “Then— then what is it?” she asked. “ Bear, do you know what keeps him away ?” Falconer hesitated, and she saw it. “ You do know ! ” she cried. “ And you have never opened your mouth ! You have let him be mis¬ judged— traduced. Oh ! what is friendship like yours worth ? I would not have so poor a thing at a gift !” She looked very piquante and pretty, but how unreasonable — how utterly , unreasonable she was! Falconer’s voice sounded grave and cold as he an¬ swered stiffly —

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The Wooing of Christabel. 580 “ You are quite right : I do know what keeps him away. Where you are wrong is in jumping to conclu¬ sions without giving me time to explain that I have given St. Ives my word to say nothing about it.” ‘‘Oh !” She looked confused for a moment, and even a little penitent, but penitence died quickly under Fal¬ coner’s stiff offence. “ Where are wrong,” she retorted, “is in blam¬ ing me for not knowing what I could not know. But surely you may speak now you hear how he is maligned ? If you wrote and told him - ” “It would be all the same,” Falconer assured her. “And suppose I sent a letter to his bankers, how soon would he get it, do you suppose ? A man who is in the Rockies one day, and three months after¬ wards at the Cape or in Japan, is not a man easy to write to, or to get an answer from. Besides, I know just what he would say.” “And that is - “ That he preferred the gossip to making the real reason known.” “But the gossip is discreditable, and the real reason, whatever it is, could not be that.” “No,” agreed Falconer. “Arthur is weak and foolish, but I don’t think - ” “ Think / And you call yourself his friend ! ” She waited to hear no more, but ran away to her own room, and took a photograph of St. Ives from her drawer, and looked at it with eyes that were sud¬ denly dashed with tears. “ It is not weak,” she said, as she restored it to its place. “ Bernard calls everything weak that is not disagreeable, well-named old Bear that he is ! It is not a weak face ; it is a pleasant face, a kind face, a good face, whatever bears may growl about it ; and I will trust it. Yes, and - ” She did not finish the sentence, but stood looking before her with a far-away gaze till stifled giggles brought her to herself. “What are you staring at.^” asked the voice of Flavius, who, with Marmaduke, had come in un¬ announced. “Look at her. Marmalade; doesn’t she look silly ? That’s how Eliza looks when she tells us about her young man.” The next moment Flavius was outside the door, with two abnormally red ears, and a deep sense of injustice swelling in his breast. What had he done to make Netta fall upon him like that? — Netta, who invariably took a joke so well, and was, in fact, always such a brick ! CHAPTER THE SIXTH. MISS featherstone’s protegee. “ Officious, innocent, sincere. Of every friendless name the friend.” — Dr. Johnson. IVEMINSTER was One of the prettiest little watering- places on the south coast. It was two miles from Ivethorpe, and the Vicarage lay half-way between the sombre old mansion and the bright modern village on the cliff. The church was on the cliff, and the princi¬ pal street ran up to it, but down on the beach there was a pleasant stretch of yellow sand, a few fishermen’s cottages, and a terrace of white stuccoed houses, with a gravelled road in front, dignified by the name of the Esplanade. The present church was a comparatively modern building, but the churchyard was ancient, and on one side of it were ruins of the old minster that gave its name to the village, and furnished the summer visi¬ tors with their most popular place for pic-nics. Mr. Falconer had only held the living for about a year, but already he had made his mark in Ive- minster. He was not exactly popular : a stiff manner and somewhat ungracious bearing would always pre¬ vent his being that ; but if he was not cordially liked, he was respected and looked up to in a way that his age made remarkable. Few men of thirty, or indeed of any age, have the force of character that would have made Bernard Falconer a power for good or ill where- ever his lot might have been cast. Mrs. Falconer, his mother, was a dainty old lady, with soft white hair, fine and bright as spun glass. Her eyes, as dark as her son’s, were almost as bright as his still, and her manners might have made a French marquise die of envy. She had not been long in Iveminster, but already every cottager in the village adored her ; the great ladies of the neighbourhood hid their diminished heads, and all their masculine belongings — fathers> sons, or husbands — declared with one voice that Mrs. Falconer was the most charming of her sex. She enjoyed her popularity, as she had enjoyed it all her life, with an innocent naivete that disarmed the most censorious and pacified the most jealous. How could anyone be jealous of a sweet little old lady with a bland and child-like smile, and a pleasant word for everyone she met ? She was much more like her nephew, the petted and popular Arthur Neville, Lord St. Ives, than her own uncompromising and rather ungracious son, and was, he declared, invaluable to him in the parish for the ease with which she made friends, and the dex¬ terity with which she smoothed over difficulties and made peace. Even her three irrepressible grandsons were awed by her gentle dignity, and manifested rudi¬ mentary perceptions of decorum in her presence. She was very fond of them all, especially of Marmaduke, whom even Flavius refrained from calling “ Marmalade” before her, and Bernard and Netta did their best to keep the boys in order, and prevent their pranks from disturbing grandmamma. It was not an easy task, for Mrs. Falconers nerves were far from strong; and the uncle-in-charge lived in daily dread of a catastrophe, and looked forward to Christmas, when Kenneth would go to school, with a cheerful anticipation untempered by any regrets. He would have sent them all to school if he could have had his way, he thought, as he walked across the fields to the village one fine October morning when the boys had been unusually trouble¬ some. The Vicarage was a mile from the church, but it was a lovely walk, and as he left the river-side and the yellowing trees that encircled the Vicarage and the Hall, and began to climb the ascent to the village on the cliff, the crisp fresh air from the sea blew about his temples with invigorating breath. He whistled to his

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The Wooing of Christabel. dog and gave himself up to enjoying the beautiful morning, and to forgetting, if possible, that any boy in the world had the right to call him uncle. Scamp, the dog, was evidently enjoying himself too, starting imagi¬ nary rabbits in every hedge, and making rushes at the sheep till his master called him to heel. 581 been recorded in song ; but Scamp’s master was quite unaffected by it. He knew it would not last, and indeed in about five minutes Scamp would get up — with an air of suddenly remembering something important — and trot off down the street without wasting another thought upon his master. Generally speaking, Scamp’s busi- He was a particularly innocent and harmless-looking fox-terrier, who answered to the summons with almost abject obedience, but his master knew he would not keep with him long. At the first house they stopped at Scamp would look up in his face with a touching ex¬ pression of patient fidelity that seemed to say he would wait for him for ever. Strangers who saw Scamp looking at his master like that were reminded of the dog of Beth Gelert, and other dogs whose faithfulness has ness would be an appointment with another dog, which would begin with playful curvets, and with those gal¬ vanic movements of the stump which seem to indicate that a fox-terrier would wag his tail, if ruthless man had left him a tail to wag, but which ended usually in a more or less sanguinary fight. Scamp was as ready to fight another dog as Flavius was to fight another boy, and had gauged to a nicety the fighting power of every dog in Iveminster. He trotted along the little street

Page 599

The Wooing of Christabel. 582 with a proud consciousness of being a match for any of them — the big St. Bernard that belonged to Miss Featherstonehaugh of the Grange always excepted. The mere sight of him made Scamp lower his apology for a tail in a wholly ineffectual attempt to get it between his legs, and fly, straight as an arrow from a bow, for his own doorstep, where he yelped aloud till the door was opened and he was safe within it. Luckily, in Scamp’s opinion, this dog did not often take his walks abroad. He was a big, good-natured St. Bernard, who seldom took any notice of dogs smaller than himself, but in Scamp’s salad days he had once presumed on this magnificent indifference to snatch a bone from Bruno’s huge pendulous lips. The majestic animal did not trouble to fight about it : he quietly lifted Scamp by the scruff of his neck, and shook him, as Scamp him¬ self might have shaken a rat, till he dropped the stolen dainty, and then he let him go. Scamp never forgot or forgave the indignity, and as he trotted along he kept a sharp look-out for Miss Featherstone’s carriage — she always called herself Featherstone, on the ground of the? shortness of life — and stopped short as he saw it coming down the hill. Scamp knew the carriage quite well — nay, he knew even the sound of the horses’ hoofs, that sounded to human ears so exactly like any others, and would start from his nap on the hearth-rug, and growl and bark as it passed. Miss Featherstone was sitting in it this morning, erect and observant as usual, while Bruno threw out his big ipaws, and lumbered along in stately attend¬ ance behind. Scamp saw, and took to his heels at once, but not before Miss Featherstone had seen and recognised him. ‘‘ The vicar’s dog ! ” she exclaimed. Then no doubt his master is about. Jenkins — ” (pulling the check-string sharply) — “ see if anyone knows where Mr. Falconer is. It will save my going to the Vicarage to see him.” Plenty of people knew where Mr. Falconer was, of course, Iveminster being one of those delightful places where everyone knows everyone else’s business as well as, or better than, they do themselves. It was a watering-place that had hardly got out of the village stage yet, and the butcher’s boy, who was the first person they met, was able to inform them that Mr. Falconer was at old Brookes the sexton’s, having just heard it from Mrs. Baker’s Mary, who had heard it from Mrs. Shaw’s Ann, who ^:ad seen him go in a quarter of an hour ago, and - ‘‘Bless the boy ! that’s enough,” said Miss Feather¬ stone sharply. “Drive round by Brookes’s, Jen¬ kins — I should think he will be coming out soon.” Miss Featherstone was a rather eccentric, but un¬ deniably charitable old lady, who lived in solitary state at the Grange, and, in default of any lady of the Hall, had long been regarded as the Lady Bountiful of the village of Iveminster. She was less popular than the silver-tongued Mrs. Falconer, but her purse was much longer, and money wins power, while courtesy only begets love. The vicar called the two old ladies his curates, and would have been puzzled to say which was the most useful coadjutor, though — filial piety apart — there was no question which was the pleasanter. Mr. Falconer came out of the sexton’s cottage, and found Miss Featherstone waiting for him with im¬ patience visible in every line of her strong and rather hard-featured face. “ I thought you were never coming,” she said brusquely. “ What can you have had to say to that doddering old man, to take you so long } But never mind about that. I want you to come with me to see a — a friend of mine, who is ill.” “ Certainly. Where does he live ? ” “It isn’t a he^ and she doesn’t live anywhere ; or, if she does, I don’t know where it is. She is stay¬ ing with me — but jump in, and I will tell you all about it.” The vicar obeyed the peremptory order ; and as they drove along, Miss Featherstone began her story at once. “You know those people who were staying all the summer at Victoria House, on the Esplanade ? ” “No - ” “Oh, nonsense ! You must remember them. There were two young girls — pretty, but not very good style — who went about with walking-sticks and Tam o’ Shunters, and always had a pack of boys at their heels.” “There were so many girls of that sort,” said the puzzled vicar. And, indeed, Iveminster was not as yet the haunt of the haute noblesse. “Well, I dare say; but these were rather striking- looking. Then there were some younger children, and a very pretty governess - “Tall and fair, and quite distinguished-looking?” “Just so. I thought you would remember them when I came to the governess,” said Miss Feather¬ stone drily. “Well, it seems that some children in the same house had had scarlet fever before they came down here, though the parents said nothing about it to the lodging-house people, and the Drummonds’ governess was taken ill with it. As soon as the Drummonds heard what it was, they all went away immediately, and poor Miss Elliven was left to get better or worse, as she might. Dr. Masters told me that the landlady — who is by no means a Blue- ribboner. I’m afraid — was furious at having an in¬ fectious lodger to spoil her let, and he believed the poor girl was shockingly neglected. So the end of it was that I went to see her, and — and if ever I wished that we hadn’t abolished ducking-stools, and stocks, and pillories, it was that afternoon ! If I could have had my way, that old harridan of a landlady should have had a taste of them all.” “ I feel with and for you,” said the vicar, with a twinkle in his eye. “May I ask what you did, as you could not carry out your amiable desires ? ” “ You needn’t laugh, young man. There would have been a sermon without words in an hour in the pillory that would have done her far more good than any of yours. However, as you say, I couldn’t carry out my

Page 600

The Wooing of Christabel. wishes, so I carried off Miss Elliven instead. And she’s been at the Grange ever since, though how much longer I shall keep her there, unless there’s a change - ” Miss Featherstone broke off and blew her nose violently, and then added, with a break in her voice, “ She said this morning she w^ould like to see a clergy¬ man, so I set off to find you. Dr. Masters does not give up hope, I believe, but I doubt if he wall pull her through.^’ “ Have you sent for her friends ?” asked the vicar, who w^as nothing if not practical. “ She has no friends, poor thing ! She told me so when I hinted at sending for them to nurse her at the lodgings. As for those Drummonds, I should like to scarify them. They paid her up to date and then washed their hands of her, and have never so much as troubled to find out if she is alive or dead. But here we are. I’ll just go in and see if she feels able to see you.” She soon came back and took him upstairs, where one of the pleasantest rooms in the house had been allotted to the invalid. She was lying on a couch by the fire, the pale fair face almost as white as the pil¬ lows it rested on, and looking. Falconer thought, all eyes in its thinness and pallor. The hair, which had been cut short, was fine and fair, and surrounded the temples like a nimbus or glory, while the wasted hand looked diaphanous against the crimson of the couch. She seemed, the young clergyman thought, to re¬ call some mediaeval picture. Surely somewhere, in the brief foreign tour which he had once taken with Arthur Neville, he had seen a face like that? But the Rev. Bernard Falconer had only the meagre remembrance of individual pictures common to those who have rushed through famous galleries, guide-book in hand, and was quite unable to identify the Raphael or Ghirlandajo the sick girl’s face re¬ called. He only felt that the face on the old canvas by Arno or Tiber or Elbe, and this of the living — or was it of the dying?— girl before him, was the love¬ liest and saintliest vision that had ever blessed the sight of man. CHAPTER THE SEVENTH. A DISH OF TEA. “ Now stir the fire and close the shutters fast, Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round, And while the bubbling and loud-hissing, urn Throws up a steamy column, and the cup That cheers, but not inebriates, waits on each. So let us welcome peaceful evening in.’’— Cowper. ‘‘How late Bernard is !” said Mrs. Falconer. “An¬ nette, do you think the clock can be right ?” “ Yes ; Bernard set it by his watch this morning,” said Annette, going to the window. “ He will be here directly, auntie. I can see him coming in at the gate.” “Then ring the bell, my dear, and tell them to bring the tea. He will be here by the time it has stood to draw.” 583 And, indeed, by the time the dainty little equipage was set out in the Vicarage drawing-room, the vicar had come in, and, after giving his mother the kiss that never failed her at parting or meeting, had drawn his chair to the fire the October afternoon made ‘pleasant, and stretched himself in it with the air of a man whose work is done for the day, and who finds rest not unwelcome or unsweet. Afternoon tea was an institution at the Vicarage, and a very pleasant one. The drawing-room was long and low, with panelled walls painted in white, but softened by draperies of dull Indian silk in faint harmonious shades of green and gold. There were drawings in water-colour, sunny little landscapes, and studies of yellow roses and tall white lilies on the walls ; and wherever vase or glass or flower-pot could stand there were flowers, arranged with exquisite taste, and tended with an unremitting care that kept them always fresh and sweet. Mrs. Falconer used to say that it hurt her almost as much to see a faded flower as a neglected child, and in her own house at least she was never pained by the sight of either. Netta’s first work was always the replenishment of the numberless little vases that made the Vicarage rooms so attractive and so sweet ; and if the boys were refractory, they were always scrupulously clean. To appear before grandmamma with unkempt hair or unwashed hands was a form of independence that had never suggested itself even to Flavius, while Kenneth was a dandy born, and Marmaduke had something of the innocent freshness and fairness of the flowers themselves. The boys never appeared at afternoon tea, which was, perhaps, one reason why their uncle thought it the pleasantest meal of the day. He seldom failed to arrive in time for it himself, and if ever the epithet “genial” could have been applied to the Vicar of Ive- minster, it would have been when, in the relaxation of the afternoon hour, he lay back amongst the cushions of his favourite lounging-chair, or stood, cup in hand, on the hearthrug, in the attitude supposed to be the peculiar privilege of his race and sex. But indeed it was little wonder if reserve thawed and sternness disappeared in the pleasant atmosphere of a room whose mistress looked the embodiment of peace and good-will, while the room itself might have wooed ah anchorite to unaccustomed indulgence. The chairs vied with each other in luxurious shapes ; there were softly cushioned couches and lounging-chairs ; wicker-chairs with downy pillows, upholstered in velvet or plush ; little tables that lent themselves to iete-a-ieiesj low footstools that invited confidences ; and an especially cosy corner, where Mrs. Falconers chair stood, and beside it a low and tempting-looking seat, the happy possessor of which was always an object of envy to the rest of the room. It was generally Falconer’s custom, when he found his mother and cousin alone, to take the coveted chair himself, and relate for their benefit whatever incidents of the morning might interest or amuse ; but to-day, though he sat down by his mother’s side, he did not volunteer his usual budget. Fie sat quite stilly

Page 601

584 with thoughtful eyes, and a smile that went and came upon his lips. ‘‘What are you thinking about, Bear.?” Netta in¬ quired. “ IVe asked you three times if you’ll have any more tea, and I don’t believe you’v^e heard a word I said.” “I — I’m afraid I didn’t,” stammered Falconer, with a conscious look that quickened his cousin’s vague surprise into eager curiosity. “ Yes ; I’ll have another cup, please ; and you shall tell me all the news while I drink it.” Netta opened her eyes still wider at this reversal of the usual programme. “ Hear the deluding man ! ” she cried gaily. “ What news are we likely to have to tell .? Do you want to hear how many mistakes there were in Kenneth’s French exercise, or what new form of danger Flavius has run into ? Are you interested to hear that Eliza’s young man has ‘’listed,’ or that the black hen has found a new nest it baffles even Marmaduke to dis- cov'er ? This is the sort of small beer we chronicle, and we’d much rather listen to you, especially when we feel sure you have something really interesting to tell us. Come, Bear ; out with it ! We are all atten¬ tion — aren’t we, auntie ? — and we should like to know where you have been, and whom you have seen — and all about it.” Bernard laughed, but he hesitated a moment before he spoke, and the hesitation whetted Netta’s curiosity afresh. He did not know why, but certainly he

Page 602

The Wooing of Christabel. 585 shrank with a curious reluctance from relating his visit to the Grange. It had been an epoch in his life, and the pale, spirituelle face, with the deep magnetic eyes, had haunted him ever since with strange persist¬ ency. He would rather have said nothing about it ; but Netta w’as looking provokingly curious. Netta would certainly ferret it all out, and then, what could he find to say ? He must tell them, of course ; but he wished his cousin had not put on that air of quizzical expectancy. After all, it was a sufficiently bald narrative that Falconer gave ; but the outlines of the story were too pathetic in themselves not to win attention and in¬ terest. Mrs. Falconer was as much interested as Netta herself, and both were full of admiration for Miss Featherstone and of pity for the deserted governess. Netta's indignation at the treatment she had received would have satisfied even Miss Featherstone ; and her remembrance of the Drummonds was evidently quite as vivid as that of the irate lady of the Grange. ‘‘ Loud, fast girls, with great manes of untidy hair, who always walked about as if they thought everyone was looking at them ! If you don’t remember them, Bear, you are very ungrateful for all the eyes they made at you. And I remember the governess, too, and how different she was — a tall, fair girl, with a stately kind of walk, and very fine dark eyes. I used to wonder who she was, and how she came to be mixed up with such a crew. What did you say her name is. Bear ? ” ‘‘ Miss Elliven.” What an odd name ! And what is her Christian name, I wonder?” “ Really,” said Falconer, with a laugh, “we didn’t get as far as that. Do you want to see if it fits in with your theories ? ” “You may laugh,” said Netta, with her prettiest pout, “ but people do grow to their names, more or less. You would have been quite different if your name had been George or Fred ; and you can’t think how glad I am that I haven’t a name that takes much living up to. Fancy if I had been a Theodora, or Christina, or even an Elizabeth! Now, Miss Elliven has a name of that sort, I feel sure. She couldn't be a Sarah or a Jane.” “ Considering that Sarah means Princess - ” “ That it meant it once, in another language, you mean. It isn’t the real original meanings that count ; it is the associations and meanings they have come to have for us.” “ Well, I’ll ask Miss Featherstone what her friend’s name is the next time I see her, and you shall see what your theories are worth,” said Falconer. And then the talk drifted away to other subjects, as perhaps he meant it should. He did not forget his promise, however, and reported to his cousin, a few days afterwards, that he had inquired Miss Elliven’s Christian name, and learnt that it was Belita. “ Belita ? Why, that is a Spanish name, isn’t it?” “ Very likely. I’m not a walking dictionary on the subject of proper names,” said Falconer, in a teasing tone. “ It is a Spanish diminutive — the ec[ui valent of our Bell or Bella.” “And decidedly prettier than either.” “ Yes. I told you she would have an uncommon name, and you see I was right. Belita — it is not ex¬ actly what I expected, but it seems to suit Miss Elliven, don’t you think ?” “ I dare say the theory can be stretched to order, though if the name is Spanish, it is certainly the only Spanish thing about her. She is much more like a Norse princess stepping across a frozen lake under a high white moon than a dark-eyed senorita flirting a fan in the sun.” “ Dear me 1 ” exclaimed Miss Delmar. “ Dear me ! Why, Bear, I didn’t think you had it in you to be so poetical. But how your Norse princess must have snubbed you if she can only suggest such frosty simili¬ tudes to your mind 1 Is she very haughty and un¬ approachable ? ” “ Not haughty or unapproachable at all, but there is a sort of isolation — an aloofness about her. Somehow she makes one think of the line — ‘ Her soul was like a star, and dwelt apart,’ I never see her without thinking of it.” “ Well, I think I should prefer something a little more sociable,” said Netta, with a laugh, but her cousin did not answer, and perhaps did not hear her little jest. His eyes were on the western sky, where the evening star was shining in lonely splendour, and a look of abstraction was on the dark earnest face that Netta did not venture to disturb. “I wish my mother would call on Miss Feather¬ stone,” Falconer said at length. “I should like her to see Miss Elliven. Couldn’t you suggest it to her, Netta ? ” “ Couldn’t you ?” said Netta, a good deal amused ; but Falconer shook his head. He had got over his first shyness on the subject, and was quite willing to talk about Miss Elliven to his cousin, but his mother was a different matter. She would ask so many ques¬ tions, and would think the simple request meant so much more than it did, whereas it would come so easily and naturally from Netta. “Well, I suppose I must do my best,” conceded Miss Delmar. “ I will persuade aunt to call, if I can, and perhaps we might ask Miss Featherstone and her friend here.” Falconer’s eyes shone, but Mrs. Falconer was less amenable than they expected. “ Ask her here ? Certainly not ! ” she said, with decision. “ My dear, think of the risk of infection ! And Marmaduke has never had scarlet fever— it wouldn’t do at all. I am not sure if it would be wise even to go to the Grange while the poor girl is there,” ended Mrs. Falconer, in the tone from which, at Ive- minster Vicarage, there was no further Court of Appeal. Falconer, who was in the room, understood that Netta’s well-meant efforts had failed, and went away

Page 603

The Wooing of Christ abel. 586 more disappointed and annoyed than he cared to show. Was everything to be spoilt by those boys? But after all it was those boys who brought about the introduction on which he had set his heart, though it did not take place for some time. Mrs. Falconer’s fears availed to prevent any intercourse between the Vicarage and the Grange till Miss Elliven had entirely recovered, and the recovery was so slow that as soon as she was fit to travel, Miss Featherstone took her to the south of France to recruit her spirits and her strength. Iveminster was much exercised as to the relations subsisting between the two ladies. Was Miss Fea¬ therstone going to adopt the ci-devant governess? or was Miss Elliven going to remain with her benefactress as companion, or what ? These were the questions which agitated the tea-tables of the few residents who remained in Iveminster during the winter months, but both guesses were wide of the mark. Miss Elliven had gratefully accepted Miss Featherstone’s invitation to remain with her till her health was thoroughly esta¬ blished, but after that she would look for another situation ; and perhaps the mistress of the Grange liked her protegee all the better for the independence with which she could so thoroughly sympathise. They were not to return till close upon Christmas, and Falconer found himself looking forward to this year’s Yuletide with a curious impatience. He missed his visits to the Grange; he missed the gaunt old woman with the hard-featured face and the caustic tongue ; and still more he missed the pale figure on the couch, with the sad, haunting eyes, and the face that seemed to him the fairest he had ever seen. There was something in it he could not forget, and that moved him even in remembrance to a deep interest and a great compassion. What had her history been ? he wondered. That it had been a sad, even a tragic one, he did not doubt, but if Miss Featherstone knew it, she did not say a word to throw light on her visitor’s past. It was the girl’s own face and manner — her “aloofness,” as Falconer phrased it — that made him feel as if some great sorrow had separated her from the hopes of youth, and even from the ordinary relationships of life. Beautiful as she was, he did not even fancy himself in love with her. The reticence he had felt in speaking of her sprang from quite other feelings — from a conviction that he could not conceal the chivalrous interest she had awakened in his breast, and that Netta would be sure to misinterpret it. He shrank from such misconcep¬ tion as a sort of profanation, and as Christmas drew near, grew shorter of temper and of tongue, and so im¬ patient Avith the boys that it took all Netta’s tact to prevent collisions that would have infallibly spoilt Mrs. Falconer’s Christmas. There was no doubt that the boys were unusually troublesome, whether from the friction with their uncle’s impatient strictness, or only that three healthy boys kept indoors by the weather found it difficult to be “ good ” — if goodness and quietness were to be re- ’ ' garded as synonyms. It was all the more difficult as Mrs. Falconer was ailing, and as Netta sat in her aunt’s sick-room, and thought of the boys left to their uncle’s tender mercies, she lived in daily dread of a catastrophe. At last it came. Falconer was awakened in the small hours of the night by a crash and clatter on the stairs that brought him out of his room in vague alarm, only to find his three hopeful nephews sliding down the stairs on tea-trays, in emulation of the Canadian tobogganing they had been reading about the day before. They were coming up again, three little night-gowned figures, each carrying a tray as big as himself, when they saw their uncle, and, inconti¬ nently dropping their trays, stood regarding him with open-mouthed surprise, while the trays slid down un¬ heeded, and fell with reverberating clash and jangle one upon another in the hall. Mrs. Falconer woke in a paroxysm of alarm, and could hardly be persuaded that there were no burglars in the house. She was seriously shaken, and the doctor declared that something must be done to en¬ sure her nerves from a repetition of such a shock. “ Kenneth is going to school,” said Bernard and Netta in a breath; and Netta added, “And Plavius and Marmaduke are so young - ” “ Do you know where Flavius is at the present moment ?” asked Dr. Maynard drily. Netta had to confess her ignorance, and the doctor proceeded, in a tone of triumph — “ I saw him ten minutes ago dancing a pas seal on the window-ledge outside one of the bedroom win¬ dows ! I would not answer for the consequences if his grandmother bad seen him too.” “ He ought to go to school, but my mother will not part with the two little ones,” said Bernard. “It is really very difficult to know what to do.” “ Well, if I were you,” said Dr. Maynard, “ I should get a governess. Women can do twice as much with boys of that age as men, and that friend of Miss Featherstone’s would be the very woman for the work. They came home a few days ago, and I hear she is looking out for a berth.” Netta could not resist peeping up at her cousin from under her eye-lashes ; but all he said was — “ I will hear what my mother thinks. It is she who must decide.” CHAPTER THE EIGHTH. AN ICE-MAIDEN. “ He comes to neere who comes to be denide.” Sir Thomas Overbury. Mrs. Falconer duly listened to the pros and cons, and agreed that it might be well to secure Miss Elliven’s services, if her testimonials should be satis¬ factory. cried Falconer. “My dear mother, ^ you had ever seen Miss Elliven, you would understand that there can be no ‘ if’ in the matter.” “Nevertheless, Bernard, I shall make the usual inquiries,” said the old lady placidly. “ Miss Feather¬ stone will have the sense to understand that some¬ thing beyond her own fancy for the young lady is

Page 604

The Wooing of Ciiristabel. necessary before receiving her as an inmate of our home.” Miss Featherstone entirely understood it, if Fa^ coner did not ; but the answers to Mrs. Falconer’s inquiries were as satisfactory as her son had pre¬ dicted, and as soon as Christmas was over Miss Elliven was installed at the Vicarage as governess to the two younger boys. Miss Featherstone was delighted, and declared that the arrangement was so satisfactory all round that it was nothing short of a special Providence that had led her to invite Miss Elliven to the Grange, and thus make her acquainted with the household at the Vicarage. Mrs. Falconer was far too old to be plagued by those unruly boys, and if Belita insisted on taking another situation, she could not have any¬ thing better than this that was so close at hand, and so desirable in every way. “ You see, I have learnt to call my dear young friend by her Christian name,” said Miss P'eather- stone ; “and I have learnt something else, too— and that is, to love her with all my heart. She has had a hard life, I believe, and I am thankful to think she will have so kind a home.” “We will do our best to make her happy, I am sure,” said Mrs. Falconer ; and she kept her word. Miss Elliven settled in her new home like a flower transplanted into a congenial soil. She responded to Mrs. Falconer’s kindness with almost filial affection, while Netta declared that she had found in her the friend she had always dreamed of, but never possessed ; and the boys, after a brief but quite unsuccessful struggle for the mastery, developed unsuspected pos¬ sibilities of obedience, and at the same time showed an enthusiastic affection for their conqueror that was not without both a comic and a pathetic side. The only person with whom Miss Elliven did not seem on entirely cordial terms was the one with whom — in right of first acquaintanceship — it would have been natural to expect she would have felt the most at ease. Falconer had looked forward to her coming with an eager delight scarcely to be distin¬ guished from a lover’s expectancy, and had shown her from the first a delicate welcome and chival¬ rous courtesy, all the more striking from his usual briisqiierie. Netta looked on and marvelled ; but if she marvelled at her cousin’s transformation, she was hardly less astonished at the governess’s calm uncon¬ sciousness and almost haughty indifference. Miss Elliven made it plain that she only felt the most casual interest in her pupils’ uncle, and in spite of his best en¬ deavours, Falconer found himself kept at arm’s length when he was not absolutely ignored. Was it pos¬ sible, Netta wondered, that Miss Elliven did not see how anxious Bernard was to win her friendship and regard? Could she be unaware of the feelings Mr. Falconer entertained for her ? And could she really be as indifferent as she seemed? Netta would have liked to drop a hint or a question, but either seemed utterly impossible in the face of that serene indifference. All she could do was to wonder and to wait. 587 Whatever under-currents of hope or fear, of joy or pain, the quiet days hid, they slipped by uneventful, and with little to mark their course, till, almost un¬ awares, the winter’s long sleep was broken by the first kiss of spring. It was the faintest, most evanes¬ cent touch ; but it was the difference between life and death. Already the air was lighter, the quality of the sunshine was different ; the earliest buds and flowers crept out in lair and sweet procession. In the lanes there were celandines, with leaves of shining green and flowers of shining gold, and here and there a “ rathe primrose ” in paler, yet more exquisite beauty, or a firstling speedwell, bluer than the sky. The garden was gay with snowdrop and crocus, and as the lengthening days crept on, came “ the daffodils that take the winds of March with beauty,” and tell us spring is fully come. The winds of March held high carnival in Ive- minster, and even in the sheltered Vicarage made themselves roughly felt ; but Miss Elliven seemed to care little for them. She was out whenever it was possible, looking with intense delight at every swelling bud or opening flower, and trying — but utterly in vain — to make Flavius and Marmaduke share her plea¬ sure. They could not even understand it, and only stared when she greeted with joyful exclamations and sparkling eyes the mystery and miracle of awaken¬ ing life, of which each day brought some new sign to those who had eyes to see. Every day there was a little more green upon the lilacs, a little more roundness in the rowan -buds to tell of coming leaves. The peach-trees glowed with blossoms of celestial pink, the plums put forth their cream-white cups ; the burnished brown buds on the cherry-trees looked like clusters of tiny river-shells. The pears were opening their dappled sheaths, and the bare black apple-boughs were touched with grey at the points, and studded with dots of vivid crimson, like drops of cochineal. “ I’ll look at them fast enough when the fruit’s there ! What’s the good of buds ? ” said Flavius, with immeasurable scorn. And Marmaduke took up the question like a little echo, and felt himself a man. It was Falconer who professed himself devoted to botany, and followed Miss Elliven round the garden, begging to be instructed in the mysteries of that fasci¬ nating study, and more than ready to find beauty in anything on which her eyes rested with favour. If she would only look as kindly on him as she did on the peach-blossoms or the pear-buds ! the young man thought, as he paced the straight, unromantic walks in the fruit garden by the side of the tall and stately young governess, who did not even trouble herself to look at him at all. Could she not understand that friendship was all he sought : that she need not fear the unwelcome or impertinent attentions which, no doubt, her beauty had brought upon her from other men ? It was only friendship he desired, he assured himself: but he was made to feel that even that was more than Miss Elliven was disposed to accord.

Page 605

The Wooing of Christ abel. 588 She would have nothing to say to him, even as a pupil, telling him with a frankness that savoured of bluntness that her business was to teach his nephews, and that even if she had been willing, her botanical knowledge was too slight to be of any use to a person of his age. ‘‘ You don’t know what a duffer I am ! ” said Falconer. But though she laughed, she was obdurate, and he was too afraid of offending her to press the point. Perhaps Miss Elliven understood him better than he understood himself. She was not ungrateful for the friendship she so persistently declined ; but she understood how easily it might develop into a Warmer feeling, and by degrees her coldness had its natural effect. Falconer gave up the attempt to win her regard. He admired her more than any woman he had ever seen, but he ceased to seek her society, or attempt to penetrate her reserve ; and Miss Elliven taught the boys, and fraternised with Netta, and showed a daughter’s affectionate care to Mrs. Falconer, very much as if the young master of the house had no existence. Iveminster was very quiet in the winter and early spring ; but Miss Elliven never complained that she found it dull. “I like a quiet place,” she said, when Netta grum¬ bled — as she was fond of doing — at the lack of society, and the distance of the Vicarage from the town. “ That was why I stayed so long with the Drummonds. They were not nice ; but they lived in an out- of-the-way village in Lincolnshire. There was no fear - ’’ “No fear of what?” asked Netta, surprised at the sudden embarrassment in her friend’s tone. “Fear was a wrong word to use,” said Miss Elliven. “ I meant that I am not fond of meeting strangers, and no one ever came to Black Fen.” “There are plenty of visitors at Iveminster in the summer,” said Netta. “ But you know that — you were here yourself last season, just when the place was full.” “ Oh, yes ; and I saw the sort of people. I don’t mind said Miss Elliven indifferently. Netta was puzzled ; but there was again the inde¬ finable hauteur and reserve in the governess’s manner that made it impossible to question her. “ If it is swells you don’t like, you are not likely to be troubled with them,” said Netta, with a laugh. “ Rank and fashion are not largely represented on Iveminster beach. I’m afraid. I expect that is why Ivethorpe is shut up so long. It must be very different from what it was before Iveminster sprang up.” “Ivethorpe? That is the big house by the river, isn’t it ? A big, gloomy place, that looks quite un¬ inhabited.” “It is uninhabited, except for an old caretaker and her husband. St. Ives has been away for years.” “Is that the owner? ” “ Yes, he is a cousin of ours — of mine and of Bear’s, I mean.” “Is he like Mr. Falconer ? ” “Like dear old Bear? Not in the least. There i^ould hardly be a greater contrast, I should think. St. Ives is tall, and fair, and pleasant — or at least he used to be before he went away.” There was something in the tone or in the stifled sigh that made Miss Elliven say quickly — “ You liked him ? j'^ou were sorry when he went, were you not ? ” “ We were all sorry — Auntie, and Bear, and all of us. You can’t guess what a difference it made. We didn’t live here then. Bear was only a curate, and we had to live in town because Aunt Falconer liked to be near him, so we saw St. Ives nearly eveiy day. He was so different from Bear, always smiling and bright, though he could not have had a very happy time with that awful old man. Of course I don’t mean that Bear is not nice,” added Netta, with a feeling that she ought not to make comparisons that could only be invidious before the girl whom Bernard so much admired. “ Bear is the dearest fellow in the world, and so straight and honest through and through, but Arthur - ” Arthur Was it Netta’s fancy, or had the colour suddenly faded from her companion’s lips ? It was back again so quickly that she could not be sure, but surely there was a disturbance in the beautiful face, a look of distress in the startled eyes, that had not been there a moment ago. “‘Arthur’ is Lord St. Ives’ Christian name,” ex¬ plained Netta. “You — you do not know him, do you ? ” Miss Elliven smiled at the unlikely supposition. “ Most certainly not. I have not been in the way of knowing lords, and I never even heard of this one before.” “Then why did you look so— so - ” “So what ? ” “ I don’t know how to express it— startled, I think ; and somehow as if you knew his name,” said Netta lamely. Miss Elliven looked away from her, with eyes that were full of pain. “ I am very foolish,” she said, in a voice that sounded as troubled as her eyes. “ I did not think I was so weak still. I do not know Lord St. Ives. As I told you just now, I never heard his name till to-day, but you called him Arthttr — a name that was very dear to me once — and — and I have not heard it for so long.” Her voice was broken and agitated, but she quickly recovered her self-control. “ Forget how foolish I have been,” she said, as she returned impulsive Netta’s kiss. “ I do not know why I should have been so silly. It is an old story, and ended long ago. We will not speak of it again.” “ Do you mean that he is dead? ” whispered Netta, who was too full of sympathy to be able to keep silence. “ I mean,” said Miss Elliven, in tones that had

Page 606

The Military School of Music, Kneller Hall. grown cold and repressive, ‘‘ 1 mean that he is dead to me.” It was impossible to ask more after this, and Netta did not try. She understood now, she thought, why Miss Elliven’s beautiful face was often so sad and almost severe, and a great pity filled her heart. The story that underlay the words ‘^He is dead to me” could only be a tragic one, and it was not for her to seek to penetrate her friend’s reserve. She stood silent and a little awkward, and it was possibly a relief to both when the boys were seen approaching. “Aunt Netta,” Flavius shouted as they came near, “Uncle Bear wants you. He’s in the library with grandmamma, and they’re reading a letter.” 589 “Do you know who the letter is from?” Netta asked ; but Flavius only turned a somersault, and vanished with an unearthly yell. Marmaduke had already dragged Miss Fliiven away, and Netta went to the library, feeling vaguely curious. Her aunt and Falconer were there, as Flavius had said, and in Bernard s hand was a thin blue sheet of closely written paper that made her heart leap in her breast. Bernard looked up with a smile as his cousin came in. “ I have heard again from St. Ives,” he said. “ He is coming home at last.” END OF CHAPTER THE EIGHTH. THE MILITARY SCHOOL OF MUSIC, KNELLER HALL. 4^®^^^HERE and how are our military band- masters and bandsmen trained ? ” is a question that has often been addressed to the writer. It is a natural question, considering the very large number of musicians now in the pay of the Crown. In the service there are altogether about one hundred and forty-six infantry bands, of which three belong to the Foot Guards, one each to the Artillery and Engineers, and the remainder to the Infantry of the Line. The cavalry, including the Household Regiments and Royal Horse Artillery, number thirty-two. The regulation “establishment” of the cavalry bands consists of one bandmaster, one sergeant, one corporal, fifteen privates, and five boys (from fourteen to eighteen years of age) — in all twenty-three. The infantry bands are made up by one bandmaster, one sergeant, one corporal, twenty privates, and eight boys — in all thirty-one. A simple calculation will show then that there are considerably upwards of four thousand musicians regularly en¬ gaged in the military band work of the country. It is surely of interest to know how these receive the special education necessary to fit them for the duties they are required to perform. A military school of music is in this country quite a recent institution. As Sir George Grove tells us in his admirable Dictionary, bandmasters in the British army were until recently mostly civilians, with no guarantee for their competence for the post, and bandsmen were instructed and practised in a casual and often imper¬ fect manner by each regiment for itself. A band¬ master formed no integral part of the corps, and could not be compelled to accompany it in case of war or foreign service ; and the statics of bandsmen is even now so far anomalous that in action their duty is to rescue the wounded under fire and take charge of them in hospital. Each band was formed on its own model ; it played whatever instruments its bandmaster chose ; and as for a uniform pitch throughout the army, such a thing was never thought of. It was the Crimean War that specially revealed the evils of this state of matters and the need for united systematic action. There being no enlisted masters, nothing could be done with the bands during the cam¬ paign, and they were therefore broken up and the players placed in the ranks. The French, on the other hand, kept their bands together throughout the whole course of the war ; and not only kept them together, but maintained them in a state of thorough efficiency. Naturally their good camp music, and the total want

Page 607

590 The Military School of Music, Kneller Hall. of mu^c among our forces, caused much comment on the part of our officers ; and it was then that the Duke of Cambridge, who was present with the army, determined that when the opportunity came he would endeavour to have the military music of the country put on a proper footing. Shortly afterwards, by command of His Royal Highness, a plan was drawn up and submitted to the officers of the army, to which they at once gave their assent and subscription. In pursuance of this plan, Kneller Hall was opened as a Military School of Music on the 3rd of March, 1857 — that is to say, within twelve months of the sign¬ ing of the Treaty of Peace at Paris. The school is situated near Hounslow, about ten miles from London. It is easily reached from Waterloo station, where the intending visitor can book either to Twickenham or Hounslow, from cither of which places he will have about a fifteen minutes’ walk. The name “ Kneller Hall ” is derived from the fact that the building stands on the site of the house of Sir Godfrey annual Army Estimates. Since that time the institu¬ tion has gone on flourishing. In 1857 there was the very modest musical staff of only four masters ; now the school can boast of nine professors, besides a director of music, and a schoolmaster from the Gov¬ ernment Normal School for general education. The average number of bandmasters appointed annually from the Hall is twenty ; and about eighty bandsmen are sent out every year, thoroughly equipped for taking a place in the ranks of the bands. The length of term is not rigidly fixed, but as a rule bandmasters remain for two years, and bandsmen eighteen months. In summer the hours of instruction are seven daily, in winter six. The number of pupils naturally varies with circumstances, but the average strength is about one hundred and sixty. Students are divided into two sections — the first section consisting of those who are being educated as bandmasters, and the second of those in training as instrumentalists for service in the regimental bands. Both classes of students are admitted, as vacancies occur, on the recommendation of the commanding officers or band¬ Kneller, the Court painter, who came here in 1709 that he might be near Hampton Court, where his brush was often employed. In 1848 the house was rebuilt and enlarged as a Government establishment for training schoolmasters, so that there is little but the site to account for the name of the present institution. For several years the school was only in the experi¬ mental stage. The Government gave nothing but the use of the building, and the ordinary soldier’s pay to the student according to his regimental rank. Every¬ thing else — professors’ fees, music, musical instru¬ ments, &c. — had to be provided for by an annual payment of ten pounds from each regiment. It took several }ears to convince the authorities of ihe unfair¬ ness of this method of working ; and it was not until 1875 school was taken over by the War Office, and all its expenses arranged to be provided for in the masters of their respective regiments. Those sent up for training as bandmasters are already skilled per¬ formers on one or more instruments, and their selection for further training is generally due to their having shown an aptitude for the management of men, and a general fitness for responsibility. Experience has proved that the mere possession of musical ability is not the sole qualification necessary to make an efficient bandmaster. Even military law, strong as it is, has less power than personal influence ; and it is abso- “ON WEDNESDAY AFTERNOONS . . . THE GROUNDS ARE OPEN TO THE PUBLIC” (/. 592).

Page 608

The Military School of Music, Kneller Hall. 591 I'RIVATE LESSONS ON THE CLARIONET. lutely essential that the bandmaster should possess such qualities as will enable him to obtain the ready and cheerful obedience of the men under his charge. No one is therefore put in training as a bandmaster unless he has, in addition to his musical gifts, the recommendation of being a good disciplinarian, and possessed of such tact as will enable him thoroughly to control and conduct his band. The course of instruction for those being trained as bandmasters ranges, as we have said, over two years, and embraces everything necessary for a military musical life. On joining the school, a number of questions of an elementary kind are given, to be answered on paper, the object being to ascertain the amount of musical knowledge already possessed by the intending student. Having passed this examination the pupil is set to work at harmony. For the first six months he is considered a probationer ; and if at the end of that period he is favourably reported upon, his status as a student is confirmed, and he is passed on to the next “ form.” The subject of harmony is now gone into more thoroughly, the time occupied being from six to eight months. In the third form the atten¬ tion of students is directed chiefly to the study of counterpoint in four parts, and to military musical instrumentation — that is, a knowledge of the compass, capabilities, and proper combination of the various in¬ struments, and the method of treating them in the “ score.” Another examination has now to be under¬ gone, the questions being so arranged as to give a rSsttme of the entire course of study. This examina¬ tion satisfactorily over, the student is passed into the fourth form, and considered qualified, and he then de¬ votes his remaining time at the school to ‘‘scoring” and to assisting the professors in the instrumental instruc¬ tion of the lads who are being trained as bandsmen. Every student in training for a bandmastership is put through a course of instruction in each of the instruments used in a military band, so that he becomes practically acquainted with, and qualified to impart instruction in, the method of blowing and fin¬ gering such instruments — a most important part of the bandmaster’s duties. All who qualify for bandmaster- ships are able to compose ; and on securing an appointment each student leaves to the library of the institution one or more of his own compositions or arrangements from the great masters. It is, however, thought advisable not to encourage too much the pro¬ duction of original music, the more legitimate duties of the bandmaster — namely, the properly instructing and conducting of his band — being put forward as of primary importance. Indeed, on leaving the institu¬ tion to take up appointments, bandmasters are advised that their competency will more probably be judged by results than by “ what they may actually know, or the certificates they may happen to possess ; ” and that, therefore, “ a bright and intelligent performance by the band under their charge will do more to obtain them favourable opinion than any assumption of knowledge or possession of certificates.” A certificate from the school must, however, always be held by bandmasters receiving appointments in the service. This certificate bears that the holder ‘‘ has undergone a course of training at the Military School of M usic, Kneller Hall, KNELLER HALL FROM THE WOOD.

Page 609

The Military School of Music, Kneller Hall. and passed a satisfactory examination in harmony, counterpoint (in four parts), military musical instru¬ mentation, and in scoring for a military band. He has given proof of intelligence as a conductor, and of COLONEL SHAW-HELLIER. having a fair knowledge of the teaching and manage¬ ment of a military church choir. He has, besides, passed a brief course of practical training in the various instruments used in a military band, and is competent to train men to their use.” It will thus be seen that the military bandmaster, though sometimes looked upon as a second-rate musician, is, in reality, a thoroughly cultivated and “ all-round "' artist. The second class of students at Kneller Hall gener¬ ally number about one hundred and ten privates, boys and adults, training for bandsmen. Boys are admitted at the age of fifteen, and are drawn from the Chel¬ sea Hospital, the Royal Hibernian Military School (Dublin), the Metropolitan Poor Law Schools, &c. The course of instruction for bandsmen is naturally less extensive than that for bandmasters. It is not necessary for a bandsman to study all the instruments in common use in the service, and at Kneller Hall he is generally assigned the one for which he has shown a special aptitude or preference. If, after having served as a bandsman, a player develops the necessary qualities, he is certain to be sent back to the school for farther education as a bandmaster. This, as we have seen, entails a course of two years’ training, so that the ordinary band-players do not receive anything like the comprehensive education accorded to band¬ masters. The students at the Hall have many advantages tending towards their comfort and musical improve¬ ment. In order that they may become familiar with the highest class of music and with the best manner of rendering it, they are frequently sent to London to attend the opera and the better-class concerts. They have a capital library of music and musical literature, which is yearly enriched by a grant of books from the Government. A commodious reading-room is also at¬ tached to the institution ; and apparatus for gymnasia, and appurtenances for outdoor games, are abundantly supplied. The present Commandant, Colonel Shaw- Hellier, in short, leaves nothing undone which would help to add to the efficiency and prosperity of the school. On Wednesday afternoons during the summer months the grounds at Kneller Hall are open to the public, who largely avail themselves of the privilege in order to hear the band of the institution. This band averages in strength from ninety to a hundred players, and is conducted in rotation by the students in training as bandmasters. Bandmasters are now first-class staff-sergeants of the regiments to which they belong, and have a fixed salary of ^loo a year in addition to their regimental pay. The cost of this salary is borne by the private purses of the officers, which is an anomaly calling for speedy rectification. The non-commissioned officers and men of the line bands receive only the same pay as men of the same rank serving in the ranks. The bandsmen attached to the Guards, Artillery, Engineers, and Marines are allowed to accept private engagements, and they are thus enabled to add very considerably to their army pay. The members of line regiment bands on the other hand, being seldom stationed long in one place, have little chance of supplementing their scanty pay by private performances ; hence, as has been said, “It cannot be wondered at that they do not, as a rule, remain so long with their regiments as the mem¬ bers of the stationary bands. And as the rules of the service permit them to sever their connection with the army at the end of six or twelve years, and they become entitled to a bonus of 8 on discharge after the shorter period named, and of ^^36 after the longer, it not unfrequently happens that they become discon¬ tented with the small pay they receive as bandsmen, and are tempted by the prospect of more remunerative employment in the orchestras of the theatres or con¬ ceit-rooms to try their luck as musicians in civil life, instead of serving on in the army until entitled to a pension.” Again, the fact that bandmasters are classed as non-commissioned officers (while riding- masters hold commission rank) is sufficient to account for the difficulty in obtaining men of education and refinement to fill these posts. This constant drain on the bands of the line regiments creates an extra¬ ordinary amount of work for the bandmaster ; and it is surely a proof of the good done at Kneller Hall, that, under such circumstances, the military bands of the country are kept in a state of such thorough effici¬ ency, as they admittedly are. For much of the information in this sketch we are indebted to a memorandum drawn up by Colonel Robert T. Thompson, the late able Commandant of the school. j. CuTHBERT Hadden.

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593 PICTURES OF THE MONTHS. September. The sun still shines in the woodland glade, Where leaves are flushing beneath his kiss ; And children roam through the paths, afraid One flower of the late sweet growth to miss. And they themselves are the blossoms fair. Who make new spring to the parents there. SOME FACTS ABOUT LENGTH OF LIFE. T was once remarked by an as¬ tute observer of the laws that govern human life, that “ before an individual was born it was 20,000 to I against his dying at a given age of a given malady and this is still, and must ever remain, true. The recognition of the fact that “ - all must die, Passing through nature to eternity,” happily constitutes the boundary of our knowledge as to individual catastrophe. But scientific investi¬ gation has led to the discovery of a series of facts con¬ nected with human life, which not only astonish us with the minuteness of their details, but astound us with their wonderful accuracy. By such means we know that, for instance, a clergyman who has attained thirty years of age, has an expectatio7i of thirty-five more ; that an agri¬ culturist of the same age has an expectation of forty more ; while a sovereign can claim no more than twenty- two or twenty-three years beyond that given age. This last fact would seem to demonstrate the truth that “while royalty confers upon its possessors all the ad¬ vantages and enjoyments ,of the world in the highest degree, it certainly does not confer on them that which is to be esteemed as far more precious than them all — the blessing of long life.” The following interesting chronological table, showing the names of the Kings and Queens of England, from William the Conqueror downward, their ages at death, in addition to the probable cause or manner of death, would appear to support this assertion : — Name of Sovereign. Age at Death William I. 6o William II. 43 Henry I. 67 Stephen 49 Henry IT. 55 Richard 1. 43 John 49 Henry III. 65 Edward I. 67 Edward II. 43 Edward III. 65 Richard IT. 33 Henry IV. 46 Henry V. 33 Henry VI. 49 Edward IV. 41 Edward V. 12 Catise or Name oJ Sovereign. Age Cause or Manner oj Death. at Death Manner cf Death. Rupture and Richard III. 42 Killed in Bat- Fever tle Shot by an 1 Henry VIT. 52 Consumption Arrow Henry VIII. 55 Ulcerated Leg Surfeit of Lampreys Edward VI. 15 Consumption 1 Mary ! Elizabeth 42 69 Small-Pox Course of Na- The Piles 1 James I. 58 Ague [ture Grief j Charles I. 48 Beheaded Killed by an Charles II. 54 Apoplexy Arrow ! James II. 67 Course of Na¬ Fever ture Age Mary II. 32 Small-Pox Diarrhcea j William III. , 52 Fall from a Murdered Horse Course of Na¬ ; Anne 49 Apoplexy ture ; George I. 67 Paralysis Consumption ; George TI. 77 Syncope Apoplexy j George III. 82 Course of Na¬ Pleurisy- 68 ture Murdered George IV. Bursting a Ague Blood-vessel Smothered William IV. 72 Old Age 758

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594 Some Facts about Length of Life. Taking the average of the foregoing figures, it thus appears that our kings and queens do not survive beyond fifty-two and a half years or thereabouts, and as their average expectation of life has been computed to be, at the time of their accession to the throne, thirty-three years, “the penalty of their royalty has thus been a curtailment of their existence by a period of ten and a half years,” for they should have died at the average age of sixty-three. With that marvellous insight and historical accu¬ racy which was a distinguishing trait of Shakespeare^s genius, the great dramatist seems to have noted this fact when he made King Richard II. moralise on those (c - stories of the death of kings,— How some have been deposed, some slain in war, Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed ; Some poisoned by their wives ; some sleeping kill’d ; All murdered. For within the hollow crown That rounds the mortal temples of a king, Keeps Death his court, and there the antic sits Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp.” Of course it will be said that the great risks, indicated in the Shakespearian drama, are now almost entirely removed, and the lives of kings are proportionately prolonged by the progress of civilisation. Still, Newton found (confining his survey to Europe) that “kings reign, one with another, about eighteen or twenty years.” But putting aside mere statistics, however interesting and suggestive on such a subject as old age, attained either by king or by humble cottager, the ques¬ tion of the expecta7icy of life, whether considered from the point of view of the scientist or sentimentalist, is one which is ever present with most people. “The prolongation of the life of the people,” said the Census Commissioners some years ago, “must bverbe an essential part of family, municipal, and national policy. Although it is right and gracious to incur risk, and to sacrifice life for public objects, it has always been felt that length of days is the measui'e^ and that the completion by the people of the full term of natural existence is the groundwork of their felicity.” How to attain that measure is, of course, the grand problem which almost every member of the human family tries to read aright for himself or herself, according to light and opportunity. It is interesting to know what some “ wise old men” thought of length of life. For example, Cornaro, at the great age of eighty-five, wrote : “ The spirit increases in perfection as the body grows older.” Fontenelle declared that the happiest years of his life were between the fifty-fifth and the seventy- fifth. Buffon, at the age of seventy, as if address¬ ing himself to youth, said, “ Every day that I rise in good health, have I not the enjoyment of this day as immediately and as fully as you have? If I conform my movements, my appetites, my desires to the impulses of a wise nature alone, am I not v/ise and more happy than you ? And the view of the past, which awakens the regrets of old fools, otfers to me, on the contrary, the enjoyments of memory, agreeable pictures, precious images, which are worth more than your objects of pleasure ; for they are pleasant, these images, they arc pure, they call up only amiable recollections. The inquietudes, the chagrins, all the troop of sadnesses which ac¬ company your youthful pleasures, disappear in the picture which represents them to me. Regrets ought to disappear in like manner ; they are only the last flashes of that foolish vanity which never grows old.” Hufeland, a famous German physician of the last century, also wrote wisely on the subject of longevity, and in his work, “ The Art of Prolonging Life,” he said : “ Long life has at all times been the chief wish, the principal object of mankind ; but how contradictory are all the plans ever proposed for obtaining it ! The stern theologist derides such attempts, and asks if the period of existence is not determined to every being, and who is able to add a hair-breadth to his stature, or a minute to the duration of his existence ? The practical physician again ex¬ claims, ‘Why do you search for the particular means of prolonging life ? Employ my art, take care of your health, guard against diseases, and cure those which have appeared. This is,’ says he, ‘the only way to pro¬ mote longevity.’ The adept shows his ‘vital elixir,’ and boldly asserts that those who will persevere to take that incorporated spirit of life may hope to become old. The philosopher endeavours to resolve the problem by teaching men to despise death, and to double life by enjoyment. The innumerable legion of quacks and empirics, on the other hand, who have gained the con¬ fidence of the multitude, inspire them with a belief that there are no surer means of growing old than by using their nostrums.” And so we find that all over the world a variety of extraneous influences is ever at work in the moulding of individual opinion as to how — if desirable at all — a green old age may be obtained by every man and woman born, and how this “ love of life” may become a palpable reality in the enjoyment of length of days. The fact remains the same, how¬ ever, in spite of preacher, physician, philosopher, or empiric, that the blessing of longevity is withheld from the many ; but how far and in what respect it has been acquired by the few, as the immediate result of any one or other of the foregoing influences, it is impossible, humanly speaking, to determine accurately. - The Scriptural limit of human life is certainly passed by a comparatively large number of the human race in every quarter of the globe, and that sometimes to a length approaching the generations of patriarchal times. A few references, therefore, to the great ages of certain classes of our fellow-men and women are at all times interesting and suggestive. And let us con¬ fine ourselves at present to Europe. Great Britain has long been famed for the numbers of instances of longevity it has produced. Denmark, Norway, and Sweden have also furnished from time to time some remarkable cases. Ireland, in spite of famine and sore internal troubles of long duration, has supplied the statist with many cases of men and women who have attained very great ages, and a reference to thes« may be specially made in this article, in view of the great interest always attaching to the history of that unfortunate country. The following is a list, taken from authentic sources*

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Some Facts about Length of Life. 595 of the names and ages of natives of Ireland, whose lives, if traditions may be relied on, greatly exceeded the orthodox limit of human existence : — Jonas Warren died at Ballydoyle in 1787 . aged 167 Countess of Desmond died at Cork in 1612 .. .. ,, 148 Colonel Winslow died at Tipperary in 1766 . . . . ,, 146 Countess of Eccleston died at Dublin ; (uncertain) ,, 143 William Leland died at Lisunka in 1731 . . .. ,, 140 William Gulstone died at - in - .. .. ,, 140 William Shapley died at Knockall, Roscommon, in 1757 ,, 138 Catherine Mooney died at Tuam in 1768 .. .. „ 136 James Sheil died at Ballybadden, Kilkenny, in 1759 „ 136 A Mrs. Thomson died near Dublin in 1796 . . . . ,, 135 Martha Rorke died at Dromore in 1789 .. .. ,, 133 Elizabeth Marchant died at Hamilton, Bawn, in 1761 ,, 133 William Beale died at Dungarvan in 1803 .. .. ,, 130 And so on down a long list of noted centenarians of many nationalities — three or four hundred in number —not one of whom was younger than 120 years ! In the annals of longevity there are numerous 'similar instances also in Scotland and Wales. Pro- ‘bably the greatest age ever attained by a dweller jnorth of the Tweed was that of a certain Colour M ‘Grain, who died in the Isle of Jura i8o years •old; while in the south, at a place called Cochen, near Cardiff, a man named William Edward died •in 1668, aged i68. These men, however, were children •comparatively to a native of England, one Thomas Cam, who actually reached the miraculous age of 207, having been born in the year 1381, and there- .after existed in the flesh till the year 1588 ! This •case is said to be confirmed by the register of the parish of St. Leonard’s, Shoreditch, where the date of •death is recorded as having occurred on January 28th, 1588. The records of no other European country are able to surpass this case, although there was an ■instance quoted in the Russian Petersburg Gazette some ■time in the year 1812 of a native of the district of Ekaterinoslav, who died having attained to between .200 and 205 years of age. Among the other nations of Europe, France, Spain, Italy and Greece figure prominently in respect to the •old age of many natives ; but, on the whole, Russia — it is singular to say — has hitherto supplied the statist with the largest number of extraordinary instances of prolonged human life, notably the instance already referred to of the bi-centenarian. In addition to that •case, we find the following : — A woman living in Moscow in 1848 . aged 168 Peter Sonnosky died in Moscow in 1853 . ,» 122 Jevan Sapoveschesky, a Russian soldier, in 1845 .. ,, 121 .and many others between 100 and 120 years of age. Apart from the question of nationality and old age, a remarkable circumstance to be observed is that “ more women attain great ages than men on a?t ave?'age, although more of the latter attain the utmost extent of longevity.” Hufeland thus endeavoured to account ifor this important fact : — The equilibrium and pliability of the female body seem for a certain time to give it more durability, and to render it less •susceptible of injury from distinctive influences. But male strength is without doubt necessary to .arrive at a very great age. More women, therefore, ibecome old, but fewer very old. In the first half of a man’s age, an active, even a fatiguing life is con¬ ducive to longevity ; but in the last half, a life that is peaceful and uniform. No instance can be found of an idler having attained to a remarkably great age. Rich and nourishing food, and an immoderate use of flesh, do not prolong life. Instances of the greatest age are to be found among men who, from their youth, lived principally on vegetables, and, in some cases, had never tasted flesh.” Moreover, let those who will not marry take heed ! The same authority just quoted declared that “ there was not one instance of a bachelor having attained a great age, and that the fact was as applicable to the female as to the male sex.” Many examples illustra¬ tive of this sensible theory will occur to the reader. Scarcely a week goes by but the fact may be met with of some aged individual dying and testifying, in the number of children and of children’s children to the third and fourth generation, to the force and truth of the physiologist’s statement. The most notable instance of this was supplied in the matrimonial experiences of a centenarian Frenchman, a certain Dr. de Longue- ville, who lived to the age of no. He had been married to no fewer than ten wives, the last of whom he wedded when in his ninety-ninth year, and who bore him a son when he was in his loist ! A wide field of interesting and suggestive information is presented to view in considering the subject of old age, and its attainment by persons of various ranks and degrees of eminence. We have already given a list of the names and ages of the Sovereigns of England, from William the Conqueror down, a list which showed the average age of British Monarchs to be not of the best. Of 300 of the Popes, no more than six attained to or exceeded eighty years of age, though it is curious to note, by way of contrast with the holders of the Pontifical chair, that a very large number of instances occurs of monks and hermits attaining to unusually long ages. Thus, we are told that the Apostle John lived till he was ninety-three ; Paul, the hermit, by means of an almost incredibly severe regimen in a cave, or grotto, lived till he was 113; and St. Anthony till he was 105. Poets and philosophers have at all times been distinguished, according to Hufeland, by their remark¬ able longevity, “ especially when their philosophy was occupied in the study of nature, and afforded them the divine pleasure of discovering new and important truths : the purest enjoyment, a beneficial exaltation of ourselves, and a kind of restoration which may be ranked among the principal means of prolonging the life of a human being.” The following interesting list illustrates the comment of this philosopher, who himself attained a good old age Tasso - A^e at Death, Racine Age at Death, 59 Virgil - 52 Demosthenes 59 Shakespeare 52 Lav'ater 60 jMohere 53 Gal van i 6i Dante 56 Boccaccio - 62 Pope - 56 Fenelon - <^3 Ovid - Aristotle 63 Horace 57 Cuvier 64

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The Garden in September. 596 Age at Death. Age at Death. Milton - 66 Kant - - . 80 Rousseau - - 66 Plato - 81 Erasmus - - 69 Buffon 81 Cervantes - - 69 Goethe 82 Dryden - 70 West 82 Petrarch - - 70 Franklin - 84 Linnaeus - - 71 Herschel - 84 Locke - 73 Anacreon - 85 La Fontaine - 74 Newton 85 Handel - - 75 Voltaire 85 Reaumur - - 75 Halley 86 Galileo - 78 Sophocles - 90- Swift - - 78 Michael Angelo 96 Roger Bacon - 78 Titian 96 Corneille - - 78 Herod ias - 100 Thucydides - 80 Fontenelle - 100 Juvenal - 80 Georgias - 107 Young - 80 It is strange, though by no means unaccountable, that physicians who practise are shorter-lived than almost any other of the professional classes. The solution of this has been offered by one of themselves, as follows : — “ Physicians have the best opportunity of observing those prudential rules and precautions for preserving health which they lay down for others ; and there are fewer employments in which the powers both of the body and mind are exposed to so much con¬ sumption as this. Head and feet must be always exercised in common. But the greatest mortality pre¬ vails during the first ten years of their practice. And after that they become inured to the fatigue, and almost impervious to the noxious effluvia, infectious disorders, or even the heart-melting scenes of woe into which thei-r professional duties call them.” Still there are some who have attained to a great age. Amongst them may be mentioned the folio v/ing : — Age at Death. Age at Death. Boerhaave 70 Harvey 81 Haller 70 Mead - 81 Tissot 70 Duhamel - 82 Gall - 71 Astrue • 83 Darwin 72 Hoffmann - - 83 VanSuirtm 7^ Pinel - - 84 Fallopius - 72 Swedenborg - 85 Jenner 75 Morgagni - 89 Heister 75 Heberden - 92 Cullen 78 Reysch 93 Galen 79 Hippocrates - IC9 Spallanzani 79 In closing this paper, one is tempted to add some practical suggestions as to how length of life may be attained. But — to avoid the risk of sermonising on the theme — what could be better for all classes of readers than simply to be reminded of the experience of that beautiful character, Old Adam, in As Voji Like Ity who so feelingly said : — “ Though look old, yet am I strong and lusty, For in my youth I never did apply Hot and rebellious liquors to my blood, Nor did I with unbashful forehead woo The means of weakness and debility ; Therefore vty age is as the lusty winter, Frosty hit kindly T Does not this contain the kernel of the whole matter? THE GARDEN IN SEPTEMBER. UST as in the month of March we not infre¬ quently have a week in which summer and winter shake hands, so also in the month of September, on which we are just entering, we have a like strange experience. In the early half of this same week we may perhaps find our¬ selves sweltering by the seaside, while the fruit on our garden walls is yet ungathered save by the wasps, while a few days later a great change sets in, and we are sitting for the first time, not by the seaside, but at home by the fireside. Experience, however, has taught us not to wonder at these changes : of course they impede our work in the garden, and but for our greenhouse, or frames, or any hurried protection that we are able to give, we are at the mercy of the elements, and can only quietly wait until the storm has passed and a reaction sets in. September, however, is a great harvest month, not only in the corn-fields, but in the fruit-garden, and as such, it certainly belongs more to summer than to winter. Something, then, with advantage may be said just now as to our general harvesting operations in the garden. And, first, our peaches and nectarines are necessarily occupying a good deal of our attention at this time. And with all our care, we shall find that many, in a warm and ripening season, will fall to the ground during the night, and perhaps become the prey of slugs into the bargain : it is a good plan, then — where at least you are having a fine crop — to contrive a sort of network or gauze bag, sloping from the wall, so as to catch the fruit as it falls. It is, however, a thousand pities to gather wall-fruit too soon, and it can hardly hang too long on the tree ; then, again, much hand¬ ling of the fruit before, or even after, it has been gathered is detrimental to it, while anything in the shape of that barbarous custom of gently pinching

Page 614

The Garden in September. 597 the fruit to see if it yields to the touch is still more disastrous, and can only result in decay, as a little expe¬ rience will readily show. Two good methods of ascertaining the condi¬ tion of your wall-fruit are, first, by using the nose ; and, secondly, by using the eyes : these cannot harm the fruit, while the fingers can. If, then, the aroma of the fruit is very fragrant, you may conclude it is nearly ripe, though bear in mind that fruit is more or less fragrant even before it is ripe ; and next, if you notice that the stalk which supports the fruit is slightly disposed to drop it, or to part from the parent stem, you may con¬ clude that the fruit will soon drop of itself, so that this fact, coupled with the fragrancy of the fruit, should justify you in gathering. And, lastly, gather very gently, and if you find the least resistance from the stalk, let the fruit remain on another day or two. And it is surely worth while to be a little particular over peaches, nectarines, &c., which, when fine, or in . a scaTce season, sometimes realise sixpence or eight- pence a piece, and even more than that. And a word must here be said as to our old trouble— the insects and the slugs. Upon the whole, it almost seems to answer best to leave an imper¬ fect peach, or green fig, &:c., expressly for the use of our winged enemies : you will notice that they generally single out 07ie for their attack, and leave the rest alone ; so never gather a bad or decayed speci¬ men, but leave it for the flies and wasps. If only one or two friendly spiders could be induced to build their houses close to your wall-fruit, this might prove an advantage to the gardener and the spider. Another misfortune is that a bottle of sugar and beer hung up to attract the wasps also attracts the bees, and we do not care to weaken our hives by this process. We must, then, make up our minds to so7ne loss j but perhaps it is, after all, not a very serious one. And next, a very fair number of our apples ripen in September, while all of them are certainly ready by the middle of the following month. And may not one cause of the subsequent decay of apples and pears in our store-rooms be, not merely that they were gathered roughly or carelessly, or were bruised in the process, or stored away when wet or in a damp room, but that they were gathered immaturely and at an improper time ? A good plan, then, is this month, when you see a fine crop coming on, to take an apple and open it, and if you find that the pips are decidedly turning colour, gather your tree within a week from that day; but if the pips are quite white, let all hang a little longer. Where your tree is a very large one, you will also notice that those seem the ripest and finest that have had most of the sun, and have faced south and west : these you might gather first, and leave THE FRUIT HARVEST. the others for a time ; the re¬ moval of some of the fruit, too, will always assist the ripening of any that is allowed to hang on, while in all cases you will find that the finest is at the top of the tree. But if from their very plentifulness we are wont to treat apples roughly, and thus are foolishly willing to sacrifice so many, we should at least be a little more particular over our pears. These must certainly be treated more gently, or they will never keep at all. Gather them by hand, placing the finer sorts in a basket that is lined with something soft, say a little hay, and never have a large weight of pears in one basket — they are impatient of the least bruise, as you will quickly discover — and, finally, place them on the shelves of your fruit-room quite gently. A similar tenderness is, of course, necessary in handling figs. For Morello cherries, a net is the only thing that will keep off the birds. In a dry harvest season, or when water is scarce, the birds are certainly a terrible scourge in the fruit-garden ; and on these occasions, who has not frequently put up whole coveys of thrushes, and black-birds^ and sparrows innumerable ? When this is the case, harvest the fruit forthwith.

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598 THE WRONG BERTIE. A STORY IN TWO CHAPTERS. BY THE AUTHOR OF ‘‘HIS OWN PROPERTY,’' ETC. ETC. CHAPTER THE FIRST. piVE ^ o’clock on a Feb- r u a r y afternoon — and it might as well have been five o’clock in the mornin g. From the gas - lit window of a house in South Kensing¬ ton two girls looked an^ously out into the thick yellow fog that hid even their own area railings from sight, and wished with all their hearts that it had come on at night when all the mem¬ bers of the family were safe at home. ‘‘ I wish you would not be so foolish, Leila,” said one, in quiet, slightly reproachful tones. “ Of course they have kept him for the night, but I shall have you and mother in hysterics before morning, all the same.” “ I am so sorry, but I can’t help being frightened,” said the other, in eager apologetic tones. ‘‘You know the fog came on so suddenly that he might have started home. I wish I might go and see ! ” “Don’t be ridiculous. You would only be another cheese sent after the other lost ones. And there he is ! ” said Maud Weston, as someone came hurriedly up the steps, and the next moment a prolonged tinkling of the electric bell fell gratefully on their ears. “ Yes, that’s i3ertie ! I know his ring ! I’ll open the door for him ! ” cried Leila Sargent, rushing into the hall in her impetuous way ; while her cousin sped quickly up the stairs, remarking — “Well, I think it was most unsafe to send such a child home in the fog, but I am glad for mother’s sake.” “ Here you are at last, Bertie. Aunt Mary was in such a fright. She thought you were lost, but 1 hoped YOU - Oh ! ” Leila had begun to speak in her clear eager voice almost before she had unfastened the door ; and now as she threw it open she stood aghast. On the step outside stood a tall handsome man, a perfect stranger to her, who was smiling to himself in a highly amused fashion. “ I am Bertie,” he said politely, as he raised hi& hat, “ but I am afraid I am the wrong one.” He paused for a reply, but Leila was too much over¬ come for speech. She flushed a vivid scarlet, and wished the ground would open and swallow her up. This was the kind of thing she was always doing : rushing headlong into some foolish blunder of which her youngest cousin would have been ashamed. In the model family of Weston poor Leila’s youthful errors were serious crimes, and she felt now as if she had been caught breaking all the Commandments at once. For his part, the stranger rather enjoyed the picture of the girl in her blushing confusion. There was something picturesque about her attitude as she stood with her hands still on the door, half hidden behind it, just her dark head and bright mobile face falling under the illumination of the hall lamp. “I presume I am speaking to Miss Weston?” he went on, as Leila remained silent. “ My name is Law, and your brother asked me to call on you as soon as 1 came to town.” Leila knew the name at once. Captain Law was a brother-officer of her eldest cousin Harry, and his special friend. She emerged from behind her shelter¬ ing door and plunged into incoherent speech. “ Oh, yes ! of course I know ! ” she said. “ They will be very glad to see you — my aunt and cousins I mean. I am not Miss Weston, I am only Leila Sargent. But I thought you were my little cousin Bertie ! ” and she looked up at him with disappointed brown eyes that appealed irresistibly for help. “Your Bertie is out in the fog still, then ? ” he asked kindly. “Yes, I am afraid so. You see, he goes to school daily near here, and he has not come home this after¬ noon. They may have kept him for the night, but, on the other hand, he might have started home and got lost. It has never happened like this before, so we don’t know what to think, and Aunt Mary is so anxious. He is only ten years old, you know. Oh, I did so hope you were he ! ” finished Leila piteously. “ Where is the school ? ” asked Captain Law in a friendly interested way that gave her strange confi¬ dence at once. “ I used to know this neighbourhood extremely well, and if it is not very far off I will under¬ take to fetch him.” “ Oh, will you ? ” cried Leila in radiant delight, and thinking of nothing but her own Bertie. “ That would be too good of you ! ” “ I would do a good deal more than that for Harry Weston’s brother,” returned Captain Law, with a quiet smile. “ Where am I to go ? ” Leila gave him the requisite directions, and then, as he disappeared into the fog again, shut the door and flew upstairs, feeling that she had really done a very clever thing for once. Maud had come out on the landing above to see

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The Wrong Bertie. what was keeping Leila so long. A very handsome girl was Maud Weston, with good features, and a peculiarly dignified way of holding herself, that always, made her seem much older than she really was. “ Well, is he all right } ” she asked, standing at the head of the stairs like a queen receiving her guest. “ It was Bertie, I suppose ? ” ‘‘It was a Bertie, but the wrong one,’’ exclaimed Leila breathlessly. “ It was Harry’s friend, Captain Law, and he is so good-natured. I told him about Bertie, and he is gone to fetch him.” “ My dear Leila ! ” was all Maud said ; but Leila felt as if she had been knocked over backwards, and she followed her cousin into the drawing-room with a sudden terrible conviction that after all she had, as usual, done the wrong thing. “ What has happened, Maud asked Mrs. Weston sharply, her anxiety having affected her temper — “ What has Leila done now ?” “ Only made a parlourmaid of herself and a foot¬ man of Captain Law,” answered Maud, shrugging her shoulders. “ It was he who rang the bell, and she has sent him to fetch Bertie.” “Leila ! How could you do such a thing What will he think of you ? ” cried Mrs. Weston in thorough vexation. Leila stammered through her story, to the immense amusement of the younger daughter Connie, who seemed to look on it as an excellent joke. But Mrs. Weston could not see anything in a ludicrous light just at that moment, and her sharp words of reproof finally drove poor Leila away to shed tears in the seclusion of the shabby schoolroom, which she and little Bertie looked on as their own. Poor little Leila ! She was so very young for her twenty years, and so impulsive and sensitive. She worried her calmer cousins as much as their un¬ demonstrative ways and quiet maxims wounded her. There was a sore aching at her heart to-day for the mother’s love that had blessed her childhood, before she came, a forlorn little orphan, into the well-ordered family in Thurlow Square. She felt, as usual after falling under her aunt’s displeasure, as if life could never be happy again. And, as usual, she wept away her grief, and had begun to recover her spirits before the right Bertie came bounding in, full of excitement at having been fetched from school by a real soldier, and of the fun of their walk home in the fog. Bertie and Leila had tea and toast together in high glee ; she congratulating herself that no one would miss her, and that perhaps Captain Law would have forgotten her before they met again. She was much mistaken for once. Captain Law was being made very welcome in the drawing-room as Harry’s friend, and as being just home from India with the latest news of the absent brother. But though he was received with smiles, and apologies for Leila’s treatment of him, and thanks for his kind escort of little Bertie ; and though Maud looked handsome, and Connie was amusing, and Evelyn lavished tea and cakes upon him, he was wondering all the time why Leila did not reappear, and missing 599 the eager face and appealing eyes that had looked up at him so frankly an hour ago. By-and-by Mr. Weston came home, bringing such a report of the fog that it seemed heartless to turn their guest out into it. And when it transpired that Captain Law was only staying at his club, and not expected anywhere that night, he was pressed to stop and dine, and, unless the fog lifted, to sleep. So when Leila came running into the drawing-room before dinner, looking very young and pretty in her simple white gown, there stood Captain Law on the hearthrug, to her great consternation. “ Oh ! I didn’t know there was anyone here. I was just running to get the first look at Punch^'' stam¬ mered Leila, blushing again. “ Here it is,” he said, holding it out. “ I was afraid I was the wrong Bertie again.” “ Oh, no ! ” said poor Leila ; then taking courage from his kind manner, she went on hurriedly— “ I am so sorry I was so rude this afternoon. You must have thought I was quite cracked to open- the door like that. I am always doing the stupidest things.” “ Is it stupid to be anxious about your little cousin ? ” he asked, smiling. “ I am sure any one of my sisters would have run to the door if they had thought I was arriving safe in such a fog.” “ Oh, would they ? ” cried Leila, relieved beyond: measure. “ I thought you would be horrified at me.” Captain Law fairly laughed. He had such a merry ringing laugh that Leila found it quite infectious. “ I think it will be a long time before you horrify me, Miss Sargent,” he said. And then he sat down,, and began to point out to her the jokes in Picnch. Leila had always felt the deepest interest in Captain- Law. In her eyes he was a perfect hero. He had. shared the perils of an Egyptian campaign, and saved her cousin’s life. Every letter of Harry Weston’s spoke of his beloved friend Law, and Leila attributed, to him every perfection under the sun. She sat all the evening and watched him with shy adoration. He was all she had pictured him. — tall, handsome, charming in manner, and geniaL enough to rouse stately Maud into becoming anima-^ tion. He made an easy conquest of the whole family,, from Bertie who sat next to him at dessert, and asked for tiger stories, to Evelyn, the eldest daughter, who^ was clever and thought most young men frivolous. Finally, when the fog cleared and he left about: eleven o’clock, he expressed a hope of speedily seeing, them again, and said that he hoped to bring his- mother to call when they came to town for the season.. “And I hope you will open the door to her,” he added,, turning to Leila, with a twinkle in his eye. Leila was afraid he had drawn down fresh disgrace upon her, but Mrs. Weston only laughed. Things strike one under different aspects at intervals, and she. was gratified at the prospect of knowing Lady Mary Law. “ He is the eldest son, and they have a very fine estate in Norfolk, I believe,” Leila heard her remark¬ ing thoughtfully to her husband.

