The Cosmopolitan 1887-12: Vol 4 Iss 4

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‘THE COSMOPOLITAN. VoL. IV. DECEMBER, 1887. THE SHAH AND HIS COURT. By WOLF VON SCHIERBRAND. | ggg his two visits to Europe, Nusr- ed-Deen Shah is essentially a barba- rian; and it is probable that the third visit that he is about to make will not change him. He possesses most of the faults and a few of the virtues of one, and a truthful, unvar- nished narrative of his life and surroundings will confirm this assertion. To make some of the things affirmed in this article comprehensible to the reader, it must be borne in mind that although Persia is a poor country (by reason of its resources lying undeveloped and the many centuries of misrule and internal strife), the Shah himself is perhaps the wealthiest prince on earth—certainly one of the wealthiest—just as the reigning dynasty of Saxony, who rules overa land of very small size, is much wealth- ier and possesses larger estates than does the Emperor of Germany. Again, with the persistence of the Oriental to live with his thoughts in the past, the average Persian, ig- noring the cold facts, still believes his coun- try to be the most powerful in the world. Nusr-ed-Deen (Light of the World) belongs to the Kadjar dynasty, which obtained su- preme control in Persia about one hundred years ago. It was founded by the able Khadje Mehmed Khan, who became famous in his- tory under the title of the Eunuch King, and his successors—Agha Mohammed Khan, Feth Ali Shah, Mehmed Shah, and Nusr-ed- Deen Shah—have all been men more or less gifted by nature. The present Shah must have inherited his moral weakness and nar- rowness of mind from his father, Mehmed Shah, who stood all his lifetime under the 25 VM AU complete domination of Hadjee Agassi, sur- named Maku, a man of plebeian birth and manners, but of great energy of character and shrewd in everything that touched his own interests. Only once the traditional ferocity of the Kadjar race broke through with Mehmed Shah, when he caused tlhe great kaimakam (grand vizier) to be foully murdered. Nusr-ed-Deen has been guilty of many deeds of this nature. He was born in 1830, his mother being Maedeh Alia, daughter of the Kadjar chief, Kaseem Khan. Neither mother nor son was ever a favorite with Mehmed Shah; and even at the hour of his birth Nusr-ed-Deen’s mother was virtually in banishment in a village near Tabriz, not many miles from the Caucasian border line of Asiatic Russia. The young Prince exhibited the outward charac- teristics of his race even more plainly than had his father. He looks quite otherwise than does the modern Persian of pure lin- eage. His eyes have a melancholy, veiled look and are too near the nose ; he is of tall- er stature—six feet high—whereas the Per- sians average about five feet five inches ; he has decided bow-legs and his organs of speech are so fashioned that even at the pres- ent day he can not properly pronounce the Farsee, with its innumerable hoarse gutturals and its odd vowel sounds. His mother did not speak Persian but only a dialect of Turk- ish, and as this, too, is spoken universally in that part of Persia in which he was brought up, the Prince habitually spoke Turkish till his accession to the throne, and learned Per- sian in a desultory manner as one would Vea

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THE COSMOPOLITAN. SHAH’S WINTER PALACE IN ASHUR-ADABAD NEAR TEHERAN. master a foreign language. Evento-day the -—with a strong foreign accent to it; and Shah speaks Farsee much as he does French there ail? Pe. 5 WY; e MANTEL IN THE GRAND TALL OF THE SHAH'S PALACE IN TEHERAN. are many words in Persian that he is unable to pronounce at all, such as the phrase, ‘‘kheilee khoub’’ (very well), which recurs hundreds of times a day. The young Prince’s early education was sadly neglected, and he and his mother had to undergo all manner of vicissitudes and humiliations, the memory of which still rankles in the monarch’s breast. As he was very awkward in his manners and gait, and spoke in a timid, hesitating way, he drew several years ago one of the in- numerable caricatures that form with him a source of unfailing amusement, and showed the sketch to his courtiers. It was a slightly exaggerated repro- duction of himself as he looked and acted just before he attained to the throne. ‘‘Who is this?’’ he asked his minions. None dared speak. ‘“'That was I, as I felt and looked at that time,’’ he said. ‘‘ Many a time did we lack food, my mother and I,’’ he continued, drawing a deep sigh. ‘“ Where then were you fellows, now so lavish in your protestations ? ’’ As his father strongly disliked him,

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THE SHAH AND HIS COURT. it had been the intention to make the second son, Abbas Mirza, the heir, although the law, as fixed in the treaty of Turcomanchai, en- titled Nusr-ed-Deen to the succession. This project was harbored by Mehmed Shah for a number of years, and, despite the threats of Russia to enforce the rightful heir’s claims if need be, it would have been carried out if the Prince’s death had not intervened. Even then, however, Mehmed Shah did not recon- cile himself to the idea of having Maedeh Alia’s son succeed him, and, but for his ha- bitual procrastination, and death finding him unprepared, the unnatural father might yet have deprived his son of the heritage. Nusr-ed-Deen saw this father (who hated him so cordially) but a half-score of times in his life, and it is said that he never heard a kind word from him. The Shah, on those rare occasions when he admitted Nusr-ed- Deen into his presence, took delight in hum- bling and abusing him, even in the presence of slaves and underlings. He would give orders to furnish him with none but ill-fitting garments of mean material, and to give him the poorest and meanest fare. On one oc- 259 casion, when the young Prince, then a boy of twelve, was brought into the room where they had told him his father was, he found the latter’s favorite child, of about the same age as the heir, with him, receiving tender caresses and words of endearment, while no attention was paidtohim. This half-brother of Nusr-ed-Deen was the son of a slave, a dancing woman of low extraction ; and the Shah showered all his paternal affection on him—a bright and handsome boy—and en- couraged him to indulge in every whim. To amuse him once, when the boy was in bad humor, the Shah caused a number of people to be gathered in from the street and had them executed with the most refined cruelty; whereat the little fellow clapped his hands and regained his usual gayety and lightness of heart. On another occasion, this fledgling, egged on by Mehmed Shah, shot a barbed and pointed arrow at Nusr-ed- Deen that narrowly missed the young Prince’s eye. Thus systematically maltreated and neg- lected, without training and instruction, Per- sia’s present ruler grew up and became at SUMMER RESORT OF THE ZAHIS-ED-DOULEH.

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THE COSMOPOLITAN. 2 —_ 7.3 “ Bi 71 d uF D ll. i sm PARK IN KAMZANITEH. (Summer resort of the third son of the Shah.) fourteen a big, bony, lank boy, who stam- mered, and talked but the rough dialect of his mother’s teaching. He was made Gov- ernor of Azerbeidjn, that northwestern province whose capital town is Tabriz, and whose inhabitants are of Turkish origin. His fortunes then slightly mended, and he began to observe men and things and to learn how to control and rule them. But even into his new and important office his father’s ill-will followed him, and many a time, because his salary was not sent reg- ularly, the young Prince and his mother were deprived even of the necessaries of life. Once, after waiting impatiently for the where- withal to keep the pot boiling, a tax-collector sent what purported to be the revenues of a certain district. Imagine the disgust of Nusr-ed-Deen when it was discovered that they consisted only in kind, such as field produce, lumber, and the like. One lot—a number of fine rugs—had to be sold at great loss to an Armenian dealer to furnish next day’s dinner. The young Prince had in this checkered way grown to man’s estate and become eighteen years old, when, on October 15, 1848, Mehmed Shah died. This tyrant’s death was attended with circumstances sim- ilar to those occurring at the death of Louis

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THE SHAH AND HIS COURT. XV. Everybody who had by illegitimate means grown fat and rich under his reign sought safety from the wrath to come in pre- cipitate flight. Hadjee Agassi, the late King’s unscrupulous toady, at once decamped with all of the wealth he had stolen and swindled people out of for long years, taking his clique of friends and tools along with him to his native town of Maku. None of the wives and children even of the dead despot troubled themselves about his remains. The corpse lay uncared for, with the meaningless stare of death in the unclosed eyes, in a back room of the castle at Teheran, where the old King had suddenly breathed his last. The limbs were still twisted in the agony of death, and the long beard, dyed a raven hue a few hours before the dread hater of all 261 shams came to seize his prey, was still bedraggled with the foam that had oozed out between the bluish lips. Thus the dead King lay, only partially covered with a rug, ‘‘ with none so poor to do him reverence,’’ for four days and nights, till the long-neglected son and heir appeared on the threshold of the little room, cast a long, wistful glance at the somber face of the father who had been no father to him, sniffed the air of decay emanating from the fast decomposing body, and gave strict or- ders to pay all due honors and religious rites to these poor remains of what had been but a few days before a haughty and all- powerful King. Mehmed Shah was speedily buried with all the pomp and circumstance his successor had decreed, but only hirelings THE SHAH OF PERSIA.

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262 followed the cortege to the grave, and the rabble cursed the dead when they had not dared to curse the living. Nusr-ed-Deen had had a rough time of it these four days till he appeared by the side of his father’s putrescent body. Russia had always favored Nusr-ed-Deen, and some of the few historical lessons he had received in his boyhood had made him a blind admirer of Russia and of her czars, Peter the Great and Nicolas, who, with Frederick the Great, have remained his ideals through life. Thus, when the then Russian Consul-General, M. Anitchkoff, had been informed by a well-paid spy of the death of Mehmed Shah, he at once and at full speed set out to tell Nusr-ed-Deen of it, so as to enable the latter to be in Tehe- ran and claim the successorship first, for it was well understood that pretenders would arise to contest the rightful heir’s claims to the crown, among those being Firouz Mirza and the Ilkhani, an uncle to Nusr-ed-Deeu. M. Anitchkoff, after a long and. dangerous ride of several hundred miles, arrived at the Prince’s palace at three o’clock in the morn- ing, and had him awakened at once and saluted as the new Shah. As usual a lack of funds troubled Nusr-ed-Deen, but his good fortune at this critical juncture, and the exertions of M. Anitchkoff. brought him THE COSMOPOLITAN. into contact with the Ameer Mirza Taghi, who put his vast private fortune com- pletely at the disposal of his young sovereign. With this money troops were quickly hired, and the outfit for the journey to Teheran (to be made with Ori- ental splendor) was, of course, procured. The Ameer hastily beat back the straggling hosts of one of the pretenders who had al- ready collected forces at Kaswin, and made the road clear for the youthful Shah, who effected a dignified entry into Teheran on the morning of the second day after. The vari- ous rebellions in the south of Persia were drowned in a deluge of blood, and the state of anarchy that prevailed for several months after Mehmed Shah’s death soon gave way to comparative order and quiet. Ameer Mirza Taghi was appointed grand- vizier by the young Shah, and he proved not alone a faithful friend to the inexpe- rienced youth but a man of unusual gifts, energy, and ideas, who began to institute a number of reforms which, in the main, were greatly needed, and which benefited the country at large. The Shah gave this re- markable man (who might have rejuvenated Persia and enabled her once more to take her stand with the mighty powers of the world) his sister, Malek Zadeh, then a girl COUNTRY PALACE OF ZIL-ES-‘SULTAN NEAR ISPAHAN,.

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THE SHAH AND H/S COURT. ~ Rech SE, t ~ : pe oe rs _ a: Lal “e* i» et " | 4 I Gatcal M ' fs TCHFHEL MINAR. (Ruined Palace of the last Dynasty.) of twelve, for a wife, to attach him to his person and interests by ties of marriage as well as friendship. As the Shah was quite inexperienced, ignorant, and very awkward, the great Ameer became, in the seclusion of the palace, the tutor of his sovereign, and taught him not only the complicated rules of Per- sian etiquette, but also the language, literature, and historyofthe country,read- ing and writing, and how to speak and bear himself in public. Inthe space of two years these lessons bore fruit, and the royal pupil learned how to look and act his part. Meanwhile, too, the stricter and more system- atic administration of the country, the founding of new schools and the im- provement of the roads, etc., brought about a larger revenue to the Shah’s coffers and greater wealth tc his people as well. Everything seemed to have been put on a more prosperous basis. Unfortunately, the Shah had begun to give heed to flatterers and cringing minions, who poisoned his mind so as to make him suspect the man who had been his friend in need, and to interpret ev- ery new reform, every wise measure of the Ameer, as another’ step to supplant or oust MARBLE THRONE IN THE SHAH’S PALACE,

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THE COSMOPOLITAN. his master and seize the sovereign power. This suspicion finally became a conviction, and the downfall and death of the wise pre- mier was resolved upon. In November, 1851, after ruling wisely for three years, Ameer Mirza Taghi was driven into exile, and a successor given him in the person of Mirza Agha Khan, a man full of ruses and insin- cerity, who managed to make the Shah be- lieve that he was ruling the country, while the vizier was really doing it. This man became immensely rich within a few years, when he, too, fell and was plundered. The murder of his friend and benefactor, Ameer Mirza Taghi, is probably the worst thing the Shah has done in his life. After driving him into banishment the young King sent out his assassins to put the disgraced dignitary entirely out of the way, and thus rid him ofan ever-haunting fear. The Ameer was finally strangled in his bath, and the Shah had no longer to dread him. Whether the fears of the Shah were well-founded or not is hard to tell at the present day, as Orientals are not in the habit of confiding damaging correspondence to secret drawers nor of leaving note-books or diaries with compro- mising entries lying about ; and the Ameer has probably left nothing behind him to either exculpate or inculpate him. Anyway, right or wrong, the Persian never thinks of criticising his ruler’s actions. He has a proverb: ‘‘ Kismet est. Hamme male shah. Umre padishah daraz bashod.”’ (Such is fate. Everything is the king’s. Long life to the king !) The last thing that the murdered Ameer would have thought of, probably, would have been to try to justify himself, or to inquire whether the treatment he had received was just or unjust. It can not be said, at any rate, that the Shah has at any time since shown signs of remorse at this or at the other actions that we, with our Western notions of morality, would condemn. The morality of the Persian is radically differ- ent from our own. Even in the days of Saadi, the poet, things were at such a pass that one of his precepts—‘‘ A lie told for a good purpose is preferable to the truth which creates discord’’—was, and is still, con- sidered a marvel of wisdom and sagacity, and the late grand-vizier, Sadr Azem, coolly told one of the British diplomats, when the latter expressed disgust at having been broken faith with: ‘‘Take this as a rule: a ; 5 ; } “e) hohe a Riad bi at bio, rs , ia At .) re ‘ya. COURT-YARD IN NAIB-ES-SULTAN’'S PALACE.

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THE SHAH AND HIS COURT. ARTILLERY SQUARE IN TEHERAN, (With entrance to the Shah’s Palace.) All I say is untrue; what I write may be true.”’ The Shah certainly has his goodly share of that peculiar conceit that goes largely to make up the Oriental despot, and he has well-defined and rather good-sized ideas as to what is due him and hisrank. He has quite a stock of titles and forms of address, such as Shah, Shahinshah (King of Kings), Khakan (a Kadjar title), Padishah, Alahac- zret (Majesty), which latter is the formal appellation that he goes by. The usual phrases in addressing him, however, are, Kaéebleh atim (Point toward which the Earth inclines), and ‘‘ Kurban shalwém’’ (May I become your sacrifice). It is not customary to address the Shah in any more direct man- ner; but if, in the course of a conversation, it can not possibly be avoided, he is not spoken to as ‘‘shdma’’ (you), which is the common form of address in polite Persian, but as ‘‘/o”’ (thou). In his intercourse with European diplomats the French “Votre Majesté’’ is employed, being at once inter- preted by the dragoman into one of the above Persian phrases, and in addressing him in writing he is spoken to and of as ‘‘ Votre Majesté Imperial.” The Shah lacks breadth of view and com- prehensiveness of ideas, and everything for 26 the last thirty-five years has tended to make this fatal defect in his character as a ruler more pronounced. He is capable only of judging isolated facts, but never when pre- sented to him in their correlation. The en- durance and hardiness of the Persian horse is, for instance, undeniable. One day, when the Shah, in company with a number of courtiers, had climbed a steep mountain, six thousand feet high, he turned around to a European in his suite and asked, ‘‘ Now, could your horses in Ferenghistan climb as high as this and yet remain fresh and service- able?’’ Whenthis had been negatived, he continued : ‘‘ That is why you have good roads in your countries and we have not. If you had our horses you would have no better roads than we.’’ Of late, however, since his visits to Europe, he has become convinced that railroads would be a benefit to Persia, and he wishes some built. Yet he will not spend a cent of the untold wealth in his pri- vate treasury to accomplish this, nor devote any part of his revenues to it, or give guar- antees of any kind, because he has been told that in America all the railroads have been built with private capital, entirely forgetting that the circumstances in each case, and the conditions of the two countries, are radical- ly different.