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6oo The Wrong Bertie. And she jumped promptly to a conclusion — “ What a handsome couple he and Maud would make ! ’’ thought Leila- to herself enthusiastically. CHAPTER THE SECOND. Shortly after Easter, Captain Law redeemed his pro¬ mise, and brought his mother and sister to call. Leila was not at home that afternoon. She had gone in en¬ thusiastically for painting, and worked nearly every day at a studio close by, to her great satisfaction. However, she had a full account of the visit. Lady Mary was charming, and so was the daughter, and they had arranged to go to a charity concert together next week. Everyone seemed delighted with the ac¬ quaintance, and Leila was sure that Maud looked unusually bright and handsome that evening. That engagement for the concert was only the first of many. Hilary and Florence Law took a great fancy to the Weston girls, or seemed to do so, and very soon they met nearly every day. Leila used to hear all about it before dinner, when she looked on, a little wearied after her hard work, and watched her cousins dressing for some evening party. She did not care to go out much herself : dissipation tired her and made her unfit to paint, so she kept in the background and made a good listener. One evening, however, the Westons were giving a large dinner, and Leila, although she had escaped dining downstairs, was obliged to appear afterwards. When Captain Law came up into the drawing-room he caught sight of a pretty figure through the open window. Maud and Hilary were sitting together on the balcony in the soft May twilight, and a little figure in white leant over the back of Maud’s chair, talking and flourishing a fan with eager, graceful gesti¬ culation. ‘‘ Hush, Leila ! The gentlemen are coming up,*’ said Maud. It’s only Bertie,” said Hilary lazily. He’s gone to bed,” answered Leila, waving her fan. “Not this one; it is the wrong one, as usual,” said Captain Law coolly, stepping out on to the balcony. And then he asked Maud if she was not going to sing. Hilary followed her to the piano, and Leila slipped away to the other end of the balcony. “ Are you studying the stars or the lamps ? ” asked a voice beside her. And as she turned, with a start, to find Captain Law at her elbow, he went on calmly : “ What do you do with yourself all day ? Why do we never see you now ? ” “I’m busy painting,” answered Leila. “And I don’t care for society.” “ You will soon turn into a paint-brush, I think,” he returned casually. “ So you don’t care for society ? What do you care for, then ? ” Leila hardly knew ; but she found herself gliding into a pleasant conversation, and owning by-and-by that to spend an occasional day on the river was to her mind the summit of human bliss. And after all, she thought when everyone was gone, an hour or two later, if all society was like that evening, it would not be so bad. She had not done one foolish thing, and she had really enjoyed herself. One of the Law family had a birthday next week, and it was decided to celebrate it by a day up the river. The expedition was fixed for Saturday, so that Leila and little Bertie might both go, and fortune favoured them with a perfect day. Leila had never enjoyed a day more, and was radiantly happy from the moment of starting. After lunch she disappeared quietly, and it was not till a couple of hours later that Captain Law came upon her sketching in a quiet nook, while the river shone like silver beyond the rushes at her feet. “ You do really care for this ?” he said, after gazing quietly for a moment or two at the sketch into which Leila had thrown her whole soul. “ Oh, yes ! It is perfection ! I think to be left alone to sketch in a spot like this is the greatest joy in the world ! ” answered Leila enthusiastically. He smiled to himself at her innocent avowal that his company was no additional charm, but he sat down under the willows and watched her while she dashed in a few finishing touches. “ I hope I have not disturbed you,” he said at last, as she laid her sketch down to dry. “No, not at all, thank you : you are so nice and quiet,” said Leila, meaning to be very polite. Captain Law nibbled a blade of grass to hide his amusement, and then suggested that he had come to say tea was ready. Leila folded up her paint-box re¬ gretfully, and turned away with a sigh. It was the first time she had ever really been alone with Captain Law, and he was so kind that she quite for¬ got to be shy of him. She was almost sorry when they came upon Maud, standing in her statuesque beauty under a large spreading beech-tree as though awaiting them, and Captain Law moved forward to join her. No one of the assembled party imagined that he had been spending the last half-hour with the little artist who fell so modestly into the background when the tall handsome couple emerged on to the camping-ground. That was only the first of many pleasant country expeditions, which Leila always joined. Someone had put it into Mrs. Weston’s head that it was bad for the girl’s health to spend long summer days in the studio among the paints, and that sketching in the open air was far better for her. So Leila laid up a store of sketches that would rouse pleasant memories when the dull winter days came, and thought she had never enjoyed a summer so much. With July came an invitation to^ Maud to go down into Norfolk with the Laws. Bertie was asked also, to meet some little cousins, and then, as an after¬ thought, it was suggested that Leila might like to come and paint among the Broads. So all three accepted gladly, and turned their backs on hot dusty London, and went down into the land of level meadows and slow winding streams. “ It was so kind of you to bring me, Maud ! I know you got me the invitation,” said Leila, as she looked

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The Wrong Bertie. 6oi contentedly out upon the dewy lawn on the evening of their arrival. “ Do you think I should have come without you ? ” asked Maud, laughing. And then, with a scrutinising glance at her little cousin, she added, “ It was Captain Law who wanted you to come.” ‘‘Was it? How kind of him!” said Leila grate¬ fully. “He always is so kind to me.” “ Of course you will accept the offer ?” said Maud. “ I don’t quite know. Of course it would involve throwing up part of my leave, and going out in October at the latest. Otherwise, it is an offer not to be lightly refused. I want very much to consult you about it. Could you spare me a few minutes to discuss it in ? ” He still spoke pointedly to Maud, and seemed to ignore Leila, who went suddenly scarlet, and then pale, “captain law came upon her sketching” {p. 600). He was kinder than ever during the days that fol¬ lowed. He was always quietly arranging things to please Leila, always taking care of her unobtrusively. He and Maud Weston were the leading spirits of all the fun that went on, but they took care that Leila should always have even more than her share. “ It is because he looks on me as Maud’s sister,” thought Leila to herself gratefully, and she thought also that she looked on him as a kind elder brother. One sultry summer afternoon she was sitting with Maud in a secluded corner of the grounds, when Cap¬ tain Law came suddenly upon them, looking a little graver than was his wont. In his hand was a telegram, and as he paused beside the tree that shaded the two girls, he mechanically unfolded it. “I have just received a most unexpected offer,” he said, addressing Maud. “A friend of mine has sud¬ denly got a district command in India, and has wired to know if I will be his aide-de-camp.” while he spoke. She waited till Maud had risen and passed out of sight with him, and then she turned and fled like a frightened hare to a favourite hiding- place of hers among the hayricks in the meadow. Two truths had suddenly flashed upon her. He was going to accept this offer only if Maud would go to India with him, and she herself was jealous of her. In the moment that had sufficed for her to realise what a blank his absence would cause, Leila had learnt the state of her own heart. It was not as an elder brother that she looked upon Bertie Law. Long she crouched there upon the fragrant hay, too stunned and miserable to move. She heard voices calling her to join them in boating on the Broad, she heard one deep manly voice above all — the last to abandon her name — to which she thrilled responsive ; but she made no sign. She could not join the happy- party yet. The crimson sunset had burned itself away, and the

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6o2 The Worries of a “ New Chum.” August twilight was falling fast, when Leila at last raised herself slowly from her nest, and dragged her cramped and wearied limbs homewards. But as she reached the gate that led to the shrubbery she heard excited voices on the other side of the hedge and caught clearly words that made her heart stand still. “ Upset the boat ! — Bertie — drowned ! ” she heard distinctly. She was too much overcome to speak or cry out ; she heard the voices die away in the distance, and clung helplessly to the gate-post, with her head resting on her hands. Her mind was too full of the one Bertie to think for a moment of the other; she had only an awful vision of the young man she had seen so lately full of life and vigour, who was now lying drowned under the treacherous waters of the Broad. A step sounded down the path, but she would not look up, for she knew her ears deceived her. Then a voice she thought never to hear again cried in surprise and anxiety — “ Here you are at last ! We could not find you any¬ where ! What has happened ? What on earth is the matter Leila raised her face incredulously. There he stood, no wraith in the fading light, but himself, handsome and full of life as ever. “ Someone has been frightening you about; Bertie !” he cried with sudden comprehension, as he saw her white scared look. He vaulted the gate and stood be¬ side her. “ He is all right, I assure you. He only got a ducking, young monkey ! though he nearly upset the boat. He is tucked up warm in bed now, and will get no harm.” Leila turned away from him in utter confusion. How should she hide from him what she had really dreaded ? How play her part with every nerve un¬ strung ? Captain Law drew a little closer to her. “Is it a case of the wrong Bertie again?” he asked, in a voice that she had never heard from him before. “ Did you think I was drowned, Leila ? ” For answer she stammered desperately something about Maud. “ Maud ? ” he repeated. “ Don’t you know that Maud has been our best friend ? Have you never discovered what she found out long ago : that I love you, Leila ? ” Was it the same world that she had been living in an hour ago ? Leila wondered vaguely, as he took her hand in his, and went on — “ It was Maud who contrived that you should come here, that you might learn to know my people and my home ; and it is she who has undertaken to persuade her father and mother to let you go out to India with me in October, if you will. Leila, will you come ? Or shall I throw up my appointment and wait till after Christmas? For I cannot go without you.” Would she not have gone with him next day ? But her happiness seemed too great to be true. “ You cannot want me ; I am so young, and do such foolish things,” she murmured deprecatingly. “ Don’t 1 love all your little impulsive ways ? Didn’t I love you from the moment you rushed to open the door for me in the fog ? Am I the wrong Bertie still, Leila ? ” and smiling, he drew her closer. “ No, never again,” she answered softly, almost afraid of her great joy. “ You are the right Bertie for me now, and always ! ” THE WORRIES OF A NEW CHUM.” BY THE REV. FREDERICK HASTINGS, ADELAIDE, S.A. “new chum” is the familiar term applied to a new¬ comer to Australia. No sooner had I arrived than I received a letter from a very devout and solemn minister wel¬ coming me as a “ new chum.” I was sur¬ prised, but not shocked. Well, this land has many advantages and offers many joys, but the “new chum” has some things which tend to worry him. First and foremost are the mosquitoes. They not only worry, but torment. They seem to let the colonist alone, but they go for the “ new chum.” His blood is richer and sweeter. His skin is not so hardened by the sun. The poison from previous bites has not yet inoculated him. One lady said, “ Mosquitoes never touch me.” I envied her, and wanted to know the secret, but could not find it out. When the dry weather comes the mosquitoes are not quite so troublesome. Anyhow, at present I and others of my family find it an advan¬ tage to use plenty of oil of lavender and camphor, both to prevent bites and to check irritation after a surreptitious puncture. Then the flies are a great worry. We have them in much larger numbers than at home. They swarm over everything. Sugar, butter, preserves, milk will be black with them. To-night, when at an hotel in the country, I could not see a particle of pre¬ serve in a well-filled dish ; the flies made it a mass of blackness. Then they are so persistent. They mean business. I find they will even creep under my dark goggles unless I wave them off. Many men wear netted silk veils to keep them off.

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6o3 COMMEMORATION DAY. To-day I saw a minister with puggery and veil. In another place I saw a ploughman in the field with a white (!) gauze veil over his hat and face. One man, who had lost his way in the bush, left a written paper saying that he did not despair of finding his way, but the flies tormented him so much that he shot himself to avoid feeling any longer their attacks. The residents generally, by means of gauze blinds and gauze doors, manage to keep out the flies ; and when they get in, wives, by opening the windows on the lee side of the house, and by going about with towels, will drive them out. Then the dust is, of course, a worry to a “new chum.’’ At times there are dust-storms. The cry is then “Windows shut ! ” “Doors shut!” Even then through the ventilators the impalpable fine dust, borne in great clouds over the city, will penetrate and smother everything. I never saw such clouds of dust flying as when at Broken Hill. But the heat, ah, that worries, tires, exhausts, ener¬ vates you at first. Some profess to enjoy the hot weather, but to most people loo degrees in the shade is unbearable. One man who was warned not to go too near the crater at Vesuvius replied, “ Oh, it won’t hurt me, for I come from Australia.” “Ah! last Christmas was a scorcher. Then we could only lie down and mop ourselves, or we went down into the cellar to try to get cool. If we had had a refrigerator large enough, we should have got into that. This is not hot, or what we call hot. You wait a bit.” So spoke an old colonial last Yuletide. The “ new chum ” thought it quite hot enough. It seems that sometimes no degrees in the shade is reached. It was Christmas-time, but anything more unlike an English Christmas cannot be conceived. The handle of a door that had been exposed to the sun was not bearable. An attempt to turn it was speedily abandoned, until a leather glove had been placed over it. A wooden handle of a spade exposed to the sun for some time, was just as hot as one could bear it without dropping. Yes, the weather is very different here on December 25th from that in England. No fog, no snow, no sleet, no biting east wind. In¬ stead, cloudless skies ; hot winds at times like a blast from a furnace. Harvest is just being gathered : peaches, apricots^ cherries are abundant. Almond- trees are laden, the oranges and lemons are giving a good show of fruit. The cacti are blooming, and the oleander and hibiscus are smothered-with white, pink, and vermilion blossoms. My own garden is prolific in huge geraniums, in tomato-plants, and water-melons. I have just had to spend an hour with the hose, for the ground is so dry. Think of that at Christmas ! But at Christmas here, as in the Old Countr}^, you must take up the worry of trying to find out presents to suit your friends. All the shops are decorated, and the posts of the arcading in front have branches of pepper-tree, of gum-tree, or bamboo fastened to them. Gay flags flutter ; crowds are in the shops ; present-buying is the rage. You cannot get served for a long time. You must learn patience, and try and get all the moral good you can out of that present-hunting worry. When you

Page 621

The Worries of a “ New Chum.” 604 have ended your difficult task, you are thankful and tired. Yes, here is a cafe with fine sheltered balcony. From your pobit de vantage you look down on the crowds in Rundle Street, the busiest in Adelaide. You can enjoy an ice, strawberries and cream. In the luxurious bamboo chair you can also enjoy the balminess, and gaze your fill on the constellation of the Southern Cross. Santa Claus is moving. The young people are an¬ ticipating his coming. Can he travel as far? Will he be as much at home here as in England, Germany, and America ? Stockings are hung up. When Christmas morning dawns there is excitement in many a home — shouts of surprise and joy. One friend told me that his little ones were up before dawn, and worrying Santa Claus. He wished their eyelids had been as heavy as his own. The goose and plum-pudding of Christmas did not find such keen appetites as would have probably been found in England : the heat takes that away for a time. But there is something else that deprives you of it : that frightful sense of loneliness and that home¬ sickness that will come over you as a new chum ” at such a season. You try to drive off the worrying feeling. With some friends, as soon as the rays of the sun begin to moderate, you try a game of tennis on the lawn. Afterwards the Japanese lanterns are lit. Then we throw down rugs upon the grass, draw our lounging-chairs in a circle, and armed with palm fans, moreover with a chemical prepara¬ tion for keeping off mosquitoes, we pass the rest of the evening in telling a tale. Strolling homewards from our friends, we give peeps into several gardens. Illuminations are in many. In one, belonging to a poor man, the luxuriant vine that grew over poles was gay with paper lanterns. Little poverty in this land : every man can, if he will, make his children happy. You conclude that the working classes here have fewer worries than those at home, and fewer than the “ new chum.” As showing how the “ old chums ” banish worries, let me mention how they keep Commemoration Day. This year, as it fell on a Saturday, it was observed on the Monday. Then the Governor goes down to Glenelg — the Brighton of this district — the place where South Australia was proclaimed a colony. He is entertained by the Mayor in honour of the event. Just fifty-three years ago a naval officer from H.M.S. Buffalo landed here, and, hoisting the Union Jack, proclaimed this a British colony. Since then what wonderful progress has been made ! That magnifi¬ cent city behind has been built, hundreds of miles of railway have been laid down, thousands of miles of roadway made, homesteads planted, mines opened out, and great commerce carried on. Fifty-three years ago a few landed on a shore all marsh and scrub for a dozen miles. It must have been lonely then. The lofty range of hills beyond looked down upon them gloomily : now a beach thronged with as many as gather along Yarmouth Sands at its most popular time. Horses and vehicles of all descriptions are scattered about : tents of various kinds, from the elaborate bell-shaped to the few yards of sacking at¬ tached to the cart-side and a couple of poles. The people make shades for themselves. They settle down in the sands, make small fires in disused paraffin tins, boil the kettle, and eat and drink from arrival till leaving. As I saw this huge seaside picnic — looked at the long crowded pier, the people enjoying themselves in merry- go-rounds, and swinging boats, and sailing boats — saw also many out bathing in the shark-protected part, and many others outside the enclosure risking being snapped up suddenly — as I looked on the brilliant costumes of a few Afghans and Hindoos, and the prevailing white of the colonists, it was very difficult to realise that it was Christmas-tide. I tried in the sights around to forget all worrying home-sickness. Perhaps among the small worries of a “ new chum ” is the visiting worry. So many friends call to see you on arrival that you find it diffi¬ cult to return the calls. They expect return calls very speedily, or feel slighted. Each lady leaves not only her own card on the hall-table, but two from her husband. The position of each residence, in a district almost as large as the area covered by London arid its sub¬ urbs, in streets without numbers, is most difficult to ascertain. I have had to give up some in despair. Then, house-hunting is a great worry to a ‘‘ new chum.’' The style of house is different from the English, and ladies think it is a great improvement. Generally, there is only one floor. The two-storey houses are cooler than those in the bungalow style, except where the latter have a layer of seaweed between the uniform corrugated roof and the ceiling. “an hour with the hose.’’

Page 622

6o5 “we pass the rest of the evening in telling a tale” [p. 604). Landlords generally undertake to pay the rates, and so the rent asked strikes a “new chum’^ as exces¬ sive. Experience shows that it is not higher than in London — indeed, much lower if the quantity of ground to each house is taken into account. I could not get my house for longer than a year, as the owners wanted to sell. Now I have probably to turn out. Even readiness to pay higher rent will not enable me to stay. When I have ceased to be a “ new chum,’^ I shall probably know how to man¬ age better than to have to move all my furniture again so speedily. Protective duties cause much worry to the “ new chum.” The Custom-house officials have keen scent, and can easily make you smart if you bring things with you. I did not relish paying duty on a piano several years in use, or on a bicycle on which I had travelled hundreds of miles. A Wesleyan minister coming from another colony is said to have ffieen assessed at the frontier so heavily on his buggy that he left it to be sold for the duty. It is said that he might even then have been worried to pay any de¬ ficiency. After all, “new chums ” now have nothing to worry them comparable with the difficulties and annoyances which beset the first settlers. I have just been hear¬ ing of the trials of some ; of their hardships in crossing the mountains to their houses ; of how great trees with their sharp branches were cut down, and “ hitched ” on to the bullock-waggons to keep them from going too fast down the steep hill ; and I have come to the conclusion that it won’t do for me to speak of any more worries to which a new-comer may now have to submit, or 1 shall run the risk of being laughed at. Perhaps I might find that a heavier worry than others I have already mentioned.

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6o6 THE PATENT -PROTECTED MAN. HE “ outer rind of man,” of which Francis Quarles wrote words of wisdom, has come to be almost a fixed quantity in life. The curl or curve of a hat, or the length in skirt of a coat, are still movable factors by which the man of fashion may beproved and found cor¬ rect, but these things are now so unimportant that they may be disregarded with impunity. A man’s a man for a’ that, and a’ that,” and the dress of man in general is now nearly changeless, and always commendably simple. Coat, hat, and trousers may not be beautiful ; they are far from satisfying high artistic tastes ; but when a dissatisfied theorist would have us adopt the toga, the sombrero, or knee-breeches, it is soon evident that we are too busy in these days to be bothered with incumbrances, and too much in earnest to be troubled about trimmings or gay colours. This being so, it might have been thought that man’s dress would not offer many opportunities to the inventor and patentee. Where would there be room for “improvements” in a costume which hardly fluctuates at all, and in which, so far as clothes are concerned, there need be no difference between a duke and a dustman? Not so, says the inventor ; the less complicated a costume the greater must be the scope for improvement. He and his kind have set to work, undeterred by almost continuous failure, on every part of man’s garb, think¬ ing, evidently, to reap fortunes from it, as one would pick blackberries from a bush, so that the Patent Records, instead of being dry and dismal reading, are really — at intervals — quite interesting. But it is still difficult to realise how men, however sanguine, and presumably sane, could have believed or hoped that the public would adopt and wear things such as they have gone to the trouble of devising and to the expense of protecting by patent. The fine imagination of Swift or Rabelais could not contem¬ plate a world under more extraordinary aspects than this, in which we move and have our being, must have appeared to the anticipations of some patentees ; and, when other sources of inspiration fail, the writers of comic operas and extravaganzas may turn to the Patent Records with the certainty of finding, with a little patience, some entirely new ideas. It is not so very long ago that a lively discussion was carried on in the newspapers as to the merits of Hips versus Braces. This had been anticipated many years before by patents for making breeches and, later, trousers self-supporting by the insertion at the back of metal springs ; and, subsequently, after the introduction of india-rubber, of elastic catches into the waistband, sometimes both at back and sides. One would have the trousers fastened to the shirt by means of buttons and little linen straps. Another, perhaps having in view Douglas Jerrold’s humorous attempt in the “ Clovernook Papers ” to prove that men were ruled and led through their buttons, brought forward an arrangement of hooks and studs, by which those dangerous enemies to the peace of the one sex, and means of supremacy in the other, might be en¬ tirely dispensed with. One of the inevitable extremes in male apparel, to which it is as periodically subject as the recur¬ rence of the seasons, is to have clothing very close- fitting — what in the opposite sex has been styled the eel-skin mode. Thus it was that men were said to have special trousers for different purposes — these for walking, those for riding — or were be¬ lieved to bring their pocket-necessaries to a mini¬ mum, for fear that the bare figure outline should be unkindly broken by too much handkerchief or a cigar-case. Such garments, and trousers in particular, provoked many witticisms. This man was seen to drop a walking-stick in the street, and had to wait until a passer-by would pick it up for him. A fashion¬ able tailor was told by a customer ordering a pair of breeches that if he could get them on he would not have them ; and another was represented as finding himself, with a new pair of trousers, in the dilemma that no matter in what order he started to dress, he could not finish the task, for, with his trousers on first, he could not get his boots on, and putting boots on first, he could not get his trousers on. To obviate difficulties of this kind, and yet permit those who would be dandies to be dandies indeed, there were perfected trousers, which, by the insertion of elastic pieces in the seams, either at back or sides, would have the property of so much expansion as was necessary, and no more, so that, in spite of his trousers, the wearer could ride, row, play cricket, or otherwise amuse himself. Considering that it was at this time necessary to have trousers ironed every time they were worn, to remove wrinkles in them, the plan ought to have been sure of success. But it was seen by an¬ other thoughtful inventor that these skin garments must be unhealthy by checking perspiration. Forth¬ with ventilating trousers appear, invisibly perforated, and these were followed by others having a ventilated gusset, or angular piece, inserted in them. Speak¬ ing of skin garments, one early patent would have had us hark back to the very first principles of dress, and clothe ourselves in the skins of animals, but in an entirely new and patentable manner. Before caout¬ chouc entered into commerce, men bold enough to acknowledge themselves afraid of getting wet had garments of painted cloth or oiled silk, such as the first umbrellas were made of. These were to be superseded by the method of our patentee, which was to take “ the peritoneal coat, membrane, or covering of the caecum or other intestines,” taken preferably

Page 624

The Patent-Protected Man. immediately after the slaughtering of an animal, and placing them edge to edge, stretch them on a lay figure of the required size, when, it was said, they would be welded into a perfect-fitting and entirely waterproof garment. We find one common motive of inventions, the principle of combining two or more purposes in one article, often worked out (theoretically) in clothing. Here is a double-fronted shirt, two fronts (the upper one to be detached) to every shirt, and the laundress set at defiance, with the additional advantage of the insertion of slips of crinoline steel, or other yielding metallic substance, to prevent the “rucking up” to which such things are subject. There are combined collars and neckties ; reversible coats, with differing surfaces, so that either side might be worn outward at will, and trousers made after a similar fashion ; also double-fronted coats ; a paletot which might, by artful flaps and appendages, be made into a short coat, a great coat, a dress coat, or a hunting coat ; and coats which, being dress or “ claw-hammered ” coats in the first place, had skirts that could be detached or folded back out of sight when not wanted. Here are trousers, partly lined with waterproof materials, and so con¬ trived that “ the lower part of the legs thereof can be turned up and buttoned round the body for riding, or in wet and muddy weather, and turned down or but¬ toned round the leg in fine weather or for walking.” For similar emergencies there were hoods and capes of thin materials concealed, in patent ways, under coat-collars ; or wings attached underneath coat-skirts, which could be brought out to cover the legs in a shower ; or mud-shields which might, could, would, or should be fastened to the heels of boots, to keep the trousers from being spattered. Other economical multifold methods provide re¬ versible collars, or double wristbands ; and for the preservation of hat-brims, edges of collars, or other articles of dress liable to fray, there was a plan of fixing to them a beading of “ china clay,” or other substantial and readily renewed material. Weak-chested people were armed with chest pro¬ tector and braces in combination ; weak - throated people with stock and respirator in one, or with collars so lined with woollen, or other soft, warm, and washable materials, as would, according to the kind intentions of the designer, “ give the wearer the protection of a muffler without its sickly appearance.” For people who were nervously solicitous about their sight, one Samuel Stocker took out an elaborate patent, comprising a hood that might envelop the head, having a gauze-covered aperture to see through. He also invented a veil furnished with openings, and screens for the eyes, nose, and mouth, which could be rolled or turned up round the lower part of the cap to which It was fixed when not in use. Furthermore, he perfected a hollow air-tight band, which might, when fastened to the brim of a hat, be inflated, when desired, to serve as a pillow, and two other wonderful novelties in hats, to which anything but a full official description would fail to do justice : — “A head covering intended to protect the eyes. It 607 is formed as a hat or cap of any desired shape, with one or two apertures in front just above the brim, and fitted with screens of glass, wire-gauze, or other suit¬ able material. An elastic band may be attached to draw down over the apertures and hide them, when the hat is worn in an ordinary position. “A head-covering for the same purpose. It con¬ sists of a hat having the body made in two parts. The upper part rests upon the head, the lower part (which carries the brim) slides over or within the upper ; it is provided with apertures or screens as before mentioned. An elastic water-tight band con¬ nects the parts, and the upper part is supported on the head by a strap, or by drawing in the lining.*’ How mercifully have we been spared the spectacle of our streets haunted by hooded and goggle-eyed figures — as unsightly as a diver in his business suit ! For economy and ease together, a model garment was to combine coat and trousers ; another was to attach a false white waistcoat to the shirt. A coat has been censured as a garment without a front, and the waistcoat as another without a back. An in¬ ventor anticipated the witticism by patenting a design which united the two in one. Another would have under-clothing for men, for the sake of comfort and several other considerations, made in one piece ; and these principles were carried to an extreme by uniting a jacket or coat with the trousers at the waist, and with a hood attached to the neck-band of the coat, which should form a cap. The desire to alter shirts so that they might be more easily put on has been so often manifested as to suggest that mankind must often be in a hurry in dressing ; one would have shirts open at the side, and another would open them down the entire front, so that they could be put on like a coat. For better endurance of travelling there are nu¬ merous contrivances : a morning gown which could be converted into a railway rug ; a combined stretcher- bed, cushion, and wrapper ; or an air-proof bag or cushion to be fixed in the back of paletots, jackets, or coats, which might be inflated to form a soft seat, a small tube being carried from the bag to a side pocket, so that the inflation might be effected without taking off the garment. Cloaks which could be in some way or another converted into tents are common enough, and, not to prolong an enumeration which has threat¬ ened entire transformation, in this or that particular, of the entire clothing of men, we need notice nothing more but efforts to provide universal-fitting clothes. The mysterious dispensation which Mr. Alfred Jingle noticed, whereby all the long postmen were allotted short coats, and all the short postmen long ones, would soon have been remedied if some inventors had been successful in smaller articles. The man who could, as one did, devise leggings which by means of con¬ cealed machinery would fit legs of any size or shape, would have been quite equal to a greater emergency, while he could in any difficulty that occurred have entered into consultation with another who matured some gloves which, with elastic bands inserted in the seams, “should closely fit the fingers and hands of different persons, although varying in circumference.” S. W. B.

Page 625

6o8 MY AUNT’S HOUSE. BY M. B. WHITING. “it was a constant amusement to see how things were getting on” 609). E were very well off until our aunt, who wanted to do us an ill turn, died, and left us her house. Of course we were very pleased at first. It was a pretty, rambling place, with a low verandah quite covered with ivy and roses, and an old- fashioned garden, with trim straight borders and neatly kept gravel paths. There w'ere three of us — Matthew, Jane, and I. Matthew was a ( lerk in a bank when he was younger, but as our father had left us each a little sum of money when he died, we persuaded Matthew to leave his work, for he had never been strong, and now that he was getting elderly we could not bear to see him com¬ ing back pale and tired from his desk in the evening. We were very happy together ; we had a nice garden to our house, where Matthew spent most of his time, and though we lived in a small way, it never occurred to us to wish for more. But now that this unexpected stroke of good fortune had befallen us we began to consult what we should do. I think we had better live in the house ourselves,” said Jane. “Tenants are always a trouble, and it would be so nice to have that pretty place.” Jane is quite young — hardly more than forty — and it is necessary to check her when she is too forward in giving her opinion ; but Matthew is always very lenient with her, and he said at once, “ Yes, the garden would be very pleasant in the summer, and we should have no rent to pay.” I always have to think for them both, and I spoke up decidedly. “There could not be a more foolish idea. Live in it, indeed ! What should we want with a great place like that for dust and mice to run riot in ? We must let it, of course, and the rent will make a nice little addition to our income.” I am the eldest, and— 1 say it without pride— I have more common sense than both the others put together; therefore they generally fall in with my opinion, even though they may not altogether agree with me. “ Let us go and look at it,”said Matthew, “ and then we can decide what to do for the best.” My aunt’s house stands about three miles out of the town, in a pleasant little hamlet ; a branch line runs out past it, so that it would be a most convenient place for a gentleman in business. It certainly looked very pretty on that summer afternoon, and I could almost echo Jane's wish that we should make it our home, but I knew better than to indulge such thoughts, and turned my mind to prac¬ tical considerations. “ Let us go over it,” I said, “ and see what repairs it will want.” “ There is something wrong with the water-pipes,

Page 626

My Aunt’s House. 609 evidently,” said Matthew, as he pointed to a large pool in the middle of the kitchen floor. “Yes, they must be thoroughly looked to, of course, and I think the whole place must be painted and papered : it will never let while it looks so dingy as it does now.” “ I must say the rooms are very small,” said Jane. “ Don’t you think, while the workmen are here, they might knock down the partition, and make a nice drawing-room ? ” I generally snub Jane at once : it answers best in the end ; but this remark had so much to justify it that I could not but listen to her, and Matthew took up the idea eagerly. Well done, Jane ! ” he said. “ That would be a grand improvement ; but if we throw that piece of the passage into the drawing-room, how shall we get round to the dining-room ? ” “We must make another passage,’* said Jane de¬ cisively. “Yes, but we cannot make a passage without a place to make it in.” I had been silent so long only because I had been revolving something in my mind. “ Listen to me a moment,” I said. “We will carry out your idea, Jane, but with an addition. We will throw the passage into the drawing-room, and run up an outside corri¬ dor, with French windows opening into the sitting- rooms.” “ Capital ! ” they both exclaimed at once, and the matter was settled. We agreed not to employ an architect, but to engage a working builder to carry out the plan under our own directions. It was a much pleasanter way of doing it : there was no estimate to frighten us, for we deter¬ mined to take one thing at a time, and only go as far as we found it necessary. It was a constant amuse¬ ment to go over to the house and see how things were getting on, and I think we both agreed with Matthew when he said, “ Really, 1 shall be quite sorry when the work is done.” It was not so pleasant, however, when the bill came in. How it had mounted up so enormously we could not tell, but the sum-total fairly staggered us. I under¬ took to write to the builder and demand an explana¬ tion. but when it came we could understand it less than the bill itself. “ I think we had better put it into a lawyer’s hands,” said Matthew. To this, however, I would not give my consent. “We shall only lose more in the end,” I said. “We must pay an instalment now, and when we have let it we can pay the rest out of the rent.” “When we have let it !” The words passed into a household phrase before that longed-for day arrived. We put an advertisement into several papers, and many people came to see it, but they all had some objection or other to make. Some thought it too big, some too small, some too far from the town, and some too near ; some wanted more bedrooms, and some even disliked our delightful corridor. “ Very pretty ! oh, yes, very pretty indeed ! ” said one lady, as we pointed it out to her ; “ but it is a perfect wilderness of cold draughts ! ” We were silent : we could not deny it. Matthew said something rather feebly about cocoa- nut matting, but the lady left without listening to him. Things were getting very desperate, when one day a gentleman called and said that he had heard we had a house to let. Instantly we were all in the highest state of excitement. Jane and I flew to put on our bonnets, and Matthew reached down his hat and stick. The gentleman told us that his name was Wilton, that he had seen our advertisement in the paper, and that he wanted a house some little way out of the town, as his children were not very strong. “ How many children have you ?” said Matthew. “ Oh, several,” replied Mr. Wilton. “ Is this the house It looks very pretty.” We had become so accustomed to hear the house found fault with that our hearts warmed to him at these words, and we parted mutually pleased, after showing him over the place. We heard from him in a day or two, accepting our terms. Our house was let ! We could scarcely believe our good fortune. We took an early opportunity of walking out in that direction, and paying a call on a friend who lived in a house not far from ours. The conversation soon turned upon our new tenants, and Miss Caxton’s words confirmed our worst fears. (/. 608). 759

Page 627

6io My Aunt’s House. “ I am so sorry you have got such a tribe of ram¬ paging children into your house,” she said. “ 1 was going by the other day, and heard a great noise, and there were two boys crawling over the roof of the corridor. Their mother was leaning out of the window trying to reach them with a broom, and as one of them got away from her he put his foot through the glass. You never heard such a set-out as they made in your life.’’ Our hearts sank to zero. The Wiltons had taken the house by the year, and we did not see how to get rid of them at a moment’s notice ; yet before six months — much more a yea7' — had elapsed, our poor house would be a ruin and our garden a wilderness. It was not altogtther with disappointment, therefore, that in a few months’ time we heard that Mr. Wilton had decided to leave the neighbourhood, and would be much obliged if we would release him from our agreement. We gladly consented, though with a little outward show of reluctance. But we could not quite understand why the Wiltons were so eager to be off. They had had the house remarkably cheap, con¬ sidering their requirements, and it seemed ungrateful, to say the least. They were no sooner gone, however, than we found out the cause of their haste. Our house was a wreck. The term may seem a strong one, but it is not too strong for the truth ; both paper and paint were practically gone, tiles off the roof, windows broken, pipes out of order — everything was a ruin where once •all had been so neat and beautiful. We watched the builders at work this time with very different feelings ; there was no pleasure in it now, and though the bill was not so heavy as it ihad been before, it made no difference, for there were no funds to meet it. What was to be done ? Matthew suggested that we should sell out some of our capital, but that was clearly impossible, for we should then have little left to live upon. It was a difficult point, but, as usual, I Iiit upon a solution. We would mortgage the house ! Matthew did not altogether like the plan, but, as he had no better one to propose, I carried the day. The house was mortgaged, and both bills paid off. Months passed away, and still the house remained unlet. One gentleman was very much inclined to take it, but there was no coach-house, and though we were sorely tempted to build one, we dreaded bricks and mortar too much to venture, unless he would have taken the house for at least seven years. A widow lady offered to take it if we would let her have it free for the first two years, and we werq rather sorry after¬ wards that we had not closed with the proposal, fur there seemed no chance of anything else turning up. Meanwhile, we had to reduce our expenses daily to imeet the drain of the interest. “ The next thing will be that we shall not be able to pay our debts,” said Matthew gloomily ; but it is always the darkest hour before the dawn, and only a few days after he made the remark we had an offer that bade fair to remove our difficulties. A gentleman and his wife came down to stay at an hotel in the town and look about for a house ; directly I heard of it, 1 got Matthew to go with me to call upon them, for I felt that such an opportunity might not occur again. Mr. and Mrs. De Courcy were most pleasant people ; one could see at once that they had been accustomed to move in the very best society : there was an ease and grace about them that contrasted pleasantly with our local manners. They received us most kindly, and made an appointment to see the house. “ 1 can hardly hope that they will take it,” I said, as we walked home ; but, contrary to my expectations, they were enchanted with it, and fell in with all our wishes with the most surprising readiness. I did not wish to say anything about a repairing lease, for I was afraid they might not like it, but Matthew had been so alarmed by our previous adventure that he insisted upon it. Mr. De Courcy was most gentlemanly, I must say. ‘‘ I should have proposed it myself if you had not thought of it,” he said, with one of those bows of his that made me feel that my bonnet was very shabby, and that there was a darned place in my Sunday shawl. Such politeness required a like return ; and when he asked us if it would make any difference if he paid the rent yearly instead of quarterly, as it would be a good deal more convenient to him, we could only reply that it would make no difference at all. “It will be awkward, all the same,” said Matthew to me afterwards. “We have had to go into debt already, and if we are to get no rent for a year, we shall have to go in deeper still ! ” “ I know that ; but what could we do ? We might have lost them altogether if we had refused ; and with such excellent references our money is safe enough.” When a thing is done there is no use in discuss¬ ing it ; we had got our tenants, and I think we were glad to get them at any price. No people could have been more pleasant than they were : they made no difficulties about anything, and were always friendly and cordial whenever we saw them. Again and again we congratulated ourselves on our good fortune. We were very glad, all the same, when the year drew to a close, for of course we had been obliged to pay the interest as usual, and as we had only our regular income with which to meet it, we had gone into debt on all sides. “The year will be up in a fortnight now,” I said, when Matthew was groaning one day over our unpaid bills. The next day was fine and bright, and I proposed that we should go out and call upon our tenants. We thoroughly enjoyed our walk ; the pleasantness of the day, added to the near prospect of relief from our difficulties, raised all our spirits, and we chatted gaily along the road until the house came in sight. “ I think they might keep curtains in the windows,” said Jane, as we reached the gate. “Nonsense, Jane!” I replied sharply. “You are always finding fault about something or other ; no doubt ^t is the latest fashion to have no curtains.” “ The house does look rather odd, though,” said Matthew, “in fact - ” He broke off suddenly, and

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My Aunt’s House. 6i I quickening his pace, went up to the dining-room window and looked in. Jane and I followed, and pressed our faces against the glass. The room was bare ! Not a stitch of furniture was left ; carpets, curtains, all were gone. Jane burst into tears. “Jane, how stupid you are ! I exclaimed angrily, but more because of the growing dread at my heart than that I really thought her stupid. “ Of course they are house-cleaning.” Matthew said nothing. He went up and tried the appeared on Matthew’s forehead. As for Jane, she cried all day, which only made me cross. I could see no way out of our troubles, and I did not even try to advise Matthew ; the sky was so dark and gloomy that it seemed impossible for any light to appear. “ I suppose we shall have to go through the Bankruptcy Court ? ” I said bitterly one day. “ No,” said Matthew : “ there is another way, and I want to consult you about it. If we sell off some of our capital, we can pay off all our debts.” “ But how shall we live.^ ” I exclaimed. “ ‘there were two boys crawling over the roof of the corridor’ ” (A 6io). door ; it was open, and we rushed in. The empty rooms echoed to the sound of our feet ; the bare walls seemed to mock our misery : our tenants had run away, and we were ruined ! Whatever Matthew’s faults are, I must admit that there are sparks of nobility in his nature. When we had proved beyond a doubt that our fears were cor¬ rect, his first words were, “ Now we must think how to meet our creditors.” “Matthew ! ” I cried, in a sudden burst of remorse, “ it has all been my fault. Oh ! I wish we had never had the house at all ; but you shall do just what you think best now.” “ Very well,” said Matthew, “ we will sell the house and pay off the mortgage, and then we will see how we stand with the world.” I felt it was right, and I said not a word to hinder him, but it was not the affair of a moment ; nor when the house was sold at last were we in any better position than we were before, for in addition to the back debts which had still to be paid, there were the legal expenses. I was not at all surprised to see streaks of grey in my hair, nor to notice how many new lines had “We must take a little cottage, and keep no servants, and I must try to find some work as a copying clerk. I am afraid that is all I am good for now.” “ Matthew ! You a copying clerk again ? I cannot let you do it.” “ There is no other way,” said Matthew cheerfully, “ and so we must make the best of it.” I said no more ; no, not even when I found that after all our debts had been paid we should not have enough left to live on, unless Jane and I found some employment. I knew that Matthew was right, and that it was the only honourable thing left for us to do. Jane has gone out as companion to an old lady, and I take in needlework, and keep our tiny cottage in order for Matthew and myself. We are not quite unhappy, in spite of all our troubles, but we feel the break-up of our home keenly, and when I see Matthew come in, worn out and weary, from his scantily paid labour, and think of the hap¬ piness he used to enjoy as he went about helping those in poverty and distress, I feel that the best wish I can bestow on anyone who has an aunt, is that if she should die she may not leave them her house.

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6I2 IVords by John Francis Waller, LL.D. Piano. ^ a te7npo.

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6i ] WOOING BY FLOWERS. Come back again at autumn-tide And meet me in my bower, And ye shall learn, the maid replied, “ How fares it with each flower.” At autumn-tide they stood once more Beside the maiden bright. Then from a vase the flowers she bore And placed them in their sight. The lily leaves were dull and stained ; The shrivelled rose was dead ; The odorous violet fresh remained — “ The bard,” she cried, “ I’ll wed.” John Francis Waller. ONCE on a time, to woo a maid Three suitors sought her bower. “ Give me, I pray,” the maiden said To each, “ thy favourite flower.” The lord, he took a lily fair That grew in regal pride ; “ This flower put in thy raven hair ; ’Twill suit a noble’s bride.” The knight, he plucked a rose and cried, “ This flower place on thy breast.” The bard a violet gave, and sighed, ‘‘ Ah ! near thee let it rest.”

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614 WOMANLIKE. By the Author of “A Man of the Name of John,” “King or Protector?” &c. &o. “ Womanlike, taking revenge too deep for a transient wrong.” CHAPTER THE TENTH. A S Madam, I want some work to do in the world.” It was Betty Darell who spoke, as she sat watching the September sunset by the side of her friend and chaperon, Mrs. Ward. Mrs. Ward was a woman of more than middle age, who had been very pretty in her youth, and was pretty still, with her delicate fea¬ tures, soft faded com¬ plexion, and silvery hair. She was the person Betty loved best in all the world. She had loved her ever since Mr. Murray had said, “Here is your new pupil, Mrs. Ward,” and the new friend had taken both the cold trembling hands in her own, and kissed her. Kissed her ! Kissed poor, plain, neglected Elizabeth! From that moment Betty would have died for her. And the passionate loving impulse deepened into devotion as time went on. Mrs. Ward was one of those rare people who can win the confidence of young girls, no matter how varying their characters. She understood shy reserved Betty even better than the girl understood herself, and she was more than a mother to her, bestowing on her a wealth of loving care that Betty amply repaid. She loved all her pupils, but there was something about this lonely girl that went to her heart, and Betty remained with her gladly for four years, each unwilling to part from the other. Mrs. Ward had never had a large school. When her husband’s death plunged her in a moment from affluence to poverty, she had begun by taking three or four girls to educate, and, though she might have added to her numbers had she chosen, she steadily refused to take charge of more than she could really know and influence. But the life of constant care and thought grew too much for her when she was no longer young, and when Betty came of age, and was able to make a home of her own, she ventured to propound the wish of her heart : that Mrs. Ward should come and share it with her. It needed but little pressing on her part to induce her friend to consent. Mrs. Ward had begun to feel a longing for a quieter life, and she would have done a great deal for Betty. There was something about the girl that reminded the elder woman of the young daughter she had lost so long ago ; and to Betty, Madam — as she called her when they were alone together — represented all she had ever known of home. The next two or three years were spent by Betty in building her own house. Nothing would induce her to buy one, though she might have had her choice. “ If I am a parventc^ I will be known as one,” she said calmly. “ But at least my house shall suggest me, and not someone else’s ancestors.” Betty Darell did not look like ^parvenu. She came of gentle blood, and it showed itself in her manner and bearing. And her house, when built, did not look obtrusively new, nor yet a pretentious copy of the antique, but simply a solid red-brick English country house, whole very look suggested home and comfort. She had had a great deal of trouble over it. First she had to settle where she would like to live. Then, when a certain village among the Surrey hills had attracted her irresistibly, she had to beg, and entreat, and finally pay a fancy price for the land upon which she had set her heart. And then came the delight of building. She bought two cottages near by, and turned them into a dear little house, where she spent a great part of the year, and whence she could go up day by day to watch the walls rising, and to gaze at the lovely view from the spot where her terrace was • to be. By the time the house was finished she was on friendly terms with all her neighbours, rich and poor, and welcome everywhere. And last spring Hawk’s Nest, as Betty had christened it, was furnished and made ready at last ; and while all the world was driving in the London parks, and going to concerts and operas, Betty, half wild with delight, was wander¬ ing among the lilacs and in the snowy orchards, and sitting up half the night to hear the nightingales sing. Through August and early September she had lent her house to an overworked clergyman and his family from a city parish, while she and Mrs. Ward were paying visits. Now, as the month drew to a close, they had returned again after their wanderings, and, as Betty felt with delight, had really come home. She sat now on the low cushioned seat in the broad bay-window, side by side with Mrs. Ward, with that sensation of utter content and repose that she always felt when they were alone together, and gazed out of the open casement in tranquil delight. Just outside lay a broad gravelled terrace, round whose stone ba¬ lustrade roses and Virginia creeper already twined, and below, grassy terraces and slopes stretched away down the hill-side, till an invisible fence divided the last from the wide meadows where the cattle grazed among the long shadows in the evening light. And in the distance upon every side the view was bounded by ranges of hills, purple with heather, or dark with woods, near, at hand, and fading into fainter

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Womanlike. hues against the glowing sky, as the sun sank slowly behind the dim far ridges of the Hampshire hills. It was a lovely scene, and one of which Betty never tired. To-night, too, it had all the charm of an old friend seen after long absence. There was that peculiar feeling of intense satisfaction about it that the rich soft colouring of a Surrey landscape always gives. Betty felt it always keenly, and she was- young and rich, and had all her heart could desire ; and yet, sitting there, with her calm grey eyes gazing into the far distance, she said — “ Madam, I want some work to do in the world.” “ What sort of work, Betty ? ” I hardly know ; but something that will be work always, and give life an interest. I did not need it while 1 had my house to build ; but now that is done and I am quite settled for life, I must have some work to do. I have neither relations nor tenants with claims upon me ; I have not to earn my own living. I am alone in the world, and rich, and have no one but the gardeners’ and coachman’s families to look after. What shall I do.?” “ I don’t know yet, Betty. You are full young to set up a definite Work with a large W.” “ Now you are laughing at me,” said Betty, in smiling remonstrance. Mrs. Ward was smiling too, but her smile was very sweet as she answered — ‘‘ You know the work I should like to see you doing, Betty, and I hope you may do it yet.” Betty- shook her head. “ I shall never marry,’’ she said. “ I don’t know how it is, but I think that love — that sort of love — ^was left out of my nature. I never cared for any man for one moment in all my life. Several men have wanted to make love to me, but I would not let them. One man, this summer, wanted to marry me, and I would not let him. I never shall want to marry, I know.” Betty’s tone was calm and reflective, as though she had been discussing someone else’s feelings. “May I know who that man was, Betty .?” asked Mrs. Ward. Betty considered. “ No ; I think it would be better not to say. Madam,” she answered gently. “ He was very rich : he wanted me, not my money. But I did not want him.” Mrs. Ward sat watching her pupil’s face while the sun dipped slowly behind the distant hills, and the after-glow spread in glory up the sky. “ You are a strange girl still, Betty,” she said at last. “ I hope some day you will meet the man you can love, because you would make him very happy.” “ I would rather make you happy,” returned Betty affectionately. “ Now tell me what work I can find to do. There is little to do in the village, and 1 have no particular talent to cultivate. What shall I do?” “ There is the Dovecote,” suggested Mrs. Ward. Betty had called her cottage the Dovecote because there they two had lived in such peace and harmony. Now she no longer needed it, she had put an elderly 615 woman in charge, under whom she intended fo train girls for service, and she made it a home of rest for governesses and ladies unable to afford change of air. “ Oh, that is nothing ! ” said Betty quickly. “ 1 just go down of a morning and see what Mrs. Sharpe is going to give them for dinner, and if everyone is comfortable, and there is an end of it.” “ Except when you take your doves out driving, and read to the weak-eyed, and - ” “ I assure you that that is all nothing,” returned Betty, laughing. “Put that out of your head, and turn your energies to discovering what I am to turn mine to.” “ If you really wish for work, Betty, the work will be sure to come. Do not go too far to look for it, lest you find what was not meant for you,” said Mrs. Ward gravely. Betty glanced at her with quick comprehension. “ I never knew anyone yet really desirous to do good to others who did not find the opportunity arise if he or she had only patience to wait. You are right in looking on your money as a trust. What it is to be used for will be shown you in good time,” ended Mrs. Ward in her gentle way, and Betty laid a hand in hers by way of reply. So they sat there silently, till the last faint rosy glow had died away, and the stars were peeping out, and a young crescent moon sailed softly into sight, and Betty dreamt of the future while her companion mused over the past. “ By the way,” said Betty, later in the evening, as she was sorting out her papers with leisurely joy at being back at her own writing-table, “here is an invitation to Mayes for to-morrow. We ought to go, for I suppose it will be the last tennis party of the season.” “ Yes, certainly. I suppose that it is to celebrate the return of the prodigal,” said Mrs. Ward. “ Oh 1 Is it true that Fred Carrington has come home ? ” “ Yes, quite true,” answered Mrs. Ward, who had been home a day or two longer than Betty, and had heard all the local gossip. “ He found eighteen months of fevers and hardships quite enough, so he has forsaken his cattle ranche, and come home, like a good bo}^, to go to the University and the Bar, as his family always wished him to do.” “ He ought never to have gone abroad. Being the only son, and a very clever fellow, too, he had no business driving cattle,” remarked Betty. “ I shall be glad to see him again : he was such a nice boy when he left home. I wonder if he has altered.” “ I hear he has very much improved. Poor Mrs. Carrington nearly wept for joy when she told me he was at home again. It was very cruel of him to go, but he was very wild and thoughtless,” said Mrs. Ward. “And very young,” said Betty, ruthlessly tearing up a map of the Argentine Republic that Roger Haughton had made for Dickie’s instruction one day. The next day proved showery after the treacherous

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6i6 Womanlike. sunset. Scarcely had they reached Mayes when a regular downpour set in, and the tennis-players beat a hasty retreat indoors. The Carringtons had lately been adding to their house, and they amused their guests during the rain, in true country fashion, by taking them all to see the new rooms. Betty was taken charge of by Fred himself— a pleasant young fellow, much improved, as she had heard, by his absence, who took a real pleasure in showing her the billiard-room and the smoking-room that his indulgent parents had given up to his exclusive use since'^his return. “ It is awfully good of my father,” he said eagerly, as he led her proudly into his den. “Isn't it a jolly room ? ” “ You have a great many pretty things about,” said Betty cordially. “ Oh ! I go round the house and take what I like,” returned Master Fred coolly. “ But this is the real gem of the collection.” As he spoke he conducted her proudly to a table near the window, whereon stood, in a place of honour, a very handsome photograph-frame. Betty looked in surprise. She could not mistake those features nor those eyes, that seemed to have a searching look even in a photograph. “ Surely that is Mr. Haughton ? ” she said. “You know him.^"” cried Fred excitedly. “Then you know the finest fellow in the world ! I can tell you. Miss Darell, if it hadn't been for him, I shouldn’t be here now. He found me up-country, awfully bad with fever, and if he hadn't looked after me and nursed me from that moment, there wouldn't have been anything of me left to nurse.” “ Really,'' said Betty, with a curious sort of double interest in the narrative, “ I did not know you had been so ill.” Rather!” cried Fred, with a sort of pride in his illness. I had had fever before, but not as badly as I had it then. Nobody but he would have pulled me through.” “But were you all alone asked Betty. Fred looked a little abashed. “Well, the lot 1 was with were no good,” he said. “ I cut them as soon as I was well enough, and went to Buenos Ayres after him, and he lent me the money to come home. We came in the same ship, you know. He is a regular brick, and no mistake ! ” finished Fred with enthusiasm. Betty could not help lingering to hear the boy dis¬ course, which he did fluently upon such a congenial 'Subject. It was a new view of Roger's character to her. She had heard plenty of his South American experiences and adventures, but they were all told from his own modest point of view. She knew him to be a successful man of business^ and she had imagined him as being perhaps rather hard in his dealings, and keen at driving a bargain. His kindness to Dickie she had looked on as being shown for old friendship’s sake, if not for a warmer feeling. His deference to women might simply be the result of appreciation of their society after being de¬ prived of it so long. But here was Fred exhibiting him in a new light : as a good Samaritan going out of his way to aid a young fellow who was sick in mind and body — as a successful man holding out the right hand of fellowship to one who had failed utterly— as a man who had always been steady himself, and yet was tender with those who had gone astray. Perhaps after all he had not been so proud and hard in his youth as she had chosen to think him, and she found herself wishing she had been a little less hard on him herself, as Fred sang his hero’s praises in her attentive ear. She was quite surprised when Mr. Carrington came in search of them at last, saying — “My dear Fred, do you know what the time is ? Miss Darell must be ex¬ hausted for want of her tea, and I wish to introduce her to Mr. Elliot.” “SHE WAS RIDING QUIETLY ALONE" {p. 620). CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH. Betty followed Mr. Carrington into the large square hall, where everyone was taking tea, and seated herself not far from her hostess, who was talking

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Womanlike. to a tall grey-haired man, a stranger in the neigh- bourhood. “ Oh, here you are at last ! ” said Mrs. Carrington, turning to her hospitably. ‘‘ I could not think what Fred had done with you. \ou must want your tea badly. Let me introduce Mr. Elliot— Miss Darell.” Mr. Elliot looked down at the tall straight figure sitting very upright in a large armchair, and bowed courteously. There was something about Betty’s face that took his fancy at once — or rather interested him, for Mr. Elliot was above anything so trivial as a fancy. “What has become of Fred now?” asked Mrs. Carrington, busying herself to supply Betty’s wants. “ Flown to fresh fields and pastures new, I suppose ? I must go and find him, for I want him to come and speak to old Miss Mowbray. Will you look after Miss Darell for me?” she added, turning to Mr. Elliot with a genial smile before she hurried away. “I see you read Milton,” remarked Mr. Elliot, seating himself close to Betty as he watched her eyebrows move almost imperceptibly. She turned to him with a smile of appreciation. “ I know ‘Lycidas’ almost by heart,” she said. “ I wish people would not misquote such a well-known line.” “ I suspect that the great majority have never seen it in the original, and have no idea whence it comes.” “ Probably not. No one reads Milton nowadays; it is the fashion to think him dull,” said Betty. “You do not find him so?” said Mr. Elliot. “No, indeed. I think it is much duller work to labour through such sonnets and ballads as appear in all the magazines of the present day. It is a relief to me to turn to the old poets, who at least knew what they meant to say, and said it.” I think that Milton and Shakespeare ought cer¬ tainly to be two of the compulsory subjects in the local examinations,” remarked Mr. Elliot, not doubting that anyone of intelligence must agree with him. “Certainly not!” said Betty warmly. ‘‘It is my belief that setting Shakespeare’s plays as subjects for examination accounts largely for his being unread nowadays. He has ceased to figure as a poet : he has become merely a subject, useful for teaching the meaning of obsolete words and the construction of passages.” “But would you then read Shakespeare without understanding him?” asked Mr. Elliot, beginning to be interested. Do you think that learning the meaning of obsolete words is understanding him?” asked Betty in return. With a great poet, all you need is to feel his spirit, and to be impressed as he would have you be. It does not increase the effect to find out how it is pro¬ duced ; if indeed any study of Shakespeare could ever teach you why he is a great poet : which I doubt.” Betty spoke rapidly, with a look of intelligent in¬ terest upon her face that lit it up almost to beauty. She could see that she had an appreciative listener who cared to discuss such subjects, and she was in her element. Mr. Elliot had a clever, thoughtful face, with nice kind eyes, and a smooth-shaven mouth 617 and chin that were particularly well cut. He was the sort of opponent that Betty loved to argue with— certain of learning something, whether he defeated her against her will or not. “J wonder,” said he inquiringly, “ whether you approve of the higher education of women?” “ That depends entirely on what you mean by a higher education,” said Betty. “If you mean giving them a smattering of Greek and Latin, I am distinctly against it.” “ I agree with you that to acquire a smattering of anything is mere waste of time ; but surely to learn even one subject thoroughly — as a woman must do if she goes in for an examination — must be of great use in forming her mind?” “ But my experience is,” said Betty, “ that girls who go in for examinations learn nothing thoroughly. They learn only what will pay, and find themselves, when all is done, with their minds stored with bits and scraps of information which they cannot combine for want of material.” “ I think you are too hard on the average can¬ didate.” “ I do not think so. I remember a girl I knew who had passed two examinations with distinction in history. About two periods she could lecture for hours ; concerning all other history her mind was a blank.” “ But surely to study those two periods thoroughly gave her the key to all other history ?” “ Only the key had taken so long in forging that she was weary of it, and threw it aside when finished. I think it is a very melancholy feature of modern education,” went on Betty, “that girls take so little interest in the history of their forefathers and the old time before them. They think that the proudest product of the ages is a Girton girl, and that all the wisdom and learning of centuries is concentrated in the women of the nineteenth.” Mr. Elliot was more and more interested in Betty’s views ; her ideas were so surprisingly old- fashioned, and yet she seemed a young person of intellect and culture. He became anxious to draw her out still further. “ I think you are hard on your sex,” he remarked. “ Perhaps I am,” said Betty, smiling ; “ for, really, it is hardly their fault. See how girls are appealed to on all sides now to write essays and express their thoughts. The thoughts of girls hardly out of the schoolroom must be so valuable ! If they were only told to undergo a course of English literature instead, and find out what were the thoughts of master-minds on the same subjects, how much better it would be for them ! I think the object of a girl’s education should be to inculcate a love of books which would last through life : not to show, by means of examinations, how much— or how little— she knows.” “ You love books ?” said Mr. Elliot, smiling. “ I have always loved them,” answered Betty. Then she was to be envied, he remarked ; but at the same time he was sure she was prejudiced with regard to the good of examinations. Betty maintained

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6i8 Womanlike. her opinion, and they fell into hot argument. He defended the cultivation of the feminine intellect, and charged her with wishing to condemn her sex to stocking-darning. She declared that cramming was not cultivation, and that for a woman not to be able to mend her own stockings was a disgrace. He advocated thoroughness, if only in one subject ; she maintained that women ought to have a discursive education fitting them to take intelligent interest in any subject. He boasted of the learning of Girton ; she returned that if the picked intellects of women had taken all these years to produce a senior wrangler, the less said about them the better. They were still arguing merrily, much interested, and equally firm, when Mrs. Ward came up to them at last with a look of amusement on her sweet face. “ Betty dear, I am sorry to disturb your interesting discussion,” she said, “ but do you know that it is quite fine now, and that everyone is going except ourselves ? ’’ Betty rose, laughing. “ I hope we part friends ? ” she said, turning to Mr. Elliot with frank amuse¬ ment. “ Oh, certainly ! But I should very much like to continue our discussion. Miss Darell. Do you live near here?” he asked eagerly. Betty explained where her home lay, and introduced Mrs. Ward ; and Mr. Elliot begged permission to call, which she granted with pleasure. She had en¬ joyed the encounter of wits as much as himself, and quite looked forward to meeting him again. Alto¬ gether, she had an impression of having passed a particularly agreeable afternoon ; and the impression was connected with the grey-haired man who saw them to their carriage. “Do you know who that was, Betty?” asked Mrs. Ward as they drove away. “ He is Mr. Godfrey Elliot, the author of ‘Feminine Culture in Modern Times.’ He is a great authority on education, and he has come down here with the intention of standing for this division of the county at the next election. He thinks he could do so much more to further his cause in Parliament.” Betty laughed her rare low laugh of intense amusement. “ What ca7i he think of me ?” she said. “I have spent the whole afternoon fighting hard against his pet theories, and quoted his own books in derision.” That evening, after dinner, Betty came up to Mrs. Ward as she sat cosily enjoying the first fire of the season, and knelt beside her with a hand on hers. “Madam,” she said softly, “I have found my work.” “ Yes, Betty ? ” “ It is to be a new kind of school : a school for girls in my own rank of life. I have been thinking over all Mr. Elliot said, and it seems to me that girls educated on his principle either become intensely conceited over their learning, and very narrow¬ minded, or else grow so weary of the whole system that they hate the sight of books. So I don’t think that is a great success. And then there are girls like Dickie Mortimer, who learn only what is useful in society, and are turned — straight from a convent¬ like seclusion — into the world, to sink or swim : to become frivolous and marry for money ; or occasion¬ ally to marry for love, and rise through its higher education to be good wives and mothers.” “And there are some like yourself, and Frances Benson, who have pursuits and interests to keep them happy if single, and yet are not averse to matrimony, like superior women,” said Mrs. Ward. “Very few. Madam; and all I have ever met are your pupils. So I want, some day, to establish a school where girls can be trained as you trained us, and not sent into society with heads so empty that flirtation can fill them, ready to be coaxed into foolish marriages by the first men they meet. If Dickie Mortimer had had her head full of heroes as I had at her age, Jim Adair would have seemed to her the common-place young man he is. A little hero- worship is a safe vent for the feelings of girls in their teens, and nowadays girls are mostly either too foolish or too superior to have any heroes.” Mrs. Ward had heard all about Dickie Morti¬ mer, and she did not contradict Betty. She only asked — “ When will you establish your school ? ” “ Ah ! that I do not know. When I am older and wiser, and more experienced,” answered Betty mo¬ destly. “ But 1 shall have an object in life now : to study girls, and to think out my own theories of education. And some day, when I am an old maid, I hope I shall have a perennial supply of girls to learn to know and love, and to be a friend to, as you have always been to me. Madam. I should like them to feel to me a little as I do to you. I owe you every¬ thing I am and know,” she went on, winding her arms round her friend in one of her rare outbursts of affection. “ 1 love you more than anyone in the world, and if I ever do any good at all with my money, re¬ member it is all your doing, all ! ” Mrs. Carrington came up next day to ask Betty all she knew about Roger Haughton, and to tell her the whole story of his influence on Fred’s career. It ap¬ peared that the headstrong lad had insisted on going out to a cattle ranche near Buenos Ayres, and on arriving, had found himself deceived as to the opening promised him. He lost the money he had put into the affair, and was reduced to the greatest extremities, which he was ashamed to confess. Roger had found him amidst low, unworthy companions, sick and penni¬ less, had nursed him back to health, rescued him from his surroundings, and, more than all, persuaded him to write home a penitent confession of his niisfortunes, and to follow his letter by the next steamer. No wonder that the mother was grateful, and anxious to hear all she could of her son’s friend. He had promised to come and stay with them later on, she said, and she could not have said it more proudly had he been a prince. Betty paced the terrace long in silent musing after Mrs. Carrington had left her. She felt that she had

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Womanlike. misjudged Roger, and had not troubled to understand him. When first she heard of his arrival she had been afraid that he would betray the past, about which she was morbidly sensitive, and tell others how he had known her once, poor and neglected ; finding he did not recognise her, as she truly told him she had not thought about him at all, till his alliance with her to save Dickie from a worldly match brought them on terms almost of intimacy. And then he had suddenly surprised her with the story of his love. For the moment she had rather enjoyed turning the tables on him with his own words ; it was a slight revenge for the pain he had given her long ago. But now, as she looked back on their inter¬ view, she felt she had been undignified, and had come perilously near to losing her temper. If she saw him she would apologise to him for her hasty words ; but she had a shrewd suspicion that he would not come to Mayes now. _ CHAPTER THE TWELFTH. The ideal feminine education now became the great topic at Hawk’s Nest. Mr. Elliot came to call the following week, and challenged Betty again to single combat. She liked him still better on closer acquaint¬ ance ; he was a well-read man, who had seen a good deal of the world, and his ideas were always worthy of attention, even though she often disagreed with them. He had taken a house close to the nearest county town, five miles off, and Betty had a greater respect for him when she found he hunted and shot, for like all womanly women, she liked men above all things to be manly. For his part, Mr. Elliot was pleased to find that Betty did not ride to hounds, and congratulated her on their having found one point of agreement— a dislike to ladies in the hunting-field. As a matter of fact, they had many ideas in common, and he was of great use to her in her plans for the village lads’ entertainment, amongst other things. She had built a new parish room, where she gathered them together in the evenings, to learn fretwork, and carv¬ ing, and such-like innocent employments, once or twice a week. Mr. Elliot approved highly of what he called her Technical School, and inaugurated a suc¬ cessful series of lectures on other nights, giving the first himself, and inviting friends to carry them on. What with her evening classes, and the Dovecote, and the University Extension lectures in the little town, which she attended at Mr. Elliot’s urgent re¬ quest, not to speak of her social duties, Betty found her life a very busy one as the autumn days flew by. It seemed to her that she never had a moment to her¬ self Her house was very popular, an^ her friends were always dropping in at odd moments, particularly Fred Carrington, who was always coming to know if she had heard of his hero lately. Roger Haughton was now in London, and hard at work: so Dickie reported. Poor little Dickie ! Her letters were not very cheer¬ ful, but she said Roger was a great deal at their house, and a great comfort to her. “ It will be a case of a 619 heart caught on the rebound,” thought Betty to herself, and so she did not hesitate to ask for news of Roger for Fred’s benefit. Dickie was very much interested in his story, and said she had been envying Roger for going to stay so near Betty, but Roger said he was not sure he should be able to go, after all. He was going out to Buenos Ayres again early in the spring, and meanwhile he was very busy, and was not sure he should get another holiday. I don’t think he will want one in this direction,” was Betty’s inward comment. She hoped he would console himself with Dickie. She was sure the child was devoted to him, and he de¬ served a nice little wife. After all, his had been a sad life so far. Seven years of office drudgery ended by a crushing blow in early manhood, and seven years more of hard work in unhealthy climates, to be followed by another shock, which, though she was sure he was now getting over it, had been very sharp at the time. It was a wonder that he was not soured or embittered by his experience of life. Her own life just now was exceedingly happy. She enjoyed her busy days, and still more her free peaceful evenings alone with Mrs. Ward. She was undergoing a course of reading at Mr. Elliot’s request, intended ta convert her to all sorts of new views. He was always coming over and staying on to lunch or tea, to ask her opinion about something, or to bring her some new passage or fact that had struck him. And then they wrangled amicably to their heart’s content, till they were exhausted, but unconvinced. Or a quiet fit would seize them, and he would read aloud one of the old books she loved, while she and Mrs. Ward sat at work. He thought it a pleasant sight to watch the two women plying their needles with dainty swiftness, and turning out all manner of warm garments for the com- ing Christmas distributions. One day it came upon him suddenly, as he watched the firelight play on Betty’s soft brown hair, and idly followed with his eyes the flashing of her rings as her hands moved to and fro, that such a woman would grace a liearth better than one who read Latin and Greek fluently, and con¬ sidered her intellect on a par with his own. For with all her wilful opposition, Betty never took up that position. She claimed that women, being different from and inferior to men, had a right to a different and less severe education. And it seemed ta him on this particular wet afternoon, when he had deserted his bachelor quarters for Betty’s pretty drawing-room, that such an opinion argued a very modest and womanly mind. The idea grew on him more and more as he laid the “Faery Queene” aside, and began to discuss Eliza¬ bethan literature. It was a subject on which he was well informed, and Betty’s genuine interest, her in¬ telligent questions, her little laughing remarks that drew forth his quiet humour in reply, all had a fresh charm for him that da)^ When he drove away down the winding road in the wind and the rain, the middle-aged man whose in¬ terests political and educational had hitherto absorbed

Page 637

620 Womanlike. him, felt that he had left Paradise behind him, and knew that he was in love. For the next few days he kept away. He was considering his position, and debating whether it was such as would justify his proposing to an heiress. And he was still undecided on the point after nearly a week’s consideration. Meanwhile, Betty was surprised at the sudden cessa¬ tion of his visits, and missed them greatly. She had felt at first that it was a great honour for such a distinguished man to give so much of his time to her ; now she felt as if she had a right to it. She finished a book he had left with her, and wanted him to come and discuss it. Some of the boys were troublesome at the carving class, and she wanted his advice. Then there came a pouring wet day, when Mrs. Ward was confined to her room with a bad cold, and Betty was reduced to wandering about the house for exercise. She felt lonely and desolate, and began to think of the long-past days of her lonely childhood with self-pity. Her own house did not satisfy her : it looked so selfish, arranged as it all was for her own gratification. Was she always to live thus, with no one belonging to her, no one to please but herself? She looked out of the window at the thick mist that blotted out all the view, and longed with all her heart for — she hardly knew what. The next afternoon she was riding quietly alone along the muddy lanes. The heavy rain had brought down most of the leaves, but some still lingered, brown, and gold, and crimson, on hedge and tree, glistening in the bright sunshine. The meadows were a dazzling green ; the sky a glorjous blue expanse where white clouds chased each other in the breeze, and cast flying shadows on the brilliantly clear hills. Betty thought the world was a very pleasant place as she felt her noble chestnut moving under her while they plashed through the muddy lanes. All the world was full of life and motion to-day, and she herself had a pleasant consciousness of her own vitality as she sat erect in her saddle, ruling .her spirited horse with a delicious sense of freedom and power. So Mr. Elliot met her, as he too rode through the miry lanes, trying to persuade himself that he was not going up to the Hawk’s Nest. Good afternoon,” he said in surprise. “ Are you alone ? ” Betty drew rein under a fine old elm that sent a few golden leaves fluttering down on her in welcome. “ I found a poor woman, in a cottage among the hills, very anxious about her child,” she said, ‘‘ so I sent my groom to see if he could find the doctor, and said 1 would ride home alone. “ We must have some ambulance lectures next, I think,” she went on, as he turned his horse and fell into line with her. “ It suddenly struck me how far some of these people are from medical aid. What do you think about it ? ” “ It would be an excellent idea,” he answered ab¬ sently. Mr. Elliot looked his best on horseback. He rode well, and his figure was still that of a young man, and his hat concealed his slight baldness. Altogether, he was a personable man as he rode by Betty’s side. As for her, riding in the golden sunshine under the golden trees, on a horse whose sleek coat took gleams of golden light, she seemed to him a perfect vision of the most beautiful woman he had ever known. “We have not seen you for so long,” said Betty, in her friendly way. “I suppose you have been away ? ” “Have you missed me, then?” he asked eagerly, turning in his saddle. Almost before Betty knew what she was saying, she had answered — “Very much.” And then the look on his face sent a faint flush into her cheek. “ I have been keeping away from you on purpose,” said Mr. Elliot, speaking in a quiet, deliberate w^ay, “ because I was not sure if it were right for me to come.” Betty was silent, but her heart beat a little faster. “ I dare say you know that my income is not very large,” he went on, as though merely stating a fact that had no special interest for either of them. “ Mine was only a younger son’s portion, and though it has sufficed for my wants as a single man, it w^ould not have allowed me to think of forming a home unless I had added to it ; and the work I have endeavoured to do in the world has not been exactly lucrative. So I frankly confess that I have never thought of having a home of my own — till lately.” Betty patted her horse’s neck without speaking. Conflicting feelings kept her silent. “ I feel now,” went on the grey-haired man, regret¬ fully, “how much happiness I have missed. But I have never met — till now — a mind congenial with my own, or anyone whom I could, imagine as being my companion through life. Of late I have felt that there could be no such happiness as that of finding some¬ one thoroughly sympathetic : whose mind, in differing from my own, would only invest everything with fresh interest : with whom I felt myself understood, and who cared to understand me : in short, a woman whom I could both love and esteem. But perhaps it is too late for me to dream of such happiness ? ” he ended, sighing. “ You talk as if you were very old,” said Betty quietly. “ I am just fifty,” he said ; “ and it is late in life for a man to think of offering himself to a woman.” “ That,” said Betty softly, “ would depend upon the woman.” “ You are very young compared to myself,” he said regretfully. “ I feel that it is presumption on my part to speak to you of such things ; but I can assure you that you are the first woman I have ever loved, and I love you more than I thought it possible to love.” Betty sat with her head turned away, feeling his eyes upon her. There was something in his reference

Page 638

Womanlike. 621 to his age that touched her. She did not think him old : she liked grave, sedate men, and it seemed to her a great honour that a man of his age should think of loving her. She knew that he unbent with her as with no one else ; she felt that he drew her on to express thoughts that she could not find words for with others. “ It is only fair to tell you,” she said, after a pause, “ that I am fully purposed to devote part of my money to founding a coh lege for girls some day. The plans are in the air at present — it may be years before I begin it — but I am quite determined not to waste all my money on myself.” “I know it,” he said. And it is because I feel that you have with me a real interest in education, and in other social questions of the day, that I have thought we might be of use to each other in working out our ideas. I expect to be in Parliament before long, and I think that in the wider interests and opportunities which would then be mine we should find mutual happiness. I can imagine no life happier than one of such con • genial work as I look forward to- with you.” Betty knew not what to say. She liked him so much, she felt at that moment so drawn towards him, and a vision of a new and wider life rose temptingly before her. But she could not decide her fate at once : she must have time for reflection. ‘‘Mr. Elliot,” she said gently, ‘‘be- lieve me that I feel . you have conferred a great honour upon me in speaking as you have done to¬ day ; but It has been so totally unexpected, that I hardly know how to answer you. Will you ^ive me a little time for consideration ? ” ° As long as you will,” he said courteously. “ If you knew what happiness it was to feel that you would even consider the idea ! I have been, perhaps, pre¬ mature m spetiking ; but I felt that honour would not permit me to visit any longer at vour house unless you knew my object in coming.' Shall we consider the subject as laid aside till Christmas ? And i u feel my visits burdensome, the slightest hint - ” ’ ^ “Oh no !” she said, touched by his consideration. 1 could not keep you waiting like that ; it would neither be fair nor right. Give me three days. By the end of that time you shall hear from me ” She turned her face towards him as she spoke with a sweet, shy glance that made the poor man’s heart leap for joy. No boy could have been a more bashful wooer than this elderly man ; he felt it such presumption on his part to suggest that this youno- and handsome heiress should link her fate with his. But he was too true a gentleman to weigh overmuch “so BETTY WAS BETROTHEO ’* (/. 622). the accidental circumstances of fortune. His only claim on her notice was his love, not the position he could give ; nor would he even dwell much on the prospect of the life they would lead together. Yet, though he felt himself how awkwardly and badly he expressed his sentiments, Betty felt only the true devotion that inspired his words, and knew that under the quiet exterior dwelt the love and romance she had dreamt of, as truly as in the hearts of the knights of old. He rode with her to her gates, and left her to ascend the winding carriage-drive alone. So lost in thought was she that she forgot even to wave her hand to Mrs. Ward as she rode up to the porch. Her faithful friend, watching from the little boudoir above, missed the accustomed greeting, and looked at her a little anxiously, as Betty came in with an ab¬ stracted air. Something had happened to the girl, she knew ; but, like a wise woman, she asked no ques¬ tions, though Betty was lost in a brown study till dinner-time. In her own room that night Betty sat long over the fire, debating what answer to give to Mr. Elliot. She liked him so much. She felt that she could not bear to hear that he was not coming to the Hawk’s

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62? The Ways and Whims of Thomas. Nest any more in the way that had grown so familiar. Yet, was this love ? Did she really want to marry him? Her thoughts slipped back unconsciously to her last wooer. His proposal had been a very dif¬ ferent one : she had had him at her mercy, and had not spared him. She was a little ashamed of it now j but it was his own fault. He should not have spurned her long ago. She remembered telling him that she should neither love nor marry, and there was a look in his eyes of unbelief. Had he thought she might change her mind with regard to him? Well, her engagement to Mr. Elliot would settle that, thought Betty proudly, beginning to dwell on his good qualities again. Next day, as Mrs. Ward sat alone in the gloaming, Betty came softly up to her. “Madam,” she said, “Mr. Elliot has asked me to marry him, and I have said ‘ Yes.’ ” “ Do you love him, Betty dear?” asked her friend gently. “ I think I do. I never could love anyone pas¬ sionately : it is not in my nature. But I like him very much ; I miss him when he is not here — our minds and tastes have so much in common. I am always happy when he is here ; and he loves me, Madam— he loves me truly.” Mrs. Ward shook her head gently, as Betty spoke in quiet, unmoved tones. “ He is a good man, and he will do his best to make you happy, I do not doubt,” she said ; “ but I could have wished a better fate for my child.” “ I thought you wanted to see me married ?” “Yes, to a man you love.” “ I would not marry him if I did not love him, Madam.” “ You do not know your own heart, Betty. There is a love concealed there truer and deeper than the love you are giving him.” “1 give him all I have to give. I have had so little practice in loving,” pleaded Betty. And then, with a sudden half-shy impulse— “ Do you think he will answer my letter soon ?” “ I expect he will answer it in person,” answered Mrs. Ward, smiling. That little speech pleased her more than any argument in Mr. Elliot’s fav'^our that Betty could have used. And he did answer it in person. Betty was out on the terrace sunning herself and watching the view, when he came. He came out from the house alone, sent by Mrs. Ward, and he saw her standing there, wrapped in a fur cloak, bareheaded, in the sunlight. He came swiftly towards her, with his grave face lit up with joy, and she turned to him with a sudden thrill of feeling that spoke from her true grey eyes. She had not known how much she missed this quiet, grey-haired man until he came again. “ My love ! ” he said, and took both her hands in his. And so Betty was betrothed. END OF CHAPTER THE TWELFTH. THE WAYS AND WHIMS OF THOMAS. BY ALFRED J. BAMFORD, B.A., AUTHOR OF “TURBANS AND TAILS; OR, SKETCHES IN THE UN ROMANTIC EAST.” “ VES, he certainly has a striking A individuality,” admits my host in reference to a remark of mine about Thomas. “ There are few people who could stand the test of his present con¬ dition without losing self- respect. He is particularly ragged and shabby, yet as self-possessed as ever. I venture to think that if you were to appear with the tail torn away from your coat, you would inevitably feel a little awk¬ wardness, and show it ; but Thomas, as you see, though tailless, is in no way ashamed or disconcerted.” Thomas is a blue titmouse. While we are speaking about him, he is in a cage on a corner of the breakfast- table, evidently conscious that he is a member of the family, and, if the smallest, not the least important. He certainly is very small— and seems smaller from having dispensed with his tail, and, indeed, a good deal more of his natural feathering. A hand is put to the bars of his cage with a trifle from one of the dishes— it matters little to him which, for he is not fastidious— and Thomas seizes the offered morsel, settles with it on one of the perches, holding it under his little blue feet, while he divides and disposes of it delicately but promptly. There is a slenderness of form about that little bill of his which almost disguises its effective strength. That tit-bit swallowed, there is no eager, vulgar looking for the next. Thomas is not a dependent waiting upon the favours of his superiors. He is rather a person of importance, whose tastes are studied and whose wants are anticipated. The next delicacy will be ready as soon as he is. So he will have a turn round his cage, running zigzag about on

Page 640

The Ways and Whims of Thomas. the side wires, then taking a tour under the wires of the top, and dropping upon his perch just as a ministering finger is ready to tempt his palate with another bo7t7ie bouclie^ after which he is off again. There is little wonder that — bird though he be — he is called a titmouse. But his movements out- HIS FAVOURITE POSITION. mouse any mouse in variety if not m celerity. Where is the mouse that could lead, or even follow, Thomas upon the under-side of his cage-roof? And as for quickness of movement, when Thomas gets excited he is not seen as a definite form, but as a greeny-blue streak or band running in all directions, and bent at all manner of angles. We all have our pet, and often most unreasonable, aversions, as Shylock explained to the Duke of Venice. Thomas would doubtless object to the ‘‘harmless, necessary cat,” referred to by the Jew, but as he is kept out of the way of creatures of that order, he has no opportunity of manifesting this dislike. He, how¬ ever, does evince a very strong dislike to white pocket- handkerchiefs. The taking out of one of these articles, much more the offering of one to him, excites his worst passions. He lifts his crest, spreads his wings, and attempts to seize and tear the offending cambric to pieces. All this is very absurd. But I am sorry to have to record that he has been proved capable of passion more criminal than eccentric. He formerly shared his cage with a brother, and that brother is no more. My friend tells me that he had often noticed conduct which to an unsympathetic observer might have suggested quarrelsome dispositions in these two brothers, but which by him and his family had been attributed to nothing worse than love of excite- tnent. One summer, during their holiday, they asked a 623 neighbour to take charge of Thomas and Dick. On their return from their holiday, poor Dick presented a most pitiable appearance. Thomas had got the upper hand and had used his opportunity; and, while it had been sport to him, it had been death to Dick. The two brothers were at once separated, but it was easy to see that this ought to have been done before. It was now too late. A day or two afterwards there was a funeral, and Dick’s stripped and torn little body was buried out of sight. But not even the funeral of so near a rela¬ tive tended in the least to depress the light-hearted Thomas. On that day of mourning he was as cheer¬ ful as ever, neither lamenting the dead nor fearing the halter of justice. Nor from that day to this do I understand that he has suffered a single twinge of conscience. “We’ll take a walk after breakfast,” says my friend and host, “and I’ll show you where Thomas was born.” So we stroll out together on a blowy day of the first week in March. We pass through a cold, dismal¬ looking town of stone-built cottages and smoke- begrimed mills and factories, out through the town, till we find ourselves on a path striking through fields, and then we enter a narrowing dough, through which ripples and bubbles a noisy little stream of clear water, shut in by a thick growth of stunted trees climbing up the hill on either side. It is a. pleasant walk now we have left the houses and chimneys behind. The air is fresh, for it comes direct from the sea, not many miles to windward of us, and the sun is shining brightly between hurrying showers. Our path takes us up the side of a hill. It is a stiff climb, but the breeze we enjoy as we rise is invigorating. Up¬ wards still we go till we strike the edge of the moor and the eye wanders over the rolling expanse of heather. A number of peewits are beating their way against the wind overhead ; some half a dozen grouse come rushing nervously past us, as though they did not know that grouse-shooting had ended some three months before ; and, flying low to escape the force of the wind, some crows come round the shoulder of the hill on a foraging expedition. THE TRAGEDY.

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Patchwork — Past and Present. 624 But we only skirt the moorside. Leaving the heather almost as soon as we find it, we follow a path down again through the hill-side pastures. Almost from our feet, up into the wind that seems ready to make sport of him, rises a skylark. He cannot stand against so stiff a breeze, but, even as he is carried along upon it, he rises upwards and pours forth his song. The grass and the heather are withered, the moor is bleak, the wind is strong, but the skylark has seen the sun, and, though its glory is now hidden again, the bird rises into the rain-cloud and sings of the corning spring. And now, in a few moments, we are down again among trees, following a winding path that leads ever down and down, until, at the bottom, it crosses a brook by a rustic bridge formed by a single tree- trunk thrown athwart the water-course. Soon we have to cross the brook again — this time by a solid stone bridge, but still under the trees. Close by this is a rough, dry wall, and in this wall, between some of the less closely set stones, the parents of Thomas once made their nest. Here it was that Thomas, with Dick and one or two anonymous brothers and sisters, first saw the light. The nest had been placed in an exposed position, but those who were left in - it, when Thomas and Dick were invited to my friend’s home, escaped detec¬ tion as nestlings, and entered in due course upon the responsibilities of the full-fledged. They are very probably, at this moment of our inspecting the place of their birth, among those birds who from the branches overhead are inspecting and dis¬ cussing us. The spot is a lovely one, and I can¬ not help telling my friend that had Thomas been brought up amidst its beauty and peace, his character might have been developed to less fratricidal ends. FEAR NEITHER OF HALTER NOR JUSTICE. PATCHWORK— PAST AND PRESENT. O far as the present paper is concerned, the term “patchwork” will include any work made of different pieces of material, either sewn together by their edges, or laid on each other and then sewn down, or appliqucd^ as it is usually called. Perhaps the earliest historical piece of patchwork was the handiwork of our first mother Eve, when, as we are told, she sewed fig-leaves together to make aprons for herself and Adam, although we are left in the dark as regards the needle and thread used by her, and can only conjecture that they may have been a sharp thorn and a fibre of some sort ! Another very early example, dating so far back as B.C. 980, was the Egyptian funeral tent of Queen Isi-em-Kebs, mother-in-law of Shishak, who besieged and took Jerusalem some three or four years after the death of King Solomon. This is, at the present time, preserved in the Museum at Boulak, and may be described as an enormous piece of patchwork, consisting of thousands of pieces of the skins of gazelles, first dyed, and then sewn together with threads of the same colour. The outer edges appear to have been bound with a cord of twisted pink leather. The tent itself consists of a flat top, divided down the middle ; on one half are six large representations of vultures, each surrounded with a text in hiero¬ glyphics ; the other half is covered with yellow and pink rosettes on a blue ground. The side flaps show first narrow coloured bands, then a fringe pattern, next a row of broad panels, red, green, and yellow, with a device in blue and pink ; on this border are figures of gazelles, kneeling, with a pink Abyssinian lotus suspended from each animal’s collar. The remainder of the side flaps and all the

Page 642

Patchwork — Past and Present. 625 back and front ones consist of large pink and green squares. At a later period we find that the Cymri in Britain made garments for themselves from the skins of ani¬ mals, probably sewn together with bone needles ; they were also occasionally embroidered, as in the case of Boadicea, Queen of the Iceni, who, we are told by Dion Cassius, wore an ‘‘embroidered mantle of fur’^ on the day of her defeat by the Romans. Passing from these days to later ones, we find that the inlaid or applique patchwork was revived by Botticelli about the end of the fifteenth century. He intended it primarily for church banners, as being a more effective and durable style of work than any other for that purpose. He died in 1515, and, since that time, this branch of needlework has been carried to great perfection. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries fine quilting was introduced ; and this was almost invari¬ ably done in geometrical patterns. Occasionally, also, embroidery was used in addi¬ tion to the quilting, and these geometrical patterns were the commencement of the more ordinary cotton and silk patchwork of the present day, which is so much used for a variety of purposes now, but which, nearer the beginning of this century, was scarcely applied to anything but quilts. In those days almost every house possessed one or more of these homely cotton patchwork bed-coverings, which were made in numerous styles and colours. A description may here be introduced of two very old-fashioned quilts, belonging to friends of the writer, which would certainly, in these days, be considered extremely quaint. The first, and most ordinary one, was of cotton materials only. The centre was a large white calico square, upon which was firmly sewn down (or ap- pliquM) a sort of picture, which had j^reviously been cut out of cretonne of a still earlier period. This picture consisted of two enormous horses, bearing “ CRAZY PATCHWORK ” KETTl.E-HOLDEK. A PORTION OF THE FUNERAL TENT OF QUEEN ISI-EM-KIBS, {From a Photog‘''aph.) respectively a lady and gentleman, clothed in what were supposed to be Moorish costumes, riding along a sandy lane under huge palm-trees. In the distance was a very gay castellated building, and in the fore¬ ground were a dog and one or two nondescript ani¬ mals. The whole of this centre-piece must have occupied much time, and given much trouble to arrange. Round this white square were several rows of ordi¬ nary patchwork, consisting of alternate squares of contrasting colours — for instance, two blue and two pink -(which was a very favourite combination) — four of these small squares being seamed together to make one large square, which, in its turn, was stitched to another of the same size until the centre-piece was surrounded. These rows of squares, it may be re¬ marked, cn passant, were sometimes of graduated sizes, but in any case they were continued round and round until the quilt was large enough for use, or for a border. In the bed-covering in question there were several rows of patchwork, with corners of the same style ; but between each corner was a long strip of white calico, with more figures and animals sewn on it, to match the white square in the centre. The whole piece of work was lined with strong white sjieeting. 760

Page 643

626 Patchwork — Past and Present. and the entire eflfect was very gay, although it would certainly not have been accepted to-day as High Art ! The other quilt had rather a touching history. It belonged to a very old lady, whose life had been full of change. She had, at some time or other, amused herself with making a bed-covering from scraps of dresses she and her friends had worn at various in¬ teresting periods of their existence. She must have had a marvellous collection of materials. Some of the scraps had belonged to her own childish garments ; very trifling cost, or even obtained for nothing by those who had any friends engaged in this business. These veritable patchwork quilts were wonderfully gay in appearance ; and small ones were, and are, in great request in hospitals — particularly in those set apart for sick children, where the small patients can often forget their pain and weariness for a few moments in the study of the unaccustomed brightness of their bed-coverings. A further advance in the style of quilts may be CORNER OF A PATCHWORK QUILT. next came pieces from frocks worn on certain eventful days at home, at school, on birthdays — at her first party— on the day she first met her future husband. There was also a fragment from her wedding-dress- pieces from dresses worn on occasions of special in¬ terest to her, bits of her children’s frocks, each with its individual history ; and, finally, the last row or two contained a goodly number of black pieces, embroi¬ dered in white, with the initials of the dear ones who had passed away to their rest. These morsels of material had all been joined together and lined ; and really the quilt formed quite a story of the old lady’s life. Of course, this was a far more elaborate piece of work than the counterpanes in ordinary use at that period— thirty or forty years ago— which were usually made of waste pieces from the Manchester print works, ‘bundles of which could be purchased at a noted in the stripes of alternate white and red or other coloured calico, which, still later, have developed into the elaborate bed-spreads of lace, satins, and other materials which are now so extensively used. A few months since a rather unique quilt was ex¬ hibited in Liverpool— first in a shop window, and afterwards at a bazaar. Some enterprising lady had persuaded a number of county and local celebrities to write their names across some small squares of white calico. These autographs she carefully worked over with thick red silk— edged the squares with lace insertion — sewed them together, and bordered the whole with a deep lace frill. The general effect was uncommon certainly, but scarcely repaid the trouble which must have been taken. Patchwork in silk and velvet scraps is now much used for all sorts of articles— mats, tea-cosies, cushions.

Page 644

The Merchant Prince. and many other things, being made wholly or in part .in this manner. The scraps are sometimes tacked over paper shapes, .and sewn together to form geometrical patterns, when the result is simply called silk patchwork j or else the pieces are laid on a foundation of calico or some •other strong material, slightly overlapping each other, then sewn down with bright-coloured silks, with a stitch technically called “herring-bone,” and finally jnore or less embroidered, sometimes to such an extent that very little of the original groundwork can be seen. At present this method of arranging odds and •ends of silks is usually known as crazy patchwo7'k^ .and very crazy the result sometimes is ! 627 Although now the workmanship is infinitely more refined, it is, after all, but the same idea of work as the Ancient Britons and still earlier nations had, when — as previously noted — they “joined together pieces of skins or other materials and afterwards embroidered them.” It is still open to doubt whether a large proportion of the embroidery, &c., which provides occupation for so many ingenious workers and excites so much ad¬ miration now-a-days, will withstand the ravages of time equally with the work which was executed ages ago with patient industry, some of which seems, in¬ deed, to be wellnigh imperishable. M. D. Eastwood. THE MERCHANT PRINCE. A. Story in Three Parts. By J. BERWICK HARWOOD, Author of “What the Coral Reefs Gave Me,” “Paul Knox, Pitman,” “ Lady Flavia,” &c. PART THE THIRD. HAT followed has always appeared to me rather like a feverish dream than a real experience of waking life. I can remember how the first robber who sprang in over the broken door received a blow from the butt-end of my pistol, .and fell like an ox beneath the pole-axe, and then that Captain Ruy, whose gay garb was smeared with blood, tried to stab me, that we wrestled and •fell heavily to the floor, and then that Miguel, knife in hand, knelt beside me, and prepared to cut my 'throat. What kind arm was it that interposed itself between me and the gleaming blade, causing the .assassin, with a cry of alarm, to scramble to his feet and make an effort to escape ? but all too late, for now the room and the staircase were crowded with Indians, .armed with hatchets, spears, any weapons caught up in haste, and all under the command of Athualmanco, •who had been the first to hurry to my rescue, and whose lightest word was instantly obeyed by his wild people. Two of the gang, at no small jeopardy to neck and limbs, had leaped from the windows into the ;garden below, mounted their horses that were tethered near, and ridden off, but three prisoners were taken, ■the most notable of whom was the redoubted Captain Ruy, the other two being Miguel the Mestizo, and the robber whom I had felled to the earth, and who got up, scowling and rubbing his shaggy head, to find himself a captive. “ It is well, dear friend, that you did not forget to use the horn,’^ said Athualmanco to me, when the ■noise of the scuffle was over ; “ for this Don Ruy, as •they call the highwayman, boasts of having the blood •of three-and-fifty victims on his hand, and large rewards have been offered by the Government for his capture, while this ’’ — pointing scornfully to Miguel — was the treacherous fox that let the villains in.” San Antonio, like most Mexican villages, had no regular police, so that we were obliged to keep guard over the three prisoners until the gendarmes who had been summoned from a neighbouring town should arrive. We found the old factor and the residue of the servants lying in their beds, bound and gagged — tolerable evidence that they, at any rate, were not in the confidence of the robbers. Miguel, crestfallen as a fox caught in a trap, hung his head and avoided every eye. But Don Ruy, who was as vain as he was truculent, swaggered and bragged as though unconscious of defeat, and looked at us all with a broad stare of insolent defiance, down to the very moment when the sergeant of the carbineers attached his chained wrists to the stirrup of the horse beside which he was to plod towards Camalcanga and its prison, the other two thieves being similarly disposed of. The rescue, how¬ ever, had been effectual and prompt, thanks to the precautions of Athualmanco, who smiled sadly when I praised the zeal and daring shown by his followers. “We Indians have little left, Don Hereward,” he said, “but we are true to each other. You are, per¬ haps, the first white man who has winded the shell-horn to call aid, but there is not a cabin, not a hut, along the coast-line where its summons would be unregarded.” My journey to Mexico was perforce postponed, since it was necessary that I, too, should on the morrow repair to Camalcanga, and give evidence before the judge of the district concerning the bold attempt at robbery and murder that had so nearly proved suc¬ cessful. In the meantime, Athualmanco, at my re¬ quest, took charge of the pearls, which seemed safer in his custody than in mine, while during my sojourn at Camalcanga I wrote to my principal, Don Alvaro, offering to take the estate on a lease, and to pay him a rent for it fourfold that which in the best years of its sadly mismanaged condition it had produced, only stipulating that for sixteen years to come all manorial

Page 645

628 The Merchant Prince. ■.W ‘ CHAINED TO THE STIRRUP OF THE HORSE BESIDE WHICH HE WAS TO PEOD TO C2\MALCANGA AND ITS PRISON” {p. 627). rights and privileges should accrue to me. And my indolent and good-natured employer closed gladly enough with the proposal. ‘‘I don’t know, my young friend” — he wrote — “ whether you have lighted upon a placer of golden nuggets, or have discovered an infallible method of winning at three-card Monte. But I do know that you are a fine, honourable lad, whose word is his bond, and I know, too, that I prefer a safe ten thousand dollars for my estate at San Antonio to taking my chance of what farmers and collectors think fit to spare me ; so you are welcome to your manorial rights, and much good may they do you ; but I will bid the notary make ready the papers at once.” I started for Mexico, revolving in my head a project, bold and ambitious, of which I had received the first notion shortly after Athualmanco’s magnificent gift had placed at my disposal the potential means of ra¬ pidly winning wealth. And I was eager, for Leonora’s sake, to do this. It was her dear image, it was the remembrance of her smile and of her tears at our last sad parting, that made me diligent in the pursuit of earthly prosperity. Since I had been manager of the neglected estate, I had had time to perceive the advan¬ tageous position of San Antonio — a mere fishing hamlet now, but which ought to have been the natural sea¬ port of the fertile district around, and which was cut off by a range of rugged hills from Cholatzlan. As it was, only a few small coasters visited the place, and the very cereals that grew so plentifully were sold unduly cheap on account of the difficulty of conveying them to market. Some outlay of money would, however, suffice to create a deep-sea harbour, beside whose quays vessels of larger tonnage could take in cargo, while additional ex¬ penditure on roads and the drainage of the swamps would open up the country beyond. In this opinion I was con¬ firmed by the dictum of a clever young American surveyor whom 1 consulted, and who undertook to carry out my ideas. “You glut the market, Herr Weston,” said the patient old German who was the chief dealer in precious stones and similar wares in Mexico. “ It is many a day since such a quantity of pearls, and so fine, have been offered for sale, and it will take some time to plant them all in New York, and Paris, and Italy, and some risk for the merchant. If your fishery goes on as it has begun, your success will bring about a permanent fall in the value of the commodity!” It was not for me to tell him that the pearls I sold had been brought to light more than three centuries ago, and I was obliged to submit to a reduction in their price in consequence of the very largeness of the glistening harvest; but even then Athualmanco’s munificent gift was enough to make me relatively rich. “ Sixty-three thousand pounds ” — such was my soliloquy as I left Mexico in the yellow diligence, with its not unwelcome escort of carbineers, for the sea-coast— “ should be enough, well employed, to elevate me to the rank of a minor capitalist. I wonder what my Uncle Gudge would say to such a sudden change in my position.” I had written to the above-mentioned relative on four several occasions since first landing at Vera Cruz, but had received no replies to my letters. With Leonora I kept up a tolerably frequent correspondence, but of late the dear girl’s missives had been shorter and more hurried than before, and had been dated not seldom from Vera Cruz, or Mexico, and even New Orleans and San Francisco— places at which she and her sister made brief sojourns in company with their father. Mr. Millingham, I gathered from what she told me, and from certain rumours that from other quarters came to my ears, had now, in his restless desire to become colossally rich, plunged recklessly into speculations which the more prudent stigmatised as sheer gambling, and had linked his fortunes with those of a famous American firm, whose advice and example had tempted him to desert the beaten path. He was himself sanguine of success, talked of realising vast sums, and of returning to Europe with a golden key to secure admission to the highest social circles — and even bragged of the brilliant alliance that awaited his beautiful daughter when once she should be launched amongst the Upper Ten Thousand of

Page 646

The Merchant Prince. 629 London. “As if, dear Hereward, I could ever care for anyone but you,” she wrote ; and the sight of those written words, and my conviction of their truth, comforted me for many a day. I was obliged to make more than one visit to the capital of the State to give evidence before Procurador and judges against the mauraders awaiting their trial, but at last the brigand chief, Don Ruy, and Miguel the Mestizo were sen¬ tenced to twenty years’ hard labour in the chain- gang, the subordinate highwaymen being let off with milder punishment, and I was free to devote myself to the realisation of my projects. My initial difficulty was in procuring a supply of labour. The Indian tillers of the soil, I found, had a semi-superstitious repugnance to any novel form of employment. But Athualmanco’s influence over his countrymen procured me recruits from the forest and the fen, while my smart American ally suggested another mode of alluring candidates. “ Guess, Colonel, Tve been long enough in tropical parts to know that the way to get a darkie to buckle to his work is to bribe a white man to set him the example. And, though at a dear rate, Pve enlisted a ragged regiment of these latter — five shipwrecked sailors from the Spread Eagle that was knocked to lucifer matches against the rocks of Point Matados, a German photographer, an Italian pastry-cook, and an English circus rider — eight men, all told. Every rowdy of the lot must draw his dollar a day, besides rations, but you’ll see, sir, whether my decoy-ducks do not produce the desired effect. If these copper-coloured loafers decline to follow a white man’s lead, my name is not Hersces Parker.” And, indeed, the sight of our little contingent of improvised white nav¬ vies, as with shirt-sleeves rolled up they plied pick and shovel on the harbour pier, did seem to exercise a magical effect upon the dusky peons, who first stared, then confabulated together in whispers, and at last came sheepishly forward, one by one, to volunteer their services. Before long all prejudice, on the part of the workers at least, was dispelled, and it was found better to labour on our sea-wall or our roads for the half- dollar a day which formed a just remuneration for native toilers than to earn the moiety of that amount by hoe and sickle in the maize-fields. Mr. Parker was a skilful engineer, and my young friend the cacique often visited the works to encourage the workers of his own race, who prized a kindly word from him, as we in Europe value the smiles of royalty. Soon we had a mole of good masonry stretching out seawards, and a sub¬ stantial breakwater that defied the heaviest ocean storm-waves, and be¬ hind which sea-going vessels of fair tonnage could unload or refit, while docks, wet and dry, were in course of construction, and roads opened up the country beyond, and brought secluded villagers into communication with the coast. The scowling Spaniards who lormed the scum of the white population of the place — proud, poor, and lazy — could hardly believe their eyes as they stood grouped together, picturesquely draped in their tat¬ tered serapes and puffing at their everlasting cigars on the beach, and watched the rapid growth of our improvements, and the arrival of steamers and sailing- vessels in the new haven. Change, of course, is never welcomed by all, and I can remember when the priests crossed themselves, with averted heads, in reply to my civil greeting when we met in lane or street, and how mothers ran to snatch up their children at the cottage doors, lest the evil eye of that wicked wizard, the heretic Englishman, who by a compact with the infernal powers was modernising the place, should blight and wither them. Ignorance, superstition, and envy were all leagued against me at the first, but I persevered, and won popularity by degrees. ‘‘ Viva el Inglese !” was the cry in fair and market of farmers who could now send in corn by waggon¬ loads from the lonely rancho, where once the only means of conveyance was the pack-saddle of horse or mule, and whose vaqueros could now drive in the cattle along a decent road, instead of threading wood¬ land paths in the bush. And the same words were echoed by labourers well treated and scrupulously paid, and by all who profited by the new-born prosperity of San Antonio. There were fresh houses, stores, ware- “SOON WE HAD A MOLE OF GOOD MASONRY STRETCHING OUT SEAWARDS.’’

Page 647

The Merchant Prince, o houses, workshops, rising around us ; white im¬ migrants from Europe and America poured in quest of employment or of custom into the place, and com¬ merce grew and flourished with a rapidity that exceeded my utmost hopes. Under these circum¬ stances it is not surprising that, a year or so later, the straw hats of the Indian peons and the broad sombreros of the Spaniards should have been every¬ where doffed at the appearance of the English improver or his shrewd Yankee surveyor, and that I should be recognised by all as a benefactor to the district. About this time my former employer, Evn Al- vaio, came to pay me a visit under his own roof, and looked with a half- amused wonder and interest at the changed appearance of the well-remembered spot. ‘U\Iy young friend,” he said, “my first conjecture was certainly correct. You must have found a gold¬ mine, or a royal treasure of Montezuma’s, or some good fairy must aid you as Cinderella was helped, or you could never have transformed sleepy, slovenly San Antonio into a bustling, thriving seaport. I scarcely recognise my native place. Here is a re¬ spectable harbour, with tall ships moored beside the wharves, and flags of all nations fluttering, where lately a few fishing-nets were drying on the bare beach, and nothing but a coasting felucca could find safety in a storm. Here are hotels, and taverns, and shops with plate-glass fronts, decorating a street that only boasted the few stalls of the village carneso and cobbler, the pulque seller, and the dealer in coarse sweetmeats. Ah, well ! it is all very fine, but I could never have done it, and I can only wonder, Don Hereward, at the infinite capacity of your countrymen for taking trouble.” In vain I pointed out to Don Alvaro that the improvement of his own property had kept pace with that, of San Antonio in general, that the ruinous old mansion was in trim repair, the great gardens no longer a wilderness of weeds, the area of cultivated land far wider, the harvest much more abundant than of old. “ An excellent thing for yourself, amigo miol^ he said, with indolent good-humour, “and well have you earned the prosperity that seems to spring up at your tread. A good thing, doubtless, for my children will be the increased value of the estate when your long lease — unless you and my son should care to renew it — shall expire. But I am an old-fashioned Spanish gentleman, and could never have displayed all this industry, like you English, and your cousins under the Stars and Stripes. My neighbour, and your old patron — Mr. Millingham — is another in¬ stance of restless energy, which I can only hope will bear as solid fruit as yours, caballero, certainly seems to do.” In answer to my questioning, Don Alvaro did not scruple to tell me that report averred Mr. Millingham to have entered upon a very perilous path, in concert • with a notorious “ ring of American speculators, prominent among whom was the firm mentioned by Leonora, and to be boldly trying to control the* market, instead of following its fluctuations. “ It is the simple gambling game of Monte, as gold- diggers and graziers play it over a deal table in a tavern,” he said : “ if the card turns up red— why, it is- well ; but. if black, you lose all. My cochineal, Don Hereward, and my logwood and dye-stuffs are quiet commodities that suit me better than trying to buy up- all the corn of Chicago or all the cotton of Charleston. I am sorry for the daughters, if anything goes wrong with my too confident neighbour.” It must have been six months after this visit from Don Alvaro that I received a letter from a Lon¬ don solicitor, informing me, in the driest business phraseology, of the death of his esteemed client,, Peter Gudge, Esq., of the Yews, Highgate, and that the deceased gentleman had left, devised, and be¬ queathed all his real and personal property to my unworthy self. I could scarcely, at first, credit the truth of what I read, but true it was. Poor Uncle Gudge must have had a warmer heart under that rugged exterior than he was deemed to have, and must either have taken an unsuspected fancy to my¬ self during our one memorable interview, or have tardily remembered that, according to the Scottish proverb, blood is thicker than water ; but at any rate he gave me all he had to leave, and the bequest more than doubled my available capital. “ Reckon, Colonel, San Antonio two years hence will whip Cholatzlan into very small pumpkins,” was the remark of Mr. Hersces Parker, now permanently in my employment as local engineer-in-chief, “ and you, as the boss of the concern, would be bowed into any bank parlour from here to Boston.” True it was that fortune, since the day when Athualmanco led me to the rocky cave where lay the precious deposit of pearls, seemed to have smiled upon my efforts. The fishery itself yielded a hand¬ some income for a man of my inexpensive habits, while every year added to the productiveness of the now well-managed estate, the profits of which, deduction made for Don Alvaro’s annual rent, were mine. Mine^ too, were tolls and harbour dues, with various royalties paid by the newcomers who were eager to set up steam corn-mills and saw-mills, forge, and factory on Don Alvaro’s property. I had a counting-house of my own beside the quay, and six of the steamers and four of the three-masters that carried on the traffic with California, and Oregon, and West Texas be¬ longed to me. And then it was that I began to be styled, half-jestingly, the Merchant Prince— a name first bestowed on me, I believe, by Don Alvaro, but which presently found its way into print, and spread from lip to lip and from newspaper to newspaper. One day Mr. Parker, the surveyor, on my arrival at our place of business, met me with an unfolded copy of the New York Messenger in his hand, and I saw at once by his excited air that he had something notable to tell. “The crockery basket has been kicked over, Colonel — a great smash — and the king of those Anglo- American capitalists has come to grief. Pell and

Page 648

(Drawn by Percy Tarrant.) 190 A BOAT SONG. (See A 631.)

Page 649

A Boating Song. Pook have failed for two million dollars, and dragged down all the rest, and among them your old employer, Mr. Millingham, of Cholatzlan, who was chairman of the company in which all the lot were concerned.” So serious did I deem this intelligence, that I set off for Cholatzlan as soon as I could order my horse to be saddled, and rode the distance rapidly. How well I remembered, as I entered the villa from which I had been banished, the day of my dismissal from Mr. MillinghanVs employment. I returned now to find the merchant on his death-bed. The proud, too confident man had not been able to endure the smart of failure and the ruin of his hopes, and had been struck down by apoplexy within an hour of receiving the fatal news. I was allowed to see him, as he lay helpless, propped with pillows, on his couch, and I think he knew me, but speech had become to him impossible, and the seal of death was upon his haggard face. His two daughters were constant in their attendance at his bed¬ side, and all that care and skill could effect was done, but in vain. Six hours after my arrival he died. Again, when the first transport of her natural sorrow was spent, I asked Leonora to be my wife, reminding her of our vows and of my unaltered constancy. 631 “ Yes, and I have loved you too, ever and always,” she replied, raising her beautiful tear-stained face that she had hidden in her hands, “ but that now can never be of which you speak. I am no heiress now. Charlotte and I will be very, very poor, since all is gone, while you, Hereward, are a Merchant Prince, and might wed more highly than v/ith a penniless girl like me.” “ What signifies the loss of fortune ? ” I demanded half-indignantly, “ so that we two are true to one another, as we have been from the first ? Come, dearest Leonora, I am not the man to allow a fit of silly sentiment to rob me of my promised bride.” It was settled, then, that immediately after the funeral Leonora and her sister should return to England and find a temporary shelter with their married brother in London, while I was to put my affairs in order, and follow in two months’ time. Since then six years have gone by, and during five of these Leonora and I have been the happiest couple in England, though my dear wife insists that she ought to have released me from my word on the occasion of her father’s ruin,, and persists in calling me her Merchant Prince. THE END. A BOATING SONG. ON the rippling river Merrily we row. Past where rushes quiver, Nodding to and fro ; Past the water-lilies. Floating cool and white. Where the old grey mill is Gleaming in the light. While we sing a merry song. As we gaily speed along. Then, when sunset-flushes Make each cloudlet smile, ’Midst the reeds and rushes Rest we for a while. Hear the water plashing Softly o’er the weir. Watch the ripples flashing. And, when night is near, Sing we then our farewell song. As we homeward speed along. G. Weatherly.

Page 650

632 WHAT TO WEAR IN SEPTEMBER. CHIT-CHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR PARIS AND LONDON CORRESPONDENTS. FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. ARIS at the present mo¬ ment would seem to be given up to foreigners. Americans abound, and English folk hurry back¬ wards and forwards from Switzerland and other favourite resorts. Very little is known as to what the coming fashions are likely ;to be ; although wholesale houses are doing a very good trade with the English retail firms. The modes are not generally those which the Parisians themselves adopt ; for, truth to tell, you in England are mostly a year behindhand, though there has been a very marked improvement in dressing, as far as Englishwomen are concerned, in the latter part of this century, and an English belle in the best society can compare favourably with the best-dressed Parisian. I am now about to explain to you some pretty dresses suitable for the month, which are sketched in the illustrations. The little girl in our initial letter wears one of the new fancy fashion¬ able tartans — it is made in the style which finds most favour for children just now. I note how very smart the little ones look in such frocks, and it is a make which can be easily copied. The skirt is quite plain and gathered on to the bodice at the waist. The material is cut on the cross, which in itself constitutes a trimming. The little bodice in th^ same plaid is made full back and front. The colourings are double blue lines and single red ones on a creamy fawn ground. The yoke, cut in a rounded form, is of blue velvet, the exact shade in the plaid ; and from below this comes a Bolero jacket of the same blue, edged on either side with close-set gold buttons. There is a blue sash-belt without ends, but secured by a rosette, all made of a eross-cut band of velvet. The plaid sleeves are of the gigot form, the narrower portion at the wrist being finished off with a cuff of blue velvet fastened with three gold buttons. There are several pretty novelties in children’s fashions : one mode of trimming for evening wear is some three rows of lace insertion about an inch wide let into the skirt above the hem and piped at either edge. Very vivid colours are in favour, as red and grass-green, with which creamy white is blended for vests and sleeves. Spotted materials are the newest, and occasionally combine with plain stuff. Swiss belts appear on some of the bodices. The sleeves are frequently slashed. Thick white dresses are worn in the evening trimmed with bands of white braiding, and the fishwife style is now made up in two tones — the lighter for the plain skirt, the darker for the tunic and bodice. Children’s boots are worn so high that, out of doors at all events, it is difficult to see what colour their stockings are ; but, in truth, they always match the dress exactly or are black ; but this is dusty wear for little children. In the sketch below two fair dames have wandered away from the gay company at a fashionable resort to enjoy each other’s society. They are both charmingly dressed in styles which exactly represent the fashions, not only of the immediate present, but of the near AN AUTUMN DAY.

Page 651

What to Wear in September. 633 future. At this moment many provident women are preparing for winter and late autumn, and these styles are equally well suited for the thicker fabrics worn when the weather is colder. The lady who is stand¬ ing wears a species of polonaise made of a soft woollen material in one of the new greens. This forms the back, which is totally untrimmed, and falls in fluted folds from the waist to the feet ; but the front is of a tender shrimp-pink cloth, very fine and very supple. The portion intended for the skirt-panel is em¬ broidered all over with black silk, and braid of a fine Etrus¬ can pattern, and at a distance looks as if covered with an ap¬ plique of black lace. For the bodice, the plain pink cloth forms cross way folds in front, and is finished off by a dainty Stein- kerk tie of an¬ tique white lace. There are revers of pink on the green, worked in black also ; the sleeves are pink and black to match, finished off with a cuff of green velvet. I want you parti¬ cularly to note this sleeve be¬ cause it is what is likely to be well worn for some time. It fits the arm almost as closely as the coat-sleeve, with the addition of being much raised on the shoulder, but it lacks the floppy fulness which has characterised those sleeves worn in London as well as Paris during the past few months. The seated figure displays a much simpler st)le, but again skirt and bodice are cut in one, and very careful fitting is necessary. The front of the bodice is on the straight, but the sides are cross-cut, which shows to advantage when, as in our model, the material is check. The colouring here is blue and white, and plain china-blue of the darkest shade. There is an under-skirt of plain blue foulard, and the check foulard is cut up on either side of the front breadth, and united by buttons of two distinct sets of eight with loops of cord. The same trimming appears in the triple slashings of the bodice both back and front, showing the blue under-bodice ; the full high sleeves are of plain blue also. The shady straw hat is trimmed with marguerites, and that of her friend with the queen of flowers. Her parasol is of plain blue foulard, while that of her companion is pink lined with white and edged with lace. A novelty in millinery is the double crown to hats. These extra crowns are generally united by bands of feathers, and are wider than the sur¬ rounding straw, which they overlap. The crowns are very flat and small, and a no¬ tion of height is only gained by trimmings. When it is possible to obtain the right shape, it is quite easy to trim them, for a mass of flowers, or a few feathers and a bow, are all that is needed ; but there is much art in the way they are placed. The Alsatian bonnet is still much worn ; but there are no two hats and no two bon¬ nets which seem to be alike, and women have the privilege now of not only studying their own idiosyncra¬ sies, but can follow what style they find best suits them. It certainly takes but little material to make a modern bonnet. A new colour is coming out this au¬ tumn for boating and hard wear, called ap- propria t e 1 y “bar k,^’ for it is the tinge of the outer covering of trees when torn off, only some¬ what redder ; it blends well both with yellow and cream, and is to be had in flannel. Several dresses of this kind have been made up either with the now fashionable leather jackets of exactly the same tone, or with a cape slightly pointed back and front, bordered with a graduated pinked- out frill. White cloth jackets find great favour in early autumn — quite short and very simply made — often having no fastenings at all, and again with one button only. Wrap-cloaks are being made with loose Grecian fronts and Zouave jackets, but they are too fanciful for general wear. The Breton make of bodice has “don’t hurry ! ”

Page 652

What to Wear in September. 634 been utilised for dresses and outdoor jackets, showing no fastenings, and rounded at the throat, with bands of velvet across. FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. The reign of cottons and washing dresses is on the wane, and we return to woollen gowns with pleasure. Two very pretty ones are worn by the sisters descend¬ ing the staircase seen in our picture. The elder, the bride of a year ago, is chaperoning her youngest sister, and, as is the right of her position, wears the more elaborate toilette of the two. It is made in soft black cashmere, scattered all over with tiny em¬ broidered florets of light peach silk, matching the trimmings on bodice and skirt. At the back the skirt is fully gathered ; in front it has an appliqued band laced apron fashion edging the hem and carried up each side of the front breadth. The groundwork of this trimming is black silk with light peach laid over it as an applique, which again in its turn is worked in black in a full florid pattern. The “ leg of mutton ” sleeve is composed entirely of this mixture of black and peach ; while the full pointed front of the same light silk is covered with spotted lace bordered with black galon and trimmed at the neck with de¬ tached marguerites of the same. The young girl wears one of the new autumn gowns in one of the novel autumn shades, namely, a greyish- green of two tones. The back of the skirt is of the lighter tint, so is the front, but at the edge it is em¬ broidered in applique, with the darker tone falling over a band of the same, as though it were an under¬ skirt. The bodice is of the light grey-green, but the sleeves are of the dark tint, with a lace ruffle at the wrist ; a wide frilling of the same lace turning down¬ wards from the throat. The bodice is seamless, which means that it fastens under the arm ; and the waist- belt of passementerie starts from immediately beneath the armpit, graduating to the waist, and composed of the two shades. Seamless bodices are features in fashion, and are becoming when properly managed. The under-bodice, or lining if you like that better, is well seamed and well boned, but the outer covering is stretched to the figure on the cross so that it appears moulded to it. There must of necessity be a slight fulness in the front of the waist, but elsewhere there is neither seam nor wrinkle. The idea is a good one. A convenient fashion is coming in of wearing black hats and bonnets with coloured dresses ; and black ribbons’ are introduced on many gowns, especially with red, blue, and pink ones. Yokes and sleeves are mostly of a distinct colour from the rest of the dress. I can strongly recommend for this intermediate season the use of feather boas ; many a weak throat and bad cold originate in a too liberal use of fur ones, to which many women are constant the whole year round. ' The feather kind are by no means so warm, and prove most becoming. 'I'hey are now made often as ruffs without ends, but tied with ribbon bows. This much diminishes their cost and makes them less^ cumbersome when carried in the hand, for they really ought to be taken off on entering a room if you wish to derive full benefit from them. They suit nearly every class of face ; they are made in white, black,, grey, and natural tones ; and for evening, in light pinks and blues. A word or two as to gloves. If money is no object, and you are content to pay a good price for what will last a long time, invest in reindeer or doeskin gloves, for the country. They keep clean and look well, and. they are now made with huge brass, coin-shaped but¬ tons quite as large as a threepenny-piece. Another excellent novelty is the chevrette-made* waterproof ; they are called “ Cape chevrettes,” and no- water will penetrate through them. It is quite the fashion to wear white gloves with white dresses, not plain white dressed kid, but vSu^de or castor. For driving the goatskin are the best, but they are costly,, and for the same purpose doeskins are made with leather palms. Russian leather gloves are delightfully scented, and really are wellnigh everlasting wear. Like everything else, there is a great art in how you wear a glove ; in the first place, they ought never to* be put on for the first time in a hurry ; they should be turned down well below the opening, and each finger well worked in before the thumb and before- they are buttoned ; then, when they are taken off,, they should be pulled into shape and not put away carelessly. Brooches have almost given place to ornamental pins, which are made of every conceivable shape,, such as thistles, moons, man in the moon, stars, rays, and single stones. Moonstones and paste are much in favour, and are a peculiarly happy combina¬ tion, as the tiny brilliants which form the setting set off the dull, somewhat lustreless moonstone, which is- often carved in quaint, fantastic designs. A useful article, which will be much needed in the rain and mud which autumn and winter invariably bring us, is a new dress-supporter, entitled the “Eclipse,” which not only takes the weight of the- dress off the hips, but has an ingenious contrivance whereby the skirt is raised from the ground by means of an invisible buckle. It is no longer an impossibility for a pedesU'ienne to- look smartly dressed w'hen forced to go out in in¬ clement weather, for the new mackintosh cloaks are almost as elegant as the luxurious out-of-door dust- wraps in vogue during the season. Some excellent cloaks in charming designs and perfectly free from, odour can be now obtained. These garments, which, are guaranteed waterproof, are made in all the new shades, and can be had in either plain silky materiaL or fancy figured light cloth, with high collars and shoulder-capes, or long loose sleeves reaching almost to the hem of the skirt. Woollen cloth is now ren¬ dered waterproof in such a fashion that it is un¬ detectable, and looks exactly like any other cloak, thereby enabling it a double debt to pay — serving for- a wrap in sunshine and for wet weather also.-

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635 THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars respecting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge himself to notice every article or work submitted. _ Breath OME interesting Figures. ‘ breath figures ” were ex¬ hibited by Mr. W. B. Croft at a recent soi?'ee of the Royal Society. These figures de¬ pend on the fact that polished surfaces are capable of receiving an impression of bodies in low relief, if the latter are pressed against them for a certain time depending upon circumstances. The impression reveals itself when the surface is breathed upon. Thus, if a coin is pressed against a sheet of freshly cloven mica for thirty seconds, then removed, and the surface breathed on, the de¬ tails of the coin will become visible on the mica. Similarly, a sheet of printed paper, if placed between two plates of glass for ten hours, will leave an impres¬ sion of the letters on the glass which can be read by breathing on the latter. Sometimes the letters are white, sometimes black, and occasionally they change from white to black. Mr. Croft also shows that if two coins are placed on opposite sides of a plate of glass, and then electrified for two minutes, they will leave a distinct image of their sides upon the glass. A Domestic Benzoline Motor, The domestic engine represented in the figure is driven by benzoline, and is very compact in build. It stands on a base a foot long by seven inches broad, and it is sixteen inches high. It runs at a speed ot 1.200 revolutions per minute without a load, and at 250 to 800 when doing work. The power developed is one- fifth of a horse-power, and is obtained by explod¬ ing a mixture of air and the vapour of benzoline. The reservoir for the latter contains about a quart, and the vapour is mingled with air by means of a small inspirator. The explosions take place in the bottom of the cylinder once in every two revolutions. They are produced by the sparks of an induction coil excited by a small bichromate of potash battery. The cylinder is cooled by circu¬ lating water ; and the speed is regulated by a throttle valve. It is stated that the quantity of benzoline used is from ^ to f of a pint per hour, so that the cost of working does not exceed a penny per hour. Such an engine can be fixed on the kitchen table, the shop counter, the laboratory bench, or the floor*, and the water-tank for cooling the cylinder on a shelf above it. The machine is started by giving it a few turns by hand. A New Dress-Trunk. A new trunk has recently been brought out which is fitted with protecting flaps instead of a loose tray. These flaps, made of curved metal plates, hinged to the four sides of the box, are folded outwards while the box is being packed. And when this operation is completed, the flaps may be lightly folded over the dresses, and secured by a connecting strap. There is then no fear of the materials being in any way damaged by the shutting of the lid or fastening of the trunk. A Thunderstorm Register. The brontometer of Mr. G. J. Symons, F.R.S., and MM. Richard Freres, of Paris, is intended to give a complete scientific record of the phenomena of a thun¬ derstorm. It consists of a chronograph which propels a travelling band of paper at a speed of six feet per hour, and on this an amenograph traces the varying velocity of the wind, while a barograph also records the pressure of the atmosphere. Keys are also pro¬ vided which actuate marking pens at the will of the observer, and register the instant of a flash of light¬ ning, the beginning and end of a thunderclap, as well as the intensity and duration of a shower of hail or rain. We may also mention the new hair hygrometer A DOMESTIC BENZOLINE MOTOR.

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The Gatherer. 636 of MM. Richard Fr^res, in which a bundle of hairs, by expanding or contracting under the varying humidity of the atmosphere, actuate a delicate pen which traces a line upon a ribbon of travelling paper, and thus register the humidity in a continuous manner. The hair hygrometer is especially useful at lower temperatures, such as those about 32® Fahr., the freezing point of water ; for, unlike other hygrometers, they are unaffected by this degree of cold. The Tower for London. The prize designs for a London rival to the Eiffel Tower are shown in our engravings. No. i, the winner FIG. r. of 500 guineas, is calculated for a height of 1,200 feet, with an octagonal base 300 feet in diameter. It bears a striking resemblance to that in Paris. No. 2, winner of 250 guineas, is intended to be 1,300 feet in height, and 470 feet wide at the bottom. No. 3 design received honourable mention. Its prospective height is i,55ofeet. The favoured design is that of Mr. A. D. Stewart, M.I.C.E., together with Mr. J. M. McLaren and Mr. W. Dunn, A.R.I.B.A. The jurors report that on the whole the competition was disappointing, there being no single design which could be recommended for execution as it stands. An Electric Range-Finder. An ingenious device for finding the range for guns on board men-of-war at a moment’s notice has been invented by Lieut. B. A. Fiske, and was recently tried by the U.S. naval authorities. It consists of two telescopes, one placed at the bow and the other at the stern of the vessel. The distance between them serves as a base-line, and the telescopes are both directed on the distant object. By trigonometry, if the angles at the base of the triangle formed by the base-line and the object are known, the distance is easily found. Now, the inclination of the telescopes when pointed to the object would give these angles by direct observation : but this plan is discarded in favour of one more accurate and prompt — one. In short, which is adapted to an object whose distance is always varying as the vessel moves. Instead of reading the angles by sight, the positions of the two telescopes are caused to vary the resistance of two branches of the well-known Wheatstone electric balance, and these resistances are proportional to the angles subtended by the telescopes and the base-line. The apparatus is so arranged that the restoration of the balance to equilibrium gives the distance. Recent trials on the s.s. Chicago showed that it was accurate to six-tenths per cent. We may also mention that experiments in firing heavy guns at night by means of the electric light were recently made in Toulon harbour. Targets were fixed at a distance of two miles, and the electric light pro¬ jected on them from the revolving platform which carried the gun. It was found that the accuracy of firing under these conditions was as good as during daylight. Autographism. Dr. Mesnet, of Paris, has recently drawn attention to a curious phenomenon which was first observed about ten years ago by M. Dujardin-Beaumetz, who brought before the Societe Medicale des Hopitaux an instance of it in a female patient, who afterwards received the name of the fe7nine cliche. It appears that if a moist pencil be lightly drawn over the skin of some persons, their flesh will rise into a weal which follows all the traces of the pencil, so that the hand¬ writing or a drawing appears in relief. The colour of the mark is whiter than the rest of the skin, which usually takes a rosy blush. The relief is quite visible from a distance of ten to twenty yards, and sometimes continues for several hours. A French officer of

Page 655

The Gatherer. artillery reports a case of autographism in a bay horse belonging to the Versailles garrison in 1871-3. If a straw were plucked from its litter and drawn lightly over its flank, the flesh rose almost im¬ mediately and showed its course. The soldiers often TOWER FOR LONDON. — FIG. 3. amused themselves in doing so ; but the animal seemed to be unaware of the experiment, and was in other respects as well and efficient as the rest of the horses. The cause of the phenomenon is unknown ; but according to Dr. Mesnet, human subjects are easily hypnotised, and it is probably due to some particular nervous susceptibility. t Malaria Screens. The experience of Mr. Stanley on his last African expedition is that malaria is borne on the winds far inland, across open plains, or up the course of rivers, but that a belt of trees or high shrubs acts as a screen against its effects. Emin Pasha adopts the plan of sleeping under mosquito curtains, which appear to ward it off ; and Mr. Stanley has suggested that veils of some thin material should be worn as respirators in districts affected by malaria. Above the altitude of 5,000 feet in Africa it seems to disappear, or, at all events, is much less observable than in lower regions. A New Theory of Harmonics. Professor Koenig, the well-known German physicist, has propounded the theory that “harmonics’’ in music are tones whose frequencies are integral mul¬ tiples of their fundamentals. By taking a couple of tuning-forks vibrating 2,048 and 2,304 times per second, or having a ratio of 8 to 9, and sounding them together, he is able to produce the middle c (256 vibrations a second) from the succession of their beats. The same “ beat-tone ” is obtained by sound¬ ing forks having a ratio of 8 to 15. Dr. Koenig has 637 also constructed rods which vibrate at different rates when struck on different sides, and these if struck on the edge give out two different notes and the “ beat- tone ” resulting from them. Other rods he has con¬ structed emit notes below the limit of the human ear ; but two of these can be made to yield a “beat- tone” which is audible. Contrary to the opinion of Helmholtz, Dr. Koenig holds that the timbre of musical notes is affected by differences of phase amongst the component tones. A Brougham Lighted by Electricity. Mr. J. E. Platt, of Burntwood, Cheadle, has fitted up his brougham with the electric light. The current is derived from an accumulator 1 5 inches long by 65 inches wide, and 9 inches deep. The cells contain a supply of current to last eight hours. Not only the outside lamps of the carriage, but an inside ceiling lamp, are fitted with incandescent bulbs, and these are so arranged that candles can be at once substituted should anything go wrong with the battery. Natural Address Cards. Some natural address cards have recently been introduced into the German market from the Came- roons on the Western Coast of Africa. They consist of the dried leaves of the silver poplar, which can be written upon with ease. A very pretty visiting card is the result. The Density of Thunderclouds. An explanation of the dense character of thunder¬ clouds has been offered by Mr. Shelford Bidwell, F.R.S., who finds that when a jet of steam is electri¬ fied, its shadow on a wall instantly grows darker, thereby proving that the density of the jet is increased. It may also be remembered that smoke when electri¬ fied tends to condense into soot, and hence perhaps the popular notion that falling “smuts” are a sign of thunder in the air. We may refer in this place to a study which has been made of the statistics of light¬ ning strokes in Germany. From these it appears that lightning storms originate in the mountains and travel over the lower lands. Strokes, it seems, are more frequent in flat, woodless, and low-lying grounds, such as valleys, meadows, and marshes, than in high or wooded hills. The number of strokes a year appears to be on the increase in Germany. They are com¬ monest in July and August, and in the hotter parts of the day. Preserving Sea Animals. Mr. A. Haly, Director of the Colombo Museum, has been successful in preserving the delicate and brilliant colours of tropical fishes in a mixture of glycerine and gum. These ingredients are both mixible with alcohol if care is taken in the manipulation. Molluscs, sea anemones, and jelly-fish are also preservable in the solution. We may add that Mr. Haly finds that sea-water saturated with bichromate of potash is good for hardening that exceedingly soft creature, the jelly¬ fish.

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The Gatherer. 638 A Prompt Life-Saver. The “ Ready Life-saver,” which we illustrate here¬ with, is designed to obviate the dangerous delay in throwing a life-buoy with its attached signal light. Much time is lost in preparing the canister which contains the inflammable compound and fixing it to an ordinary buoy. With the new appliance, by the mere turning of the handle, A, which only takes half a second, the canister is punched to let in the water, and the buoy, B, with the canister attached, is thrown into the sea. The buoy has been adopted by the Atlantic Transport line of steamers. Tempering Steel in Lead. The Chatillon-Commentry Steel Company of France have lately made a series of experiments which prove that steel is improved in tenacity and elasticity by tempering it in molten lead. The steel is heated red- hot and plunged in the liquid lead, where it is allowed to cool. Armour-plates treated in this way are not so easily penetrated by a projectile. Telegraphing Across Rivers. Mr. W. F. Melhuish, of the Indian Telegraph Depart¬ ment, has succeeded in transmitting telegrams across the Hooghly where it is half a mile wide, for instance at Chundernagore, by using bare metal wire. In fact, he employed the outer iron wires which sheathe one of the river cables. Of course, the ordinary telegraph instruments are not sensitive enough for this, as so much of the current escapes to the water, but with the Cardew vibrator, in which the vibratory signal currents are received in a telephone, it was quite practicable to telegraph. It follows that if a river cable should break down, the outer sheathing can be used to keep •up the communication until the copper conductor inside has been restored to its old state of insulation. Again, in military operations, a bare wire or wires laid across a river will, at a pinch, serve to convey messages, or if a land wire be torn from the poles and lying on the ground, it will not cause an interruption, through leakage to earth, if the Cardew instrument is used with it. A New Theodolite. A new theodolite has just been introduced by a well-known instrument maker, which presents several improvements. In the first place, it can be used without the tripod stand — say, on the top of a wall or other building — and the frail cross-lines of spider’s web or fibre of the objective are replaced by plantinum- iridium wires, which can be cleaned by a camel-hair pencil, and do not rust. Moreover, adjustable points for measuring distances are fitted to the eye-piece. An Oil-Shell for Stormy Weather. An Austrian inventor has designed a shell contain¬ ing oil to be fired by ships in stormy weather, with a view to calm the billows ahead of them. It consists of a wooden cylinder about a foot and a half in length, containing about two-thirds of a pound of oil, and lined inside with shellac to prevent the oil penetrating the wood. When fired from a mortar, a phosphide of cal¬ cium light, carried by the shell, shows its position, and the oil, displaced by the water, spreads over the sur¬ face of the sea. A single shell is capable of calming a space of more than 1,000 square yards. A Calculating Disc. The calculating disc of Mr. Cuttriss is an improved form of the well-known slide rule, and consists essen¬ tially of a thin metal disc having a ring which slides round its circumference. Both of these have two scales engraved upon them, as shown. Multiplica¬ tion, division, proportion, and fractions, both vulgar and decimal, together with roots, powers, and a variety of other calculations, can be made with it. It is also specially adapted for the use of electrical engineers. Of course, its convenient shape and size is much preferable to that of the ordinary slide rule. A Simple Cure for Hemorrhage. It may be useful to mention that ham-fat has been tried with success for stopping bleeding at the nose. Several aggravated cases of this hemorrhage have lately occurred at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, U.S., and as a last resort Dr. D. Hayes plugged the nostrils with cylinders cut from raw bacon. The remedy is very simple, and said to be effective.

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The Gatherer. 639 Preserving Beams from Insects. Seamless Boats. At a recent meeting of the Entomological Society the question of preserving the beams of churches from the ravages of beetles was discussed, and Mr. White- house recommended that the wood should be well •soaked in paraffin oil. A Lamp-Cleaner. A machine for rapidly cleaning the gauze of miners’ safety lamps has been introduced into the Wombwell Collieries at Barnsley. It is driven by a belt and pulley, and the two brushes seen at the ends of a shaft have a reciprocating motion ; two other brushes have a circular motion, and are intended to sweep the ends ^of the gauze, and various parts of the lamp. A Use for Cotton-Plant Stalks. Hitherto the stalks of the cotton-plant have found no use, and the planters have regarded them as a nuisance, but recently it has been found that the fibres are eminently suitable for the manufacture of bagging. Much of the bagging now being made from it is used in packing the cotton for transport. Mr. Heslop, of Leeds, has devised a method of forming steel boats without a seam by one operation. The metal plate used is one-sixteenth inch thick, and of oval shape. It is heated in a furnace, and then moulded in a die to the required form by hydraulic pressure. Three dies are employed to gain the form by degrees, and thus preserve the metal from crack¬ ing or buckling. The boat is then polished, and fitted up with air-tight compartments and othei necessaries. Musical Phantoms. A correspondent of Nature has called atten¬ tion to the visual images which are seen in the air, by a lady of his acquaintance, when certain musical instruments are played. The sound of the oboe causes her to see a white obelisk, which is more acute the higher the pitch of the note. Sometimes, if the notes are of an intense and yearning character, the figure moves rapidly to¬ wards her, point first, as if it would strike her. The sound of the violoncello, the high notes of the bassoon, trumpet, and trombone, and the low notes of the clarionet and viola, make her see a flat undulating ribbon of strong white fibres ; and when the violins of an orchestra strike up after the wind in¬ struments have been prominent, she sometimes sees a shower of glistening white dust. These phantoms are usually seen floating in the air half-way between her and the players. The lady is herself an accomplished musician. A Rival to Jute. On the Persian shores of the Caspian a plant has been discovered which possesses a splendid fibre, soft and elastic, with a glossy, satin-like texture. It is strong and pliable, and appears to be especially suit¬ able for the manufacture of sacking, ropes, and pack¬ thread, so that, being very plentiful, it is likely to be¬ come a formidable rival to jute. The discoverer has given the plant the name of Kanoff. The Tesla Motor. The electric motor of M. Tesla, which is the only .•successful motor driven by alternating currents, has been applied to work the Hercules coal-cutter by the Monongahela Gas Coal Company of the United States. By the joint labours of these two machines a floor space of 600 square feet can be cleared in ten hours. The Vacuum of Electric Lamps. Mr. F. Higgins, a well-known electrician, finds that the higher the vacuum in the bulb of a glow-lamp, the better the light obtained with the same strength of current. Two apparently similar lamps will give out very different lights from this cause alone ; moreover, the ill-exhausted bulb grows hotter than the other. The lamp of high vacuum attains to incandescence slowly, and darkens again at the same rate when the current is cut off ; while that having an imperfect va¬ cuum suddenly brightens, and as suddenly cools again. A Laughing Plant. In Arabia is a plant which has all the properties of laughing gas. It has bright yellow flowers, and seeds like black beans. These last are dried and crushed to powder, and when swallowed in small doses, cause the person taking them to laugh and dance, and behave in the most ridiculous manner, until exhaustion and sleep supervene. The plant is known locally as “ the laughing plant.” Wild Animals as Pets. It is not always cruel to make a pet of a bird or an animal generally considered wild, or that has even been born in the freedom of wild life. Mrs. Brightwen, a vice-president of the Selborne Society, gives us in “ Wild Nature Won by Kindness ” (T. Fisher Unwin) a series of most interesting pictures of furred and feathered friends of hers who were all by nature wild. It is rarely that one comes across so interesting a book as this unpretentious volume, with its vivid

Page 658

The Gatherer. 640 sketches of animal life, and we almost feel as if we had actually known the ill-fated starling who was named “Richard the Second,^’ and “Frolic,” the squirrel — to say nothing of the robins, the jay, and the gerbilles, who would eat through the linings of their box home. This does not profess to be a book of instruction, but no one can fail to learn something from its perusal, and it is just the book to read to children. The Public Libraries Movement. The advance of the public libraries movement is such as must rejoice the heart of every true friend of education and culture. The third edition of Mr. Thomas Greenwood’s “ Public Libraries,” which has just been published by Messrs. Simpkin Mar¬ shall & Co., marks another good step forward in the march. Four years ago only 133 places had availed themselves of the Public Libraries Acts ; now they are in operation in 208 places. The year 1887 saw the Acts adopted in no fewer than ten London parishes, another was added to the list in 1888, 1 889 found another three recruits, and already one has been enrolled this year. But there are still many places and districts, in and out of the Metropolis, where public libraries are needed, and in such cases Mr. Greenwood’s book should serve as a veritable armoury for those who feel this need, and are willing to help in meeting it by securing the formal adoption of the Libraries Acts. And when the Acts have been adopted, inexperienced Commissioners ought to find the book equally valuable to them. Prose Reading. We are all of us familiar enough with books of poetical extracts for daily reading. Now we have from Messrs. Longmans a collection of daily readings of prose under the title, “ The Steps of the Sun.” The field from which the authors are selected is wide enough to meet all tastes, and no one can complain that the prose is prosy. We hope that these pleasant and thoughtfully made extracts may serve not only to in¬ terest their readers day by day, but may also lead them to the works from which they are taken. In that case they cannot fail to do good, as well as to afford a pleasant few minutes each morning or evening. A Model Sundial. An interesting little model, illustrating the principle of the sundial, has just been published by Messrs. G. Philip & Son. On a small scale it reproduces the features of this time-honoured and time-marking apparatus, and has the advantage of being readily adjusted. For teaching the difference between solar and civil time it will be useful, and as its support is so planned as to illustrate the decimal system, it might with advantage be added to our existing school fur¬ niture. Wyclif and Chaucer. These are the two great names dealt with in the fifth volume of Professor Henry Morley’s “ English Writers ” (Cassell), and they are treated with all the fulnesb which their work merits. Probably the in¬ fluence of Wyclif as a Reformer has overshadowed his influence as a writer, despite the fact that it was largely through his writings that he strove to effect his ends. Of Chaucer, Professor Morley gives us a most interesting and careful study that will be wel¬ come alike to those who are already familiar with the poet’s writings, and to those who are only seeking an acquaintance with them. The professor has now brought us nearly to the close of the fourteenth cen¬ tury in our study of “English Writers,” and in the “ Last Leaves ” to this present volume he tells us that he hopes in the next to reach the end of the period that closed with the introduction of the printing-press — that best of friends to writers of every nation. “ One and All.” As a Cornishman, proud of the county from which he springs, Mr. Richard Tangye adopts its motto as the title of the autobiography that Messrs. S. W. Par¬ tridge & Co. have published. It is always interesting to trace the rise of a great and successful enterprise from its humble beginnings; but we do not remember a more interesting industrial history than this of Mr. Tangye’s, in which he sketches the progress of the great business with which his name is connected : from the single workshop to the far-spreading works that are now necessary. The story loses nothing from the good-humoured manner in which it is told. For instance, the fortunes of Mr. Tangye’s firm really date from the time that they supplied the “jacks” used for launching the ill-fated Great Easterri, and Mr. Tangye tells us in this volume that on one of his first busi¬ ness visits to London, a gentleman introduced him to another with these words : “ This is the man who launched the Great Eastern^'' “Now, I am not tall,” says the author, “ and there was a decidedly sarcastic tone in the factor s voice ; but he looked somewhat abashed when I replied, ‘Yes, great events from little causes spring ! ’ ” Two Books to be Studied. Two books that well deserve careful attention lie on our table together this month. One is the third volume of Cassell’s “ New Popular Educator,” which seeks to carry on the work begun by its predecessors. No more striking proof of the change brought about by our later educational policy could be found than this work affords in the wide range of subjects which it is found necessary to treat. To all who wish to improve their education this work is a veritable vade meciim. The second book we refer to is “ Musical Groundwork” (F. Warne & Co.), which covers a good deal of ground in a small space. Considering the multiplicity of subjects dealt with, the author is to be congratulated on a very readable book as well as a useful one. As a first reading-book on the general principles and history of the art of music we do not know a better one, and we cordially commend Mr. Crowest’s little book to the notice of those of our readers who desire a brief and popular introduction to this fascinating subject.

Page 659

641 WOMANLIKE. By the Author of “A Man of the Name of John,” “King or Protector?” &c. &c. “ Womanlike, taking revenge too deep for a transient wrong.” CHAPTER THE THIRTEENTH. N the whole, Betty’s en¬ gagement gave more satisfaction than en¬ gagements generally do. No one stood in a suffi¬ ciently near relation to have any right to object to it, and all the neigh¬ bours thought it a most suitable match. Mr. Elliot’s position would be an equivalent for her fortune, and there was no doubt that mentally they were eminently fitted for each other. Frances Benson was the only person who wrote privately to Mrs. Ward to ask if Betty were really happy, and if Mr. Elliot were worthy of her. Her old friend answered in the affirmative. She had the greatest respect for him, and Betty cer¬ tainly seemed very happy in her quiet way. Whether her elderly lover would ever call out all the love that she could give, Mrs. Ward did not feel so sure, but on the whole she felt things were well as they were. “ I always feared that Betty would waste her love on someone who could not appreciate her, and break her heart,” she said to herself. Mr. Elliot had the greatest admiration and esteem for Mrs. Ward. In fact, it was his courteous deference to her that had first unconsciously won Betty’s heart. She had a great aversion to the brusque, selfish man¬ ners of modern times, and her lover’s perfect courtesy to all women was one of his strongest claims to her regard. Of all her friends, little Dickie Mortimer was the most wildly excited about Betty’s engagement. And being up in London for two or three days’ shopping in the end of November, Betty stretched a point on her last afternoon in order to get to Cromwell Road, and see Dickie herself. She found a drawing-room full of people, for it was Mrs. Mortimer’s “ at home ” day, and a Miss Mortimer in every corner. She began to wonder a little less at their mother’s anxiety to get some of her daughters married, as Dickie introduced one sister after another. Last of all, Mij?. Hunt desired to make her acquaint¬ ance, and Betty entered into conversation with her with a curious mixture of feeling. She recognised, with a gleam of memory that thrilled her, the features that she had seen in Alice Mortimer’s portrait long ago. Pretty Mrs. Hunt was still, and exquisitely dressed, but her face had an anxious, unsatisfied expression, and she seemed to be nothing more than a very fashionable woman. She spoke of their cor¬ respondence in a light, easy way, with a covert sneer at Dickie, and then glided off to the latest doings of society, as depicted in its special papers. Betty felt they were mutually boring each other, and was glad to turn to Mrs. Mortimer after a while, as Dickie was kept busy at the tea-table. Betty could not help remarking on the child’s looks, which did not do her credit. “ Yes, she does look white,” said Mrs. Mortimer carelessly. “ She says the London fogs and absence of fresh air try her. It is her own fault. She need not have been here now if she had not chosen, if people won’t take the chances they get of leaving home, they need not complain of it.” Betty opined that Dickie was still in disgrace, and their subsequent conversation confirmed the idea. Nothing Dickie said or did was right, and a very little observation revealed the fact that the child had a crushed, quiet look, and was dressed carelessly, as if she had ceased to take any pride in herself. Betty could not quite understand the change, which hardly fitted in with her theory about Roger Haughton, but it made her heart ache, and a sudden idea seized her. ‘Mf you think Dickie is wanting change of air,” she said to Mrs. Mortimer, “ will you spare her to me for a little visit ? I am going home again to-morrow, and will gladly take her with me, if she may come.” Mrs. Mortimer was delighted at the proposal, and Dickie rose at once in her mother’s estimation. The wealthy heiress, whose position in society was likely to be a good one, was a friend worth having. She accepted the invitation gratefully, and beckoned Dickie across the room with a smile. “ Dickie, Miss Darell is kind enough to ask you to go and stay with her in the country. I am sure it will do you good,” said Mrs. Mortimer graciously. “ Can you be ready early to-morrow, Dickie ? ” said Betty kindly. “ I will call for you, and we will leave our luggage at Victoria. Then we can do some shop¬ ping, and go down together in the afternoon.” The joy that lit up Dickie’s face was good to see. She nearly threw herself on Betty in her delight, and promised to be ready by six in the morning if necessary. Betty laughingly fixed a later hour, and then, as she had no further object in remaining, rose to take leave. Dickie left the room with her, intending to see her out, but glancing over the staircase, she saw some fresh arrivals in the hall. “ Come in here,” she said, pushing open the door oi a little room on the landing. “You won’t mind its being dark ? I did so want to speak to you — and to tell you what a darling you are I ” “Poor little Dickie! I am afraid you have been having a hard time of it,” said Betty, as Dickie hugged her effusively. 761

Page 660

Womanlike. 642 “ Poor mother is rather put out to-day/’ returned Dickie coolly. “ Perhaps you haven’t heard Jim is engaged to a girl he has met in Scotland — a Miss Fraser. He has only known her a month, and they are both desperately in love. All the family are de¬ lighted. She is two-and-twenty, and very well off, and much better suited to him than I was. But I don't care what she’s like as long as it isn’t I ! ” Have you come to that, Dickie dear ? ” said Betty, rather amused. “ Yes, oh, yes ! I should have died by now if I had been engaged to Jim! ’’said Dickie frankly. “But, Betty, do tell me about yourself. Are you very happy?” “Very, dear. But you shall hear all about it to¬ morrow, and be introduced to Mr. Elliot,” answered Betty. “ I must go now, for he is waiting for me, I expect. 1 am staying with his cousins, you know, and he was to fetch me in their carriage.” “ Must you ? Well, I shall have you all to myself to-morrow. Why, there’s Roger 1 ” cried Dickie, rushing out to stop the last of the ascending visitors. “ Roger, here’s Betty 1 ” He turned on the stairs just above, and came back. The light on the landing fell full on his face and on Betty’s as she emerged from the dark little room, in her soft furs and large hat with its long feathers. She thought at the first glance that he looked worn and altered since the summer, and then her eyes met his, keen and questioning, and she looked at him no more. She shook hands with him very quietly, and was glad that Dickie rattled on. “ I am going to stay with Betty to-morrow. Think ■of that, Roger!” cried Dickie, with dancing eyes. “Oh, do say you are going to Oakleigh too, after all, and then we shall all be there, and it will be splendid.” “ I don’t know yet if I can go,” he answered, addressing Dickie. “ Of course if you are in the neighbourhood I must make an effort, I suppose.” “ Of course you must ! ” cried Dickie. “ Oh, what fun we shall have ! Betty dear, will you mind if Roger sees you out ? I must go after the Brownes. Good-bye till to-morrow.” She bid Betty a dozen last good-byes, and frolicked off to the drawing-room, again, completely her old bright self. Roger was left to escort Betty downstairs. “It is very good of you to carry that child off,” he said. “ She has not found life a bed of roses lately.” “It is very pleasant to be able to make people happy so easily,” answered Betty. He made no reply till they reached the foot of the stairs, then he stopped. “ 1 hear that I have to congratulate you,” he said in a rigidly quiet tone of voice. Why did he wait till they were in the full light of the hall again ? and why did he look at her in that penetrating way ? Betty felt quite annoyed. “ Thank you very much,” she said stiffly. “ I was wishing to know — but I suppose it is now superfluous to ask,” he went on, “whether you have any objection to my coming down to Mayes on the second, as 1 have been asked to do ? ” “ I hope you will do exactly as you think best about it,” she returned coldly. And then, with a sudden im¬ pulse, “ I think that the best thing we can do witli regard to our last interview, Mr. Haughton, is to forget it, and meet as friends.” Roger bowed assent, and went forward to open the door without speaking. A carriage was waiting out¬ side, and he saw some man just getting out of it, who proceeded to hand Betty in with tender care. Roger stood bareheaded on the doorstep in the frosty air, till the gaze of a passer-by restored him to a sense of his surroundings, and he went in, shutting the door with decision behind him. But Betty, driving through the darkness by her lover’s side, could see nothing but Roger’s face, and knew that he w'ould never console himself with Dickie. Dickie thoroughly enjoyed herself next day. It was pure delight, to begin with, to be alone with Betty again ; and then they had such delightful shopping to do, in which Betty proved a fairy godmother, and showered warm furs and thick boots upon her, under pretence of arming her against country damp and cold, till Dickie was almost wild with joy and gratitude. Mr. Elliot met them at Victoria, and saw them off. Dickie was very much impressed by him — too much so to inquire till they had started why he was not coming too. Betty explained that he had to lecture at a Polytechnic Institution that night, and she took it so calmly that Dickie felt free to revel in sole possession of her friend, though for her own part she thought it sounded a very dull proceeding. They started as the sun was setting, and when they had run out of the London haze the sky was clear and bright. It was a brilliant frosty evening, with a full moon silvering the landscape, when they reached Oakleigh, and Dickie was in transports of delight. She declared it was all like fairyland as the carriage bowled along the hard frozen roads, and she looked across the wide meadows and leafless woods to the dark line of hills rising clear against the starry sky. Then the house came in view, with its lighted windows shining a warm welcome. They spun up the drive, and drew up with a clatter before the deep porch. Dickie sprang out, and was in the wide hall, with its roaring fire, in a moment, in perfect ecstasies at finding herself really in Betty’s home. “ This way,” said Betty, laughing, and led her into the pretty drawing-room where Mrs. Ward sat await¬ ing them in a cosy nook near the fire, with a kettle singing them a lusty welcome on the hob — for it was Betty’s fad to make her own tea. “ Madam, 1 have brought you another child.” Mrs. Ward rose to receive Dickie wdth her sweet smile, and Dickie fell in love with her^n the spot. “It is so good of Betty to have me, and everything is so lovely ! ” she said incoherently, as she kissed Mrs. Ward with a sudden impulse of affection. “ Dickie, I have a great dissipation for you next week,” said Betty presently, as they were enjoying their cosy tea. “ I am going to have an afternoon party, with Orford Morrison to recite, w'hile the Carringtons have their house full. You know they have a regular shooting party ? ”

Page 661

Womanlike. 643 “ Oh, Betty, how delightful ! ” cried Dickie. “ I love reciting ! ’’ “I don’t! ” returned Betty, laughing. “When re¬ citers try to harrow me I generally laugh, and when they try to be comic I am bored. But I found Ethel and Mab Carrington were dying to hear a good reciter, so this is their treat.” “ And mine,” added Dickie. “ How delicious ! ” “ We must go and see the Carringtons to-morrow. They are such nice girls, about your age ; and I am sure they will amuse you when I — am busy,” finished Betty, with a little laugh and blush. Dickie looked up with an answering smile. She hardly believed in Betty’s engagement even yet. When she had finished her tea, she began to cast longing eyes at the grand piano that stood tempt¬ ingly near, and Betty invited her to try it. Dickie was only too delighted. She had it open in a moment, .and was soon filling the room with joyous ringing melodies that expressed the inmost feelings of her heart. Betty listened, well content. The music in¬ terpreted her own feelings for her ; she was so glad to be home again by Madam’s side. It was one of her free evenings— no one would disturb them ; they three would have a delightful feast of music together .after dinner, all alone. She quite forgot that she •ought to have wanted Mr. Elliot to make a fourth. For once she relaxed her principles, and allowed Dickie to come in and have a gossip over the fire in her room when they went up to bed. Dicky made .a preliminary tour of the room first, admiring and .asking questions, while Betty exchanged her evening •dress for a dressing-gown, and shook down her long brown hair. “ Betty dear, this is the loveliest house that ever was ! ” she said at last, throwing herself upon the iTug at her friend’s feet. “ And it is all your own ; -and you are going to give it all up, and be married ! ” She looked quite reproachful, and Betty could not rhelp laughing, “ But it will be my home still, as far as possible,” -she said. “But that is not at all the same thing,” said .Dickie, shaking her head. “ You will have lost your ■freedom.” “ Ah, Dickie 1 ” said Betty gently. “ Didn’t I tell you that you were too young to be married ? ” “Yes; and you were quite right, as you always .are,” answered Dickie, more gravely. “And I shall thank you all my life long. I wouldn’t be engaged .now for all the world. Betty, do you really like it ? ” “ Very much,” said Betty softly. “ Do you know,” said Dickie slowly, and gazing •into the fire — “you won’t mind my saying it, will you ? — I did so hope that you and Roger would have liked each other.” “ Did you ? ” said Betty quietly. “Yes, I did, in the summer. And, Betty, I do think he liked you,” said Dickie gently. “And I don’t think he likes your being engaged to Mr. Elliot. I am so sorry. Poor old Roger ! I wish you .had liked him, Betty.” Betty felt a strong desire to turn the subject. “ You were asking about Fred Carrington at dinner,” she remarked. “ I thought I had told you all about him in my letters. What did you want to know ? ” “ Oh, everything ! ” replied Dickie eagerly ; “ be¬ cause letters tell one so little, and I can’t get any¬ thing out of Roger, except that Fred is a nice boy. Do tell me the whole story from the begin¬ ning.” So Betty told her all she knew ; and as she told in one connected story of the words and deeds that Fred had recounted at so many different times, she wondered no longer at the boy’s hero-worship. Some¬ times he had almost bored her with his details, but now she saw the man with the boy’s eyes, and he seemed to her a very noble figure. “How like Roger!” said Dickie, when she had done. And when Dickie was gone, Betty sat musing — not of the man whose ideas of education were high and noble, and who would fain bring up the youth of England in the best possible way, but of a man who had no ideas on the subject at all, but who was in himself a living education, and who had made a steady, well-principled man out of reckless, careless, wild Fred Carrington. CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH. It was astonishing how soon Dickie fitted into the life at Hawk’s Nest, as if she had always lived there. In two or three days they could hardly believe that they had been without her so long. She was always busy, and took a keen interest in everything. To play to the good ladies at the Dove¬ cote was delightful to herself and them ; to help at the evening classes was most interesting ; and to be with the Carringtons when Betty was “busy,” as she euphemistically described it, was always fun. When she could get Betty to herself she was simply in raptures ; and as for Mrs. Ward, they developed a reciprocal liking which caused Betty to think better of Dickie’s taste than she had hitherto done. Of course Dickie and Fred Carrington became great friends, and they used to rave about Roger together till the Carrington girls were wild with curi¬ osity to see this wonderful man. On her first Sunday at Oakleigh they had a long walk together after afternoon church, during which Fred was required to relate his South American ex¬ periences from a higher point of view than usual. Dickie came in from her walk rather grave, and found Mrs. Ward alone in the drawing-room. “ Where’s Betty ? ” she asked. “ In her boudoir with Mr. Elliot,” answered Madam. Dickie stood gazing into the fire with a very sober expression on her bright little face. “Mrs. Ward,” she said suddenly, “do you think Betty is in love with Mr. Elliot Mrs. Ward looked up quickly at the grave young questioner. “ I hope so,” she said cautiously.

Page 662

Womanlike. 644 “Because I don’t think she is,” went on Dickie. “ I think she thinks she is, which is quite a different thing.” Mrs. Ward made no reply, and Dickie turned and looked at her. “ You think so too ?” she said. “ My child, it is very difficult for outsiders to judge,” said Mrs. Ward gently. “At her age Betty must judge for herself.” “ But do you think she is happy ? ” persisted Dickie, throwing herself on her knees beside the elder woman, and gazing up into the wise, kind eyes. “ Do you really think she is happy ? Mr. Elliot isn’t half good enough * for her ; but if she is happy, I should not care ; but is she ? Does she really care about edu¬ cation and all sorts of fine things? or does she try to care, to please him ? ” There was a long pause, and she saw that Mrs. Ward’s eyes were full of tears. “ Betty is as dear to me as my own child,” she said at last. “If she were not happy it would break my heart. We must pray that all may be well.” “ Ah ! If she had only cared for Roger ! ” sighed Dickie, turning away. Mrs. Ward looked up quickly, but she said no more. The Carringtons had a shooting party that week, but Roger Haughton had been specially invited to arrive on Monday, a day before the other men, and to stay as long as he would ; and after putting off his visit once or twice, he had really promised to come at last. Dickie was not surprised, Betty was, when the young Carringtons walked up to the Hawk’s Nest at dusk on Monday afternoon, bringing Roger in their train. The long drawing-room looked very pretty as they entered from the cold frosty air, with its flowers and palms and draped easels, and quaint screens shutting off cosy nooks, the whole lit by a tall pedestal lamp that cast a soft glow through a pink shade. Mrs. Ward sat at one side of the hearth, wrapped in a soft white shawl, with Dickie on a low stool beside her, and Betty was making tea opposite, with' Mr. Elliot’s assistance. It was a cosy home-like scene, and Mr. Elliot seemed so entirely part of it as to make his position in the house very evident. Betty looked up surprised as the Carrington girls came in, followed by the triumphant Fred, behind whom loomed a tall figure that she knew well. She dropped her last spoonful of tea into the teapot hurriedly, and rose to meet them, rather glad for once of the length of the room. Mr. Elliot composedly poured boiling water on to the tea, and replaced the kettle in his methodical way. By the time he had done so to his satisfaction Betty stood beside him, introducing : “ Mr. Haughton — Mr. Elliot.” The two men bowed gravely. Mr. Elliot was in¬ terested in the man who had done so much for young Carrington ; Roger was apparently not interested in him at all. He seated himself by Dickie, and began to converse exclusively with her, while Ethel Carring¬ ton was apologising prettily to Betty for their intrusion. and explaining that Mr. Haughton had brought messages from home for Dickie. Yet, for all his absorbing talk with Dickie, Betty had a firm conviction that he was taking in Mr. Elliot all the time. She knew by this time how much he could see with apparently unseeing eyes ; and she found herself talking and laughing with more animation than usual, that he might see how perfectly happy she was. By-and-by Fred Carrington begged for some music, and Ethel offered to accompany Dickie if she would get out her violin. Dickie consented willingly, and there was a general move towards the piano. It stood in a recess near a window, backed by curtains and tall green plants, against which Dickie’s lithe little figure was thrown into relief by the light of the piano candles, as she swayed to and fro, while her violin- bow flew, and her face wore an expression of rapt enjoyment. Mr. Elliot drew near to listen. He loved music, and it was a great trial to Betty that she could neither sing nor play to him. Roger got up and crossed over to put his cup down, and took a chair close to Betty’s. They were alone together by the fire now : everyone else had been drawn away by the music. Betty shaded her face from the * blaze with a palm-leaf screen, and under its shelter glanced at Roger. His face was absolutely inscrutable, as he gazed at Dickie in silent appreciation. “ Dickie is improved in her playing, do you not think so ?” asked Betty after a while. “ Yes, there is more soul in it. If she had ever cared for Adair, I should account for it on the theory that to sing or play well you must previously suffer from a broken heart,” answered Roger, rather grimly. “ Has she ever regretted her decision, do you think ? ” “ Oh, no ! She says she can never thank us enough for helping her to make it,” said Betty. She said “ us ” because it seemed a little arrogant to say “ me,” but she was not prepared for the glance that little syllable evoked from her companion. It effectually reduced her to silence, and she sat in dreamy enjoyment while the violin notes rang through the room, pleading, protesting, wailing, ending at last in strains of joyous delight. She had forgotten for the moment who was by her side as she wandered far away from earth into her old dreamland of romance. “I was with King Arthur and his Table Round; where were you ? ” she asked, smiling, as the last note died away. “ In Arcadia. One does not stop there long,” he answered low. Betty rose up to meet Mr. Elliot by way of answer. They began discussing music composers ; from Dickie’s violin they wandered far into the regions of criticism. Betty knew a good deal about music, though she was no performer, and took her part well, but Roger declined to be drawn into the conversation. He had been out of England too long to know anything oi modern composers, he said, and he sat silently by while Mr. Elliot discoursed of Raff and Brahms, and gave Dickie good advice generally. Betty was proud of the knowledge and judgment he displayed, but was it possible that she found herself wishing that he had

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Womanlike. 645 enjoyed the music as thoroughly as she had done without analysing it after¬ wards ? ‘‘Roger is good,” said Dickie, as they lingered round the fire when Mr. Elliot was gone, after dining with them that night. “ He has been telling me that he has offered to take Bertie out with him next spring. You know Bertie leaves school at Christmas, and we don’t know what to do with him. I do think it is so very good of Roger. He says he shall put Bertie and Tom Gordon to look after each other, and if he works hard/he will see that he gets on.” “ It is very kind of him,” said Betty quietly. “ He seems fond of young men.” “ I like Mr. Haughton’s face very much,” said Mrs. Ward musingly — but he looks sad and worn for so young a man.” “ He is not young. He is just three- and-thirty,” said Dickie, in a tone of expostulation which made the others laugh. “ What do you call a man of fifty, then ? Is he a patriarch ?” asked Betty teasingly. “ Yes,” said Dickie boldly. “And in ten years’ time he will be rheumatic and aged, while you are still young.” Something in Betty’s face made Dickie repent her thoughtless words as soon as they were uttered. She made a joke of them, and begged caressingly ‘I HEAR THAT I HAVE TO CONGRATULATE YOU”'(/. 642). for forgive¬ ness, which was accorded her. But Betty could not forget hf'” speech. Dickie spent all the next day at Mayes — Betty had a lecture to attend in the neighbouring town, and had promised to lunch with friends first ; so they parted soon after breakfast. When they met again, late in the afternoon, Dickie appeared to have had the more enjoyable day. Betty had been disappointed in her lecture. She had made a point of going because Mr. Elliot was anxious to know how the lecturer would treat his subject, and he had so utterly failed to grapple with it that her notes were dull and poor. Dickie, on the contrary, had had a most delightful time. Roger had been so charming, everyone at Mayes was quite delighted with him ; and then the shooting party had arrived by degrees, including a man with a lovely tenor, and there had been music in the hall, over which she had presided. But she did not tell Betty that Roger had drawn ber away during their afternoon ramble, and asked her abruptly — “Well, Dickie, you must have seen plenty of Mr. Elliot in the last week. What do you think of him ?” “ He is a dull old prig, not half worthy of Betty,” had been Dickie’s prompt reply. “ But does he make her happy ? ” demanded Roger. Dickie paused, and could not answer ; and Roger looked her through and through with his piercing eyes. “ Then he doesn’t,” he said concisely. “ Oh, Roger ! I don’t know, and Mrs. Ward doesn’t know ; but we hope he does,” said Dickie wistfully. And he had said no more. Betty’s party was fixed for the next afternoon, and the contingent from Mayes arrived rather late, as the men were lazy after a long morning in the coverts. Betty was standing near the door, receiving her guests with graceful dignity. Mr. Elliot sup¬ ported her, and Dickie hovered near, ready to pounce on Roger. “ How late you are ! ” she said reproachfully — “We have had two recitations already, and they are lovely. Come to the back of the room with me, and then we can stand up and see everything.” Roger gave in good-naturedly, and let excited Dickie lead him to a corner where they could stand comfortably and see over everyone else’s head. The room was prettily arranged, with the light chiefly concentrated on the reciter, as he sat at the piano, surrounded by plants and screens artistically draped in picturesque fashion. Through the open J

Page 664

W OMANLIKE. 646 doorway the light from the hall fell on Betty in her pale grey gown, trimmed with soft fur. She seemed quite at her ease, receiving fresh arrivals and point¬ ing out seats for them with her sweet smile, while in her intervals of leisure she exchanged remarks with Mr. Elliot, stepping out into the hall with her usual consideration, lest she should disturb the reciter. At last the stream of arrivals ceased, and she took a chair near the door. Mr. Elliot evidently complained of the draught, for he soon moved for¬ ward, and seated himself near Mrs. Ward. Dickie was completely absorbed in the recitations, and even inspired Fred with some of her enthusiasm ; but Roger heard not a single word that was being spoken, as he leant against the wall with his arms folded, and ■watched the profile outlined against the curtain that hung in the doorway. Betty appeared to be, as she had prophesied, rather bored than otherwise. Once or twice at some harrow¬ ing passage she smiled to herself with genuine amuse¬ ment, and glanced round the room ; but seeing everyone else grave, if not affected to tears, she com¬ posed her features decorously again. Suddenly a change came over her face, and Roger instantly gave his full attention to the recitation that was proceeding. Aided by music, the reciter told in flowing language of monks in their chapel, hearing a sweet voice whose strain called back to their hearts ^memories of the old life, of loves forsaken, and of friends long unseen. And as music and poem flowed on he suggested rather than dwelt on the terrible suffering of that regret, awakened too late, of the stern reality of the convent, of the agony of knowing in vain that they had chosen the wrong path in life. Roger saw a drooping head, and an expression on a face usually self-contained, that made his heart beat fast, and told him all he longed to know. Before the recitation was over Betty had slipped away to warn the servants that everyone would be coming to tea directly. It was all over very shortly, and her friends de¬ parted, thanking her warmly for the treat. Betty was vaguely glad her party had been a success ; more glad that it was over. The Carringtons lingered a little later. The girls were chatting to Mr. Morrison, a little overcome by the honour of their introduction, and a group was gathered round Dickie, who had been persuaded into playing for them. Betty sat in a stately arm-chair near a tall lamp, listening to Mr. Elliot as he explained something to her. She looked up at him with attention, took a letter from his hand, and bent over it while he talked on. The lamp-light showed cruelly the bald place among his grey hair ; he looked older than usual as he discoursed with a business-like air, like a professor instructing an intelligent pupil. Roger sat with folded arms on a deserted sofa, and watched the group in silence. Suddenly there was a cry from Betty of “ Madam ! ’’ that startled them all. She sprang from her chaii, and flew across the room. But Roger was beforehand with her. A paper candle-shade had suddenly caught fire, and fell, a flaring mass, into Mrs. Ward’s delicate lace cap. Even as Betty cried out, Roger’s quick eyes saw it, and in a moment he had crushed out the flames. ‘‘It is all safe, dear; I am not hurt,” said Mrs. Ward, with a smile, as Betty bent over her. “I scarcely had time to realise what was happening, thanks to Mr. Haughton.” But Betty hung over her, saying nothing, because she could not speak ; trembling, pale, and Avith eyes full of passionate devotion and anxiety. Mr. Elliot was quietly picking up his scattered papers, while Roger looked on in silence. The little accident broke up the party. Betty found herself promising Mrs. Carrington she knew not what, and hastening Mr. Morrison’s start for the station. And when they were gone, she held Mrs. \\ ard in both arms, crying — “ Oh, Madam ! I thought I should have died of fright.” And Roger, on his homeward Avay, was saying m- wardiy — “ Fool 1 She never looked at him like that ! Will no one tell her what she is doing ? ” CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH. Betty found that she had promised faithfully to dine quietly with the Carringtons next day, and to take Dickie to lunch with the guns on Friday. She did not feel at all inclined for either entertainment, she did not quite know why. She supposed that she felt a little flat after the mild excitement of her party. Mr. Elliot had come over to Mayes for a couple of nights, but even that seemed no great attraction. It Avas no pleasure simply to meet him in society, she told her¬ self. HoAvever, by the evening she felt in better spirits, and Avent with a smiling face to shoAV herself to Mrs. Ward, Avho declined dining out in the Avinter, before starting. Dickie Avore a soft Avhite gown, which she frankly confessed to be ver^^ ancient ; but she contrived to look veiy young and pretty in it, Avith the aid of some lovely chrysanthemums. Betty had attired her¬ self « chaperoit, she said, in a maroon velvet gown Avith a long train, and the diamond stars Mr. Elliot had given her as her only ornament. Mrs. Ward approved of them both, and told them to be sure to enjoy themselves. Dickie seemed to have every in¬ tention of doing so, and Betty felt strangely old and dull as she listened to her merry chatter on the Avay. The party amounted to rather more than a dozen, and the dinner Avas quite an informal affair, the men outnumbering the ladies : Avhich Avas perhaps as Avell, as they Avere tired after their day’s shooting, and had not all energy enough for conversation. Betty found herself placed betAveen Mr. Elliot and Roger. The former had plenty to say to her. The latter was absorbed in a sporting discussion Avith his neighbour. Betty heard them still talking of guns, and

Page 665

Womanlike. 647 bores, and the merits of different powders, as the various courses succeeded one another, and wondered how they could so waste their energies. She and Mr. Elliot were meanwhile entertaining Mrs. Carrington with a wide range of topics, as they sat at her right hand. Quite towards the end of dinner their hostess began speaking of Fred, who was reading with the vicar of the parish for his matriculation at Easter. She complained that it was very tiresome for him to have to rub up his neglected learning, and to waste his time at his age in reviving his Latin and Greek. Mr. Elliot agreed that as a rule far too much time was wasted on the classics, and began expatiating on the advantages of the Modern Side at a public school. As a sudden pause occurred in the gunpowder discus¬ sion, he turned to Roger — “ 1 am sure that as a practical man you will agree with me, Mr. Haughton,” he said, “ that for a man destined for business the time given to classics is merely wasted, and that the modern system of educa¬ tion only needs developing to bring us on a level with the Germans ? ” ‘‘I don’t know about the Germans, for we won’t have any in our house,” returned Roger in his slowest, most deliberate way. “ But as regards Englishmen, 1 am afraid I am not of your opinion.” Mr. Elliot was amazed. Do you mean to say that the time given to acquiring the classics would not be far better spent on modern languages?” he asked, eager for the fray. ‘‘ I mean that I would far rather take a boy into our business who has been well grounded in classics, and therefore has learnt how to learn, than one who has spent his time in acquiring modern languages, his schoolboy knowledge of which is almost useless,” was the reply. Mr. Elliot refused to believe such a statement. Roger quietly reiterated it. By degrees all the table was drawn into listening to the discussion between the fluent man of theory and the slow calm utterance of the man of facts. From the first Roger had distinctly the best of it. When Mr. Elliot expounded that, given certain propositions, certain results must ensue, he only continued to reply coolly that in practice they did not. If Mr. Elliot had been wise, he would have let the matter drop, but his pet theories were at stake, and he continued his argument with zeal. Roger had the advantage, and he used it crushingly. His opponent was entirely defeated, though unconvinced, when Mrs. Carrington gave the signal for the ladies to leave the table. They will never settle it, for neither will ever give in,” she said laughingly to Betty as they crossed the hall. ‘‘ Miss Mortimer, you must give us some music at once to soothe our weary brains after this heated controversy.” Betty said nothing ; she was disturbed in mind. Her sympathies were all with Roger : she felt that they should be with Mr. Elliot ; and she was glad that Dickie’s music enabled her to indulge her abstrac¬ tion unnoticed. Mr. Elliot joined her as soon as the gentlemen began to appear. He was quite animated and excited still. “Really, Mr. Haughton has most singular ideas,” he said— “ most singular for such a clever man. We must renew the subject over our pipes to-night. You must have been much interested in the subject, Betty ? I wonder now if you were old-fashioned enough to agree with him ? ” he added, smiling. “Oh! I know nothing about men’s education 1” said Betty quickly, with an answering smile. Later on, when Mr. Elliot had been drawn away by the music, Betty felt rather than knew that Roger was by her side. “ I hope our discussion has not annoyed you ? ” he said. “ Not at all,” said Betty coldly. “ I could not help crushing him. It is doctrinaires like Elliot who are reducing us to the level of those Germans he thinks so much of,” he went on. “Do you think you ought to say that to me ? ” said Betty indignantly. He had made her look at him, at all events. “ Yes, I do,” he said coolly. “ Perhaps you did not realise that he is a faddist ? And the fact seems to concern you as much as anyone.” She did not know him in this new mood, and she felt she ought to be very angry \vith him, only— she was not. “ I like a man to have some object in life,” she said proudly. “ So do I,” said Roger. There was a silence between them, broken only by crashing chords on the piano. Betty longed to move, and yet seemed held against her will. “ I suppose you are very angry with me still ? ” he said at last ; “ and I wanted you to grant me a favour.” “What is it?” “Will you give me a few minutes’ conversation to-morrow, after lunch? We can’t talk here, and I have something I want to say to you. I leave this place next week, and England in the spring,” he added. “ It will probably be our last meeting. And I want to say something to you about Dickie.” There was a suppressed eagerness in his manner, despite his quiet tone, for which Dickie’s name could hardly account. Betty was half inclined to refuse his request ; but the next minute her spirit rose. Why should she care what he wanted to say ? Was she not engaged to Godfrey Elliot, and beyond his reach ? So she promised what he asked. The lunch took place next day in a shed belong¬ ing to a farm near at hand, for Mrs. Carrington was afraid of the damp coverts after a night’s heavy rain. It was altogether a great success. Dickie enjoyed it immensely, and so did two Miss Grants, brought by a friendly neighbour, to whom lunch with the guns was also a novel experience. Betty looked very handsome in her homespun gown and neat little hat ; but was it only the dark fur boa that nestled round her throat that made her look so pale ?