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266 It is this narrowness of view and this ina- bility to see things in their true light, to- gether with his avarice, that have prevented the Shah from becoming the wise and efficient ruler he otherwise might have developed into. For Nusr-ed-Deen, although not ac- cording to our standard of morals a high type of man, possesses several virtues that are rare enough in the Orient. He has a good stock of common sense, is just and humane in all ordinary cases, is anxious for all kinds of improvements, so long as they do not cost him anything, and has, by dint of traveling, reading of French illustrated newspapers, and conversations with Euro- peans, picked up much general information. His avarice, though, spoils everything in the line of reform that he engagesin. Let me cite a few samples. When his army was reorganized in 1873 and put (in theory at least) on a European footing, he also pur- chased twenty-five thousand breech-loading guns. As his whole infantry numbers less than that, this stock was sufficient. He en- gaged, by contract and fora number of years, Austrian, German, French, and Russian mili- tary instructors, and paid them good salaries. But his penuriousness made all this ineffect- ual ; for he could not bear to have those nice, shining, smoothly polished guns handed over to the tender mercies of the common soldiery, who have probably no rivals in ig- norance and stupidity in the world. He locked the guns up, and has kept them safe away from his men ever since, so that the European instructors, drilled in the hand- ling of breech-loaders, had to unlearn their science and show these Persian dolts in uni- form how to present arms with worn-out matchlocks, and how to fire off guns without powder or cartridge. Some of these Euro- pean officers confess to-day that they would not know how to handle a _ breech-loader themselves, having become so accustomed to the use of the old smoothbores and match- locks. But the twenty-five thousand guns are safe--only so eaten up with rust that they would bring but little as old iron. The Shah pays small salaries to a certain proportion of his servants, employees, and dignitaries, if the money comes out of his own pocket; that is, out of the legitimate revenues of the country; but he pays at least promptly and fairly what he agrees to pay. After deducting what he deems THE COSMOPOLITAN. right for army, administration, and house- hold purposes, he puts the balance away regularly every year into his private treas- ury. Once the money—which must always be coin—has been dumped into his vaults, no power on earth can induce the Shah to give the slightest portion of it back again, or to touch it for atiy purpose whatsoever. To what a ridiculous extreme he carries this. maxim of his is shown by the fact that last year, for instance, he borrowed money of the Armenians and paid usurious interest on it, to cover an expenditure he had not foreseen, sooner than go to his strong-box and take from its illimitable treasures the smallest portion. Heis not a prompt debtor in such cases, for this same Armenian had to resort to a peculiar expedient in vogue in Persia to get back his money—forty thousand ‘oman (sixty thousand dollars). Hestrode into the royal stables one fine day last spring, and, seizing the tail of the nearest horse, ex- claimed : ‘‘ Penah avordam”’ (I have sought protection). An ancient custom makes it incumbent on the debtor under such circum- stances to tolerate the presence of his cred- itor in his house or stable, and to provide for him and his family until the debt is can- celed. The Shah held out for a little while, but finally settled with his Shylock on fair terms. The Shah’s close-fistedness betrays itself in many petty ways. He derives quite a respectable income by exacting a certain sum from the ministers of the different nations represented in Teheran, every time he has granted an audience tooneofthem. He will send one of his higher servants with the formal demand to pay up on the morning succeeding the audience, and the money is, ofcourse, always promptly paid. This is sup- posed to defray the expenses of his recep- tion ; but as His Majesty never serves any- thing in the way of refreshment to his diplo- matic friends save the saccharine matter termed ‘‘taffy’’ in American slang, these expenses are really only imaginary ones. Again, he will go about during a large part of the year visiting his higher dignitaries and staying generally several days with each one of them. As, on such occasions, not only the Shah and his immediate suite have to be entertained and cared for by the host, but his numerous retinue of servants and hangers-on as well, and as an immense sup-

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THE SHAH AND HIS COURT. ply of the choicest dishes has to be served at each meal and alarge ‘‘ pishkish’’ (present) to be made the Shah in parting, many a one of these dignitaries is temporarily ruined by the honor forced upon him ; and the Shah is saved the expense of housekeeping and of feeing his servants. While on his round of visits last spring the Shah had dinner at the house of the Ikbal-ed-Davuleh (grand chamberlain), and a huge dish, embellished with hyacinths and other harbingers of the warm season, was put before the sovereign’s plate. It bore a pile of early cucumbers, almost worth their weight in gold.* The Shah said never a word, but began to put himself outside of as many of these cholera-provokers as he could safely do. Hehad burieda couple of dozen of them, and the host and his more prominent guests began to indulge the hope that their turn would soon come, when His Majesty quietly and solemnly stowed the remainder away in his bosom and pantaloons and left the table literally loaded. The Shah is superstitious, and can be very cruel. He firmly believes in astrology (moonadshim), and the horoscope (¢d/eh) must always be taken and must have pro- nounced favorably before he will venture on any journey, even on a brief trip or a hunt- ing excursion. And then he will turn back if some bad omen—any one of the thousand and one things that the Persians call ‘' dade khaden’’ (bad luck) should present itself. It has happened that he has given up a long- planned trip because at the moment of start- ing a crow flew across his path. He believes sneezing to be a sure forerunner of misfor- tune, and as closely observes the flight of birds as did the Roman augurs ofold. Only in the matter of jewelry he is unsophisti- cated. While, for instance, the average Per- sian considers the turquoise as the stone of all others that brings the best fortune to its owner, the Shah is not at all particular. He will just as soon take diamonds, rubies, and even such stones as are held to involve bad luck, as topazes. The Shah is not so steeped in sensuality as his grandfather, Feth Ali Shah, was ; and *The Persians are passionately fond of cucumbers, and eat incredible quantities of them raw, without salt or any other condiment. This food never seems to disagree with them, and is considered in the light of harmless fruit. Early in the season, when the firstcu umbers are 267 though he, too, is a great admirer of the sex, and is even to-day not entirely insensible to the charms of his well-stocked andaroun, he has in the main been rather austere than otherwise in his relations with his wives, the popular impression to the contrary notwith- standing. I was told on credible authority that even twenty years ago the Shah would often remain faithful for a number of weeks to one woman out of the sixty odd composing his flock ; and he will often goon long hunting excursions without having any female solace along with him. When he was young and ambitious, Nusr- ed-Deen cherished glittering dreams of con- quest. One of the results of the lessons in history he had received from the great Ameer was to inspire him with the wish to enlarge his domains again to the size they were under Nadir Shah (whose name is still a household word in Persia), or, better still, under the reign of the Sassanian dynasty. The great Ameer would reason with him and try to convince him that it was not a larger territory he needed, but a happier people, .a long peaceful reign, and the rational devel- opment of the great resources of his coun- try. Yet, with a despot’s obstinacy, Nusr- ed-Deen clung to his idea, and under succeed- ing grand viziers attempted to carry out his plans. He waged fierce and bloody wars against Afghanistan, and his troops, largely under the command of brave European ad- venturers, such as Count Borowski, General Seminot (a Frenchman), and others, once act- ually seized the larger part of that country and took Herat by storm. He was also suc- cessful in the campaign against the Imaum of Mascot, capturing Bender Abbas on the Persian Gulf. But the foolish war against England, with the murderous engagements at Mohammerah and Busheer, and the yet more disastrous campaigns and razzias against the Turcomans, depleted’ his treasury, reduced his army greatly, and laid whole districts of his country waste, without in any way add- ing to his military glory or possessions. Strange to say, though so eager for laurels, Nusr-ed-Deen never went to war himself, but always remained at a safe distance out raised in the southern provinces, fancy prices are paid for them by the wealthy, often up to one or even two fomdn (a dollar and a half to three dollars) apiece. Later on they are extremely cheap.

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268 of harm’s way. The incompetence of his generals and the inefficiency of his soldiers having been at last sufficiently demonstrated to him, he relinquished his dreams of ter- ritorial aggrandizement and turned his thoughts to other things, such as a reorgan- ization of his army and the gradual replen- ishment of his private treasury. A strange peculiarity of the Shah is his broad humor, his fondness for practical jokes, and his passionate love of caricature— strange because so unusual for an Oriental, on whom our humor is generally’ wasted, it being incomprehensible to him. The aver- age Oriental never sees the point of a West- ern joke—not even when that point is punched and hammered into him, as is done in that great British mirth - provoker ‘*Punch,’’ There are many good sayings of his in circulation in Teheran. When it was proposed to levy a duty on all imported wines, and somebody in his suite objected because it would beso hard to watch the frontier and pre- vent smuggling, the Shah said, ‘‘ Put my uncle Ardashir near the frontier and he won’t let a drop of foreign wine escape him,’’ this same Prince Ardashir being a well-known consumer of foreign wines. One of his na- tive physicians is of Hebrew descent, and his official title is ‘‘ Hakimamalek”’ (king of doctors), but he has been proverbially un- lucky with his patients. Once, provoked at his unskillful treatment of him, the Shah said, ‘‘ You are such a king of doctors that I’d soon have no subjects left if I let you have your way.”’ His great stronghold, though, is carica- ture. There would be many thousands of such autograph sketches of the Shah’s in ex- istence if he had not made it a rule always to destroy them after they had served their turn in provoking the guffaws of his suite and servants. His drawings are made quickly, and he has considerable skill in hitting oft likenesses on the spur of the moment ; but they all exhibit the uniform failing of Per- sian art—an utter want of perspective. Noth- ing and nobody are safe from his pointed pencil and hissharptongue. Every Europe- an diplomatist receives not only a nickname in Persian, generally a word meaning some- thing funny or indecent—the Persian lan- guage being exceedingly rich in synonyms and in words of the character mentioned— but is also further popularized by serv- THE COSMOPOLITAN. ing as a model for the Shah’s swift pen- cil. If the Shah has not succeeded to any alarming extent in making his army more formidable, he has succeeded beyond all ex- pectation in amassing wealth. Undoubtedly he is the richest man in the world, so far as cash wealth is concerned. What he terms his museum is acurious place. It contains a profusion of costly articles and objects of art such as exist nowhere else at the present day, it being the opinion of well-informed Europeans who have viewed these treasures, that their money value is perhaps twenty-fold that of the contents of the so-called green vaultsat Dresden. Itisimpossible to give ex- act figures, for they could only beobtained af- ter a long and minute inspection and valua- tion by experts ; but roughly estimated, it is probable that there is more than a hundred million dollars’ worth of jewelry, precious stones, coined and uncoined gold, costly oé- jets de vertu, fine porcelain and glassware, old weapons and armor, tableware and or- naments of exquisite Persian and Hindu workmanship, etc. The so-called peacock throne (a part of the plunder Nadir Shah carried off from Delhi one hundred and fifty years ago) is alone valued at many millions, even after a number of the large, rough, and uncut jewels have been broken out and stolen. It is an incongruous place, this mu- seum. There you will see vases of agate or gold and lapis lazuli, said to be worth mill- ions ; and alongside of them empty perfume bottles of European make, with gaudy labels, that can be had at wholesale for about five cents apiece. You will see priceless mosaics and exquisitely painted cups, and cans, and vases, which were presented by some Euro- pean potentate ; and side by side with them you will notice horrible daubs, veritable ten- cent chromos, picked up the Lord knows how and where. You will perceive glass cases filled with huge heaps of rubies, dia- monds, emeralds, sapphires, turquoises, gar- nets, topazes, beryls, of all sizes and kinds, cut and uncut; and cheek by jowl with these your eyes will see cheap music boxes, Jew’s harps, squeaky hand-organs. The Shah must also be in a condition to ‘**bull’’ the market on pearls ; for here is, for instance, a big glass case, twenty-four inches long by eighteen inches wide and high, that

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THE SHAH AND HIS COURT. is more than half filled with beautiful pearls (mostly from the Persian gulf fisheries) of all sizes and degrees of loveliness. Ina separate long case the orders and decorations of the Shah, coming from nearly every country in the world, are kept on exhibition ; but the crown jewels are in alittle box that is always locked and for which the Shah himself for- ever, waking or sleeping, carries the keys. The contents of this box and of the several vaults where he keeps his piles on piles of bright, shining, unused money, he never al- lows others to view, although the museum may be visited once a year by the European diplomatists and the friends that they vouch for. ; The museum forms a part of the Shah’s palace in Teheran, and the same want of judgment, the same barbaric taste that pre- sided over the composition of the museum may be seen in the decorations and whole interior arrangements of the palace. The furniture is partly very fine and costly, part- ly very rough and shabby ; the wall-papers are gaudy as a rule; of the rugs and carpets, some are the choicest products of the Persian looms ; others are cheap English or French fabrics, with a generous display of scarlet, sky-blue, and bright green in the floral pat- terns. The andaroun, the part allotted to the ex- tensive female branch of the royal family, is in poorer taste, and is more meanly fur- nished than that serving the Shah alone. Some of the state and ceremonial halls are, indeed, very fine and elegant. Asa curious proof of the Shah’s vanity, it ought to be mentioned that his picture, sometimes a cheap lithograph, but more often a pretty oil painting, a faithful photograph, or a water-color portrait, may be found in every one of the rooms in this extensive row of buildings, often three and even five times. Even in the picture-gallery, where the like- ness in oil of Queen Victoria, Emperor Wil- liam, Czar Alexander, King Victor Emman- uel, Emperor Francis Joseph, etc., sent by these rulers, are hung, the Shah’s features may be observed on mantel-pieces and small tables. He evidently doesn’t want you to forget that this is his palace. One of the odd features about this palace of his is the fact that three small rooms in it have their walls entirely covered with pictures cut out of the English, French, 269 and German illustrated journals, which at some time or other came into the hands of His Majesty. Not a great deal of discrimination seems to have been shown in selecting the pictures. In one of these rooms there is also exhibited a big framed lithograph of General Butler. It is a litho- graph evidently dating from that gentleman’s last presidential venture in 1884; for it shows him as he looks in his happier moods. Nobody could tell where the picture came from, but the presumption is that the gen- eral sent it himself. Out of the wealth of anecdotes told of Nusr- ed-Deen Shah and his family, I'll select a few characteristic ones. When the present Austrian Minister at Teheran, a gentleman bearing the name of a Hungarian noble family, paid his initial visit to the Shah, and his name was proclaimed in a loud voice to ° the Shah, it so happened that this name, as pronounced by the Master of Ceremonies, meant something very indecent in Persian, whereat the monarch broke into a vigorous fit of laughter, entirely oblivious of all eti- quette and of the rules of Oriental polite- ness, so punctilious in all matters. His sense of humor is so strong that he could not control his facial muscles, and went on laughing till the tears stood in his eyes, when he, in a half audible voice, made the suggestion to the courtier standing near him to call the new minister instead of his own another name, changing it by a single letter, whereby he produced a word even worse in its meaning than the first. The courtier was so tickled at this that he, too, broke into a titter. That was the rather in- formal reception accorded to the representa- tive of one of the great powers of Europe. The Shah, however, afterward atoned for his behavior, and he and the Hungarian noble— Baron de Kosjik—became good friends, and are so still. Once the Shah conceived the idea of imi- tating Haroun-al-Raschid and going about by night in disguise and unattended through the streets of Teheran. In leaving the castle, the sentinel, dozing in his box, let him pass two nights without hindrance, whereupon the Shah had the sleepy soldier flogged. The third night another soldier stood on guard, and he stopped the Shah and forced him, despite all his protestations, to spend the rest of the night in the sentry-box, bar-