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648 Womanlike. though irreproachably got up, looked unmistakably a man of another generation than Roger, as he condoled with Mr. Carrington about a rheumatic shoulder, and remarked that one did not grow more active as one grew older. The guns began to be impatient to get back into the coverts again, and the two elder men led the way, Mr. Elliot under the impression that Betty was going to drive home with Mrs. Carrington. Some of the girls, however, wanted to walk with the guns, and After lunch they strolled outside to look at the bag, which the keepers had been arranging in goodly rows. “Who shot the woodcocks.?” asked Betty, as she contemplated them in company with Fred Car¬ rington. “ Haughton. He is shooting like a demon to-day. “ ‘why don’t you say at once that you are jealous of him?’" (/. 649). I don’t believe he made a single miss,” answered Fred proudly. Betty glanced at Roger, who was standing a little way off, showing his gun to one of the Grant girls. He did not look very demoniacal as he explained to her how to load it, and let her take aim with it to feel its weight. He looked very handsome in his rough shooting clothes, and his amused animation at Miss Grant’s interest made him look younger than usual. He seemed for once what he was : a man in the prime of life, full of power and vigour. Mr. Elliot, who issued from the shed close beside him, Betty proposed going as far as the woods with them, when she and Dickie could walk home across the fields. The party straggled across the meadows in little groups, and Betty found herself bringing up the rear with Roger. She had been wondering all day what he could have to say to her. His manner had been so extremely cold last night that she quite failed to understand him, and her heart beat a little faster as they walked along the muddy path, with Roger’s footsteps following behind her. Apparently, he was in no hurry to say his say, for they walked in silence

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Womanlike. to the gate at the end of the first field. As she paused, and turned while he closed it after them, however, she could not help exclaiming — “ What a beautiful sky ! ” It was radiantly blue, with long shoals of little soft white scattered clouds lying motionless, and beginning to shine in golden splendour as the sun sank low. It was a soft, mild December day. The dark woods stood out clear among the browns and purples of the freshly turned land. There was a rich moist scent of earth and fallen leaves in the air, and it was still — so still ; they could hear nothing but the retreating voices across the fields, and the occasional faint crackling of the beaters in the distant covert. “ After all, there is no place like England ! ” said Roger involuntarily, and leaning against the gate, he began to whistle softly to himself. “ That is not a very cheerful air,” said Betty, after a pause. He gave a short laugh. “ It is a song they sang last night that seems to ring in my head,” he said. “ It is not so very in¬ appropriate. “ ‘ If dead to me my heart’s desire, why should I fear to die?’” he sang in a low rich voice. “ I call that a very weak sentiment,” said Betty coldly. “ I thought you had something to say to me about Dickie ? ” Oh, yes ! about Dickie,” he said, and suddenly resumed his usual grave manner. “ I wanted to tell you, seriously, that I know Mortimer’s business to be in a very bad way, and himself to be in delicate health. If anything happens to him those girls will have to earn their own living. Now, can we take means to ensure Dickie such a musical education that if necessary she may feel herself qualified to play in public or to teach ?” Again that “we!” It was like the old days at Wrayesbrook, and there was something very pleasant in plotting for Dickie once more. After all, he was going to be rational, and there was nothing to fear. “ I thought Mrs. Mortimer would not hear of such a thing, though,” she said. ‘‘ Exactly. But could you make it appear a case of zeal on your part, or invent any other excuse ? If you would only undertake the diplomacy, I will undertake the expenses,” he said. “ Do you think it can be done ? ” “ I have no doubt it can. If you will leave it to me, I will undertake the trouble and the expense,” said Betty a little jealously. “You will not let me work with you? Are you never going to forgive me, Betty ? ” She was completely taken by surprise, after all, and she felt strangely helpless under the gaze of those keen passionate eyes. “ I have quite forgiven you,” she said hurriedly. “ I wish you would think no more about what I said that day. I was very rude, I am afraid, and made a great deal more of my girlish pique than I really felt. It is far better forgotten.” 649 ‘‘ I never forget,” he said quietly. “ But since you have forgiven me, I am going to offend you again. I would not interfere if there were anyone else to do so^ but I cannot stand by and see you sacrificed without a protest. Have you considered what you are doing in marrying a man you do not love ? ” Betty felt what was coming, and all her pride sprang to arms. “How dare you say such a thing to me?” she cried. “Because no one else will dare. Because Mrs. Ward and Dickie are unhappy about you, and because you love Mrs. Ward ten thousand times better than Elliot.” Betty snatched at the first defence she could find. “ Why don’t you say at once that you are jealous of him ? she cried. “ I am madly jealous of him, because he neither deserves nor appreciates what he has won. If you were happy I could bear it ; but you are not happy, and if you marry him you never will be. Nor will he. You will never satisfy him nor yourself Remember I have warned- you that you are preparing certain misery for yourself and him if you marry the man you do not love.” Roger had worked himself into a perfect passion. “ Look in my face and tell me that you love him, then!” he demanded, as Betty made some faint dis¬ claimer. She looked up proudly, but her glance quailed be¬ fore that imperious gaze that seemed to read her very heart. “ You cannot,” he said in a low tone of triumph. “ I will not speak of such things to one who has no right to question me,” answered Betty, low but firm. “ I shall marry Mr. Elliot at Easter : and I will never speak to you again as long as I live ! ” She turned away with quiet dignity, and Roger, left behind, stood like a man suddenly turned to stone. Betty felt as if she had two selves when she gained the covert-side. One was talking calmly, wishing the guns good luck, drawing Dickie away for fear of de¬ laying them longer, and starting homewards with a parting jest and smile. The other was furious, insulted, arguing wildly with herself in the depths of her heart. How dared he speak to her so ? Why did he imagine such cruel things about her? And why, why, why would he put into plain words the terrible suspicion that had haunted her, unacknowledged and unnamed ? She scarcely knew what she was replying to Dickie’s cliatter, and the first sentence she clearly heard as they were nearing home was — “ Oh, do look at the sunset ! ” The little soft white clouds had turned a rosy pink that gathered strength every moment, and the sun was sinking behind a bank of grey clouds whose edges he tipped with burning crimson. As they lingered to watch the sight, the sudden stillness struck Betty like the hushed calm before the storm. The last dropping shots in the coverts had ceased, and Dickie’s merry tongue was still. Suddenly, as they gazed, there rang out upon the

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About ’Buses. 650 clear air two shots in rapid succession, horribly dis¬ tinct, and followed by a vague sound that might have been a shout or cry. The two girls started and gazed into each other’s fcices. Then each began to reason away the fear she read in the other’s eyes. “ It was only someone firing off his gun before he went home,” said Dickie. “ They don’t do that now ; but there could not be anything wrong, they are all so accustomed to guns,” said JhJetty. But there rose before her Roger’s face of despair; and his words, “ I am madly jealous ! ” and the sunset clouds glowed and burned against the pale blue sky, and reflected themselves in a pool at her feet, till to her dazzled eyes the whole world seemed blood-red. Why, why had Fred said Roger was shooting like a demon to-day ? END OF CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH. ABOUT ’BUSES. BY F. M. HOLMES. AS it a trick? Was it a little dodge on the part ot the lady to escape an¬ other fare ? The con¬ ductor seemed to think so, and spoke strongly. Now, when passengers pass certain points tra¬ velling in a ’bus, of course extra prices are charged ; and the lady in question quietly passed the point up to which she had paid, and when, some little dis¬ tance on, her attention was drawn to this fact by the conductor, she seemed quite innocent of the matter. Thus she had a longer ride for her penny than she had paid for — presumably on the way she wanted to go ! From the conductor’s manner and language we imagined he was used to this trick — if such it was in this case. But it is to be feared that some conductors themselves sin in a similar manner by — keeping back, shall we call it ? — some of the money they take in fares. It may be urged that they and the drivers have to fee the horse-keepers at the yards whence the ’buses start, and that this curious development of the tipping system may be held to justify the peculations — at least, to some extent. But that the system is thoroughly wrong we suppose none would deny. However, if the conductor taxes his fares, he appa¬ rently objects veiy much to his fares — in human form —taxing him. Another trick we have seen practised on a conductor was the stopping of the ’bus by a roguish street- boy. The conductor was busy on the top collecting his fares, when up on the foot-board jumps the mis¬ chievous little urchin, sounds the gong, and pulls up the unsuspecting driver. The ’bus stops. What is it ? Street-boy pulls again, and on rumbles the vehicle. Down comes Mr. Conductor, and on this occasion leaps from his ’bus, and, chasing the boy, inflicts condign punishment ; then has to tear along the crowded street to catch his carriage. ’Buses were once called ‘‘ Shillibeers ” : for the simple reason, we suppose, that they were started in London by an enterprising individual of that name. He was an undertaker in the City Road. We do not know what gave him the idea. Perhaps he copied it from ' France ; perhaps he originated it. In any case, the date of the running of the first ’bus was the 4th of July, 1829. Quite a “glorious fourth,” indeed, for the numbers who now make use of this cheap and convenient means of conveyance. Yet of the number who do so, how many know of Shillibeer ? That first ’bus was a large three-horse affair, and plied, not “up and down the City Road,” as the song says, but from Paddington to the City. It provided for twenty-two passengers inside, but it was not until 1849 that a seat was added on the roof. The ’bus is significant of the growth of great cities. Its popularity is characteristic of changes in the habits of’their citizens. When persons lived at their places of business they did not require the morning ’bus. But when they radiated from the centre to the suburbs, when Clapham, Islington, Canonbury, and Paddington rose into great and increasing request as residential localities for men whose business led them to the City, then was required the useful ’bus. Charles Dickens makes but few references to the conveyance destined to become such a feature in metropolitan life. But one of his “ Sketches by Boz ” is devoted to the subject, and another tells of “ The last Cab-driver and the first Omnibus Cad. Cad here is not, we believe, intended as a term of oppro¬ brium, but as short for conductor, as cadging or touting for passengers. The particular “ Cad mentioned was a certain Mr. Barker— an “ assistant waterman to the hackney coach stand,” who perceived the injury that eventually would be inflicted on coach and cab stands by the new system, and, like a shrewd man, made terms with the enemy, and got an engagement on an omnibus. This appears to have been the ^ “ Royal William,” running from Lisson Grove to the City. But though the new system has grown far more than the real or supposititious Mr. Barker, or possibly Dickens himself, surmised, yet there are cabs enough still left in London ! From Dickens, too, we gain an idea of the speedy

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THE FIRST ’bus. increase in the number of ’buses. He speaks of their “rapid increase in the Paddington Road.” This supports references from other sources, that the demand for them grew, and they multiplied accord¬ ingly. We find it said that about 1844 there were some 1,400 omnibuses, and 200 on various ways to Paddington. And when, in 1855, the association now known as the London General Omnibus Company was started, there were numerous proprietors of ’buses in existence, of which several were bought up, though some few of the others remain even until this day. That so many should have been in existence within about twenty-five years of that first ’bus of the enterprising Shillibeer shows how popular the vehicles had become. There were several Frenchmen connected with that scheme of the London General, but they gradually left the concern. Two of the directors, however, now reside in Paris. The scheme was started “ under French laws,” but in 1859 was altered as at present. Some improvements it may be said to have effected, but it was the Road Car Company, started in 1880, which made the most change. They introduced the garden seats on the top of the vehicle, and, better still — especially for ladies — the staircase-way leading to the dizzy heights above. Previously men had to clamber up almost as they could. Yet a third company has recently appeared, “ The London Omnibus Carriage Company,^’ which places the wheels under the ’bus, an arrangement that per¬ mits the body of the vehicle to be wider. Certainly this company’s ’buses are handsome, light, and airy. To some of these carriages inner wheels have been in¬ geniously fitted, so that should the outer wheel come to grief no disaster need be feared. An enthusiastic- conductor was one evening at great pains to explain this to me. What would our friend Shillibeer think of ’bus enterprise in London now ? And though the fares are very low, yet the profits are good, since the London General Omnibus Company pay a ten per cent, dividend, and the Road Car Com¬ pany four and a half per cent, for 1889. We suspect the cheapness, however, in many cases really yields a better return, because with the ever-popular penny for a fare, many persons ride for short distances and the passengers are constantly changing. Thus along a penny distance three or four passengers may occupy the same seat, and the lucky company receive four- pence, whereas, had the “ five sous” been the rule, the- seat might have been vacant the whole way. They da not seem to have learned this in Paris even yet. It is one of the things they do 7zo^ do better in France, even if they did give us the idea of the omnibus. That name “ omnibus ” is, of course, a Latin word, signifying “for all.” It exactly describes a vehicle which is not a private carriage, but literally “ for all who pay their fare. And now about wages. From the report of the last Road Car Company’s meeting, we find that, according

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About ’Buses. 652 to the chairman, the company gives better wages, while its men’s hours are not longer than those of other similar companies. The London General’s drivers get 6s. a day ; the Road Car men, from 6s. to 6s. 6d. The former’s conductors, 4s. per day ; the Road Car conductors, 4s. to 5s. The horse-keepers of the former company, 3s. ; while those of the Road Car Company receive 3s. 5d. Perhaps the latter do not levy black-mail on conductors and drivers. Certainly the tickets which the conductors give to the passen¬ gers indicate there is a check on the receipts. Food for the horses, however, is quite as great, if not a greater, charge than wages. From the London General’s accounts for the latter half of 1889, it seems that the average charge for food foi* each stud — 2>., we understand, eleven horses belonging to each ’bus in work — was only £i2>o for the six months. This was much less than in 1888, when the cost was and in 1886, when the cost was ^134 ; but in 1889 maize was cheap, and the price of food-stuffs gene¬ rally was low. A similar reduction ap¬ pears in the Road Car Company’s accounts. The cost of feeding per horse, per week, was 9s. lod. in the latter six months of 1889, while in the year preceding it was los. 5d. How closely expenses follow on income is seen in the fact that the aver¬ age earnings of each car were £16 i8s. id., and the expenses ^16 4s. id., giving a weekly profit of 14s. per car ; while in the same time of 1888 the average profit was but 6s. qd. per car ; and this, though the average earnings were ^17 is. 4d., for the expenses were ;^i6 14s. yd. The difference of profit appears to be almost entirely due to the reduced cost of food. Small as this profit seems to be, yet there must be a good many penny passengers to make up a total of 1 7 in receipts. But there are lower fares still ! There are one-horse vehicles plying for short distances for one halfpenny. How can they pay? Well, they have no conductor, and, as we have just said, but one horse. Such a ’bus plies regularly up and down Tottenham Court Road, and passengers, for instance, by tramcars which end at Euston Road, find it, no doubt, a convenience for conveyance to and from Oxford Street. It was a shrewd idea for the London General to cut in here and reap something from the competing tram-traffic. But to whom are the fares paid? To no one. There is a box which the driver’s eye can see through an opening or window in the roof. Each passenger rattles his halfpenny into this box. There seems to be a code of honour among the passengers that each shall pay. . If a person has not the nimble brown halfpenny, he must seek change from his fellows or from the driver. These vehicles are so convenient, and we imagine answer so well, that we should not be surprised at the great multiplication of their number. The railway companies are now running ’buses for the convenience of their passengers, though those conveyances compete with the cabbies rather than with other omnibuses. On giving notice, pater¬ familias, who may have to convoy a large family, with baggage galore, to the seaside, can have for a fixed charge a well-ap¬ pointed vehicle at his door, ready to transport the whole in comfort to the station. And, as we are speaking of the various kinds, there are the large three-horse ’buses of the Metropolitan Railway plying between Portland Station and Regent Street. The drivers of these im¬ portant-looking carriages are favoured above their professional brethren by having a curious umbrella fixed over their heads. As the ponderous machine rolls along, the umbrella seems to shake as though it would fall, but it never does overwhelm the Jehu it is placed to protect. Then there are the “Pirate” ’buses. Of these beware. They fly no black flag with skull and cross- bones ; their designs are not murderous, but mer¬ cenary. They appear like other ’buses, and quite innocent and useful. But the luckless passenger may find he has to pay sixpence instead of a penny, or at least double fares. This may not be ruinous, but it is annoying. It causeth the man to mutter, and the woman to speak out a bit of her mind. It breaketh the cheeriness of the jolting journey ; you feel you have been “ done ” or “ had,” deprived of your money unjustly, and no one likes that. There is no help for it. No law, of course, prevails, fixing the rate of fares, and these private speculators running their vehicles along well-known routes can legally charge as they choose. We have seen a story somewhere that Mr. Gladstone was thus taken in once by a pirate ’bus, and the ex-Premier revenged himself by warning all unsuspecting passengers about to enter THE RAILWAY ’BUS.

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About ’Buses. 653 THE LUBBERS’ LADDER. of the true state of the case. Whether true or not, it shows how the pirate may be punished in a very practical way. But as prevention is certainly better than punishment in this case, the unaccustomed passenger should see that the name of some well- known company or proprietor is on the ’bus, or inspect the table of fares on entering the vehicle. This last resource, however, is an awkward one, as it is un¬ pleasant to have to stop the ’bus and leave amidst the abuse of the conductor, who will probably demand his fare all the same. What is required for the public pro¬ tection is that the table of fares be posted in a con¬ spicuous position outside the vehicle, near the entrance. On the difficult question of the men’s hours we shall say but little. They are too long. At a meeting held not so. very long since, it was stated that the men worked from fourteen to eighteen hours per day. From in¬ vestigations we have ourselves made this seems about correct, though we should have said seventeen hours. Times for meals, too, are said to be irregular and inadequate. This grievance, again, can be remedied by shorter shifts of hours. It will, perhaps, surprise some people to learn how many men are engaged in the ’bus and tram traffic of London. Mr. T. Sutherst, at the meeting referred to, said there were five omnibus and twelve tramway companies in London, and some 10,000 men were altogether engaged ; the capital employed was about four million pounds, while the profits were some £2^0^000 a year. An enormous development this — including the trams — of the venture of the enterprising Shillibeer in 1829. The men engaged would, with their families, make quite a respectable-sized town. Yet so vast is London, that their numbers are but as the proverbial drop in the bucket to the myriads of the mighty City. The use of ’buses seems to be increasing. The traffic receipts of the London General amounted to ;^I2,578 os. 4d. in a week in March, 1890, notwith¬ standing the lowness of fares ; while in the corre¬ sponding week of the preceding year they were ^11,805 6s. 9d. The Road Car Company’s receipts for the same week were £z-S'io os. 2d., and in the preceding year ^2,402 9s. id., showing in both cases a substantial increase. In fact, London is so large, and the advantage of cheap conveyance so great, that these vehicles meet an immense public want, and meet it, too, in a fairly satisfactory manner. In the rural districts, ’buses connecting with rail¬ ways are sometimes dignified by the name of ‘‘coach.’^ Some are, indeed, different from the London ’bus, in that much of the space at the top is fairly level for luggage, while there is but a second seat behind the driver, capable of accommodating four or five persons. We remember a ride on one, when piled with luggage and persons somewhat mixed on the top ; the two horses were thought unequal to the task of dragging it up certain hills, and finally a fiery steed, used to shunting on the railway, was attached in front, and a porter sitting jolting astride, the ’bus made a start ; but, alas ! now and again the fastenings gave way, and on went the gaunt, bony beast with his jolting rider, leaving us behind. It was a sight, no doubt, to make the Jehus of the City shout with laughter, but all the same that ’bus sometimes required the most careful driving— and got it. When returning, it was again very crowded. It was well there were no lynx-eyed City police on the watch, or some pas¬ sengers might have been left behind. THE sirens’ STAIRCASE.

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Piano. Voice. 654 Words by S. S. M‘Cukky. \ _ t-i--a-=r Vlp ' Music by Erskine Allon. -F — q- :g_. - A->-^ -^-1- m Allegretto semplice. A maiden’s soHg a-woke the dell, As shades of eve a-round me - =n--T— Dip iiSr :p=I=tr Ped. cres. 5H Ped. r^-trcuc^iz; dim. — ^ H — ^ ^ ^ 2II^" ^ ‘w ^ ^ ^ - ^ - ^ fell; I heard it floai, now faint, now strong. The hoar-y lin-den-trees a - mong. Like far -off -15 dim. -g-^- i£^r=iK=gz I - : — - _ T — r- =]- poco animato. — mf_s,irZZT^ - - 1 - - L* note of vil - lage bell, Like far-off note of vil - lage bell. ’Twas some old strain whose - - - 'Is Dip poco agitato. zlA dim - - i - ?- g t: : — sr-izzi: rc?: P- lone-ly swell My days of boy-hood knew so well, The oft - told tale of love, of gfc|*fs;u-^=*E:3Z=rzz;i=rrz=3iir=zf^E5irnfei^^ j” ^IgLp^atqjgZjic: -Jl^^rari^zziz --|; "Ir /■ - ?Vz ~ - u - - en - - do. Tempo I mo. pp 9 ^ ^ — m — M ^iSiEiEiES^S Ped. sj« Ped.

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655

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656 A NEW HOME OCCUPATION FOR LADIES. HOW many wo¬ men there are who admire pretty things, and long to have their houses full of them, but yet have no oppor¬ tunity of executing any pieces of art work that rec[uire much time or labour! Some of the minor arts must be thoroughly sUrdied before good specimens can be produced ; for ex¬ ample, wood-carv¬ ing, repousse work, glass-staining, and china-painting. So the busy ones con¬ tent themselves with needlework, which they can take up or put down at a moment’s notice. A change of occu¬ pation, however, is pleasant, and I think that hundreds of young women will be delighted to find what charm¬ ing articles they can produce in Bossa Fascilis. It is well known that our Royal Family feel a great interest in all kinds of artistic work, so it did not surprise me to learn that the Princess Louise had taken a lesson in Bossa Fascilis from the inventor. It is so easy to do, that for a skilled artist like the Princess Louise one lesson would suffice. I intend to describe the work fully, so that our readers will have no difficulty in producing perfect specimens. No one need fail with a little persever¬ ance and determination to succeed ; still, practice is indispensable if we would turn out first-class ex¬ amples. The firm, clear outline, the exquisitely rounded curve, show the master-hand, and at a glance we can tell the faltering lines of the amateur’s first attempts. Bossa Fascilis somewhat resembles repousse work when completed, but it is not laborious, as that is ; nor is it noisy, for there is no punching or hammering to be done. Only the simplest of materials are needed. To enumerate them : first, there is the thin metal plate which looks much like silver, and which is to be em¬ bossed. These can be had of all sizes and shapes, to suit any ordinary purpose ; they are, in fact, metal panels. A few wooden tools of varied forms, but all with rounded tips, are specially made for the em¬ bossing. An agate style, some “filling,” a wooden panel, a square of glass, and a piece of thick felt are also required. For the further decoration of the panel, oil and lustra colours are used ; also for certain speci¬ mens imitation jewels, which can be obtained ready set in gilt mounts. The materials and tools, with requisite instructions, would cost the worker a guinea. This includes a panel ready traced and commenced, but oil and lustra colours are extras. To give our readers a fair idea of the art of Bossa Fascilis, I will describe the entire working out of one piece. On the thin metal plate the design can be sketched direct, or a tracing taken from a drawing may be transferred to it ; the latter plan is the best for amateurs, especially those who are not particularly good draughtsmen, to adopt. Red or black transfer- paper can be used, and the design can be fixed by going over the outlines with oil colour. For a be¬ ginner this will prove helpful, but when, after practice, the work can be quickly done, it will be unnecessary. The tracing, or sketch, is made on the face of the plate ; the outlines are next gone over with the agate style, which indents the metal so that the lines show on the back. Now the plate is turned face down¬ wards on the piece of felt, and the design is embossed by the aid of the rounded wooden tools. The metal is sufficiently soft to allow of the design being simply pressed out, so that no exertion is required on the part of the worker. When the whole is well modelled the plate is again turned over, but this time the back rests on the square of glass. The outlines are then gone over to make them perfectly clear, firm, and even ; for this purpose a wooden tool that is only slightly rounded at the tip is employed. The reason why glass is selected for laying the plate upon during the process of marking out the design finally, is found in the fact that it does not yield to pressure. The embossing being thus successfully accomplished, the next move is to make it invulnerable, as far as possible, to knocks, for as the metal is thin it easily dents. There is a particular kind of “ filling,” or paste, which is found to answer better than plaster of Paris, which was used when Bossa Fascilis was first brought out. The design at the back of the plate is concave, and this is filled in with the paste, which soon hardens, and becomes a support for the embossment. A sheet of paper is pasted over the back, and the piece is then ready for mounting on the wooden panel. The edges of the metal are turned over the sides of the wood panel, and nailed down to it ; a few nails are also hammered through the design to keep the metal close to the mount ; these do not show when the piece is painted. The modes of decorating the embossed panels are so various that an ingenious worker can use the same

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A New Home Occupation for Ladies. 657 design several times, and yet secure quite different effects. Lustra colours are particularly well suited for the work ; the metallic glitter corresponds with the metal design, or ground, which is left visible. If a floral arrangement is only slightly conventionalised, then I think oil colours are preferable, but this is all a matter of taste. Camel-hair brushes are used for laying on the colours. Occasionally a piece is done with transparent oil colours that allow the metal to show through ; this manner of working imparts a gleaming silvery effect that is extremely pleasing. In colouring a panel, the design may be left plain, and the background alone be painted, or the design may be touched in parts with colour. On the contrary, the ground may be of the metal, with an embossed coloured design upon it. Metal backgrounds may be incised with set patterns by the aid of a pointed tool. These should be simple— such as the scale armour pattern— so as not to detract from the embossment. Then, again, backgrounds may be painted entirely in one colour, or varied tints may be employed between different portions of set designs ; for example, an embossed monogram may be backed with a contrast¬ ing colour to that laid on the rest of the ground of the panel. Old illumi¬ nated missals would afford hundreds of good ideas to workers. Once more, backgrounds may be shaded from light to dark, or one colour may be gradually blended into another. It will be as well for me to take our illustrations, which have been supplied by the inventor of Bossa Fascilis, Mr. Elliott, and describe how they can be suc¬ cessfully decorated with colour. These clever, effective, bold designs are from Mr. Elliott’s own hand ; our readers, there¬ fore, enjoy not only the opportunity of copy ing a true artist’s work, but of execut¬ ing designs made expressly for Bossa Fascilis. The monogram book-cover can be made to re¬ semble, when finished, old leather. It is a splendid design, and, if well executed, makes an exceedingly handsome album-cover, blotter-case, or book-cover. The background of the design is partially carried out in deep rich blue, and partially in a tan shade. The upper portion is blue, whilst the broken semicircles in the left-hand lower corner are tan-coloured. The conventionalised leaves are all of silver, and lozenges of silver encircle the monogram, and the flowers are tinted. The border is tan with silver design, and the edging is of blue and silver. I allude to the metal when I speak of silver, for no silver is laid on when carrying out any of the designs. These articles cannot be satisfactorily mounted at home ; leather is the best combination, but brocade can be used. The second illustration represents a blotter-case, en¬ riched with arabesque design, and studded with jewels. The groundwork of the centre is the metal left un¬ touched with colour. The embossed arabesques are tinted with shades of chrome and Indian red, and the border is chrome, with imitation opals, emeralds, and diamonds placed on it at set intervals. At the four corners are jewels ; three ornament the centre, and each of the raised diamond-shaped portions of the design has one jewel to relieve it. The tone of colouring is soft brown, ranging from yellow to deep, warm, red-brown. Both these designs can, of course, be coloured to suit the worker’s fancy. I have de¬ scribed the scheme of colouring used upon the finished specimens, thinking that it would be a help to beginners, and would give them some idea of the work when complete. Our initial illustra¬ tion, of poppies, may be done entirely in oils in naturalistic style ; the back¬ ground may be of cream shade, with wide bands of deep blue crossing it dia¬ gonally. This makes a pretty wall-plaque or cabinet panel. None of the metal is here left visible ; it differs from an ordi¬ nary painting only so far as regards the embossment. For photo-frames an excellent effect is gained by painting the ground some rich colour, such as olive-green, deep red, or blue, and tinting the fine design to resemble ivory. A large oblong panel, with space for photo, can bear a design of acorns done in transparent oil colours, to show the metal slightly through the colours. MONOGRAM BOOK-COVER. 762

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658 EMBOSSED AND JEWELLED BLOTTER-CASE. Some charming panels have been designed as up¬ right backs for brackets. One has the background shaded from brown to cream, and upon this is a group of terra-cotta and yellow-tinted chrysan¬ themums. The second has a blue-grey ground, with graceful yellow and cream poppies ; these form a pair. Sconce-panels are also arranged with wrought- iron candle-holders. Some of these are diamond¬ shaped ; they make a very agreeable change from the now general 7'epoiisse brass and copper sconces. Wall-plaques and photo-frames can be mounted in mahogany headings, or in wood enamelled to cor¬ respond with the design. Bossa Fascilis is just the thing for ornamenting writing-table sets, which are now made e7i suite: blotter, envelope-case, ink- stand, post card case and calendar, letter-rack, and open box for unanswered notes. I think, too, a panel of Bossa Fascilis would greatly enhance the beauty of an expanding photo-screen for the table. These are some of the smaller articles it will suit, but it can be used for door-panels, heraldic shields, friezes, mirror-frames, and furniture decorations. E. Crosslevt. HOW MEN HIT THE BULUS-EYE. 'UCCESSis everyone’s mark. But only a few put an arrow in the white. Sometimes it is a ran¬ dom shot that does it. It can¬ not be denied that there are such things as happy accidents. The stocking-frame and the spinning-jenny were the almost hap-hazard inventions of William Lee and James Har¬ greaves. Cheap pottery came into existence at Burslem through a girl neglecting a vessel suspended over her fire. The contents were a solution of common salt intended to be used in curing pork. The liquid boiled over, and spread across the unglazed exterior of the vessel ; uniting with the brown clay surface it soon gave a brand-new enamel. A working potter in the neighbour¬ hood heard of it, and came to inquire. The result was a great development of local industry. Schan- ward, a plain glass-cutter of the quaint old German city of Nuremberg, has linked his name inseparably with the rise of the art of etching on glass. His fame followed on a neat and timely guess. Some aquafortis fell upon his spectacles. He saw that in consequence the glass was corroded and made soft to the touch of tools. Thereupon he drew figures on a transparent plate, buried them beneath varnish, applied the acid to the ground of the design, and soon had his sketch standing out in effective relief. An eminent living liiih'ateur has related that his

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How Men Hit earliest real success came to him by the channel of coincidence. A great writer of the day required special service rendered, and it was in his power through an accident of early association to help. The fable of the lion and the mouse received a fresh application. The need and the supply were brought adventitiously together. It proved a useful intro¬ duction. The door of opportunity which had seemed closed before was now opened, and the young worker made the most of his chances. Another hand may assist in drawing the bow. Louis XIV. of France was present in 1667 at the siege of Douay. He was eager for the fame of the victorious soldier ; but his heart failed him. The fire from the city was heavy, and the king’s suite urged that he should retire and not further expose a valuable life. Louis was tempted to yield. An encouraging whisper from his friend and adviser, De Charost, saved him from discredit, and gave Douay into his hands. The wine is drawn, it must be drunk,” said the courtier of stouter courage. And Louis stayed and earned the applause of his troops. Nevertheless most men hit the bull’s-eye otherwise. Purpose and persistence train effort upon the difficult mark. Three typical careers of the century prove it. Jean Francois Millet, the French peasant-painter, was face to face with absolute want many times. Year after year it seemed as if reward and recognition were hopeless. But he worked on and waited, and at last reached the goal of popular appreciation. The world has since looked on and seen America and France in friendly rivalry for the possession of Millet’s master¬ piece, “The Angelus.” There could be no doubt when the final price was registered that the painter had hit the bull’s-eye. Thomas Carlyle was repulsed in his early attempts to achieve success in literature. Fie knew that a publisher’s “ No ” was bitter. It was slow work winning the common ear for riddles of wisdom. It appeared as if the stout shot, “ Sartor Resartus,” had missed. But Carlyle did not allow chagrin to pass into despair. He steadily bettered his equipment, aimed at his mark again, and scored. Benjamin Disraeli had set his mind on high place, but could he touch that target ? Was there the remotest chance for him — a novel-writer, a lion of salons^ some said a fop, without great wealth or powerful connections or commanding birth ? And it is a story that will quicken young ambition to far years how Disraeli answered those questions, and by resolute force of will, fertility in resource, and patient repetition of endeavour, planted his arrow in the white and stood at the red despatch-box, Prime Minister of England. At the outset of life these winning qualities will almost surely be shown. From the annals of music an example may be taken. Dr. Thomas Augustine Arne, whose music to the masque of Coimis gained for him a high reputation, as a lad was destined for the law. His father would hear of nothing else. He was educated at Eton, and on leaving school was placed in a solicitor’s office for a term of three years. But young Arne had musical proclivities and THE BuLL’S-FYE. 659 ambitions and hopes, which were to shape his career in spite of adverse appearances. He privately con¬ veyed a spinet to his bed-chamber, and practised when supposed to be at rest. There was risk of detection, with a possible thrashing to follow. Arne was not unfilial, but held that he had a moral right at least to gratify his passion for music in leisure hours. He had a plan to avoid home friction. He muffled the strings of his instrument with a handkei- chief, and under these disadvantageous conditions still made progress. To the man who intended to succeed, means were available. It is ever so. Mr. Archibald Forbes, in the first years of manhood, was a soldier in the ranks. But he was persuaded that he had the power to do a notable thing or two yet with the sword’s ancient rival, the pen. He would make his mark as a writer. His attention was directed to an offer of a prize of fifteen guineas for an essay on “ The Advantages the Mother Country derives from her Colonies,” to be written by a working man. It seemed to Mr. Forbes that he met this condition. But his knowledge at the time of the British Colonies was limited. He was not then the travelled “ special correspondent ” of great newspapers. Where were his books of reference.^ He was stationed at Weedon, a place without either a free or a subscription library. But the obstacles were no matter. The prize had to be won ; he v/ould hit the bull’s-eye. The young soldier rummaged round and discovered an old encyclopaedia: 'It was enough. Industry, application, and native gifts did the rest, and the fifteen guineas went into Archibald Forbes’s pocket. But one of the surest ways of attaining success is by sighting a popular or professional want, and proceed¬ ing to supply it. A lady once tried to treat wjth an eminent firm of publishers for the disposal of manu¬ scripts in various departments of literature. It was in vain. She encountered a polite negative. There was at the moment no market for these wares. “ Then what is wanted 1 ” she asked bravely. “ A good Cookery Book,” said the representative of the house. The lady went away, and worked, and sent in “ copy ” again ; and her production this time was welcomed, published, and netted her a large sum. Eli Witney Blake was engaged, in the year 1852, in the work of macadamising the streets of Westville, in the United States. It seemed to him that there was waste of labour, and that it should be possible to im¬ prove on ancient methods. Perceiving the lack, he looked keenly for a contrivance to meet it. His search was energetic and persevering. Money was in the machine even now looming dimly before his mind’s eye. Experiment followed experiment, until at the end of five years Mr. Blake came before the mechani¬ cal world with the invention of the stone-breaker that bears his name, and which has everywhere come into use for breaking ores and preparing road-metal. In like manner Gail Borden noticed a deficiency in the matter of convenient and portable food for emigrants, and people undertaking long journeys over the ocean or through desolate lands. He thought, and in¬ vestigated, and pushed forward to his chosen mark.

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66o Autumn Gardening. In the course of time he hit the bulFs-eye. Gail Borden originated the ever-useful pemmican — lean meat dried, pounded, and pressed into cakes. The value of his invention was thoroughly tested by Dr. Kane on his Arctic expedition ; and in the Xondon Exhibition of 1852 he was awarded the Great Council medal. Yet a third American inventor had his attention called to a current need by advertisement. Andrew Campbell was a son of the soil, but too energetic and inquisitive to follow the plough. His guardians bound him apprentice to a carriage-maker ; but work was slack, there was small opportunity for learning the trade, and the lad took it upon himself to terminate the contract, and enter upon another elsewhere. He was already wondering how he should hit the bulPs-eye. And he read one day a liberal offer for a printing press, to turn out five hundred copies per hour. Campbell’s acquaintance with such machines was comparatively slight, but he set to work at once to learn and scheme and model. He framed a specimen press which promised to meet the indicated requirements. But on this occasion he was too late. The time for examina¬ tion was past. The disappointment may have vexed him, but it did not lead to the abandonment of the enterprise. He toiled on at perfecting his plans. And in this way he scored success as the designer of the earliest known registering power printing press for colour-work. It was a genuine and important want that Sir Humphry Davy supplied with his miners’ safety lamp ; and Sir James Young Simpson with the marvellous anaesthetic, chloroform ; and Messrs. William Fothergill Cooke and Charles Wheatstone with the pfactical introduction of the electric telegraph ; and Julius Reuter with his news agency system ; and Mr. Isaac Pitman with his art of phono¬ graphy— to group together as a concluding illustration a set of very various fresh departures. To see where there is room for a new material in manufacture, a new way to sell old wares, or a novel relief to labour, and to occupy the vacant spot, is generally to achieve success. Meissonier, the French painter, used for one of his striking canvases a model of a prancing horse. The model was shaped by his own hands, and the work occupied the mornings of a whole month. The painter was careless of the cost in time and trouble, so that he could compass exactitude to the living animal. Of his compatriot, Detaille, it is said in Paris that “ he has a camera in his eye,” so patient and thorough is the artist’s observation as he moves to and fro. The most painstaking study of scene or object precedes the labour of reproduction. Lord Lyndhurst was counsel in a cause ceVebre relating to the invention of the bobbin-net machine. He was resolved to hit the bull’s-eye ; and his method was full familiarity with all his details prior to coming into court. The reading of papers, the hearing of witnesses, the explanations of his client were not enough. Technical knowledge would play a great part in the case, and this knowledge he would have. The determined advocate went down to Nottingham, stood at a loom, and invited instruction. He bent his whole energies to the mastery of a new employment, and he did not leave the mill until he had grasped the principle of the machine very thoroughly. At the trial he exhibited a beautiful little model, put his points clearly, and backed them up by working his miniature machine. And he won the verdict. Suc¬ cess was due to resolute making-ready betimes to win it. The world still has its ambitious young marksmen. Many of them are clever. But if they are to hit the bull’s-eye, they must not trust to fortune. This may either serve or fail them. It is wisest to seek a royal will, a quick eye, a patient power of preparation. W. J. Lacey. AUTUMN GARDENING. HEN we begin to speak of autumn gardening, we know at once that we are rapidly leaving summer behind us ; and for that reason we shall give here a few hints as to the cultivation of those flowers whose bloom delights us in the wane of the warmer months. And perhaps one of the most showy and useful autumn flowers is one of which we have as yet said but little, and that is the aster. It has a very large family, as we shall presently see, though to attempt to enumerate all the different members of it would be next to impossible in our limited space. The aster, as we can at once perceive, is so called from its star-lW^Q appearance ; the natural order to which it belongs is that of the Compositas — the same order of which the dahlia, and even our common daisy, are also members. There are, of course, a few green¬ house species of* the aster, of which we may say something presently, but the vast majority of the family belong to the hardy herbaceous class, and we can rear them fearlessly in our ordinary garden soil. And we might here with advantage enumerate a few of the hardy sort that bloom in September and October. Of the old-fashioned class are, for example, the Aster puniceus^ or red-stalked aster : its pro¬ perties are oblong lanceolate leaves and branching

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Autumn Gardening. 66 1 GIVING SUPPORT. Stem ; it bears numbers of blue composite flowers, and grows to a considerable height. The New England aster does not attain so great a height, and yields fine purple composite flowers ; the Aster co7icolor is an October bloomer, grows about a foot in height, and gives purple flowers ; while the Aster difftisus^ also an October bloomer, attains, perhaps, the height of two feet, and gives white flowers. North America is the natural home of all these. A more modern kind for our open flovver-beds is the Victoria. The general effect of an aster-bed is admirable, and for hand¬ picking at a time when many other flowers are be¬ ginning to fail us they are simply invaluable. The greenhouse species can be raised by cuttings under a bell-glass — use plenty of sand, with peat and loam. Of this class we may name Aster erubesce7is^ a red flower blooming in June ; Exasperatiis., a white specimen flowering a little earlier ; as also does Frti- ticulosus.^ a blue one. Many others, of course, of both the hardy and the greenhouse kind, could be named. The dahlia may certainly be called another autumn flower, though, indeed, by the middle of October its glories are beginning to disappear, as the first frost, for the most part, knocks them over. Briefly here we might give in outline the way in which we usually rear this gaudy flower. Perhaps in the third week of May we buy our young dahlia in a pot to which already the roots are so ad¬ hering that it is almost pot-bound. In our ordinary garden soil we then dig a small hole, into which we at once turn out our dahlia, driving in first of all a good stake, to which we shall secure it. We then give it a plentiful watering — in fact, we may say a soaking — and this watering must afterwards during the summer never be neglected, or our dahlia will assuredly fail. On the top of the stake we place an empty flower-pot, which will serve as an admirable trap for the earwig, which has ever, alas ! been accus¬ tomed to feast on the dahlia, and thus occa¬ sion a defective bloom. You will next find that, as your plant grows, most likely addi¬ tional stakes will be needed for its support, the stem and stalks of the dahlia being singu¬ larly brittle. Watering, supporting by stakes, and watchfulness against the attacks of the earwig, are the chief necessities in the culture of this handsome flower. Its charm is in its variety and brilliancy of colours, but cer¬ tainly not in its fragrance. The chrysanthemum is another autumn flower on which we largely depend both this month and the next ; here, again, we shall not sing the praises of the fragrancy of the chrysanthemum. The soil best adapted to its growth is turfy loam and peat, or, if the turf has not thoroughly decayed into the loam, you had better add a little leaf-mould. As, however, this flower may be called essen¬ tially a November flower, we must say a little more about it next month. After Michaelmas our greenhouse is well stocked for the winter, for here it is, for the most part, that we gardeners on a limited scale have to shelter our supply of cuttings for the following summer, our few exhibition flowers for the autumn, and even, it may be, the little grape-vine over our head. With this last we shall probably decide to do away altogether, for grapes and flowers seldom succeed for long together. It may do for a short time, but in a year or two we generally find that mildew sets in, and that grapes are lost and flowers are hindered and droop. And indeed, even in the absence of the vine, considerable care is necessary in the greenhouse in the autumn. If it be a warm season, some of our cuttings are disposed, perhaps, to go ahead more than we like ; and if it be a rainy season, we are in fear of many damping off. Plenty of air is needful just now in our crowded house ; and during much rain a fire should be lit, and, with the aid of opened glass and door, every effort should be made to keep the house as dry as we can.

Page 680

662 A Disciple of Mesmer : a Story of Hypnotism. Our open flower-beds will, doubtless, be yet fairly gay for the time of year, and if we have been careful to maintain in the greenhouse a supply of successional bloom with which to fill up blanks in our beds, by plunging flowers in them we may continue to be gay even to the end of the month. Our apple and pear harvesting is, of course, in full swing just now, and will very soon be over but in the kitchen garden we are busy also harvesting our potatoes — an operation which ought never to be postponed later than the present month. Celery will need, too, just now a regular and careful earthing up ; but all un¬ occupied spaces may well be filled with cabbage plants, as in a very few weeks they will be large enough for consumption as greens, at a time when other vegetables are growing scarce. A DISCIPLE OF MESMER: A STORY OF HYPNOTISM. BY HENRY FRITH. CHAPTER THE FIRST. A MYSTERIOUS PATIENT. GENTLEMAN wishes to see you, sir,” said the polite man-servant to his master in his study. Dr. Bensing turned round, and putting down the volume that he was reading, said firmly, ‘‘Arnold, have not I told you never to disturb me after five o’clock ?’’ “ Yes, sir ; but this gentleman is a foreigner — a wealthy person, I should say ; he was most particularly positive, and - ” “ Pecuniarily persuasive, I dare say ! ” interrupted the physician. “Well, I will not permit any violation of even implied contracts. Show him into my con¬ sulting-room : I will see him. But, Arnold, you must not take bribes from my clients, remember.” “ I declare, sir - ’’ “ Don’t,” said the physician ; “ only remember my instructions.” The man-servant departed — only half convinced. His master walked to the window, musing. “ He will be one too many for me some day,” he muttered. “ I can hardly keep him in order now. His will is stronger than mine, and if he once obtains the upper hand I am ‘ a lost mutton.’ Well, well ; I wonder who this queer patient is who has persuaded Arnold to risk dismissal.” Dr. Bensing was, at that time, what is termed a “ general practitioner,” with a certain limit as to the “ general ! ” He drove out at ten a.m. every day, except Sundays, when he usually, walked — if he could — and he returned at five, when he would see no one^ unless the case was extremely urgent. His assistant then attended the poorer patients, and the doctor rested until it was time to look in at any patient’s bedside. This was his daily routine. In appearance he was genial, grey, and benevolent. He was rather under than over the middle height, walked with a swinging of the arms ; and in all weathers, in all seasons, was dressed in a frock coat, a white waistcoat, and sported a flower in his button-hole. He was a widower with one child, a daughter, named Irene : a very pretty girl of nineteen, most fascinating in manner, and of a firmness of character astonishing in one so young. Of the other inmates, only one need be mentioned. This was Arnold the footman— a person of polished exterior and good manners. His history was a curious one. The doctor- had discovered him in a workhouse. Struck by his manner and bearing while under his care, the- gentle physician took him into his service ; and, so- far as he was aware, Arnold had not proved unworthy. He was an ambitious, strong-willed man ; evidently he had been well educated, and he already had picked up some knowledge of drugs. Of his distant past no one knew anything. He had considerable influence with the doctor, and very much admired MissBensing^ who rather distrusted him. But the doctor could see nothing wrong in his protegt^ and went his rounds cheerfully ; although he had at times much ado to- keep up appearances in accordance with the resplen¬ dent brass plate which announced him “physician and surgeon” to all in South Lambeth and social Stockwell.

Page 681

A Disciple of Mesmer : a Story of Hypnotism. The doctor passed on into his consulting-room where his patient was, somewhat impatiently, await¬ ing him. The moment the physician crossed the threshold he experienced a most peculiar sensation. He felt attracted towards his visitor, and, like all weak natures, felt inclined to “gush.’^ The visitor, too, seemed to be above the usual level of Dr. Bensing’s patients. Besides, an air of mystery hung about the man, and excited the doctor’s curiosity. Would he detail his symptoms? “ I have not come for advice exactly,” said the stranger in a peculiar tone ; “ I only want you to make up this prescription.” The doctor looked surprised, took the paper ex¬ tended to him, glanced at it, shook his head, and returned the creased and tumbled document. “ i cannot make that up,” he replied ; ‘‘ and I am sure no chemist in England will.’’ “Just so,” replied the stranger. “But I want it. You have a surgery here. Give me the drugs, and I will make your fortune. It is for my own use, I declare.” “ But it is poison ! You could commit a series of crimes almost undetected with such a quantity. My peace of mind would be gone for ever if I let you have such a mixture. Why do you come to me ? ” “ Because others will not do it. I can have the stuff on the Continent ; it is necessary for me. I cannot perform without it. I shall die ! ’’’ “ Are you an actor, then? ” asked the doctor. “No; a hypnotist — a mesmerist — a public per¬ former. I repeat, give me the drugs, and 1 will make your fortune! Now, is it a bargain? I must have it ! ” “ Not from me,” replied Dr. Bensing gently. He was a poor man ; he dimly perceived that the stranger might be useful to him, but he could not screw up his courage to run the risk. Besides, his conscience was not easy on the subject. The man might be honest ; but suppose he committed murder 1 “ No,” he said, “ I ca7i't I “ Well then, you shall I retorted the stranger, fixing his steel-blue eyes on the doctor’s face. ^''Yoic are going to do it. Listen to me : fix your eyes on this coin : it is your fee. Go down, and make this up,” he continued, slowly and firmly. “ Put the drugs into the form of lozenges, and bring them back. Take care of the prescription ! ” The doctor stared, rather vacantly, at his imperious patient, but. in obedience to the wave of his hand he proceeded downstairs— a few steps only — to the surgery, which was then unoccupied, mixed and com¬ pounded the lozenges, and then carried them up to the mysterious mesmerist. “ Many thanks ! ” said the latter. “ Here is your fee. Come and see me to-night in the Concert Hall. Send in your card. You have saved my life ! Remain where you are until the clock strikes the quarter to six. Be seated.” So saying, he placed the dazed general practitioner in a chair, and quitted the room. Arnold subsequently 663 opened the door, and let him out. The mesmerist looked at him sharply. “ Hum I ” he muttered as he walked away. “ I think I know that young man. Helen will remember, I dare say. I will do that poor Bensing a good turn. He is clever, good-hearted, but weak — very weak ; his servant could give him many points in will-power. Now, who is he ? I must ascertain his identity.” CHAPTER THE SECOND. THE» MESMERIST. Meanwhile a very different scene was being enactea in the drawing-room of the small suburban house in which the physician and his daughter resided. Miss- Bensing, another young lady, and an extremely pleasant young gentleman were seated at a cosy table, discussing various items of news with their five o’clock tea. “ You must come, Irene,” said the young man. “ Bessie and I will see you home. The doctor will not want you.” “But he she replied. “He sees so little of me all day — I see him seldom except on Sundays — that I do not feel I am justified in leaving him a whole evening. Besides, I don’t care for mesmerism. I don’t believe in it.” “ Then you won’t come ? ” said the young man,, looking very much disappointed. “ I am sure we- don’t see much of each other.” “Quite as much as is good for you, you greedy boy!” she replied playfully. “You must not come- dangling after me when you have your work to do. When you have passed your examination, and are really a solicitor, then you may come oftener. We must keep him in order, Bessie, must not we ? ” “ I think he is very patient,” replied the other lady,, who was Cecil Denton’s sister. “ I am sure if I were engaged I should not be so obedient as he is.” “ Yes, you would if you knew that I am such a determined character, and that I think I am worth waiting for,” replied Irene, with some seriousness of manner. “ Cecil knows papa’s views, and so do I. But he has been good, and I will go with you this- evening, Bessie. Yes, dear,” she said, turning to her lover, “ I know it is hard to wait : am not I also waiting ?” Bessie made no remark as her friend’s slim fingers- sought her brother’s wide broad palm, and his thicker, but supremely “ orderly,” digits enclosed the slender hand of his lady-love. “ You are my guardian angel, darling,” he whispered. “ I know how good and true you are ! ” Miss Denton, having carefully studied the bubbles- in her tea-cup, now looked up, and said, “Reny dear,. I think I will ask your father to come with us to this exhibition to-night.” Good-natured Bessie ! making an excuse to leave the lovers alone. “ I heard the street-door shut : his visitor is gone. . Excuse me a moment, won’t you ? she continued. Irene blushed and smiled. Cecil told his sister

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664 A Disciple of Mesmer : a Story of Hypnotism. not to hurry on his account, and then Miss Denton descended to the study. But her old friend was not there ; so she turned to the consulting-room, and knocked at the door. There was no answer. “Oh, Arnold she said, “is the doctor disengaged.?” The man, who had suddenly appeared at her side, bowed slightly as he replied — “Yes, miss, I think so. Do you wish to see him ? I think you can go in, miss — allow me.” Arnold quietly anticipated his master’s friend, and opening the door, looked in — “Miss Denton, sir.” No answer. Bessie entered with Arnold. The doctor was seated and staring into vacancy — seemingly in a trance. “ He’s been set asleep by the professor,” muttered the man. “ / knew him ! Let’s see— I think I can awake him. Get up, sir ; time’s up ! Why, here’s a prescription, a tumbled one too. Get up, sir ; time’s up ! ” Miss Denton stared at Arnold as he made some rapid strokes with his hand before the doctor’s eyes. The physician awoke, and as he regained his ordinary composure the chimes tingled out the three-quarters past five. “ Has the gentleman gone ? I was asleep, my dear ; in a brown study— ha, ha ! Come into the library. Thank you, Arnold ; you need not wait ; I am quite well now.” As they quitted the room the pleasant manner of the servant changed, and he muttered, “A queer prescription this looks ! I will ask Mr. Jones (the assistant) about this. Hum ! And fancy my old professor coming here. Did he recognise me, I wonder? If he did^ and he speaks out, my chances of getting on are very small. Bob Arnold, my boy, ‘ faint heart never won fair lady ; ’ and you intend to win Miss Irene, and cut out Denton. I see my way to getting over the doctor ; I can control him : I see that. The game is mine, mine ! Hurrah ! I am master here ! ” In this comfortable frame of mind the pleasant- mannered and gentlemanly valet descended to his apartments ; while the doctor and Bessie, after a few minutes’ conversation, joined the young couple upstairs. The doctor hardly approved of his daughter’s choice, because Cecil was young, and not rich. He would have to work hard, and Irene would have to wait and weep. But, on the other hand. Dr. Bensing could not bear to interfere with the happiness of the young people, and trusted that time would save him the trouble and pain of deciding the question. The party attended the lecture, and were most interested and amused. After the seance the doctor sent round his card as requested. He had a vague recollection of the circumstances ; but when the pro¬ fessor asked for the prescription he was at fault. “I will send it back,” he said. “Now, tell me, what did you mean about my fortune ? ^ “ I mean this — You saw this evening that I per¬ formed many so-called tricks. They were not tricks. You have virtually saved my life by your medicine. My wife — my helpmate — the best woman in the world, shall thank you for her sake, and the sake of the children. Come home with me to supper. I will explain my method ; you shall learn how hypnotism is the truest anaesthetic : it renders people insensible to pain, it is as harmless as water, and by its aid any opera¬ tion can be performed. Cata¬ racts, cancers, cists, and teeth can be extracted ; and any other surgical operations, such as ampu¬ tations, can be carried out under its influence. You will want an assistant ; your servant will do. He is firm and clever. Be on your guard with him. Now, sir, I am a new man, thanks to you. I will keep my word. Your fortune shall be made.” Within a month Dr. Ben¬ sing had mastered the rudi¬ ments of the new science. He practised, studied, ex¬ perimented, with the assist¬ ance of his confidant and protege Arnold, and his fame began to spread abroad rapidly. But success was dearly purchased.

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665 CHAPTER THE THIRD. BLACKMAIL. NEMESIS. Two years afterwards Dr. Bensing was famous. No longer living in the suburbs in the midst of small villa residences, he now inhabited a mansion in a square at the western end of town, and was in hourly request to attend operations of all kinds. His mes¬ meric influence was all-powerful, and he in a few years became indispensable. His own practice as a physician also increased, and in fact there was no busier man in London than Dr. Bensing. Arnold, the faithful adherent, also shone with a reflected lustre. He studied also ; accompanied his master on many occasions, and ended by sometimes attending minor cases himself when the high and mighty ones desired the immediate attention of the doctor to induce the hypnotic state. Indeed, Arnold was making immense strides in his new path of life, and at times actually succeeded with patients when his master failed. Few who had known Arnold in his capacity of valet would have recognised him in his new sphere, in his new surroundings. In fact, Arnold was a “ big-wig ” now. Miss Bensing was also greatly admired, and poor Cecil Denton viewed with distrust and alarm the ever- increasing distance, and the growing social barriers, which were day by day extending between him and his love. Irene was true at heart ; but the Dentons revolved in a very different social orbit from the fashionable West End hypnotist. All London had gone mad over hypnotism. Dentists studied it; surgeons made use of it ; scientists derided it, but could not deny its efficacy. Irene herself could not but acknowledge its success, although no attempts of her father, or even of the potent Arnold, had ever succeeded in reducing her to a condition of suspended animation. Under these circumstances people were, after a while, surprised to remark the change which had “HE WAS BEING DELUDED AND ROBBED —SYSTEMATICALLY— BY HIS ASSISTANT” (/. 666) come over Dr. Bensing. His cheerfulness, his benevolent smile, had disappeared. He was anxious, annoyed at trifles, irritable ; would not permit Irene to receive Cecil Denton ; and, in fact, the popular hypnotist seemed half dazed himself. He was ab¬ sent, nervous, and fearful of something. What had brought about this change? It remained for his daughter to fathom the mystery. One evening she penetrated to the library, the cosiest room in the house, where, surrounded by her beloved books, she read ; and as twilight fell, drew behind the curtains ; finally falling asleep in the autumnal dusk. She was awakened by voices in earnest, low conversation. One speaker was evidently her father ; the other she did not so quickly recognise, but a few moments of involuntary eaves-dropping aroused her thoroughly, and excited her fears and indignation. Her father’s assistant w^as the other speaker. “ I cannot, Arnold ; you will ruin me ! Permit you to pay your addresses to my daughter ! Impossible ! ridiculous ! You forget our relative positions. It is too absurd. You, a nobody — to aspire to my daughter ! Why, man, you are mad ! ” “ Oh, no. Doctor,” was the calm reply. I am perfectly collected. You forget that my position is a good one ; that I have an excellent practice as an hypnotist, and am daily increasing my clients. Yozir position .in South Lambeth was no higher at one time!” “Silence sir ! ” said the doctor sternly. “ Leave the room. If you cannot conduct yourself with propriety, you shall quit my employment. I have been already greatly annoyed by your presence at times. We had better part : you are my servant — so - ”

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666 A Disciple of Mesmer : a Story of Hypnotism. No, no, Doctor : not so fast. We shall not part so easily. Do you know that it is you who should sue for mercy ? Your servant I Do you know that the mes¬ merist has died of an overdose of poison of your prescribing? I have the prescription. If I chose I could bring forward evidence. Servant ! that's pretty good. Look here ! ” Here he made a few rapid passes. Stand where you are,’’ he continued. ‘‘Take out your cheque-book from that drawer, and write me a draft for fifty pounds : I require some ready money. Light the candles, please.” Irene’s heart almost ceased to beat as she peeped between the curtains and saw her father obey the commands of Arnold with the utmost docility. It was with great difficulty that she restrained herself; the villany of the man was horrible. He had gained the mastery in the art, and in future her father would be his valet’s servant. The doctor was bidden to confess all — and did so in her hearing. This terrible discovery accounted for everything she had previously mourned. Arnold had influenced the doctor— the pupil had become the master. Her eyes were opened. The practical dismissal of Cecil, the uncertain temper and moody fits of her once indulgent father, were all accounted for. He was being deluded and robbed — systematically —by his assistant ! The doctor signed the cheque and put the book away in the same mechanical manner. Then Arnold said — “ I knew the Professor in other days, and was sorry to hear that he died so suddenly. But the jury yesterday were very anxious to ascertain who supplied him with the drugs, ‘ which no respectable or respon¬ sible person should have made up.’ The punishment of social degradation may fall upon you, Doctor, unless you give your consent to my marriage with your daughter.” Irene could hardly believe her ears. Her heart stood still for a second, then it beat faster ; and, putting aside the curtains, she cried, “ Never I I have heard your horrible plot and will unmask you — Father ! father ! do not pay any attention to this villain. He shall be prosecuted.” “Indeed, miss!” replied Arnold. “We shall see. Vote have heard all ! Very well, you will be an im¬ portant witness against your father. Good evening.” Irene and her father remained standing in silent despair for a while. All Arnold’s former conduct was explained. He had a terrible secret in his possession which, unless Irene would sacrifice herself, would be used to ruin the doctor. “ It is all true, darling,” whispered the unhappy man. “ I gave the man the poison. It may have been too strong — I am guilty — I wish I had never practised this hypnotism. It is a terrible weapon in unprin¬ cipled hands, and may yet cause much misery.” “ But, father, it was not intentional ; you made up the drugs under compulsion : it was no voluntary act. Dearest father, let us consult someone. May I send for Mr. Denton — for Cecil?” She blushed as she preferred this request. Her father kissed her fondly, and consented. In an hour Cecil had arrived, and had been informed of all the details. Cecil’s indignation may be imagined. He stormed and raved, and was with some difficulty dissuaded from horse-whipping the villanous assistant. “Do you know anything of the scoundrel?” he asked. “ A plausible villain indeed 1 He must be checkmated. I wish I knew his past.” “ You legal gentlemen are always suspicious,” said Irene. “Arnold has behaved very well till now. Father took him without a character ; as a young man, he was fairly educated and clever. I heard him say that he knew the Professor, the mesmerist.” “ Oh, indeed 1 this is a clue. I will seethe widow — poor woman, she will not prosecute. Your father has been most kind during this sad time. But the pro¬ mulgation of the prescription will be very unfortunate, and may be ruinous. 1 will interview Arnold first.” “ Do be careful, dear, for my sake,” she cried. “ Never fear, darling ; you may trust me.” But Arnold declined all compromise. He w'as as obstinate as possible. He had set his heart on marrying Miss Irene, and he w’ould marry her or “ruin the lot,” as he elegantly expressed it. Denton gave the assistant a piece of his mind, reported the termination of the interview to Irene, and w’ent out to seek the Professor’s widow. She was highly indignant. She was sure it was an accident— her husband had taken an over-dose of his favourite stimulant — and she w\as certain the lozenges, wffiich had caused his death, had not been made up by Dr. Bensing. They had, she thought, been pre¬ pared abroad. “ I wish you w^ould see Miss Bensing, and reassure her,” suggested Cecil. “ I am greatly interested.” “ To be sure, sir. I will go round. My husband always said he was grateful to the doctor, and it is curious that our very next visit to London should be his last, poor fellow 1 He w^as a kind husband to me, sir.” An appointment was made for the next day. Cecil had a cab sent to the lodgings in Pimlico, wdiere the widow was residing, and she reached the doctor’s house at the time named. Arnold \vas just coming out, and was extremely surprised to see her He w'ould have closed the door had not Cecil just then appeared. As it was, an undignified dispute was in progress. “What is the meaning of this?” he cried. “Mr. Arnold, this lady has an -appointment here. Why do you insult her ? ” “ Arnold!” almost screamed the Professor’s relict. “His name is not Arnold. He’s Joe Madden, who W'as my husband’s apprentice, and stole his plate. He escaped, and was never discovered. Arnold, indeed ! Call a policeman, sir, quick. The villain !” This fortunate recognition altered the whole aspect of things. People wondered wdiy Dr. Bensing’s assist¬ ant had so suddenly left town, but it was understood that he had gone to America. Dr. Bensing made no effort to detain him ; he found his health and practice improve still more in the absence of his

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About Rounds and Catches. 667 late “partner.” Irene and Cecil were united shortly after Arnold’s disappearance. I’he Professor’s widow was befriended by Dr. Sensing as long as he lived, and by Mr. and Mrs. Denton after the death of the kind-hearted doctor — who never again heard of Arnold, except that eventually he was brought to justice, and sentenced to a long term of imprisonment for some crime committed in the United States. ABOUT ROUNDS AND CATCHES. ERE are two musical foims generally linked together, in theoretical as well as practical music. Each form has some distinguishing feature, and yet they possess a similarity of character which connects them together with the Canon as of one family. In another sense, too, they stand allied, inasmuch as fashion has thrown them far into the background, until now the Round and Catch — a species of music which delighted our ancestors — are scarcely ever met with amongst professing or non-professing musical people. This on artistic grounds is to be regretted, because there was much in this class of music which deserved to be kept alive ; and it often displayed an ingenuity and originality in musical construction such as might tax the powers of modern geniuses who build up great reputations by composing hymn-tunes and single chants. Nevertheless, the encouragement and attention given to the glee and to part-songs has so increased the production and execution of these larger forms of vocal music that, for the moment, the older forms — less ambitious if more ingenious — must lie content to wait their turn until a reaction in art shall suffer them to take a prominent place again for musical practice and enjoyment. Being thoroughly English musical forms, and reflecting, as many of these delightful pieces do, the inventive skill and readiness of a past age of native musicians, it is emi¬ nently desirable that such highly creditable and unique work should not be allowed to pass into oblivion, or be permitted to make way altogether for barren foreign importations which, if more pretentious, are rarely as meritorious as music pure and simple. In one direction Rounds may still be heard, viz., in schools. No one who has passed any experience in connection with schools will need to be reminded of what a Round is ; how it is sung, and what it is like when rendered. The course of school experience, whether for scholar, teacher, visitor, or examiner, always includes the doubtful blessing of “ some music,” and in this a Roimd is always included — the unfortu¬ nate compositions which are most frequently selected being “ White Sand and Grey Sand,” or “ Hark ! the Bonny Christ Church Bells.” A Round, then, is a composition for two, three, four, or more voices, each singer starting the composi tion at a fixed number of bars after the first singer has begun, going straight through the music, and only stopping at a given signal, up to which moment the united voices have, or should have, rendered correct harmony. The following Round, by our countryman, Dr. Hayes, descanting on the brevity of life compared with the lasting influence of art, will show what is meant : — Unlike a Canon, a Round can only be sung in the unison or octave, that is — being a species of fugue in the unison — its character will not allow of the melody being reintroduced at other intervals, such as the fourth and fifth above or below the original melody. The identical ground must be constantly gone over by each voice ; and here we have, perhaps, the best origin of the term Round, from the fact that in these compositions the performers follow each other through the several parts in a circulating motion. Many Rounds have sacred words, as for instance, “Agnus Dei” (Travers), but much more frequently they are set to secular words. Unlike the Catch, too, it is seldom purposely amusing in its words, but the musical construction is the same as the Catch, and the maimer of the singers’ rendering of the two forms is identical. A Round sung at the unison is said to be for equal voices. In the following representative list of Rounds, not a little amusement, after the style of that afforded in the humorous Catch, is often obtain¬ able : — . V “Great Tom is Cast” (Lawes). “ Hot Mutton Pies” (Arnold). “John Ran .so Long” (Arnold). “Pussy Cat” (Purcell). “There was an Invisible Fox” (Hilton). “Sound Drums, Sound Cannons” (Dibdin). “ Chairs to Mend” (Hayes). “ Three Blind Mice ” (Playford). “ The Cuckoo ’ (Nelham). “ Wind, Gentle Evergreen” (Hayes). “The Lark, Linnet, and Nightingale.” “ If the Man who Turnips Cries ” (Lidarti). “A Boat, a Boat unto the Ferry” (Jenkins), “ Banbury Cakes.” “The Silver Swan” (Smith).

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668 About Rounds and Catches. “The London Crie.s” (Cobb). “ Goose Law’d with Goose ” (Lawes). “ Wilt thou Lend me thy Muse?" (Nares). In “ Hot Mutton Pies/’ in the above list, a conflict of voices brings the cries of “ Dainty young beans ! ’’ and ‘‘ Crabs ! ” to the listener’s ear ; while in “ Chairs to Mend” there is an incongruous mixing up of ‘•New mackerel!” “Old rags!” “Hare-skins and rabbit-skins ! ” The good old times are suggested in “Any milk?” “Maids, buy a broom!” “Hot pippin pies ! ” preserved to us in “ The London Cries ” catch. But all are more or less interesting, musically and literally. To these titles might be added many others not less humorous than the following little musical “ Lesson in Spelling and Grammar ” (Lambert), which, being after the manner of the Round, may well close this too brief survey of this interesting musical form : — The Catch, if somewhat similar in its continuity of character, is a more ingenious and important com¬ position in every way than the Round. Its words and its music have an amusing originality and point about them when most successful. It is usually written for three or four unaccompanied voices as a continuous melody, not in score ; but all the parts together make good harmony. The words, too, in the accepted Catch, are so selected that by their construc¬ tion, or by their interweaving, or by the interruption of melodies, ingenious cross-readings are elicited ; and this is especially possible when, with the rendering of a Catch entrusted to clever singers, the union of the words is supplemented by a grimace or movement of the hand, foot, or head to mark the catching at each singer’s words. In Dr. Hayes’ collection of Catches we are told “the Catch in music answers to the epigram in poetry, where much is to be exprest within a very small compass, and unless the turn is neat and well pointed it is of little value.” Dr. Callcott’s capital Catch, “ Ah ! how Sophia,” affords a good example of the play and humour distinguishing the ingenious style of Catch. The words run thus : — Go,f^ich the Indian's borrow’d plume, Yet richer far than that your bloom ; r Jti but a lodger in your heart, And more than me I fear have part.” In reading these words there is nothing particular to be seen, but when the words are sung as Dr. Callcott intended them, and as I have indicated in italics, there is much to hear. One singer seems to render the first three words thus — A house 07i Jire^ repeating “phia, phia,” with a little admixture of cockneyism, Another voice calls lustily out, Go^ fetch the engines— fetch the engines I while the third coolly says, “ I’m but a lodger — I’m but a lodger,” consequently he is indifferent whether the house be burned down or not. Thus there is much that is humorous in the Catch, and since, to bring out all the points of such an amusing composition, for instance, as Webbe’s “Would you Know my Celia’s Charms?” was a somewhat catchy process, many have jumped at this as the origin of the term Catch. Unfortunately, however, this theory must be dispelled. The “catchy” element is entirely wanting in the oldest Catches, and in these the words are so simple and prosaic, as well as pointless, that they differ little from the ordinary Round, and to elicit anything of a funny character from them would be next to im¬ possible ; therefore, a more probable derivation of the term is that in the earliest Catches each singer took up or caught his part. Two or three hundred years ago this may have been something of a musical effort, but nowadays the merest vocalists would have little difficulty in rendering such simple and straightforward Catches as “ Old Clothes” (Gregory) : — Examples of other Catches of the Round., and there¬ fore simpler, style are : — “ Ah ! how Sophia can you leave Your lover, and of hope bereave ! “ Shew a Room ” (Holmes). “ His Grace in a Rage " (Cuzens). *

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About Rounds and Catches. Not a Day more than Thirty ” (Berg). “As Thomas was Cudgeld one Day by his Wife ” (S. Webbe). “ Come, Honest Friends ” (Ives). “Pretty Maidens, Buy my Fairings ” (Atterbury), “There Lies a Pudding in the Fire ” (Ancient). “ Let’s Drink to all our Wives” (Brown). “Parting Catch” (Purcell). With the introduction of the amusing element into the Catch, great scope was afforded for the exercise of the wit in composers and poetasters — an opportunity that was not allowed to slip, and by which the making and singing of Catches grew into a rage. By such processes as mispronunciation, excessive accent or gesture, and the interweaving of sentences, the dif¬ ferent voices joined to make the most ludicrous state¬ ments, and to give comical twists and terminations quite opposite to the listener’s expectations. When the words were accentuated by gesture and action, not a little demand, it need scarcely be said, was made upon those who professed to the proper interpreting of the Catch : thus it became quite an art to sing them with point. John Parry — a name known to lovers of music a generation gone — furnishes an example of the humorous in his composition, “ My Sylvia Wears a Rosy Wreath,” the amusing nature of which will soon be discovered if three readers of this will master the voice parts. One singer performs the upper staff throughout, then takes the second, and after¬ wards the third ; the other voices follow in the same order, accelerating the time a little at each repetition : — Sil - via wears a ro - sy wreath, By me for her en - twined. wig is by her mo-therworn, By bar-bers’ skill de-signed. paints and sings, and in her style Dis-plays a grace-ful mind. In the notable ‘‘Would you Know my Celia’s Charms.^” (Webbe), the humour is found in the marked accent given to such words as fortitude, thirty, and ffty-five, and by which the singers contend in turn for their view of the lady’s age as the only truth of the matter. Other Catches excel¬ ling in musical contrivance are Lord Mornington’s “’Twasyou, Sir;” “Come, Honest Friends ” (Ives) ; “Tell me, ye Pow’rs ” (Webbe) ; “ Would you Sing a Catch ” — in which the second voice sings part of the scale of C ; “ Mister Speaker” (Baildon) ; “ Hunting Catch ” (White) ; the extremely difficult and bluster¬ ing “ Playhouse Hubbub ” (Arne) ; and Dr. Harring¬ 669 ton’s clever composition, “ Give me the Sweet Delights of Love.” A Catch especially demanding action and expression is “I cannot Sing this Catch” (Harring¬ ton) ; and something amounting to a dual effort is needed to do traditional justice to Dr. Aldrich’s “ Tobacco ” Catch — one to be sung by four men while smoking their pipes. The Dean of Christ Church was an inveterate smoker, and some folks said he did more smoking than preaching. In either case the following little musical composition will long pre¬ serve his reputation : — 1 2 3 4 whether we smoke, or whether we sing, Let’s be loyal, and re » ? , b c - i iw U /«■■?? — - WT - - 1 ! ' m Good, good, in-deed 1 The i Jv ^ , ! ^ . IL ... — - r-” ^ m ^ m n ^ What say the learned 9-^ — ^ - 1? What say the learn - ed ? P L - say we a - gain : If life’s a smoke, as — I’

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Coins, Old and New. 670 The Catch, like the Round, is considered to be of decided English origin. The earliest composition of the Catch species known is found in the MS. of the middle of the thirteenth century, now in the Harleian Library, and some poetical effusions of the latter half of the fourteenth century were even described as Catches. Many old and scarce musical collections contain examples, viz., “Pammelia; Musick’s Miscellanie, or mixed varietie of Pleasant Roundelaies and Delight¬ ful Catches,” 1609; “ Deuteromelia ; or, second part of Musicke’s Melodie — Pleasant Roundelayes and Delightful Catches,” 1609; ‘‘ Melismata : Musical Phansies, fitting the Court, Citie, and Country Humours,” 1611. The form reached its zenith of popularity in Charles II.’s reign. The shamelessness which marked the Restoration period contaminated the music as it did the literature of the time, and the Catch became a vehicle for obscenity and indecency. When the nation came to its senses, this very element proved the death-knell of the Catch. “ They are three parts obscenity and one part music,” says Jackson, of Exeter ; “if they are not indecent they are nothing.” While, therefore, the temporary loss of the musical form is to be deplored, the banishment into compara¬ tive oblivion of words and sentiments which could not be listened to in a mixed company can never be matter for regret. Preserve the old English musical form with its quaint delightful humour by all means, but let the words be such as are, to quote the title-page of an old •collection before me, “consistent with female delicacy.” “ Be Merry and Wise ” is a text which adorns an old work, “Apollonian Harmony” — a famous collection of Rounds, Catches, and Canons — and this moral might well be borne in mind if we, happily, revive the Catch. The following example is “merry and wise” enough, and so far as the words are concerned would serve as a model for future Catch composers : — Its musical construction, however, lacks the fugal device and play which constitute so enjoyable a feature in the Catches and similar compositions of the best writers, whose musical skill all would fain see emulated in these latter days, if only in the shape of Rounds and Catches. FREDERICK J. Crowest. COINS, OLD AND NEW. LD coins are like marginal notes on "’the page of history. They epitomise an epoch ©r date a reign. Where manuscripts have been consumed, or monuments have perished, the dis¬ covery of buried money has rescued the names of kings and heroes from oblivion, and even enabled us to re¬ construct some forgotten chapter in the annals of our race. Coins, there¬ fore, have a value beyond their use as a medium of exchange. They are frequently portraits of reigning princes, registers of events, and symbols of different States. Like other things in art, their origin is obscure, and they have been developed from crude beginnings to their present perfection of design ana form. Barter was probably the first mode of exchange ; but in •early times something of the nature of coins was used : for instance, shells, pieces of salt, strips of leather, and weights of metal, iron, silver, gold, and so on. The original “shekel” of Scripture was, Derhaps, a piece of uninscribed silver weighing so nuch— the name comes from the Hebrew verb ‘shakal,” to weigh. Ring money in the shape of 3^olden chains, each link detachable and adjusted to 1 certain weight, so as to serve for money as well IS ornament, was common in early times in Europe, md lingered on after true coins had become cur¬ rent. Such were the chains and torques of the Erse and Gaulish chieftains. They were of fine gold. Dent into a hoop, with decorated ends, which were Dressed together round the neck or waist of the chieftains who wore them. Besides these torques, the ancient Irish had a variety of ring money, which may be described as a loop of gold or silver with disked ends. This is illus¬ trated in Fig. I. TTTr; T — TTJTcw TJTMr: MOTCKv. J ewels werc also u^ed

Page 689

Coins, Old and New. for money in those early ages. Indeed, the term ‘‘ money” is supposed to come from ‘‘ manica,” a bracelet. True coins appear to have come into Eu¬ rope about 800 years before Christ. The Lydians of Asia Minor and the neighbouring Greek colonies made rude coins of gold, which were punched in a die to take in relief some symbolical and sacred figure. Such are the double ‘‘stater” (or “standard”) of Miletus in Ionia, weighing 248 grains, and stamped on one side with the figure of a lion’s head. A similar coin of Sardis, the capital of Lydia, has the figures of a lion and a bull on one side. By-and-by the reverse side of ancient coins showed a concave figure of the symbol ; and finally, the reverse side had a separate device. The figures of gods were delineated on the obverse side, and also the heads of deified heroes. After the time of Alexander the Great the heads of living kings were represented on coins ; and in the hands FIGS., 2 AND 3. — STATEK OF I'HILIF OF MACEDON, AND ANCIENT BRITISH IjMITATION. FIG. 4.— COIN OF TASCIOVAN. of the Greeks the stamped coin took the developed form which it has since retained. The Greeks are supposed to have introduced their coins into Gaul and Britain from their settlement of Massilia (now Marseilles), and it is known that the Greeks carried on a trade in tin with Britain about 300 B.C. and later. A well-known Greek type of coin in those pre- Christian days is the stater of Philip of Macedon (Fig. 2), known as a “Philip.” It has a head of Apollo on the obverse side, and a charioteer on the reverse. This coin is interesting as having been imitated by the ancient Britons, as shown by the coin (Fig. 3) where the outlines of the head and horses can be traced. After the Roman conquest of Britain (55 B.C.) the Roman influence was felt in British coinage, the terminations of the names of princes being Roman instead of Greek, as before. Examples of Romanised 671 coins are those of Tasciovanus, and his son Cuno- belin. Fig. 4 illustrates a coin of Tasciovan believed to have been coined at Segontium, a city of the Segontiaci of Surrey. Finally, upon the complete subjugation of Britain by the Romans (70 A.D.), the coins of the conquerors became current in place of the native coins. Their gold piece was the “ aureus,” worth 25 silver “denarii,” which corresponds to the “deniers” of France, and became the parent probably FIG. 5.— ROMAN COIN WITH FIGURE OF BRITANNIA. of the Anglo-Saxon silver penny. A Roman bronze coin is shown in Fig. 5, and is interesting as having a figure adopted for “ Britannia” in the reign of Charles II. On the withdrawal of the Romans (414 A.D.) the Saxons introduced a new coinage, believed to have been a rude imitation of the Lower Empire coins of that date. The principal Saxon coins were the “ skeatta/’ or silver penny (^V less value than a penny), and the copper “styca.” Their design was crude, as will be seen from the example given in Fig. 6, where the Christian emblems of the dove and cross can be distinguished. The silver “ pennies ” of the Heptarchy followed, the name coming, perhaps, from the Latin “pendo,” to weigh, or “ pecLinia,” cattle. Fig. 7 is a fine example of a silver penny of Offa, King of Mercia (a.D. 757), whose coinage seems to have been superior. Later on English coins were imitated in some parts of the Continent, and the practice continued, the word “sterling” being used for them, from, as is sup¬ posed, the custom of examining the coins at Easter by “ Esterlings.” The Saxons also introduced the terms “ scilling,” or shilling, for 5 pence, and “mancus” for 30 pence; but these were at first imaginary coins, representing a sum of money. It was only in the reign of Henry VI 1. that the shil¬ ling came to be a real coin. William the Norman fixed the Saxon shilling at 4 pence, and in¬ troduced a Norman shilling whose value fig. 6.— saxon skeatta.

Page 690

Coins, Old and New. 672 was 12 pence. There were other imaginary coins in early Norman times ; for instance, the “mark,” value 160 pence, and the “pound,” referring to a pound weight FIG. 7. — SILVER PENNY OF OFFA, KING OF MERCIA. of gold or silver. Under the early Norman kings the Saxon coinage retained its original appearance, more or less ; but as time went on, and workers in seals improved their art, especially on the Continent, the Norman coins became more florid and ornate. Fresh coins, such as the groat, the farthing, the halfpenny, as well as gold pieces, were minted. The coins of Edward I. had conventional figures of kings, which continued for eight succeeding reigns. Edward III. assumed the title of King of France on his groats ; and the words “ Dei Gratia” were also adopted in his reign. He also coined a new gold “ florin,” the name being derived from a well-known gold coin of “ Florence.” This coin was, however, soon recalled, and the silver florin we now possess did not appear till long afterwards. The famous gold “ nobles ” also came out at this time, their original value being 6s. 8d., and the word coming perhaps from their appearance, or the noble metal they were struck from. They bore the legend, “ Edward Dei Gra. Rex Anglo, et Franc. D. Hyb.” (Dominus Hyberniae, or “ Lord of Ireland”) ; and the obverse showed a kingly figure with sword and shield, the shield being emblazoned with fleur-de-lys and leopards, while the reverse showed a “ ship of state.” The “ rial ” (or royal), so called after the French coin, was in vogue in the time of Edward IV., as also the “angel,” which had a figure on the obverse of the archangel Michael pierc¬ ing a dragon with a spear, and on the reverse a vessel. Henry VII. introduced a gold piece called a “sovereign” (a.d. 1503), or “double rial,” the term “sovereign,” however, disappearing until revived by the new coinage of George III., in 1817. It repre¬ sented the king in royal robes, seated ; and also bore FIG. 8.— SOVEREIGN OF ELIZABETH. the semblance of a full-blown rose on the reverse, the centre of the rose containing a shield emblazoned with arms. In the reign of Henry VIII. the coinage became much debased, and the king’s head on the silver pennies showed the copper mixture so well that his Majesty’s loyal but humorous subjects were wont to call him “ old Copper-nose.” In this reign the pound Troy (so called from the fair of Troyes in France) superseded the older Tower pound in the Mint ; and the standard or “ crown” gold was settled at its present composition, 22 carats fine gold to 2 carats alloy. Edward VI. issued crowns and half-crowns of silver, and began to purify the currency : a work which was successfully carried on by Queen Elizabeth, who showed her interest in the work so far as to coin some pieces with her own fair hands, and distribute them as keepsakes. The mill and screw plan of coin¬ ing now superseded the older stamp, and gave a better finish to the pieces. Elizabeth also introduced a new type of sovereign and its fractions, of which an FIG. 9. — “mermaid” token. example is given in Fig. 8. She also coined the first colonial money for the use of the East India Com¬ pany. Until this time Ireland and Scotland both had coins of their own ; the Irish coins being originally of Danish origin, perhaps. A coin of Somerled, a prince of the Hebrides, is said to be extant ; as also a coin, or coins, of Malcolm III., a contemporary of William I. But probably few Scottish coins are known prior to the twelfth century. After that we have a truly national Scotch coinage, with pieces bearing the “ lion ” and the “ thistle.” Under James I. of England and VI. of Scotland, the arms of Scotland and Ireland were quartered with those of England and France on English coins. The term “Great Britain” was adopted for the United Kingdom, and on the reverse were the words “ Que Deus conjunxit nemo separet.” Charles I. improved the national coinage, both in design and execution. Cromwell discarded the royal arms from English coins, and substituted the simple cross of St. George, with a palm and olive branch, and the legend, “ The Commonwealth of England.” On the Restoration Charles II. revived the old forms of his father’s coinage. It is impossible within the limits of this article to enter into all the changes and vicissitudes of British coinage, the modifications of design, the new pieces

Page 691

{See page 673.)