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270 ring egress with his bayonet. The next morning the Shah, after having been liber- ated, first had the unaccommodating soldier bastinadoed, and then he applied a plaster to his lacerated feelings and soles by sending him a purse with a hundred fomdan (one hundred and fifty dollars) and a khadat (robe of honor); but he was cured of his love for nightly excursions. One of the worst deeds Nusr-ed-Deen has been guilty of is the assassination of Shahzadeh Yussuf, an Afghan prince and pretender, who had sought refuge at the Shah’s court during the wars with his native country. The Shah caused him to be stabbed to death by one of his body servants, while taking the air in the garden behind his palace. The murder was done so close by that the Shah even heard the victim scream and call for aid. When the assassin, red- handed, reported the deed done, the Shah coolly said, ‘‘From what I heard I think the young man must have passed some un- comfortable moments.”’ That the Shah can be cruel and occasion- ally unjust is also proved by the fate that overtook a sergeant who had, during a panic that had seized the Persian army at the siege of Meshed, rallied a small force around him and had led these against the Turcomans, while the generals ran away, and who had thus snatched victory out of the jaws of de- feat. The man was afterward cruelly muti- lated and degraded, as having been too for- ward and suspiciously rash. Another sol- dier, who, by a similar deed of bravery, had saved a whole Persian camp from being slaughtered in their sleep by the Turcomans, was put to death for a like reason. Just before the Shah’s last visit to Europe a regiment whose native district in Mazan- deran had been greatly damaged by floods, asked to be given permission to re-build the houses and till the fields, because their wives and aged parents could not manage the work unaided. They set up the justice of their claims in a petition, and gave this to a man high in the favor of the Shah, a bribe being, of course, paid him. Nothing came of it, though. Then a delegation, deputied by their comrades, waited for the Shah by the roadside the day he went out to the shrine of Shahzadeh Abdul Azeem to pray fora safe and prosperous journey. The Shah, how- ever, did not stop to ascertain their wants, THE COSMOPOLITAN. but drove on rapidly past them. In their grief and disappointment some of these sol- diers threw pebbles after the carriage, one of these shattering a paneinit. A fewsplinters hit the face of the monarch and cut him slightly. That whole regiment, at least all the men who could be found, were mutilated or put to death—strangled, beheaded, walled up alive, or crucified. Of another regiment, whose pay had been stolen by the officers for years, and of whom some men clamor- ously asked the Shah for bread or money, he had every seventh man shot and their bodies left in the desert for the vultures to pick at. When the Shah was once remonstrated with for having appointed a notoriously base, cruel, and grasping man to an important gov- ernorship, he said: ‘‘This man will amass in three years as much wealth out of that province as another man would in ten. He will, therefore, be ‘ripe’ for me all the sooner.’’ His custom is to let his dignita- ries rob and plunder unmolested for a certain time, and then to pounce upon them and squeeze all the stolen money out of them again for his own private benefit. He frankly admits that he knows three-fourths of the taxes are ‘‘eaten’’ (the technical term in Persia for stealing, swindling, embezzling), but he says that he always gets at least two of these three-fourths back again in the long run, and that he can afford to wait. Nusr-ed-Deen has three adult sons and two who are yet babies, besides a lot of daughters. His first born is Massoud Mirza, whose offi- cial title is Zil-es-Sultan (Shadow of the King). This man is about thirty-seven, and bears a striking resemblance to his father in the peculiar bent of his character, but lacks the humanity which, for an Oriental despot, is a distinguishing feature of the Shah. He is small but of powerful frame and herculean strength. He, too, shows a noticeable deflec- tion from the vertical line in his legs, has his eyes too near the nose, and speaks in that curious, hesitating manner and low voice that his father shows. He is a man of a certain ability and with more energy and steadiness of purpose than Nusr-ed-Deen; but he is cruel by nature, and although he, too, is fond of a joke, his humor is always of that exceedingly rough kind called practical jok- ing. He has been Governor of Ispahan for many years, and he is thought to be worth about twelve million /omdn (sixteen million

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THE SHAH AND HIS COURT. dollars) to-day. How he came to gather in such riches may be understood when it is mentioned that for the first five years he was death to all the wealthy men of his fertile district. Whenever one of these did not ‘‘come down’”’ quite as liberally as the Prince thought he ought to, the man would be bundled off to prison and tortured till he had revealed the hiding-place where his treasures lay concealed, and the latter would be at once seized and incorporated with the active governor’s daily swelling ‘‘pile.’’ It is said that thousands of men have been dealt with in this somewhat summary fash- ion during the first five years of the Prince’s administration; but since then he has greatly mended, the explanation being, probably, that he deems extortion no longer necessary, having a colossal fortune and an efficient little army that he is amply able to pay reg- ularly. This Prince, although the oldest, is not the heir, having been born of a seeghay, but his vaulting ambition will not let him accept this fact as conclusive. His avowed aim is to make for himself such a reputation as to outshine his younger brother, the heir, and to use his wealth and his army so effect- ively at the death of his father as to forestall his brother and seize the government. Of his practical jokes many examples are given ; many examples are also given of his energy and incorruptibility in a certain im- portant emergency. Last year, during the melon season, a soldier had picked a melon and devoured it without paying the peasant for it the stipulated price, five shakee (three and a halfcents). The peasant went to com- plain to Massoud Mirza, whose ear is always open, evén tothe lowest. After listening to his plaint, he said: ‘‘ Well, you shall have justice. I will test this matter to the core. Bring in the soldier.’’ The gormandizing soldier was brought in. ‘‘ Cut this man’s belly open,’’ he said to his execvtioner. ‘‘If there is a melon inside,’’ he added to the peasant, ‘‘ you will get your money ; if not, off goes your head.’’ The soldier was cut open, the melon found, and the peasant paid. A mollah (priest) owned a fine property, consisting of a house and a shady garden in Ispahan. The Prince coveted it, and con- fiscated it finally. To all the demands of the mollah to restore the property, the Prince invariably answered, ‘‘ Farda’’ (to-morrow). 271 The mollah went to Teheran, obtained an audience with the Shah, and told him what was thetrouble. The Shah gave the mollaha jirman, running to this effect: ‘‘ My dear son ! Give the mollah his property back, for he is a just and upright man with a kind heart.”’ The mo/l/ah went back to Ispahan and showed the letter to the Zil-es-Sultan. ‘‘So you have a kind heart,’’ hesaid, frowning. ‘‘ Why did you not say so before? However, I’ll have to convince myself of that.’’ He clapped his hands. Theexecutionerentered. ‘‘ Cut this man’s heart out,’’ he said. ‘Do it tenderly, so it won’t hurt him.’’ The heart was cut out and brought to the Prince on a salver. He viewed it critically, patted it with the hand, and then said : ‘‘ So that isa kind heart. I’m glad I’ve seen one. Give the mollah back his heart and his property now! What, he’s dead? Ah, well, then I suppose I must keep it after all. Put him in another house—one where he’ll stay !”’ While but few men would probably ap- prove of or relish such rough joking as this, Massoud Mirza is in his own peculiar way a wise and efficient ruler. Under his régime the whole south of Persia has vastly im- proved, and thesafety of life and property has become an established fact. Rebellions and smaller uprisings, such as used to be com- mon there, have been put down with an iron hand, so that now the Shah’s sway is every- where undisputed and his authority acknowl- edged by even the wildest mountain tribes of Luristan. How this has been accomplished, the following will explain : One of the most savage and intractable tribes in Luristan had had for years as their leader a native prince, fierce, brave, terrible to his foes, but liberal to his friends ; and with him they had been successful often enough in their quarrels and guerilla wars with the government, when they had refused to pay tribute. The Zil-es-Sultan resolved toput an end tothis. He invited the Prince, during an armistice, to come into Ispahan with a thousand of his best warriors, and to be his guest while the preliminaries to a lasting peace should be arranged. The Prince and his suite were offered safe conduct, and were assured that their persons and property should be sacred under the laws of hospital- ity. An oath on the Koran to keep the promise was taken by the Zil-es-Sultan, ac- cording to Moslem custom, and the Ko-

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272 ran sent along as a symbol and proof of this. The mountain Prince fell into the trap. Though knowing by reputation the Punic faith that the Kadjar dynasty has forever shown its enemies, he believed himself safe, and went to Ispahan with his thou- sand stoutest men. They were received splendidly, and on the evening of the second day a big banquet was given to all of them. When the feasting was over, Ameer Abdullah Khan, the unsuspecting mountain chief, was invited into the Zil-es- Sultan's private room. ‘‘ Ameer,’’ said the prince, without wasting any time, ‘‘I want thy head!’ The Ameer at first believed this to be a joke, but was roughly undeceived by the Zil-es-Sultan, who also refused all the ransom offered by the chief for his life and liberty, even when he had offered the whole of his fortune —two million soman (three million dollars). ‘‘If you had ten times two million /omdn to offer me as ran- som,’’ said the Shah’s first-born, ‘‘ you should die to-night, for you are a curse to the land and a danger to my authority.’’ The Prince stamped his foot ; the black curtain in a re- cess of the room was drawn aside, and out stepped the headsman in his blood-red garb and his long sword under his arm. A whizz, and the head of the chivalrous chief rolled to the feet of Massoud Mirza. The same night, by a preconcerted plan, the weapons of the chiefs thousand men were seized and they themselves put in chains. The more active and dangerous among them were put to death, and the rest sent home in exchange for heavy ransom. There has never been a revolt since in that part of Persia. Massoud Mirza has, like his father, picked up an incongruous and ill-digested mass of general information, French and English il- lustrated papers being the prime sources of his knowledge. Yet he does not speak any- thing but Persian, and depends for his read- ing on the translations made by his secretary and physician, a clever Armenian. Never having been outside of Persia, and possess- ing not an atom of exact knowledge about anything, this Prince holds totally errone- ous ideas of Persia’s position in the world. He thinks that his little army could whip any of the modern powers, and that he will have no trouble in making himself master of the country when his father dies. He de- THE COSMOPOLITAN. spises and under-estimates all foreigners, and has no cordial relations with any one of the powers, nor with their representatives in Teheran. While the Shah had sense enough during his visit to Europe to see that if he should ever come to measure his strength with Russia, England, France, Germany, or any one of the modern powers, he would be miserably beaten and shaken to pieces ; and while the Shah has, in consequence, been rather conciliatory in his relations with the monarchs of Europe, and has nursed very tenderly amicable relations with them, so as to keep them his personal friends, this Prince, ignorant of the real state of things, is overbearing and haughty, and is sighing for the day when he, as Shah, may treat again the representatives of foreign powers in the same contemptuous manner that his great-grandfather, Feth Ali Shah, did. How solid the armor of Massoud Mirza’s ignorance is underneath the thin veneer of surface information may be guessed when it is known that he has never béen able to master more than two of the four rules of arithmetic—addition and subtraction—and these but poorly; that he has no knowledge of actual history or political economy, nor even of the resources of his own country. Early this last summer he paid a visit to the medi- cal department of the imperial college at Teheran, and his curiosity being aroused by a model of the human body made of papier maché, which serves the professor to incul- cate some conception of anatomy in his pupils’ minds, he stepped up and examined it. All at once he exclaimed: ‘‘ What is this? How can your pupils learn how to treat patients when you make them believe the heart is in the wrong place?’’ It was found that he had opened the valve allowing a peep into the inside of the body with the organs placed where they belong. He saw the heart on the left side of the breast, and he persisted mulishly that that was wrong ; that the stomach filled up the whole interior of the chest, and that the heart was in the head. He, like thecommon run of Persians, also believes in the ‘‘ white liver’’ (djegarre sefie) and the ‘“‘black liver’’ (djegarre sya) in lieu of our liver and lungs. His younger brother, the heir-apparent, or valiahd, is a much different but by no means better man than Massoud Mirza. His name is Mouzaffer-ed-Deen, and he is Gov-

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THE SERENADE. ernor of Azerbeidjan and resides in Tabriz, now the largest and wealthiest town in Persia. His intellect is weak, and his once powerful frame has lost its vigor in conse- quence of continual debauches of the vilest kind. This Prince is a slave to the most de- praved appetites, and his vices are of such an outrageous nature that he has acquired a reputation for them even in such a country as Persia, morally, probably, the most rotten land of the present time. Heiscruel, mean, grasping, vacillating, and stands completely under the control of the priesthood, whose bidding he is always willing to do, so long as it does not interfere with the gratification of his peculiar tastes. The third brother, Kamran Mirza, is the most good-natured and good-looking of the noble trio, but does not amount to much in- tellectually. He is rather amiable than otherwise, and conciliatory in his speech and manners, but is dishonest, full of tricks and swindling devices. His title is Naib-es-Sul- taneh (viceroy), resides at Teheran, and is the minister of war and commander-in-chief of the army; also the favorite son of the Shah, since another son, whom his father desired to make the heir, is dead. Though kind-hearted in the main, Kamran Mirza may become cruel ifit serves his turn. One morn- ing I saw in front of the Derwazeh Kaswini (Kaswin Gate) of Teheran executioners slit open the noses and cut off the ears of forty 273 grain speculators because they had forgotten to bribe this sprig of royalty before raising the price of corn. They and their brother merchants atoned for this omission next morning by a ‘‘ piskkish’’ (present) of three hundred thousand fomdadu, and were then left unmolested. The private soldiers of a regiment after lying in garrison at Teheran for six months had received but six 4rams (ninety cents) in pay, just about the twenty-fifth part of what was due them. The difference’ had been ‘‘eaten’’ by the officers and the general-in- chief, the prince’s share amounting to three thousand ‘oman alone. It is notastonishing, therefore, that Kamran Mirza has a summer palace with fountains, parks, and gardens much finer than any his father can boast of. This is Kamranich, a few miles from Te- heran. Europeans are treated by this gen- tleman with the itching palm with much greater politeness and consideration than is the case with his brothers. The heir, indeed, always avoids meeting strangers from be- yond Persia, as he dreads their possible in- terference with his pleasures and pastimes. Thus it can not on the whole be stated with any degree of truthfulness that royalty in Persia, especially as represented by the younger branches, is strictly respectable, but for that matter royalty has not been very respectable in Europe up to recent times. THE SERENADE. By JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY. THE midnight is not more bewildering To her drowsed eyes, than, to her ears, the sound Of dim, sweet singing voices, interwound With purl of flute and subtle twang of string, Strained through the lattice, where the roses cling, And with their fragrance waft the notes around Her haunted senses. Thirsting beyond bound Of her slow-yielding dreams, the lilt and swing Of the mysterious, delirious tune, She drains like some strange opiate, with awed eyes Upraised against her casement, where, aswoon, The stars fail from her sight, and up the skies Of alien azure rolls the full round moon Like some vast bubble blown of summer noon.

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THE LYNHAVEN CROSS. By JoHN ESTEN COOKE. MAY legends are related of the wild sea-coast of Princess Anne County, Virginia, which is the triangle between the southern shore of the Chesapeake and the Atlantic Ocean. Some of these stories refer to wreckers plying their criminal trade on the ocean side, but one of the most curious is connected with Lynhaven Bay and the inundation that formed it. This bay, now covering a large expanse of country, had once no existence; it was the result of a freak on the part of a single man, Giles Hernshaw, a fisherman living in a cabin near the banks of the Chesapeake. Hernshaw was a rough character and bore a very bad reputation. He was a man of about fifty, of great personal strength, with a shag of hair nearly covering his low fore- head, and a harsh and forbidding expres- sion. There was very little doubt that he was a wrecker, but no one had ever charged him with it. In fact he was rarely seen ex- cept when he was dragging his nets in the bay, or at the court-house, whither he went to sell his fish and fill his jug with whisky. An incident on his return from one of these visits will indicate the ferocity of his char- acter. He had once been arrested for creating a disturbance and sent to jail by Colonel Hart- well, a magistrate. On this occasion he was heard to say with a scowl, ‘‘I’ll have my heel on him sooner or later.’’ Some months after- ward Colonel Hartwell died and was buried in the graveyard of Lynhaven church, where a tomb was erected over him, consisting of a flat slab with his name inscribed upon it, and a tall stone cross rising as a head-stone. Hernshaw passed Lynhaven churchyard with two of his rough associates a few days after its erection, and seeing the monument, leaped over the wall and went toward it. Having reached it, he mounted on the slab, ground his heel on Colonel Hartwell’s name, and then, shaking his fist at the cross, re- joined his companions. At the time he had a wife living, and one of the party told her of the incident with rude laughter. The poor woman turned pale. Taking a cross hanging round her neck, she held it up and muttered a prayer that her husband would one day cling for safety to it ; and these were nearly the last words that she spoke. She died not long afterward while giving birth to a daughter, her only child, and then Hernshaw was seen to havesomething humanin him. The one soft spot in his coarse heart was his love for his baby. He engaged an old crone to come and live with him and look after the child ; but he never seemed satisfied when she was out of his sight. He had made her a cradle of the planks of a wrecked vessel, and his favorite occupa- tion was to watch her sleeping in front of the cabin. When she awoke he would fondle her, listening to her prattle and admiring her winning ways ; and one of these always filled him with superstitious awe. Asthe poor mother was dying, she had taken the cross from her own neck, hanging the ribbon around the child’s ; and now this cross was herfavorite plaything. Thechild would grasp it as soon as she awoke, hold it up, and put it to her mouth as though she were kissing it. And Hernshaw looking on would feel a thrill pass through his frame, as though his dead wife were present and repeating her last words to him. When not thus engaged, Hernshaw was busy dragging his nets in the bay, or turning over in his mind a scheme that had long occu- pied him. Hiscabin stood neara small stream called Little Creek, running parallel with the shore and emptying into the bay about three miles off. To reach the fishing-grounds he and his associates were obliged to pass this inlet, making a journey of six miles daily ; and Hernshaw had conceived the project of opening a shorter route. The level sand-bar, extending between Little Creek and the bay, was less than a quarter of a mile in width ; and by cutting through this obstacle they would be able to make a channel wide enough for the boats. By dint of thinking and talking Hernshaw had at last arranged everything with his associates, and the work was to be attempted.

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THE LYNHAVEN CROSS. On a bright summer morning he left his cabin with a broad field-hoe on his shoulder to go to the place of rendezvous. Thecradle containing the baby was standing in the sun- shine at the door, and the child was asleep. Hernshaw stood for a moment looking at her; then he stooped down and touched the small face with his bearded mouth, and cau- tioning the old woman to take good care of the child, went to meet his companions. The spot selected for opening the channel was about a quarter of a mile from the cabin. The landscape was wild and lonely. A flat expanse extended inland, clothed with wire- grass and shrubs ; and the only building in view, except the cabins of the fishermen, was the ancient Lynhaven church, where the slate roof rose from a group of pines about a mile distant. Hernshaw glanced in that direction, and a singular expression came to his face. He had caught a glimpse of the cross over Colonel Hartwell’s grave gleaming in the sunshine, and turned hastily in the opposite direction. Here the prospect was wilder and lonelier. Nothing was seen but the melancholy sand- dunes and the misty expanse of the Chesa- peake beyond. A strong wind was blowing from the Atlantic, and the waves broke with a muffled roar on the long dike of the sand- bar. Above this threatening murmur rose the shrill scream of sea-fowl, and another sound which Hernshaw recognized—the loud boating songs of the 'longshoremen. He even joined them, about twenty of the roughest characters of the coast, and as they had brought plenty of drink, the work began with ardor. The men looked to Hernshaw as their leader, and followed his directions with implicit obedience. All that was needed, he said, was to dig a narrow trench only a foot or two wide, and a few inches deep, and then the water of the bay would wash through and open the channel. The ‘longshoremen answered with shouts, and the heavy field-hoes rose and fell rapidly. The bar was nearly on a level with the water and consisted only of loose sand, so that by a little past noon they were half across. Then they rested for half an hour, eating, drinking, and singing their songs, and re- suming work, proceeded rapidly until, just as the sun was sinking, they found themselves within a few yards of the bay. Suddenly one of the oldest ’longshoremen 275 went up to Hernshaw and they held a low consultation. There was no doubt as to what this meant. A strong east wind was blowing and had piled up the waves ofthe bay. To open the trench might result in sudden dis- aster. Hernshaw hesitated only a moment ; either he believed that there was no danger, or he determined to brave it. He seized his hoe, advanced in front, struck the last blow that opened the channel, and in an instant the whole party were swept away. A huge wall of water, that seemed to have been waiting, rushed through the narrow channel, tore its way through the yielding sand, and rolled inland carrying every thing before it. When Hernshaw saw the last of his party, they were swimming for their lives. But he gave no further thought to them. He was thinking of his baby, and struck out with all his strength for the cabin. Only the roof was out of the water, and the old crone was clinging to it. Hernshaw shouted the name of the child, and the old woman burst into loud cries. The water had lifted the cradle, she said, which had floated away with the child asleep in it, and she pointed in the direction of Lynhaven church, whose walls rose about half a mile southward. The Reverend James Jenant was at this time rector of Lynhaven Parish, and his parsonage was about three hundred yards in the rear of the church,on rising ground. On this after- noon he had gone to the vestry room to con- sult the parish register, and was thus en- gaged when a rushing sound attracted his attention. He raised his head, and looked through the window. A flood of water was beating against the walls of the edifice ; and this flood, steadily rising, was soon nearly on a level with the elevated floor of the church. Utterly unable to understand this startling occurrence, Mr. Jenant hastily raised the win- dow. The whole surrounding country was submerged and resembled a lake. All the tombstones around the church had been cov- ered, with the exception of one—Colonel Hartwell’s—-and against the tall stone cross rested a cradle containing a child. It had been caught by the cross, which had prevent- ed the stream from sweeping it on. But as the water continued to beat upon it, the frail planks shook, and it slowly turned round In another moment it would have been dashed against the walls of the church and over-

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276 turned, when a swimmer darted toward it and seized it as it was about to disappear. Hernshaw uttered a loud cry as he caught the baby to his breast ; and throwing one arm around the cross, supported himself and the child. An hour afterward a boat was sent to the rescue of Mr. Jenant by his family, and re- turned with three persons instead of one from the half-submerged church—the clergy- men, Hernshaw, and the child. He was found obstinately clinging tothestone mon- ument over Colonel Hartwell’s grave, and the child was playing with the small cross that once belonged to her mother. The scenes of this legend are alluded to in DANGERS OF By W. DO not see how any one could doubt that the Esquimaux of America and the north- ern tribes of Siberia know better than any other people how to take care of themselves in cold countries. Naturally, therefore, Arctic expeditions provided with a sufficient num- ber of native allies will always find them- selves better off than those depending en- tirely upon their transported resources. It is impossible to foresee and provide against all the contingencies that may arise ; and it would be well for those who propose to jour- ney in the North to be prepared, in case of emergency, to subsist upon the land, and to do this, native assistants are essential. It is the natives who know where to look for game, and how to approach it when found. They showed me how to stalk rein- deer. When the wind was so light as to render it difficult to establish its direction, in order to advance upon the game from the leeward they taught me to pluck a little pinch of fur from my deer-skin coat and throw it in the air, and in that way find the direction of a breeze too light to move the most delicate weather-vane of civilization. When peering over the crest of a hill, to watch the movements of a herd of reindeer grazing in the valley beyond, my Esquimau guides have cautioned me to move my head directly up or down, and not sideways, as the latter motion would more readily attract the attention of the wary game. If, while THE COSMOPOLITAN. Bishop Meade’s ‘‘Old Churches of Virginia.” The writer says : ‘‘ The moment the trench was opened the waters of the bay rush- ed through the sandy beach, five or six miles, forming the present Lynhaven River. The invasion carried away nearly the whole burying-ground attached to the church, and the tombstones were strewed along the shore. In 1819 Commodore Decatur and another emi- nent person were bathing in the middle of the river, and were enabled by feeling with their toes to decipher the names of those whose graves were covered.’’ The tombstone and cross over Colonel Hartwell were not discovered, and nothing more is known of Hernshaw. THE ICE PACK. H. GILDER. hunting musk oxen, without the aid of dogs to bring them to bay, they find themselves on level ground, without shelter to cover their approach or behind which to hide from the advancing herd, they cut a block of snow and stand it upon end, there to watch the movements of the animals through a loophole in the sheltering snow-block. The natives of the Frigid Zone know, too, how to set effective traps for deer, wolves, and other animals, without the aid of wood or white men’s implements. A deer-trap, for instance, is made by digging a hole in the deep snow and covering it with snow- blocks held in position by resting upon each other. For bait, little lines of salted water are led to the center of the covering of the pit, and following up one of these the unsus- pecting animal falls in and becomes an easy prey to the hunter. A wolf-trap is made by coiling into as small a space as possible slender strips of whalebone about a foot in length, and tying them with thread made from sinew. Each coil is then imbedded in a small chunk of meat and thrown upon the snow, where it is subsequently found by the wolf and bolted without chewing. In a little while the frozen meat thaws, the sinew is wet and slips the loosely-made knots, the whale- bone straightens and pierces the stomach and intestines, and the animal dies in tor- ture.

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DANGERS OF THE ICE PACK. In winter the northern native knows how to find the ‘‘blow-hole’’ in the ice-fields, where a seal comes up to get a fresh sup- ply of air for his lungs. This ‘‘blow- hole’’ is very different in reality from that which is usually pictured in the illustrated stories of Arctic travel. Generally they are represented as irregular openings in the ice from two to six feet in diameter. The fact is, one unfamiliar with the habits and haunts of these marine mammals would pass directly over a ‘‘ blow-hole’’ in winter or spring and hot see it, as it is not usually more than from half an inch to an inch in diameter at the surface of the ice. The na- tive seal-hunters are greatly assisted in these searches by their dogs, whose keen noses scent the odor of seal meat, and guide their masters to places on the right or left of the line of search that would otherwise have escaped the notice of even these keen- eyed hunters. When found, the location is marked for future reference, and at some subsequent time, when meat is scarce in the snow-hut that shelters the hunter’s house- hold, he repairs, with snow-knife and spear, to one of the places previously marked, and building a shelter or break-wind of snow- blocks, sits down to await the return of the seal. Sometimes these vigils are prolonged not for hours only, but for days at a sitting. In the spring, when the seal comes out upon the ice to bask and doze in the warm sunlight, the hunter approaches him by ly- ing down and advancing cautiously, at the same time imitating the motions of a seal, keeping his feet and legs, which he crosses at the ankle, close together, so that they much resemble the hind-quarters of a seal. Indeed, when at a distance, I have frequently found it difficult to tell which was the seal and which the man. It is the early training of the northern savages that has taught them to do all this skillfully. Among otherthings they showed me a nov- el mode of catching ducks and geese. In trav- eling over the ice-fields late in the spring, we have often come, very unexpectedly, upon a lot of these aquatic birds swimming in a small open water-hole or a surface-pond that was hidden from us by intervening hummocks until we were right on top of them. In fact, I, who, on the first occasion, was a little behind the others, was quite startled by the extraordinary conduct of our 277 natives, who were dancing around and shouting like a lot of maniacs, the effect greatly enhanced by the constant snapping of their long dog-whips, while throwing the lash far in front of them as if beating an un- seen foe. I looked on in perfect amazement, for I had never seen these well-behaved peo- ple act in such an unseemly manner. What could it all mean ? I approached cautiously, and saw beyond the hummocks in front of me the open water-hole and a flock of ducks and geese swimming around, apparently frightened out of their wits, for they did not seem to be able to rise or use their wings except in help- lessly flapping around the pond. Oncein a while a well-aimed slash of the whip would coil the end of the lash around the neck of one of the birds, and, before the coil had time to unloosen its hold, the doomed bird would be snatched out upon the ice, where it was immediately seized and skinned by one of the women or children. Who but an Esquimau would ever devise such a method of bird-catching? If the traveler is over- taken bya storm and unable to reach shelter, it is his native guide who shows him how to make himself comfortable, or, at least, as comfortable as the circumstances will permit. There is one danger to which the Arctic traveler is subject that, without native assist- “ance, would be almost certain to prove dis- astrous. Along theshoresof the Arctic seas is found, in winter, a border of ice, varying in width, but usually extending from about six to nine miles from the ice-foot, which is attached to the land. This broad expanse of ice is known as the shore ice, and beyond it is the broken or pack ice that is held to the shore ice by a sea breeze, or is blown out to sea by an off-shore wind. It is on this loose pack that the Esquimaux hunt the walrus that constitutes their staple food during the winter months. Therefore it is only while the loose ice is held to the shore ice by a sea breeze that it is possible to hunt the walrus suc- cessfully. Sometimes during the progress of the hunt, or while the hunters are skin- ning and cutting up their prize, the wind changes and comes out strong from the land. Then it is that the shore ice, or a large part of it,often several square miles in extent, is brok- en offand carried out tosea. Frequently those who are at work in the pack or on the outer edge of the ice are not aware of the move-

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278 ment of the main field, its progress being so gentle asto be imperceptible, until, approach- ing the land, they find themselves cut off by open water, sometimes only a few yards in width, and sometimes, perhaps, a mile or inore. This is always a predicament to make the bravest men turn pale, and even those ac- customed to such perils can fully appreciate the danger to-which they are thus exposed. Ofien a large field, a mile or so in extent, will move off at an angle from the coast line and may still be held to theshore, or be firm- ly pressed upon it, at one end or the other, according to the direction of the wind or the configuration of the coast. This is the first act to be established, and away the people hurry as nimbly as their feet can carry them, or, if provided with sleds and dogs, as fast as they can urge their teams, to the place where such slender chance of escape may yet be left. A party of white men thus set adrift upon the open sea, upon a floating island of ice whose movements are entirely beyond their control, would be about as helpless as it is possibleto be. But the natives of the Arctic inland seas are not discouraged, even under the most adverse circumstances. In Hud- son’s Bay it is a matter of yearly occurrence for some of them to be socarriedaway. They know that there is a reasonable prospect that their floating island will be swept back by a ~ change of wind, not, perhaps, to the point they had left, but some distance to the right or left. An Esquimau hunter is self-sus- taining almost anywhere in his own country if he has with him his hunting implements and his snow-knife. He never goes abroad without them, and so may be said to be al- ways prepared for an emergency. When he finds himself afloat, and that there is nothing for him to do but to wait until his icy bark anchors itself upon some shore, the first thing he does is to build a snow-house for shelter. Then, if without food, he walks abroad in search of game. His chances for finding seal or walrus, or, perhaps, a polar bear, are just as good, if not, indeed, better, upon his island of ice than if it were at- tached to the shore. I remember, while wintering in North Hudson’s Bay, meeting several Esquimaux who had been carried off by the breaking up of the ice. One, a young man named Ter- rearneeak, was gone from camp nearly two THE COSMOPOLITAN. months. He drifted trom Depot Island, on the north shore, to Marble Island, about two degrees of latitude below where the drift started, and found a large number of his tribe encamped around two whalers that were in winter quarters there. It had taken his floating island ten days to make the voyage of about one hundred and twenty or one hundred and thirty miles, and in the mean time, by the breaking up of his ice-field, he had, while hunting one day, been separated from his snow-hutand the carcass of the wal- rus which he had killed the day of his mis- fortune, and which had so far served him for food, so that when he reached his friends around the ships he had a most excellent ap- petite, but appeared none the worse for his adventure. An old man of the same tribe, whose real name is Toogoolah, but who was generally known as ‘ Ox-co-ma-did-lee,’’ was carried off from near Whale. Point, about fifty miles east of Depot Island, and, after drifting around nearly a month in the open water of Hudson’s Bay, was finally landed in the Kinneepatoo country, on the west coast, far below the latitude of Marble Island, and it took him a month longer to get back to his people at Whale Point. In fact, he had been given up as lost, and his two wives had been taken by kind friends in the tribe, for, as soon as a man dies, his wife becomes the wife of some one else—there are no spinsters and no widows in Arcticlands. Onestormy day, when the hunters were all at home in their snow-huts, the low doorway of one of these dwellings was darkened by a burly form, seemingly still more burly in its fur clothing, and, to the astonishment of all the inmates, up jumped old Toogoolah, his face covered with grease and smiles, shouting ‘* Ox-eo-ma-did-lee,’’ which is an Exquimau expression akin to ‘‘ Here we are again,”’ and from that day to this, if he still lives, he is better known by the name with which he introduced himself on that occasion than by the one he had borne from his youth up. When Lieutenant Schwatka and I were preparing, at Depot Island, for our journey to King William’s Land, in the spring of 1879, two men and two boys were carried off, while walrus hunting, and were gone four days. One of the men, Equeesik, with his young brother, Owanark, was to accompany us on our long journey ; and, as they were