Page 692

The Wooing of Ciiristabel. issued, the symbolism involved, and the occasional debasement of the currency. We may, however, mention the system of “ tokens,’^ which appears to have originated in the need felt for a small copper coinage. Fig. 9, for instance, is a token of the celebrated “ Mermaid Tavern in Cheapside, the resort of Shakespeare, and of Elizabeth’s reign. The need of small' change became so great that Charles II. overcame his prejudice against coining the baser metals, and issued (1672 A.D.) a copper coinage, which was called “servant of money.” George I. was the first to adopt the title “Defender of the Faith” upon our coins, and George III. effected great improvement in them by his new coinage of 1817. The silver crown- piece, with the Greek figure of St. George and the Dragon still on our sovereigns, now appeared, from a design by Pistrucci. The half- crown was produced by Wyon, and the shilling by Wyon, from a design cut in jasper by Pistrucci. The coinage of George III. gave our coins sub¬ stantially the form they now possess. Queen Victoria, who began to reign in 1837, issued a series of coins having her bust, executed by Wyon from a wax model of her face taken from the life. 673 The shillings were like those of the preceding reign, with the words “One shilling” between oak and laurel branches. Large pieces were also struck as medals, not for circulation. In i860 die new bronze coinage replaced the older and weightier copper pieces. The Jubilee, or fiftieth year of her reign, was, as we all know, signalised by another new coinage in the form of a “ double florin,” or four-shilling piece, in silver ; as well as a £2 and a ^5 piece, in gold. The Jubilee florin is shown in Fig. 10. FIG. 10. — THE JUBILEE FLORIN, 1887. THE SHIP’S COMPANY. HE’S the captain of the Waterwiich, And a very good captain too, I And she’s trim and neat from her hat to her feet. And her eyes are blue — true blue. And whenever we meet upon the shore Or sailing across the bay, I cry, “ Boat ahoy ! ” like a true sailor boy. And this is what I say : “ Oh, make me your boa’s’n or your mate,” say I, “And let me sail with you. For you are the captain of the Waterwitch^ And a very good captain too.” Then she lifts her eyes with sweet surprise : “ The mate, that sails with me. Must honour and obey, and never say me nay, On land or on the sea.” Then I’ll be your mate, sweetheart,” say I (And she gives me her pretty hand). For I want no more on land or shore Than to live at your command.” So I beg to state, she’s made me mate. And together we sail the blue, For she is the captain of the Waterwitch, And I — am all the crew. Frederic E. Weatherly. THE WOOING OF CHRISTABEL. By E. NEAL, Author of “ Witness My Hand,” “ My Brother Basil,” &c. CHAPTER THE NINTH. HIS PORTRAIT. Oh, what a fall was there!” — Shakespeare. IYES could not be in England before Easter, but the intervening weeks would be none too many for all that had to be done in them. Ivethorpe had been shut up so long that repairs were urgently needed, and St. Ives had asked his cousin to superintend them. “Do as little as you can,” he wrote, “for I shall probably not remain in England. But some of the rooms must be made habitable, as I am bringing a friend with me. I don’t know how far the old place is given over to rats and moths, but I suppose the library and smoking-room can be got ready, and any bed¬ rooms that don’t look too suggestive of ghosts.” “Not remain in England Restless being! why cannot he settle down like other people ? ” said Mrs. Falconer. “ Perhaps he will, if we can make Ivethorpe really 733

Page 693

The Wooing of Christabel. 674 nice,” said Netta. “ If I were Arthur, I should make a bonfire of all that horrible old furniture, and paint and decorate and entirely re-furnish it from basement to attic.” ^ “ St. Ives is evidently of another way of thinking,” observed Falconer. “ He seems to want as little doing as he can. I suppose we had better go over the place to-morrow, and decide what must be done.” Like most of Falconer’s suggestions, it was too prac¬ tical not to be adopted. The morrow proved fine, and a merry little party trooped across the fields from the Vicarage to the great gloomy house by the river, whose master was coming back at last. Falconer and his mother went, as a matter of course, and Netta, who declared she would not go without Miss Elliven, and was rewarded by one of Falconers rare smiles. “But the boys?” said Mrs. Falconer doubtfully. “The boys can come too,” said Netta. “They want to see Ivethorpe so much, and Flavius is quite good when Miss Elliven is there.” Flavius was, at all events, anxious enough to see Ivethorpe, to be lavish of promises of obedience and docility, and kept them as well as could be ex¬ pected. He and Marmaduke kept dutifully at their governess's side till they were safe within the walls of Ivethorpe, and if the temptation of racing each other along endless corrridors, and sliding down baluster rails a foot wide, was too much for them, perhaps the elders were not inclined to insist on their presence. Old Mrs. Widgery would look after them, and Fal- -coner considered Miss Elliven’s opinion of the pro¬ posed alterations absolutely essential. Ivethorpe was a great rambling house, of no parti¬ cular style of architecture, and of decidedly gloomy .appearance. It was built of dark grey stone, and the heavily mullioned windows seemed constructed to .admit as little light and air as possible. The wood¬ work was of oak, now black with age, and the furni¬ ture either of oak or mahogany, almost as dark, with faded cushions whose colour was scarcely distinguish- .able. The long passages and vast empty rooms were full of echoes, and the neglected and melancholy aspect •of the deserted house was quite depressing. “ One would think the poor house knew its master was away,” said Netta sentimentally. For a person •of her direct and downright character, she was curiously sentimental where St. Ives was concerned. Her girl¬ hood had been unruffled by any serious love-aff’air,and the nearest approach to it lay in walks and talks with Arthur Neville, which seemed to mean a great deal more in Netta's remembrance than they had ever done •at the time. It had been quite impossible for Neville, in those days, to walk and talk with a pretty girl with¬ out adopting lover-like looks and tones, and if Netta had laughed at them then, she remembered them now with a tenderness more nearly allied to tears. “ It’s not a house,” said MisS Elliven, “that one could fancy people getting very fond of. I think nothing could make it bright and home-like— but I suppose one loves one’s home, whatever it is,” she added, with a sigh. “ I don’t think St. Ives loves Ivethorpe,” said Netta. “He never even came here after he succeeded to the title. And though he was often here with his grand¬ father, the old lord was an awful old man, who made poor Arthur’s life a burden to him. It is strange to think of a great gloomy pile like this being his home : he that seemed always sunshine and life - ” She broke off with a laugh that concealed more feel¬ ing than she cared to show, and Falconer observed with a rather curious glance — “ I don’t think you will find St. Ives exactly like he used to be. Judging from his letters, I should say he was altered very much indeed.” “People don’t change their natures — they can't. And his was always sweetness and light.” “Well, the light is certainly gone,” said Falconer shortly, “ and I think it is more than likely that the sweetness may have .followed. Men don’t go through experiences like his without getting more or less soured.” He turned away, as if anxious to change the subject, and taking out his pocket-book, busied himself with jotting down measurements and memoranda for the \vorkmen’s guidance# The old caretaker had taken possession of Mrs. Falconer, and was pouring the symptoms of her favourite complaint into that lady’s kindly and gracious ears ; and Netta turned to the governess with an injured pout. “ Bear never appreciated St. Ives. I don’t know what it was that sent him away ; but whatever Bear may hint, I am absolutely certain he was not to blame.” Miss Elliven smiled rather sadly. “ How nice it is to have a friend like you,” she said affectionately. “ I wonder, if you knew my story, if you would feel as sure I was not to blame ? ” “ I feel sure, without knowing it,” cried Netta, in her quick, impulsive way. “Dear Belita, do I not know you ? And that is how I feel when Bernard says disagreeable things about St. Ives. He may have been foolish, perhaps— he was quite young when he went away — but I know, oh 1 I know he never did anything mean or base ; and that is all that really matters, isn’t it ? ” “ One would like to think so,” said Miss Elliven. “ Mean or base — certainly one would not willingly be either ; but sometimes when one is only foolish and ignorant, and perhaps a little selfish, one may do things that are iDOth.” Netta wondered what she meant. Miss Elliven was thinking of herself, not of Lord St. Ives, she felt sure ; but Netta knew too little of her friend’s previous history to have any clue to her meaning. It was curious, indeed, how little they any of them knew about the girl they were all learning to hold so dear The references she had given to Mrs. Falconer had been quite satisfactory. Mrs. Drummond had testi¬ fied to ability and irreproachable conduct during the two years Miss Elliven had been in her service ; and besides this, there was a testimonial from the wife of an English diplomatist at St. Petersburg, whose children had been under Miss Elliven’s care before she went to the Drummonds, and who wrote of her with evident affection.

Page 694

The Wooing of Ciiristabel. ^>75 “And where were you before that ? ’’ inquired Mrs. Falconer. Miss Elliven looked a little surprised, but she answered readily enough that she had been at school in Germany, and had gone straight from school to the situation at St. Petersburg. Of anything antecedent to her schooldays it was clearly unnecessary to inquire, but though the prosaic history might be sufficient for “a character,'' it seemed meagre to friendship ; and Netta had secretly de¬ plored the reserve Miss Elliven maintained as to the details of her youth. That she was an orphan, without a home, Miss Featherstone had already told them, and even in dressing-room conferences Netta had learnt little more. For some reason or other Miss Elliven seemed disinclined to speak of herself, and, indeed, had never made so near an approach to confidence as in the rather enigmatical sentence she had just uttered. But it was impossible to pursue the subject now, as perhaps Miss Elliven knew. It was not a time for confidences, even if such a time should ever come ; and as Netta looked at the proud, firm lips, she felt that it was very doubtful indeed. Well, she would ask nothing, Netta thought loyally. She would trust Belita Elliven even as she trusted Lord St. Ives, and for the same reason, at once so illogical and so sweet. She pressed her friend’s hand sympathetic¬ ally ; but nothing could be said, for Mrs. Falconer had exhausted Mrs. Widgery’s budget of aches and pains, and was coming towards them. “ I wonder if there is a portrait of St. Ives here," she said. “ I should like to show Miss Elliven what •dear Arthur is like, and we haven’t a photo of him at home.” A guilty colour sprang into Netta’s cheeks as she thought of the treasured photograph in her own pri¬ vate drawer. But it was impossible to show that to Miss Elliven, or to anyone else. “ I haven’t seen any portraits here,” she said. “ Perhaps Mrs. Widgery knows if there is one.” Mrs. Widgery, who was evincing a respectful in¬ terest in the conversation by standing with her head •on one side and blinking very hard, replied at once in a cracked and wheezy voice — “ Which there is a pictur’ of his lordship, please, ma’am, in the boodore, if the young leddies would like to see it. A cristolum, or some such, the hartiss •called it, and was took from a photograrf the last time iis Mr. Harthur were down. 1 found it when the old lord died, laying about amongst the lumber, and put it over the chimbley-piece in the boodore, being as his poor ma were allays fond of that room, and used it constant when here. Dear, dear ! that’s a many years now ; and how pleased she’d a’ been to have seed him such a finely growed young man ; and her a-laying amongst the daisies, poor thing ! I’ll show you the way to the boodore, ma’am, though it’s up a many steps — the quality allays liking a view.” Mrs. Widgery sighed gently at this amiable weak¬ ness on the part of her betters, and turning to lead the •way, almost upset Flavius and Marmaduke, who had completed their survey of the house, to the decided deti.nient of their personal appearance. Anything so grubby and dusty had never presented itself to Mrs. Falconer in the shape of a grandchild before, and perhaps her delicate dismay had as much to do with Flavius’s offer to fetch the christoleum as Mrs. Widgery’s ostentatious gasps as she toiled up the stairs. “ Let me get it,” said Flavius, looking carefully away from his grandmother’s reproachful eyes. “ I know the picture you mean. It’s in the jolly little room in the turret, isn’t it ? — a masher, with blue eyes and a fair moustache ? ” “ That’s him, sir,” said Mrs. Widgery ; “ and if you can bring him down, I’ll be beholden, my knees not being what they was.” Flavius sped away, followed by his brother, and the elders waited on the landing, looking out on the glid¬ ing river and clustering trees, whose bare, leafless branches made a thick tracery against the faint blue sky, while Mrs. Widgery held her sides, and panted a noisy accompaniment. “ Bless that dear b’y’s heart ! ” she said fervently. “ I haven’t been up in the boodore this many a long day. But there — young legs is different.” They certainly were. Miss Elliven thought, with a smile, as Flavius and Marmaduke came clattering down the stairs with a noisy scramble that made her tremble for their grandmother’s nerves. “ Gently, boys ! ” she cried, but the warning came too late. Already Marmaduke had slipped on the unaccustomed oaken steps, and clutching at his brother’s arm, they rolled down together, the picture they were carrying falling with them. The boys were none the worse, but christoleums are more fragile than boys. The portrait that Miss Elliven was to have seen, the life-like presentment of Arthur Neville, taken only a month or two before his marriage, lay on the bottom step, broken into a hun¬ dred fragments. They called it an accident, and mourned over it, and consoled each other with many trite remarks. What no one even suspected was that the boys’ unlucky stumble, for which Miss Elliven took them to task with some sternness, had altered the course not only of her own life, but of Lord St. Ives’. If she had seen his likeness - But she did not see it, and went on her way, little dreaming who he was. CHAPTER THE TENTH. THE COMING OF ARTHUK. “ She saw him not, or marked not, if she saw .... Put Arthur, looking (downward as he passed, Felt the light of her eyes into his life Smite on the sudden.” — Tennyson. It was late in April when he came — one of the sweet spring days when the sad almost forget their sorrow, and the anxious lay aside their care, and life seems strangely touched with youth and hope and joy. Miss Elliven, restless with the divine restlessness

Page 695

The Wooing of Christ abel. 676 of the spring-time, had wandered out into the garden she loved so well, and was pacing the soft turfy walks between the fruit-trees, rejoicing in the flush of blos¬ som that surrounded her on every side. The pear- trees and the cherries were all abloom now, and looked as if robed and veiled in white ; the apple- blossoms, “ tinct with vermeil,” were only less snowy and pure. The earth might, indeed, have been decked for its bridal, so much was white in fashion with the flowers ; and Mrs. Falconer’s governess walked amongst them, as fair and white and sweet herself as any flower of them all. Her dress, as it happened, was white to-day, and her complexion, always pale, was inexpressibly transparent and clear and pure. She was taller than most women, and as she walked along, her white skirts trailing on the soft fine grass, she carried herself with the stately grace that always made Falconer think of the poet’s lines : — “ She moves a goddess, and she looks a queen.” It was not of Falconer that she was thinking now. Miss Elliven’s eyes, as she took her solitary walk amongst the flowers, were full of tender thought, of longing and yearning, of memories in which Bernard Falconer had neither part nor lot. It was not of him she was thinking, but of a lover whom she never saw now, whom she had not seen for years, and might never hope to see again, but whose name uttered unawares could move her still to sudden tears, to a vain passion of regret, to an intolerable pain she did not know how to bear. It was so long since she had seen him, so long since they parted, and the time they were together had been so short. Together 1 Had they ever been together, except in her own foolish belief, not seeing that while he was all in all to her, she was nothing, and less than nothing, to him ? And yet - A sigh fluttered to her lips that came from the very depths of her heart. In this life she would never see his face again, and yet, to see it only for an hour, she would willingly have bartered whatever chance of other happiness the future might hold in store. She walked along with eyes that took no note of outward things, and started as a voice funded shrilly at her side. “He is come — he is here ! ” cried the voice, and she looked down, dazzled and amazed. It was the strangest descent from the exaltation of her thoughts to Flavius’s round, freckled face, and broadly beam¬ ing grin. “ He is here— he is come. Miss Elliven ; and Aunt Netta is out, and grandmamma wants you to come and pour out tea.” Flavius had to repeat his summons twice before she understood. “ Who is here ?” she asked, a little bewildered still. “ Lord St. Ives and another man,” said Flavius. “ Come and see them. Miss Elliven. St. Ives is just like the picture that Marmaduke and I broke the day we went to Ivethorpe, and the other fellow isn’t half bad.” Miss Elliven laughed. “ I shouldn’t say that description was your strong point, Flavius,” she observed. “‘Isn’t half bad’ is not exactly informing ; and as your unlucky tumble effectually prevented my seeing the portrait of Lord St. Ives, I am not much wiser for hearing he is. like it.” “He isn’t exactly like it,” said Flavius, with candid criticism. “ He is older, and not half such a masher but if you’d seen the picture you’d have known the sort of fellow.” Miss Elliven smiled to herself. Without having seen the picture, she thought she could form some idea of the manner of man Lord St. Ives must be. Tall, and fair, and blue-eyed, Netta had called him, and always blithe and gay, “ all sweetness and light ” — if these things were true, she felt she could like him well for someone else’s sake, if not for his own. And once more the shadowy smile, that was not bright, but only sweet and sad, crept about her lips, and the eyes that looked so straight at Flavius saw something far away that was not a little round-faced boy with yellow hair and an abundant crop of freckles. The way into the house led past the windows of the vicar’s study, and Flavius, glancing in with the quick, roving eyes so little escaped, saw that Lord St. Ives and his friend were there with his Uncle Bernard. He would like to have pointed them out to Miss Elliven, in hopes of seeing her look shy and confused — an ex¬ perience he had never yet been able to enjoy — but he had already wasted several remarks on manifestly inattentive ears, and did not venture to hazard another. He contented himself with a ludicrous, imitation of his governess’s stately walk and a panto¬ mimic performance, intended to express his sense of humour at her serene unconsciousness, and would have been mortified if he could have known how entirely his antics were thrown away. The spectators at the study window had no eyes for Flavius. Falconer’s were full of admiration and the friendly regard no coldness had availed to entirely chill ; and in St. Ives’ and his friend’s was the sort of wondering amaze which is perhaps a man’s first feeling in the presence of beauty as perfect and as rare as Miss Elliven’s undoubtedly was. The sunbeams slanted through an opening in the trees, and fell full on the fair, musing face, touching it with a wonderful radiance that made it seem, one of the men said afterwards, as if she were rather some creature “compounded of light” than a mere flesh- and-blood woman, as mortal as themselves. They stood gazing, as if spell-bound, till she passed out of sight, and their tongues were unloosed. “Who is she.^” asked St. Ives, drawing the long breath of relief that denotes release from an undue strain of feeling, whether of pleasure or of pain. “ Did I not tell you we had a governess for the boys ? ” said Falconer briefly. “ A governess ! that adorable creature, so queen¬ like, ^^//?/ ” exclaimed St. Ives’ friend, who spoke with a foreign accent and much gesticulation. St. Ives looked at his cousin like a man whose eyes have been dazzled by the light. “ Whoever she is,” he said in a low tone, that

Page 696

The Wooing of Christ abel. sounded a little awed, “ she is the most perfectly beautiful woman I ever saw in my life.” Falconer did not speak. He felt with unreasonable wrath as if every word they uttered was an outrage and profanation — as if their careless praise was an unpardonable insult. 677 “We will go back to the drawing-room, because my mother is expecting us,” he said rather coldly. “ And the so charming Mees ? ” cried the irrepres¬ sible Frenchman. “ I have no doubt Miss Elliven will be there,’’ said Falconer, more ungraciously than before. THE WARNING CAME TOO LATE” (/. 675). M. de Bassompierre, the companion of St. Ives’ latest adventures, looked at the vicar’s gloomy brow with uncomprehending wonder. '‘^Parbleti he cried. “Why stand we here, when one so fair— so pret-ty, is it not ? — is in the salon close by.^”’ He spread out his hands with a droll gesture of supplication that made St. Ives smile, but Falconer was not in a smiling mood. St. Ives put his hand on his cousin’s shoulder, affectionately. “The same growling old bear!” he said, with a look that disarmed the words. And then, in a lower key : “You needn’t mind De Bassompierre — it is only his way.” “Then I don’t admire his way,” retorted Falconer. M. de Bassompierre was already in the hall, beckon¬ ing them on with one hand, while the other lay

Page 697

The Wooing of Christabel. 678 expansively on his breast. Falconer looked at him with intense disfavour. “What mountebanks Frenchmen always are !” he muttered, as he went on to the drawing-room and opened the door. Mrs. Falconer was in her accustomed place, and by the tea-table sat Miss Elliven, busy with cups and saucers, and ready to dispense the fragrant herb. Falconer took his guests up to her at once. “ Let me introduce - ’’ he began, but the ‘ intro¬ duction was never completed. Miss Elliven raised her eyes to the visitors as he spoke, and fainted quietly away in her chair without uttering a word. CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH. MISS elliven’s story. “ I knew ’twere madness to declare this truth, And yet ’twere baseness to deny my love.’’ — Dryden. All was confusion for a moment, and then Falconer recovered his presence of mind. He carried the un¬ conscious girl to a sofa, and, taking the flowers from one of the vases, dashed the water in her face, and was relieved to hear a faint moan, and to see the colour returning to her lips. “ She is coming round — we shall only be in the way,’’ said St. Ives, looking with pitying admiration at the beautiful face, whose chiselled features looked only too much as if they had been carved in ala¬ baster. “ You are quite right, Arthur,” said his aunt. “ You will come back to us to-morrow, will you not ? — but just now I think you had better go. Miss Elliven is ill, and M. de Bassompierre will excuse an old woman for sending you both away.” M. de Bassompierre smiled and bowed, and accepted his dismissal with infinite grace, but with so many ceremonious compliments that St. Ives had fairly to drag him away. Falconer went with them to the door. “It. seems rather like turning you out,” he said awkwardly ; “but, you see, we look upon Miss Elliven as one of ourselves. You will come to-morrow, St. Ives? There’s a good deal of business that could not be got into letters.” St. Ives groaned dismally. “ I wish it couldn’t be got into talk, either,” he said, shaking his cousin’s hand. “ However, I’ll come, and I hope I shall find Miss Elliven better. Give my love to Annette, and tell her I am sorry to have missed her.” “ All right,” said Falconer briefly. He shut the door, eager to return to the drawing-room, and St. Ives observed, as he walked on with his friend — “Falconer is as impatient and autocratic as ever, I see. But you will like him when you know him, I assure you.” “ Sa?is doiitCj sa77s doiite I ” said the other, in pre¬ occupied tones. He went on a little without saying anything, and then exclaimed abruptly: “Tell me then, my friend, this beautiful demoiselle^ why have she swoon ? She lift her eyes — beaux yeux^ parole dho?meur f—io you, to me, and fall back eimce^ in one swoon. Is it by chance you or me ?” “ Not me — most decidedly,” replied St. Ives. “ I never saw Miss Elliven in my life before. 1 am sure of it,” as De Bassompierre looked incredulous. “ Hers is not a face one would forget.” “But certainly not,” agreed the Frenchman, “only, see you, how could it be me ? I have had my suc¬ cesses, but not so 7'apide, I am not so vain to think that.” St. Ives burst out laughing. “Why should it be either?” he asked. “Why should either of us have anything to do with it ? Girls faint every day, for anything or nothing, don’t they ? And why can’t this poor young lady do so without a romantic stranger building up a novelette about it ? There is not much romance in an English country parsonage or in a governess’s life.” “ Pa7'do?i^ there is romance in every life, 77i07t cher. It is true that I know nothing of la belle gouve7'7ia7ite^ except that she is beautiful and young, but what would you? Young and beautiful— it is a romance in it¬ self.” “Romance?” said St. Ives, with an intonation of bitterness ; “ you are welcome to it for me. I am thankful to think that I am too old for folly of that kind. My romantic days are over, never to return.” M. de Bassompierre did not reply directly. “ What age have you, my friend ? ” he said quietly. “You are still under thirty, is it not? It is young to have done with romance — ah, yes ! it is young ! ” And meanwhile Miss Elliven had regained her consciousness. The swoon had been long and deep, but it was passing off now, and Falconer obeyed his mother’s peremptory nod and left Miss Elliven to her care. She sat up as the door closed, and looked round her a little wildly. “Is he gone ? ” she asked. “ Is who gone, my dear? Do you mean Bernard ? ” Miss Elliven shook her head. “ I meant Mr. Neville,” she whispered faintly, and turned so white that Mrs. Falconer made her lie down again, and insisted on silence. But later on, when Falconer had gone to a meeting, after which he was to call for Netta and bring her home, Mrs. Falconer recurred to the subject again herself. “Did I understand you that you knew Lord St. Ives ? ” she asked, with a good deal of curiosity in her voice. It was so curious if she did, and yet what else could “ Mr. Neville ” mean ? “No,” said Miss Elliven, “ I never saw Lord St. Ives before. It was the other one— Mr. Neville. Oh ! Mrs. Falconer, if I had thought of seeing him here - ” Her voice quivered painfully. She looked so agitated that Mrs. Falconer, curious as she was, thought of nothing but soothing her emotion. “My poor child, don’t distress yourself so, or you will be ill again. Mr. Neville ? I don’t quite under-

Page 698

The Wooing of Christabel. Stand. Neville is the family name of Lord St. Ives — do you mean that you knew him when he was Arthur Neville ? ” Miss Elliven looked at her in almost incredulous astonishment. “ Is Mr. Neville Lord St. Ives ? I never thought — I never dreamt of that ! And you were talking of him every day, and I never knew. I never guessed you meant him. And now I thought the other one must be Lord St. Ives.” “ My dear,” said the elder woman kindly, “ try and compose yourself” — for indeed Miss Elliven was shaking like one in an ague-fit — “ what could you have known of my nephew to agitate you like this ? You must have been so young when he left England, scarcely more than a child.” “ I was a child,” sighed Miss Elliven. ‘‘ I was only sixteen.” Mrs. Falconer drew a breath of relief. Whatever the relations between her nephew and Miss Elliven had been, and however the girl had been- moved by his unexpected appearance, the emotions of sixteen were not likely to lead to permanent complications. Besides which, she reflected with some satisfaction, St. Ives had not seemed to recognise his former acquaint¬ ance. “ Do yoii think he knew you ? ” she asked, and again that curious shivering came upon Miss Elliven. “ I hepe not ! ” she said fervently. “ I think you may be quite easy about that. He looked at you, he spoke of you as one does of a stranger. I have no doubt you have grown out of knowledge ; girls of your age alter so much in seven years. And 1 do not think he even recognised your name.” A crimson flush mounted to Miss Elliven’s brow. “ No,” she said, very low, “he would not do that.” Mrs. Falconer looked very uncomfortable. “ You — you do not mean that you have given us a false one?” she exclaimed; but the clear eyes that met hers almost disarmed suspicion. “It is my name, every letter of it,” replied Miss Elliven, “but I do not think that Mr. Neville — that Lord St. Ives — would recognise it.” Suddenly she knelt down and buried her face in Mrs. Falconer’s lap. “ Oh ! ” she sobbed, “ if I could only tell you all ! But I cannot — I caimot — and you must think it so strange.” For a moment sobs choked her voice, and then she looked up, and her face was pale, but firm. “ I will go,” she said. “ I will go away at once. If I had known who you were — if I had known I ivas coming amongst his people — I would not have come.” Mrs. Falconer did not answer at once. Her eyes were full of troubled thought. It was all so strange, so inexplicable, she did not know what to think. And she had grown so fond of Miss Elliven ; the thought of parting would have been painful, even without the miserable sense of distrust and mystery that would be involved in it now. 679 “ My dear,” she said gently, “ I think we are neither of us fit to decide so grave a point to-night. Go to bed, and to sleep, and in the morning we may see our way better. If you could have told me a little more - ? ” she ended wistfully, looking at the pale, proud face, with the clear innocent eyes it seemed so impossible to distrust. “ I can only tell you this,” said Miss Elliven ; “ there is nothing wrong in what I cannot tell you. Lord St. Ives is not to blame — you must not let yourself think that. He was — oh ! only too good, and noble, and kind. And if I do not wish to meet him, it is only to spare him pain. You will believe that, will you not ?” Mrs. Falconer bent down and kissed the fair up¬ turned brow. “ My dear, I will believe it, because I believe you,” she said impulsively. “ And now you must go to bed. Bernard and Netta will be here directly.” A new fear leapt into the startled eyes. “Oh ! ” she cried earnestly, “you will not tell them, will you? Promise me, promise me that ! ” “ I will not tell them to-night, certainly,” Mrs. Falconer promised. “We will leave to-morrow to take care of itself.” How could she promise not to tell her son, her unfailing guide and counsellor ? the kind lady thought. And then she sent Miss Elliven to bed, and sat over the fire, grave and anxious and perplexed, until the others returned. Netta had heard of St. Ives’ arrival, and was too full of that to be as concerned about her friend’s inopportune illness as she might otherwise have been. Neither she nor Falconer connected the two events, so Mrs. Falconer was spared embarrassing questions ; and, after assuring them that Miss Elliven had quite recovered from her indisposition, the talk drifted away to St. Ives and the friend he had brought with him. “ Tell me all about them, auntie darling,” pleaded Netta. “ I asked Bernard ; but men are so stupid, dear, aren’t they ? He didn’t tell me anything I really wanted to know.” “ I told you St. Ives seemed all right, and only looked a little older. What more could you want?’’ asked Falconer, with a fresh sense of his cousin’s unreasonableness. “Well, I want a great deal more,” Netta declared. “ Aunt, you have seen him ; does he look well and happy — really happy, you know ? And what is his friend like ? A very French Frenchman, Bernard says. It does not sound too attractive.” “ Which of your questions am I to answer first ? ” asked Mrs. Falconer, smiling at her niece’s eagerness. “ St. Ives is a good deal altered, but whether he is happy or not I cannot say. He is graver, and, I think, there is more power in his face. However, he is coming to-morrow, so you will be able to judge for yourself.” “ And his friend with the magnificent name, which Bernard murders so cruelly ? What is he like ? ” Netta inquired.

Page 699

68o The Wooing of Christabel. M. de Bassompierre seems a cultivated and pleasant man. He is very P'rench, in the sense of being extremely courteous and well-mannered.” “Well - mannered !” ejaculated Falconer. “ I am thankful to think that an Englishman does not think it necessary to make a buffoon of himself in order to be that.” “Moral?” said Netta. “And the moral is that M. de Bassompierre has evidently trodden on some of the Reverend Bernard Falconer’s corns. He has been quite venomous about the poor Frenchman, auntie, so you and I must be extra nice with him to make up for it. I wonder if he will come with Arthur to-morrow. Do you know what time he is coming ? ” “Early, I believe,” said Falconer. And on the strength of that Netta ate her break¬ fast the next morning with her eyes on the window, and was too much absorbed in her watch to notice that Miss Elliven was watching it too. Mrs. Falconer had sent word that she had had a bad night, and would breakfast in her own room ; and Bernard was deep in his paper, and had no eyes to spare for anything but that. He went into the study after breakfast, and the two girls were left alone, but they were both too pre¬ occupied for conversation. Netta was waiting with feverish impatience the coming of the cousin who lived in her memory as the one little bit of romance in an eminently unromantic life ; and Miss Elliven was wondering, with a curious heart-sinking, what her fate was to be. Would Mrs. Falconer be satisfied with the meagre statement she had made, unsub¬ stantiated as it was by any shadow of proof, or would she tell her she must go ? And which did she herself desire — to stay, or to go ? To go would be wisest, she knew ; to stay might undo her life-work, and could ■only lead to difficulties and complications, to inevitable suffering for them both ; and yet — and yet - How could she go, how could she, without seeing him again? If he did not know her it could do no harm, and perhaps the hungry longing that had kept her awake all night might be stilled again, and she would find strength to go. She could not go yet, she told herself : she could not go without seeing him .again. She would at least put off her decision till Mrs. Falconer came down ; and she called the boys to their lessons, and gave a divided attention to the •elements of Euclid and the dates of the Norman kings till the door-bell rang, and drove every vestige 'Of colour from her face. Netta had seen St. Ives from the window, and was already in the hall, and Falconer came out from the study. Miss Elliven could hear the cousins’ greeting, and the tones of a voice she knew as well as they. Oh ! why had not she the right to run out and greet him too ? The right ? Who was there in all the Tvorld had so good a right as she ? “ He was married, wasn’t he, Miss Elliven ? ” shouted Flavius. And Miss Elliven looked at him 'with dilated eyes. Married she whispered in affirighted tones. “Child! What do you mean? what do you know about it ? ” “ Know he was,” said Flavius. “ Shut up. Mar¬ malade, you duffer, and let 7ne say it. ‘ Henry the First, iioo, died 1135, married Matilda of Scotland and Adelais of Louvaine ’ — there! Two wives, and Marmalade said ‘not married ’ ! Flavius was triumphant ; but Miss Elliven was no longer interested. Her thoughts were not with the royalties of the twelfth century, but with the living cousins in the hall. Would they come into the school-room, and would he come with them ? “And now you must see the boys,” Netta was say¬ ing. “ They are doing their lessons, but Miss Elliven will let them off to come and speak to you.” “ How is Miss Elliven?” that other voice inquired, in tones of unconstrained and friendly solicitude. She knew, even before he came in, that Mrs. Falconer was right. He had 7iot known her the night before, it was evident. Would he know her now ? He came in and spoke to the boys, and then he shook hands with the governess, but though his eyes rested very kindly on the beautiful face, there was no recognition in them. Whatever her desire to remain unknown had sprung from, she understood, with a swift sharp pang, that it was abundantly fulfilled, and a verse of the psalm the vicar had read at prayers seemed to sound again in her ears : “ He gave them their desire and sent leanness withal into their soul.” Was it not so with her ? To sit there and see him looking at her with the friendly courtesy that seemed to put a wider gulf between them than entire neglect — nay, even than absence itself — was a pain she could scarcely bear. She sat white and trembling, clasping and unclasping her hands, and answering St. Ives’ well-meant inquiries as briefly as she could. Flavius had his wish in seeing his governess embarrassed at last, but it was not as amusing as he had expected. “Are you going to be ill again. Miss Elliven?” he whispered, when the others had gone out of the room. There were unsuspected gleams of tenderness in the little boy’s nature that contrasted queerly with his rough manners and droll unpoetic face, like the looks that sometimes beam from the eyes of some shaggy and uncared-for Skye terrier. “ Would you like us to do an exercise instead of saying our lessons ? ” he asked bravely, although it was the day for Latin — a language Flavius regarded as a demoniac tongue, invented specially for the torture of small boys. “Thank you,” said Miss Elliven ; “but I am afraid I must excuse your lessons to-day. I do not feel well enough to take them. You may go and play in the garden, and Marmaduke too.” Flavius strangled an hurrah with some difficulty, and as the boys sped away Miss Elliven went upstairs to her own room, and fell upon her knees. She was pale and exhausted, and trembling in every limb, as she sobbed out a voiceless, wordless prayer ; but when she rose at last her agitation had passed away, and the peace of a great resolve was on the quiet face. She did not go down again, but knocked at Mrs. Falconer’s door.

Page 700

The Wooing of Christabel. 68i “ You have something to tell me,” that acute lady said, as the governess entered. “I see it in your eyes.” Mrs. Falconer was up and dressed, and sitting in her dressing-room. She made room for Miss Elliven beside her, but the governess did not take the offered seat. She stood pale and still before the woman who, however much she might be her friend, was her mis¬ tress also. Yes, I have something to tell you,” she said, and then she faltered, as if the telling was not easy. “I told you the night would bring counsel,” said Mrs. Falconer; “ I hope it has also brought light.” “ Yes,” said Miss Elliven gravely, “ or at least light has come. I have seen him. I have seen Lord St. Ives again, and I am sure he does not know me. As far as he is concerned, I need not go.” “And you wish to stay?” said Mrs. Falconer, with an accent of doubt she could not quite control. Her own meditations had not led her entirely to this result. “ I wish to do what is right,” said Miss Elliven. “ I told you yesterday that I could not tell you how I came to know Lord St. Ives, but I have come to feel that you have a right to know. If — if you will promise me to keep my secret, 1 will trust you. I will tell you my story. I feel that I could not, that I ought not to stay here without doing so, and then you must decide.” “ Thank you,” said Mrs. Falconer. “ I believe you will only be doing right to tell me, and I need not say I shall regard your confidence as sacred. Come and sit here, and try to feel as if you were talking to a mother.” The story, as Miss Elliven called it, took some time to tell, and was interrupted by many ejaculations of wonder from Mrs. Falconer, by gestures of surprise, and almost of dismay. But if Mrs. Falconer’s face was grave, it was very tender also. Her arms were round the weeping girl as she ended, and a kiss that might have been a mother’s was pressed upon her brow. “ Child ! ” she cried, “ it was the maddest, foolishest thing to do, and yet I love you for it. To think that he should not know you ! It seems incredible.” Miss Elliven sighed. “He does not remember. Fie never cared for me, you see,” she said simply. Then she raised her eyes and looked at Mrs. Falconer Avistfully. “ I have told you all,” she said. “ Tell me what you think I ought to do. Do you think I ought to go or stay ? ” Mrs. Falconer took the beautiful face between her hands and kissed it. “ Are you willing to be guided by me ?” “Yes,” said Miss Elliven. “ Then, my dear, I think you ought to stay.” CHAPTER THE TWELFTPI. AN ANAGRAM. “There is much — nay, almost all — in names.” — Carlyle. While Miss Elliven was relating to Mrs. Falconer the story which seemed to that lady so pathetic and so strange, Bernard Falconer was closeted in his study with Lord St. Ives, discussing the details of the “ business ” with which he had threatened him yester¬ day. It related chiefly to the mismanagement of the estate, and to suspected defalcations on the part of the steward, which had had something to do with St. Ives’ return ; but which he now seemed inclined to pass over in a way Falconer called “positively im¬ moral.” St. Ives was indeed almost as careless in money matters as in the days when he had found himself involved in the toils of Wendover, the money-lender ; and though no man likes to be robbed, he was not inclined to do more than dismiss the steward, and utterly refused to prosecute him. “ It’s half my own fault for leaving so much in his hands,” said St. Ives. “He would go straight enough where he was looked after, I believe ; and at any rate, I feel I ought to give the poor beggar another chance. I’ll send him away as soon as I can meet with another man to take his place.” “ I should send him away at once.” “ I’ve no doubt you would ! But I’ve got myself to think of, low as the motive may be. I’ve about as much notion how to manage an estate as Scamp there ; so, you see, I should be rather cornered if I sent Webster away before I got a successor.” “I suppose so,” conceded Falconer; “but you would very soon get to know all about it, if you would only settle down at home. And why don’t you, St. Ives? An absentee landlord can never be a good one. It is bad for the place, and for yourself too. Surely you must have had enough of travelling by now.” “Why, yes, if that were all. It is all very well to say, ‘ Why don’t I settle down ? ’ but would you, in my place ? Would a solitary life at Ivethorpe be so de¬ lightful ? And do you forget that I am a man doomed to solitude ?” F'alconer did not affect to misunderstand him. “ You still think, then, that your wife is alive ?” “ I shall think so until I hear that she is not.” “ Well, you know what my opinion has always been. If she were alive, I believe you would have heard of her before this.” “ It may be so,” said St. Ives, in a dispirited tone. “ I have thought so lately more than once, especially since I came home ; and I will tell you why. I saw both the detectives and the lawyers as I came through town, and they both told me the same thing. Old Wendover died, it seems, three or four years ago, leaving all his money to his daughter, and she has never appeared to claim it.” “ That is conclusive, I should say.” , “ So / should think, if it were anyone but Chris¬ tabel.” Falconer did not answer. The reverential regard St. Ives felt for his lost wife seemed to his practical cousin folly and misplaced sentiment It was mere waste of breath to talk to a man who had not been convinced by a proof like this. “ Well,” he said, after a pause, in which the thoughts

Page 701

682 The Wooing of Christabel. of both had been busy, ‘‘if I were you, St. Ives, I should give up this roaming, useless existence. Come and live at Ivethorpe, and look after your people, and take your proper place amongst your neigh¬ bours. The duties of life are yours still, even if the pleasures are not.'’ “Cheering prospect I ” commented St. Ives bit¬ terly. He leant his forehead against the high mantel-piece, and gazed down into the fire that was blackening and dying under the brilliant April sun, with a weary and hopeless expression that contrasted painfully with the still youthful face and figure. Suddenly Falconer exclaimed, “If all the lawyers have told you is true, I suppose you must be quite a rich man ? ” “As riches go, I suppose I am,” said St. Ives, without looking up. “ My revered grandfather made more fuss than he need about his wealth ; but there is more than enough for a man who leads a life like mine.” “Your grandfather ?— but I was not thinking about him. Did you not say old Wendover was dead, and had left his money to your wife.^” “Well?” “ Surely you are entitled to it ? ” “ So they say ; but I shall not claim it.” “Not claim it? Well, really, St. Ives, I call that Quixotism gone mad ! Think of the good that you might do.” St. Ives faced round with glowing eyes. “ And think of the hound I .should be if I touched a penny of it. My poor girl, who has given it all up for me ! How do I know in what straits she may be for want of it ? It shall stay untouched, for her to take or leave.” “ Or for some sixteenth cousin of old Wendover’s to set up a claim to, failing other heirs ?” St. Ives made no reply. He was gazing out of the window with a sudden look of interest that brought Falconer to his side. Mrs. Falconer had persuaded Miss Elliven to go for a walk, and she and Netta were going by together. Netta glanced in and nodded brightly ; but Miss Elliven passed on with stately step and averted gaze. “What an exquisite face!” St. Ives exclaimed. “ And yet there is something — I do not know what it is— but there is something about it that reminds me of Christabel.” “Of Christabel— of your wife?'"' cried Falconer incredulously. “ My dear Arthur, do you know what you have done ? You have brooded over your wife till you have idealised a well-meaning, foolish child, who could scarcely have been called even pretty, into a beauty and a saint. You must forgive my plain speaking, but when you compare her with Miss Elliven - ” “ I know it seems absurd,” said St. Ives. “ I know that Christabel was plain enough, poor girl, and as different from the absolute perfection of your beau¬ tiful governess, as — as — as that brown little cygnet following its mother down the river there is from that fair white swan. But I think there is a certain beauty of soul that may show itself in similar ways, even in the most dissimilar faces.” Falconer, on his part, thought that his cousin was capable of talking more nonsense on the subject of his wife than a sensible man could be expected to listen to, and was glad that a tap at the door saved him from the necessity of making a reply. It was Mrs. Falconer, who had come in to see St. Ives, ostensibly to ask him to fix an evening for coming to the Vicarage, but really, as she owned afterwards, to try and realise to herself that he was not only her nephew, but the hero of Miss Elliven’s extraordinary story. How impossible it seemed, as site looked at the familiar face, lit up by the smile he had always worn for her I She brought out her little invitation with the strangest sense of unreality, and the sort of apology she might have made to a stranger. “ Our ways are simple, as befits a parsonage,” said the vicar’s mother, “but if you can forego late dinner in favour of high tea - ” St. Ives laughed. “ My dear aunt, what banquet could compare with tea poured out you? I am not wedded to late dinners, I assure you. There have been many days when De Bassompierre and I would have been thankful to feel sure of a dinner at any hour of the twenty-four.” “ Then will you and your friend come to-morrow at half-past six ? You may at least rely on something to eat - “As if I didn’t know your sumptuous teas of old? Were there ever such curries, such chicken, such mayonnaises, such cakes and scones?” “Ah I” said his aunt, “he hasn’t lost his beguiling tongue, has he, Bernard ? Go away, you clumsy boy — your compliments are too direct. M. de Bassompierre could surely teach you better? He could at least show you how to make them with infinite delicacy and grace.” “ I will ask him to give me a lesson,” said St. Ives, as he looked at his watch, and declared he should be called a 'perfide Anglais unless he went back to his friend at once. “ Only, please remember,” he said as he took his leave, “ if my manners are not all you could wish, IVe been shut up for two mortal hours with a Bear.” He went away with a jest, but his aunt noticed how grave his face had grown again as he walked down the garden path. “ Poor Arthur 1 ” she said very tenderly. “It is always easier to pity than to blame him. I won¬ der, oh ! I wonder if he will ever know happiness again ? ” “ Why should he not ? ” said Falconer, looking at his mother in surprise. If she had known the secret he was bound not to reveal to her, she might have felt some doubt, but why should she now ? “ What St. Ives wants is something to do,” he added. “No one can be happy without that.” “Work is your panacea, I know,” returned Mrs.

Page 702

i HE Wooing of Christabel. Falconer. ‘‘ It succeeds in nine cases out of ten, only i think this is the tenth.'’ “ What do you mean ? ” I mean that what St. Ives wants is not something to do, but something to love.” It might be true, but was out of the question, Falconer thought, but he did not say so. He could not tell his mother how impossible such a solution of the problem was, and silence seemed the safest course. Mrs. Falconer said no more, but from time to time she betrayed a lively interest in her nephew, and his approaching visit that excited her son’s curiosity, and made him, Nettgi declared, decidedly jealous. She teased him unmercifully, but there was a good deal of foundation for the assertion. He was so used to being the central object of interest in his own house, that almost unconsciously he resented the petting his mother bestowed on St. Ives when he came, and even the attentions which M. de Bassompierre — politest of men ! — lavished upon Netta, and which she received with what Falconer considered quite unnecessary graciousness. But if Falconer objected to the voluble Frenchman, everyone else found him an acquisition, and possibly a relief. Mrs. Falconer was nervous and altogether unlike herself; Miss Elliven was curiously silent, and St. Ives was gloomy and oppressed. Falconer himself was affected by the oppression of the others, which he felt rather than apprehended, but Netta and De Bassompierre kept up a flow of lively badinage, like two happy children playing with combustibles \vhose nature they do not understand. Falconer had no longer to complain of the French¬ man’s admiration for Miss Elliven. He had, indeed, made for the corner where la belle goiLver7iante^'^ was sitting when he first came in, but had found himself received with a chilling indifference that made him speedily beat a retreat. “ I like not the icicles, nioi^^ he said to Netta, and to himself he added : “ Beauty is good, but V esprit, it is better.” Perhaps to show his appreciation of Miss Delmar’s espi'it, he devoted himself to her for the rest of the evening, and Netta enjoyed it. It was pleasant to her to let St. Ives see that others found something in her to admire, and Arthur’s presence gave addi¬ tional zest to the compliments that were too grace¬ fully veiled to offend. She would never, never, neve> care for anyone but St. Ives, but she could not be rude to his friend, and civility cost nothing, not even a sigh ! She could listen to M. de Bassom¬ pierre and look af St. Ives, and she availed herself of her privileges to do both whenever she thought her¬ self unobserved. “How Netta is grown and improved!” St. Ives whispered to his aunt. “ 1 wonder no one has per¬ suaded her to leave you before this.” “ I don’t think anyone has tried,” was on his aunt's lips, but this is one of the facts that are always buried in decent oblivion, and she changed it into “ I don’t think Netta has any wish to leave us.” “No?” said St. Ives, “I dare say not. But when 683 the right man comes, I expect she will change her mind.” “If the right man does, I hope she will, but not unless. An unmarried woman has her trials, no doubt, but they are — they can be— nothing to the misery of an unequal or ill-assorted marriage.” St. Ives agreed, with a sigh. Ill-assorted and un¬ equal ! What words could have described his own marriage better? — nay, what words could have de¬ scribed his own marriage so well ? He got up abruptly, and went across the room to the piano, where Miss Elliven was evidently preparing to play. It was curious— it was, perhaps, part of that subtle likeness in unlikeness of which he had spoken to Fal¬ coner — that as he crossed the room he remembered his first evening at Brookfield, and how Christabel had played a nocturne of Chopin’s like the well-taught school-girl she was. Miss Elliven was playing it in very different fashion now. What pathos and passion there were in it, played like this I It was the same, the very same, he was sure, but how different ! — as different as was the Vicarage drawing-room, with its subdued harmonious colouring, from the drawing¬ room at Brookfield, or as this supremely beautiful girl from the poor gawky child who had been for an hour his wife ! ^ “Are you fond of Chopin?” he asked, and then, before she could speak : “ But I need not ask. Only one who loved his music could play it like that.” “ I do love it,” Miss E 1 ven admitted ; “ but I always did that. Unfortunately, one wants something more than love.” “ Knowledge, do you mean ? ” “ Techiiiqiie? Yes, and - ” “And sorrow!” said De Bassompierre, who was standing by. He turned to Netta, and added, in a tone even lower than his bow — “Mademoiselle, I hope you will nevare play Chopin comme c^a. It is beautiful, magnifiqiie, but triste, so triste, see you? Sad, you call it? Yes — sad so as to make the angels weep.” Netta stared and tried not to laugh. She was English to her finger-tips, and abhorred the expression of sentiment or feeling, especially in a drawing-room. She always distrusted it as artificial and unreal ; but if M. de Bassompierre’s sentiment was not deep, it was genuine as far as it went. “ Your friend, she liaf a history, is it not ? ” he said, as Miss Elliven began another piece. “ I admire her, see you ? but I like the demoiselles, moi, whose history shall commence by-and-by.” Nevertheless, his applause was the loudest as the music ceased. St. Ives did not applaud at all. It would have seemed to him an impertinence, almost a profanation. He shut the piano as Miss Elliven rose, and even De Bassompierre had never achieved a com¬ pliment like that. There was no more music, and Netta brought out a box of letters, and gave puzzle-words which reduced her guests to the verge of distraction. De Bassom¬ pierre had never played before, and his imperfect

Page 703

684 “‘YOU WILL BELIEVE THAT, WILL YOU NOT?”’ {p. 679). knowledge of the language made it difficult to him, but as soon as he comprehended the principle he was •eager to display his skill. “ Go ! ” he cried, “ I will find you von word, joste 'voii! that shall say to you in himself, ‘beauty, and music, and love.’ ” He hunted out about half a dozen letters, and put them down before Netta. “Have you found him?” he asked presently, but Netta shook her head. St. Ives came and looked over her shoulder. “ I can see nothing but my own name,” he said. ‘‘‘ Pray, am / music and beauty and love ? ” “ Yotir name ? That is all nonsense,” said his friend. “ Those letters make not ‘ St. Ives.’ ” “No ; but they make ‘ Neville,’ ” said St. Ives, put¬ ting them in order on the table. De Bassompierre looked at them in evident sur¬ prise. “ They make you, but they was not meant for you. I will put him now as he was intend.” He rapidly re-arranged the letters so as to form the name of Ellive^i. “ It is ‘Neville’ backwards, see you? That is ver drole, is it not ? ” END OF CHAPTER THE TWELFTH.

Page 704

685 A GOSSIP ABOUT CORNISH COOKERY. EY A. G. PAYNE, AUTHOR OF ‘'CHOICE DISHES AT SMALL COST,” ETC. VERY county in England has, in one form or another, certain dishes peculiar to itself. We have Yorkshire cakes and Yorkshire puddings, besides the famous Yorkshire pies. There are Norfolk dumplings, as well as Suffolk dumplings and Suffolk buns. There is Leicester pie and Leicester pudding. Devonshire is famous for its cream, its cider, and its junkets. Of all counties, however, Cornwall probably possesses more distinctive dishes than any other in England, many of these being of extreme anticjuity. Cornwall is famous for its vegetables ; and if Kent has been called the “ garden of England,” Cornwall may well claim to be considered the market garden, supplying as it does, with assistance from the Scilly Islands, a great proportion of the vegetables for the London market. The principal reason of the productiveness of Corn¬ wall is the climate, the peculiarity of which is its equability. In winter the glass rarely goes below 50°, and in summer seldom rises above 70°. It is a small peninsula jutting out into the Atlantic, and its shores are warmed by the Gulf Stream. A mist floats over it in winter and keeps it warm, while a similar mist in summer acts as a species of umbrella, and keeps it cool. Scarlet geraniums are in full bloom all the year round ; while last, but not least, the cattle have always plenty of grass, snow being almost unknown. From this it will be well understood that vegetables and milk form a distinctive feature in Cornish cookery. The most popular dish among the country people in Cornwall is what is known as Cornish Broth, the chief feature of which is a huge slice of one of those gigantic cabbages which abound, and which Cornish- men and Cornish cows seem to enjoy with equal relish. These cabbages are not green, like the ordinary ones, but quite white, and in the autumn of the year often attain a size larger than a nine-gallon cask. Indeed, we have known prize cabbages, exhibited in agri¬ cultural shows, as big round as a wheel of a cart, and weighing over twenty pounds. Cornish broth is made by boiling a huge slice of one of these cabbages with some turnips (swedes), carrots, parsnip, parsley, and onion. Leeks are better than onions, and, as we were informed by a Cornish country¬ woman who was making the broth in question, in her Cornish dialect: “We ‘belong’ to put leeks in it,” which meant we “ought” to put leeks in it. On all great occasions, such as the Sunday dinner, a piece of beef is boiled with the vegetable, and eaten after the broth according to the French custom. Another staple diet in Cornwall is Cornish Pasty. These meat turnovers make their appearance at most of the railway refreshment rooms soon after leaving Plymouth, and are far more honest than the ordinary railway meat pie. They are made in the shape of a turnover, and are generally about eight inches long, and the inside is composed of slices of meat, either pork or beef, mixed with potatoes cut in slices, also slices of swede turnips and shredded onions. The pastry is the ordinary dripping crust, similar to that used to make a large meat pie suitable for the children’s early dinner. The only seasoning is a little pepper and salt. No gravy is added, but the inside is generally moist owing to the juices from the turnips, potatoes, and onions. These Cornish pasties take about an hour to bake in a fairly brisk oven. They are extensively used by the miners and outdoor labourers who have to take their dinner with them ; and many who are in the habit of taking their luncheon might do worse than give them a trial. A very popular dish in Cornwall is known as Heavy Cake, which, among the juvenile inhabitants, supplies the place of the ordinary plum cake elsewhere. It is a very plain and wdiolesome cake, and is made as follows : — To every two pounds of flour is added half a pound of currants or half a pound of sultana raisins, three table-spoonfuls of moist sugar, a pinch of salt, one ounce of lemon candied peel chopped very fine, and about a quarter of a grated nutmeg. Half a pound of dripping or lard, or a quarter of a pound of each, is added, the flour being rubbed well in, and sufficient water to make the w’hole a thick stiff paste which can be rolled out. The cake is rolled out about an inch thick on a baking-sheet, and baked in the oven. As the name implies, the cake is very heavy and very substantial, and often forms the dinner of a labouring man. At the season of Christmas, when throughout England people are preparing the mincemeat and plum pudding, the Cornish housewives -are busy over the manufacture of the famous Saffron Cakes, which seem peculiar to this county. Probably the custom is of great antiquity, but it is a curious fact, and shows how customs are handed dowm, that Cornish miners who are engaged in the mines in South Africa and Mexico — and there are many thousands who have gone thither — make a point of having saffron cakes at Christmas. The following are the ingredients of a saffron cake made last winter in a place near Helston : — Six pounds of flour, three pounds of currants, half a pound of candied peel, two pounds of either dripping or lard, one pound of butter, one pound of moist sugar, two nutmegs grated, three eggs, a quarter of an ounce of saffron, and a pint of barm, this barm being a species of yeast. What will strike most persons is the very small proportion of eggs to the very large quantity of flour,

Page 705

686 A Gossip about Corkish Cookery. but we give the recipe as it was made in a small country house, and we were assured that poor people never used more, as at Christmas-time eggs were very dear. As, however, the cake when baked has the appearance of having been composed almost entirely of yolks of eggs, the small quantity does not matter so far as looks go, and very likely the saffron was origin¬ ally introduced from motives of economy. The saffron is used as follows : — A quarter of an ounce is placed fur about five or ten minutes in the oven to get dry. 1 1 is then crushed with a rolling-pin and broken up into a powder. This powder is placed in a basin, and about a pint of boiling water poured on it. Afterwards more water, and sometimes) milk, is added, in suf¬ ficient quantity to enable all the ingredients to be mixed together. The cake is then baked in tins in the ordinary way. At Christmas-time, throughout the greater part of Western Cornwall, the bakers’ shops are filled with these bright yellow cakes, while in the windows of the grocers’ shops heaps of saffron are exhibited in conjunction with the raisins, and currants, and candied peel. Sweet Giblet Pie is another well-known dish among Cornishmen, and shows how very much their cooking resembles that of the Continent. Those who have travelled in Belgium and Germany will remember how common it is for fruit to be served with meat. Stewed prunes are sometimes handed round with pork sausages. Preserved currants are always served with veal. Giblet soup in Germany is made with apples, and sometimes, instead of apples, very small new potatoes are served in the soup whole. Giblets are also, in Germany, cooked with pears and turnips. Space will not allow us to enter into the details of these German recipes, but we may mention that they are all to be found in “ Cassell’s Dictionary of Cook¬ ery.” It is, however, a curious coincidence that the sweet giblet pie peculiar to Cornwall is made like the ordinary giblet pie, with the addition that raisins, or apples, or potatoes, or turnips form one of the in¬ gredients. When apples are added, raisins are not used, and vice versa. Scalded Cream is perhaps the most popular of all Cornish dishes. It is eaten in a variety of ways, and it seems to be an essential point in hospitality to have a dish of cream at every meal where there are guests. In summer-time the cream is served with fruit, but in winter it is often eaten quite plain, being spread on bread like butter, and a little sugar sprinkled over the top. This scalded cream very much resembles what is known in Devonshire as clotted cream, the scalded cream being thicker and richer. This cream is easily prepared as follows : — The milk is collected in a large round metal vessel, containing about two gallons. This is allowed to stand for several hours, so that the cream may settle at the top. The vessel is then placed on a shut-up stove and the milk allowed to get hot, but not to boil. This generally takes some time, which, of course, varies with the quantity of milk and the heat of the stove ; but as soon as one or two bubbles begin to rise the vessel is removed from the fire, and at the same time the cream at the top will be observed to turn more yellow, and get what we may call crinkly. The length of time one must allow the milk to stand before it is put on the fire can be judged from the following facts: — The milk taken from the last milking at night is put on the fire the first thing in the morning. The early morning milk is usually put on the stove about one o’clock in the afternoon. It is wonderful how prolific in milk are some of these Cornish cows. We are personally acquainted with one that yields three gallons of milk in the morning and two and a half in the evening. Two gallons of milk will produce about a pound and a half of scalded cream. It is always best to allow a whole day for the milk to get cold before taking the cream off. After the cream has been removed, of course the milk remains. In London and most parts of the country it is called “ skimmed” milk, or ‘^separated ” milk, the latter word being derived from the machine used in dairy farming called the “separate!*.” In Cornwall it is called “ scald,” or “scalded ” milk. In towns it is sold at three pints a penny, and in the country four pints. Large quantities are given to the pigs. What a pity it is that it cannot be transported, and sold at this price at the East End of London ! Perhaps the day may come when huge blocks of frozen milk — not separated— but pure, will find their way to the London markets from Devonshire, Cornwall, and Ireland, like the frozen mutton from New Zealand. In conclusion, w’e wfill describe how to make a genuine Cornish Junket. The recipe is so simple that we do not know how anyone can fail to succeed. Take, say, a pint of fresh milk and warm it in a sauce¬ pan till it is rather hotter than blood heat, add two teaspoonfuls of Cornish rennet, and pour it into a glass dish and let it get cold. The milk can be first sweetened and flavoured with vanilla, &c., or can be used quite plain. When it is cold it forms a solid. In fact, a junket is one solid mass of curd as smooth as a piece of blanc-mange, only far lighter. A slight quantity of whey will form in the dish round it. In making a junket, you should calculate the time as nearly as possible, so that it is eaten directly it gets cold, as after a time it gets watery. It is also apt to get more watery after it is cut. For instance, were you to make a junket and pour it into a glass dish an inch and a half deep, very little whey would form round the edge, but if you were to take out two or three spoonfuls the holes would gradually fill up with whey. The custom in Cornwall is to serve the scalded cream with the junket. It seems to strangers a funny mixture, but it is the custom of the country. Junket is extremely nice served with stewed fruit, especially with stewed raspberries or stewed currants and cherries. Whether it would be possible to make a junket out of Lon¬ don milk we cannot say — the experiment might be tried ; but we all remember the story of the London milkman who told the cook, on her com¬ plaining of the thinness of the cream, that it only wanted stirring up, as the cream had settled at the bottom. It is evident that our milkman was not a Cornishman.

Page 706

68/ PICTURES OF THE MONTHS. A PRIME MINISTER’S ENGAGEMENTS. N England the Sovereign reigns, but does not govern. The person who governs is the Prime Minister. This constitutional maxim has been freely rendered by Professor A. V. Dicey as follows : — “ The Executive of England is, in fact, placed in the hands of a com¬ mittee, called the Cabinet. If there be any one person in whose single hand the power of the State is placed, that one person is not the Queen, but the Prime Minister.’’ It may be re¬ garded as a still more singular anomaly that the Prime Minister is an unknown being in our Constitu¬ tion. The Vinerian Professor just quoted designates him as Chairman of the Cabinet. Such a functionary is equally unknown. The Prime Minister, as such, has been evolved, in a curious manner, out of modern necessities, alike of speech and of thought. There were Prime Ministers before the accession of the House of Hanover, but they were known by other titles, and they had less power. Cardinal Wolsey was Henry VlII.’s “Prime Man of the State,’' according to Shakespeare, as Prospero was “The Prime Duke” of Milan; and Lord Keepers of the Seal and the King’s Conscience were Prime Ministers in reality, though not in name. Popular power centred in tax-raising, and the head of the Exchequer Department was made, at the time just mentioned. Lord High Treasurer. The second word was occasionally omitted, and so we find Addison, in his letters, referring to the “ Lord Treasurer.” The re-organisation of the Treasury under Lords Com¬ missioners marks the next stage of advance towards the Prime Minister. The Lord High Treasurer be¬ came the First Lord of the Treasury, and the use of the French term Preinie7‘ originally carried with it the connecting words, “ Lord of the Treasury.” The change to the older English word Prime, with Mini¬ ster added, was clearly made to recognise the growth of general power in the hands of the head of a Ministry, and the lessening of financial control with the division of financial work. The old High Trea¬ surer was virtually the Chancellor of the Exchequer ; the new First Lord gradually ceased to be so. It is hardly possible to trace these changes in detail. They may be detected in private letters, speeches, and newspapers, but not in official documents. As late as

Page 707

688 A Prime Minister’s Engagements. 1851, we find Mr. Richard Doyle writing to Lady Duff Gordon of Lord John Russell as “First Minister.” Until 1885 the First Lord of the Treasury had always been Prime Minister, with possibly a temporary break when the late Lord Derby was permitted, on account of his age, to be without a formal office. When Lord John Russell wished to be in Lord Palmerston’s Cabinet without any special office, the request was declined as inconvenient, if not uncon¬ stitutional. The supposed connection of the Prime Minister with finance lies at the root of the Treasury headship. But it was useful in other ways. With the specialisation introduced into the Treasury of late years, the First Lord has had very little to do. He can easily leave to others many details. He has no daily routine of work,, and he is thus free to exercise that control of all his other Ministers which is apart of the Prime Minister’s duties. Whether this direct personal and habitual control is as real and as consciously felt by Ministers themselves as it used to be, is very doubtful. There is good reason for believing that since the late Sir Robert Peel’s time, and, to a slighter extent, since Lord Palmerston’s day, there has been a greater range of freedom and activity on the part of individual departmental Ministers. It is probably inevitable and wise. Human energy is limited, and national concerns grow in extent and complexity. A Prime Minister cannot control in quite the same sense as he used to do, nor is it desirable that he should attempt to dominate in matters of detail, which would most likely smother him into feeble arm-chair government. A Prime Minister’s engagements may, therefore, be said to have lessened, as far as the general details of administration are concerned, during the last few decades, without in any way lessening the actual power and responsibility of his position. If this were not so, we should not have seen Mr. Gladstone adding to his Premiership the Chancellorship of the Ex¬ chequer, or Lord Salisbury assuming the duties of Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. When at the Treasur}^, the Prime Minister is much occupied with the distribution of the patron¬ age at his command. The clerical patronage alone is so considerable that it has to be divided into departments, as the Queen’s Division and Peel’s Division (named after the great statesman). It may be mentioned here that when an appointment is recommended a brief docu¬ ment is drawn out, signed by the Prime Minister, if not entirely written by him ; a copy is made of it, and then the original is transmitted to the Queen. The Minister in attendance upon her, wherever she may be, presents these recommendations to her, and when she has written upon them “ Approved, V.R.,” copies are made, retained by Her Majesty, and the originals are sent back to the Prime Minister. The next stage is to forward the originals to the Department of State with which the appointment is ad¬ ministratively connected, where they are pre¬ served amongst the archives. There are cases, however, in which, as in various com¬ missions, the Queen’s actual signature and the document it is written upon, with the royal seal attached, pass into the hands of the person appointed, and a copy only is archived. But either the original or the copy is always preserved. A Prime Minister cannot have any regu¬ lar office hours, even when he is simply a First Lord of the Treasury. Mr. Gladstone has always lived at the official residence in Downing Street when he has been Prime Minister, and so he has been always ac¬ cessible and always at work. It was his custom to begin the official duties of the day about ten o’clock, and he remained very closely at work until noon, getting through a large amount of business. He was very THE PREMIER. (From a Photograph by Russell Sons.)

Page 708

A Prime Minister’s Engagements. 689 methodical and laborious. Indeed, to have the pleasure of working with him, or of assisting him, was in itself an education in public life and affairs. His secretaries, in whom he always had —and with excellent reason— implicit confidence, had been busy long before that hour, reading important letters, so that they could submit to him their principal points in a few words, sum¬ marising such documents as needed treatment in that way, and generally sparing him drudgery and the use of his eyes in mastering the contents and deciphering the caligraphy of all ob¬ scure communications. Reports upon important matters from the several departments of State are constantly being received by the Prime Minister, who, in this way, is kept an coura7it with what is going on, and with the progress of business which may have been determined upon in Cabinet Council. With the cessation of minute personal control there has naturally been an increase in the number of official and semi-official communica¬ tions which claim the attention of a Prime Minister and his private and official assistants. It would not be possible for him to peruse all such documents himself— the time and la¬ bour required would be immense— and so the bulk of it is done by trusted persons. Replies are dictated, and copies are taken of everything needful to refer to again. Naturally, there is much that is trivial and merely literary lumber, but it has to be got through, and the transmitter and the first re¬ cipient do whatever is possible to save time and trouble. A Prime Minister, as such, apart from any other office he may hold, is in regular receipt of boxes of communications from foreign parts, some of great interest, and others of a comparatively unimportant nature. Embassy and consulate officials are thus in more or less frequent communication with the head of the British Government ; and in their desire to neglect nothing of any importance, they are much more prone to send what may have to be returned as of no value than to make their despatch-boxes light and really interesting. Lord Salisbury, the present Prime Minister, is also Foreign Secretary ; and he does not reside in his official residence, but in his own private house. When m town, he may be frequently seen walking in the corner of the Green Park nearest Arlington Street foi a short time before settling down to his morning’s work, which usually begins a few minutes after ten o clock. By that time his secretaries have made something in the nature of a classification of the 764 the EX-PREMIER. (From a Photograph by Barrand.') official documents which he has to see, or sign, or transmit for the use and information of other Ministers. Letters have been read, and precis made of the longer ones. Two or three hours of close work follow, some of which may have no connection with distinctly foreign affairs, and bear upon administrative or Parlia¬ mentary concerns. When this is over, the Premier is free to visit the Foreign Office, or to take some little relaxation before his mid-day meal, or he may prefer to plunge into the enormous mass of material which our foreign officials inflict upon their chief. Foreign Office work differs from Treasury work in involving more routine. It is very heavy indeed. The office itself has many subdivisions, and the apportion¬ ment of their work involves much time, and often considerable nice discrimination. Large boxes of despatches periodically arrive, and their examination occupies a large amount of time. Every communi¬ cation of any importance has attached to it a short and carefully made summary of its argument and

Page 709

A Prime Ministers Engagements. 690 contents. Indeed, without this table of contents official work would be much more of a painful drudgery than it really is, and it would be next to impossible for heads of subdivisions, much less for the Foreign Secretary himself, to maintain anything like a fair acquaintance with what is proceeding in various parts of the world. The reference here is to ordinary fully written despatches, and such official notes as do not rank so high, and yet play their part, occasionally, as State papers, and are printed, as necessity arises, for the information of Parliament. Cipher messages are dealt with separately, and are duly written out for the perusal of the Secretary by the officials of the secret department on duty for that purpose. The Prime Minister has to make a special minute of the proceedings of every Cabinet Council that is held, and this is duly conveyed to Her Majesty for her in¬ formation. A copy is kept for the use of the Cabinet, and a second one for the use of the Premier himself. This will explain the Cabinet etiquette which requires the assent of Her Majesty before reference can be made to matters that come before the Prime Minister in session thereon — notably, in such cases as resig¬ LORD SALISBURY’S ROOM AT THE FOREIGN OFFICE. {Cabinet Councils are sometimes held round the table in the foreground i) nations, always involving the most delicate handling, as was seen in the present Lord Derby’s case during the San Stefano Treaty negotiations, and in Mr. Cham¬ berlain’s case over Land Purchase and Home Rule in 1886. It is also the duty of the Prime Minister to furnish the Queen with a nightly record of the proceedings in Parliament, of which two copies are generally taken. Mr. Gladstone invariably did that duty himself, as far as the House of Commons was concerned, during the time he was Prime Minister. He was to be seen with his despatch-box on his knee, busily engaged upon it during m.any an exciting debate. Official etiquette re¬ quires that the report itself shall be written on quarto sheets, and that each sheet shall have a considerable blank space at the top. At one time, during his con¬ nection with the Commons, Lord Beaconsfield fur¬ nished similar reports, but when he grew older he was allowed by the Queen to depute the work to Lord Bar¬ rington. Reports of the House of Lords are seldom of a very lengthy character, and there is now some relaxation in the former custom of requiring the Prime Minister to report in person. The custom dates from the time when the Sove¬ reign had no other way of being informed about Parliamentary debates. This sketch of a Prime Minister’s en¬ gagements — im¬ perfect and slight as it neces¬ sarily must be — will destroy some illusions. It will be seen that hard work has to follow high office, and that there is such a thing as the drudgery as well as the glory of government. The picture drawn in men’s minds of an English Pre¬ mier, governing a mighty Em¬ pire with a nod, receiving am¬ bassadors, hold¬ ing audiences with the Queen, dining Lord Mayors and Corporations, cheered in London, feted in the provinces, making striking speeches, the centre of the “ world’s desire,” with hundreds of officials doing work for him when it must needs be done, is fascinating, but it has its other side. Greatness brings responsibility ; love of rule means love of work, and the heart of the patriot statesman must not be far away from the hand of the man of business. Edwin Goadby.

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691 MRS. MONTGOMERIE’S MANCEUVRES. CHAPTER THE FIRST. “that not impossible she.” RS. MONTGOMERIE was the most popular woman in Wray- mouth. “ The sweetest wo¬ man in the world ! ” the little world of Wraymouth called the gracious lady who smiled so cordially at everyone she met, and whose house was famous for the most brilliant receptions and the most charming garden parties in the place. Perhaps one secret of her popularity was that she was such a contented little person, and so thoroughly satisfied, not only with herself, but with everything and everyone about her — Miss Jemima always excepted, and just now Nora Desmond very particularly excepted indeed. Miss Jemima, or Aunt Jemmy, was Mr. Montgomerie’s only sister, a maiden lady of considerable means, but with a tongue as blunt as her sister-in-law’s was smooth, and a way of digging up other people’s motives and dragging them into the light of day that Mrs. Montgomerie considered positively indecent. But Miss Jemima’s misdeeds had lately sunk into no¬ thingness by the side of Nora Desmond’s unpardon¬ able sins. Nora was an orphan niece of Mrs. Montgomerie’s, who had just resigned a situation as governess, and had been invited to West Mount while she looked out for another. Mrs. Montgomerie meant to be kind, and if Nora did take the children’s lessons there was no need for Miss Jemima to congratulate her on getting a governess cheap. Cheap 1 As Mrs. Montgomerie looked at Nora Desmond to-night, she felt that the asking her to West Mount had been a grave mistake, and might cost her very dear indeed. For Nora had by no means shown what her aunt considered a proper sense of her position. She had agreed readily enough to take the younger children’s lessons in the morning, but after that she behaved exactly as any other guest and relative might have done. The penniless orphan had shown no disposi¬ tion to eat the bread of humbleness, or sit down in metaphorical dust and ashes. She had indeed shown - and felt— a grateful appreciation of her aunt’s kind¬ ness, but she had not seemed at all overpowered by it, and, crowning sin of all, she had “ flirted disgrace¬ fully” udth Herbert Fleming, who was not only the most eligible bachelor in the neighbourhood, but was considered the particular property of Linda Mont¬ gomerie both by her mother and herself. There was some excuse for their thinking so. The families had always been intimate, and Herbert was constantly at West Mount, where he was petted and made much of, and where the cheerful family life was a pleasant contrast to the virtual solitude of Fleming’s house. Somehow or other— Fleming did not exactly know how, though perhaps Mrs. Montgomerie did— he always found himself told off as Linda’s cavalier. Fie had no objection so long as there was no one more attractive in the field. He knew Linda better, and liked her better, than any other girl in Wray¬ mouth, and, little as he suspected it, he might very probably have drifted into an engagement with Linda Montgomerie, if— well, if he had not come into Mrs. Montgomerie’s drawing-room one August even¬ ing, and seen Nora Desmond. There are many types of beauty in the world, but amongst the many there are few that stir the hearts of men like the mingled archness and grace of a young Irish girl. As Fleming looked at Nora to-night, he thought he had never seen so bewitching a creature. All at once he knew that he cared nothing for Linda, that he never had cared for her at all — that at last he had found the “ not impossible she ” of whom every man dreams, and whom, perhaps, not many find. And all this while he had not even spoken to her ! He had only stood and watched her while she was introduced to others, and marvelled at the grace of liei movements and the sweetness of her voice. He had been burning to speak to her, but when his turn came he had not a word to say. He could only stand and look at her with dazzled eyes, seeing nothing for the brightness of this celestial vision, as men are blinded by the noonday sun. He saw nothing, it seemed to him then, but all his life long he remem¬ bered the look she wore and the smile she gave. He thought of nothing else all the way home \ but when Lady Fleming asked her son if he did not think that Irish niece of Mrs. Montgomerie’s an uncommonly pretty girl, it was curious how little Mr. Herbert Fleming had to say. Yes, he supposed she was, he assented indififerently. And then he declared himself too sleepy to talk, and leant back in his corner of the carriage to paint the darkness with the outlines of that matchless face, and fill the silence with the echoes of her voice. CHAPTER THE SECOND. AUNT AND NIECE. “But but, Mr. Fleming, you have only known me a fortnight,” said Nora, in a startled voice that was a little proud, and perhaps a little hurt too. “ I know,” said the young man humbly, “ but I could not let you go without a word, and they tell me you are going away to-morrow. I thought you were to have been here for some time yet.” “Yes,” said Nora frankly. “I thought so too. But Aunt Belinda heard of a friend who wanted a governess to go with her daughters to Switzerland, and she thought it was a chance I ought not to miss.

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6^2 Mrs. Montgomerie’s M.a.nceuvres. They will give me all my expenses, and a pound a week besides, and, of course, 1 am earning nothing here.'’ “You sordid child ! If you would only listen to me, you should never earn another penny. 1 know it is soon to speak, but what has time to do with it ? We don’t want a fortnight, we don’t want a week, or a day or an hour to find out if the sun is shining, or if the birds are singing. I love you — and I could not love you better if I had known you for a hundred years. Why should I not tell you? Will you not believe it now you know ? ” What answer Nora might have made he was not to know. Just for a second her eyes lifted themselves to his with a sweet bewilderment, and then they opened wide in dismay. “ Someone is there ! ” she cried. “ Oh, Mr. Fleming, I must go — indeed, I must.” The conservatory they were sitting in opened into the drawing-room, and she fled away before he could utter a word. Fleming, looking round in startled con¬ fusion, saw someone disappearing through the door into the garden. Who it was he did not know, nor did he particularly care. The fact of the interruption was much more important to him than its cause. Would Nora listen to him again ? and would her answer be the same he believed he had read in her eyes ? He went into the drawing-room in hopes of seeing her, but she was pouring out tea for quite a crowd of people, and it was time to go before he had said a word. He could only wish her good-bye, and whisper a humble request that he might write to her. “ I — I suppose so,” stammered Nora uncomfortably. Mrs. Montgomerie was looking at them with an ex¬ pression her niece had never seen in her pleasant, comely face before. Fleming did not see it now. “ Will you give me your address ?” he asked, “or” — suddenly perceiving how disturbed she was — “ will you send it to me ? ” Nora’s “yes” was so low that only a lover’s ears could have caught it, but Fleming heard it distinctly. His tones were jubilant as he made his farewells to Mrs. Montgomerie, and went away with a parting glance that was meant for Nora only, but was inter¬ cepted by two other pairs of eyes. “ So that is why the pretty niece is bustled off to Switzerland, is it?” thought Aunt Jemima, nodding her shrewd old head like a Chinese mandarin. “ 1 wouldn’t have had that girl here another week for a thousand pounds,” thought Mrs. Montgomerie. “ However, I hope there is nothing serious between them yet. I wonder if she will tell me anything before she goes ? She is frank and innocent, and she likes me, I think. I dare say a little persuasion will open her lips, and I confess I should like to know exactly how' far it has gone.” For though Mrs. Montgomerie had been the eaves¬ dropper in the conservatory, she had only caught a few words, and was very anxious to know if she had interrupted a mere flirtation, or something more serious. She went to Nora’s room that night, and had not much difficulty in obtaining the information she desired. Motherless Nora was sorely in need of sym¬ pathy and counsel, and her aunt was so sweet and sym¬ pathetic that the happy girl soon poured out her tale. “ Do I understand that Mr. Fleming made you an offer?” Mrs. Montgomerie asked when Nora stopped at last. “An offer? I — I suppose so,” said Nora blushing very prettily. “ We — he was interrupted, and I ran away. But he told me he loved me — isn’t it wonderful. Aunt Belinda, that he should care for me so soon ? — and — and that is all,” ended Nora suddenly. Some¬ how her aunt’s eyes were not quite as sympathetic as she had thought. “All?” said Mrs. Montgomerie. “ I do not call that exactly an offer, Nora, though an inexperienced girl might easily have thought so. Certainly Mr. Fleming ought to have said either less or more.” “ Someone was there, and 1 ran away,” said Nora, in a tone of defence. “ He could not say more then, could he. Aunt Belinda ? But he asked if he might write to me, and I promised to write and give him my address.” “ There I think you were wrong, my love,” said Mrs. Montgomerie decidedly. “ You are very young, Nora, and have had no one to guide you, so 1 make every excuse, but it is not usual to correspond with young men unless you are engaged to them, and in my opinion it is scarcely maidenly to do so.” “Oh, Aunt Belinda!” cried Nora, with burning cheeks. “Not maidenly? I never thought, I never meant - ” ‘‘ No, my dear, I am sure you did not,” said her aunt soothingly. “ But 1 assure you it is not a thing I should allow Linda to do, and girls in your position should be even more careful. I am afraid — I am very much afraid that Herbert Fleming is trifling with you.” “ Oh, Aunt Belinda 1 ” The piteous eyes, the appealing tones might have softened anybody except a mother doing, according to her lights, the best she could for her child. “ I don’t see what else it all means,” said Mrs. Montgomerie. “ If he was in earnest, would he not have come to your uncle or to me ? He knows us well and he must know we should have offered no objec¬ tion. But instead of doing that, instead of taking the only right and honourable course, he tries to entrap you into a clandestine correspondence.” “ Not clandestine !” murmured Nora. “ I am sure he did not mean that.” “ At any rate he has said nothing to us, your natural protectors, and you must not blame me if I draw my own conclusions. I don’t want to damp your hap¬ piness, my dear child, but I should be sorry to see you wasting your affections on a flirt like Herbert Fleming.” “ Is he a flirt ?” whispered Nora, the red lips paling visibly. “Is he not?” said Mrs. Montgomerie. “ I do not pretend to say, but I am afraid, my dear, there are too many girls who could answer the question for you.”

Page 712

Mrs. Montgomerie’s Manceuvres, 693 Nora sat looking before her with wistful, troubled gaze. ‘‘Then— then what do you advise me to do?” she asked at last. “ You see I did promise to write to him — to send him my address.’^ “ I should certainly not do it, Nora. Be guided by me, and you will soon know if he is in earnest or not. her own statements. She felt convinced that Fleming was only flirting — as he always did ! thought Linda’s mother vindictively, and she congratulated herself on having opened her niece’s eyes. She said nothing to Linda ; there was no need, she told herself ; and confidences should be sacred, of course, especially when repeating them would do more When he finds you do not write he will understand that you have seen the impropriety of doing so, and will respect you all the more. As for your ad¬ dress, he can easily learn it from me, and if he is in earnest he will do so, no doubt. And now, my child, I shall say good night. Go to sleep and forget your troubles.” _ CHAPTER THE THIRD. FROM A SENSE OF DUTY. It is astonishing how easily we believe the thing we wish. Mrs. Montgomerie by the time she came to the end of her little homily to her niece entirely believed harm than good. And so Linda heard nothing of Fleming’s attachment to her cousin. He came to the house as frequently as ever, and was as graciously received, but after the first week he seldom men¬ tioned Nora’s name, and certainly never asked for her address. Mrs. Montgomerie plumed herself on the fulfilment of her prophecies. “ A flirtation and nothing else,” she thought triumph¬ antly : “but Linda will keep him in order, I’ve no doubt.” Which was a little premature — but Mrs. Montgomerie was a sanguine woman. She even thought that Fleming’s silence proved that Nora was

Page 713

Mrs. Montgomerie’s Manoeuvres. 694 forgotten, till one day when the post came in while he was at West Mount. “Do you ever hear from Miss Desmond?” he asked abruptly, but Mrs. Montgomerie was equal to the occasion. “ I hear often — and I see there is a letter from her here,^’ she said pleasantly, as she opened the foreign- looking letter. The young man’s eyes rested hungrily upon the thin blue sheet, and then he turned reso¬ lutely away. “A delightful time she seems to be having,” Mrs. Montgomerie purred on. “ The Spences are a large family, and the- young men have joined them now. Dear Nora will be quite in her element, naughty little flirt that she is. But, I suppose, when a girl is so lively and so pretty, she can hardly help her¬ self.” No, Mr. Fleming supposed not. But he supposed it in a voice that was hard and cold, and quite unlike his own. Mrs. Montgomerie peeped up at the pale stern face, and wondered if she dare venture to say more. “Of course, I am not defending it,” she said ; “but men are always so ready to play the moth to the candle of a pretty face. And, to tell you the truth, Herbert, I have sometimes been afraid that, short as was the time the dear, naughty child was with us, your own wings were not quite unsinged.” Fleming looked at her with gloomy eyes. “ If you mean that I loved — that I love her with all my heart, you are quite right,” he said, with discon¬ certing frankness. “ I always meant to tell you as soon as - ” “ As soon as - ? ” “As soon as there was anything to tell,” said Flem¬ ing, with a short, bitter laugh. “ Apparently there is nothing, you see.” “ I don’t see, I assure you. Do you mean that you were refused ? ” “It never got as far as that. I meant to write to her as soon as I had her address, and she promised to send it me. We were interrupted, but she knew, I am sure she knew, that I meant to renew my pro¬ posals as soon as I received it.” “ Well?” “Well, she has not sent it, that is all.” “ I am afraid it is alL indeed,” said Mrs. Mont¬ gomerie, with a sympathetic sigh. “My poor boy, I feel for you, I assure you; but you must see for yourself what it means.” “ There may be some misapprehension, some mis¬ take. Perhaps if I wrote to her - ” “ You will please yourself, of course, and I can easily give you her present address, though I believe they are leaving Montreux to-morrow. But, my dear Herbert, I must, as a friend, tell you honestly that I fear you have given your heart into very unsafe keep¬ ing. I cannot bear to blame my own niece, but I cannot shut my eyes to poor dear Nora’s failings. The Irish are a most attractive race, but I fear con¬ stancy is not their strong point, and love of admira¬ tion has always been Nora’s bane. Painful as it is to me, I feel it my duty to tell you that I believe she left her last situation in consequence of a flirtation with the eldest son.” Mrs. Montgomerie’s sense of duty did not go so far as to constrain her to add that Nora had left in order to escape the young man’s unwelcome attentions.. She shook her head with another sympathetic sigh, and settling her eye-glasses comfortably, glanced over her niece’s letter. “ I am afraid it is the old story over again,” she sighed. “ She seems to be going everywhere with the young Spences, and we know what that means, where Nora is concerned.” Fleming took his hat. “ I know you mean kindly,” he said ; “ but I would rather not hear her blamed.” “ I do mean kindly,” Mrs. Montgomerie protested- “ Must you go, Herbert ? Linda will be so disap¬ pointed to miss you. And as for blaming Nora, that is the last thing I wish to do. If I have said any¬ thing that looks like it, it is because I should like to- save you from sorrow.” “ You are always kind,” the young man said grate¬ fully. “ But do you really mean you think she was- only playing with me ? ” “ That is what I think^'* Mrs. Montgomerie owned.. “ But time will show. If she sends you her address, I will withdraw, and gladly, all that I have said.” “Yes,” said Fleming, after a moment’s pause.. “The test is a fair one. If Miss Desmond keeps her promise, I will ask her pardon for having doubted her.- If not — well, if not, I will try to forget that I ever saw her face.” CHAPTEH THE FOURTH. MISS jemima’s advice. “Why, bless my life!” cried Miss Jemima, “ it’s- Belinda’s pretty niece 1 ” Miss Jemima, got up in the most correct tourist cos¬ tume, was standing on the deck of a Channel steamer bound from Boulogne to Folkestone, and staring hard at Nora, as she sat amongst her pupils and their' friends. Miss Jemima did not know the Spences, but there was no doubt about their governess, and the: kind old lady bustled across the deck and claimed ac¬ quaintance at once. “ Dear me 1 it seems an age since we met, doesn’t it ?” she said, when she had been duly introduced to- the Spence family, who, after a few civil words, con¬ siderately evolved a lively interest in the view from' the other side, and left Miss Desmond and her friend together. “ IVe been all over France with a maid and a valise, and you — why, bless me, child ! you look as if you’d taken a ticket for a good deal longer journey, and on a line where they don’t give returns. What have you been doing to yourself? I never saw anybody so gone off in my life.” “ I haven’t been doing anything,” said Nora, with what seemed to Miss Jemima the merest shadow of the brilliant smile she used to admire so much. “ Humph ! Walked you off your legs all day, I expect, and kept you up correcting copy-books at night ! ” “Indeed, no. No people could have been kinder or more considerate.”

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Mrs. Montgomerie’s Manceuvres. “ Then— then you’re in love, and that’s all about it,” said Miss Jemima. “/ know what it means when a girl looks as you do and vows there’s nothing the matter. And surely — yes, I’m sure Belinda said something about a young — what-d’ye-calh’em — Spence, isn’t it “ I don’t think the Spences are dangerous to any¬ body’s peace of mind,” said Nora, with a frank laugh. “The eldest is engaged, and the next is only seventeen.” “Humph!” said Miss Jemima drily, “I told you Belinda said it— I didn’t say I believed it, did I.?” She was silent a moment, and then she said abruptly, “ Do you ever hear anything of that young man at Wraymouth — young Fleming, I mean.^” “No,” said Nora shortly, her cheeks flaming and paling, and her hands trembling sorely against her will. She turned away her head, dreading what the next question might be, but Miss Jemima asked no more. Perhaps she had seen enough. “ I do love Belinda ! ” she said softly, rubbing her nose till it got quite wrathfully red. Miss Jemima laid her hand kindly on Nora’s arm. “ People always tell me their troubles, my dear. Suppose you tell me yours ?” “ I haven’t any to tell. Miss Jemima.” “ Exactly ! They always begin that way,” said Miss Jemima. “ Get the fibs over, my child, and then the truth will come out. I’ve taken a liking to that pretty face of yours, and I’ve a good deal of respect for Herbert Fleming. I don’t think he is the man to play fast and loose with anybody.” “ You — you don’t think he is a flirt, then?” whispered Nora shyly. “ Why, no — what should put such a notion in your head ? ” “Aunt Belinda said she was afraid he was.” “Aunt Belinda is not infallible. I wonder what else Her Sapience was pleased to observe. I wouldn’t take too much notice of Aunt Belinda if I were you.” Nora felt quite guilty for listening to such remarks, but there was a certain comfort in them too. She looked at Miss Jemima’s kind, sensible face, and felt that she would like to know her opinion about that unfortunate promise, the remembrance of which made her cheeks burn every day. So, with many blushes and a few hot tears, the story was told, and by the time Folkestone was in sight. Miss Jemima had heard everything, and had given her opinion thus : — “Unmaidenly ! That is all balderdash, my dear, if it isn’t something worse. In my opinion you have behaved disgracefully to the poor 3^oung man, and if you take my advice you will write to him at once. Tliere is no need to do more than send him your address, but you promised to do that, and a promise must be kept.” “Very well — I will,” said Nora meekly, and Miss Jemima actually chuckled as she thought of her sister- in-law. She smiled to herself every now, and then as she journeyed towards home, but the first thing she saw there was a letter from Mrs. Montgomerie, and Miss 695 Jemima’s smiles died out as she read the opening words : — “ West Mount, September q.2>. “My dear Jemima, — I know you will be pleased to hear that our darling Linda is engaged to Herbert Fleming - ” “Pleased !” ejaculated Miss Jemima. “Pleased!: I should like to slap them both.” chapter the fifth. LINDA ASSERTS HERSELF. The letter Nora sent to Fleming was brief : — “ Dear Mr, Fleming,— In accordance with my promise I send you. my address. I have come back to England with Mrs. Spence, and am staying at her house, Melton Priors, nr. Wraymouth. “ Yours sincerely, “ Nora Desmond.” “ In accordance with her promise ! ” Was three months after date Miss Desmond’s idea of keeping a promise? thought Fleming savagely Oh, why had he been so foolish, so mad, as to utter the hasty, half-despairing werds that had bound him to Linda Montgomerie? He knew now that it was. just a fit of pique, but at the time he had told him¬ self that if he could not be happy himself he might make someone else 50, and that it was his duty to do¬ it. His duty ! He was a nice fellow to talk of duty, when the sight of another girl’s writing could set his pulses beating like a steam-hammer, and a few cold words from her could move him more than his be¬ trothed’s caresses. To think that she was so near him now ! Melton Priors was on the road to Wraymouth, and he felt, that he must see her before he went to West Mount. Did she know of his engagement? he wondered. But some instinct told him she would not have sent him even that cold and brief epistle if she had known. How should he answer it ? He felt that he could not do so. He could only go and see her, and tell her the truth as best he could. He scarcely knew the Spences, and he felt relieved as he neared Melton Priors and saw Nora coming through a gate in the park. For a moment neither spoke. Fleming had been picturing the meeting all the way, and wondering how he should get his story told, but he did not think of his story now. He only remembered that there was but one woman he loved, and that she stood before him. “ Nora ! ” he cried passionately. “ Nora I ” She looked at him with a pale scorn that struck him dumb. “ My name is Miss Desmond,” she said quietly- “ Allow me to congratulate you on your engagement, Mr. Fleming, and to wish you every happiness.” “You — you knew of it then?” he stammered, in blank surprise. “ I heard of it at breakfast tliis morning.” “Why did you not write to me sooner?” he cried, with a terrible pain in his voice. “ Did you not guess — did you not know why I wanted your address ? ” “ Was it to tell me of your engagement to my cousin ? ”

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696 “ ‘will you not let me explain?’ he asked humbly.” “You are mocking me! You know I do not love your cousin 1 ” “ You are insulting her and me to dare to tell me so ! I will wish you good morning, Mr. Fleming. My way lies down this lane.” “ My way lies wherever yours does — at least till you have heard me out.” She turned away impatiently, but he kept resolutely at her side. “ Will you not let me explain ? ” he asked humbly. “ The blackest criminal is allowed to speak in self-defence.” “ Defence is unnecessary where no accusation is made,” said Nora proudly. It was all the protest she made, feeling, perhaps, how vain all protest was against his desperate earnest¬ ness. And so, by degrees, she heard all there was to tell, and understood the story better even than he. “ So 1 ” she said bitterly, “ it was my aunt, was it, who told you I should write if — if I cared for you ? ” “She certainly told me so. But why do you ask? And why do you look at me like that ?” “ My aunt told me it would be unmaidenly to write. She said that if you really cared you could get my address from her.” They were silent, looking into each other’s eyes with a sort of dreary despair. Then Nora put out a trem¬ bling hand. “ Good-bye,” she said gently. “ I — I am glad that I know.” “/am glad that I Icnow — but I am not going to say good-bye, unless it is to Linda.” “ Yes — because it is right. You must keep your word ; and I shall not mind so much now I know.” The quivering voice trailed off into silence ; but though Fleming pleaded hard, he could not alter her decision. His promise to her cousin must and should be kept, she declared. Linda was not to blame, and Linda should not suffer for her mother’s sins. They were both too absorbed to see that Linda herself was coming towards them. She was riding, but the groom was far behind, and as she came up to her betrothed she reined in her horse. She was flushed with excitement, and spoke at once, without any preliminary greeting. “ I thought I should meet you, so I came. I wish to give you this,” taking from her finger the ring he had given her. “ I think there has been a — mistake.” “ A mistake ? ” gasped Fleming, while the brilliant gem slipped unheeded from his palm. “ Linda, how did you know ? ” “ I had a letter from Aunt Jemima this morning,” said Linda simply. And then she turned her horse’s head, and rode abruptly away. “ She is a grand creature 1 ” said P'leming. “ I did not think she had it in her. But now^ Nora, my own - ” # * * * * Linda was a grand creature after all, for to this day Mrs. Montgomerie does not know why her daughter broke off her engagement, or what she thought of her mother’s manoeuvres. Neal.

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697 WHAT TO WEAR IN OCTOBER. CHIT-CHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR PARIS AND LONDON CORRESPONDENTS. I.— FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. HIi time has come and gone when we sing our summer’s requiem — for this year at all events ; and now we look forward to the delights of autumn with its golden tints. But winds blow often cold, and we learn to know that out-door wraps are an absolute necessity; indeed, in the country it is well to have a jacket, that is easily slipped on, always at hand, even in the summer-time. In the initial letter you will find a new and fashionable autumn covering, which is suited alike to town or country wear. It can be made in vel¬ vet, silk, or a thin woollen, and is in fact a bodice with revers from the shoulder that form scarf ends reaching almost to the hem. The oblong sleeves gathered high on the top fall to the elbow only, and, like the revers, are bordered with passe¬ menterie. It is capable of being rendered warmer and more serviceable by tight under-sleeves and a pointed waistcoat in front. I have seen it made in fawn-coloured ladies’-cloth, and brown velvet vest and sleeves. Many of the newest winter mantles are being made on these lines. One fact is quite certain in Paris fashions — that dresses, mantles, and most of the more permanent portions of dress, will be of two materials, and I specially recommend to the notice of those women who are economically inclined the pinafore dress. It has many good points to re¬ commend it. Provided with a plain skirt and bodice, many changes may be rung by having a variety of the pinafores to slip over it. The accompanying sketch will give an ad¬ mirable idea of what is worn and how it is best arranged. Here the skirt and under¬ bodice are of fawn and blue check in soft woollen. Over this is a plain material of the same fawn tint. It forms an upper skirt bordered whth a ruche, and the low bodice is edged with the same and gathered at the waist back and front. The sleeves are com¬ posite — check to the elbow, where they end in a ruche, and close-fitting to the wrist, of the plain colour. Those who desire to ring many changes wfthout a great variety of garments could easily turn this garment into a dinner-gown by having the lower portion of the sleeves movable, and dispensing with the under-bodice. In my opinion, the best of all tea-gowns come from Paris, and I feel sure no one could fail to admire the second dress in the illustration, which would serve for that purpose and also for other occa¬ sions. It could be made in a variety of materials and they need not be costly, but this original model was an eau de Nil silk made e7i Priiicesse^ perfectly plain, the sleeves and front of gold and white brocade. The front is merely a narrow strip widening slightly at the base ; but the sleeves are a good wide unmistakable gigot, which threatens to have few rivals during the ensuing months. The novelty, however, in this gown is the scarf-sash belt, which coming from the right side beneath the arms, passes across the centre trimming and apparently appears again as a bow on the left side. Just at the present moment the Paris shops are full of collarettes made of feathers, in black, white, and the FAIR CRITICS.

Page 717

What to Wear in October. 698 natural tones, indeed in all colours. These are un¬ questionably convenient, they slip on and off and give a great deal of becoming softness to the throat ; young and pretty faces appear to rise from a mossy nest ; and they are no weight if they have to be carried. Most of them now are tied at the back, the ribbons hanging down in a long bow and ends. In England, except for opera-cloaks (as you still call the mantles worn with evening dress, though the opera is just the one place where you never retain them), Medicis collars, high and upstanding, would seem to be going out, but here this is certainly not the case, and as in the end you always follow Parisian modes, depend upon it you cannot do wrong in appending these becoming adjuncts to evening gowns. When they do not stand up close against the throat they are filled in with tulle or ostrich feathers, or some trimming that has the merit of setting the face against a background of downy softness. Even the summer dust-cloaks had these very becoming addi¬ tions, so certainly they will appear on more substantial winter ones. Sleeves dissimilar from the rest of the dress are being applied to almost all the new autumn gowns. A novel idea for a tea-gown is the Bolero jacket, to which a long flowing skirt is sewn. The same fashion is applied to a mantle, but here the fulness is kept more to the back. For carriage wear most remarkable cloaks are being made with the high collars, embroi¬ dered ones, treble capes, cords crossing the bodice, and thick ruches of feather trimming both inside and outside. Parisians minimise the difficulties of dressmaking a great deal, and sleeves ready for insertion in gowns are to be bought at many of the shops. A dinner- dress may be easily re-trimmed, for all kinds of fichus and trimmings can be bought ready to embellish it. Some of these are accompanied by sleeves of a thin material puffed out without foundations, having bows of ribbon matching the dress. Day dresses have won¬ derful sleeves covered with black or white lace, or rich embroidery. White and black are combined most happily. The skirts continue to be extremely simple, with rosettes of ribbon carried down one side as the only trimming. But for evening wear, flounces are coming in. One flounce is often placed at the edge, headed by rows of ribbon, and three lace flounces are added to the waist : the old style of thirty years ago has come in again. Frenchwomen make up all thin fabrics over a silk under-skirt, whether it be of wool or light Oriental silk, and wisely so. I have seen a good selection of the new season’s woollens at one of our leading dressmakers’, who is now making up a number of large important-checked materials. I noted several new stuffs under the head of “ Poiles,” and I selected as tho most distinctive four “carreau,” viz., check; and two ‘‘rayd,” viz., striped ; and these I will describe to help in selection. With one exception the checks had all rough lines, few or many. An example in fawn had the check formed by perpendicular lines, alternately two and one inches wide ; over this were four horizontal narrow lines of rough black stripes, each check quite six inches square. In another variety the check was composed of a broad band of black and brown, with narrow rough stripes of black, and two-inch and half-inch stripes of white, crossed by close-set black and coloured lines like bars in music. In a third the large check was composed of red, blue, and brown, with wide cross-bars of the black rough weaving. In contrast to this is a soft plaid, large in size, of serge weaving, in peacock and two tones of brown, with flecks of white. The “Poile raye” had in one ex¬ ample a dark blue ground, with twelve hair lines of many colours at intervals ; in another, broad blue- green stripes and narrow mousse-green ones, with lines- of shaded red. II. — FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. The two pretty figures in the second illustration show simple styles of dressmaking, which now are extremely fashionable. The one is tailor-made — this I do not re¬ commend at all to the notice of the home dressmaker — but the other is simplicity itself, and quite easily made at home. The skirt is very narrow, but the plainness of the front is disguised by four or five pleats on the hips ; at the back the fulness is gathered on to the bodice, and the whole is slipped on at once as many gowns are now. The trimming is formed of a double row of a piece of the material cut on the cross, folded, and then measuring four inches : it is gathered in the centre and requires to have two yards fulled into one : viz., for a skirt three yards wide, two lengths of about six yards would be required. The fulness of the bodice crosses beneath an ornament, leaving visible a vest and collar-band, and full sleeves, buttoned at the wrist, of the plain material. The gown from which the sketch was made was a soft navy blue with white brocaded flowers, and blue ribbons and buckles with green foliage adorned the blue straw hat. The tailor-made gown has a plain skirt with five rows of stitching, pleated on the hips, gathered at the back, and opening diagonally in the front of the bodice, the plastron fastened with a double row of buttons. It comes only to the waist, and from the plastron is a pointed piece about an inch wide, fastened beneath the arm with one button. A stringless bonnet ac¬ companies this, and note that the hair is worn as a catogan, the fashion of the immediate future. For Scotland, rough surfaced tweed of a tawny brown shade is most in favour. Leather is con¬ sidered the best trimming for hard sportswoman-like wear ; but I think it is a fault against good taste to edge the skirts with leather fringe, which becomes en¬ tangled with furze and soiled with mud. Waistcoats and belts shaped to the figure and laced are made also in leather ; so are the cuffs. Braid is a more gene¬ rally useful garniture, and I give the preference to the broad kind, coarsely plaited, unless it be a vest covered with narrow braid, finely plaited, with a loose coat over it, having the long tail ends cut after the fashion of a man’s coat. The collars become higher and are invariably straight. I am now about to discourse of the new woollens

Page 718

What to Wear in October. 699 prepared for such gowns. Of course plain materials will be worn, and I am inclined to think that they will have the preference, but the novelties lie in the way of checks, which are large and important. Judging from the thickness of the new materials, we are to expect a cold winter. The fashionable colourings are dark tones of emerald and mousse-greens. Browns, verging from tawny fawn to copper-red, are in the ascendant. Warm browns with a dash of terra-cotta are blended with black; brown, white, and black are a favourite mixture, and sometimes red is combined with the other three. Peacock comes to the fore again, also many dark blues — the lighter shade tending towards electric blue. Heliotrope of the darker petunia shade with a white and black check of large size upon it, is one of the best examples of the new Amazone cloth, and the same design is repeated in many colours. The stuffs are all forty-eight inches wide. Hitherto we have associated Ama- zones with plain colours, but now huge checks are shown in such mixtures as blue, black, yellow, and a speckled brown all combining in the pattern They are good reliable materials — costing a few pence under five shil¬ lings a yard, and not costly when you consider the width; and this is about the general price of this class of woollen goods. Cloths with rough surfaces are very well worn, such as Missouri, a large rough check of plain brown, and brown and white, quite twelve inches square, flecked with white and black oblong spots. The names of the new stuffs this year are misleading. The cachemirs — cachemirs brochds — aie fai removed from cashmere. The one has a rough, hairy surface, which gives a distmgue effect to the large checks, while the brochd is just soft cloth with small irregular patterns of distinct colour on it. The new homespuns have rough pepper-and-salt mixtures with black and, white dots like the nebulae of a heavenly body, and from this indistinct ground, if inspected veiy closely, stripes and checks may be made out. Another very thick material is the Herrison broche, in stiipes, with a conventional design in white outline on a serge-like red, black, and brown ground. There is a large choice this year in cheviots, but they are all of neutral tints, blues and browns com¬ bined principally in large checks, in diagonal weavings, when they are called Cheviot fa^onne.” Some are moi e \\iiy than others, with a more hairy surface, and others are sold with plain cheviot to match. Tailors always have a weakness for tweeds, and the term this year covers a wide range, from a wiry fabric THE LAST MATCH OF THE SEASON. not much thicker than cashmere, to a thick rough woollen check, only a little thinner than homespun. Among the novelties is the “ Drap St. Petersburg,” not particularly soft or thick, but certainly warm ; the ground of plain colours (and there are seven mixtures to choose from) has a large check formed of one coarse rough line, the horizontal and perpendicular of two colours, and at the angles there is a square patch of two inches, which appears to be darned — for example, on a deep myrtle-green a check of Nil' and orange, the two-inch square darned in light brown. Most stylish gowns are made in this cloth. Scotland is the land for woollens, and the pretty fancy Scotch plaids with brown lines on a blue ground and other mixtures of colour are admirable ; so are the Ecossais, where the checks are diversified with white speckles. The rough nature of some of the stripes has given a name to the fabrics — Astrachan, for example, which has rough black stripes not unlike Astrachan fur on plain and on fancy stripes.

Page 719

700 THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars respecting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge himself to notice every article or work submitted. _ An Eye-Tester. The Ophthalmic Re- fractometer is an in¬ strument for enabling a person with defective vision — that is to say, near or short sighted — to be fitted with a suitable lens or set of lenses in the form of spectacles or eye¬ glasses. It consists of an armchair as shown in the figure, in which the patient seats himself, and looks at a series of test types or objects of vision on the opposite wall. He obscures one eye by a spectacle-frame having a black glass in it, and looks with the other. At the sides of the chair are frames for holding lenses which are adjusted to the eye. One after another the lenses to be tried are brought between the eye and the object until a proper fit has been obtained. strainer is in such a position that it can be most readily cleaned. All coffee-drinkers will join in the wish that these coffee-jugs, or the principle which governs them, may meet with universal adoption. The Niagara Commission. With the view of utilising part of the water-power of Niagara, a syndicate has been formed in the United States, and a considerable tract of land bought on the southern side of the Niagara River, above the Falls. The “ head ” of water, or actual fall of level, at Niagara is 200 feet, and it is estimated that if 4 per cent, of the water is utilised at a head of 140 feet, some 120, coo horse-power will be available for turning mills on the spot, or generating electricity to convey the power to a distance — for example, Buffalo, eighteen miles distant. In order to carry out the idea in the best manner, a commission of famous electricians. has been appointed, which includes such names as Sir William Thomson, President; Professor Mascart, member of the French Institute; and Colonel Turrettini, director of the St. Gothard Tunnel works. Plans are also invited from certain engineering firms, and these will be submitted to the judgment of the commission. The Lineff Electric Tramway. In supplying electricity to a tram-car by means of a conductor laid along the street, it is very important A Pair of Household Novelties. An ingenious use of superheated steam in cooking is made in a simple steamer, patented only recently. The steamer consists of a cone of tin, at whose apex is a tiny crater closed by a marble. Above this cone is the grating upon which are placed the potatoes or other articles to be cooked. When the steamer is placed in the saucepan the water is, of course, at the same level inside the cone and outside it. But, naturally, the water inside it reaches boiling point much sooner than the other, and quickly generates steam that lifts the marble at the top of the cone, and reaches the articles to be cooked in a powerful, con¬ tinuous volume. I'his steamer is well worth a trial. Another household novelty that we have just seen for the first time is a self-straining coffee-jug, to the metal lid of which is fixed a fine strainer which passes com¬ pletely down the back of the spout, and thus serves to clear the coffee as it is poured out. The advantage of this plan i& obvious, especially to those who hold, as many people do, that coffee should never be made in a metal vessel, but always in one of earthenware. The to seclude the wire trom the surface traffic, or from wet due to dirt and rainfall. But obviously the wire must at the same time be hidden in such a way that the current can be drawn from it at any point of the line while the car travels, so that the motor may run continuously at a regular speed, if required. Some¬ times this is done by laying the conductor in a channel under the roadway, and getting access to it by a narrow slot through which passes a contact projecting from the car. The slot, however, is apt to let in water

Page 720

The Gatherer. 701 and dust ; therefore Mr. Lineff has brought out a system in which there is no slot, and the conductor is entirely covered in. Along the conductor lies a loose strip of iron, which may be regarded as a movable part of the conductor ; and above these runs a rail which is ordinarily insulated from them. But it will be understood that if the strip of iron be raised up into contact with the rail through the at¬ traction of a powerful electro-magnet on the car the electricity will charge the rail, and if there is a con¬ nection by a travelling brush or contact with the motor on the car, the motor will be actuated by the current. This, in fact, is what is done. The car is provided with an electro-magnet which lifts the iron strip into contact with the inner rail, and a metal brush from the car in circuit with the motor is thus able to convey the current from the secluded conductor. In the sectional figure, F is one of the tramway rails on which the wheels of the car run, and E is the insulated contact rail which runs parallel to it ; G is an insulating base on which rest two copper conductors, B, charged with the current, and upon these lies the iron strip, A. The chamber is covered above and entirely insulated from the surface, except when the magnet on the car lifts the strip. A, into contact with the rail, E, and allows a brush or wheel contact travelling on the latter to tap the current. The contact rail, E, is divided into short sections for the better insulation of the current, so that only a short length is electrified at a time. Mr. Gilbert Kapp, a well-known electrician, has reported very favourably on the new system. A Circulating Filter. The filter which we illustrate herewith combines the two advantages of subjecting the water to a long- continued action of the filtering material and an effective aeration. The figure represents a section through one form of the apparatus. Water is supplied at the top of the jar. A, into the chamber, G, G, and passes down through the perfora¬ tions, F, F, into the filtering cells, H, H, as shown by the arrow, then up through the cells, H', H', and down again through the central chamber, j, which is filled with It collects in the bottom, B, B, and is drawn off by the tap on the left. Air is admitted to the cells by the open neck, E. The filtering medium is patent manganous carbon ; but any other may be used if preferred. The apparatus, which is made of different patterns and sizes, has been very highly recommended by many eminent authorities, and, after exhaustive trials, adopted in the army and navy. A Gas-Gun. According to the Revue Indiistrielle (Paris), M. Paul Giffard, a joint inventor of the well-known boiler injector, has brought out a new firearm in which gunpowder or other explosives are replaced by the A GAS-GUN. expansive power of liquefied carbonic anhydride (COo). The weapon is illustrated in the figure, where F is a steel cylinder containing the liquefied gas under pres¬ sure. The gas can be liquefied by a pressure of 36 atmospheres, and when this pressure is withdrawn it will suddenly expand behind the bullet and force it from the barrel with great velocity. This is done by pulling a trigger, which opens a valve in the rear of the reservoir and allows a certain quantity of the liquid to expand into the barrel behind the bullet and drive it out. M. Giffard states that a sufficiency of liquid for several hundred shots can be stored in the reservoir. The bullet is placed in the barrel by the breech, and the whole mechanism is so simple that the gun can be made, it is said, for twenty shillings A military rifle on this plan designed for the French Government weighs only 4^ lbs. There is no smoke^ little recoil, and a feeble report. An Adjustable Telephone. The telephone apparatus in use is not always con¬ veniently fixed for use by different speakers of various heights, and the device which we illustrate is in¬ tended to overcome this drawback. It is simply a frame of two uprights, on which the telephonic apparatus, consist¬ ing of transmitter, re¬ ceiver, bell, and battery, can slide up or down to the required level. The carriage which contains these apparatus is bal¬ anced by counterweights, like the sash of a win¬ dow, and remains at any position until it is shifted by hand. While upon this subject; we may mention that experi¬ ments on telephoning between two frames on the same rail have recently been made by the Baltimore and Ohio Railway Company. The conductor is an iron rod laid between the rails for the whole length of the line, and contact is made with it by means of a brush or wheel contact piece let down from the train. The necessary apparatus, including an alarm bell to call attention, is supplied to each train ; and the rails act as the return conductor of the circuit. j

Page 721

The Gatherer. 702 A New Pavement. Lead is an excellent preventative of slipping on a ilat surface, and it has now been applied with success to the tops of cover-plates, hydrant-boxes, and so forth, in our streets. These covers are apt to become greasy in wet weather, but by inserting plugs of lead at intervals, the foot is enabled to “grip” the plate. Our engraving shows how the inventor of this improve¬ ment applies the plugs to the ordinary wooden paving, a plug. A, A, being inserted at each corner of the joints. Carrier Swallows. M. Desbouvric, of Roubaix, has trained a number of swallows to return to him and perch on his finger, with a view of testing them as carriers of intelligence, instead of the pigeon. They are very intelligent, fly high, and catch food on the wing, and can be inured by practice to the French winter, therefore he is of opinion that they are preferable to pigeons for carrying purposes. Sketching by Lens. A rapid method of making sketches in the field has been introduced by M. Blain, a French cavalry officer. The apparatus consists of a rectilinear lens by which an image of the view to be sketched is formed within a makeshift “dark chamber,” consisting of a small black curtain hung on a frame over a portable drawing- table. The draughtsman simply copies the image in pencil or water-colour on a sheet of white paper. The whole appliance, with camp-stool and table, is made very light and portable, so as to be easily carried about. A Safety Gas-Regulator. An improved gas-regulator has recently been patented, which gives the consumer full control of the supply to his house. The regulator may be fixed in any part of a house, but is generally attached to the supply-pipe before it reaches the meter. In appear¬ ance it is not unlike a small meter, but it has a much larger dial, and a face opening like that of a clock. The dial is divided into certain sections, graduated from “gas off” to “full on,” and these sections repre¬ sent increasing proportions of the full supply. On the dial are two hands, one an index-hand (like the gilt hand of a barometer), being controlled by a mechanism which can only be brought into play by someone pos¬ sessed of the key to the case of the instrument, which would, presumably, be the consumer himself. This index-hand represents the maximum proportion of the supply that can be drawn at the time ; of course this may be varied to suit the convenience of the consumer, but the important feature of the instrument is that the maximum supply is absolutely under the consumer’s control. The other hand is movable, by an ordinary turning key, to any point between “ gas off” and that registered by the index-hand, but it cannot pass the latter. The uses of such an instrument as this are obvious, and need little explanation to any householder or manufacturer who is also a large consumerx)f gas. Drilling Square Holes. Square or angular holes can now be drilled in metal as easily as circular ones by a new machine. In appearance it resembles an ordinary drilling machine, as will be seen from our illustration ; but the point of the cutter is caused by a series of cams to describe a square or polygon, as the case may be. The Ainley- Oakes type is employed for square holes, and the Tyler-Ellis type for holes of any outline. The latter also cuts the angles very clean. As the difficulty of cutting square holes in metal has hitherto been great, these machines are likely to be very useful A Vanishing Type. The investigations of scientific ethnologists and anthropologists have, during the past few years, com¬ pletely overthrown the old popular and traditional idea that the Anglo-Saxons either expelled or exter¬ minated the ancient Britons in what is now England, and in scientific circles it is generally recognised that the British people as a whole, including the English, from the German Ocean to the Welsh border, are in reality an extremely mixed race. A modern English¬ man, in the strict sense of the word, may be roundly

Page 722

'Fhe Gatherer. 703 'described as half Anglo-Saxon and half Welsh, or, in anthropological language, an Anglo-Celt-Iberian. A new type, which had better be called the “ British,” has grown, and is still growing, out of the blending process which is going on ; and recent observations tend to show that the Anglo-Saxon, properly so called, is not the most persistent element in the nation ; but, on the contrary, is dying out. Dr. Beddoe, of Bristol, a perature may be given to the air before it reaches the plants. The vitiated air escapes by the ridge ven¬ tilators, D, and thus a current of pure air is main¬ tained in the house. A Coal-Gas Detector. Spongy platinum has the property of becoming red- hot when exposed to a mixture of combustible gas and PURE AIR FOR THE GREENHOUSE. leading scientific authority on the races of the British Isles, has, with the help of Mr. Charles Roberts, made a large number of observations, which prove that the fair Teutonic and Danish type is vanishing by degrees, and the darker types are predominating. Light hair, it is now believed, was equally a mark of the pure “ Celtic” race, and the fact has led to great confusion in history and literature, for we seldom know whether the classic authors are confounding the old Celtic¬ speaking with the German-speaking races or not. Dr. Beddoe finds that the people of the east coast of Scotland and the north-east coast of England show the highest percentage of fair hair in these islands. Curiously enough, Bristol and Glasgow have also a large number of fair-haired individuals. Hair darkens 55 per cent, during the first five years of life, and a further 33 per cent, up to the age of 45. The dark¬ ening is less marked in the case of women than of men. Dr. Beddoe is of opinion that fair-complexioned individuals are less able to withstand the insanitary condition of large towns than those of dark complexion, and that the law of natural selection operates against their increase. Pure Air for the Greenhouse. Our figure illustrates a method of ventilating a plant-house by means of purified air, which can be heated at the same time. The air passes into the house by the aperture A, and traverses a box, B, con¬ taining a purifier. This box is placed underneath a set of hot-water pipes, c, so that the required tern- common air, therefore Mr. H. W. Warren has sug¬ gested its use in detecting a leakage of coal-gas. The platinum is obtained by saturating asbestos in a con¬ centrated solution of platinum oxylate, and then igniting it in a platinum crucible. To use the asbestos thus platinised, it is first warmed to a temperature of 80® Fahr. by some safe means, then brought into the suspected atmosphere. If the air contains ^ per cent, of gas, by volume, the spongy platinum will become red-hot. A safe and simple detector of coal-gas would be a boon in certain cases, but this proposal is per¬ haps too scientific for general use. History for Young Readers. There is a good deal to be said in favour of giving children some acquaintance with the history of other countries besides our own. Indeed, provided that British history be not neglected, we cannot see any¬ thing against this plan. So we are glad to welcome ‘‘The Story of Denmark” (Longmans), by Charlotte S. Sidgwick. It is simple and interesting in style without being babyish, and ought to attract as well as instruct young readers, especially as it is accompanied by a map and other illustrations. Stories, New and Old. Of new stories, one of the most pleasing we have come across of late is “ Nigel Browning,” by Agnes Giberne, just issued by Messrs. Longmans. It is a story that will delight girls, for it has plenty of action

Page 723

704 The Gatherer. and a strong love-interest, while there is a good, robust tone throughout. The two heroines — for there are two, Fulvia and Ethel — are both good characters, pleasantly and cleverly drawn. While new stories claim a hearing there are others which, though old, are, indeed, ever new. Such are the works issued in Cassell’s ‘‘Japanese ” series, so called from their being printed on one side only of paper of great strength, though it is very thin in texture. “ Oliver Twist,” “ Handy Andy,” “ The Last Days of Pompeii,” “ The Yellowplush Papers,” and “Jack Hinton,” are among the woiks issued in this handy form, which is particu¬ larly adapted for the use of travellers. About the Maories. In the strict sense of the term, Mr. J. C. Frith’s “ Nation-Making” (Longmans) is not a story, but in its curious descriptions of life among the Maories of New Zealand, and their strange customs and super¬ stitions, will be found an interest that many a “story” lacks. Mr. Frith has raised our idea of these abori¬ ginal inhabitants of the grand islands wherein Eng¬ lishmen are once more striving to work out their old problem of nation-making. In the chapters on the Maories, our author will claim deservedly the atten¬ tion and interest of all his readers. But there are other chapters in the book that deal in a more or less contro¬ versial spirit with questions on which Mr. Frith seems to forget there may possibly be differences of opinion, and wherein all his readers may not feel disposed to follow him. For Lady Readers. As they were issued, we referred in “ The Gatherer” columns to Mrs. De Salis’s practical A la Mode” cookery books. We are glad to notice now that Messrs. Longmans have published another work from her pen, uniform in price and appearance with this series, under the title of “Tempting Dishes for Small Incomes.’’ The dishes are certainly most tempting and our readers will be glad to hear that the great majority of them may be procured at the cost of small outgoings, while the directions are at once simple and thorough. Much of the prejudice that still lingers round gas-cookery would be swept away if ladies would study and follow out the admirable hints given them by the author of “ The Art of Cooking by Gas ” (Cassell). The opening chapters are devoted to an exposition of the general principles that should guide the cook in the management of gas-heated apparatus, and these are followed by a goodly number of recipes and menus -specially adapted for preparation by gas¬ cooking. This work does not profess to be a new cookery book in the ordinary sense of the term, but in its own line it ought to prove a valuable addition to the library of any housewife. But, however important a part of her work cookery may be, no lady would pretend that it is the whole. So we are glad to draw attention to two new works on needlework issued by Messrs. Ward, Lock & Co. The first is on “ Drawn Linen Work,” or “ Punto Tirato,” and is by Ellen T. Masters, who deals with this attractive form of handi¬ work in a very practical manner, and as the book is fully illustrated by diagrams and patterns, the veriest tyro should be able to master the rules of this popular branch of needlework by its aid. The prettily got-up little work entitled “The Knitter’s Note-Book,” which accompanies Miss Masters’s volume, and is issued by the same publishers, is equally helpful and thorough. We are glad to welcome it, if only in disproof of the fears that were expressed some time since that knitting was becoming a lost art. Its use ought to increase rather than decrease before the stimulating power of this handy little manual. Before the Wedding— and After. On either side the threshold of matrimony the steps of the novice are beset with difficulties. An engage¬ ment brings with it a host of new duties and fresh dangers to both the contracting parties, and to their friends also. These are not all to be lightly waved aside by “chaff,” and, without a good deal of considera¬ tion all round, the young people will be exceptionally happy if they do not realise the truth of the “ many a slip ’twixt cup and lip.” A legion of heartburn¬ ings might be avoided or cured if “ those about to marry” would take the excellent counsel which Mr. Somerville Gibney offers them, good-naturedly enough, in “Captives to Cupid” (Bowden, Hudson & Co.). Some of his chapters are purely hortatory, one or two are almost minatory, but all are practical and to the point. Let us hope that our friends will so far profit by our author’s kindly offices in the rest of his work, that they will not need even to read his last chapter but one (“ On being Off with the Old Love”), but will happily hear, as in his concluding chapter, the sound of “ Wedding Bells.” Even then, they may find that all their troubles are not ended, nor all their dangers passed. So we advise them once more to seek advice— this time from our good friend, Mr. Hardy, in “How to be Happy, though Married,” of which a new and attractively dressed edition has just been issued by Mr. T. Fisher Unwin. With such excellent guidance as is here offered them, all Mr. Gibney’s “Captives to Cupid” ought to be able to- take rank with Mr. Hardy as “ Graduates in the University of Matrimony.” STORY COMPETITIONS. To Competitors. — The manuscripts (^nearly one himdred) in the Eight- Part Story Competition are iww under considei'ation^ and the Editor hopes to be able to make his award before the close of the year. The award in the Four- Part Story Competition vnll necessarily be held over until the New Year.^ owing to the exceptionally large number of stories requiring detailed consideration in the other Competition.

Page 724

705 THE WOOING OF CHRISTABEL. Ey E. NEAL, Author of “ Witness My Hand,” “ My Brother Basil,” &c. CHAPTER THE THIRTEENTH. LOVERS OR FRIENDS? “ And what is Friendship but a name, A charm that lulls to .sleep?” Goldsmith. PRIL has given place to May, and May to June, and still St. Ives lingers at Ivethorpe. It can scarcely be said that he has taken his cousin’s advice to “settle down, and take his proper place in the county,” for he contents himself with the two or three rooms which were got ready for him at Easter, and the rest of the house looks as blank and uninhabited as ever, and discourages the few callers who have heard that the owner is there, and leave their paste-boards at the door. St. Ives has been at home to no one yet; and though he returns the calls, it is apparently for the purpose of informing his neighbours that he is only at Ivethorpe to re-fit for another expedition to Tibet, or perhaps up the Congo. He has not decided where. What he has decided is that he has no intention of taking up his abode at Ivethorpe, and wishes only to be regarded as a passing guest. A few solitary bache¬ lors, tired of their own society, a few mammas with grown-up daughters, ask him to dinner, but he does not go ; and the county deplores that “ poor dear St. Ives is so eccentric ail d unsociable,” and invents a hundred stories to account for his seclusion, not one of which even grazes the truth. That he has run through his grandfather’s money, and is hiding from his creditors, is one version ; while another suggests that he has brought home a dusky and quite un¬ presentable bride ; and a third declares— on the best authority— that St. Ives had a sunstroke in India, which disordered his brain, and that the dark, foreign- looking man who goes about with him is his keeper. For M. de Bassompierre still stays with his friend, and by degrees it oozes out that they are writing an account of their travels, and that their book will shortly be given to the world. There was at least more truth in this report than in any of the others, as St. Ives admitted one day when Netta taxed him with being an author in disguise. “In embryo, not in disguise,” he corrected. “ Then it zs true ! And you have never told us a word,’' cried Netta, with her little offended pout. “Tell me all about it, Arthur, at once : which of you is writing it, and what is it to be called ? ” “We are both writing it, and the title isn’t settled yet.” “ Haven’t you thought of anything “ We’ve thought of plenty of things, but either some¬ one else has thought of them before us or the publishers say they are not sufficiently ‘ taking.’” “ What is a ‘ taking ’ title, I wonder.^” said Netta. “Alliteration seems to be considered as fetching as anything,” rejoined her cousin. “ We rather thought of ‘From Timbuctoo to Tartary,’ or ‘A Trot from Tilbury to Tibet’; but so many books have names like that. I suggested this morning that we should call it ‘Giraffes and Gazelles,’ by two ‘ Globe-trotters,’ but 1 don’t think De Bassompierre takes kindly to it.” “ I should think not,” said Falconer, who was standing by. “Really, St. Ives, a man of your position should have more dignity than to adopt American slang of that kind.” St. Ives felt inclined to laugh, as he always did when Falconer talked about position and dignity. “There’s nothing very dignified about me,” he observed, and gave a practical illustration of his opinion by chasing Flavius and Marmaduke round and round the lawn till Mrs. Falconer implored him to stop. The Vicarage generally emptied itself into the garden these hot summer afternoons. The house faced the west, and was intolerable in the glare of the afternoon sun ; but the garden, with the dark woods shadowing it and the river winding by, was deliciously cool. Mrs. Falconer took her knitting on to the lawn, and had her tea-table set out there instead of in the drawing-room; and the boys “did” their lessons in a rustic arbour by the river, where they enjoyed the advantages of coolness and shade, but where caterpillars were apt to drop unexpectedly on their exercise-books, and where the bees kept up a drowsy hum, and the butterflies that flitted by, made their attention wander hopelessly from their books. Miss Elliven was issuing from this “Temple of the Muses,” as St. Ives called it, now, and Falconer saw, with a frown, that his cousin had gone to meet her, and was coming along the path by her side. What right had Arthur, he thought, to show attention to any woman? And it seemed to him that Lord St. Ives was decidedly attentive to Miss Elliven. Netta either did not notice, or thought it too usual an occurrence for comment. She was not of a jealous disposition, and was glad that both St. Ives and his friend seemed to regard Miss Elliven as one of them¬ selves. “ Did you know about the book. Bear?” she asked, in tones full of interest. “ It will be delightful, I know, for M. de Bassompierre has told me so many of their 765

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7o6 The Wooing of Ciiristabel. adventures. I wonder how they write it together. Do they take it in turns— or how ? ” “They write it at night, I should think, said Falconer sourly. “ It seems to me that their days are all spent here.” He strode away ; and Netta watched him with wondering eyes. How cross Bear always was now, the girl thought petulantly, and what a pity it was to spoil things when everything was so delightful. Every¬ thing seemed delightful to Netta this summer, and the days seemed all to speed on golden wings. Was it really three months since St. Ives came home. It was Arthur’s presence, she admitted, that had made this summer so different to the rest. But though she admitted this, she did not deceive herself. She knew, as well as she had known with half the globe between them, that she was only a cousin to him, and that they would never stand in any nearer relationship. And yet the all but daily companionship still stirred the old feeling in her breast, and Netta was not conscious how little vital reality there had ever been m her unrequited love for her cousin Arthur. It was sen¬ timent, not passion, as she would have found out long ao-o, if anyone had crossed her path who had been able to evoke the deeper feeling. But, in spite of her money, Netta Delmar at five-and-twenty was still un wooed and unwon, and still believed that her heart had been given to Arthur Neville years ago, and that the feeling she entertained for him was the strongest and most permanent she was ever likely to know. A faint misgiving, a feeling that if this were so she ought to be a good deal more miserable than she wao, occasionally crossed her mind, but no doubt she would be miserable enough when Arthur had gone, bhe would enjoy his presence while he was here, and let her tears wait. She carried out the heroic resolve with a success that surprised herself. Netta wrote a good deal of poetry about this time— verses of a melancholy cast in w'hich “the smile that hides a breaking heart ii.mred prominently, and in which an early gnye was the only future contemplated with any satisfaction ; but if her own smiles were alluded to, they certain y hid the breaking heart extremely well. . , , Netta felt that she scarcely fulfilled her own ideal ot a heroine dying for love ; but she remembered that “the heart may break, and brokenly live on, an took solace from the thought. She affected senti¬ mental songs now, at which she would previously have laughed, and threw a pathos into them that delighted both herself and her hearers, especially M. de Bassom- pierre. When she sang “Unless,” the emotional Frenchman listened with tears in his eyes, and Netta s were scarcely dry as she foretold her approaching “ Unless you can die when the dream is past, Oh ! fear to call it loving.” Her dream would be past soon, and then no doubt she would fade with the fading leaf, thought Netta, with a sivh. But meanwhile the June days were full of beauty, and M. de Bassompierre was the most agreeable and devoted of men. He was indeed untiring in his efforts to please “Mees Annette,” as he had begged permission to call her, and was omy absent now because he had gone into Iveminster for the third volume of a book she was reading. etta reo-arded it all as French politeness ; but Falconer, who had to listen, in season and out, to the French¬ man’s praises of the ^Uhannante Mees” who had captivated his susceptible heart, held a different opinion, and was annoyed with Netta for encouraging attentions he believed she was unlikely to reward. Even Mrs. Falconer, who had her mind full of othci things just now, opened her eyes at the daily bouquets that arrived from the Ivethorpe conservatories for “Miss Delmar, with M. de Bassompierre’s distin¬ guished regard,” and began to think that she might have more than one pair of lovers on her hands. Were they lovers— those two who were pacing the river-walk now— Mrs. Falconer asked herself. It was abundantly evident that St. Ives had no idea he had ever seen Miss Elliven before, but there was no doubt that he sought her society now ; and as Mrs. Falconer watched the lengthened tUe-a-tite under the drooping trees, she wondered how it would end. Would the admiration he had more than once ex¬ pressed for her beauty lead to a warmer interest still, and if it did, would St. Ives forget the difference of rank and fortune? Was he the man to sacrifice himself for any woman? Mrs. Falconer could not answer her own questions. She felt, since the day she had heard Miss Elliven’s story, that she did not understand her nephew, and could not even guess what he would do. , . i It was a question St. Ives had not begun to ask himself yet. 'He told himself that Ivethorpe would have been intolerable to him but for its nearness to Iveminster Vicarage, but he was not careful to inquire wherein the charm of the Vicarage lay. There was a charm, and that was enough for him. He was always ready to accompany De Bassompierre when that enamoured young man found his way to the house of “ la charniante Mees” and it was only the part of a friend to draw Miss Elliven into conversation, and leave Netta free to receive the tokens of adoration the voting Frenchman was so eager m lay at her feet ; but if any more personal reason existed, he was not anxious to discover it. How could he be? How could he be more than a friend to any woman he whose wife was perhaps living still ? His poor, shy, plain little wile 1 What a contrast site was, in her shyness and gauchcrie, to the stately and beautiful girl who walked beside him now, with grace in every movement, and a manner whose sweet com¬ posure a princess might have envied. And yet every now and then, like a whisper scarcely caught, like the scent of some half-remembered flower borne on a passing breeze. Miss Elliven’s face in some strange and subtle way recalled his wife’s. “ Had you ever any relations named \\ endovei . he asked suddenly. Miss Elliven did not answer. She leaned back ao-ainst the wide smooth boll of a beech-tree, and reo-arded him with blanched face and startled eyes.

Page 726

The Wooing of Christabel. “Why— why do you ask?” she panted nervously. What right have you to inquire who my relations are?” “ 1 beg your pardon,” he said humbly. “ Perhaps I had no right, but I knew someone of that name »once, and something in your face reminded me of her.’’ His voice softened tenderly, as it always did when he spoke of his wife, and Miss Elliven looked at him -curiously. “Was it someone you cared for?” she asked. Her voice was low and eager ; her eyes seemed to pierce his soul. “ No,” he said sadly ; “I did not care for her. I •only ought to have done so.” She sighed, and her hands fell listlessly at her side. She turned away and resumed her walk, and St. Ives .thought she was offended. “ Forgive me if I have said anything to pain or an¬ noy you,” he cried. “ I do not know where or how I have offended.” “ You have not offended,” she answered, with a smile like a pardoningqueen. “ I was surprised at your ques¬ tion, but I will answer it. I had some relations of that name once, but they are all dead now.” “ May 1 ask one more question ? These relations of yours — were any of them named Christabel ? ” “ No,” she said gravely, “ none.” “ You are sure of that ?” “ I am absolutely sure.” He thanked her, but he could not repress a sigh. No doubt her relations were some other Wendovers ; the name was not an uncommon one, and if there was no Christabel -amongst them, they certainly were not the Wendovers he sought. It was disappointing to have seemed to hold a clue, and then to find it slip through his fingers ; and it was all the more disap¬ pointing because lately— he did not ask how or why— his desire to learn his wife’s fate had been curiously quickened. It would be more difficult than ever now, he knew, to find out what had become of the missing girl. Not only was Wendover dead, but he had ascertained that Miss Frost, the little governess, had also passed away. He had always fancied that some day she would relent and reveal his wife’s hiding-place, but though this hope had failed him, he told himself pas¬ sionately that he would never give up the search. F ormerly his search had been prompted entirely by solicitude for the poor child whose love had led her to -efface herself that he might be free, but now he felt that for his own sake no less than hers he must find out the truth. Her sacrifice had been quite unavailing, as an older person would certainly have known it could not fail to be. He was not free : he never would be free so long as he did not know whether she was alive or dead. And as he looked at his beautiful companion now, he felt, with one of those flashes of intimate con¬ viction that are a revelation of our inmost selves, that it had become a matter of life and death to him to know. He could not, he dare not, attempt to analyse the 707 sudden passion that possessed him. If he were free ; if he were only free ! “ They are bringing out tea,” said Miss Elliven ; “ Mrs. Falconer will wonder where you are, Lord St. Ives ; and I must find my little boys.” What a contrast her calm and quiet tone was to the tempest within him ! She bent her beautiful head, and was gone, and St. Ives looked up like a man awakened from a dream and saw De Bassompierre coming in at the gate. The Frenchman ran to his friend with outstretched arms. “ Permit that I embrace thee, my friend ! You are not the rose, but you have been near to she all the hours of my exile. The adorable Mees ; where is she, then ? Have she seem to miss me — to repine ? ” “ I have not seen her,” said St. Ives, “ but I believe she is waiting to give us some tea.” They found Netta at the improvised tea-table on the lawn, but Miss Elliven had disappeared with her charges, and did not return. “ It is strange what a villainous compound is sold in England for tea,” said St. Ives, as he walked home with his friend. M. de Bassompierre turned on him a face radiant as the westering sun. “ You can say so, when she made it? Heathen ! to me it had the flavour of the nectar of the gods.” CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH. A man’s tears. “ But this effusion of such manly drops, This shower, blown up by tempest of the soul. Startles mine eyes, and makes me more amazed.’* SliAKESPEARE. Mrs. Falconer’s birthday was on the 25th of June, and when it transpired that Miss Elliven’s birthday was also on that day, the boys’ enthusiasm knew no bounds. They set their hearts on a pic-nic to the ruins of the old monastic church which had given Ive- minster its name, and though grandmamma declared she could neither sit on the grass nor climb up ruined stairs, they had not much difficulty in winning her consent. St. Ives and De Bassompierre were to go, as a matter of course, and Miss Featherstone, who was asked partly as Miss Elliven’s friend, and partly with a view to companionship for Mrs. Falconer on the safe level of the grass-grown floor of the ancient refectory. The boys were radiant, and spent their play-time for a week beforehand in the manufacture of presents, most of which came to grief in the making, while the remainder might be valuable as tokens of affection, but could scarcely be called so as works of art. “ Do you think she’ll like \t— really?^' asked Flavius anxiously, holding up a cloth penwiper that might _ by the help of gay lines in silk and a vivid imagination —be considered to represent a butterfly, and looking at St. Ives, who was adviser and confidant-iri-chief to his little cousins. “ She will like the pains you have taken with it,” was the most St. Ives would commit himself to, but Flavius was easily contented.

Page 727

^Qg The Wooing “ It has been an awful fag,” he owned, with an air of conscious virtue, “ but I think it’s been worth it.” He looked affectionately at the ill-used fragment of cloth, and then glanced up at St. Ives. What 2iXQyou going to give her, St. Ives ? ” “ To give whom ? Grandmamma ? ” “ No,""! know about that. Netta showed me the shawl you got her in — in ” “Cashmere?” “ I dare say. It was some silly geography name like that ; but what are you going to give Miss Elliven?” “ 1 don’t think I’ve thought much about it” — which was scarcely a fact. “ You see, I don’t know if she would like me to give her anything.” “ Shall I ask her ? ” inquired Flavius, readily. “Certainly not! But perhaps you could find out if there is anything she wants. Do you think there is?” know 1 ” cried Marmaduke. “ She hasn t got a guinea-pig 1 ” , r • i. u The suggestion was offered in all good faith, the possession of a guinea-pig seeming just now to little Marmaduke Dickinson the suminum bonicm of human existence, but the roar of laughter with which the proposal was received quite disconcerted him. “ Guinea-pigs are awfully jolly little things,” he said, in a tone of sulky dignity, and if you hold them up by their tails their eyes drop out. The coachman told me so.” “Would you like one of the remarkable animals yourself?” inquired St. Ives kindly. We might go into Iveminster and see if we could get one.” The yells of delight that greeted the proposition almost made him repent having made it. But there was no drawing back. Flavius knew of a shop where they might be bought, and St. Ives had no peace till he had made each small cousin the proud possessor of a dappled little animal, whose tailless condition gave the first shock to Marmaduke’s faith in his fellow-creatures. Then, and not till then, St. Ives turned his steps into the High Street, and asked the boys to show him the best jeweller’s shop, jjewellers are accustomed to troublesome and vacillating cus¬ tomers, but the unfortunate shopman who waited on St. Ives averred afterwards that, “except for gents buy¬ ing ‘ engaged ’ rings for their young ladies, he had never known such a troublesome gent as this. St. Ives felt difficulties in the way of decision quite apart from the intrinsic merit of the trinkets he was shown. Would Miss Elliven accept a present from him, he wondered? And if she would, had he any right to ask her to do so? He put the latter question a^de with an impatient affirmative he did not stop to verify, but with regard to the former, he felt that the chance of acceptance would probably be in inverse ratio to the value of the gift. The rings and bracelets which had tempted him at first were out of the question ; even a locket might be thought too con¬ spicuous or too costly, and he turned reluctantly from the glittering cases to a little tray of safety-pin brooches, with initials or devices in various precious stones. OF Christabel. “What is Miss Elliven’s name?” he asked the boys. “Belita,” said Flavius. “But it’s not her real name— it’s short for something else.” “ And you don’t know what ? Then perhaps a B would hardly do ? ” Finally he selected a brooch that bore, instead of a letter, a bee formed of a single sapphire, with wings composed of diamonds. It possessed the meiit of being much more valuable than it looked, and if there was any uncertainty about the name, it was safer not to venture on initials. His only anxiety now was whether Miss Elliven would accept it ; but, greatly to Falconer’s surprise, and perhaps just a little to his own, she displayed no hesitation. “Thank you,” she said earnestly, with a look that thrilled him with delight. Her eyes shone, an ex¬ quisite colour sprang into her cheeks. The next moment she turned away her head, but Falconer, watching her with anxious scrutiny, knew that the shining eyes were suddenly dim with tears. She rose and went into the garden, and St. Ives followed her, to his cousin’s hot indignation. De Bassompierre and Netta were already there, helping the boys to feed their guinea-pigs, and Falconer turned to his mother, and saw with intense surprise that her eyes were following Miss Elliven and St. Ives with a look of unmistakable satisfaction. “ Mother ! ” he cried passionately, “ what are you smiling at ? Do you know, do you understand, what it means, and do you think it is a smiling matter ?” “No,” she said, with a sort of tender gravity more inexplicable still— “ No, my son, I think it goes deeper than smiles.” “/ think,” he said, in a tone of concentrated wrath, “that St. Ives is behaving inexcusably. Weak and foolish I always thought him, but I did not think he was a scoundrel.” ^ “ I trust he does not deserve the term now.” “If you knew as much as I do about him, you would know that he does. And if he continues to per¬ secute IVIiss Elliven with his attentions, I shall tell him so before the day is out.” ‘‘Persecute?” said Mrs. Falconer, with the tender smile that had exasperated her son before. “ I do not think that is quite the word. As far as I am a judge, I do not think Miss Elliven regards St. Ives’ atten¬ tions as persecution.” “ You mean - ? ” said Falconer, and stopped. He sat down, and only by an effort that made his lips white, repressed his indignation. It was true he felt it ! She loved this man who had no right to seek her love. Truly, he had done well to call him a scoundrel 1 For the moment he was too paralysed even to think what he would do. He felt that he must go out to try and recover something like calm before the wagonette came round, and he went to the door with a face that drew from his mother a little sound of dismay. Falconer turned and looked at hei earnestly. “If you knew as much as I do - ” he exclaimed, but she interrupted him with the strangest smile

Page 728

The Wooing of Christabel. 709 “ My dear Bernard/’ she said — and even as she spoke, the wagonette drew up at the door — “ my dear Bernard, what if I Jmow inore?^'^ The others came trooping in at the sound of the wheels, and prevented a reply. But, indeed, what day he would keep the secret St. Ives was turning to so base a use. Before he slept that night the truth should be known. He would gain St. Ives’ permission to reveal it if he could, and if not - Well, if not, there were higher duties even than “HE RAISED HER HAND, AS IF HE WOULD HAVE KISSED IT ” {p. 712). reply could he have made He could not have be¬ trayed his cousin — he could not have revealed the secret he had promised to keep, and, short of that, what was there it was worth while to say ? That his mother had any information he did not possess he did not for a moment believe, and he felt bitterly that in her mistaken kindness she was encouraging an intimacy that, if she had only known the truth, she would have been the first to deplore. If she had only known ! He vowed to himself that this was the last loyalty to a friend. His face was very grave and stern as he made this resolve, and his mother, who knew it so well, felt a thrill of indefinite alarm. ‘‘You will not spoil my birthday, Bernard.^'’ she whispered, as he helped her up the high step to the comfortable front seat everyone insisted she must take. “ No,” he promised, pressing her hand much harder than he knew. She was a brave woman, and she uttered no cry, but that agonised and agonising clasp

Page 729

710 The Wooing of Christabel. revealed the disturbance in his mind, and set her wondering and thinking all the way to Iveminster. Like himself, she was saying, “ If only the truth were known ! ” It was a merry little party, save for Falconer’s silent presence, that drove along the dusty road under the summer sun, but Miss Elliven was quick to notice the exception. “ Have you a headache.^’’ she asked kindly, glanc¬ ing up at the dark silent face beside her. “ Marma- diike, don’t make quite such a noise ; and, Flavius, don’t pull your brother’s hair.” Marmaduke was perched in between his grand¬ mother and the coachman, enlightening Jones on the natural history of guinea-pigs at the top of his shrill treble voice, and much disturbed by the attacks of Flavius on his defenceless curls. “All right,” said Flavius complaisantly. “I’ll pinch his legs instead.” He was captured by M. de Bassompierre and Netta before he could carry out his amiable intentions, and made to sit between them — a position they probably enjoyed as little as he. “But leetle boys must be said the French¬ man. “ Say, then, if the pinch is so pleasant that you will give him to your brother, me also, shall I not give him to you ? ” Flavius subsided with magical celerity, and com¬ ported himself with unimpeachable propriety for the rest of the drive, revenging himself afterwards by climbing like a cat up the most dangerous part of the ruins, and then executing a war-dance upon the top. Fortunately, his grandmother did not see him. She was greeting Miss Featherstone, who had just arrived, bringing Bruno with her — at the sight of whom Scamp incontinently disappeared — and the two ladies were enjoying De Bassompierre’s astonishment at the size of the noble brute. “ He is not fe7'0ce — he ? ” inquired the Frenchman, putting out his hand to stroke the magnificent crea¬ ture with a hesitation that made Netta laugh. I thought you were a lion-killer ! ” she said rather scornfully. “ Are you “But yes,” said De Bassompierre calmly, “ I fear not the lions, but it is temeraire to touch the strange dogs. I love not the hazard of the hydi'ophobie^ me. But if it will content Mademoiselle - ” He thrust his hand into Bruno’s great mouth, and held it there with an expression that might have be¬ fitted Scasvola in the tent of Porsenna. “ Mademoiselle, is she content?” he asked, as he stepped back with a low bow. Netta bit her lip. Why would he make such a ridiculous parade of his devotion? She could see Miss Featherstone smiling, but she was too angry to smile herself. “ How could you be so silly ? ” she said reproach¬ fully. “ He might have bitten you.” He gave a resigned shrug as they moved away together. “ Perhaps. But at least I show Mademoiselle I am not a coward. If it had been a lion, I would have done the same ! ” Netta longed to tell him not to be a goose, but something besides politeness restrained her. It waS' all very foolish, but to the girl who had never had a lover there was something sweet in the folly. She had lived all her life till now with no tribute to her womanhood but those half-jesting speeches of Arthur Neville’s, which he had forgotten so long ago and she had remembered too well ; and now, as her youth seemed to be slipping from her, she had roused this tempestuous and ardent admiration in an inflam¬ mable little Frenchman, as far removed from her ideal of a lover as a man could well be. She was half angry and half amused, and wholly and artlessly as¬ tonished, but she was a little touched, too. If only he had been a little taller — or if she could have forgotten Arthur Neville ! She was beginning to be conscious that it was Arthur Neville, not Lord St. Ives, who came between herself and any other lover— Arthur, with the bright face, and gay and careless smile, with the laughing blue eyes and unclouded brow, not the older man whose smiles had grown so rare, and whose forehead was lined with sorrow or with care ; but to be con¬ scious of this and to be ready to accept another lover were two quite different things. “And pray, my dear,” said Miss Featherstone, touching Mrs. Falconer’s arm with her lace parasol, “ who is this M. de Bassompierre, who seems so very devoted to Netta ?” “ He is a friend of St. Ives - ” “Pish, my dear ! Of course I know as much as that. I mean who is he, and who are his people ? If he.is going to carry off your pretty Netta - ” “ But, indeed, I don’t know that he is going to do anything of the kind. I think foreigners have that exaggerated manner, and I doubt if it means as much as it appears to,” said Mrs. Falconer, with a politely repressive smile. She had learnt to know that what¬ ever was told to Miss Featherstone one day was known half over the parish the next. “ As to who he is,” she added, “ I believe his father was a vicouite — when there were such things in France — but as he was not a rich man, and there were several sons, this young man cannot be very well off.” “ Poor as a rat, I’ve no doubt ! Well, you are right to be cautious, for I dare say he has heard of Netta’s money.”* “ Not from us, certainly,” said Mrs. Falconer, with dignity. “ I cannot say what St. Ives may have told him. But as far as I can judge, money has very little to do with it.” And, though he was a Frenchman, it was true. “It is not for your dot; it is for yourself,” he was saying to Netta now. “ Chere Mademoiselle, if you will do me the honiieur to accept my hand, I will love you all my lives.” But as he looked at Netta he knew that he had spoken too soon. “ I am sorry,” stammered Netta. “ I did not think you were in earnest - ” “ Not in airnest ? Oh, Mees Annette ! ”

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The Wooing of Christabel. 711 I mean I am sure I could not care for you as you deserve. It is better — oh ! it is much better that you should forget that you have ever seen me.’’ ‘‘Oh, del I She tells me to forget !” cried M. de IJassompierre in tragic tones. And then, to Netta’s utter astonishment, he pulled out an embroidered handkerchief and wept into it copiously. A man’s tears may be the saddest things this human life of ours can know, but unless they attain this tragic height, they are apt to provoke a smile. Netta would have smiled, very probably — being in the mood to exasperate and be exasperated — even if her lover had been a shame-faced Englishman, winking away the detested moisture from his eye, and trying hard to look as if he did not know that a big and utterly-to- be-loathed round drop was coursing down his cheek. If she had felt as angry and as bitter as she felt just now, she would probably have bidden him to dry his eyes, but how could she do this to a man who was already industriously performing the operation 1 “Do you want everybody to see you.^ Do you want St. Ives and my brother to laugh at us ?” she asked incisively. “ Pray, pray^ M. de Bassompierre, put up your handkerchief, for my sake, if not for your own.” “ For your sake ? Ah ! Mees Annette, what is there I would not do for that?” cried De Bassompierre, with a fresh access of emotion that put immediate compliance out of the question. Netta looked at him for a moment with something like contempt, and walked away with her head in the air. M. de Bassompierre had done for himself as far as she was concerned, she considered, and she meant to let him see it. She kept out of his way for the rest of the day, and was deaf to the most ingenious compliments and im¬ pervious to all appeals in the shape of glances and sighs, devoting herself to the little boys, and going about with one on each side of her as a sort of body-guard. It was an efficient protection. No one — not even a Frenchman — could make love in the presence of Flavius and Marmaduke Dickinson. CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH. THE echo’s voice. ** Hark ! how the gentle Echo from her cell Talks through the cliffs, and murmuring o’er the stream, F..epeats the accents,”— Aicenside. N ETTA’S sudden devotion to her nephews had the un¬ intentional result of leaving their governess free, and St. Ives was prompt to see and use his opportunity. He sat by Miss Elliven’s side while she sketched the bay, and he walked with her through the scented grass when they went to hear the famous echo on the other side of the Minster fields. Falconer was a mine of scientific information on that, as on most subjects, and had much to say on echoes in general, and this echo in particular, that two of his auditors thought rather dry. They moved out of earshot, and Miss Elliven exclaimed — “ Don’t 3mu think it spoils a beautiful thing like this echo to be told exactly how it is produced? It is much more interesting to think of all it meant in old days, and how many people must have liked to come and listen to it. What did they think, I wonder, be¬ fore people knew that that old wall had anything to do with it ?” “ Didn’t they think it was a prophetess, or some¬ thing of that kind?” said St. Ives vaguely. “ I won¬ der if she could be induced to prophesy for us now ? What would you like to ask her, Miss Elliven ? Is there anything in your future you would particularly like to know ? ” “How can one tell without knowing? If it were pleasant, I should like to know it, but I think I am a coward. I am afraid of pain.” Something in her voice touched him strangely. He understood that she had suffered keenly, little as he knew how. “ I should like to think that, whatever the past may have held, there is no pain in the future for you. There should not be, if friendship — if love — could keep it away.” “ That is too much to hope,” she said gravely. “ We can only judge the future from the past. The one grows out of the other, does it not ? ” “Not always, one may hope. Surely there must come a time when the past may bury its dead. It has come to me now.” He spoke almost fiercely, with a defiant tone, and she glanced at him curiously. “ Has your past been unhappy ? ” she asked. ^‘I — I did not know that.” ‘‘ No — how could you ? I knew I had made a mess of my life some time ago, but I did not know how utterly I had wrecked it till quite lately — till I knew youP “ Oh — ? ” with an accent of pain. “ I — I thought we were friends ? ” “ Friends ! ” he cried bitterly. “Yes, I suppose we are. And I suppose you are satisfied with that ? I am not.” The words seemed to escape him almost without his own volition. But the instant they were uttered a swift repentance overwhelmed him. What had he said } — and what right had he to say it ? “Forgive me !” he cried earnestly. “Forget what I have said ! I had no right to say it. Friends — yes 1 we may be that, and I thank and bless you for the word. Let it suffice until I have a right to ask for more — if I ever have.” The pain in his voice went to her heart, but she did not speak. She sat down on one of the many seats that abounded in the neighbourhood of Iveminster — for indeed she was trembling too much to be able ta stand — and pressed her hand upon her heart. Could she — dare she — speak yet, or would it undo all ? They had wandered on to the cliff, out of sight of the others, who were busy with the echo still, and except for the shouts and laughter that came from time to time across the fields, they might have been quite alone. The sea lay before them, smiling in the summer sun,.

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712 The Wooing of Christabel. and breaking on the beach below with soft, recurring plash ; the white chalk cliffs that bounded the bay glistened against the blaze of sea and sky ; overhead there were little white clouds sailing slowly by, and on the far horizon w^hite sails shining in the sun. It was a day to live for ev^er in one’s remembrance as a vision of beauty and peace. It was so still they could hear the approaching voices of the others, and Flavius sending a farew'ell shout for the echo to answerback. “ I say, old boy ! Are you there still ? ” shouted the nineteenth-century boy, and the mysterious voice at which chiefs and priests had trembled, came softly back in low, ghostly tones. They were too far off to catch the echo’s answer, but the last syllable floated faintly to their ears. ‘‘Ill!” It w^as all they heard, and Miss Elliven shivered at the evil-omened word. She was in the strain of all but overpowering emotion, in the mood to be superstitious, and she let the echo’s voice decide the question she had been debating with herself. No — she would not speak yet. She stood up as she heard the others coming towards them, and caught her breath with something that was almost a sob. “ They are coming,” she w'hispered incoherently, “ the — the others.” “ I cannot see them ; I cannot meet Falconer,” said St. Ives. He raised her hand, as if he would have kissed it, and then pressed it fervently, and almost threw it from him. “ I dare not ! ” he whispered hoarsely ; and then he dashed down a rude pathway that led down the face of the cliff to the shore. Miss Elliven looked after him with the strangest smile, and pressed her own lips to the hand he had almost kissed. “ Dear 1 ” she said softly ; “ would you have done it if you had known whose hand it was ? ” Her fingers wandered to the little pin at her throat, and the touch reassured her. She lifted her face to the sky, and all the glory of the sunshine fell on it, and seemed to transfigure it. To Falconer, who was in front with Flavius, that exquisite face, with the sunshine falling on it, seemed to wear a beauty of more than mortal mould, and but for the boy’s presence, he could have groaned aloud. He had seen St. Ives’ farewell, and he knew what had brought that light to the beautiful eyes, and that ineffable smile to the trembling lips. A tempest of indignation, a passion of righteous wrath surged over his soul. He could hardly help following his cousin, and hurling at him the reproaches he felt St. Ives deserved ; but his promise to his mother restrained him. He would keep his word : he would say nothing now ; but before to-night St. Ives should know what he thought. And meanwhile, was there nothing he could say to Miss Elliven to show her the precipice on which she stood — the true position of the man whom he believed she loved ? It might be true that St. Ives’ wife was dead, as he himself had always believed ; but what legal proof was there of it, and what right had St. Iv'es to behave as if he had proof that it was true? He admitted — being just, even in his anger — that St. Ives had probably come to believe it, and even that his own emphatic declarations might have had something to do with this belief ; but if he had known what use St. Ives would make of his possible freedom, he would have cut his tongue out rather than have persuaded him that he was free. He was painfully conscious, in his struggle to deal justly with his cousin, that if the woman who had won St. Ives’ affection had been any¬ one but Miss Elliven, he might have found it easier to make excuses for him — but that it should be this woman out of all the world ! She saw him now, and came down the slope to meet him, her white dress floating behind her, and a wonderful look of exaltation and peace upon her face. Was it not in some such fashion as this that Beatrice must have looked at Dante, Falconer thought. He felt so reverent of her beauty and innocence, of the noble soul shining through the frank grey eyes, that he could have fallen on the ground before her, and kissed the hem of her robe. He must and would save her, at whatever cost to others or to himself ! What was his promise to St. Ives compared with the necessity that seemed laid upon him to open her eyes to the truth ? He stood before her in the sunshine, a tall, grim figure, with long clerical coat and wide-brimmed hat, and something in his face that arrested her attention at once. Flavius had gone back to the others, who were beckoning and making signs that they were about to return to the ruins ; but neither Miss Elliven nor Falconer noticed their signals. She was looking at him in wonder, and almost in alarm, and he was too absorbed in his purpose to be able to think of anything else. “ Miss Elliven,” he said, in low, concentrated tones, “ I have something to tell you, something that I fear may - ” But no ! he had no right to assume that it would distress her. He must tell her, but he would do it in the fewest and plainest words he could. “ Do you know,” he said, taking her hand as one takes the hand of a friend under the surgeon’s knife — “ do you know that Lord St. Ives is a married man ? ” She lifted her face with a radiant smile. “ Yes,” she said ; “ I know it — because I am his wife ! ” _ CHAPTER THE SIXTEENTH. HUSBAND AND WIFE. “ You are my true and honourable wife ; As dear to me as are the ruddy drops That visit my sad heart.” — Shakespeare, “ I AM his wife !” said Christabel. And Falconer gazed at her with a surprise that left him no power to speak. He stood before her dumb with amazement, para¬ lysed by a rush of conflicting feelings ; but he did not doubt her statement for a moment. He knew that it was true, because he knew her again. The scales fell suddenly from his eyes, and once more he seemed to see the great wide staircase at Brookfield, and his

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The Wooing of Christabel. cousin’s tall young bride ascending it, and wondered how it was that he had not known her before. Different as was that unformed, angular girl from the beautiful woman who had called herself “ Miss Elliven,” it was tlfe difference of degree, not of kind. There was likeness enough to prove the identity, when once his eyes were opened to see it. He asked for no further proof, for he needed none. He lifted his hat reverently, and his whole soul went out in a mute passion of thanksgiving. How vain his fears had been ; how unnecessary his indignation ! How won¬ derful the Providence that had thrown husband and wife together, and joined their hearts at last ! His own heart was full of pure and unselfish gladness. He looked at Christabel with a smile that was almost like a woman’s in its tremulous brightness. “ His wife ! ” he said, in a tone of deep relief. “ Oh, if you had only told us before !” ‘‘You are not angry?” she said wistfully. “Angry? No; only thankful and glad ! But why did you not tell us ? Was it by St. Ives’ wish that you kept us in the dark ? ” “He does not know himself,” said Christabel. “ I told Mrs. Falconer when he first came back, and now I have told you. I knew what you must have seen,” she went on, with a blush, and a shy glance at the dark face above her; “and I did not want you to misunderstand.” “ And you say he does not know ? ” he said in a puzzled voice. There was so much he could not understand. “Not yet,” she said, with a deepening blush. “I don’t want him to know just yet.” “Was it because of St. Ives that you came to us?” he asked, after a pause, in which he had been re¬ volving many things. “No, oh no! I had never heard of him by that name. I did not know it would ever be his. I knew nothing, I guessed nothing, till he came into the drawing-room that afternoon, and - ” “ And you fainted, poor child ! Yes ; I remember now.” “ It was after that, that I told Mrs. Falconer, and I asked her if I should go away or stay. She wished me to stay ; but I was dreadfully afraid. I thought he would never forgive me if he knew. But somehow I could not go away.” “And you are glad you stayed ?” “ Yes,” said Christabel simply. “ I — I think — I hope — he is beginning to care for me at last.” “I am sure of it,” said Falconer. “But Miss Elliven — Lady St. Ives - ” “Will you not call me Christabel ?” she said shyly. “ You are his cousin, you know.” “And yours; and so perhaps I may venture to advise ? I think then, Christabel, you ought not to keep your husband any longer in the dark.” She looked at him with startled eyes. “ But — but I only thmk he cares,” she pleaded. “ He must not know till I am quite, quite sure.” “ Are you not a little selfish ? It does not hurt for you know he is your husband ; but I think it is 713 hard on him. It is true that your only rival is your¬ self ; but have you any right to tempt him to set even yourself between him and his duty to his wife ! ” She was impressed by his words, he could see, but she did not answer till they had nearly retraced their steps to the ruins. Then she held out her hand, with her frank, beautiful smile. “You are right, Mr. Falconer - ” “ Cousin Bernard,” he corrected. “ You are right, Cousin Bernard. I will tell him to-night.” “ I am sure you will be doing right,” said Falconer ; “ and I do not think you need be afraid.” He said no more, for they had come to the little gate which led to the ruins, where the others had evidently arrived some time before. The elder ladies were sitting together in the shade ; Netta and Mar- maduke were standing at the foot of a ruined tower, up which Flavius was climbing ; and M. de Bassom- pierre stood in a melodramatic attitude a little apart, with folded arms and melancholy brow. Suddenly there was a shout and a crash. They saw De Bassompierre dart forward, and heard Netta scream. “ Someone is hurt ! ” exclaimed Falconer, hurrying on with long strides that left Christabel far behind. Some stones seemed to have fallen from the top of the tower, and a little cloud of dust arose from the dry ground, and prevented her seeing clearly what had happened. She ran forward, trembling, and saw Mrs. Falconer and Miss Featherstone hastening to the spot with blanched looks of dread. It was M. de Bassompierre who was hurt, they discovered. He was lying unconscious on the ground, with his head on Netta’s knee, and a face as white as her dress. Netta, looking as if she scarcely knew v/hat she was doing, was scolding Flavius volubly, and Marmaduke was crying aloud, either from the effects of the scolding or the fright ; Flavius, looking more subdued than Christabel had ever seen him, ran to his governess, as if for protection from his irate aunt. “Will he die?” he said anxiously, pointing to De Bassompierre ; “ and shall I be hung ? ” A fresh howl from Marmaduke greeted the inquiry ; but Falconer put the boys aside. “Stop whimpering 1” he ordered, “and let me hear what has happened. Is he fainting, or hurt — or what is it ? Netta, can’t you explain ? ” “It was for me,” Netta moaned, in a choked voice ; “ it was to save me — me, who have laughed at him, and derided and despised him. Oh ! if he might only live - ” She bK)ke off in an agony of tears, and Falconer bent to examine the prostrate man. One arm was evidently broken ; but though he moaned when it was touched, he gave no other sign of consciousness. “ We ought to get a doctor at once,” said Falconer. “ I’ll go for Maynard - ” “Let me^ Uncle Bear !” cried Flavius eagerly — “ Perhaps if I get the doctor, they’ll let me off.”