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DANGERS OF THE ICE PACK. natives of King William’s Land, we depended much upon Equeesik’s good offices in estab- lishing friendly relations with the people of that country. We were naturally anxious, too, on their account ; but the old hunters in camp assured us that there was little to fear for their safety, but said they might not get back in time to start with us. They did get in, however, during the night before we broke camp, and were ready to pull out with us for a year’s journey a few hours later. I asked Equeesik how they fared on the drift, and he assured me that they were very com- fortable indeed. Their only anxiety was that they might not get back in time to join our party. He said they made a snow-hut, and, as they had killed one walrus before the ice broke away and another while afloat, they had plenty of food to eat and blubber to burn. ‘‘But how could you burn the blub- ber? You had nolamp,”’ saidI. ‘‘Itooka slab of frozen walrus-hide,’’ said he, ‘‘and it made a very good lamp. Jgloo oko amasuet (the hut was plenty warm).’’ The fact is, that these ever-ready savages were quite as com- fortable in their floating home as they would have been in theirown camp. A snow-hut is only asnow-hut anywhere, and with plenty to eat they are just about as well off and as contented in one place as in another. The two boys in that party, Owanark and Oozook, were equally as happy as the others, but it was only because they were with their big brothers, who possessed the experience, skill, and the physical qualities to do the best in such an emergency. Had they been alone, they could not have been so comfort- able and would certainly have been in greater danger. Boys of their age (twelve or four- teen years) are good dog drivers, and are fre- quently sent by their parents on errands tothe neighboring settlements, but seldom to such a distance as to involve camping-out over night. Often, however, they are caught ina storm, or, darkness coming on sooner than anticipated, they may be compelled to make shift for a single night. Sledge journeys are generally conducted upon the smooth surface of the shore ice, near the ice foot, and it oc- casionally happens that the children are thus carried out upon the loosened ice. I remember one day in the spring of 1880 accompanying the walrus hunters out to the loose pack, about six miles in front of our huts, which were themselves about three 279 miles from the shore. The wind changed while the hunters were cutting up a huge walrus they had killed, and it came out strong from the land. Fearing that the ice might be broken at a reef about a mile in front of our huts, they sent me back to camp with a boy to guide me through the hum- mocks. This was a lad named Koomana, a great favorite with all our party, and who had, with his father, accompanied us on our sledge journey to King William’s Land the year before. He always regarded me as a sort of step-father, because his parents had given him to me when we first came among their people, a little over two years previ- ously. Koomana was a very manly little fellow, though only about fourteen years old when I parted with him, and had killed more seals and reindeer than any other lad in the tribe. On our way back to camp that after- noon he talked a good deal about the dangers attending the ice movements, because, from having heard of so many adventures of that sort and so few with a fatal termination, I had begun to regard the attendant dangers rather lightly. He told me that during the spring of the year our party arrived in Hudson's Bay he was going from a point west of Depot Island to a place a few miles farther east, near the mouth of Lorillard River, where a few people of his tribe were encamped in their snow- huts, and had to cross this reef where the hunters feared I might find the ice broken. With him was his sister, Neepshark, who afterward became the wife of ‘‘Esquimau Joe,’’ and two younger sisters. After walk- ing for a long time in the direction of a hill on the coast, which was the point where they were to land, they were astonished to notice that it seemed all the time just as far off as when they started. This was explained later when they saw a long stretch of open water between them and the shore. He said they were very much frightened, but kept on until they came to a place where the ice-field they were on joined onto another which seemed to be attached to the land, but in this they were disappointed, and after a while it grew so dark they couldn’t see. So they made a hasty shelter of snow to protect them from the wind, and slept till morning, very cold and hungry. They started off as soon as they awoke, without knowing in what direction they

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280 were walking. His sister, Neepshark, though about ten years his senior, set him the bad example of becoming very much discouraged, and both his little sisters were crying. At last he saw what he described as a black thread along the ice in front of him, and joy- fully called his sister’s attention to it by say- ing: ‘‘ /-ting-er (what is that)?’’ ‘* Ar-my (I don’t know),’’ she replied, and then he triumphantly exclaimed: “ Pick-ee-tu-lik (Depot Island).’’ And soit was. Then they hurried on hopefully, and found themselves nearing land that he knew well enough, but which was a long way from home. The ice was still in motion, opening and closing and grinding against the ice- foot with great force and with a frightful sound. He stepped lightly over the crack at a favorable place, followed by his two older sisters, but the youngest, a child of about six years, fell in and was caught be- tween the masses and crushed to death. Her body, from the waist up, was above the ice, but below that was squeezed flat by the pressure against the solid ice-foot of a mass probably a mile or two square and from five to seven feet thick. The heart-rending screams of the poor little prisoner rent the air, while her terrified brother and sisters caught her by the arms and vainly tried to drag her out from that terrible grip. The tears rolled down Koomana’s cheeks as he told me the story, and I was unable to repress a shudder as I hurried on to cross the fatal reef that still lay between us and the snow hut that was our only home in that desolate land. Not long after this terrible event, another boy, about Koomana’s age, was driving a dog- sledge, on which were seated two younger brothers and a sister, from one encampment to another by way of the treacherous shore- ice. They had not gone very far, when the ice loosened from the shore, and it was evi- dent that the children would be carried out to sea. On that shore, however, there stood an Esquimau, who, though only a poor savage, had a heart that would do honor to any Christian. It was old Ishuarkaloo, Koo- mana’s father. He knew that the children, unaided, would be in great danger, and, though they were not his children, he had not forgotten the fate of his little one only a few days before; so without the slightest hesi- THE COSMOPOLITAN. tation he leaped upon the fast-receding ice- floe and started in pursuit of the sledge and its precious load. The old man had only stopped long enough to seize his seal-spear and his snow-knife, and was then equally well prepared to rescue the little ones or to share their fate. A deed like that in the civ- ilized world would entitle the doer to a medal from the Life-Saving Association, and I am glad to say that it was appreciated in his own country, too. For I remember once when in our camp there was a kilowty— which is a drumming-performance, where the men do the drumming while the women sing—I noticed that when Ishuarkaloo took the drum, the women sang a song, the words of which, translated into English, set forth that ‘‘ Ishuarkaloo lied when he said he was afraid to go on the moving ice to save Net- chuk’s children.’’ The remarkable experience of the nineteen members of the Polaris expedition, who were one hundred and ninety-six days upon an ice-floe, during which they floated from Smith Sound, north of Baffin’s Bay, to a point off the coast of Labrador near St. John’s, Newfoundland, is a matter of his- tory. Those who have read the published accounts of that wonderful drift will not be at a loss to imagine what would have been the fate of that devoted band had it not been for ‘‘ Esquimau Joe’’ and the Green- lander Hans, and particularly Joe. He it was who built the snow-house that was their only lodging, and he, too, killed most allthe game that furnished them with food. It was his steady nerve and cool, deliberate aim, with only a Remington pistol mounted ona rude stock like a rifle, that brought down the ice bear, the flesh of which saved them when starvation stared them in the face. The only instance I can recall where a party carried away on an ice-field was with- out the aid of native experience was that which resulted in the death of Ensign Put- nam of the U. S. steamer Rodgers, during the winter of 1881. He was traveling along the lower shore of St. Lawrence Bay, in East- ern Siberia, upon a dog sledge, in company with three other sleds, each driven by a na- tive Tchouktchis, and upon each of which was an officer of the Rodgers. Putnam’s was the only sled without a native driver. There was a terrible storm blowing at the time, and the snow was flying so that it was

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JUDEA. impossible to see, while seated on a sled, the leading dogs in its team. When the sleds driven by natives arrived at the point where they turned off from the coast to a hut about one hundred and fifty yards up the shore, Putnam’s team held on upon the ice, keeping the wind behind them, which the dogs will always do unless closely watched. He was not missed until all the other officers entered the house, and then it became apparent that he had failed to notice the turning in from the coast. The natives could not be induced to go in search of him, because they knew it would be useless and that no one could pos- sibly get back against that wind. Next morning, when the storm lulled and his companions went in search of their miss- ing comrade, they found the track of his 281 sled leading right down to where the ice had subsequently broken off, and it was then known that he had been carried out into Behring Sea. Four days later he was seen two or three miles out from the land, en- deavoring to make his way to the shore over the new ice, and was never seen afterward. Most of his dogs came ashore, and one with a pistol bullet hole in its head made by its master in an attempt to kill it for food. His comrades saw him from the shore, but could not reach him, for the sea was filled with young ice, over which it was equally impos- sible to walk or to force a boat. So perished poor Putnam. I can not help believing that had he been accompanied by one of the na- tives of that coast, he would have escaped his terrible fate. JUDEA. By JAMEs T. Ou, happy they who saw! McKay. Our eyes are dim, And faint our hearts, with striving, heat, and dust; And devious the road, although in Him Wh guides the starry round is our sure trust. Men have sought out so many newer ways That fork and interweave, ’tis hard to find The grass-grown, narrow track amid the maze; And with much searching for it we go blind. So long, so weary, long and far since when The nightly heavens did with portent shine: Such swarming myriads of brother men Have been and disappeared and made no sign! Our ears are dull with hearing overmuch ; The story told a thousand times grows cold— Oh for another flame-lipped prophet, such As set on fire the people’s hearts of old! Once more, once more if on our longing sight Might flash the radiant messenger that came Upon the shepherds as they watched by night, With tidings of great joy in glad acclaim ; If o’er us on the sky once more might gleam The herald-star’s ecstatic blazonry— How should we rise and bid it onward stream, And follow, follow, over land or sea!

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TIMOTHY CHUBB AND THE COLD PUNCH. By FRANCES COURTENAY BAYLOR. IMOTHY Chubb was a warm-hearted, pig-headed, high-tempered man. He was a good farmer, as the bursting barns, care- fully-protected- hay-ricks, fine cattle, neat fences, and beautifully-tilled fields of his five- hundred-acre farm attested. He was an ardent granger, and hated all railroads, their presi- dents, corporations, employees, ways, means, and methods with a fierceness that would have delighted Dr. Johnson, and alarmed most people who heard him talk of them for the first time, while the particular railroad that ran straight through one of his best meadows—the Southern & Central—was the Mordecai at his gate, a stench in his nostrils, the bane of his existence. He was a strict but just and even generous master, and never lacked for men to ‘‘handle’’ his crops, harvest when he would. He was an aggressive, not to say merciless neighbor in the matter of stray sheep, predatory pigs, open gates, and broken fences, but a not un- kindly one outside of these high agricultural crimes and misdemeanors, having been known to take off his coat and work much harder than any hired laborer in order to help save a friend’s crop threatened by rain, and as liberal with his machines, and seeds, and tools as with advice how to make the best use of them, if his sound, sensible, but dictatorial orders about ‘‘ top-dressing,’’ and ‘*subsoiling,’’ and ‘‘ rotation,’’ and the like can be called advice. He had been a peppery, masterful, but substantially indulgent husband to a meek spouse, who never contradicted him in her life, except upon one occasion when she found herself unavoidably obliged to de in the face of his most positively expressed statement that she was getting well rapidly and would be ‘‘ out of that bed in less than a week,’’ He was an imperious but really devoted father to his only child, a daughter, Lucy Merriman Chubb by name, and by nature a creature far meeker, shyer, and more timid than ever her mother had been. Lucy was eighteen years old in the summer of 1883, when she returned from boarding- school to Clover Farm, bringing ‘‘a di- ploma’’ (framed) that Admirable Crichton could never have honestly won, a great heap of tattered, dog’s-eared, bescribbled school- books, treating of history, moral philoso- phy, physical geography, chemistry, as- tronomy, botany, trigonometry, etc. (whose contents it is unnecessary to say she knew by heart and remembered and practiced all her life long) ; some blank books in which had been carefully copied a whole series of her valuable and original compositions on the ‘‘ Mind of Man,’’ ‘‘ The Evils of Infidel- ity,’’ ‘‘ Reflections on the Universe,’’ ‘* Medi- tations on the True and the Beautiful ’’ (rep- resenting a prodigious amount of mental effort extending over a period of two years, during which she wrestled for three days out of every month with the loftiest problems that could occupy the attention of a Newton as conscientiously as any she-philosopher of eighteen that ever lived to become the attrac- tion of something stronger than gravitation not wholly unconnected with apples) ; an album containing the autographs of twenty- five altogether congenial and utterly devoted friends ; the last Fashion Bazaar (for ‘‘a sweet polonaise’’ exactly ‘‘ adapted to slen- der figures’’), and a delightful conviction that life would now begin to be interesting, romantic, brilliant, as full of delicious fruition as it had always been of delicious promise. In other words Lucy was “fin- ished ;’’ but not in the sense of being done for. A more healthy minded, sweet tempered, wholesome maiden, a prettier one (if you like brunettes), anda pleasanter one for ‘‘ human nature’s daily food,’’ you could not have found in the whole State of Illinois. Not that she was extraordinarily gifted, witty, musical, or even vivacious ; but because she was a sweet, unselfish, gentle young girl, full of kind thought for others, quietly cheerful, contented, fond of her father and home, and doing twenty things a day to brighten both, as a matter of course, too, not as ‘‘a mission ’’—a pleasure to herself rather than duty to others.

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TIMOTHY CHUBB AND THE COLD PUNCH. The high-shouldered old house with its steep roof, its heavy porch, its pleasant old orchard stretching away at the back, its homely, home-like environment of sheds and barns, hay-ricks, feeding-troughs and horse- pond, its noisy fowls and placid cattle, took on a special and particular air of its own, an added charm that was over and above its own look of. peaceful plenteousness, when Lucy came home. Lucy’s neat, trim figure was to be seen here, there, and everywhere. Lucy’s basket, and garden-hat, and gloves, and keys, and other feminine possessions were all about the place. She seemed to pervade the whole farm in a wonderful way. Her pony was in the nearest meadow ; her spick and span little carriage was sitting with its feet up in the coach house, and could be plainly seen from the road that curved that way and then led off to the fields. Her flowers bloomed gayly in new beds made for them in the old garden. Her sewing was left on the circular bench under the great elm along with Tupper’s ‘‘ Poems”’ and ‘‘ Thaddeus of Warsaw,’’ or some one of the Waverley novels, with which she was ‘improving ’’ herself. And she herself was among the currant bushes, in the dairy, the poultry-yard, the kitchen, in which last place, indeed, she achieved gastronomic triumphs that made glad the heart and ge- nial the temper of her father. He had told her that she was not to doany- thing ; that he had all the ‘‘help"’ he need- ed, and that there was no necessity for her ‘‘to turn her hand to anything.’”’ But Lucy was eminently domestic in her tastes, and energetic in her character, and she could no more have idled away her days in fine-ladi- cal fashion than she could have devoted her nights to sqyaring the circle. She took a turn at ‘‘The Antiquary’’ or ‘‘ Plutarch’s Lives’’ between times, when she was mak- ing preserves, because she had been told that she had a mind to improve, and was anxious to do her duty by herself as well as by other people. But her confections were never burnt in consequence of her absorbing interest in Scotch dialect or Roman consuls, and her pretty face showed a much more pro- found interest in the color of her straw- berries, and anxiety to have them satisfac- tory in quantity as well as quality, and “come out ever’’ with her jars when it was time to bottle them, than it ever did 283 during the process of improving herself by a patent method, that had the effect of mak- ing her turn over the pages very rapidly, but only to see how long the chapter was, and wish it a good deal shorter. Her father was delighted with her conduct and character in every particular. He felt himself to be as directly the author of all that was admirable in it as of the abundant wheat crop that he had planted and was about to harvest. He was always con- vinced that everything that he did was right and could not but turn out well. Every thought almost that he could spare from the engrossing business of his life, his farming, was given to her. He settled in his own mind exactly what her future was tobe. He was ambitious for her; she should be as much of a lady as anybody; she should marry a professional man of means and standing, and of his own selection. No farmer, with unsound views about every- thing ‘‘from a to izzard,’’ need apply, or hope to live off him, and manage /zs farm. The house was a different thing with her in it, but he must not be such a fool as to suppose that he could keep a pretty girl like that to lightit up. What he could and would do was to marry her to the right man, and he flattered himself that he was the very per- son to decide who the right man was. Wom- en never knew what they wanted, nor were they satisfied when they got it. When har- vest was over he would settle that thing. There was young Lathrop the lawyer— here ensilage pushed Lawyer Lathrop, and Lucy, and all thoughts of marrying and giv- ing in marriage, quite out of his mind, and if he ever thought of them again for the next six weeks, it was with an agricultural seren- ity of conviction that there was “plenty of time.’’ There was plenty of everything at Clover Farm, and the processes to which he had been accustomed were all slow ones of plowing, and sowing, and waiting for the early and latter rain to moisten, for snows to protect, and sun to ripen, and all the patient forces that gradually wake from their sleep the living things in the darkness of the earth’s bosom, that tassel in silken tufts and laugh in bearded grain, and flowers, and fruits, and all manner of good gifts. But in Siberia it is said that the crops are planted, come to perfection, and are har- vested within six weeks, owing to certain

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284 climatic conditions ; and it iscertain that in far less time an affection that has stood the test of half a century’s wear and tear has been known to be planted, and to grow down to the roots of things and up to the héavens, if not to come to perfection ; so that it was not remarkable that Lucy and John—— But I must introduce John properly. He introduced himself at Clover Farm not long after Lucy’s diploma was framed and hung up in the parlor, making close connection with it even for a railroad man. It is very curious how things get about. The lilacs in the garden are bare, or budding, and there is not a bee to be seen for miles around. They bloom, and lo! an army of winged despoilers settle upon every cluster. The cherries and strawberries are allowed to bud and bloom without hearing the rustle of so much as two pin-feathers, and encouraged, they go farther. But when the rain has cried over certain little excrescences formed slowly and painfully on stems and branches; when the sun has kissed the most delicious juices into them ; when they are round, per- fect, sweet, rife, hark!: Here they come! Birds, birds, birds! The most scientific head-gardener could never tell with any- thing like the same accuracy when that moment has arrived. In the same way, when a charming girl gets home from school, pastors and masters, and teachers and governesses, and old men and children, and old women and maidens may not be aware of the fact, or may only learn of it slowly in the most indirect and roundabout ways ; but if there is a youth within a radius of fifty miles, there will be one person who will know the when, and where, and a great deal beside—who she is ; her name, her abode, her looks, dress, man- ner very likely—-and all this before the stage- coach that brought her has reached the next town, very often, if the girl be particularly pretty or attractive. Lucy had not finished unpacking her ‘trunk, and shedding tears of sentimental regret over the life and companions that she had forever left behind her at Zion Hall ; she had not arranged her work-box and desk and album and elegant portfolio of se- lected drawings and prize-books about her room, or begun to take any sort of interest in the life she was to lead, the familiar sur- roundings that yet wore such a strange air, THE COSMOPOLITAN. when John Deering found himself absolute- ly obliged to walk through Mr. Chubb’s ‘* yard ’’ (and to pass, too, directly under the parlor windows) in order to get to his mother’s house, as he came out from Mid- ford to spend Sunday, as usual, at home. Nothing but dire necessity, of course, could have induced him to decide upon a route that took him a mile and more out of his way with the thermometer standing at ninety degrees. It is to be hoped that he felt repaid for the exertion by the mere glimpse that he got of Lucy (after swiftly reconnoitering the whole building) at an upper window, indus- triously engaged in brushing the dust from her traveling-dress. She did not see him, and if she had it would have made no difference, for John was not one to strike the most susceptible maiden dumb with his manly beauty, and the idol of Lucy’s heart (of whom she was thinking at the moment) was her very dearest, darling- est friend, Genevieve Thompson, to whom she had just written sixteen pages of protes- tation and undying affection. It must have been a satisfactory glimpse on the whole, for he immediately wanted another ; and an un- satisfactory one, for it never seemed a com- plete experience. Every visit of John’s for the next six weeks required to be patched with another, and the fact that he had just been to the house seemed to serve only as an imperative reason for going again as soon as possible. He and Lucy had known each other very well as children, but had not seen each other for several years. The consequence was, that after the first conventional crust had been broken between them, four and twenty blackbirds began straightway to sing ; or, to drop metaphor, everything combined to lead their thoughts and talk back tothe (as it now appeared) delightful time when they had walked hand-in-hand in the flowery paths of happy childhood. Mr. Chubb, intent upon seed-corn and prize pigs and a new floor for the stable, had not the faintest notion of what was going on in the dairy, under the great cherry-tree, among the rows of old-fashioned four- o'clocks in the dear old garden, on the horse- hair sofa in the best parlor ; and ifhe had known of it he would have scouted the idea of ‘‘two young fools like that thinking of marrying,’’ or of his daughter daring to

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TIMOTHY CHUBB AND THE COLD PUNCH. dream in her wildest moments of disposing of her own heart, hand, and future. He met John sometimes in the hall, or about the place, and nodded to him with careless good-nature ; stopped him once or twice to ask him if his mother would sell ‘that red Alderney cow of hers ;’’ how wheat was quoted at Midford. But give him a thought as a possible suitor for his Lucy, ‘*the lawyer’s lady,’’ as he already called her in his own mind, he never did. He had known ‘‘ that boy always’’ hetold Lucy, who listened with eager, smiling interest, expect- ing to hear John finely praised the next moment—a hope dashed cruelly to the ground by his adding reflectively a moment later : ‘*He’s freckled worse than ever; he’s a regular turkey-egg.”’ Such language applied to the beloved ob- ject is certainly not gratifying to anybody, and Lucy was disgusted, but only dared to bring out a mild: ‘‘Oh, father! He isn’t at all! His skin is so fine and white and delicate that every little blemish such as no one would ever see on you—or me”’ (hastily) ‘‘is noticed at onceonhim. He’s a little sunburnt now, but it will all come off. And those things don't matter in a man, one bit.’’ ‘‘That’s so,’’ agreed Mr. Chubb, ramming tobacco into his pipe, and with no suspicion that he had been making an extremely offen- sive astronomical observation and finding spots on the sun. ‘‘He used to be ’round here a dood deal when he was a child, riding the horses to pasture and feeding the thresh- ing-machine. A nice little chap,’’ Mr. Chubb resumed, ‘‘but I’ve not seen him ’bout for two or three years. What’s he doing, any- way ?’’ To this query poor Lucy, whose dearest wish it was that a good understanding should be brought about between her father and John, Lucy, the constitutional coward, could give no reply except the evasive one: ‘‘He’s in some sort of business in Mid- ford.’’ She simply could not say that John was the freight agent of the Southern & Central Narrow Gauge Line, knowing her father’s prejudice to railroads in general, and rabid hatred of that railroad in particular. Her idea was that if she could keep this damag- ing fact in the background until her father knew what John was, all would be well. No 285 one could know John and not accept any and every thing connected with him. She coun- seled John to keep the thing from him. But John, who was a most manly and honest fel- iow, would make no promise of the kind. ‘*There’s nothing to be ashamed of,’’ he said. ‘‘I’ve got aclean record all through ; that anybody is welcome to see. I am not going to tell any minnows or whales about it. I expect to be general freight agent at Sud- bury in two years, and I don’t see but what it’s as good a business as raising pigs and popcorn. If your father don’t like railroad- ing, lam very sorry, but he’ll have to lump it, that’s all. I was intended for a farmer by my mother, you know, but it didn’t suit me at all: it was too slow—like waiting for judg- ment day ; sol got me a place on the road, and have worked up to where you see me. Don’t you worry your little head about that. I'll fix that all right. I'll tell him.” ‘‘John, I forbid you to say one word about it until I give you permission,”’ said timid Iuicy. ‘‘He'd forbid you the house. We never could see each other as we have been doing. Promise me that you won’t.’’ ‘Well, I won’t then, unless he asks me about it,’’ said John. ‘‘ But I will if he does, and more too. What business has he got taking up such notions, if he is your father ?”’ The crop that year turned out splendidly on Mr. Chubb’s hands. There had not been such a yield for fifteen years. Not a farmer in the county had any fault to find with it, and that told its own story. Mr. Chubb was radiant. ‘It means five thousand clear laid by in Midford Bank. That’s what it means!’’ he said to Lucy. ‘‘And now I can attend to other things—other things.”’ Not three days later Lucy was summoned down stairs to see ‘‘a gentleman,’’ and think- ing that there was but one man in the world, stopped to put on her freshest and most be- coming muslin gown, the better to please John, whom she had not seen for a lover’s eternity of four days. But she was disap- pointed to find quite another visitor seated on the horsehair sofa immediately under the famous diploma that ought to have pro- claimed her Mistress of Hearts, so charm- ingly simple and sweet did she look in her bravery. It was Mr. Lathrop, who came to meet her, and shook hands, and seemed to her to stay forever, although she had told

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286 him that her father had gone to Midford for the day. Somehow, with vague yet acute feminine suspicion and comprehension, she disliked him on the spot; disliked his pallor, dis- liked his Roman nose, disliked his lisp ; disliked, most of all, his flattering speeches and profuse compliments; was not even agreeably impressed by his neat dress, al- though, as a rule, she liked men to be what she called ‘‘stylish,’’ and thought it the only thing that John lacked—no, not /acked, either. That idea she could never have connected with John, if he had been minus an arm, leg, oreye. Let us say that it was the one thing that she thought might be added to John. After this a most amusing sentimental ‘*Box and Cox’”’ situation existed at Clover Farm. On most days of the week Lawyer Lathrop simpered affably, and prattled po- litely to and at Miss Lucy, who suffered many things at his hands and accepted only such attentions as she could not decline with her father ‘‘bossing’’ the affair and match- making in his own determined fashion. And every evening John Deering contrived to have an hour at least with his charmer, and needed nor desired the least assistance in doing his own wooing. Mr. Chubb’s favorite poison was faithfully and regularly administered, he holding bot- tle and spoon ; the antidote as regularly and most efficaciously given by a private practi- tioner, who understood the patient’s symp- toms and malady, and sympathized with her deeply. Poor Lucy needed sympathy, you may be sure, for between the three men she was almost distracted. She had long since given up her correspozdence with Genevieve Thompson under the pressure of her woes and difficulties. She could only fly for refuge to her ‘‘Aunt Harriet,"’ as she called a dis- tant, elderly, intensely romantic, and very admirable cousin who had lived with them at Clover Farm ever since the death of Mrs. Chubb. And what that lady had to listen to from Lucy in the way of rhapsodies and praises of one lover, and ridicule and abhor- rence of another, and lamentations over the misery of having the one taken from her and the other thrust upon her, will never be known. The conjectures, confidences, hopes, plans that were poured out upon that kind- hearted kinswoman would have utterly THE COSMOPOLITAN. wearied and disgusted anyone less unselfish and attached; but Miss Harriet was never tired of hearing them. She longed and pined to be a ded ex machina, and bring Cousin Timothy to book, and get him to “bless you, - my children,’’ and send them off to Niagara happy-pairing and honeymooning. But she was ‘‘a poor relation,’’ and Mr. Chubb was not a man to take advice from his nearest and richest of kin. Besides, Lucy implored her not to interfere. John came over rather earlier than usual one afternoon and caught, or was caught by, Mr. Chubb on the front veranda. ‘*Sit down ; sit down, John,’’ said Lucy’s father. ‘‘How’s corn going at Midford to- day, do you know? It was being thrown away yesterday. That's the worst of farm- ing. Ifthe year’s bad, you’ve got nothing to sell. If it’s good, nobody will buy what you've got.”’ And Lucy’s lover sat down, glad of a chance ‘‘to make connection,’’ in profes- sional parlance, with a gentleman who had a little daughter as well as a big crop to dis- pose of. The two chatted on pleasantly enough for some time, John listening attentively and respectfully to the future father-in-law of his hopes and keeping an eye on the door to see if Lucy would come out, and all went well until Mr. Chubb, mounting his hobby, began to give his opinion of railroads and every- thing that was connected with them. Warm- ing with his subject, he past-participled the whole institution from presidents to Pull- man porters, from securities to sleepers, and the Athanasian creed is mild and character- less compared to the richness and depth and variety of his curses against the very tel- egraph-poles that .countenanced such in- iquity. John’s first feeling was one of dismay. It had come. His face got redder and redder, and finally he blurted out: ‘‘Mr. Chubb, sir, I am a railroad man. I’m the freight agent of the Southern & Central,’’ when he could no longer control himself. ‘*Then you are a —— fool, or a —— —— knave, and you've got the ——- —— —— rascally business and thievin’, lyin’ set of companions that ever was, outside of the penitentiary—that’s all I’ve got to say about it,’ announced Mr. Chubb, rising in a turkey-cock access of fury from his arm-

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TIMOTHY CHUBB AND THE COLD PUNCH. chair. The glove was thrown down now, and John picked it up, and a pretty quarrel ensued, with this pleasant result—that John was ordered off the premises. Dark were the days that followed. Miss Harriet tripped about the house actually and morally on tiptoe, going as ‘delicately ”’ as King Agag. Lucy, that pearl of a girl, was dissolved perennially in tears, which she had either just shed, was shedding, or would shed. John vanished. Lawyer Lathrop alone remained the same, came early, stayed late, brought gifts; was blind, deaf, dumb, apparently, where Lucy was concerned—that is, to her melancholy looks and vexed speeches ; he proposed finally and was ac- cepted—by Mr. Chubb. He had heard all about John and hated him. He loved Lucy (to call an odious sentiment by a fine name), although he was perfectly aware of the state of her feelings. The fact was that he had sentimentally the cuticle of a hippopota- mus. Lucy was lovely. Lucy would have Clover Farm and shekels some day. What were hearts and darts, and tears, and ‘‘tara- diddle foolishness’’ when compared with the solid advantages to be gained by such an al- liance? So Lucy was informed one day that she was to marry a man that she detested ; very much as she might have been told that she was to change her dress. ‘‘T’ve settled the whole thing. on the 25th of this month,’’ Mr. Chubb an- It is to be nounced. ‘‘There’s no use putting off a thing when it’s got to be done. I’ve spoken to your Aunt Harriet; she’ll get whatever you want in the way of wedding finery, and I’ll see to the rest. All you've got to do is to get ready, my dear. Lathrop’s a first-rate match for any girl, first-rate. Correct man ; long-headed, even for a lawyer. Got a ver- dict against the Southern & Central, yester- day, for ten thousand—that Brownlow case. He’s the very man for you. Got money laid by, and ’ll take good care of you. Smart, deep fellow ; sure to get on, if he isn’t one to palaver the women.”’ Now, if Lucy, who had listened stupefied to all this, had been a girl of spirit, the ques- tion of marrying Mr. Lathrop would have been ‘‘ settled’’ indeed, then and there, if not exactly as Papa Chubb proposed. Not all the king’s horses, nor all the king’s men, nor all the fathers, mothers, grandfathers, grandmothers, uncles, aunts, cousins, or 287 friends in Christendom could have pushed her another stepinthatdirection. But Lucy was very timid; very gentle, and all her life-long had trembled before her big, burly, imperious parent. Shecried, ofcourse, sobbed piteously, vowed passionately that she never, never, NEVER would marry Samuel Lathrop while she lived, and fled up to her room and into Miss Harriet’ssympathetic arms, leaving her father vexed, but not seriously disturbed, con- vinced that she would ‘‘come to her senses and give in.’’ And in the end, as he had thought, she gavein. ‘‘ Chateau qui parle va se rendre.”’ She consented to listento Mr. Lathrop. She had to listen to her father. The thing was ‘settled ’’ to suit Mr. Chubb, who again, and this time formally, accepted the lawyer that had got a verdict against the Southern & Central. It was the most endearing fact that he knew of, that spruce, respectable, cold-blooded member of the Midford bar, for whom he had no great liking, except so far as he really represented his own plan for secur- ing certain advantages for his daughter. And so it came about thatin two weeks from the time it was first mooted Mr. Chubb’s point wascarried. Lucy was engaged, not to her ‘‘ dearest John,’’ as she had often pictured to herself ; John, whose photograph she put under her pillow every night, and of whom her heart and thoughts were full, but to Mr. Samuel Lathrop, of Midford. Miss Harriet was aghast; Mr. Chubb, openly jubilant ; Mr. Lathrop fishily gratified and satisfied ; John Deering in despair. Matters were at this stage, and all was brisk preparation for the wedding when one evening Lucy went to her room. Her fiancé had spent the whole afternoon with her, and “she had been only too thankful to see him drive off and to go to her room, where she cried and bathed her face, and cried again, and took off her hateful engagement ring and felt again comparatively free and happy, or at least less miserable. She was sitting there thinking of the same thing, or rather person, that always filled her mind, when Miss Harriet came in, looking excited. ‘*My dear,’’ she said, ‘‘ he’s downstairs, and says he must see you.’’ ‘‘He’’ was John Deering to Miss Harriet, and Lucy, of course, knew who “ he’’ was, and never confounded him for one moment ‘with the late-departed Samuel.