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The Wooing of Christabel. He was off like an arrow from tlie bow, and brought the doctor back with him in an incredibly short space of time. But short as the interval was, Netta had re¬ gained her composure, and was able to give a tolerably coherent account of the accident — if accident it could be called. The masonry at the top of the tower was fast crumbling away, and some pieces of considerable size were loosened from the rest, as Flavius had soon found out. He did not know that Netta was so close to the tower, and sent them crashing down “just for a lark.” Netta had not seen her danger ; but De Bas- sorapierre had, and rushing to the rescue, had dragged her away in time to save her, but not himself. It was wonderful so small a boy had been able to move pieces of such a size ; but they hung ready for their fall, and only needed a slight push to send them over. There was no doubt as to the narrowness of Netta^s escape, or the serious nature of her preserver’s in¬ juries. One arm was broken, and there was some concussion of the brain. “He must be taken home at once,” said Dr. Maynard. And as the horses had just had been put in the wagonette, they laid him in it, and drove slowly back ; Falconer and the doctor sitting with the injured man, and Netta, who would not be left out ; and the others following in Miss Featherstone’s carriage. St. Ives had not returned, but they knew he would find his way home ; and one, at least, of the returning party was not sorry that he had not joined it. It seemed to Christabel that she could not have met her husband before the others, now that her secret was known to Bernard Falconer as well as to his mother. It had gone out of her own keeping, and who could say how slight a thing might reveal it unawares ? How should she tell him, she wondered, and what would he say? — or rather, how would he look? His w’ords were sure to be kind — what words of Arthur s had ever been aught but kind to any living thing ? — but the look that would flash into his face before the words: what would that be? She felt as if the sus¬ pense was almost more than she could bear. The carriage, rolling swiftly behind Miss Feather- stone’s mettled bays, seemed slow to her impatience. She longed to reach home, and be able to be alone before her husband came. Miss Featherstone drove back, after depositing her friends at the Vicarage door, and it was not long before the wagonette arrived. They had decided to take De Bassompierre to the Vicarage, where he could have better nursing and more comforts than the bachelor menage at Ivethorpe was likely to afford ; and Netta flew about superintending the necessary arrangements with an anxious solicitude that made Falconer smile. Did she care for the penniless Frenchman, after all? The injuries to the head were less severe than had been feared, and even before reaching the Vicarage consciousness had returned. But the arm was badly fractured, and the doctor was glad to be able to attend to his patient as soon as possible, and to leave him in such careful hands. De Bassompierre fainted twice during the setting, but he bore it without a groan ; and Netta, who had been holding splints and bandages, rewarded his heroism with a kinder loot., than she had ever given him before. “ Is it that you forgive me?” he said, looking up into her face, as she bent to arrange the pillow of the couch, when the others had left the room. “Forgive? Oh!” cried Netta humbly, “don’t make me feel more ashamed of myself than I do. Oh 1 M. de Bassompierre, how shall I ever thank you ? ” He looked at her with a sudden hope shining in his eyes. “*How?” he cried. “ Mees Netta, there is von way, if you will - ” “ But if you disturb those bandages, I said Netta. M. de Bassompierre subsided under this terrible threat ; but when Falconer returned from seeing the doctor off, he found the patient holding his cousin’s hand in his own uninjured one, and Netta, with the prettiest pink in her cheeks, looking absolutely shy. “ He would she said, in a deprecatory tone. “ But yes 1” cried the Frenchman gaily. “And to think I owe it all to that little freckle boy, and the stones he fling down 1 I shall lof him, that little Flavius, all my lives.” And then Falconer insisted on quiet, and carried Netta off to t'^ll her news to her aunt, who was by no- means as surprised as she expected. But if she was not surprised, Mrs. Falconer was pleased. She had seen enough of the young French¬ man not only to like and respect him, but to believe that he was thoroughly in love with Netta, and more likely to make her happy than many of her own coun¬ trymen might have done. If he was poor, Netta had enough for both, and the Vicarage ladies were neither of them likely to look at things from a mercenary point of view. Mrs. Falconer’s congratulations were very wamt’ and sincere, and Netta’s only doubts were set at rest as she found how thoroughly her choice was ap¬ proved. “You will tell him that— and St. Ives too, won’t you ?” said Netta eagerly. “ Certainly,” said Falconer. “ I am going to Ive¬ thorpe now to see if St. Ives has got back.” He was, indeed, anxious to know. He felt that he must see his cousin before the husband and wife met, and prepare him, if possible, for the revelation that awaited him ; and besides this, St. Ives would pro¬ bably be expecting De Bassompierre’s return, and wondering what had become of him. He went out into the pleasant summer twilight, and took the path across the fields that led to Ivethorpe, wondering if he should find St. Ives at home ; but he had only got half-way when he saw him coming towards him. St. Ives had, indeed, just heard an exaggerated report of the accident, and was coming; to the Vicarage to inquire after his friend. It was a

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Waterlow Park — Past and Present. relief to find that a broken arm was the worst thing Falconer had to report, and that no one but De Bas- sompierre was hurt ; but once assured of that, St. Ives fell into a sombre silence most unlike himself. He was evidently deeply depressed, and was scarcely interested in the news of Netta’s engagement. His own troubles were pressing too heavily upon him to leave him free to sympathise very deeply with the sorrows or joys of others. What was the happiness or unhappiness of Netta’s life — nay, what was the fate of empires or the fall of kings compared with the question of what Miss Elliven had thought of the avowal of his love? Had she understood it? And what had she thought of his distracted repudiation, of his precipitate flight? The one thing he was clear about was that never, willingly, would he look on that too dear face again. He held out his hand as they came to the Vicarage gate. “ Good night,” he said, ‘‘ good night, and good-bye. I will not come in : I dare '^ot ! Tell her— but no I tell her nothing. Good-by^ Bernard. You will take care of De Bassompierre, I know, for Netta's sake, if not for mine, and 1 cannot tell when I may see you again.” ‘‘Do you mean that you are going away ? ” “ I mean that I can bear it no longer. I will know — I viust — if my wife is alive or dead.” Falconer looked at the agitated face, working pain¬ fully in the uncertain light, and felt that the time had come. “ I can tell you that,” he said, in tones that were low from intensity of feeling. “ Very strange things have 715 happened to-day, Arthur. I — I have something to tell you about your wife.” St. Ives staggered back, and put out his hands with a sort of groping action. “Do you mean that you have heard that she is‘ alive ? ” he whispered, with white lips. “ Well — better so than this horrible uncertainty, which is driving me slowly, but surely — mad He looked it. Falconer thought. He was white to the lips. His looks were haggard and desperate. At the sight of a passion like this Bernard gave up all attempt to break his news. He felt it must be told at once. “There is no uncertainty now,” he cried. “Your wife is alive — I have seen her ! Come with me, and I will take you to her.” “ Do you mean that she is hereV' 3S,” said Falconer. St. Ives drew a long breath, and nerved himself, as; men nerve themselves for the baptism of fire. “ Firm is the word ! ” he muttered. “If Christabel' is alive, I will do my duty to her, poor child ! Where do you say she is ?” They were in the hall, and Falconer opened the schoolroom door. “ She is here,” was all he said. And then he left them together. St. Ives stood transfixed with surprise. Miss Elliven he exclaimed. And then she ran to him, and fell into his arms. “ Oh, Arthur, Arthur!” she cried, “ I am ChristabeH Do you not know your wife ? ” THE END WATERLOW PARK— PAST AND PRESENT. ATERLOW PARK, as it is to be called, has a frontage upon the old North Road, and extends along it from the lane now called Dartmouth Park Hill (old Maiden Lane) to the beginning of the Highgate High Street; from this, the eastern side, it spreads west and south-west over the un¬ dulating slopes of Highgate Hill, the upper part of the land commanding good views of the City. It is only recently that these grounds became the property of a single owner ; thirty years ago they were divided into gardens of various dimensions attached to several separate houses ; of these houses, three are still stand¬ ing : Hertford House, at the north-east corner of the estate ; Fairseat House, adjoining it ; and Lauder¬ dale House, lower down the hill, but also fronting the high road. The latter was once the residence of the Dukes of Lauderdale. Between it and Fairseat House, stood at the time we speak of, the picturesque old cottage of Andrew Marvell and a house then occupied by Sir John Pennethorne, the architect, who designed the south front of Buckingham Palace, the London University, &c. This was already demolished when, in 186S, Andrew Marvell’s dwelling was found to be in so unsafe a condition as to necessitate its removal — a matter of much regret to lovers of the picturesque. As regards historical interest, Lauder¬ dale may fairly vie with it, and since it is still standing, claims the first place in our attention. Lauderdale House is supposed to have been built about 1600. It is not imposing in appearance, nor has it great architectural merit, yet we who have known it long would fain find some beauty in its gable roofs and old-fashioned staircase, notwithstanding painted imitation wood and modern casements. What though the growing needs of a more luxurious age have added on gable to gable, so that the gentle¬ man’s residence of our day has outstripped the duke’s mansion, in spite of later knowledge and architectural proofs, we still see it as the house which our early years associated with the names of Nell Gwynne and the dread Duke of Lauderdale, of whose histories we

Page 735

7i6 Waterlow Park — Past and Present. THE PORCH AND VINE OF ANDREW MARVELL’S COTTAGE. were innocently ignorant. As we wander, with our newer wisdom, about the quaint old-fashioned garden, we wonder at what date it acquired its present appear¬ ance, and whether the solitary stork still adorning one of its terraces was personally acquainted with these worthies, or whether he and his departed companion, and the fountain and sundial, were the additions of some more peaceful-minded duke, or some country gentleman of a later age. The house and lands at Highgate first became the property of the Lauderdale family about 1651. John, second earl and first duke, acquired them by right of his wife Anne, daughter and co-heiress of the Earl of Home. The duke seems to have had some trouble in obtaining possession of the estate, as it was seized by the Lord of the Manor, John I reton. The latter — brother of the General Ireton who married Crom¬ well’s daughter, and lived opposite, on The Bank, in Cromwell House— obtained a grant of it from Cromwell, on the pretence that the duke was a traitor to the State, though history tells us he had taken a leading part as a negotiator for the sale of the king, and we might have thought, therefore, that he deserved well of the Protector. There are extant, in the annals of the House of Lords, petitions dated 1666, in which the duke sets forth his claim. As the position of the great parties in the State was now reversed, the later petition was no doubt successful. The tyrant Deputy of Scotland, as Macaulay calls him, was the chief instrument employed under Charles II. in forcing Episcopacy on his reluctant countrymen, so that he seems to have been equally willing to lend his hand to any kind of tyranny. It may have been during his absence in Scotland that Charles made use _ _ of his house, with or without his consent, as a temporary home for Nell G Wynne. Tra¬ ditions long current in Highgate certainly as¬ sign this as one of the many occupied by her at various times, and the marble bath in the entrance-hall goes by the name of Nell Gwynne’s bath to this day. Andrew Marvell, writing of the king and “ that wench of orange and of oyster,’' may very possibly have been led to do so by this close proximity to his own dwelling, for the garden of Lauderdale in those days no doubt included the plot where stood Sir John Pennethorne’s house, and Marvell therefore would have been able to see into the garden from his upper windows. A shilling of Charles II. was lately found in Lauderdale House in an excellent state of preservation. Mr. Lloyd, in his interesting “ History of Highgate," from which we quote largely, further tells us of traces of a still earlier occupant of the house. During repairs, besides the armorial shield of John Lauderdale and Anne his wife, was found a letter addressed to Lady Dorothy Hobart, at Highgate, dated from St. Barthollomewes, Feb. 28th, 1626.” This lady was the widow of Sir Henry Hobart, Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas; their daughter was buried at High¬ gate. The last tenant who occupied Lauderdale House was Mr. James Yates, F.R.S., who held many literary and scientific meetings there ; later, when it became the property of Sir Sydney Waterlow, it was lent by him to be for a time a convalescent home in connec¬ tion with St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, of which he is treasurer. It was opened for this purpose by H.R.H. the Prince of Wales, July 8th, 1872. The house of Sir J. Pennethorne had, by various additions, grown up from outbuildings formerly belong¬ ing to Lauderdale. It stood back from the road, and was pulled down before the ground became Sir Sydney’s. A kind of shed or wash-house remains, which was attached to it, and on the other side almost touched Marvell’s cottage. The grounds included the larger of the two ponds in the present Park, and at a time when skating in public was not yet usual for ladies, envious neighbours might see, from the rising ground above, the young ladies of the family enjoying this exhilarating exercise on their private water. We now come to the spot where stood the modest and picturesque dwelling of Andrew Marvell. It stood rather high from the road, and the piece of garden in front was entered by a flight of steps now built into the boundary wall to mark the spot. The house— or ■ rather cottage — was prettily surrounded by trees and shrubs, and partly hidden from the footway by a hedge of evergreens. On the side towards the garden it was, we think, most interesting, the casements being of considerable age, and the porch enriched by

Page 736

Waterlow Park — -Past and Present. 717 a beautiful old vine, which twined about lattice and windows with most luxuriant growth. We may well believe it to be the one mentioned in the poem, well known by its having a place in the Golde7i Treasury^ in which Marvell describes his delight in his garden retreat. One verse runs as follows : — “What wondrous life is this I lead ? Ripe apples drop about my head ; The luscious clusters of the vine About my mouth do crush their wine,’’ The old scholar must have had a humble and well- contented mind to make so much of this little plot of ground — for very small it was, though pretty and secluded. Several of the apple-trees were left when we first remember it, but we confess to incredulity as to the existence there, even in his time, of melons in the open air, though in a later line he professes to have stumbled over them. A facetious friend suggests it was to the unpoetical vegetable marrow that he, with poetic licence, gives this title, or we may conjecture that the great linguist was not equally well versed in botany. Of a sundial we can find no trace ; but in the garden of Lauderdale, besides the one on the terrace marking the height of St. Paul’s, there is a broken one cast aside in a corner, where it has remained as long as we can remember, and this may possibly be the one mentioned in the poem. Andrew Marvell, whose career was laid in the same troublous time as that of John Lauderdale, claims our regard even more for his high integrity, political and social, than for his intellectual merits. These, however, were of no common order. Marvell was the son of a clergyman, master of the Grammar School at Kingston-on- Hull ; he was born in 1620, and at fifteen was sent to Trinity College, Cambridge. The books of that college show that he remained at the University longer than was necessary for merely taking a degree, for in 1641 it was agreed that he, with others, should no longer receive benefits of the college. We next hear of him as a traveller on the Continent, where he distinguished himself by the ready way in which he acquired languages. These stood him in good stead presently as tutor to Mary, daughter of Lord Fairfax, and were afterwards named by Milton in recommending him for the office of Assistant Secretary to the Council of State. Milton speaks of him as a man of good family, well versed in French, Italian, Spanish, and Dutch, and a good scholar in Greek and Latin, and a man of so much capacity and so many accomplishments, that if he (Milton) had had any feeling of jealousy or rivalry he might have been slow to recommend him as a coadjutor. This office Marvell afterwards obtained, and was also at one time secre¬ tary to Lord Carlisle abroad, when he was appointed Ambassador Extraordinary to Russia, Sweden, and Denmark. The inscription on the engraved portrait by Basire states that Marvell was the last commoner who received allowance from his constituents, and perhaps this pecuniary relation helps to account for the very voluminous correspondence he maintained with the electors of Kingston-on-Hull during the many years he represented them in that borough. ANDREW MARVELL’S COTTAGE (BEFORE IT WAS PULLED DOWN).

Page 737

THE CEDARS UNDER HEAVY SNOW. The uncompromising manner in which he exposed the corruption of the Court of Charles IL, and his -satirical notices of members of the first Parliament after the Restoration, made Marvell many enemies. A proclamation was issued offering a reward for his apprehension, and he found it necessary to retire to Hull. It is by no means sure that his death in 1678, at fifty-eiglit years of age, was not hastened by poison, for his constitution was sound and vigorous. His poems were edited by his widow in 1680. It may be told to his honour that, Roundhead as he was, one of the no blest panegyrics on the demeanour of Charles I. on the scaffold comes from him. His chief work is “An Account of the Growth of Popery and Arbitrary Government in England/^ but it is as a poet and satirist that his name will live. THE END OF TPIE STORY. ^^'HE bright eyes, lifted from the book. Seem, by their sweet and thoughtful look. To see, as in a magic glass, /he vision of the story pass : The hero and the heroine — The faithful pair whose fortunes shine. In spite of days long overcast. Complete in happiness at last ! Though he was brave, and she was fair, And sympathy for such a pair. In all their strange vicissitudes, Js well bestowed, the thought intrudes That there are heroes brave as he. And heroines as sweet as she, Since, from the world we know to-day^ The race has never passed away ! O gentle maiden, from the page The story speaks to every age — To such a tale there is no end ; The heroine thy bosom friend — Nay, more, thy very self— may prove 1 The hero, he whom thy sweet love May influence, in the days to be. To fight life’s battle manfully ! J. R. Eastwood.

Page 738

{.See p, 718.)

Page 739

719 SOMERSETSHIRE SUPERSTITIONS. OTWITHSTANDING the pro¬ gress of science, religion, and education, superstition still prevails in this and other countries to an extent scarcely credible. In every town, in every village and hamlet — yes, in almost every family circle — a belief in the supernatural still has a place. . , . Signs and omens are ob¬ served, faith in miracles has not died out, charms are not considered valueless, curses and evil wishes make a large proportion of our population tremble, dreams are still believed in. Indetd, nearly all, if not all, the various aspects and phases of supersti¬ tion of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries are, fto a certain extent, believed in, in the nineteenth.’'* Whether the superstitions of Somer¬ setshire are to be accounted for by the fascinating legends — half historical, half Biblical — which hover round the beautiful ruins of Glastonbury Abbey, and round the poetical mysteries of King Arthur and his valiant Knights of the Round Table, it is impossible to say ; certain it is that many curious customs and super¬ stitions which have fallen into disuse in other parts of the country still linger in the county of Somerset, and among the simple folk who spend their lives in its pleasant villages. True it is that year by year the number becomes less, and it may interest some readers to chronicle a few which are still in use, and which in a few years may have become things of the past. Many of the old English customs connected with the seasons are still observed in Somersetshire : in some parts on Christmas Eve, after burning an ashen fagot, the whole family adjourns to the orchard, carrying a hot cake and a mug of cider or ale as an offering to the best apple-tree ; reminding us of the Norwegian offering of cake and ale made at Christmas to propitiate the spirits of the Fiords. A curious custom was, I have been told, observed at Christmas until recently at North Curry, in memory of King John. A feast was held, the chief dish being a huge mince pie, bearing a rude effigy of the king ; two candles, each weighing one pound, were lighted, amid great ceremony, and whilst they burned, but no longer, the guests were allowed and encouraged to drink as much strong ale as they desired ; as soon as the candles went out the feast terminated. Another practice still in use is “ opening the Bible.” This is done at Christmas, or on New Year’s Day, with great solemnity, after breakfast. The Holy Book is laid unopened on the table, and those who wiHi to consult it open it in succession at random and in perfect silence ; the inquirer places his finger on any verse contained in the two open pages, but without seeing its contents. The verse is then read • “ Mysteries of All Nations,” by James Grant. aloud, and from it the assembly draw their conciu sions or guidance for the coming year. On Shrove Tuesday pancakes, of course, as in many other parts of England, are still universally eaten, and in some places boys go round the villages singing — ‘Tipperty-tipperty toe, Give me a pancake and then I’ll go ” — and if this request is not acceded to, a large stone is fastened to the handle of the door. Easter and May Days have always been held as great festivals in Somersetshire. A beautiful custom is still kept up in some places on Easter Day ; the whole village rises early, and, going to the top of the nearest hill, waits for the rising of the sun — this being believed to procure prosperity in their homes till Easter Day comes round again. The first of May used to be celebrated with great honour in the old town of Minehead, but the custom has been discontinued for some years past. At an early hour the town was aroused by the beating of a great drum, whereupon the inhabitants, young and old, repaired to a cross-road just outside Minehead, and there danced round the hobby-horse ; after which a procession was formed, and they started for Dunster Castle. Here they always received a good supply of ale and a donation of money, doubtless to carry on the festivities, which appear to have lasted for three days, most of the townspeople and the well-to-do tradesmen taking an active part in the proceedings ; but the ancient custom is now only kept up by the children of Minehead. Amongst many of the country people Maydew is believed to be a potent remedy in disease. I have heard of an old woman who always recommended for a weakly child that it should be drawn along the grass wet with Maydew three times running — on the ist, the 2nd, and the 3rd of May — and that great benefit would be sure to follow. Young girls are also recom¬ mended to wash their faces in Maydew to improve and preserve their complexions. Swellings of various kinds may be cured by a similar application ; but in such cases, if the patient be a man, the dew must be taken from the grave of the last young woman buried ; if it be a woman, from the grave of the last young man ! Many relics of old religious customs still exist in this county (as they no doubt do in many others), though they are shorn of their original pomp and beauty. Lighting candies in the chamber of death is a relic of Pre-Reformation times, as is also the “ Passing Bell,” or “ Soul Bell,” which is still rung in many vil¬ lages. No doubt in days gone by it was rung to entreat the prayers of the listeners for the departing soul : — “ When the passing bell dothe toll, Lord have mercy on the soule ! ” being a familiar old couplet. The curfew bell is still rung in some villages,

Page 740

720 Somersetshire Superstitions. though the custom is becoming very rare. Making a grave on the north side of the churchyard is avoided. There is a difference of opinion as to the origin of this objection, some thinking that it has arisen from the fact that on the south side the sunshine will fall warmly on the grave ; others, that it is connected with the old custom of praying for the souls of the departed. To get the left hand of the bishop at confirmation is considered to be very unlucky, and people are often earnestly warned to avoid it when their children are about to be confirmed. A strong feeling of belief in holy water still exists in the neighbourhood of Bath, and also near Shepton Mallet ; and doctors have been heard to say that they can do no more for the sick person, but recom¬ mending the friends to go and ask the priest for some holy water as a last resource. The Ven. Dr. Coombes was often asked by Protestants for holy water, and one farmer requested him to supply some to exorcise his cattle, which he said had been bewitched, and desired the doctor to. make it strongs ‘‘as the devil is very strong among the beasts.” If a hen crows it is a most unlucky sign, and be¬ tokens a death in the family ; if, therefore, an unlucky hen is heard to crow, the omen is averted by chop¬ ping off its head ! In setting a hen,'care should be taken to place in the nest an uneven number of eggs, otherwise the brood of chickens will not thrive. Always take oft your hat to a magpie, or at any rate bow respectfully to him, or evil will surely follow. Hold a robin in veneration ; to kill one is most unlucky. I his bird is said to tap three times at the window before the death of any member of the family. Never transplant your parsley ; nothing can be more unlucky, unless perhaps to break a looking- glass, which is, if anything, a little worse. Do not omit to “ tell the bees ” in case of death. An instance of this old custom occurred not long ago near Bath. A gentleman and his coachman died within a few days of each other. Both were bee¬ keepers. The gentleman’s widow lamented to the coachman’s daughter that since her husband’s death the hives were empty, and the bees had disappeared ; she could not think what had become of them. “ Of course, ma’am, you told the bees of the master’s death ?” said the girl. The lady, who had never heard of the custom, asked what she meant. Whereupon the girl explained that immediately a death takes place the bees must be told, or they will not remain. “ I went at once, when my father died, and rapped three times on the back of the hive and told them, and, you see, my bees have not gone.” I am told that this custom is strictly adhered to in many of the Somersetshire villages. Belief in witchcraft is still common in many parts of Somersetshire. Not long ago a farmer near Ilchester lost several of his cattle by disease. The veterinary surgeon who was consulted considered the rest of the herd to be in a fair way of recovery, but the farmer was not satisfied. He insisted that the cattle had been “ over-looked,” and he went and con¬ sulted a ‘‘ wise woman ” who lived in a neighbouring town. She recommended the following treatment, which the farmer carefully carried out. The last bullock which had died was encircled with fagots and the carcase was burnt, solemn incantations being said over the burning pile. The remaining cattle recovered, and the farmer and the villagers attributed their recovery, not to the advice of the veterinary surgeon, but to the ceremonial inculcated by the “ wise woman.” Another case of a very similar nature occurred in the same district. A farmer lost two fine cows through some mysterious illness. He drove many miles to consult a “wise woman,” who decided that the cows had been bewitched, and recommended him to find a horse with three nails in the near hind shoe, to pull out the middle nail, and with it to scratch the witch severely, else the rest of the cows would die. The farmer rode far and wide to find the desired horse with the necessary number of nails, but, for¬ tunately for the witch, one could not be found. He at last consulted the vicar, who suggested his send¬ ing for the veterinary surgeon and having a post¬ mortem to see what the cows had died of. This course had never occurred to the farmer, but, as he could not scratch the witch, he sent for the vet., who speedily decided that the cows had died from eating a large quantity of green vetches. The prophecies of Mother Shipton are nowhere more widely believed in than in the county of Somer¬ set. Not long ago a report was in circulation that a great catastrophe had been predicted by this old sage. She had prophesied that Ham Hill, one of the great stone quarries of Somerset, would be swallowed up on Good Friday. This catastrophe was to be the con¬ sequence of a tremendous earthquake, which would be felt all over the country. Some of the inhabitants left the neighbourhood to escape the impending evil ; others removed their crockery and breakable posses¬ sions to prevent their being thrown to the ground ; others, again, ceased cultivating their gardens. Great alarm was felt, and Good Friday was looked forward to with universal anxiety. And yet, when the day came and went without any disaster at all, even that did little to dispel the faith in Mother Shipton ; the calculator had made a blunder about the date, and it was not her fault ; and many Somersetshire folk are still waiting, expecting to suffer from the prophesied catastrophe. There is yet another custom which is widely be¬ lieved in and frequently practised in Somerset, which cannot be called a superstition in quite the same sense as the other instances named, although many deny that it is anything else. I allude to the use of the divin¬ ing-rod for finding water. The operators are called dowsers, or jowsers. They carry a rod or wand, of willow, shaped like a small pair of tongs, and on the performer holding the prongs and turning the un¬ divided part to the ground, the wand becomes agitated, and by this indicates the spot where water will be

Page 741

721 What Happened at Ridgeway-on-Sea. found. Whatever this power may be, it is often dis¬ covered quite accidentally, and no one who possesses it seems able to give any explanation of its presence. I could give numberless cases in which water, hitherto unsuspected, has been found by a dowser. One of the most interesting is that of the village of Sparkford, Somerset, which occurred about five years ago. For 200 years this village had suffered from a lack of good water. Wells had been frequently dry, but no spring could be found ; and the whole parish suffered greatly from drought. At last the squire heard of a dowser of good repute, and sent for him to try his craft. After a careful examination, he declared that he had found a spring of water, but at too great a distance from the surface to be available. He then made a circuit round the village, trying for water with his willow wand from time to time, till at length he came to a spot close to the roadside, and here he dis¬ covered a spring, which he said would be found at not more than nine feet from the surface. The well was dug. The water was there, and a splendid spring it was ; and to this day Sparkford rejoices, thanks to the dowser and his willow wand, in an abundant supply of good water. Another case occurred lately near Bristol. A manu¬ facturer, requiring a larger supply of water for his mill, commenced digging a well in what seemed to be a suitable spot ; but the supply, although good at first, soon failed, and he was uncertain whether to continue the well to a greater depth or to abandon it altogether. By the advice of some friends he sent for a dowser, who, after trying the surrounding ground with his wand, strongly advised the continuation of the well. Water, he said* and plenty of it, would be found some twelve feet lower down ; and the sequel proved that he was right. The Rev. H. P. Knapton gives the following account of the divining-rod “ The dowser is as com¬ monly used along the Polden Hills for getting water as the turncock would be in London. On the occa¬ sion when the rod was used, it was at the house of a country gentleman. There were present three Cam¬ bridge graduates in honours, and three ladies of the family, well educated and highly intelligent. The dowse was brought to the garden in which a new well was required. The rod was used by him in the manner already described, and water was quickly found. Of those present, two found the rod move in their hands ; the other four felt no influence. This dowser is never known to fail. He is a very respect¬ able carpenter — a religious man, inclined to Method¬ ism.” Many more instances of divining could be given, but these are sufficient to show that it is one of the many well-known customs still extant in Somer¬ setshire. Some of these old customs, and even some of the superstitions, are very quaint and interesting, as being relics of a bygone age, when education was at a low ebb, and the masses of the people remained ignorant and credulous. May we not hope and believe that with the gradual but steady spread of education in our schools — giving, as it cannot fail to do, to the rising generation, more taste for reading, opening and enlarging the mind, and lessening year by year the ignorance that still exists in many parts of the country, those old customs alone which are innocent and pleas¬ ing may be retained, and whatever is harmful, tending to bigotry and injustice to others, as in the case of witchcraft, may completely pass away ? M B C N.B. — For many of the facts narrated I am in¬ debted to Mr. Poole’s little book on the Legends and Superstitions of Somersetshire,” and to Mr. Grant’s ‘‘Mysteries of All Nations.” WHAT HAPPENED AT RIDGEWAY-ON-SEA. PART THE FIRST. “ Constant love is moderate ever, And through life it will persever.” — Anon. N unkind fate had determined that Captain Haste should not accompany his wife and little girls to the sea. It was not the first time that fate— in the guise of importunate friends — had prevented his joining in this annual summer outing. These friends would , at this inconvenient season urge him to fulfil some almost forgotten engagement. He had promised to shoot on a Scotch moor or cruise round the coast in a brother-officer’s yacht, and “ how on earth was he to get out of it ? ” There was certainly a fatality against his visiting the seaside in .August. To do him justice, he bore the deprivation heroically ; nor did young Mrs. Haste repine, but she smiled rather wickedly as she said how sorry she was for his disappointment ; how she hoped he might come to them for the last week of the visit, but that she feared, from what he said, it would be quite impossible.” “ I will leave it open, Edith,” he answered, and then, catching her eye, he broke out into constrained laughter, in which she joined very heartily. “ Ah, Harry ! you are not a good actor,” she said ; “you don’t take me in : don’t fancy it. Seaside lodg¬ ings and seaside lodging cooking are no trial to me, but you would rather face a cannon-ball than face Ridgeway-on-Sea. I forgive you ; you shall not be victimised. You shall go to Scotland ; and, now I 766

Page 742

What Happened at Ridgeway-on-Sea. come to think of it, I shall be glad to get rid of you, for I have promised Hortense a holiday, so the chil¬ dren will be on my hands.” Hortense was nurse to the two little daughters ot the house. She was a capable, energetic French¬ woman, the factotum of the household, the. mainstay of the establishment. She had lived with Mrs. Haste ever since her marriage, and was her right hand. Captain Haste, when he heard that this prop of his family required a holiday, was dismayed. “What does Hortense want with a holiday?’’ he said ; “ her life is all holiday. Whenever I go up to the nursery she is sitting by the window, and the chicks are playing at the other end of the room.” “She is always sewing when she sits there, Harry.” “ Sewing ? Yes, but sewing is only play to a woman. You all hold a bit of that sort of stuff in your hands, but nothing else happens. It never gets done. Hortense doesn’t want a holiday.” “ But she does, indeed. Every year since she came to us she has asked to go home, and this year she is going. It is a long journey to Ma9on ; she will be away a month or more.” “ And you are going to look after Bunch and Puck single-handed all that time? You infatuated woman ! ” “ The seaside is expensive. I always feel we are spending so much — too much money. If I am my own nurse, it will be economical.” “Why not ask Nora to go with you? She is very fond of the children ; she will do under-nurse and be a companion for you.” “That is an excellent idea of yours. I will ask her.” And so it happened that Miss Nora Hughes (who was Mrs. Haste’s sister) was invited to accompany the party to Ridgeway-on-Sea : an invitation which she was pleased to accept. On an early day in August the quartette travelled, in a hot and crowded train, from Leicestershire to that fashionable seaside water¬ ing-place on the southern coast in which they had elected to recruit their health in the orthodox (but seldom satisfactory) British fashion. The children, Dorothy and Olive by name — though known familiarly as Bunch and Puck — were an intelligent and, there¬ fore, an inquisitive little couple. Their excitement was intense ; they were each given a corner seat by the window, and there they knelt, staring out at the flying country as they munched dry biscuits, drank milk, and asked innumerable questions, to which their exhausted mother or aunt patiently provided answers. Nora Hughes was a pretty, sprightly girl, with a decisive manner and a merry laugh. She was one of those unmistakably prosperous, bright-lived people whose good spirits are a little fatiguing to those less blessed by fortune than themselves. Though her sister, Mrs. Haste, was a cheerful, happy woman, her seven longer years of life had toned down her vivacity ; from matronage and motherhood she had acquired dignity. Nevertheless, the sisters were the best of friends, and were both delighted at the prospect of enjoying each other’s society teie-a-tete for a time. Mrs. Haste had warned Nora that the post of nurse¬ maid which she had elected to fill was by no means a sinecure, and that long journey proved the truth of her caution. Children, as travelling companions, are a trial of patience from which the most genuine child- lover seldom emerges scatheless ; the mother and aunt, before Ridgeway-on-Sea was reached, were flushed, dishevelled, irritable, and thinking regretfully of the absent Hortense. The baby. Puck, of three, was a dignified little lady, with great black-lashed blue eyes, a pale thoughtful face, and a self-reliant air ; but she had an inquiring mind and a persevering thirst for knowledge which was quenchless. Her shrill voice was seldom silent ; to Nora all her questions were directed, while Bunch, upon the opposite seat, kept her mother’s attention fully alive. Shortly before they reached their des-. tination Puck yawned once or twice, and, remarking that she was “ drefful tired,” clambered upon her aunt’s knee, and, with an incomplete question on her lips, fell asleep. When the station was reached, neither the stopping of the train nor the noise and tumult of the arrival roused the little girl from her heavy slumber. “There is no need to wake her, Edie,” said the younger lady, who was in the habit of indulging her faculty of decision, and who had taken the command of the party as a matter of course. “If you give the things to the porter and .take care of Bunch, I will carry Puck.” She had gathered the sleeping child into her arms, and presently alighted carefully upon the platform with her burden. “ Leave Bunch with me, Edie, while you go and see after the luggage and get a cab,” she went on, with what her brother-in-law called her “ commander-in¬ chief air.” “ Here, Bunch, catch hold of my dress ; you can’t go with mother. Stay here.’' Bunch was impressed by her aunt’s imperative manner, and obeyed, but when Mrs. Haste was seen, in a stream of strange fellow-travellers, disappearing in the distance, the poor child broke away from Nora’s side, and fled amongst the hurrying throng of people in pursuit of her mother. A passing truck of luggage covered her retreat, and before Nora could catch her, she was engulfed by the crowd. Happily at that moment the girl caught sight of a familiar face beside her, and addressed the gentleman to whom it belonged without ceremony. “ A little child— alone— in pink — white hat— of five,” she said breathlessly, pointing to the crowd in which the child had disappeared. “ Fetch her — bring her back — she will be killed ! ” “ Oh, no, she won’t,” he said ; “ I see her. I’ll catch her.” And he threaded his way dexterously through the groups of travellers, and did so. Nora caught sight of him stooping over the little girl and talking to her, and a later glimpse of the pair, hand-in-hand, on the track of Mrs. Haste, to whom Bunch was pointing. Doubt-

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What Happened at Ridge\vay-on-Sea. Hess Bunch, who was by no means shy, had explained ■the object of her flight to the gentleman, and he had good-naturedly, if weakly, complied with her wishes. At any rate, the child was in safety, and Nora sank •down on an adjacent bench with Puck, still sleeping, in her arms, and an exasperated desire to whip someone. The meeting between this gentleman and herself was one of those untoward coincidences which are as 'Undesirable as they are unexpected. The previous week she had parted from him in her own drawing- a-oom in Cromwell Place with an (unexpressed) deter-* anination never, if she could help it, to see him again. It was not that she particularly disliked Mr. Macleod, but then she did not particularly like him, and she did particularly like the untroubled, unshackled life which .she enjoyed as Miss Nora Hughes. He was a quiet, •reserved Scotchman, whose business in the City had not prevented him from availing himself of every opportunity of meeting her during many past months, and whose light blue eyes could express a deeper •emotion than that of shrewdness. Everthing was certainly against her, for she had de¬ cided never to speak nor to see him again, and now there he came, still hand-in-hand with her niece, and -•^squiring her sister down the platform, while behind ^them a truck-load of luggage was propelled by a porter. Nora squeezed Puck so tightly in her vexation that the little girl awoke. Mr. Macleod was thinking that Nora, with flushed cheeks, stormy eyes, and with a beautiful child in her arms, was a picture such as an artist might well waste a lifetime in endeavouring to transmit to canvas, Avhile Nora wondered what perverse circumstance had brought the gentleman to Ridgeway-on- Sea, and how long he intended to stay there. But as we do not live in a palace of truth, and as our thoughts are .-seldom expressed in words, she said, with much politeness, “ How fortunate she had been to find Jiim in the recent emergency ; how kind it was of him to have taken care of Bunch ; and might she Introduce him to her sister, Mrs. Haste?” “ I met Mr. Macleod when I was staying with you •in the winter, Nora,” said Edie, smiling with gratitude upon that gentleman ; ‘‘so he tells me, though I was rude enough not to recognise Bunch’s new friend for the first moment. Won’t you put Puck down now ? •She is very heavy, and you look so hot. Mr. Macleod says that the Middleton omnibus will take us to our rooms ; our luggage is overmuch for a cab ; he is going in the omnibus himself. He rescued my small portmanteau from the very clutches of an old gentle¬ man ; I am so much obliged to him.” Mrs. Haste, it was evident to Nora, had taken a fancy to Mr. Macleod ; she was pleased to be most •gracious to him. Bunch’s attentions to him were a little overwhelming, but he did not rebuff her advances, rand he even accepted and pocketed the finger biscuit •which she offered him. In the bustle of starting and the subsequent drive, Nora’s constraint of manner •escaped notice ; she devoted her attention and con¬ 723 versation to the children, but she kept her ears open to the following dialogue. “ Do you know this place well ? ” asked Mrs. Haste. “ I have never been here before.” “ I am sure you will like it : that is, if you care for the sea.” “ Well, I do not care for the sea then, in answer to an interrogative uplifting of the lady’s eyebrows, “ 1 have come down to play cricket — the cricket week begins to-morrow.” “ We shall come up to the ground, I hope. We are both fond of watching cricket.” “ I know that your sister is a constant attendant at Lord’s,” said Mr. Macleod, looking at Nora, “ but I don’t think that she watches the cricket much when she is there.” Mrs. Haste laughed, but Nora did not ; she wondered that Mr. Macleod, under the circumstances, should care to include her in the conversation, and she thought his bantering tone out of place. “I hope you will come up to-morrow,” the gentleman continued. “ We play the Zingari ; it is a three days’ match. You know where the ground is, no doubt, better than I do myself.” “ It is not far from the station, on the cliff : it stands high and is so pretty, but the railway runs close by and the trains are very noisy. Here we are : this is the house. No. 8, Marine Parade. I suppose it is no use asking you to come in to tea one afternoon, because, of course, you won’t draw stumps till late.” “ Indeed, it is a great deal of use,” he answered, smiling. “ If I like the place I shall stay on for a time, and I shall certainly,” with a steady glance at Nora, “ come in to tea, if I may.” Then the omnibus stopped, and the ladies’ attention was absorbed by the care of the children, while Mr. Macleod superintended the removal of the luggage. ‘‘ Mr. Macleod seems a very nice man,” Mrs. Haste observed to her sister that evening when the little ones were in bed and asleep, and their mother and aunt, very pale and tired, were enjoying a well-earned rest by the open window’; “ he managed Bunch so well ; and had it not been for him I should have lost Harry’s little portmanteau. He cleaved a road through the crowd in a moment, while I was wedged between a post and a dozen sailors, and couldn’t move. The British public are the most uncourteous people in the world : they yield to physical strength, but appeal only to their feelings and they are hard as nails.” The window by which Edith and Nora were seated overlooked the esplanade, and commanded a wide sea view. Up and down this esplanade, men, women, lads, and lassies were patrolling, while in the distance a band was playing, and the sea was dotted with boats in which people were idly rowing about in the moon¬ light : the free, open-air, lazy, seductive summer seaside life was in full swing. “Mr. Macleod was very kind,” said Nora drily, “ but why were you so unnecessarily civil, Edie ? 1 could have shaken you wnen you asked hin to tea.” “ My dear, I asked him to amuse you and to please

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What Happened at Ridgeway-on-Sea. 724 him. I fancied he was a particular friend of yours ; indeed, when I was staying with you in the winter, I remember that I fancied all kinds of things. Surely you don’t dislike him ? ” ^ “ Sometimes I dislike him particularly. Just now I hate him. He had no right to accept your invitation ; he had no right to speak to me ; he had no right to expect me to go and watch him play cricket. I tell you he has asked me to marry him: he asked me to marry him only last week - ” “ And you said ‘ N o ’ ” “Of course I said ‘No.’” “ I see no ‘ of course ’ about it.” Mrs. Haste was an advocate for matrimony, and she was anxious that Nora, who was her only unmarried sister^ and who flaunted her independence rather aggressively, should And a husband ; the girl’s fancy- freedom annoyed her. “Edie, you really are talking nonsense. You say that you see no ‘ of course ’ about it ! Then I am to marry a man I hate.” “Pshaw !” said Mrs. Haste, “you don’t hate him. You liked him very much in the winter ; you were to¬ gether constantly.” “ I suppose you will allow me to be best judge of my own feelings,” said Nora, with dignity. “ I shall not marry anyone simply because he is obstinate. Mr. Macleod is as obstinate as possible. He has asked me to marry him three times, Edie ; isn’t such per¬ sistency enough to make any woman determined?” As she spoke a tall figure halted below the open window where the sisters were seated. Their rooms were upon the ground floor, and the dining-room bay- window opened right upon the esplanade. Mr. Macleod’s face — for he it was who stood there — was on a level with the window-sill. He was looking up at Nora, upon whose pretty face the moonlight fell, and the sharp lines of which it softened, but he spoke to the elder sister. “ Won’t you come out, Mrs. Haste?” he said. “It is such a glorious night, and the breeze is cool out here.” It was Nora who answered with brisk decision — “ We cannot leave the children : they might wake up and be frightened ; we have no nurse.” “ Then, perhaps, as you can’t come out, I may come in?” “Certainly you may,” Mrs. Haste said sweetly; “ and don’t put out your pipe, because both Nora and I like the smell of smoke.” A moment later, when he entered the room, Mrs. Haste was laughing, and Nora was standing by the window playing with the tassel of the blind, and looking rather sulky. _ PART THE SECOND. “ So, every sweet with sour is tempered still. That maketh it be coveted the more : For easy things that may be got at will Most sorts of men do set but little store.” Edmund Spenser. That evening which Mr. Macleod spent in talking to Mrs. Haste, while he watched her sister, was the first of many evenings which he spent at No. 8, Marine Parade. As it seemed that he had forgotten those three occasions upon which his opinions had so widely and emphatically differed from Nora’s, the girl decided that she, too, might cast their memory away, and avail herself of his friendship once more. A. sea¬ side life to be thoroughly enjoyed should be shared with genial companions, and neither Mrs. Haste nor Miss Hughes had any friend at Ridgeway-on-Sea. The care of the children, the bathing, boating, and paddling, filled the days, but when the quiet evenings came it was a pleasant change if a friend dropped in with some fresh ideas against which to rub your own, and a full account of a cricket match to detail, and perhaps a basket of flowers, such as you particularly love, to adorn your bare room. Mr. Macleod’s society was certainly agreeable to Mrs. Haste, so Nora con¬ sented to bear the infliction uncomplainingly. When the cricket week was over, Mr. Macleod still remained at Ridgeway-on-Sea. He had taken a fancy to the place, he said ; he should get plenty of cricket off and on, and the air suited him, so he decided to remain. Then followed a good time for the children, to whom he devoted himself. His pockets contained an un¬ limited store of pennies, his patience was inexhaustible, he had an architectural genius for building sand castles, and the eye of a hawk for the discovery of shells, sea anenomes, and crabs on the rocks. When it was par¬ ticularly hot that was the very occasion on which he begged to be allowed to take out the Miss Hastes for exercise in a goat- carriage, and advised their mother and aunt to stay quietly at home until after tea. Such welcome advice was not declined : its wisdom was obvious : the ladies sat at home, and they thought and spoke kindly of Mr. Macleod during his absence. They watched the trio out of sight. Mrs. Haste said it w^as a pretty picture to see the tali’ man sauntering along the esplanade with one little Avhite dancing maiden holding to his finger, and Bunch, dignified and independent, following sedately a yard or two behind. He adapted his paces to those of his companions, and looked quite good-humoured and content. His straw hat, bound with the club ribbon, was tilted over his eyes. Suddenly he turned round, and discovered both the ladies leaning out of the window gazing after him. He took off his hat, and Mrs. Haste waved her hand in response, but Nora jumped back out of sight and blushed. “Do you know, my dear,” said Edith, “that I think you are a goose. Marriageable maidens, as a class, are the least wise in the world, but you really excel your compeers in want of wisdom. There,” point¬ ing through the open window in the direction of the departing flannel-clad figure, “ what more do you want ? What on earth can you be waiting for ? What can you find to reject in that constant and unselfish man ? I have watched him carefully, I have watched him critically — he will make a good husband : he has excellent, durable, every-day virtues. Nora, if you deliberately throw away such a chance, you deserve to be an old maid, you do indeed.” Nora was leaning back in the recesses of the arm-

Page 745

725 ‘I FANCIED HE WAS A PARTICULAR FRIEND OF YOURS (/>. 724). chair into which she had sunk. She was looking very pretty, the white dress that she wore suited her fair face ; she was staring with a rather worried, puzzled expression at the speaker. An old maid,’’ she repeated thoughtfully. ‘‘ Do you know, Edie, one might have a worse fate than that. If I don’t marry, I shall have enough money to make me fairly comfortable. I shall keep several dogs and a canary ; I shall stay about with all you sisters of mine a good deal. I shall do exactly what I like to do— always. I shall, with a sweeping gesture of her arm, “be free as. air.” “ Then be an old maid,” said Mrs. Haste, with terrible severity, “and see how you appreciate your liberty with a dozen dogs and a canary ; but I warn you that a woman must be slave to something or somebody, and you will sink into servitude to your dogs, birds, cranks, and absurdities.” “ Now, Edie, you are exaggerating. Some old maids are slaves to no one ; they are the sweetest, most self- sacrificing, most loveable race I know.” “ Yes, my dear ; but those whom you describe a7-e slaves^ and to their neighbours, and you are not half amiable enough to be one of that sweet spinsterhood ; you would be unbearable. You want a legitimate director — without one, you will grow dictatorial : in fact, you are dictatorial now.” Nora made a grimace. “If you think you can scold me into marrying anyone, Edie, you will find you are wrong.” “ Mt is dogged as does it,”’ quoted Mrs. Haste maliciously ; and then, with a sudden change of manner, she went over to her sister’s side, and laid her hand gently on her shoulder. “Is there anyone else, dear ” she asked very ten¬ derly, and in subdued tones. But to this alteration of mood Nora did not respond ; she replied prosaically — “ Well, there is — and there isn’t. I mean there is nothing definite. You remember Mr. Eudo Le Strange, don’t you, Edie ? ” “ Of course I remember him. I met him at your house in the winter.”

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726 What Happened at Ridge\vay-on-Sea. “ He is very handsome, isn’t he ? He has beautiful sad eyes, and long straight hair— he writes poetry.” “ I am a soldier’s wife, so 1 prefer a close-cropped head. He seemed to me an affected boy, with a voice artificially pitched in a minor key. So he writes poetry, does he ? What a bore !” “ A bore ! ” reiterated Nora. “ A bore, did you say ? It is beautiful— the magazines print it. I thought you loved poetry, Edith Oh, I like reading poetry ; but that is a different thing to being condemned to spend your life with a poet. He would always be in the moon, trying to screw thought to rhyme. He would wish you at the Anti¬ podes if you even sat in the room with him, and if you spoke to him he would not hear what you said. 1 would as soon marry a butcher as a poet.” “ A soldier is a butcher, only he never gets a chance now-a-days of plying his trade,” returned Nora, in- cemed. “And, to be sure, I cannot imagine Harry writing poetry.” “No more can I,” said his wife, breaking into laughter at the notion. “ He says a fool who reads a book is only excelled in folly by the fool who writes it. Poor Harry !” Then Nora laughed too, so that a truce was pro¬ claimed, and the vexed question of Mr. Macleod’s matrimonial prospects was allowed to drop. Mrs. Haste was wise enough to see that her inter¬ ference had no happy effect, so she reverted no more to the subject ; although, by her invitation, Mr. Macleod joined in all their small festivities ; his presence was required on all occasions, and his advice on all subjects was not only to he asked, but to be taken. The gracious warmth of her manner was very pleasant to her sister’s lover, but it did not deceive him into taking a false estimate of Nora’s feelings towards him. As long as Mr. Macleod allowed no sign of the slate of his heart to escape him, so long was her friendliness easy and unconstrained ; but as soon as a word or look of deep meaning reached her, she became cold, reserved, and on the defensive. His patience and determination surprised her chaperon, and rather alarmed her. How would it all end ? She was allowing herself to drift with the tide, and as long as she might shake herself free of the current’s in¬ fluence when she felt inclined to do so, the drifting was agreeable enough. However, Mr. Macleod could not stay on at Ridge- way-on-Sea for ever ; such a state of affairs as the present would be over shortly — it would be a great relief when he had gone — though Edie and the children would miss him : already they weige commiserating each other over his coming departure. When the last week of Mr. Macleod’s visit had begun, Nora thought that it was likely that her spirits would rise ; and when that week had nearly e.xpired, when his last day had come, when, upon the morrow, he must return to London and business, leaving her “ free as air,” Nora unfortunately woke in the morning with a headache, and so it was impossible to feel as joyous as she had expected to feel. Not once during the past month had Mkss Hughes attended one of those many cricket matches in whichi Mr. Macleod had taken part. Over and over again he- had done his utmost to persuade her to go up to the- ground, but she had hitherto presented some incontro¬ vertible excuse to account for her inability to comply with his request. The heat, the children, the distance,, were alternately used as reasons for negation. Mr. Macleod was to take leave of the sea on Friday.. On Wednesday evening it happened that he was- calling at No. 8, Marine Parade, to return a book that had been lent to him by Mrs. Haste ; he had dropped in soon after lunch, he had made one of their party on- the beach during the afternoon, he had stayed to tea,, and now he sat with Bunch on his knee, watching Nora spread a piece of bread and butter for the little giiTs- supper. “ It is my last match to-morrow. Miss Hughes,” he: was saying. “ I am playing for Single v. Married ; we have a strong team on both sides ; you like to see- good play. Will you come ? ” There was a moment’s pause, and then she an¬ swered — “ I will come if it isn’t very hot, and if Edie would; like it.” Mrs. Haste kissed Puck — who was in her arms — gently, and replied : “ She intended to go, however hot it might be.” “ That’s right,” said Mr. Macloed, with a fervent desire that he might be “ in form ” next day, and do- something in the hitting way, such as the uneducated female eye can best appreciate. “ We shall have divided interests, Mr. Macleod,”' Mrs. Haste warned him. “We shall be at daggers - drawn. Remember, I am all for the Married. Both you and Nora are in the ranks of the enemy.” “ It is not my fault,” he said, with a smile on his lips- but earnestness in his eyes, “that I am at present con¬ strained to side against you. Some day — some day— I hope that both your sister and I may join your ranks.” At this juncture, notwithstanding Nora’s strenuous- efforts to prevent her, Mrs. Haste rose, declaring that it was long past the children’s .bed-time, and declining any offers of assistance from their aunt, she took the little girls upstairs. Nora’s desire to escape the- inevitable te/e-ci-iete was so palpable, her nervousness- so unconcealed, that there was some excuse for Mr.. Macleod’s first remark. “ Don’t be afraid. Miss Hughes,” he said, with a friendly smile ; “ I am not going to re-open the subject of which you are afraid. Let us part on this occasion good friends at least, if we can be nothing more.^’ When Mrs. Haste came back, after an unconscion¬ ably long absence, she found the two young people- very merry. Mr. Macleod was reading aloud the inimitable “Strap more,” and Nora was in paroxysms of laughter. Edith thought of Mr. Eudo Le Strange, and wished that this young man had been more dis¬ criminating I if he must read aloud, why had he not chosen “ Locksley Hall ” as a fit subject for such a contingency as the present ? It was on the following morning that Miss Hughes-

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What Happened at Ridgeway-on-Sea. accounted for her unusual gravity during the breakfast lioiir by remarking that “ she had a headache, a horrid headache, which made her feel quite stupid.” “ That is very odd,” said Mrs. Haste : “ I, too, woke with an intolerable headache this morning. I can hardly open my eyes. There must be thunder in the air.” And throughout the morning there could be no doubt about the severity of her ailment, because she lay on the sofa with closed eyes, and shuddered when the door banged, and frowned when the band played. Nora’s headache was much less severe ; she took the children out with her upon the beach ; she played with them there throughout the morning without complaint, and when she came back to lunch she was as rosy as were her nieces. Mrs. Haste still lay upon the sofa : she had been reading, for an open book lay on the table beside her. “ She was decidedly better,” she volunteered, “ but her head ached still, and she felt that it would be wiser to keep quiet.” She was determined that Nora should not be kept at home on her account, so she had ordered a pony-carriage to take Bunch and her aunt to the cricket-field at four o’clock. Puck should stay in the house and play with the new doll, which that charming Mr. Macleod had given her, but Bunch, if she would promise to be very, very good, should go to the match. Nora made no objection to this arrangement, but she shrugged her shoulders, and looked with a mis¬ chievous and meaning gleam in her eyes at her sister, who, however, did not seem equal to noticing either the shrug or the glance, for she half shut her eyes, and her face was as expressionless as a mask. When Nora and Bunch reached the cricket-ground Mr. Macleod was bowling (the “Married” were in), and so no one came to meet and usher them to the rows of seats that were set in the shade of a wall not far from the entrance gate. Nora felt a little unreasonable annoyance with the bowler for not being at hand to greet her. Little Bunch, in a clean white frock and wide white hat, walked demurely close beside her aunt, looking with the direct, fearless glance of childhood at the rows of people before whom they passed. From amongst these onlookers a young man suddenly emerged and addressed Nora. “ Macleod told me you were coming,” he said. “ I have been looking out for you — I have kept you a seat in the shade.” In after-times Nora said that she had never been more annoyed than at this chance meeting with Mr. Eudo Le Strange ; just then, however, she concealed her vexation, and smiling, blushed, and said how odd k was to have met him, and how glad she should be of a seat in the shade — to which seat he presently led her. Of little Bunch the gentleman took not the slightest notice : he had come down to Ridgeway-on-Sea on purpose to see Miss Hughes, and to Miss Hughes he talked incessantly in those deep slow tones which she had been in the habit of admiring. Nora had, con¬ trary to her ordinary rule, a distinct desire to watch 727 the cricket, and a decided interest in the bowler’s success; but Mr. Eudo Le strange had none, and he naturally expected such undivided attention to his conversation as she had hitherto bestowed upon it. No. chair had been provided for the little girl : she had promised to be good — the promise was rather a burden, for it constrained her to stand quietly by her aunt’s side, and neither rove nor join uninvited in conver¬ sation. When, upon the summit of the bank on the further side of the ground, a train went roaring past, leaving a long trail of smoke behind it as it wound round the hill out of sight. Bunch was much in¬ terested, and turning to Nora, plucked her by the arm. “ There’s a lovely, lovely puff train. Auntie.” “Yes, dear— what a horrid noise ! ” “ Auntie, may I look at the puff train ? ” “Of course you may.” “ May I go over and look close at the puff train ? ” Mr. Eudo Le Strange was talking of that Art which is spelt with a capital A, in his dulcet tones, and frowned at this mundane interruption of the subject. Nora saw the frown, and hastened to banish it. “ Very well. Bunch ; you may go,” she said. You must keep close to the wall till you get there.” “Come back soon, and keep close to the paling. Don’t run out in the field, even if you see Mr. Macleod ; you are not allowed to go near him— don’t forget.” Before the sentence was finished the child was out of earshot, and Nora watched her as she walked round the field, on her way to the wooden paling that divided the railroad from the cricket-field. But by-and-by Nora removed her eyes from that small person, and fixed them on the cricketers. The wickets of the enemy were going down fast. Mr. Macleod was bowling with great success. She thought it would be pleasant to watch each ball, but Eudo Le Strange had an ingratiating way of asking her opinion on subjects of which she knew nothing, but on which her opinion seemed of value to him, so she was con¬ strained to talk. Between her interest in the game and her impelled attention to conversation, the memory of her little niece escaped her. It was not until the last wicket had fallen, and when, in the interval between the innings, Mr. Macleod joined her and inquired for the child, that she remembered her. “ She went over to watch for a passing train,” Nora said, getting up from her seat to get a view of the field. “ I saw her just now close to the paling. Where can she have gone ? ” “ Probably she is among that crowd by the entrance gate,” suggested Mr. Le Strange ; “ the people hide her from sight.” Nora began to hurry off in the direction he indicated, then she hesitated, and glanced back at Mr. Macleod, who was steadily staring at the railroad. Her eyes followed his — she, too, scanned the summit of that high straight bank, on which long grass and tall white daisies grew. The sight of those marguerite daisies turned Nora sick and cold with a sudden fear, for they were such as the children loved to gather. As -she

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728 What Happened at Ridgeway-on-Sea. Stood still looking along the line, she gave a stifled scream, for from behind a group of larches which hid the rails for a short space a little white figure slowly emerged. It was Bunch, who, enticed by the waving daisies, had clambered the palings, and after filling her hands with flowers, was wandering down the line, hopping from sleeper to sleeper, and stooping between times to pick up the stones at her feet. She was in the track of the express — she was at play in the route “ Ah I — he is making for the - ” “There is a child on the railroad ! ” broke in upon his words, and was taken up and echoed through all the crowd around him. “ Oh ! God help her — the train ! ’’ Then there rose a shriek from the woman who had uttered that cry, as the train whirled round the curve hill, and rushed upon the unconscious child, eye was fixed upon the flying figure that, swiftly STOOD ON THE VERGE OF THE RAILROAD of the train which was already signalled, and the roar of which was to be heard echoing in the hills. Mr. Eudo Le Strange was looking at Nora — he did not see the figure on the railroad ; he was a little impatient of the fuss, and when both Mr. Macleod and Nora, without speaking a word, began to run, breaking their way through the people, and tearing across the cricket-ground as though they were mad, he did not follow them. “What’s the joke ? ” asked some man at his elbow ; “w^hy on earth is Macleod racing with the lady.?” “ It’s no joke that I know of ; they have gone to look for the little girl — she has strayed away somewhere.” Then breathlessly — as a swallow, darted up the bank towards her. They saw that he was close to her ; he was beside her ; he touched her— but they saw no more. The engine- driver sounded his whistle, then, in a dense cloud of dust and smoke, the train dashed by with a roar that drowned the screams of the women, who covered their eyes and shuddered. The men held their breath to watch ; when the dust and smoke cleared away, Mr. Macleod stood on the verge of the railroad, holding a little maiden unharmed in his arms. “ It is all right ; she isn’t touched — she isn’t even frightened,” he cried to the girl, who clung, with her head bowed upon her hands, to the palings below him. It was late that night before Mr. Macleod left No. 8,

Page 749

“Other Tongues.” Marine Parade, and when he did so, Nora accom¬ panied him to the hall door to wish him a third fare¬ well, for he was going back to work to-morrow, and she found it very hard to part with him. Nora was pale, subdued, and gentle ; her lover, on the contrary, was radiant, for he had won his heart’s desire at last — Nora had consented to be his wife. “Nora,” he said, “are you sure it isn’t a mistake.^ 729 Are you sure it is not gratitude for Bunch’s escape ? You know I not only can’t write poetry, but I can’t read it.” “That is a great misfortune for you,” she said, gravely. “But 1 think that a beautiful action is better than a beautiful thought, after all. Perhaps it is grati¬ tude — I don’t know quite what it is ; but I am very glad you want to marry me.” “OTHER TONGUES.” N some Universities part of the curriculum is designated “ Literae Humaniores,” the “Humanities,” so called from their humanising tendency, and consisting, for the most part, of the Latin and Greek classics. But in this University — ours, may I venture to say — the “ Humanities ” are, for the present, the living languages. And without any disparagement of the dead, we may rejoice that ours are the living. And this, by the way, suggests the advantages of their study : they are living, and should, therefore, quicken our life. Life— strength, development, companionship, delight, usefulness, profit. Do not these largely make up life ? While, however, the one word “ life ” would concisely sum up the probable advantages, we shall, for the purpose of this essay, consider them under the following heads : — I.— Personal. 11. —Social. III.— Pecuniary. I. Personal. — We use the word as equivalent to self-ish. in its better sense — i.e.^ pertaining to self rather than to others, but without implying anything unjust to others. Such advantages may be classi¬ fied under the ideas of growth, delight, and con¬ venience. I. Growth^ or Development. — This was well ex¬ pressed by a great potentate, who is reported to have said that for every language we learn we are another person : two languages, I am two men, and so on. Strength of mind is acquired — a mental buoyancy that is conducive to harder and better work. The exercise strengthens the muscles of the understanding in such a way that the sense of conquest is not only joyous but wipiilsive in its tendency ; for as one difficulty is vanquished there throbs in the heart a desire for mightier victories. Thus, while he who has naturally too much acquisi¬ tiveness may find in the study of modern languages a nobler pursuit than the seeking of gold, so that to him it might be said : “ With all thy getting, get understanding ; ” yet, on the other hand, he who has by nature too little acquisitiveness will find much in the study of modern languages to quicken the pulses of his mind, to strengthen its grasp, and to accelerate its paces. For “ study ” means a going after until we obtain. {a) Wisdom. — The vision is enlarged. Each language, each new word, indeed, is a stepping-stone uplifting the student so that he commands a grander horizon, wider and remoter. This breadth of view is necessary even to the clever man, the specialist of the nineteenth century, who has been accustomed to focus his vision upon a very contracted sphere. Shutting one eye and half closing the other, like a carpenter glancing along the narrow edge of his timber, the specialist needs something to raise his head and open his eyes. “ Universal experience has proved that the general scholar, liowever apparently inferior at the first start, will in the long run beat the special man on his own favourite ground ; for the special man, from the small field of his habitual survey, can neither know the principles on which his practice rests, nor the relation of his own particular art to general human in¬ terests and general human intelligence. The best preservatives against the cramping force of merely professional study are to be found ... in culti¬ vating a familiarity with the great writers, especially poets or historians whose purely human thoughts ‘ make rich the blood of the world,’ and enlarge the platform of sympathetic intelligence.” So saith the genial censor of Edinburgh. [“Self-Culture,” p. 31.] And long ago Bacon rebuked “ crafty ” men — z>., men of particular craft or occupation, because they are apt to “ contemn studies.” While speaking of the extended range of vision likely to result from linguistic studies, we may mention an increased power of extempore speech as one of the practical ways in which it is likely to develop itself. And it is interesting to note, by the way, that phren¬ ologists, rightly or wrongly, associate language with

Page 750

730 “Other Tongues.” the eye. And he who recahs some failure in public speech, will remember that it seemed like some darkening of the sight, or some sudden narrowing of its range. Thus sight and speech go together figura¬ tively, if not literally. If so, then the extended range of vision acquired by linguistic study should result in an added power of extempore speech* — a gift patheti¬ cally desired by all men and needed by most. The constant manipulation of words tends to familiarise the student with new forms of expression, and enables him to note differences and resemblances commonly overlooked. From his new self he receives constant hints and suggestions not otherwise to hand. [I?) Sympathy.— He who learns a living language has done something to more fully identify himself with the human family. He has made a breach in the wall that separates nation from nation. He has done some¬ thing, however little, to undo the confusion of Babel. And whether what he has done brings others nearer to himself, it brings him nearer to them. For I am a “ barbarian ” to any man whose language I do not know— or he is a ‘‘ barbarian ” to me. To utter one’s devotions in other tongues, if these can be used simply and naturally, must prove an agree¬ able change that should deepen our sympathy with humanity. This is, however, the case if we can only read our Bible in a foreign language. Then one becomes 2L7ieighbour, so to speak. It is thus a source of joy and sympathy if, with our own beloved English, we simul¬ taneously hear, I will not now say the Hebrew or the Greek, but the echo of French, German, or Italian. Much more, perhaps, is our sympathy deepened if we sometimes visit a place of worship where the service is in another tongue. The writer recalls an instance, and though, alas ! the sermon is forgotten, the text often rings in his ears with additional emphasis and meaning, from its having been uttered and oft repeated in these words : — “ Plus que vainqueurs.” {c) Grace.— It is possible to “grow in grace,” both human and divine, spiritual and linguistic. Each modern language should add adornment and charm to our speech : depth from the German, dignity from the Spanish, music from the Italian, clearness and vivacity from the French. And generally some such result will be found if the study is constant. Only lately I met with a very interesting example.. A more than usually prosy Englishman, a steady, solid, capable fellow, was compelled by his occupation to reside some years in France amongst the lively inhabitants of M - . On his return he could speak French very well, and in conversation would express himself just in the old prosy way, until ever and anon, in spite of him¬ self, another echo, the French counterpart of what he was saying, would present itself to his mind, and he brightened up immediately, repeating what he had just said but in a sprightlier form and with a delightful Gallic tincture. So that his speech now abounded with what has been recently described as those “feli¬ citous and epigrammatic phrases which define a situation.” A new graft had been inserted in the solid * Such is the dictum of no less an authority than Mr. Spurgeon, who Is a marvellous instance of apt and ready speech. old Stock, and it blossomed charmingly. My frieiui presented a constant play of shadow and light, like the sun popping out from a succession of dark clouds. He — my friend — now possessed another and gayer self, a new consciousness supplementary and helpful, distinct but not conflictive. We do not mean to say that nothing but Gallic influence could have produced this change. Had the subject spent the whole of his life in France, he might have been just as prosy, until coming to England and learning English, the incisiveness of our tongue, the concentrated wisdom of its proverbial sayings, and the richness of its blend, would perhaps have affected him more powerfully than did the French. 2. Delight. — Even the sense of growth and pro¬ gress, already discussed, will give true pleasure. But there are other delights, as, for instance, of companion¬ ship. {a) With Men.— If we meet a foreigner we can talk together. But let anyone cross the Channel either without knowledge of Continental languages or with a mere smattering ; how he fears to ask his first question on a foreign shore — as a timid swain might tremble to pop the question to his inamoi'ata I And what a sense of isolation, even amid busy streets 1 How helpless and ignominious one’s condition ; unable to speak, unable to listen, the delights of companionship are almost wholly lost. ip) Books.— And he who cannot read a European language shuts himself from the companionship of authors; one dare not begin to enumerate the list. True, he may have the translations, now so plentiful, but that is like a mere photographic acquaintance, when we might have companionship with the original. Robert Hall (I think it was) felt this when, at seventy years of age, he was found prostrate on the floor of his study, racked with the pains of his malady, but grasp¬ ing in his hand an Italian grammar that he might learn to read Dante in the original. But there is the further delight of companionship with — {c) Our Thoughts. — The possessor of another lan¬ guage having a secondary group of words is never alone : “never, indeed, less alone than when alone.” In obscure quarters, amidst uncongenial surroundings, or travelling, he never need “ whistle as he goes for want of companionship.” And if he reaches that stage of familiarity with other tongues that produces ease and spontaneity of thought, his delight must be, we had almost said, unspeakable. What, however, we are trying to describe, is aptly illustrated in the picture of a venerable and illustrious statesman, amid the distractions of a modern House of Commons, calmly wTiting an Italian version of Cowper’s hymn: “ Hark, my soul, it is the Lord.” Ever on the qin vive^ and yet self-detached as it were. Few of us get so far as that. But even less knowledge and ability will give much delight. Even a limited knowledge of other tongues has a tendency to make music within ; for on hearing one w’ord, by unconscious cerebration, the student hears many — like the reduplicated and subtle vibration when a note is struck. For instance, a

Page 751

“ Other Tongues. 731 servant-girl says to her mistress, and if Jane has a grievance, her vocative is as curt as ,her temper is “ short,” and may even dwindle down to m’m or ’m ; but this is what the mistress hears mentally, if she be something of a linguist : — Mea domina Madonna Madame Madam Ma’am ]\Ium M’m Latin Italian French Queen’s English Ancillary „ my lady. J? J» Is there not a charm in hearing these, and the like ? A rude rough finger has struck the one brief note, ‘‘ ’m,” but the mistress hears an octave of charming reduplications, and Jane wonders what mistress saw that pleased her. This reminds me that the several European languages have been likened to various musical instruments. Some lines are running through my mind, which I quote from memory : — “ Greek is a harp we love to hear ; Latin is a trumpet clear ; Italian rings her bridal bells ; Spanish like an organ swells ; France, with many a frolic mien, Tunes her sprightly violin ; The German rolls his mighty drum When Ru.ssia’s clashing cymbals come ; But Britain’s sons may well rejoice, For English is the human voice.” Then, to the linguist, one word is a symphony^ 3. Conve7iie7ice. — It is sometimes convenient to be able to parlez-vous a little with one’s friends ; and equally convenient, when using post-cards, to put the more confidential tit-bits in some language not com¬ monly known amongst postmen and domestics. Then, again, with regard to the reading of news¬ papers, magazines, and the like. These now abound with words and phrases from Continental languages. These phrases, too, are not always of the common order, and such as could be provided against by a few minutes’ study of the appendix to a modern spelling book. Of travelling we have already spoken, under the head of companionship. A little jnore may be added to this section, to show the inconvenience attending ignorance of European languages, and, therefore, by contrast, the convenience attending their knowledge. Not long ago a young friend of mine, a bride cn route for Italy, travelling through France, arrived at - , where her husband alighted for a few moments. The train unexpectedly went on without him, carrying away the bride, of course. Imagine the consternation of the poor girl as she is whirled away to the next station ; with no railway ticket — her hus¬ band has it in his waistcoat pocket ; with no money in her own pocket, save an antique half-crown of the Georgian era — heroically declined by the French officials : with no French at the tip of her tongue except some tantalising query as ‘‘ Parlez-vous fran- <;ais?” which would fail to evoke a helpful reply; silent, tearful, incomprehensible, she is removed from the train and detained twelve long weary hours ; and to every inquiry she can but point (as she thinks) in the direction of her missing husband, but as it seems to others towards the westering sun, without, however, bringing any light upon the difficulty. And her husband, poor man, is equally helpless at the other end. So the difficulty remained until a linguist ap¬ peared on the scene, and set the telegraph to work. What an eclipse of the honeymoon — total, appalling^ prolonged, and visible to everybody ! And yet, with a few words of idiomatic French, it might have been ‘‘ partial ” only. But such disasters are not to be averted by our common method of learning foreign languages. No, no. Life consists of something more than “pens,”" pencil-cases,” ‘‘ pommes de terre,” and the reiterated commonplace, that “ the house of my Ix'other is larger than that of your father.” Life is earnest, and living languages are not to be trifled with, or we shall come to grief in travelling. II. Social. — Hitherto we have looked at the ad¬ vantages as they affect the student himself. But the acquisition of other tongues will put him in possession of considerable power to help, amuse, or instruct those around him. 1. Children will reap the advantage, since the knowledge of another language affords one of the best and pleasantest methods of amusing and instruct¬ ing the little folks. Linguistic authorities tell us that an intelligent child of five or six years of age, who knows his mother-tongue fairly well, understanding and re¬ producing most things he hears and sees, and making known his wants and feelings, uses but three or four hundred words. Such a fact is both an incentive to¬ ns in the acquisition of a foreign language, and an encouragement to use it at home, little by little, in those odd moments when the youngsters group them¬ selves around us, tired of their wonted pursuits, and eager for something restful and novel. 2. Others. — As for such as be of riper years,”* they will find few evenings more pleasant and profit¬ able than when father, mother, brothers, sisters, and friends gather round the dining-table, under the genial benediction of lamp and fire, for the reading of some bright and picturesque French story. What repartee and correction it will evoke ; what delightful asso¬ ciations ; what echoes of rippling laughter ; what pleasant memories for after-years ; to say nothing of the instruction and refinement that should follow these exercises. And as for the enjoyment of the occasion, even the little ones will want to “ stay up and witness it. How much better than idle yawns, frivolous words, Avorthless games, or mischievous books, read in selfish, isolation, or even a laborious dolce far 7iiente. III. Pecuniary. — A few words will suffice. 1. The E77iploye7\ if he has a limited business, can- do his foreign correspondence without the expense of a foreign clerk. 2. The E77iploye who can give ready proof of his- knowledge can more easily command engagement,.

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732 The Garden in November. remuneration, and success. The Germans should be an example to us. 3. The Householder^ especially if he be a profes¬ sional man with limited income and some leisure, may, by suitable introduction, obtain resident pupils, young ladies and gentlemen from Sweden, Germany, «&c., who come over here for a year or two to consoli¬ date their English. These generally pay fairly well (they are the sons and daughters of business men) and expect about two hours’ tuition per day. Thus he who knows one or two European languages has the joy of an inalienable possession, and a capital that no crisis, save death or disease, can take from him. Such are some of the advantages : power, growth, sympathy, profit, with the discovery, perhaps, that words, even the best, are but hints and suggestions, and utterly inadequate to the expression of the whole truth, human or divine. ^And once more we should ever return to our beloved English, feeling how priceless a heritage we have received from our forefathers, and how we, in turn, are bound to send it on to posterity, “ with its wealth un¬ impoverished, and its dignity unimpaired.” Michael T. Eastwood. THE GARDEN IN NOVEMBER. MORNING stroll round the garden in November certainly does not possess for us those attractions that we find so easily in the month of May. The reason for this is not far to seek ; but, never¬ theless, lovers of work have in all time found attractions in work itselfj and in gardening particularly we know that not an hour’s real labour is ever thrown away. We are going to work then this month, and November gardening per¬ haps wants a little determination. Now by the end of October our standard roses have cer¬ tainly finished their blooming, though in a prolonged mild season and in a sheltered situation many of us have often seen small buds trying to break into a sort of unnatural bloom even nearly up to the end of the year. In this, however, the rose seldom does more than par¬ tially succeed, while there is almost an entire absence of fragrance in a very late bloom. A few words first of all as to the au¬ tumnal treatment of our undying favourite will then be opportune. Now, when summer has quite fled, we shall notice that the heads of the standard roses have attained naturally a large growth : every shoot has got so long — and the leaves also are dis¬ posed to remain on for a time — that the whole appearance reminds us of a ship ; that is to say, the stock is the mast and the head is a sail ; an equinoctial gale springs up, and you are fortunate if your rose-tree does not break off short and become a wreck. If, then, there is no frost about, and your shoots are extraor¬ dinarily long, shorten them forthwith, and if you find too many of them, the weaker of them should be cut clean away to the bottom. By this means, of course, you — to carry out our simile — reef in your sail, and your tree is comparatively safe, as the wind has less power to catch your tree. And next the condition of the stakes and ties should be seen to ; their being well secured of course holds your tree well together, otherwise the whole will sway about helplessly. Any of the tender kinds of rose in standards will, of course, require still more protection in winter. Some gar¬ deners take them bodily away, and lay them up in a shed or out-house, putting some light litter over the head ; while, on the other hand, others prefer to allow the tender standard to remain in its place, and protect it instead of removing it. In this case the wild branches should be still more trimmed in, and then some hay interwoven and twined about the head and carefully tied. But here it will be evident that rain, followed by frost, will give you a mass of ice for your hay head, and your tree would, of course, be killed. To avert this catastrophe, some light waterproof sort of calico should be placed over the whole, and your CHRYSANTHEMUMS.

Page 753

The Garden in November. 7 ^ '00 tree will survive ; but, owing to additional weight at the head, the stock should be still further secured to its stake. You need not, of course, be anxious for the safety of the stock itself if it be the ordi¬ nary briar from the woods, which we are aware is by nature able to stand the hardest winter. And another November operation is the procuring of new stocks and setting them in their places, with the hope during the following July of budding them. Here is a good winter adventure for the stronger boys of the family in any neighbouring coppice or wood. Afterwards plant your stocks in rows, rather less than two feet apart, the rows being some three feet from each other ; all of course must be well secured, although there is hardly any head worth having to act the part of a sail ; and the planting should be made in open weather when frost is quite away. All important garden alterations, again, should be made in November ; still, some care should be employed as to the locality for any new shrub, and indeed for anything on a large and growing scale. Quite re¬ cently the writer had a singular mishap to a large but perhaps so'mewhat coarse - growing Virginia creeper. In former years its growth was prodigious and most vigorous, and indeed it required con¬ stantly keeping in check. The spring of this year came, and it promised to have as profuse a foliage as in former years, when in June last it suddenly and quite unexpectedly drooped, and the whole of it — for it nearly covered one side of the house — had to be removed. But it was found that very close to the surface of the soil was a large drain pipe that had gradually interfered with its proper develop¬ ment and caused its death. This is given merely as an illustration this month, when we are very often putting in shrubs and making garden changes, of the importance of locality ^ ft choose. All may go well for a time or perhaps for a few years, and then, when it is too late, we discover our mistake. In our greenhouse, of course, one of the few re¬ maining hopes for bloom is the chrysanthemum. These must have a little water to give some strength to the blooms. Those that are in the open should be cut down when they have finished flowering. Your garden, however, will be made a little gayer just now by plunging some chrysanthemum pots into the open beds. Nor can we afford this month to pass over one operation, which, indeed, ought properly to have been carried out nearly a month ago, and that is the stock¬ ing our garden with spring bulbs in the shape of tulips and hyacinths ; some, too, we may like to pot and force on for earlier bloom. With the method of growing hyacinths in glasses of water probably most of us are familiar; the glasses should at first be in a dark place, and later on, when the roots have well grown, they can A NOVEMBER OPERATION. be brought to the light. The dahlias will doubtless before now have been taken up ; they should be stored away in dry sand or in a dry cellar, where neither damp, heat, nor frost can get to them. And some¬ times, where we are pressed for room in our solitary greenhouse, we prefer to try the experiment of pro¬ tecting out of doors some of our plants — such, for example, as our salvias, fuchsias, and verbenas. A good protection of litter, or a few hand and bell glasses, will well answer our purpose, while an ad¬ ditional garden frame is invaluable — and certainly many of these frames are not so expensive as a single greenhouse. In fact, ingenuity, combined with hard work, observation, and perseverance, will give us a fine and a profitable garden. Anyone can have a garden if half a dozen gardeners and as many green¬ houses are employed, but a fruitful garden is a greater credit to a single pair of hands.

Page 754

r — 734 Wijt OToiltr'si OTaii'Dem's* fe=?c: 13—12= -1/ - light grey I Speed thee in thy fie - - ry flight, Pil - grim of hea - - ven’s home - less way, In what In what rF ■«=fi=^=p=fi — '*1?— I— .»-f- i==^i=^=^^i*zi]iSlritip — tzazp^' * — ^fn-^-nE SiiK v — 4" I $ 1 now ? now ? Will thy pin Seek • est thou ions close re - pose now ?., now ?.. !'■ 1 1 =1^

Page 755

735 - m — 1 - [ - ^ - — 1 - f t- V 1 - — 1 - 1 - ^ - !- ^ Still some se - - cret nest On the tree or bil - - - - - low ? On the tree or bil - - - low ?.

Page 756

736 WOMANLIKE. By the Author of “A Man of the Name of John,” “King or Protector?” &c. &c. “ Womanlike, taking revenge too deep for a transient wrong.” CHAPTER THE SIXTEENTH. INNER was over at the Hawk’s Nest, but the three ladies were still seated round the table, dallying over their dessert. Mrs. Ward had received a full account of the day’s expedition, but she had heard nothing of the alarm at its end. For some reason the girls had not spoken of those two mysterious shots. And yet Betty could think of nothing else. Her dinner tasted like dust and ashes, and she watched the clock with a sort of dull despair. Would this long evening never be ever Should she never be alone, to think over her interview with Roger And when, “with her dog lying at her feet, BETTY STOOD AND THOUGHT (A 739)- when should they hear what was happening down at Mayes } A silence had fallen on the party, unbroken save for the roaring of the fire in the grate, when in the hush manly footsteps were heard on the gravel outside, and then the front door bell clanged ominously. Betty flung down her napkin, and flew to the door. “Then there is something the matter I” she said. Dickie followed her instantly. Mrs. Ward looked up in sudden alarm. “ What is it, my dear children } ’’ she asked anxiously. The servant opened the front door, and Mr. Elliot stepped into the hall. For one moment Betty ex¬ perienced a wild sense of relief. What more natural than that he should come up and see her ? But the next moment she saw that he was in morning dress, and had a disturbed, anxious appearance, as of a bearer of evil tidings. “What is it, Godfrey? What is it?’’ she cried, rushing out, and laying a hand on his arm. “ We heard the shots.” Mr. Elliot looked amazed. His dignified Betty be¬ having thus, and before a servant too ! He took her hand in his, and led her gently back to the dining¬ room, looking with mild surprise at Dickie’s frightened eager face. “ I am sorry to say that there has been an accident,” he said. “ I came up myself to tell you, in order to spare you the shock.” A sudden idea flashed on Dickie. “ Not to Roger? Not to Roger?” she cried, antici¬ pating the question that Betty dared not ask. “Yes, I am sorry to say that it was to Haughton,” he said, leading Betty towards the fire. “ On our way home to-day someone chal¬ lenged him to leap a hedge carrying his gun. His foot slipped, and he fell ; and in his fall both barrels of his gun exploded — though how they came to be loaded we cannot think.” “ But is he much hurt?” cried Dickie ; while Betty, clenching one hand, clung with the other to the mantel-piece for support. “Fearfully!” answered Mr. Elliot, gravely. “ His right arm was terribly torn and his side injured. If Mr. Lawson had not passed, providentially, at that mo¬ ment, 1 fear he would have bled to death. We got him up to Mayes,” he went on, reluctant' to tell such sad news to sobbing Dickie, “ and Lawson sent for his part¬ ner. They were forced to operate on his arm, and when I left he was still uncon¬ scious. They think he will sink painlessly from exhaustion. Though it sounds cruel, the operation was in reality merciful.”

Page 757

Womanlike. Betty felt the room swimming round her, and sank into a chair without a word. ‘‘ Oh, Roger ! Roger ! Dear old Roger ! wailed Dickie, with heartrending sobs. “It cank be true ! Is there no hope ? ” Mr. Elliot shook his head. ‘‘They spoke in a vague way of the possibility of a rally, he said ; “ but I think in their hearts that they felt there was no hope.’’ Betty rose up with an effort. “ Godfrey, you will think me very foolish,” she said, “ but this awful end to such a - happy day ” — Oh, the irony of the words 1 — “ has quite upset me. I must go and lie down.” Pale as death, she took her way down the room, laying her hand for a moment on Dickie’s head as she passed. Mr. Elliot looked in alarm at Mrs. Ward. She was very grave as she answered, “ When Betty is upset or in trouble, she likes to be alone. Even I shall not go near her for some time.” “But I - ” began Mr. Elliot. ‘‘ I think she was really faint, and needs complete quiet. I thought her overdone when she came in to¬ night,” said Mrs. Ward. Mr. Elliot lingered a little longer, dwelling on the sad facts of the accident, and promising faithfully before he went to send the earliest possible news next day. And when he was gone Dickie wept out her grief to Mrs. Ward, sobbing still that it could not be true. Roger was too young and strong to die. When at last Dickie, worn out with sorrow, had betaken herself to bed, Mrs. Ward made inquiry, and found that, as she had expected, Betty had refused her maid s usual services that night. Sad and anxious, the loving-hearted woman crept softly to Betty’s door and knocked. “ Can 1 come in, my child ? ” she asked. “Not just now. Good night. Madam,” answered a low strange voice within; and Mrs. Ward went back to her room to watch and pray, far into the night, for the girl who was to her like a daughter. For nearly two hours Betty had lain as she had first cast herself down on the sofa— motionless and tearless, aching, and numb with a pain and misery that could not yet find words. But when the last footstep had died away outside, and silence had settled down upon the house, she could no longer bear this inaction. The room seemed to stifle her, the four walls to cage her in like iron bars. She rose up, and, wrapping a fur cloak round her, extinguished the candles, threw open the window, and looked out into the night. There were no stars, no moon ; a soft haze wrapped everything in its moist mantle, there was nothing but utter silence and darkness. But the silence and the darkness soothed and calmed her ; she felt at last free from all human influence — alone with the gracious night. Sitting there with her folded arms resting on the sill, she went back — oh, such a weary way ! — through all her acquaintance with Roger. She knew the truth now, she shrank from it no longer — she loved him. The first day that she had seen him at Wraysbrook 737 he had attracted her, though she had chosen to think it was merely her recognition, without his, that gave piquancy to the situation. When they talked and plotted about Dickie, it was the mutual interest that had been the real pleasure. When she refused him so angrily, it was only, she knew now, because she could not bear to think that he of all men should have known her in those old days. The discovery was inevitable, and her wounded vanity had made her try to shift blame on to his shoulders to cover allusions to a past she was ashamed of. And then, when she had returned home she knew now why she had found her life unsatisfactory, why she had craved for work. She had accepted Mr. Elliot because his attentions flattered her, because he filled the void that she felt without recognising. Not till she saw the two men together, and felt that she was mentally defending Mr. Elliot to herself, did she faintly realise what ailed her. That recitation had first brought home to her the results of choosing the wrong path in life. And yet she would not see, w'ould not know, till Roger himself tore the veil from her eyes, and bade her save herself before it was too late. And now he was dying, dying ! because his heart’s desire was dead. She had said that she would never speak to him again as long as she lived, and she had been taken at her word. She could never tell him now that she loved him — never ask his forgiveness, never in this world. But Betty prayed, with bowed head in silent agony, that she might be strengthened henceforth to do what was right — that some day she might meet her lover and entreat his pardon in the world to come. “Mr. Haughton was still alive, but quite uncon¬ scious,” was the report in the dim grey morning hours. Mr. Elliot would bring fresh news a little later. Dickie spent the weary time of waiting at the piano, soothing herself with all the sweetest, saddest strains she knew. Betty retired to her boudoir, and gave orders that Mr. Elliot should be shown up there when he arrived. She had come to one resolution in her weary vigil, that, whether Roger lived or died, Godfrey Elliot should know all. She blamed herself bitterly for her reserve, as she sat patiently waiting, all her faculties concentrated into the one act of listening for his approach. It was a dull misty morning, the view completely hidden. Betty felt as if a dull grey cloud had descended to blight her life for ever. At last came the well-known step along the cor¬ ridor, and Betty rose. “ How is he ? ” she said. “Just the same. They have sent for a fresh opinion from London, but I fear it is of no use. It is merely a question of how long his strength will hold out,” said Mr. Elliot gravely. “ Poor fellow ! It is terribly sad. Everyone feds it very much. Poor Fred is so upset that I brought him up here to see if Miss Mortimer could comfort him.” Betty held aloof while he spoke, and merely gave him her hand. Then she pointed to a chair. “ Will you sit down ? ” she said. “ I have some¬ thing to say to you.” 767

Page 758

Womanlike. >-7 Q / 0^ Mr. Elliot was vaguely uneasy. He did not like the sad hollow tone, the white drawn face, and black- ringed eyes. If he himself had been in danger, could Betty have looked worse ? I have something to say,” she began, in a low monotonous voice, ‘‘ that will pain you very much, I know, but it must be said. We agreed — did we not ? — that there should be no secrets between us. If I had known before I would have told you, but I did not know, I would not know, till last night.” Mr. Elliot’s face was very grave. His suspicions were not easily roused, but once awakened, he saw as clearly as most men. “ When I promised to marry you,” went on Betty, with the same desperate calmness, “ I said I loved you. I thought I did. I know now that I was mis¬ taken. There is someone else whom I love more.” Dead silence. Then he said gently— “ I can guess whom you allude to ; but are you sure that you are not carried away by your extreme power of sympathy ? ” “ No. I will tell you all,” said Betty, relieved by his composure. ‘‘ I knew — Roger ” — she paused al¬ most imperceptibly before she pronounced his name — “ seven years ago. Then he said something of me — no matter what, I was not meant to hear it — which wounded me terribly. He meant no harm, but I was a foolish, morbid girl, and I never forgot it. When we met again, he did not recognise me, but I knew him, and 1 had not forgiven him. Then he told me that he loved me, and I — I insulted him.” Mr. Elliot started. “I never suspected that,” he said. “I saw how much he admired you, but I had no idea what had passed between you previously.” “ 1 tried to forget it,” answered Betty. “ I ought to have told you, but I was too reserved. I tried to think it did not matter. I was not happy when you first met me ; I missed something, I knew not what. Then when you asked me to marry you I thought I had found my object in life and should be really happy. This week 1 have learnt that 1 deceived you and myself.” There was another pause. Then Betty went on : “I thought it only right that you should know all. It is always best to face the truth. At the present moment my heart is full of Roger — nothing but Roger. If he dies, I feel as if it must kill me.” She rose and came nearer to him. I have told you all,” she said, standing meekly before him. “It is your right to know. Feeling as I do, I dare not marry you now. But if in time I can overcome this feeling— and time will overcome every¬ thing, they say— then I am yours when you claim me. But not now ; not now ! ” “Neither now nor ever, except of your own free will.” Mr. Elliot had risen too, and spoke with a dignity that became him well. I thank you for the confidence you have in me. Bitter as it is to know the truth, I can at least feel that when you promised to marry me you did not do so unwillingly ; and if the time should ever come that you would wish to summon me to your side again, I shall come gladly, knowing that you lov^e me then in truth. But now,” he continued gravely — “ now I can only give you back your word. You are from this moment actually free. I would not for worlds add to the distress you feel.” His generous words broke down the icy barrier that had frozen Betty’s heart. She sank into a chair, and hid her face. “ You are too good, too good ! ” she sobbed. “ Oh, I know now what you feel ! I know what you were giving me when I gave you nothing. What can I do to show you how gratehil I am for all you have given me ? ” Mr. Elliot took a few turns about the room. Then he came back, and looked pityingly at the bowed head before him. “It is only natural, I suppose,” he said, with an unfeigned wistfulness that went to Betty’s heart. “ 1 am too old and sober for you. I ought never to have dreamed of uniting myself to your fresh, bright youth. Poor child ! Poor child ! ” He had forgotten all his little formal turns of speech. Only the true gentleman and lover showed now. Betty had never liked him half so well. “ I think ” he went on, “ that at this moment it would be better that we should part — at all events, for a time. You know I told you on Wednesday that I was being pressed to go out and prepare a report on the American system of education. I shall go at once, and it will appear that my going was inevitable. No one need suppose at present that the relations be¬ tween us are in any way altered ; but you will know that you are free, quite free. I shall probably extend my visit by degrees, and make it last for some time.” “I am driving you away now!” said Betty, faintly. “ No, my child ; it is best for us both. I could not remain to see you suffer without endeavouring to com¬ fort you, and my presence would only be a trial to you. Besides, on what terms could we meet ? By the time I return these things will have adjusted themselves without effort. My leaving you just now may appear a little strange, but you will point out that a request from Government could not be ignored.” Betty composed herself sufficiently to look up. She was one of those few people whom tears do not disfigure — or rather, she was one of those who weep tearless, heartrending sobs, that scarcely relieve, though they exhaust. She lifted a white, agonised face now that made his heart ache. “ I cannot thank you,” she said. “ I cannot feel anything — except that yesterday I told him I would never speak to him again, and to-day he is dying ! ” “ I hope with all my heart and soul that he may yet recover,” he said earnestly. “ He is young, and has a splendid constitution. But we can tell nothing at pre¬ sent. I fear a time of weary waiting lies before you, but I trust”— and his voice faltered, but he repeated his words — “ I trust all may yet end happily.” She shook her head.

Page 759

Womanlike. “Even if he lives, he will never see me again,” she said. “ I was too cruel, too unjust ! ” “It would take more than that to drive me from you,” he said. “When he finds you are free he will soon make his peace with you.” “ No, never ! ” she said. “ I have sinned, and I am punished. He will die : I know it.” Mr. Elliot paused. He could not suggest that if Roger died she might yet be grateful for his love. At last he said — “ And if you are ever lonely, if you feel that I could be the slightest help or comfort to you, one word will be enough : from the ends of the world I will come to you ! Meanwhile, good-bye, and God bless you, my only love.” He stooped and kissed her forehead reverently, and then he went steadily out of the room. Betty crept to the window and watched the tall grey-haired figure moving down the winding drive. As he disappeared from sight, tender arms stole round her, and she laid her weary head upon Madam’s shoulder. “ I am the most miserable woman on earth ! ” she moaned. “ I sent Roger away, and he is dying — and I have just sent away Godfrey too ! ” CHAPTER THE SEVENTEENTH. Those were dreaiy days that followed, while Roger Haughton hung between life and death, and everyone waited anxiously to know how the struggle would end as the short December days crept on. Since he had no home of his own, he could not have been in better hands. Mrs. Carrington felt for him as if he had been her own son, and nothing that skill or care could do was left undone. He had hospital nursing night and day, constant visits from the local doctors, and more than once some great man was summoned in haste from London to pronounce on new symptoms, or to suggest, if possible, some fresh form of treatment. Great interest was felt in the neighbourhood for Roger, but the Carringtons showed as deep anxiety as if for one of themselves, while the man who had saved their brother’s life lay in their house with his own in jeopardy. As for Fred, he could think and speak of nothing else, and haunted the Hawk’s Nest at all hours, bringing the latest news. Sometimes he was utterly overcome and desponding, sometimes un¬ reasonably sanguine, but he always sought a sympa¬ thetic audience, and found comfort in sharing his fears and alarms with Dickie. There was no question of Dickie going home at present. She could not bear to leave the neighbour¬ hood while Roger lay still in this critical state,, and Betty could not bear to part with her, so she stayed on and on indefinitely. And while everyone else expressed their fears and sympathy openly, how did Betty get through the long weary days, and yet longer nights ? She hardly knew herself. That dreadful day of Mr. Elliot’s departure she spent in her room, and Mrs. Ward 739 explained that she was quite upset by the second shock of finding that he was obliged to go to America at once. After that she came down as usual, and went about as best she could, thankful that amidst the grave faces round her, her own worn looks passed unnoticed, or were set down to anxiety for Mr. Elliot. She threw herself into 'all the work she could find, visited among the poor and at the Dovecote, and slaved at her Christmas gifts. She rode or walked for hours every day, all in the hope of tiring her body till her mind should be forced to rest. But all in vain. She could not thrust her trouble from her thus. Ever/ unkind word she had ever spoken to Roger haunted her, every sentence she heard in his praise stabbed her with a sharp pain. Everyone else had appreciated him at his true value, and she— she had refused his love with scorn, and injured Mr. Elliot in her revengeful desire to punish him. And now he would die, not knowing, never knowing, how bitterly she had repented. Christmas came and went — a sad season for the two houses. They had no heart to rejoice, and poor Betty felt herself unfit even to share in the higher rejoicing at the season of peace and goodwill. She tried to make it a happy tihie for others, showering gifts around her with a lavish hand, but she felt even that effort had failed when Dickie broke down over her heap of offerings, sobbing, “ Roger promised me a ruby ring at Christmas, and now he will never give me any¬ thing again ! ” But every day that Roger’s strength held out was so much in his favour ; by degrees the bulletins held a faint suspicion of hope. Gradually his splendid con¬ stitution and skilful nursing triumphed over his injuries, the spirit of hopefulness became more and more diffused. At last came a glad day when Fred Carrington rushed up to the Hawk’s Nest with the glorious news that, unless he had another serious relapse, Roger might be considered out of danger. Dickie and Fred were transported with joy. To them “out of danger” meant “almost well,” and Dickie poured out her delight in such joyous melody as the house had not echoed to for many a long day, while Fred, in wild excitement, poured out his rapturous feelings to Mrs. Ward. But Betty slipped away and out of the house. Her heart was beating fast, and she felt half-choked ; she must have air. She walked quickly through the lanes, accompanied by the mastiff that was her constant reminder of Godfrey Elliot’s care; and, urged by a wild impulse ever upwards, found herself at last on the lonely hills. It was a bright, still January afternoon. She was absolutely alone. There was not a sign of life, except a faint blue line of smoke curling into sight from an invisible cottage. Far below her she could see the village green, and the chimneys of Mayes among its leafless trees. Motionless as a carved figure, leaning on her stick, and with her dog lying at her feet, Betty stood and thought. Roger would live ! That was her first glad thought. Roger would live to forgive her. And then, as she

Page 760

Womanlike. 740 grew more calm, and the first intoxication of joy passed by, she asked herself seriously if indeed it would ever be so ? What chance was there that he would ever forgive her ? She had told him that she would never speak to him again, and he would take her at her word. He would live ! Yes ; but how? Injured perhaps for life, and as an invalid for a long time to come. She fe.t a little thrill of joy as she thought that surely he would not go out again to Buenos Ayres now ; but the next moment it was checked by the question. What would his life be worth to him in future? He could neither work nor play with his old vigour; and she felt an inward conviction that he would never offer himself to her again — disabled as he would be now. Standing there with her eyes fixed on the sinking sun, Betty made up her mind to two things. One was that she had thrown away her last chance of happiness. She would never have the opportunity of making peace with Roger again ; their paths in life would hence¬ forth diverge further and further. The other, that she must bravely face her lonely life, and fill it with work for others ; unless she would grow a sour, embittered old maid. And with that she took a resolution to carry out the last request Roger had ever made her : the last he would ever make her now. When she came down the hill in the gathering dusk, the weary anxious look was gone from her face, re¬ placed by one of calm resolution. She saw her next duty now, and she would do it, trusting to be shown others in time. “ Dicke,” she said, as they sat alone together in her boudoir that evening, “Dickie, how would you like to go to Germany for a year and study music?” Dickie flushed with a sudden joy. “Oh, Betty dear ! ” she cried, “ it would be bliss ! ” “ Shall we go for a year, and give you lessons at a conservatoire ? ” “ Will you come too ? How heavenly ! But what will Mr. Elliot say?” asked Dickie doubtfully. Betty looked at the bright little face with calm grave eyes ; she had grown to love Dickie very dearly, and she had determined to confide in her. “ I am going because I do not wish to be here when he returns to England,” she answered. “ Dickie dear ! I can trust you to keep a secret ? Mr. Elliot and I are no longer engaged. While we are both out of the country the fact can be made known, but not yet.” “ Oh, Betty !” said Dickie gravely. “ 1 am so glad, because— because— I am sure you were not happy.” “It was a mistake,” sighed Betty. “But he was far, far too good for me. So, Dickie, we will go to Germany for a year, and then it will all be forgotten.” She had determined on this German scheme partly because she thought it would be far better she should have left the neighbourhood before Roger began to get about again. In a year many things, would have adjusted themselves, and she could come home and settle down for hfe. The plan gave general satisfaction. Mrs. Mortimer approved it highly, and Mrs. Ward was glad of any¬ thing that occupied Betty's thoughts. She declared herself too old for foreign parts, so it was settled that she should keep house at home, and Betty and Dickie should be chaperoned by a governess from the Dove¬ cote, who was delighted at the prospect of improving her German. Then there set in a conflict of rival guide-books, combined with prospectuses of rival con¬ servatoires, and nothing but the German tour was to be heard of. One soft, damp, February day Betty came slowly up the drive, after a long muddy ride. She was feeling rather sad ; it was a great wrench to her to tear her¬ self from her home, and it was small consolation to feel that she deserved the pain. Never had it looked more inviting than when the ruddy firelight streamed out upon the twilight, as tlie butler threw open the hospitable door that day. “ There is a person of the name of Dawson waiting to speak to you, ma’am,” he said as she dismounted. “ She said you would remember her.” “ Dawson ? ” cried Betty. The name recalled strange memories. “ Where is she ? ” “ She has been having some tea in the housekeeper’s room, ma’am.” “ Send some tea up to my boudoir, and show her up there when I ring. I shall not be ten minutes,” ordered Betty. She nodded in at the drawing-room to show that she had returned in safety, and then went upstairs almost excited. It was years since she had seen Dawson, who had always done her best to be good to her. Ten minutes later they were seated face to face near the fire in the fading light. Dawson was not altered in the least. She was grim and austere as ever, and sat bolt upright in her easy-chair as if she had been in her old kitchen. She was staying with some cousins near by, she explained, and had come over to Oakleigh to see Miss Elizabeth, as it was so long since they had met. Miss Elizabeth ! How familiar the old name sounded. Betty smiled to herself as she sipped her tea, and asked after Dawson’s movements. Dawson was a pensioner of hers, but she was still in service by preference. She was one of those old-fashioned servants who would work till she dropped. While she talked, she was looking round at the dainty room, with its luxurious furniture, the pictures and knicknacks, the evidence of wealth on all sides, and then at Betty herself, in her tea-gown of bronze plush and soft lace, as she sipped her tea at her ease. “Times have changed since the old days. Miss Elizabeth,” she remarked abruptly, in the midst of one of Betty’s speeches. “Yes,” said Betty, smiling. “For the better, I think.” “ Humph ! ” said Dawson. “ I hear that there is a Mr. Haughton lying ill down the village. Is that the young gentleman who came down to see us once just before the mistress died ? ” “ Yes,” said Betty quickly. “ Do you remember him ? ” “ I should think I did ! snapped Dawson. And

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Womanlike. 741 then, nfter a short pause, “ It was a good thing for you that your aunt died that night. Miss Elizabeth.” ‘‘Why.?” asked Betty, with interest. “ Because if she hadn’t he would have had her fortune, and not you,” was the unexpected reply. “Dawson! What do you mean?” cried Betty in amazement. “ Well, it was like this,” said Dawson, settling her¬ self to enjoy telling her story : “he came down to ask the mistress for some money, and she wouldn’t give it him, with her miserly ways ! ” said Dawson in she says, getting quite excited like. So I quieted her down, and promised to write, and she went off to sleep ; and so she was took, poor lady ! ” ended Dawson, with a half-feigned sigh. Betty sat upright, with every spark of colour fled. “Dawson, are you sure of that?” she said. “Certain sure. She spoke a bit thick ; but I could tell what she said well enough.” “And she was not wandering? Her mind was clear?”, “ Clear as mine is now, Miss Elizabeth.” contempt. “ So they quarrelled over it. I found her, when he was gone, fit to kill herself with passion. ‘ He wants to borrow my money ! ’ she says, ‘ and he shan’t have none of it,’ she says, ‘ not a penny 1 The impudent young dog!’ I got her a bit quiet, but I didn’t like her looks. That was the evening she got the stroke, you’ll remember.” “Yes, yes,” said Betty. “ Go on.” “Well, she didn’t say no more about him till the night she died ; and then she says, ‘ Dawson,’ she says, ‘ I’ve been thinking a deal about that boy, and I like him, after all,’ she says. ‘ He’s got a will and a temper of his own, and that’s more than that poor weak slip of a girl has got ’ — meaning you. Miss Elizabeth.” “Yes ; never mind that,” said Betty. “So she says, ‘I mean to alter my will,’ she says. ‘ Five hundred a year’ll be plenty for a child like her, who’ll never marry, and the rest I’ll leave to Roger,’ she says. ‘Mind you send lor Mr. Murray the first thing in the morning ; and don’t tell Miss Elizabeth,’ “ Then, Dawson, you are a wicked woman !” cried Betty. “ Why did you not tell us this seven years ago ? ” “Why, bless you. Miss Elizabeth,” said Dawson, unmoved, “he was a man, and could take care of himself, and you was only ‘a slip of a girl,’ as she said. Likely I was going to take your money away from you ! Besides, I was always fond of you, and I knew nothing about him. Bless me ! why, I wouldn’t have said anything now if I’d known you’d fuss so.” “ Fuss ! ” cried Betty. “ Do you suppose that I can liv^’e another moment on money that belongs to him?” “ It doesn’t belong to him. The old lady never made her will, and if anyone else asks me. I’ll swear she never meant to,” said the imperturbable Dawson. ‘‘ Besides, ain’t he a rich man, rolling in the mone; he made out in foreign parts ?” “ He is recovering from a desperate illness, and he may not have strength to work in future,” answered Betty severely. “ Oh, Dawson, you are a cruel woman ! How could you treat him so ? ”

Page 762

742 Vv^OIvIANLlKE. “ He’s not the gentleman you are engaged to, is he, Miss Elizabeth?” asked Dawson. “ No,” said Betty, turning scarlet. “ Oh, I thought perhaps he was,” remarked Dawson. No, indeed, he was not, and never would be ; and yet when Dawson had taken her departure Betty sat lost in the joy of a new thought. She would offer to restore the money at once, of course. Suppose it were possible that he might take it as an olive-branch ? Dickie heard the story with wonder, and approved her resolution. Mrs. Ward said nothing to dissuade her, except suggesting that Mr. Murray would not hear of it. Betty summoned him at once, and bade him write to Roger’s lawyers, proposing the restitu¬ tion of the money. As ]\Irs. Ward had prophesied, he simply pooh-poohed the idea. ‘‘ Nonsense, my dear child ! ” he said in his fatherly way. “ You have nothing to go on but that woman’s word, and she hasn’t an atom of proof to bring. Mr. Haughton won’t starve if he does retire from busi¬ ness now, and he won’t take your money, you may be sure. Don’t be so foolishly Quixotic.” Betty argued in vain. Mr. Murray stood firm. “ What will Mr. Elliot say? ” he suggested. “If Mr. Elliot objected, everything would be at an end between us at once,” said Betty, feeling very deceitful. “ It does not concern him at all.” Mr. Murray thought it did, but he could not move her ; too much was at stake. “ Well, if you will not find out his lawyers, and write to them, I shall do it myself.” And seeing she was really in earnest, and more bent on having her own way than he could account for, he gave in. “Well, I suppose we must write them,” he said, “ and be called fools for our pains.” So he wrote, and duly forwarded to Betty the reply, to the effect that Mr. Haughton was at present too ill to attend to business ; but that as soon as he was well enough the matter should be laid before him. Many weary days did Betty wait for a second letter. At last it came. “ Dear Sir,— We are instructed to inform you that our client begs it may be distinctly understood that under no circumstances whatever could he avail himself of your client’s generous offer. “ We remain “ Yours faithfully, “ Prescott and Jones.” CHAPTER THE EIGHTEENTH. Roger Haughton was lying on a sofa in the library at Mayes, vaguely conscious of the March sunshine that poured in through the open window, and of the songs of the birds outside. His eyes were closed, and to all appearance he was dozing. This silent acquiescence in invalidism was his normal state now. He got no further on his way to convalescence. His strength of constitution had pulled him through his illness, in spite of himself ; he seemed to have no desire to live, no power of rallying. His doctors and nurses were not pleased with his progress. He wanted rousing, they said. They tried bringing him out of the room where he had lain so long, but the change did not seem to give him pleasure. To-day, for the first time, he had been allowed to go out in a low pony-carriage ; but he had not appeared to enjoy the drive among the budding hedges and fresh green meadows. Now he was resting, and the house was very stilly for everyone was out this lovely afternoon ; so Roger lay and thought in peace. Till now he had hardly thought at all ; his illness had dulled all his faculties for so long. He had dwelt in a world of shadows, where human griefs and joys had ceased to affect him ; he seemed to himself to have been laid aside from the busy world in some strange, quiet place, where all the past was forgotten. Long days and nights of bodily pain had obscured his mental sufferings. The one great pain had been laid to rest : he feared lest it should wake again. He let them think that outside topics were too much for him, because he knew that there was some¬ thing they would talk about that would hurt him^* and he did not want it put into words. He had offered, as soon as the doctor would let him, to go away. He had been too long a burden on the hands of his kind hosts, he said. But Mrs. Carrington asked, with tears in her eyes, how he could suggest such a thing just as he was beginning to get well ; and so, having made the unsuccessful effort, he relapsed into his languid, listless ways again, and let himself be nursed and taken care of as they chose. But to-day his first view of the outer world brought home to him vividly how long it was since that fatal December day, and woke the slumbering memories- that would not sleep again. He was far more ex¬ hausted than they knew when he was left to rest in that pleasant room— as Mrs. Carrington fondly hoped, to sleep. Someone had spoken of Easter as being near at hand ; and at the magic word the fact he dreaded stood before him in all its cruel distinctness. At Easter, Betty was to be married. He had tried not to think of her all this time.. Someone had read him a letter from her offering him some money. Take her money, when he wanted her herself ! “Tell her that under no circumstances whatever could I touch it,” he had said, and turned his face to the wall. And now, as he lay there in the peaceful afternoon^ he tried, for the first time, to face his future life. Betty married, and not happy, he was certain ; and himself a disabled, useless man, unable to get out of England and forget her. There came a sound of whispering at the door and a well-known knock. “Come in, Fred!” he called, glad of the inter¬ ruption. “Could you see a visitor?” inquired Fred, with a grin. “ That depends on who it is.” “ It’s me,” said a chirpy little voice behind Fred.

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Womanlike. 743 “ Why, Dickie ! Come in ! ” cried Roger, quite excited. She came in, a pleasant sight, with her bright face, and her hands full of flowers. “ I was gathering primroses, and Fred met me, and we thought perhaps you would like to see me, and to have some flowers,” said Dickie rapidly, as if she were repeating a lesson. “ I am delighted to see you. Give her a chair, F red,” commanded Roger. You may have ten minutes, and then I shall carry you off,” announced Fred, as he withdrew. Dickie sat down, and mutely offered him her prim¬ roses. Roger took them with a smile, but Dickie could not smile in return. The Carringtons would have told her that Roger was looking immensely improved ; but to her the thin white hands, the drawn face, where the hollow eyes stood out in such marked prominence, were all terrible signs of what he had suffered. She realised that this was not the old familiar Roger, but a man over whose head the waters of death had nearly closed, and she was too much awed to speak. “Why, Dickie, do I look such a scarecrow?” he asked gently. “ You look so very ill, still ; I thought you were almost well,” she faltered. “ I am told I ought to rouse myself, and then I should soon be well,” he answered, Dickie was afraid of harming him by showing her emotion. She made a great effort, and spoke more naturally. “ So I heard,” she said ; “so I came to see if a scolding would rouse you.” “ What am I to be scolded for?^^ he asked, smiling. “For not taking Betty's money when she wants you to.” “ One of the privileges of invalids, my dear Dickie, is not to be obliged to discuss topics they wish to avoid,” he explained, with an ominous contraction of the brows. “ But why are you so unkind to her ? ” urged Dickie. “ She is so unhappy, and it makes no dift'erence, for she won^t spend it. Hawk’s Nest is to be shut up, and Mrs. Ward is going to some relations, and Miss Newcombe and Betty and I are going to Germany to study music and live on five hundred pounds a year.” Roger gazed at her in amazement. “ What does Elliot say to that ? ” he asked quickly. Dickie paused a moment ; then she answered — “ Mr. Elliot has nothing to do with it. The en¬ gagement is broken off.” Roger seized the back of the sofa, and pulled him¬ self up with a sudden effort. “ Who told you that ? ” he demanded. “Betty herself. It is a great secret ; I ought not to have told you. But you won’t tell anyone, will you, Roger? ’’said Dickie, a little frightened at her own success. “ No one knows yet ; but when we are in Germany, Betty is going to write and tell Mrs. Car¬ rington. You know that is the real reason why Mr. Elliot went to America.” “I didn’t know he was there,” remarked Roger as he fell back upon his cushions, white and trembling. “All right, Dickie,” he murmured, “what a fool I am ! ” He was quite faint, and Dickie half repented her rashness, but she had the wit to keep silence till Fred reappeared as Roger began to recover himself. “ I hope I haven’t done you any harm, Roger?” she said anxiously, as she rose to go. “ On the contrary, you’ve roused me beautifully,” he said, looking up with the old twinkle in his eye. “ I say, you two, I suppose your meeting to-day and Dickie’s visit were quite accidental, weren’t they ? Oh, it doesn’t matter ! ” as the guilty couple looked at each other and laughed. “ Only I want you to let me into the plot next time, as you are such good hands at it ! Good-bye, Dickie. Thank you so much for coming. You aren’t going to Germany yet?” “ Not till after Easter,” answered Dickie, as she took the hand he held out with a grateful smile. Certainly his first drive had worked wonders for the patient, thought good Mrs. Carrington. From that day Roger began to improve marvellously. He drove out every day, he relinquished his sofa for an arm¬ chair, and took exercise about the house on Fred’s arm. His doctor was delighted, and everyone was satisfied with his progress — including himself. One lovely afternoon in Easter week Dickie clamoured for a long walk with Betty. She hurried her up to her room to dress directly after lunch, and then lingered there, talking nonsense and wasting their time. It was nearly three o’clock when she took her¬ self off to find her own hat at last. Scarcely had she gone when she reappeared, and put her head round the door. “ Visitors in the drawing-room, Betty ! ” she cried. “ Isn’t it tiresome? I didn’t catch the name and she was off again. Betty went slowly and sadly downstairs. Every time that she went about the house now reminded her that she should soon leave it for ever, and that it would be deserted and desolate. Roger would not take the money, neither would she, so the Hawk’s Nest must stand empty in the years to come. She opened the drawing-room door, and went quietly in, as usual. Then she stopped, and put her hand to her heart with a sudden pang. There, in the bay window, sat a tall figure that she had never thought to see again. “ I — I — Dickie said there was some visitor. I did not know that you were allowed to pay visits yet,” she said, trying to recover herself, and advancing as she spoke. “ I am not allowed, but I do it, you see,” he answered quite coolly, as he slowly rose. How thin he was ! How worn and white ! How hollow his eyes, and how changed his voice ! Betty’s whole heart was so full of love and pity that she was almost choked. “ I came to see you,” he said, as she paused near him, steadying herself by a hand on a chair, “ because I wished to alter a decision of mine, with your per-

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The Art of Cameo-Cutting. 744 mission. I said I would not take your money under any circumstances, I will, upon one condition. Will you tell me why you have broken off your engagement to Elliot.?” He came nearer and nearer. His eyes seemed to devour her face, his hand was held out to her. Neither quite knew how it happened, but the next minute they were together in the window-seat, with her face hidden on his shoulder, while she sobbed, “ Oh, Roger ! You know ! You know ! ” “ Oh, Roger ! How much you have suffered !” she said, after a while. “At the present moment,” he said, ‘H am in para¬ dise.” “ But who told you that my engagement was broken off?” she asked. “ Dickie was the arch-traitor. She came to see me, I verily believe, on purpose.” “ But how could she know you would care ? ” “ Isn’t she a daughter of Eve ? Women always know all about each other. It was for your sake as much as mine that she plotted this meeting to-day,” answered Roger. “ Dear little Dickie ! She has repaid us amply for Alice’s want of trust long ago, which 1 believe she has always resented.” “ Don’t speak of long ago,” said Betty, with a little shudder. “Oh, Roger ! how cruel I was to you!” “ How cruel I was to you, rather ! I have thought so often of your lonely life and miserable childhood, my poor darling. I was a brute to you in those days, indeed ; but you were fully revenged, Betty. Let us both forget and forgive now.” “ Roger, do tell me, have you any idea how your accident happened ? ” she asked, laying her hand ten¬ derly upon his injured arm. “ You remember my showing my gun to Miss Grant ? I let her load it, and then I forgot all about it. I was too miserable to shoot after you left me, and this was the result of my carelessness. By the way, Betty, I thought you never meant to speak to me again ? ” She could not bear him to treat it as a Jest. “ I did not know what I was saying,” she pleaded. ‘‘ I — I was so afraid you would see the truth.” “ That you loved me ? ” “ That I had loved you all the time, and did not know it till that moment.” “ Blessed accident ! ” he said fervently. “ If it had not been for that I should have been at Buenos Ayres long ago. Betty, will you really take a crippled man, without the proper use of his limbs ?” “I will be your right hand ! ” she cried. “ I will do everything for you. You shall never feel your loss. Only, never, never talk of going away from me again! ” “ Betty, how much does Elliot know ?” he asked her presently. “ Everything. I told him all, and then he set me free. Roger, he is a noble man !” she said earnestly. “ Yes, I suppose he is a good fellow, but I was so jealous of him that I am no judge,” answered Roger gravely. “ Ah, Betty ! If you could but know what it was to see him in possession of you, and to know you were not happy, and to feel that I could have made you so if you had only waited ! ” “It was nearly as bad to feel that you had not for¬ given me, and would not take my peace-offering.” “ What, the money ? ” he laughed. “ Bless my dear aunt ! We are going to fulfil her wish, after all ! And, Betty, you are not going to Germany now ? ” “ No — oh, no ! Nowhere without you ! ” Fred and Dickie were sitting tranquilly on the ter¬ race, watching the view, while Mrs. Ward poured out tea. All three conspirators were in a state of sup¬ pressed triumph, but they felt it was time that their brilliant service met with its due reward. Out from the house came Betty and Roger, he lean¬ ing on her arm, the sunlight not more bright than their faces, as they paced slowly along. “Mrs, Ward,” said Roger gravely, “Betty has found her work in life, and we hope you will approve. It is to take care of me.” THF END. THE ART OF CAMEO-CUTTING. BY THE AUTHOR OF “A NEW HOME OCCUPATION FOR LADIES,” ETC. S|HE cameo has for many centuries been valued 1 and admired. Exquisite antique specimens ' —the work of Grecian and Roman gem- - engravers — are to be found in some of our great collections of art, and are well known to connoisseurs. A fall and a revival — this is the history of all art work— and gem-engraving was not to escape the general fate at the decline of the Roman Empire. In the fifteenth century cameos were greatly sought after ; collections wer^ made of the finest examples of the antique then extant, and Italian artists of the age produced new works rapidly to satisfy the call for cameos for personal adornment and decorative purposes. Later on, Germans vied with the Italians in producing beautiful works, and most successful they were in the attempt. Cameo¬ cutting on shells is of recent date, and we all know what adepts at it modern Italians are. It is only lately amateurs have taken it up in England, and we can hardly prophesy yet whether it will become popular, as so many of the minor arts are now, as a pastime. For one reason, to execute a good original cameo a thorough knowledge of drawing, of modelling, and of designing is indispensable ; but there are hundreds of amateurs who are competent artists, and all such could easily cut cameos that would be valuable. For those who are not so experi¬ enced, there are floral and conventional designs which

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The Art of Cameo-Cutting. 745 can be copied, and these are extremely ornamental, besides being useful as decorations. Before entering on the practical information that I propose to give on cameo-cutting, I will mention to what uses the specimens can be put, as students will then have the oppor- preparing for the end they have in view, although it is not likely that many early attempts will be of sufficient value to mount. There is little chance that the English cameo will ever be in great demand for jewellery, but for the decoration of fancy articles and small pieces of furni¬ ture they will probably be increasingly required, if English men and women persevere long enough to become proficients in the art. Cameos are well adapted for the beautifying of caskets, ladies’ work- boxes, and stationery cabinets. For articles intended for the writing-table they are specially suited ; they may be inlaid in the cover of a blotter, and in the frame of the post-time card. The ink-stand, too, made to grace a lady’s dainty Chippendale writing- table, may be enriched with cameos advantageously. Workers who are more ambitious may turn their at¬ tention to the decoration of the table itself, when they will, if they are clever cutters, make it a truly artistic affair, and valuable in consequence. Cabinets and overmantels lend themselves exceptionally well to inlaying or embossing duction of ^ cameos in the corners of the frames of the doors, and little panels or borders with conventional designs might be arranged along the top, bottom, and sides, with, perhaps, a lozenge flower cameo placed half-way down. I remember once being greatly taken with a walnut cabinet, having small panels of Wedgwood inserted at inter¬ vals in the frames of the doors ; the same was A MAxX’s HEAD IN PROGRESSIVE STAGES A woman’s HEAD IN PROGRESSIVE STAGES. repeated around the glass, and the effect was de¬ lightful. The colouring of the conch shell varies wonderfully, so that a pleasing contrast to the wood ornamented is easily found. Some of the shells have black grounds, others pink, still T h e n there are articles for the toilet-table that would look all the prettier for the addition of cameos to their other orna¬ mentation. For example, a pin tray, powder-box, back of bonnet or clothes brush, and back of hand-mirror — if of walnut, ebony, mahogany, or rosewood — might be much enhanced in beauty by cameo embossments with pink, red, or light brown grounds; whilst with the light woods any of the grounds would harmonise, and show up admirably. Brackets, cupboard doors, card-trays, vases, fan-mounts, the handles of en tons cas and uniibrellas, and the backs of occasional chairs, can all be suitably decorated with cameos. Amateurs who are interested in repousse work should turn their attention to cameo-cutting, for the beautiful shells blend exquisitely with silver, brass, and copper. For a change they might substitute a cameo for the monogram on many of the things they emboss so cleverly. But enough of the ways and means of utilising the specimens when executed ; my part now is to show how those ^ are sold ready for working on; they are of different sizes, and the prices vary ac¬ cording to the size and the colour of the shell. The smaller pieces are to be obtained at 3s. a dozen, the larger ones at 3s. 6d. each ; but there are six sizes between these two. The outlay of the cameo-cutter is in any case small, for the tool-s cost only 3d. each. Ordinary engravers’ tools are all that are requisite for

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The Art of Cameo- Cutting. 746 beginners ; later on, when success is assured, and more delicate work is in progress, finer tools may be found necessary. Some artists make their own if they need any special kind. The tools are known as scawpers and spit-stickers. Of the former there are two shapes, viz., round and flat. With the round scawper the design is cut and partially carried out, the flat scawper being employed for smoothing the work, finishing touches are given with the spit- sticker. About seven tools will be sufficient to com¬ mence with. A fine file, an oilstone, Roman cement, Tripoli stone, pumice stone, and some short, round pieces of wood make up the list of requisites, to which a holdfast may be added at the worker’s discretion. I will now describe at length the cutting and polish¬ ing of a cameo, and in doing so explain the use of all the articles mentioned above. First the shell is to be mounted, ready for cutting ; without mounting it would be impossible to work on it. Take a round piece of w^ood about six inches A BUNCH OF GRAPES. in length, the diameter being an inch in excess of that of the shell at its widest part, and on one end fasten the piece of shell as follows First cut out a piece of tissue paper, and lay it on the end of the stick ; lay the shell, flat part downwards, on the paper ; heat some Roman cement, and border the piece of shell round with this, covering the rim of wood left beyond. Bring the cement up only to the edge of the shell — not beyond it, or the tools will get blunted when the cutting is in progress. Should any go beyond, let the cement harden until it can be cut off with a pen-knife or chipped off with a tool ; if the latter is used, chip off from the shell outwards. Do not be discouraged if, while working it, the shell should come off the wood ; no harm will result, and to even the best workers such a hitch may occur at times. Six inches cut off the end of the handle of a garden rake or a broom will make a good mount for a small shell. It is best, in my opinion, for a beginner to choose moderate-sized pieces of shell for his first attempts ; the fine work suited for the decoration of tiny shells is not so easy to execute as the bolder designs cut on larger shells. An experienced cameo-cutter will quickly tell a good from a bad piece of shell ; but amateurs will do well to buy them only from re¬ liable firms. Occasionally we shall come across one that readily “ flakes ” ; others may be slightly eaten or decayed. Now as to the design, I believe most persons will agree that it is more easy when carving or cutting to copy from a model than from a drawing, but either plan can be equally well followed. Model the design in clay or w^ax, draw it on paper, or copy any cameo you may have in your possession, just as you fancy. Those who are clever at cameo-cutting do not draw the design on the shell ; they indicate it wuth a sharp tool. At best, amateurs cannot do more than make a rough sketch in pencil, as the surface of the shell is uneven ; and it would be useless if they could, for it is soon cut away and the main points have again to be sketched. The prominences and irregularities of the shell are not to be levelled ; skill is showm in making the best use of such in arranging the design. If an attempt were made to level the surface, the ground must of necessity become apparent through the design, which would be fatal to success. In setting to work, take the stick of wood with the shell on top in the left hand and hold it firmly pressed against the edge of a table ; in the right hand the tool is held, the wooden handle being in the palm of the hand, and the finger and thumb low down tow^ards the point of the blade. A holdfast is not indispensable, but it is helpful to those who have not strong wrists, as it steadies the stick. In the notch in front the stick is in¬ serted, and this pre¬ vents it slipping, as it can do if only pressed against the table. For the sake of any who may know nothing of the appearance of a holdfast, I will Just de¬ scribe one here. A flat piece of w'ood w'ith a slit or notch in it is made with a frame to winch a screw is attached. The flat piece rests on the table (the slit being left be\ ond the edge) ; the screws underneath the table is then turned, and this, with the frame, keeps the flat piece immovable. Now the round stick is slipped into the slit, and the tools are brought into play upon the shell. It is not

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The Art of Cameo-Cutting. 747 advisable tb multiply tools and appliances, and, more¬ over, it is far from workmanlike. The finest works of art are generally produced with the simplest of tools, and the more skilful a man is, the less he will depend on his tools ; to wit, the artist loading on colour with his palette knife, the china-painter levelling a back¬ ground with the ball of his thumb, and so on. So some adepts laugh at the idea of using a holdfast, and some recommend it. My recommendation is to do whichever you find easier, use it or not, but remember that work which is most easily done, as far as the mechanical part goes, is usually the best. With the file in the right hand, make a start by working from the edge of the shell upwards towards the centre, re¬ moving partially by this process the white stra¬ tum that extends be¬ yond the design. Next with the scawper block out the design roughly, then cut it with a finer scawper, modelling it according to the copy. The spit-sticker comes into play when the finishing-point is being neared ; touches are given here and there, and additional sharp¬ ness where needed. Lastly, a fiat graver is used for smoothing the de¬ sign, and giving the rounded soft finish inseparable from a perfect cameo. Make a few experiments first of floral or fruit designs ; these are always easier to commence on because any erroneous cuts can usually be smoothed away or turned to good purpose by a slight alteration in the leaves, flowers, or fruit. Not so with a face ; a wrong cut if deep is irremediable here. Say that you choose a portion of the bunch of grapes as your first essay. Sketch it out in pencil rather larger than you intend the cameo to be when finished ; this allows for the diminution sure to take place during the cutting. Make use of the highest prominences for the bunch, or bunches if more than one, of grapes. File off some of the white part of the shell around the outer portion, which will ultimately be cleared from the white stratum altogether, and form the background of the design. The file should be pushed along with a sort of gliding movement ; on no account must it be struck against the shell. Now take the scawper and cut towards the outline of the design, “ rough ” out the grapes, leaves, and stems. Cutting a cameo is rather hard work ; a good deal of force is wanted to cut the white of the shell, which is hard. In holding the stick, let the left thumb reach slightly above the top ; against this press the tip of the thumb of the right hand ; this helps you to keep from giving random cuts. Do not attempt to develop any section of the design by itself, but gradually work out the whole, getting all parts in an equally advanced stage as far as possible during progress. Very probably you may now have to re¬ draw the design, but with a little more practice you will not require to do so. With a fine scawper cut the notches in the stem, and the tendrils, vein the leaves, and get the outline more perfect ; in short, model the whole more exactly. Finish the finer and more deli¬ cate portions with great care, and give the last touches with the spit-sticker ; then smooth with a flat graver. The rose makes a lovely cameo, but it is far more difficult to represent than the grapes, consequently it should form our second study. Practice will show us many little knacks of cutting with facility ; such as the occasional turn of the stick that brings the shell to bear on the scawper instead of the actual cutting with the scawper. To become a proficient in the art of cutting cameo heads, long and steady practice is essential ; nothing less can ensure true success. A small head will employ an artist for two days ; I mean an accom¬ plished artist who has spent years at the work. Ama¬ teurs, therefore, must not expect they can produce a well-finished specimen at a sitting or two. In selecting a head to begin upon let it be in profile. Our illustrations show a man’s head and a woman’s head in course of progress, and also finished. Take the former, and notice that the first sketch represents the head roughly blocked ; the second explains the method of delevopment, and the third exhibits the finished specimen. In the first stage you cut the outline but do not attempt to perfect the profile, then you indicate the features by a few simple cuts, one for the nostril, one for the mouth, and a triangle for the eye. Next you mark out the locks of hair, outline the ear, and sink the throat. In the following stage separate the hair from the forehead, the whiskers and beard from the face, get more definite outlines of eye, nostril, mouth, and ear, suggest the perfected face by horse’s head. attending to the anatomy, rounding parts, sinking others, and hinting at the expression that you intend giving to the eyes and mouth. In the third stage complete the work. Model the whole more carefully ; especially the eye, mouth, and nostril must be accu¬ rately shaped. Cut into smaller locks the masses of FLORA.

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7^8 Racing an Arab : an hair by means of curved lines given with a fine scawper. Then take the spit-sticker and go over the different parts of the face and the hair, finishing all to the best of your ability. A touch here will impart force, another there will strengthen the ex¬ pression. Use the flat graver for smoothing the face and throat. Last of all the ground is polished after being cleared thoroughly from the white. It is rather an intricate process, but not at all difficult. Cut all the white away with the round scawper, finishing with the flat tool. This must be performed with due care not to indent the ground. When all the white has disap¬ peared the polishing is commenced. The scawper leaves slight scratches which must be removed. A little piece of pumice stone is broken off the lump, the end is dipped in water, and with this the rough scratches are smoothed down. Wash the shell in warm water and soap, with a tooth-brush. Next powder a small quantity of the pumice stone ; take a thin pointed stick of firewood, dip the end of it in oil, then in the powdered stone, and rub over the ground well. Repeat the washing. Lastly, point another stick, powder some Tripoli stone, and mix it with a few drops of sulphuric acid ; dip the point of the stick in the paste thus formed, polish the ground very quickly, and rub off at once with a linen rag. The reason of this despatch is that if the paste dries it will burn the ground. If you fear you will not be able to polish with sufficient speed at first, do only a small portion at a time, rub off the paste, and do a piece more until Adventure in Syria. you have gone over the whole, then wash in cold water. The cameo thus completed, it remains only to remove it from the stick. This is accomplished by striking the stick sharply against the edge of the table, which sets the cameo free. The tools will require sharpening during the process of cutting a cameo, therefore an oilstone is kept close at hand. They must be held the reverse way whilst being sharpened to that in which they are held when working, and passed several times quickly backwards and forwards over the oilstone. Portraits are cut in cameo, but this is quite beyond the skill of a learner, though there is no reason that anyone after steady practice and close application to the work should not be able to execute good portraits. It takes much experience to produce satisfactorily a full front or three-quarter face. Our illustration of Flora is very charming, but on account of the diffi¬ culty of execution I would place it last in the list of studies. The horse’s head with horseshoe is a cameo design that is sure to be admired at the present time. Horses, their trappings, and everything connected with them are all the fashion for decorative purposes. This design would make a good ornamentation for buttons and delight ladies who hunt ; or it would be suited for a medallion on a cigarette-box. Occasionally cameos are cut on the coloured shell, leaving a white ground, but these are rare. All the accompanying illustrations are taken from models by the accomplished Italian artist. Signor G. de Giovanni. Crossley. RACING AN ARAB : AN ADVENTURE IN SYRIA. BY DAVID KER. art swift of foot, friend Ishak, as we have all seen ; but these Faringhees (Europeans) have done wonders. Methinks they would press even thee hard if thou wert set to run a race with them.” The time was noon on a hot summer day in one of the most scorching regions in the world— viz , Southern Syria ; the place was the courtyard entrance of a large house near the western or Jaffa gate of Jerusalem ; and the speakers were two Arabs of the town, who were discussing some pedestrian feats which my two English comrades and I had performed a few days before. “What words are these, Yakoob?” (Jacob) cried the other man, with a scornful laugh. “ Faringhees, say’st thou ? Show me the unbeliever who can keep pace in running, or in walking either, with Ishak Ben Yoosoof” (Isaac, the son of Joseph). At that moment I came up, just in time to hear this final boast, which the speaker pointed by facing towards me with a broad stare of defiance, filled with that supreme insolence in which any true Moham¬ medan can leave the London street-boy or the Parisian Q^ainui miles behind. There is no finer fellow alive than the Mussulman of the right sort ; but the Mussul¬ man of the wrong sort (as everyone who has been in Egypt and Afghanistan knows to his cost) is the most surly and ill-conditioned brute on the face of the earth. “ The ass thinks his bray as loud as the lion’s roar,” said I contemptuously. “ Come and walk round Jerusalem with me, and see where you will come in— unless, indeed, you grease your feet with hog’s lard, to slip along the faster.” To a Moslem this last suggestion was the worst of all possible insults, and the Arab evidently felt it as such. His dark face grew literally purple with fur>q his large black eyes glowed like live coals, and his hand went at once to his girdle in quest of the knife which, luckily for me, did not happen to be there. “Well,” asked I, “do you accept my challenge, or are you afraid The first part of Ishak’s reply consisted of about half a dozen closely printed lines of epithets, too piquantly Oriental for translation. Having concluded

Page 769

Racing an Arab : an these remarks, he was graciously pleased to observe that he did accept my challenge, and that, with the blessing of Allah and the Prophet, he would soon show me how a true believer can deal with an infidel dog. Just then my two companions came upon the scene ; and the instant they saw what was going on, the sporting instinct of the true Briton awoke in earnest. Adventure in Syria. 749 prove true. But it was indeed too late to draw back ; for this man being (as I afterwards learned) a noted local pedestrian, an eager crowd had already gathered to witness my discomfiture, and Ishak, having thrown off his loose white robe and tightened his waist-cloth was standing ready for the start. The word was given, and we were off ! Once fairly started, I suddenly realised, for the first “a full length ahead!” [p. 750). A race ! a race ! ” two. “ Go it, cripples ! the winner I ” shouted the younger of the Ten thousand to nothing on But the older looked rather grave, and said to me, in a whisper — Better not try it, Ker. These confounded Arabs don t caie a hang for the sun, you know, and it’s hardly a fair match on a day like this.” Can’t be helped,” said I doggedly : it’s too late to back out now. This fellow says he can beat me ; and I’ll take the conceit out of him, if I die for it.” Little did I think how nearly my w*ords were to time, the formidable task that I had undertaken — nothing less than racing an active Syrian Arab (to whom 120^ in the shade was quite a normal tempera ture) over four and a half miles of steep and broken ground, up-hill nearly all the way, in the full glare of a sun that had almost shrivelled up like tinder many a man of thrice my strength. Only a “ match against time ” — but a match where Death himself was the umpire, and our own lives were the stakes. It was true that I was in splendid training for such a race, having just come back from ‘‘roughing it” with the Turkish invading army in one of the hottest

Page 770

750 Racing an Arab : an districts of Southern Arabia. But, apart from the sinewy strength and endurance visible in every line of my adversary’s gaunt brown limbs, I, in my thick boots and European clothes, was naturally at a terrible disadvantage in racing a man who had hardly any¬ thing on at all. There was only one thing to do, and I did it. 1 knew that the ordinary Arab’s idea of speed is neither a walk nor a run, but a long, slouching trot, kept up with a steady, unwearying tenacity that would tire down a wolf, whose usual gait it closely resembles. But of fast walking he has little or no idea, and his heavy, dragging step makes a poor show beside the springy stride of any practised Western pedestrian. I determined, therefore, to make the pace as severe as possible from the very start, and tempt my oppo¬ nent, if I could, into trying to keep step and step with me, which, from his want of science, would be the most exhausting thing that he could possibly do. Away we went, past the once famous Pool of Hezekiah (now green and slimy as a ditch), round the corner of the narrow, uneven street leading to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, along the front of the renowned church itself, then off to the right, down a by-street, towards the traditional site of Solomon’s Temple and the vast shining dome of the Mosque of Omar. On any ordinary day this lane would have been empty during the burning hours of noon, but the crowd that followed us increased like a rolling snowball as it went along, and we entered the street with a perfect mob at our heels. Fruit-sellers, water-carriers, dusty pilgrims, and even three or four stately Turkish sol¬ diers, came scampering after us like boys following a circus ; and, worse than all, as we passed out through the Golden Gate (which faces the Mount of Olives), the rabble of hideous lepers who haunt the spot swarmed suddenly out upon us. Those who know what the streets of Jerusalem are like may imagine what it is to tramp through them on a scorching summer day at the rate of five miles an hour. But, wrought up as we \vere to a kind of frenzy by the burning sun, the shouts of the mob, and the fierce feverish excitement of the race, we would hardly have felt the pain of an actual wound, much less that of a few blisters and bruises ; and on we went over rolling stones, and gaping hollows, and rotting garbage, and mounds of dust and rubbish, as recklessly as mountain goats. But even worse was still in store for us ; for beyond the Golden Gate we had to follow a broken, uphill path, or rather ledge, between the outer wall and the brink of the deep, narrow, cleft-like Valley of Jehoshaphat. This path was literally heaped with sharp, jagged stones, every step on which must have been torture to the bare-footed Arab ; but, ruffian and bully though he was, he had all the indomitable courage of his race, and never flinched or made a sign of pain from first to last. By this time we had covered more than two-thirds of the distance, and the strain of this desperate struggle was beginning to tell with a vengeance. My breath Adventure in Syria. came in thick gasps, and my heart throbbed like the beat of a hammer, while a singing in my ears and an ever-growing sense of dull pain along the back of my head warned me that I had wellnigh reached the limit of my strength. But the sight of the Arab’s keen black eyes watching my face for some token of weak¬ ness spurred me on, for I saw (not without a certain grim satisfaction) that my rival was in even worse case than myself. His head was beginning to droop, his parted lips quivered convulsively, his bony chest shook with the sob of every laboured breath ; and though he still kept up with me, it was only by a des¬ perate effort, too exhausting to last. Meanwhile the sun grew fiercer with every moment, and sky and earth seemed all red-hot alike, as the piti¬ less glare above was darted back upon us from the bare rocks below and the glaring white walls around. And now a sudden turn brought us to the foot of the rocky ridge once crowned by Herod’s fortress of Antonia, and now occupied by the Turkish citadel. Up this ridge I went as hard as I could go without actually running, for the Arab was now so nearly spent that I felt sure that if I could force him to a fresh effort without myself breaking down in doing so, he must give in. Ishak met the trial as bravely as man could do, but it told none the less. His dark lean face was drawn and pinched like that of a corpse, his bloodshot eyes seemed starting from their sockets, and for the first time he fell slightly behind ; but he regained his lost ground with a desperate effort as he heard the yell of angry amazement that broke from the crowd, who now, for the first time, began to doubt the triumph of their champion. I too had heard and understood that cry, and, though dizzy and stumbling at every step, I gathered the last remnant of my failing strength for the final rush, which I now knew to be very near. It was, indeed. In another moment we had passed the huge grey archway of the Jaffa Gate, and there right ahead of us, not twenty yards off, stood the house that was the goal of our race, with my two English comrades standing in front of it, and shouting with all the force of their lungs — “ Put it on, Ker ! you’ll lick him yet ! ” The call nerved me to a final effort, and, darting forward, I entered the courtyard gate a full length ahead, while Ishak fell just as he reached it, and lay writhing on the hot pavement, with a froth of blood and foam round his gasping mouth. The beaten man writhed his swollen and quivering lips convulsively in a vain effort to mutter a curse, and then fainted outright, while 1, with a red mist before my eyes, and everything spinning round me w’ith a whirr like the fly-wheel of an engine, was led away by my comrades to be hastily doctored with such remedies as were to be had. But the elder of the two, when he heard my story, merely remarked, with that freedom of speech which is the birthright of every Englishman— “ Well, I always thought you were a fool, and now I’m su7'e of it ! ” And, on cooler reflection, 1 was very much of the same opinion myself.

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751 THE ORGANIST. And as rises from the ocean, Bright and beautiful, the morning. Hill and mead and stream adorning— Rose the past to his emotion. On its wings the music bore him Straight from city — street and alley— Boi’e him to his own loved valley. Set the lordly Rhine before him. Home he saw, familiar places, Vine- clad hills and shining meadows ; And from out the deepening shadows Crowded long-forgotten faces. And he heard the low of cattle, And the goat-bells tinkling faintly^ And the brown bees murmuring quaintly To the brooklet’s merry prattle. And the sound of falling water With it brought a vision holy, For where turned the mill-wheel slowly. Smiled the miller’s gentle daughter. And in accents soft and tender Spake he as in times long vanished, Ere by ruthless fortune banished From the presence of her splendour. ^^T the keyboard still he lingered. For a theme by some old master Smote his heart, and louder, faster Beat it as the notes he fingered. O the rapture of the vision ! O blue eyes and silken tresses I What to him the world’s distresses, What its laughter and derision ? And the evening shadows creeping Round the spot where he was sitting. Watched his ghost-like fingers flitting, Listened to the music weeping. From its tears he sought to borrow Solace for his bitter anguish, Peace for all things doomed to languish In the bleeding breast of sorrow. Sudden gleams and bursts of glory Lit the hopeless miserere, As through midnight dark and dreary Rolled the passion of his story. Come away, the place is haunted. Leave him quietly with his sorrow, There shall dawn a brighter morrow When his pleading shall be granted. Matthias Barr.

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752 WHAT TO WEAR IN NOVEMBER. CHIT-CHAT ON DRESS : FROM OUR LONDON AND PARIS CORRESPONDENTS. I. — FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT. N the accompanying illus¬ tration I have given you suggestions for a pretty way of rearranging any simple dress you have by you for evening wear, as well as for making a home dinner-gown. The ma¬ terial may be either silk or light woollen, and there are many of the latter which answer admirably for even¬ ing. There has been a strong attempt made to introduce plain cloth, which is a move in the right direction. It is warm, light, and most be¬ coming, but the Queen would not allow Court dresses to be made of it, and 1 consider that this checked its success momentarily. The front of such gowns can be made of either soft silk, thick muslin, or some of the many gauzes much in vogue now, or of the Russian nets. I have come across a most inexpensive black material of double width, which is made on the cur¬ tain looms at Nottingham, that would answer admir¬ ably. It has a coarse mesh and thick patterns of rounds, squares, ovals, &c. Crepe sable^ to be had in all colours, is running its second season, and is a real success, being strong, cheap, and good-looking, and of pure English make. Crepon anglais has a little figure on it, and broche spots give substance. The mode of making is, you see by the illustration, quite simple. The front is slightly draped below the waist, and there is a gathered flounce at the edge, headed by two bands of velvet. The silk back and sides are cut in one ; the bodice is made full with a waistcoat in the centre, ending in a pointed velvet band. The sleeves have a puff of the thinner material set in a band, which means that any sleeve can be easily made to look fashionably high. There is a velvet band at the throat. There are many dainty little novelties in dress this autumn, which make us smart whether we will or not. The boas made of lisse encircle the throat in the evening, and give just the necessary finish. They are made in blue, pink, white, yellow — indeed, any colour of the narrow lisse — closely gathered on a ribbon, and they fall as low as the knee. Then the Toby rufis have come in again, under a new guise ; they are generally made of two or three gatherings of mous¬ seline chiffon or lisse, or are replaced by a cross-cut piece of lisse, French-hemmed at either edge and treble-pleated. They are all tied at the throat with ribbon. Some of the newest gossamer materials made for these purposes have three or four interwoven satin stripes at the edge. The fashions this winter for children are in no way fantastical, but seem peculiarly well suited to their requirements. Woollen frocks are preferred to all others, and the pinafore form, much diversified, is greatly in favour. The upper portion of the bodice and all the sleeves are often made of silk, while over this is a dress, cut pinafore fashion, with the fulness drawn in at the waist in front under a buckle. At the back the woollen fabric crosses like braces ; the skirts are mostly perfectly plain. Spots are worn in woollen materials, though the leading shops have huge impor¬ tant checks, but the public seem to be giving their attention to spots. Some are as large as half-a-crown, many are mere peas, while the shilling and sixpenny sizes are duly represented. Open jackets are much worn by young girls, the backs cut in four distinct tabs, the fronts opening over distinct vests, often most neatly folded. Browns blended with chamois- colour, rich red, and navy-blue are more in favour than any others. Leather is used as a trimming, and the notion is not altogether too far-fetched which has appeared in some comic papers, that by-and-by we may present the same appearance as our trunks, for we are strapped and tabbed in much the same fashion. A frock which embodied the idea was in¬ tended for a child of ten. The brown and blue check had a bias hem piped with leather, the bodice opened on one side with leather tabs, used also on the cuffs, and round the waist were treble leather bands and buckles. I think the sleeves are hardly so high as they were, and many are made with one puff from elbow to shoulder, and a straight piece to the wrist. The out¬ door garments for little girls are very important ones, closely allied to a dress, almost close-fitting, reaching to the hem of the frock, the front being of a different material from the rest, and confined with a girdle. Fur is largely used, and shows best when the coat opens diagonally. Grey and white woollen brocades are often edged with blue fox. Astrakhan is in favour also. Children’s millinery is distinguished by the size of the hats, which are enormous. The shaggy-haired beaver is the favourite item in the shops, trimmed with velvet rouleaux and sea-gulls, the bird which, for the moment, is in the ascendant. Very vivid con¬ trasts hardly seem to be considered bad taste. One of the newest hats has a large fringed rosette of pink silk in the front, a happy contrast to the fawn- coloured felt of which the hat was made. It is caught up at the back with apple-green velvet. The bonnets which juvenile Americans consider so de¬ lightful have now found a home in England. I mean the close baby shape, with the cart-wheel crown, or rather the section of the wheel. The specimen I saw was composed of tartan silk, drawn on whalebone.

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753 What to Wear in November. A border of marabout feathers edged the brim, inter¬ mixed with red velvet strings. We bring wonderful ingenuity to bear on the art of dress— -a fact that is best proved, I think, by the Vene¬ tian point lace, which is one of the features of Fashion. It is of the most intricate designs, as fine as fine can be, the needle run with thread on a foundation of silk gauze! This silk fibre is subjected to the action of acid, which eats it away and leaves the thread intact. It is not cheap for imitation lace, if such a term can be applied to a fabric possessed of so much intrinsic beautv, but it is naturally not a quarter the cost of the real article. It is made four and seven inches wide, and double that width for flounces, but the most fashionable kind has the fwo edges alike and it will be greatly worn thus. 1 see it introduced into bonnets, and on all kinds of dresses, to their great improvement. Swiss and German wits are for ever hard at woik inventing novelties for the English market, and Swiss and German fingers are ever busy producing em¬ broideries and laces of many kinds. A number of exquisite embroideries for the fronts of evening gowns are being made in mousseline de soie, worked in silk heart’s-ease and bluettes being the flowers of the season! Sometimes these are divided by metallic stripes en¬ closing floral ones, and for wedding gowns, manu¬ facturers now contrive to work the pearls in with the chenille embroidery. Some of the designs are Japanese and Chinese, but though in silk the newest patterns are certainly geometrical, not so in the embroideries on lightei fabrics. All these fabrics are sold either in 4i or 2i-yard lengths. The metal thread embroi¬ deries have almost banished beads, and have the merit of greater durability. II.— FROM OUR PARIS CORRESPONDENT. Paris is enjoying a brisk trade during the fine weather and new fashions promise a fuller show of novelties than they have done for years. There is a great flood of new ideas. We are not going to be content to follow old modes. The bonnets are small and cape-like, trimmed with fur, with jet, with terry velvet; but off the head they look infinitesimal. Feathers are uni¬ versally worn, not only in millinery but for boas and many other purposes, which include collarettes. Frenchwomen of fashion are returning to the old eighteenth-century styles, when paniers and pointed waists held sway. Englishwomen have found the straight skirts so convenient that it will be some time before they learn to accustom themselves to the un¬ natural hips which the Parisian grandes dames have accepted with avidity. The convenient short skirts are to be superseded by trains. The life women lead on the British side of the Channel will prevent them accepting this m toto — at all events, at once. It may come by slow degrees, but the degrees are likely to be very slow indeed. Fashion decrees short cloaks as a matter of neces¬ sity with the paniers ; but all cloaks will not be short because the majority have not adopted the paniers, and many long garments have been brought out for adults and children. The little figure heading 768 our chapter wears one of the capital ‘^cover-alls ” so suitable for the cold weather we have every right to expect in November ; and it is moreover supplemented by the long comfortable gaiters now fashionable with shoes— certainly among the most delightful adjuncts to a short dress that can well be imagined. Grown¬ up women are wearing them too, and I saw, not long since, an amusing picture in a comic paper of a French*^ man and his wife squabbling over a pair of gaiters that both of them claimed. The child’s paletot is made in a soft thick cloth, and trimmed with galon of a ribbon- like nature with the pattern in velvet brocade. You see how this is applied. It is carried down the front and round the back, where from the shoulders it forms the heading to a gathered frill of the material having all the appearance of a shoulder-cape. The skirt is so cut that it falls full, and there is a slit pocket on the hips. Young people are always pleased with pockets, and can hardly have too many. The hat worn by the little girl shows a continuation of the large brim, which in this instance is lined with darker velvet It turns up back and front ; the material is felt, and it is trimmed with a large upstanding bow of velvet. The two young ladies discussing the all-important A THOUGHT.

Page 774

What to Wear in November. can be adapted to an overcoat as well as to a dress ; a band of the same trimming en¬ circles the neck and the cuffs of the close- fitting sleeves, which are slightly full on the shoulders. There is little to describe, but it is clearly shown in the drawing. The season’s silks are rich and handsome. Brocades take the preference, which is good news, for though they are costly to start with, they stand any amount of wear and tear. The more costly kinds show large important designs in velvet, some floral, a mixtuie of frise and ordinary pile ; others with stripes of velvet having frise patterns divjded by satin stripes, which show coloured frise sciolls of minute design. Others again have wafer spots in twos and twos, one velvet and one frise, or elliptic spots of velvet shadowed by satin spots of the same shape on a satin ground, or spots of the size of a shilling in frise network ovei satin, sunk in a velvet ground ; or with laige interlacing scrolls and arches, such as we see in some fine old groined ceilings of long ago. There are some of them distinctive in colour¬ ing, such as black and maize on a dull petunia tone of corded silk. The newest of the expensive velvets are shot, so that in certain lights they show line stripes of one of the colours ; a combination of green and red, for example, which at a cursory glance has an emerald-green surface and red back, discovers a shaded red line in certain lights. The other, black satin with a velvet brocade enclosing another colour. "ARE WE IN TIME?” These stand up in bold relief. The best I have seen had a black satin ground with a black velvet brocade with red inside this outer raised edc^e of black. Some mantles made in this are truly magnificent ; so are the black velvets with satin motifs in vivid colouring, apparently worked in satin stitch. The silk brocades show large patterns generally, mostly geometric, though often flowers emerge from the circles and angles. Tiny floral sprays finely woven in natural colours appear on serge grounds. For a young woman I can hardly imagine a more suitable dinner-gown than one of these new silks in white, with sprays of heliotrope flowers and green leaves sparsely scattered. I have seen them made with long plain skirts bunched up as paniers at the hips, pointed bodices low, and draped with lace, and made with the Stuart sleeves, in two puffs to the elbow. A sister wore a gown made in the same style, with terra-cotta and straw-coloured flowers, having blue satin stems, on a plain blue corded silk giound. Many of the satin grounds with designs like basket- work of a distinct colour are used for mixing with woollens, but there is a great diversity in good silks. Brown, petunia, sage-green, flame mixed with black, grey mixed with black, are all well worn, as also electric blue and the sapphire-blue which is more en evidence than any other colour. topic of what time it is, and how many moments are to be spared, both wear garments guiltless of the new paniers. The cloak illustrates the long, useful class, which is in fact a large Princess coat added to the capes that were originally inspired by the military element. There is a pointed piece of velvet like a habit-shirt, which extends to the waist in front and is accompanied by a rounded Medici collar ; to this is attached the familiar graduated frill, wide round the back and on the shoulders, and narrow at the waist. The coat has nothing else special about it, except the double box-pleats at the back, which give a flow, and the sleeves having wide close-fitting velyet cuffs, which meet the full sleeves, forming one puff from the shoulder. Both girls wear large hats of the flat fashionable plateau form, trimmed on the outside with plenty of feathers and bows, and kept on by a rouleau of velvet beneath, shaped to the head. The dress worn by the figure holding her watch in her hand is one of the comfortable garments now in vogue which can be slipped on in a minute, skirt and bodice in one ; the union hidden by handsome-shaped braided passemen¬ terie, which defines the waist and is of the same design as the braiding down the diagonal opening of the bodice and skirt. It is perfectly plain and indeed

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755 PICTURES OF THE MONTHS. THE GATHERER: AN ILLUSTRATED RECORD OF INVENTION, DISCOVERY, LITERATURE, AND SCIENCE. Correspondents are requested, when applying to the Editor for the names and addresses of the persons from whom further particulars respecting the articles in the Gatherer may be obtained, to forward a stamped and addressed envelope for reply, and in the case of inventors submitting specimens for notice, to prepay the carriage. The Editor cannot in any case guarantee absolute certainty of information, nor can he pledge himself to notice every article or work submitted. _ McLeod’s Sunshine Recorder. The ingenious sunshine re¬ corder of Prof. McLeod, of the Indian Engineer- i n g College, Cooper’s Hill, is shown in our engraving. It is photographic, and consists of a small cylindrical camera, c, of metal, containing the sensitive paper which is mcrked by the sunshine as re¬ flected from a silvered glass ball B. The ball is mounted on a slide provided with a rack and pinion so as to focus the reflected image of the sun on the sensitised paper. The instrument should be placed with its vertical plane in the meridian and inclined with the ball upwards, so that the axis of the camera makes an angle with the horizontal, equal to the latitude of the place at which it is planted. The Aerophor. Electricity is developed by the machinery of spin¬ ning and weaving mills, and it has the effect of touzling the fibre, so that a damp atmosphere is required in such places to allow the electricity to leak away. This is commonly secured by damping the floors, but the plan is unhealthy and injurious to the machines. A German engineer has therefore intro¬ duced the “ aerophor,” which diffuses a fine cloud of spray, either hot or cold, by means of a high-pressure pump. It consists essentially of two nozzles at right angles ; and a jet of water at high pressure being projected through one is diffused by a jet of air issuing from the other. The apparatus is fixed on the ceiling,

Page 776

'I'he Gatherer. 756 and as the particles of moisture are small and the atmosphere not superheated, the method is clean and wholesome. It was recently tried at some mills in Ashton-under-Lyne, where 468 looms were served by 1 1 aerophors with every success. Automatic Fog-Signals. Jri_ ,R.anJoiL The ordinary fog-signals on railways are a source of danger to life and limb, requiring as they do the presence of men on the lines. The automatic appa ratus shown in the figure is intended to obviate this drawback. The explosive cartridges are contained in two sets of three turrets T T', which communicate below with a cylinder C. Two hammers H H' are worked by levers actuated by the wheels of the train. When the connecting rod, shown on the left, is pulled from the signal-box, two cartridges drop into the chamber and are placed in position under each of the hammers. The elbow-levers or triggers L l' (see Fig. 2) actuating the hammers, are at the same time set between the rails, one in advance of the other. When the train passes, these levers are depressed by the wheels, and the hammers explode the cartridges one after another. When only one explosion is desired, the apparatus is made single instead of double. Boiling Lakes. At the eastern base of a mountain range, east of the Sink on the Carson River, Nevada, there is, according to an American contemporary, a small lake covering about two acres, and enclosed between red cliffs 200 to 300 feet high, which is constantly steaming, and occasionally boiling in parts from the over¬ flow of geysers or boiling springs. A brook flowing out of the lake sends up a cloud of steam for a distance of several yards. About a mile from the pond a large deposit of sulphur and alum has been discovered. There • is another boiluig lake near Lanssen’s Peak, California. Steel Trellis-Work. A machine for stamping out and twisting trellises from a steel plate, as one cuts a dia¬ mond network from a sheet of note-paper, has been invented by Mr. J. T. Golding, of Chicago, and has lately been introduced into this country. The machine not only cuts the plate, but forms the trellis, which is afterwards painted or galvanised it desired. Trellises of diamond mesh are suitable for fencing, or as a substitute for - ^ wooden laths in plastering a wall. These trellises are made in sheets of different sizes, not in a continuous roll like wire fencing. A Luminous Beetle. A recent number of the Journal of the Royal Agri¬ cultural and Commercial Society of British Guiana contains an interesting paper on the luminous larvae and beetles of that colony. Among these is a beetle evidently belonging to the Elateridce^ or spring beetles, which is strikingly beautiful when seen in a dark place. The light is emitted along the whole body of the animal, from its head to its posterior segment, which are entirely luminous, while the intermediate segments are adorned with separate rows of golden brilliants. The light is singularly bright and quite steady, except that one or more of the dorsal jets seem to wax and wane at intervals without going out. When the insect is irritated the light becomes more intense. The “ Hedgehog” Transformer. Transformers are largely used for turning electric currents of high tension into others of low tension suitable for electric incandescent lamps. A high tension current can be transmitted to a greater distance over a smaller wire than a low tension current with the same loss of power, and hence there is a saving in copper by distributing the electricity at high tension, and then transforming it into low tension current for the ser¬ vice of the lamps. These transformers are, as is well known, a modification of the “ induction coil,” and consist of a primary and secondary circuit. The high tension current is passed through the primary circuit, and induces a corresponding low tension current in the secondary circuit. 1 n this process of transforma¬ tion by induction there is a certain loss of power, due to the resistance of the primary circuit, and to the “hysteresis” or molecular inertia of the iron forming AUTOMATIC FOG-SIGNAL — FIG. 2.

Page 777

The Gatherer. 757 part of the apparatus. In the “hedgehog” trans¬ former of Mr. Swinburne the iron is broken up into a bristly form, with the result that the loss of power by hysteresis is much reduced. Such a transformer has an electrical efficiency of about 87 per cent, during a day’s work — that is to say, the loss of power in the apparatus is only 13 per cent. Bacteria and Plants. The action of the liquid secreted by so-called “ carnivorous plants ” on the insects and other crea- tall men once existed on the earth and have become extinct. A contribution to the subject has recently been made by M. de Laponge, a French archaeologist, who has discovered portions of the skeletons of two veritable giants in the prehistoric cemetery of Castlenau, near Montpellier. One of these was a skull which must have belonged to a youth about seven feet high and some eighteen years of age. The type of skull was that found in the dolmens, or stone sepulchres of Lozere. In an earthen tumulus, containing cists belonging to the Bronze Age, M. de Laponge also A NEW STEAM I.IFEBOAT. tures caught in it has been considered a process simi¬ lar to that of digestion. But, according to the obser¬ vations of M. Raphael Dubois on seven species of nepenthes in the Botanical Garden of Lyons, it is due to bacteria in the fluid. If the secretion is drawn from the receptacle before the latter opens it is pure, and albumen is not affected by it ; but, on the con¬ trary, if drawn from the opened receptacle it exerts a powerful action on the albumen, and is, moreover, found to swarm with micro-organisms. A New Steam Lifeboat. Our illustration shows the new steam lifeboat con¬ structed at Blackwall for the National Lifeboat Insti¬ tution. The engines provided 200 horse-power during a recent trial with a consumption of 2 cwt. of coal per hour. She carries enough fuel to last thirty hours. Special attention has been paid to her turning and stopping powers. She can be brought to a dead stop from full speed in 32 seconds, and at full speed can make a complete turn in 50 seconds. A Fossil Giant. Giants figure so largely in our oldest traditions that it is a serious inquiry whether or not a race of very found parts of three human bones, the tibia, femur, and humerus, which must have come from a man no less than eleven feet high. This giant must have lived about the beginning of the present geological period, and, strange to say, an old tradition places the cavern of a giant in this valley of Castlenau. Preserving Butter. According to the Revite Industrielle^ butter can be preserved without loss of taste by enclosing it in an iron holder filled with carbonic acid gas at a pressure of six atmospheres. Experiments have shown that it can be kept fresh in this way for five weeks. A Stereorama. A new attraction has been added to the Eiffel Tower in the form of a “ stereorama,” showing dif¬ ferent views of the late Paris Exhibition. The views are fifty in number and arranged in a circle round the interior of a cylindrical pavilion, which is lit inside by a powerful arc lamp. The spectators take their seats at the lenses or peep-holes on the outside of the pavilion, which rotates in such a manner by auto¬ matic mechanism that all the views are brought under their eyes in succession.

Page 778

758 The Gatherer. A New Smoke Annihllator. This apparatus is based on the idea of washing the smoke issuing from a furnace flue, and its application to an existing chimney is shown in the figure. The smoke, S, from the flue is sucked by a fan, F, into a revolving cham¬ ber, c, from which it escapes by perforations into an en¬ closing tank, T, partially filled with water. There are blades on the outside of the re¬ volving chamber, C, and these mix up the smoke with the water, while the gases escape by the pipe, P. into the chimney higher up. The chamber and fan are driven from any convenient source of power. Exhaust steam is sometimes ad¬ mitted with the smoke into the tank. The black scum which collects in the latter is drawn off from time to time. Poisonous Mussels. Healthy mussels are not poisonous, but when they live in water which is tainted with sewage they are apt to become so. The death of a lady and her four daughters some time back, in Ireland, was caused by eating mussels from a tidal pond into which some sewage flowed. It appears that when the muscular tissues of vertebrate and invertebrate animals undergo putrefaction, certain poisonous alka¬ loids, such as lutidine, collidine, and pyridine, are formed. The two last-named substances have been isolated by a chemist from the muscular tissue of a cuttle-fish. Kerosene and Spiders. A correspondent of the Scientific American points out that kerosene has the power of attracting and destroying spiders. A cup placed under the tap of a kerosene reservoir to collect the drops was found to draw the insects by its odour and quickly destroy them. Trepanning for Idiocy. Microcephaly, or insufficient growth of the skull, may cause a virtual idiocy, by arresting the develop¬ ment of the brain ; and an interesting and successful operation has recently been performed by M. Lanne- longue in the Hopital des Enfants, Paris. A girl of four years, born of healthy parents, evinced unmis¬ takable signs of idiocy ; she could neither walk nor speak, and took no interest in anything. M. Lanne- longue, after mature consideration, lifted a slip of the skull, from lo to 12 centimetres long, from the left wall ; and a month later the wound had healed, the cliild could walk, had begun to speak, and showed the usual animation. Encouraged by this success, M. Lannelongue has since operated in a similar case, with every prospect of a like result. A Submarine Spring. A submarine spring forms the water supply of the inhabitants of Bahrein Island, in the Gulf of Persia. The climate is very hot, no rain falls, and the people draw their fresh water from the sea-bottom by means of divers, who fill it into goatskins. Owing to the force of the spring, the diver uses a drag weight to keep h*im down, and after having filled the skin, he slips the drag and is floated to the surface. Ramie for Silkworms. A lady in Columbia, South Carolina, U.S., has dis¬ covered that silkworms will feed upon the leaves of the ramie or rhea plant as well as upon those of the mulberry and osage orange. Moreover, the cocoons thus produced were larger and the silk of finer quality than that from the mulberry. The information comes from our consul at New Orleans, and is given in a recent number of the Kew Bulletin. An Electric Blower. Electricity is now used for driving ventilating fans on board ship, and in other places where belts and pulleys are inconvenient. The woodcut illustrates a blower of this kind attached to the ceiling, and having the electric motor, M, which drives the fan, arranged in a very compact and accessible manner. The current is of course conveyed to the motor from the generating dynamo by means of small insulated wires. The apparatus shown is now used on board the U.S. cruiser Baltwio7'e, and discharges 1,425 cubic feet of air per minute. The Polyphone. A little time ago, M. Zigang, a French electrician, adapted the magneto telephone of Professor Bell, so as to make it emit a continuous musical note of itself, without anyone singing into or otherwise actuating it. This he accomplished by causing the vibrating plate to make and break the circuit of the magnet coil while an electric current passed through the coil. At each vibration of the plate the current was made and

Page 779

The Gatherer. 759 broken, and thus the plate was kept in continuous vibration, and a musical tone corresponding in pitch to the fundamental note of the plate produced. Obviously, with a variety of these in operation, it became possible to play an air, by stopping and starting the notes. M. Zigang has, however, now simplified the apparatus, through finding that if the same plate is touched at certain points with the point of a stylus while it is vibrating, the pitch of the note can be changed ; and thus he is able to produce a number of notes from one apparatus, or “polyphone,” as it is called, and to play a simple tune. The Small Toe. Herr Pfitzner, a German investigator, has made a large number of observations on the small toe, and finds that in the case of 31 per cent, of the male sex, and 414 per cent, of the female sex, it is in process of degene¬ ration, through the terminal bones fusing into one piece. The phenomenon is not confined to adults, but is equally common amongst children, and Herr Pfitzner does not regard it as an effect of wearing shoes. Whether the process will continue until the fifth toe is eliminated altogether is, of course, uncertain. An Ironing Machine. The figure illustrates an improved machine for ironing linen cuffs, collars, and fronts. The top roller A is of polished steel and heated inside by means of gas. Perforators in the end of this roller admit air to the flames and allow the fumes to escape. The lower pulley B is padded on the surface, and the handle H presses it against the ironing roller A, while the small hand-wheel I, seen below, is used to vary the pressure between the two rollers as the linen passes through. Several manufacturers of cuffs and collars are now using the machine. A Pioneering Boat. The portable boat which is shown in our engraving has been constructed of galvanised steel for the use of the Universities Mission in Central Africa. It is 14 feet long by 4 feet wide, and weighs about 5 cwt. The seats and thwarts are made of teak, and the floor of pine. There is a packing of india-rubber between the frames of the shell, and the whole can be taken in pieces or put together in a short time. It is eminently adapted for pioneering work in Africa. The Growth of Boys and Girls. Recent measurements made by Herren Geisler and Ulitzch on school-children at Freiberg, in Saxony, show that between the ages of eleven and sixteen girls are generally taller than boys, and that the boys then overtake the girls and keep the lead. The same thing was observed in American children by Dr. Bowditch of Harvard, some years ago, and by Mr. Charles Roberts in England. The Siemens-Violle Standard of Light. The international standard of light is the quantity of light emitted by a square centimetre of melted platinum at the moment of solidification. M. Violle, the originator of this standard, has devised an appa¬ ratus for producing it in practice ; but it is somewhat inconvenient, and with the aid of Dr. Werner Siemens the following apparatus has been introduced as a sub¬ stitute. In it the electric current is employed to fuse the necessary area of platinum foil, and the standard is the quantity of light emitted from it at the moment of fusion. If it should be found to vary to any material extent from the Violle standard, a correc¬ tion will be applied when the latter has been deter¬ mined once for all by careful experiments. The ap¬ paratus consists of a small box K K, shown in the figure. On the bottom of the box is an insulated metal plate A, carrying a small drum of platinum

Page 780

The Gatherer. 760 itrip or foil R, a movable half-cylinder a larger fixed cylinder M, and a terminal P. The platinum strip passes under M and against which it is pressed by the spring/, and runs to the plate s, where it is clamped by the claw z. The strip is then tightened by turning in backwards, and the current of electricity sent through it by way of the terminals P, Q. This melts the platinum between M and z, and the light emitted is observed through the aperture D. To repeat the operation, the handle g is pressed, thus pushing s and Z forward, at the same time lifting z. On pulling g back, a fresh supply of platinum is brought into place and rendered incandescent as be¬ fore. The Barking Sands of Hawai. In a former Gatherer we gave an account of the sonorous sands of the Jebel Nagous or Bell Mountain on the Gulf of Suez, which had been examined by Dr. Julian, of New York, and Mr. H. C. Bolton. The latter has recently paid a visit to Hawai in order to investigate the so-called “ barking sands ” of these islands. There is a tract of these sands on the south coast of Hawai, in the district of Mana, where they take the form of dunes or sand-hills about one hundred feet high. The sand is calcareous, and appa¬ rently a mixture of broken coral and shells. When they are dislodged from the side of a dune by the feet, they slide down the slope with a deep bass tone which can be heard over a hundred feet away. The noise has been likened to the hum of a buzz-saw in a planing mill, and the note is much ,the same as that emitted by the sands of Jebel Nagous. When two quantities of the sand are separated in a bag and forcibly brought together, the shock is accompanied by a curious hooting noise. The drier the sand, the louder the sound. A bag of the sand will preserve its sonorous property for a considerable time. The natives of the island attribute the sound to the com- THE SIEMENS-VIOLLE STANDARD LA.Ml*. plaints of the spirits of the dead who, according to an old custom, were buried in these dunes. A similar sand is also found at Niihan, another island of the group. Mr. Bolton believes the phenomenon is due to films or cushions of air, capable of vibration, sur¬ rounding the dry grains of the sand. THE /;8o PRIZE STORY COMPETITION. prajHE Editor has pleasure in announcing the award in the /80 Story Competition, which, owing to number of MSS. received, is somewhat later than was originally anticipated. The competition has been in every way a success, and we must congratulate the competitors on the high standard of the work sent in. It will be seen that (on account of this MS. being nearly up to the mark of the second-prize story) an extra, or third, prize of /50 has been awarded. Many of the other .stories, although not gaining a prize, are exceptionally good, and far above the average. But the following author certainly heads the list, and therefore The First Prize of /So is awarded to — Constance E. C. Weigall, 12, The Avenue, Sunderland. The Second Prize of /60 to— Fay Axtens, 48, Fernbank Road, Redland, Bristol. The Extra Prize of /50 to— Edith Lister, 41, Campbell Road, Southsea. The MSS. in the Four-Part Story Competition are now under detailed consideration, and the award will be made known as early as possible.

Page 781

A Classified Catalogue OF CA88ELL & COMPANY’8 PUBLICAT10N8. Id. 2d. 3d. 4d. 6d. 9(L Historical Cartoons, Descriptive Account of. Cassell’s New Poetry Readers. Illustrated. 12 Books. Each. Contractions in Writing for the Press, Report of the Committee on, [W. Kirton, LL.D. The Secret of Success and How to Attain it. By John Cassell’s New Standard Drawing Copies. 6 Books. Each. (See also 3rl. mid 4d.) Cassell’s School Board Arithmetics. Cassell’s Modem School Copy Books. 12 Books. Each. Cassell’s Graduated Copy Books. 18 Books. Each. The Rating of Ground Rents. CASSELL’S NATIONAL LIBRARV. Paper covers. 3d. each ; cloth. 6d. A full List of the 209 Volumes now ready sent fost free on application. Cassell’s Standard Drawing Copies. 6 Books. Each. [See also 2d. and 4d.) Cobden Club Pamphlets. (Liston application.) ZrishParliament, A Miniature History of, ByJ. C.HasIam. Cassell’s Standard Drawing Copies. 2 Books. Each. (S'e also 2'i. and 3d.) Cassell’s Readable Readers. Illustrated and strongly bound. Two Infant Readers at s'Ad. and 3d., and Six Books for the Stand¬ ards, at 6d. to IS. id. List on apfilicaiion. The Modern School Readers. Four Infant Readers at 3d. to 5d.. and Five Books for the Standards at to is. 3d. A List on application . The Modern Reading Sheets. In Three Series, each con¬ taining Twelve Sheets, 2s. each. ( '<ee also ss.) Readers for Infant Schools, Coloured. 3 Books. Each containing 48 pages, including 8 pages in Colours, Each. Shakespeare’s Plays. 36 Parts. Or 36 in Box, 12s. The Seven Plays produced at the Lyceum, in paper box, 2s. 6d. ; or cloth, in cloth box, ss. ; or French morocco, in box, los. 6d. Sheridan and Goldsmith’s Plays. Separate. Each. EDUCATIONAL. Laundry Work for Schools, By Emma Lord. The Modem Geographical Readers. Introductory Lessons. For Standard 1 . 6d. Introductory Lessons. For Standard 1 1 . 8d. England and Wales. For Stan¬ dard III. . . . lod. Scotland, Ireland, British North America, Austrailasici. For Standard IV, . . . is.od. Europe. For Standard V. is. od. The World. For Standards VI. and VII. . . .is. 8d. Shakespeare’s Plays for School Use. Cloth. Each. ■Richard III. Henry V. Hamlet. Julius Caesar. Coriolanus. Euclid, Cassell’s First Four Books of. Paper, 6d. (Cloth, gd.) Drawing Books for Voung Artists, 6d. each How to Draw Elem0ntar.v Forms, Models, &c. How to Draw Floral and Ornamental Forms. How to Draw Landscapes, Trees, Ships, &c. How to Draw Animals, Birds, and Dogs. Arithmetics, The Modern School. By George Ricks, B.Sc. In 7 Books. Stands, I. to IV., paper covers, 2d. each ; cloth, 3d. each. Books for Stands. V. to VII., paper covers, 3d. each ; cloth, 4d. each ; Answers, 6d. A School Bank Manual, By Agnes Lambert. [see 3d.) Cassell’s National Library. Vols., in cloth. (For List of y'ols., MISCELLANEOUS. The Condition of the People. By the Ven. Archdeacon Sinclair, B. D. Shall we Know One Another in Heaven 7 By the Rt. Rev. J. C. Ryle, M. A., Bishop of Liverpool. 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Latin Primer^ The First. By Prof. Postgate, M.A. Science Applied to Work. By J. A. Bower. Illustrated. Science of Everyday Life. By J. A. Bower. Illushated. Reckoning^ Anglo-American Art of. By C. Frusher- Howard. (See also 2s.) Cassell’s “Modern School” Test Cards. Each set. Cassell’s “Combination” Test Cards. Six Sets. Each. Flowers, Studies in. In Thirteen Packets, each containing Six Flowers. Each Packet. lOd. 1/- Cassell # Company^ Limited^ Ludgate Bill, London ; Paris and Melbourne, 15 G— 8.90

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8 Cassell ^ Company's Classified Price List. 42/- cont'd. Egrsrpt I Descriptive, Historical, and Picturesque, Popular Edition. By Prof. G. Ebers. Translated by Clara Bell, with Notes b^ Samuel Birch, LL.D., D.C.L., F.S.A. a Vols. With about 800 Original Engraving^. Picturesque America, Complete in Four Vols., with Forty- eight Exquisite Steel Plates and about 800 Original Wood Engravings. Each. Til® tifo of Christ, By the Ven. Archdeacon Farrar, D.D. Two Vols. morocco. [See also 6s., 7s. 6d., los. 6d., 15s., 21s., and 24s.) St. Paul, The Ufe and Work of. By the Ven. Archdeacon P'arrar. Library Edition, morocco. Illustrated Edition, morocco. (See also 6s., 7s. 6d., los. 6d., rss., and 21s.) Farrar's Early Days of Christianity. Library EdUion. Two Vols. Morocco. (See also 6s., 7s. 6d., los. 6d., 15s., and 24s.) Poultry, The Book of. By Lewis Wright. With Fifty Coloured Portraits, half-morocco. (See also los. 6d. attd 31s. 6d.) Pigreons, The Book of. By R. Fulton. 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