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288 “Tecan'tsee him. Ican’tsee him. You must go down and tell him so. After the way I’ve treated him———’’ began Lucy, get- ting very pale, and bursting again into the ever-at-hand sobs. ‘*He says he will see you,’’ replied Miss Harriet. ‘‘ Poor fellow! You'd better go down. He may do something desperate.’’ A fear of John’s doing something ‘‘ despe- rate’’ was one of Lucy’s haunting terrors, but then to see him as Mr. Samuel Lathrop’s fiancée ! ‘* What does he want, auntie? ’’ she asked. **O, I can’t, I can’t !”’ ‘You can’t help yourself. If you don’t go down, child, you may regret it,’’ said Miss Harriet. ‘‘ What are you afraid of? He knows you're engaged, for he told me so. Go along down stairs.’’ Thus urged, Lucy went down, and John turned as pale as she was when he saw her. He was sitting on the horse-hair sofa, where she never sat now, partly because it remind- ed her of the days when she and John had spent so many hours side by side on its slippery, uncompromisingly hard surface, but chiefly because she could not so well regulate the exact and respectful distance that she wished observed between herself and her fiancé there as when she took a chair. There were no demonstrations to fear from John. Hedid not so much as offer to shake hands. He had cometotell her some- thing. And this was it, briefly told without the clauses and pauses of the agitated speaker, the interruptions and comments of the listener. Mr. Chubb, a few days before, had sold his large crop to a firm in Fenton, a hundred miles away. It had been shipped and had got safely as far as a town midway between Midford and Fenton—Fairfield. A strike was imminent, and all traffic about to be stopped. John was at Fairfield; had found it out ; knew that Mr. Chubb’s crop was on the track, and, for love of Lucy, had at the very last moment contrived to get ‘‘ every blessed car’’ sent off safely to Fenton just before the storm came that had ruined many shippers and done great injury even to such a powerful corporation as the Southern & Central. This was the gist of the interview. But a good deal beside crept into it. John learned that Lucy still loved him, and was sacrific- ing herself to her father’s ‘‘ notions.”’ Lucy THE COSMOPOLITAN. was humiliated and delighted at once by this fresh proof that John was ‘‘ the noblest creat- ure in the world.’’ They parted with love and hope both revived. Lucy thought that her father would be so touched by John’s ‘‘splendid conduct’’ that he would relent and repay him in the only coin he would take. John determined that he would ‘‘make a fight for it,’’ as he put it in his own thoughts. But alas! it was Miss Harriet who was melted, and sang John’s praises, and cried on Lucy’s neck, and declared that Lucy and John were ‘‘made for each other,’’ and that it was ‘‘monstrous to part them.’’ Mr. Chubb was vastly pleased, delighted, indeed, but he had no idea of doing anything more than thanking John, which he did that very night in cordial terms, and with a feeling that he was behaving handsomely, for he had a pen-and-ink-phobia, and never wrote a letter if he could possibly get out of it. Perhaps he preferred that way of express- ing his sense of the obligation for other rea- sons. He knew very well, now, from both Lucy and Miss Harriet, what John’s feeling was toward Licy, and of her affection for him. For one moment he even thought of ‘“‘settling’’ the matter all over again, and very differently. He had but a contemptu- ous opinion of women, however—their love, their hate, their intellect, their influence and character generally ; and he soon convinced himself that it was too late, and that one man was not only as good as another but better, too, in this case. So nothing was changed. The wedding was to be, or he would know why, he said angrily. Miss Harriet and Lucy were bidden to get ready for it, and say no more. Miss Harriet and Lucy being what the French call per- fect ‘‘ muttons,’’ /ooked unutterable appeals, wept, said a great deal behind Mr. Chubb’s back, odeyed. And John Deering raged in- wardly, protested on paper, tried to get another intervicw with Lucy, failed, and was checkmated all around for the time being. On the day before the one fixed for the wedding he made his last attempt, and it was as he was riding slewly back to Midford with the heaviest heart in the world that Mr. Lathrop’s new buggy, resplendent with paint and varnish, and drawn by a fast trotter, came bowling along ex route to Clover Farm. Mr. Lathrop was dressed in his best, and

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TIMOTHY CHUBB AND THE COLD PUNCH. felt at his best. Recognizing John as he passed by him, he very kindly and delicately pulled a paper from his pocket and flourished it at him, calling out: ‘‘See here! License! You can come to the wedding if you like. Do!”’ Mr. Lathrop was not a man of many im- pulses, but he could not resist the tempta- to taunt his rival. And John would have liked nothing better than to have dragged him out of his buggy and laid his own whip over his shoulders. All the natural savage in him was aroused. He was not in a state of nature, though, in Africa or Ceylon or the Sioux country, where men may savagely re- sent barbarous treatment, and though by no means in a state of grace, he was presently jogging again toward Midford, and again in these civilized United States and the nine- teenth century, with nothing but a red flush on his face to tell of his rage and grief. The day came. The wedding was to be at the farm. It was to be a quiet affair, only a few neighbors and friends being invited. It was to be at eleven o’clock sharp. The knot indissoluble was to be tied by the Methodist minister of Midford, Mr. Caruthers. Early as were the hours usually kept at Clover Farm, every member of the family for various reasons was awake on that particular morning long before the usual time, perhaps because none of them had slept well and some of them had not closed an eye at all. Miss Harriet, who as housekeeper had ‘‘the repast’’ (as she elegantly termed the wedding collation) very much on her mind, rose and dressed by lamp-light, peeped into Lucy’s room, and found the poor girl a very spec- tacle for pallor and swollen eyes, and general disheveled despair, had a final cry with her, returned to her own roomand went down- stairs with her mother’s manuscript cook- book under her arm, and her hands full of silverware. Lucy got up, and by way of preparing herself to become the wife of Mr. Lathrop, got out a villainous and most unflattering photograph of John, and all the letters and presents, pressed flowers and other senti- mental souvenirs that had come from or were associated with him, and spent two hours looking at them as well as she could for her tears. Mr. Chubb, the originator and promoter of this successful matrimonial scheme, was 289 by no means as happy as might have been expected. He, too, had had a bad night of it. For one thing, only the evening before he had been informed by a neighbor that Mr. Lathrop had been made the attorney of the Southern & Central by its astute pres- ident. There could not have been unpleasanter news communicated. His son-in-law the representative of that road! The thought was intolerable, and worse still he couldn’t help it, couldn’t help anything ; for, angry as he was, he felt that it was too late to break off the engagement he had made, though he thought of it for the first five minutes. He was afraid of public opinion ; he was. ashamed to ask it of Lucy after his high- handed course in the matter. And then, for another thing, he had been assailed by a whole host of doubts and fears now that his point was carried. Lucy had been a good daughter to him always—kind, affection- ate, obedient. Had he as he phrased and summed up the account between them ‘‘acted square and fair?’’ Perhaps he was a little hipped, for asa general thing he was firmly convinced of his own wisdom and was not given to admitting as a mere possibility even that he could be wrong. It is certain that he was out of sorts, and was up and dressed before the first auroral flush in the east above the elms opposite his. window announced that the day was at hand. Some uneasy influence from the farm must have penetrated as far as Midford, for John Deering also had tumbled and tossed away the night on the creaking and shackling struct- ure that did duty for a bed at his boarding- house. What should he do? What could he do to prevent Lucy, his Lucy whom he loved, and who loved him, from being sacrificed by ‘a brutal father’’ to ‘‘a beast’’ of a lover. John thought in strong language, and even so his feelings were so inadequately ex- pressed that he got up and walked the floor still thinking, thinking, and groaning aloud, and clinching his fist and biting his lips like the heaviest of stage villains instead of the worthiest and most simple hearted of men. At last he came to a conclusion, a conclusion so bold and startling that it almost stunned even him just at first. He would see Lucy again. He would get her toelope with him, if there was anything in love ora lover’s elo- quence, appeals, commands, despair. This

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290 ‘decided upon, he too arrayed himself and rushed out of the house, stumbling over the milkman and his cans at the door in his eagerness to secure a license (with which he meant to begin the work of spiking the enemy’s guns), utterly unmindful of the fact that it would be at. least two hours before any office would be open, any official at his post. It was only Mr. Lathrop who slept the placid sleep of the victor untroubled by any ‘doubts, fears, or alarms. When Miss Harriet had ‘‘seen to”’ a dozen things that were down in her mental memorandum, she gave herself up to ten minutes’ intense study of her Virginian mo- ther’s receipt for ‘‘ Bermondsey punch,”’ chin in hand, seated on the back veranda. She then rose, and with a purposeful air took her way to the pantry to put into instant ‘execution the instructions so clearly given. Bermondsey punch had always been in her family. It was a thing that no one who had ‘once tasted it ever forgot. It was natural that she should have thought of it at once when there was a wedding in question, even a wedding that she disliked and would have given a great deal to avert. She hada duty to society to perform, and she meant to do that duty ; but her soft heart and head were full of troubled, unhappy thoughts of Lucy and John, and unavailing regrets and wishes—so full indeed, that she was com- pletely unconscious when the time came todo as she was bidden and ‘‘stir in slowly one pint of old Bourbon previously mulled ’’ that she had exactly doubled the quantity of spir- it and halved the quantity of water ordered, by her absent-minded use of the pint and quart pots at hand. Quite satisfied with her work, on the contrary, she carefully covered the bowl when she had done, set it on the second shelf, and went off to attend to other matters. Breakfast that morning was a mere mock- ery of a meal, and was overin ten min- utes, Mr. Chubb and Miss Harriet being alike eager to get over it, and Lucy still in her room. It was about an hour after this that Mr. Chubb, who had been prowling over the house restlessly ever since he had come down- stairs, wandered aimlessly into the pantry. He stood there for a moment, looking idly at the cakes and cream and other toothsome THE COSMOPOLITAN. dishes about him, with the interest that such dainties always arouse in a breast that is honest, and conscious of a capacity to enjoy and digest them at the proper time, and all at once he spied the punch-bowl above his head. Now it is a generally conceded and perfectly indisputable fact, that men have ab- solutely no curiosity ; so it must have been that Mr. Chubb felt it to be his duty to in- form himself at once as to what that bowl contained. At any rate, he got it down, un- covered it, and examined. it attentively. Some light was thrown on the subject by an- other organ than his eyes, namely,-his nose. The little rings of lemon-peel that floated temptingly on the surface were agreeably corroborative of the theory suggested by the second sense, and a third was called to Mr. Chubb’s aid. Hetastedit. It was all that Bermondsey punch was famous for, and more, as we know. He tasted it again and again. It improved on acquaintance, like all really good things. Mr. Chubb got down a glass and filled it—a cracked glass perhaps, for somehow it had to be filled more than once, and it could not have been that Mr. Chubb, who was habitually temperate, and had voted at a late election against saloons and the selling of any and all spirits, could have had much to do with another fact—that it would not stay filled. When, however, the bowl was replaced finally, Mr. Chubb’s countenance was charmingly cheer- ful, and his heart was glad. Gone was his gloom, his doubts, his discontent. A world that had Bermondsey punch in it was the world for Mr. Chubb after all, and he went off to array himself for the great occa- sion. Mr. Chubb was not ordinarily as sensitive a plant as the man who killed himself be- cause he was so tired of dressing and un- dressing himself; but he must have found it exhausting work on this occasion, for in about ten minutes he was back in the pantry, and having administered restoratives to him- self, was presently so far refreshed and re- cruited that he put on his hat and walked off into the grounds singing an air that he had picked up from the minstrels in Midford some time before. On he sauntered and sung, and sung and sauntered, until he came to a summer-house, that he had built for Lucy, at the foot of the lawn. Here he turned in, feeling that he would

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TIMOTHY CHUBB AND THE COLD PUNCH. rather sit down than not, and here, at the very door, he met—John Deering. John was aghast, and stammered out something intended to be an explanation of his being there, and would have escaped, if he could, but Mr. Chubb would not have it so. To come to a place with the intention of carrying off a man’s daughter, and to be met and carried off by that daughter’s father instead, is certainly adisconcerting and extra- ordinary experience that would confound the most accomplished Lovelace for a moment ; and John felt himself taken into custody when Mr. Chubb ran his arm through his and led him back into the summer-house, where he had been hiding for the last half- hour, waiting for achance to get speech with Lucy, sight of Miss Harriet. ‘*Mr. Chubb, sir, I didn’t know—! didn’t mean—’’ he began, and got as red as his own cravat, but was not allowed to get any further. ‘Sit down, John, my dear old John! I always liked you, John. You are the finest young fellow in the country —a long ways the finest on the face of the earth. You are the best friend I’ve got in the world, John. Saved my crop for me— yes—you did—I love you, John, like a son,’’ began Mr. Chubb, still clutching his arm and beaming Bermondsey upon him. ‘‘I’ve always loved you, ever since you were a little boy ’round here riding the horses to pasture. Yes, John, there ain’t anybody I care more for than I do for you. There ain’t anything I won’t do for you. Why, yousaved my crop, don’t you know that? Thousands of dollars! Thou- sands of dollars! Time of that there strike that I wish had of ruined that -— —— railroad.”’ John had never heard of Bermondsey punch ; and when this speech began he was the most astonished young man on this continent. But before Mr. Chubb had fin- ished, John had inferred the existence of Ber- mondsey punch, as a savant reconstructs a megatherium from a single bone, arguing backward from effect to cause. So hesmiled, first to himself, and then at Mr. Chubb soothingly, and replied that he wasn’t in the Southern & Central any longer, and had never liked the work, still less his treat- ment as an employee of the road. Out flamed Mr. Chubb at once, and if words could have destroyed the Southern 291 & Central, every trace of that powerful in- stitution would have been swept from the State at once. But words couldn’t; on the contrary, the whistle of a train passing at the bottom of Clover Farm was to be heard that very moment. Mr. Chubb heard it, and raged more furiously. And now Mr. Lathrop came in for a share of abuse. John, who was getting utterly impatient, feeling that time was getting on, suddenly saw a gleam of light. He seized Mr. Chubb by the coat in his eagerness, and begged, implored him not to let Lathrop marry Lucy. ‘“Who says that that scoundrel attorney of the road—lI’ll tell you about that, John. Who says he’s going to marry my daugh- ter?” John could scarcely believe his ears. He trembled like a leaf in his agitation and desire to turn this mood of Mr. Chubb’s to good account. He could scarcely get out: ‘*O, sir! Mr. Chubb, it’s to-day. Stop it! Go right up to the house and stop it! Don’t let him marry her! She will be miserable for life! That’s the reason. I don’t ask you to do it because I love her, though I do, with all my heart and soul, and always will ; but it’s because I know she will be miserable with that man—that scoundrel.’’ ‘Ves, cold-blooded, white-livered rascal- attorney of the Southern & Central, I'll tell you about that. Sit down, John,’’ agreed Mr. Chubb. ‘Oh! no, sir. Don’t. Don’t sit down,’’ urged John, seizing him by the arm ; ‘‘goup to the house. Let’s go up there together. He sha’n’t have Lucy—never! never !”’ ‘*No, never. Sha’n’t have my daughter. Always hated him. Hate him like poison. Who says he’s going to marry my daughter? You marry her yourself, John. Come along. Marry her yourself. Got my farm, got every bushel of my crop—infernal rates! Sha’n’t have my daughter at all. He’s done took the position of attorney of the road. Just like him. I'll tell you about that. This is the way of that thing——’”’ Here Mr. Chubb tried again to sit down, and his purpose was again frustrated by John. ‘‘There isn’t a minute to lose, sir,’’ said he, taking Mr. Chubb’s arm this time and leading on toward the house.

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292 When nearly there he said : . ‘*O! sir, did you mean what you said? Will you give Lucy to me? I came here to- day to get her. I’ve got the license in my pocket this minute. May she be my wife? Will you give your consent ?’’ ‘* Yes, yes. Ofcourse. Take her! Take her! Why haven’t you married her before, John? I never loved a man like I do you, John. You've got the best head for figures, and the best disposition, and you are thought better of than any young man in this whole country-side, and——’”’ Here they arrived at the steps, and Mr. Chubb again showing symptoms of sitting down on the top one, John hurriedly guided him to, and deposited him in, his favorite arm-chair instead. It was now ten o'clock. He dashed up stairs and knocked at Lucy’s door. She opened it. She was all ready for the sacrifice and looked a lovely image of woe. She cried out, ‘‘John!’’ and fell back a few steps. This was movement one. Movement two was a rush into John’s arms, and a piteous outcry, ‘‘O! don’t let them take me from you !”’ John explained how matters stood as soon as he could take the necessary time. Lucy MODERN By FELIx L URING my last visit to Trieste I called upon the ‘‘ Turkish Mezzofanti,’’ a Syr- ian Mussulman, who presides over the hos- pitalities of a popular coffee-house, and is reputed to speak all the languages of the Mediterranean coastlands. ‘Are you not afraid the Austrian Temper- ance League will close up your bar-room ?’’ I inquired apropos of a remark on the Ori- ental equivalents for the names of certain highwines. The man of synonyms stroked his beard. ‘* They may prohibit alcohol,”’ said he, ‘‘ and coffee, tea, and sherbet, but that would only increase the demand for new kinds of stimu- lants. I can’t tell if they will fuddle with opium next, but I know they will fuddle. They may substitute hasheesh or absinthe, or Indian de¢e/. Well, I shall sell that substi- tute.”’ With similar complacency a first-class THE COSMOPOLITAN. was amazed, overjoyed, not difficult to per- suade. At half-past ten several guests and the min- ister had arrived. At thirty-one minutes past, Lucy and John marched into the room, and were married immediately in front of the horse-hair sofa, Mr. Chubb, all beaming blandness and Bermondsey, beside them ; Miss Harriet, all tearful delight, opposite ; the company much pleased and excited by this conclusion of a romance that they had been interested in for months. At a quarter to eleven Mr. and Mrs. Deer- ing were driving rapidly into Midford to take a train eastward, and Mr. Lathrop was driving rapidly out to Clover Farm to take a wife. Thetwo carriages passed each other on the turnpike, and as they did so John thrust out his head and a hand in which a folded paper was grasped. ‘‘See this? License! Sorry you couldn’t come to the - wedding!’’ hecried, and dashed on. Lawyer Lathrop caught a glimpse of Lucy. He half understood, but to make certain drove on to the farm, had a violent scene with Mr. Chubb, and got back to Midford in a blue-black temper, the only person dissatis- fied with the result of the cold-punch act. MAGICIANS. . OSWALD, M. D. miracle-monger might contemplate the peri- odic revolts against the follies of mysticism. Habitués of the miracle-habit may change their tonic under the pressure of public opin- ion or private dyspepsia, but their thirst for wonder will revive in spite of all arguments in favor of intellectual teetotal- ism. From the court conjurer of King Pha- raoh to the private necromancer of Queen Dowager Isabella, the dealers in miraculism have always found a ready market for their stimulants, and the only check to the pros- perity of their guild was the monopoly of the medieval priesthood, who for centuries dic- tated the terms-of the traffic, and suppressed competition by the barbarity of their excise laws against contraband miracle workers. That monopoly-period alone can explain the fact that our professional magicians are still admittedly inferior to their Oriental ri- vals, who can operate with the accumulated

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MODERN MAGICIANS. trade-secrets of the last forty centuries, but who, withal, betray their national foibles in the conservatism of their business methods. Such, at least, was the verdict of Aravad Sahib, the ‘‘ Wizard of Bombay,’’ who, on his visit to England, attended the soirée of a European colleague. ‘‘ How does he com- pare with your Eastern matadors ?’’ asked the reporter of a London society paper. ‘‘ He could beat us flat with our own tools,’’ con- fessed the ingenuous Hindu. ‘‘ The fact is that he hasn’t anything like half our knowl- edge, but I notice that he has got a knack of turning one trick into six.’’ But with equal frankness some of our ablest professionals have admitted that no theory of western science can account for the ex- ploits of some eastern specialists. Mr. La- bouchére, in his pamphlet on the impostures of the mind-reader Bishop, divides the achievements of modern black art intotricks of collusion, sleight-of-hand tricks and chemical secret tricks, but seems to have for- gotten Bacon’s essay on the origin of popu- lar delusions, where the z//usio speluncae, or ‘‘mistake of the dark cave,’’ figures as a chief source of error,—a source which our dark-cabinet wizards have contrived to turn into a golden Pactolus. The magi of the East, however, disdain that advantage. Their secrets are daylight-proof. Their tricks chal- lenge investigation on accessible platforms, or even in the open street, as on the market- square of Baroda, where a native juggler entertained a party of British officers by making two barrel-shaped drums rotate on their axes till their outlines became blurred by the swiftness of motion, and then turn as rapidly in the opposite ditection, all without any visible trace of external impulse, the master of ceremonies contenting himself with superintending the evolutions from a distance of five or six paces. Judging by their weight, the drums seemed mere shells of split bamboo, with a few small perfora- tions along the line of the central hoop, though the curiously plaited barrel-heads might have concealed a larger aperture. The juggler had kept his apparatus out of sight till just before the beginning of the performance, but many of his colleagues dis- pense with even that modest advantage. The Parsee conjurers that attend the yearly fairs of Agra and Hyderabad sit motionless on their red carpets, permitting, if not invit- 293 ing the gathering crowd to inspect their as- sortmept of simple apparatus, even if a mem- ber of the examining committee should in- stitute inquiries through a pair of European spectacles. When Frederick Gerstaecker accompanied the Duke of Coburg to eastern Africa, the incognito of his sovereign friend was dropped at Cairo, where a‘(German bank- er treated them to a dinner of fatherland fare, followed by an exhibition of local talent: fife concerts, Arabian dances, and legerde- main. The exponent of the latter accom- plishment produced a copper dice-box and repeatedly emptied it on the carpet, alterna- ting his throws with predictions that were lost upon the foreigners ; but after a series of similar preliminaries invited his audience to an open terrace, and in the plain light of the evening sun flung up a number of trans- parent balls that disappeared at an apparent height of some eighty feet above the foot of the esplanade. The globes were colorless and pellucid like white glass, but as light as gum, and were repeatedly submitted to the examination of the spectators. After pass- ing from hand to hand they were put in an open vessel, shaped somewhat like a short- handled dipper, and leaning back till his outstretched arm nearly touched the ground, the wizard then flung them straight up in the air, where they could be seen glittering for a moment like icicles or large glass pearls. But nobody ever saw them fall down again, though the scene of the experiment was surrounded by a large, level lawn; the air seemed to have swallowed them like globes of dissolving vapor. Could they have evaporated or exploded into a spray of mi- nute particles (after the manner of ‘‘ Prince Rupert’s drops’)? A sleight-of-hand trick was clearly out of the question, but a more tenable explanation of the phenomenon would have puzzled a chemist as much as an optician. Gerstaecker tried in vain to bribe the wizard into a hint on the composi- tion of his missiles, and was not much lucki- er in Batavia, where a Parsee juggler treated the Dutch residents to a novel mafanza, or killing-show, in the circus of the old city bull-ring. His victims were a number of worthless curs that their owners or captors had brought along with the distinct understand- ing that their entries would not survive the incidents of the performance. With no wea-

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204 pon but a light stick (possibly a tube), some six feet long by an inch in diameter, the performer entered the arena, and then invited his patrons to start their pets, one at a time. A lank hound, almost hairless with mange, opened the festivities by making a rush round the ring, but stopped short on finding his way barred by the still lanker professor, and retreated, after displaying his few re- maining teeth. The necromancer held his staff at arm’s length, still facing the dog, who presently began to stagger, and two minutes after had expired in convulsions. A second cur managed to run the blockade by leaping over the extended staff, but soon after- ward began to show signs of distress, and be- fore the end of the third minute had shared the fate of his predecessor. Dog after dog entered the ring in quick succession, some of them stopping in surprise and sniffing at the corpses of their doomed forerunners, but all finally approached the possessor of the ‘fatal secret, or even snapped at his naked shins, and not one of the thousand spectators saw him strike a direct blow, or defend him- self in any way suggesting a mechanical ex- planation of the uniform result. He would merely lift his staff with a menacing gesture or permit a blockade-runner to touch it in darting by, but in no instance was there oc- casion for repeating that touch. The vic- tims had hardly time to complete the circuit of the ring before their gait underwent a pe- culiar change: they would drag themselves along and stagger, or start as under a sudden blow, then roll over and die in the convul- sions characterizing the effects of certain virulent drugs. They had evidently been poisoned ; buthow? A post-mortem inquest failed to reveal as much as a scratch or a puncture. A poisoned arrow could not have entirely disappeared, while a gaseous poison would have betrayed itself by its odor or by its effects on the person of the performer. After the conclusion of the matanza, Mr. Gerstaecker secured a private interview with the artist, and in vain offered him a liberal inducement to explain the modus operandi of his trick. The Parsee seemed bribe-proof, but at last took his tempter aside, and in a whisper guaranteed the results of his profes- sional assistance if Mynheer should wish to try the efficacy of his art by an experiment on a two-legged subject—the amount of the proffered compensation having evidently THE COSMOPOLITAN. suggested a conjecture that the enterprising foreigner was contemplating the removal of some obnoxious fellow biped ! Victor Jacquemont, who mastered the prin- cipal idioms of northern Hindostan, comes to the conclusion that the East Indian jug- glers are mostly under the control of guild- masters who guard their trade-secrets with a strictness that would probably not shrink from discouraging treason by an act of pri- vate vendetta, and that a vague hint is all bribes or persuasion could hope to elicit from a member ofthe mystic fraternity. Near the sanitarium of Darjeeling, at the foot of the eastern Himalayas, the accomplished trav- eler once witnessed a performance that im- pressed him more strangely than the almost superhuman feats of gymnastic agility ex- hibited during the two preceding days. The wizard of the juggler troop was conclud- ing his soirée by a distribution of amulets, after warning all applicants to extinguish their torches, when suddenly the assembly, the juggler’s platform, and the canopy of the surrounding shade-trees were irradiated by a peculiar hazy light that made every one look around for the source of its rays. But they looked in vain. No lamp or lantern formed the focus of the uniform brightness pervading the air like a luminous mist, yet differing from a bog-fire (a will-o’-the-wisp) by the absence of flickering vapors. ‘It seemed an illumination of the ether itself, rather than of its gaseous admixtures,”’ says Prof. Jacquemont, ‘‘ and to test its bright- ness I took out a fragment of newspaper and failed to read only on account of the extreme smallness of the print.’’ He interviewed the leading juggler in the vernacular of his own hill-tribe, but his elo- quence was rewarded only by a reply almost as mystic as the phenomenon it failed to elucidate. ‘‘It is not fire,’’ said the juggler, “but its white brother (son frére blanchétre), and is used by many people that can not break its slumber. Go; I must say no more.’’ The eyes of his guild-fellows were upon him ; and a much less pardonable reticence was that of the Provencal spring-finder, de- scribed in the memoirs of Paul Courier. The Gitano, as the peasants called him after his Spanish gypsy locks, stubbornly declined to divulge his theory of subterranean water- courses, lest ‘‘his enemies, the rowdies of

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MODERN MAGICIANS. the Ardeche Valley, should profit by the discovery.’’ No water for such diadlots ; but for all others free tests, and moderate charges after the actual discovery of a perennial spring. He worked without a divining-rod. The monopoly of his secret seemed to run no risk from the presence of witnesses, whom he frequently invited to join his prospecting trips, probably in order to propitiate the mis- trust of the ignorant country population and their conjectures of sorcery as a ready ex- planation of every occult phenomenon. Mr. Courier himself accompanied him more than once, and thinks that he studied the botan- ical characteristics of the ground, as well as the configuration of the watershed. His modus consisted in mounting the ridge of some treeless hill and carefully comparing the trend of the valleys and dry ravines, and digging up a handful of soil here and there ; then returning to the top of the ridge, till after an hour or so, as if by a sudden in- spiration, he would descend the slope in some special direction, cross one or two of the larger dells, and then ascending the bed of a branch ravine, select a spot apparently perhaps in no way distinct from the monot- ony of the surrounding heather, and confi- dently assert the existence of water at a given depth. ‘‘ Thirty to forty yards ; cer- tainly less than forty-five,’’ as he generally expressed his estimates. And such was the fame of his prestige that the water-famished rustics would at once assail the ground with spade and mattock, and, if necessary, force their way through a stratum of solid rock. The indicated maximum was, indeed, hardly ever exceeded, though it frequently happened that a good stream of water was struck at a depth of ten or twelve feet, when the diviner had spoken of as marry yards. ‘‘ 7rés bien, if that will do; though there is a better spring further down,”’ was his verdict in such cases. His magic may have been merely the result of experience, aided, perhaps, by that sort of geological instinct that now and then enables a surveyor to predict the extent of a stratum from mere surface indications, just as old miners may acquire a knack for estimating the ‘‘ richness”’ of a special gully or bar. The patrons of the Gitano, however, pre- tended to trace his secret to the black art of his Spanish relations, and there is, indeed, no doubt that the gypsies have preserved mani- 295. fold caste-traditions of their native land he- yond the Indus. The proprietor of the ‘‘Hungarian Alhambra,’’ the ancient coun- try palace of Kis Martony, used to entertain his guests with the tricks of a gypsy ma- gician who combined his profession of vet- erinary surgerv with sundry by-trades, and boasted the possession of a secret for ‘‘ fas- cinating the affections of any domestic beast, bird, or reptile.’’ Nagy Istuan (Big Stephen) could make cats and ducks follow him for miles, and had a pet snake that left its hole at the first sound of his voice ; but Istuan had to draw the line somewhere, and posi- tively refused to operate on outlandish brutes. Over indigenous animals his influence seemed almost as unlimited as that ofa capi- talist over a board of New York aldermen, and his patron (Count Esterhazy) often warned his visitors that their skepticism might cost them the affection of a pet dog or horse. Intimate poodle dogs, said he, would leave their masters and playmates and cleave to Big Stephen, and the Vienna sporting papers used to publish amusing results of such experiments. Like Goethe’s wizard- apprentice, who tried in vain to lay the ghosts invoked by his chant, Big Stephen was kept busy disenchanting his superfluous pets, and often had to cool the fervor of their attachment by such prosaic refrigerants as a few pails full of ice-water. The appeals of former masters had but little effect in accel- erating the process of redemption. The charmed dogs (half a day’s seclusion in Stephen’s cabin being enough to develop a case of pronounced infatuation) would some- times seem to hesitate under the influence of conflicting passions, and fix their eyes wist- fully on the face of their former benefactor, but always end by running after Istuan— often at full career, as if anxious to escape the reproaches of their better conscience. Tricks of collusion and sleight-of-hand were clearly out of the question, far more clearly than in the performances of our best western pro- fessionals, not to mention their business rivals of the dark cabinet. Still, Mr. Labouchére's formula would make it difficult to classify certain exploits of our latter-day wizards, exploits which the courts of the Holy Inquisition might have refused to include under the category of ‘‘ white magic.’’ Fra Leo Monti, the Wizard of Palermo, once made a gilded dove hover for

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296 some minutes in mid-air, beating its wings in time to asolemn hymn, then fly under the bosom-shawl of a young girl and reappear in the form of a new-born child. Bosco appalled even a Parisian audience by the realism of his pretended acts of self-mutilation : chop- ping up his left hand and exhibiting the frag- ments, finger after finger; forcing a dirk-knife through his neck and walking about with the point of the blade protruding be- tween chin and ear. Adam Gessner (‘‘ Meis- ter Blitz’’) is said to have accepted an invita- tion to entertain the late Czar of all the Russias at his own palace, and kept his audience waiting for just forty-five minutes beyond the stipulated hour, then denied the charge of unpunctuality and appealed tri- umphantly to the evidence of every watch and clock in the castle—all the time-pieces on the premises being actually found to have retarded their record by just three-quarters of an hour. Abd-er-Rahman, the conqueror of Northern Spain, according to the Moorish chronicle of the Caliphs, once engaged a ‘‘ master- wizard ’’ who introduced himself by ‘‘ mak- ing the shadow of a dial retreat by twelve degrees,’’ an exploit which, indeed, even Russian facilities of collusion would fail to ex- plain. That same court-wizard is said to have predicted the issue of the battle of Tours (the Charles Martel affair) a full year before his royal patron crossed the Pyrenees ; but in that branch of his art, at least, his pres- tige can be challenged by the record of a modern specialist. The clairvoyante Lenor- mand, whose sanctum in the Rue Madeleine seems to have rivaled the popularity, and almost the elmoluments, of the Delphic oracle, foretold Colonel Murat that his career would end on the throne of a king (certainly an augurium of quite classic ambiguity), and that his fortune would carry him far beyond the borders of his native land. She also assured ex-Jacobin Bassére that the ghosts of the past would not rise against him ; and when Talleyrand visited her in the garb of a country curate she outlined his political vicissitudes in a way that convinced him that her keen eyes must have penetrated either his disguise or the veil of the future. In 1803 Napoleon himself could no longer ‘resist the witchery of her growing fame, and THE Ci OSMQPOLI TAN. one evening gave her a rendezvous in the library of the Tuileries. ‘* The rising clouds will pass, sire,’* said she, ‘‘ and the star of your fortune will con- tinue to mount higher and higher, for years to come, till——’’ ‘*Go on.” ‘*Till the ninth year shall witness its de- cline.’’ ‘* Et apres ?”” ‘* All beyond is dark, sire.’’ The sibyl herself kept no record of her predictions, but the unanimous testimony of her contemporaries seems to leave no doubt that what skeptics called her random shots resulted in an amazing number of hits. ‘Fhe science of prognostication has been defined as the art of distinguishing the main current of tendencies from the incidental ripples of the stream ; and vague prophecies @ Ja Numa and Nostradamus have probably been evolved after that formula; but some rather recent prophets have assumed the risk of specified predictions, and it would, in- deed, be worth knowing from what prem- ises of inference Jean Jacques Rousseau could arrive at the conclusien that Corsica was ‘‘going to produce a man who would as- tonish the world”’ (‘‘/'az un présentiment que la Corse va a priduire un homme qui étonnera le monde’’), or what ascertained ‘‘currents of tendency ’* could have induced Dean Swift to let this cloudland astronomer anticipate the discovery of ‘‘ /wo moons, revolving about the orbit of the planet A/ars, as double lamps of her night.’’ Time is the test of truth, and has yet to verify the claims of our latter-day cned but it is not likely that the result of that test will materially affect the demand for oracles. Thewish to “ pry through the key- hole of futurity’’ is an instinct of the human mind that will never fail to assert its de- mands, and, as usual, the demand will be equaled bythe supply. And even in its bolder forms, necromancy will continue to survive the caprices of its patrons. Prodigies in the name of Serapis are forgotten ; miracles in the name of the Church have become tradi- tions of the past ; but miracle-workers still ply their trade, and, judging from present indications, it seems not likely that their enterprise will fail from want of patronage.

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MR. CROWLEY AT DINNER, MR. CROWLEY, THE CHIMPANZEE. By OLIVE THORNE MILLER. ia one may judge by the crowds that flock to his audience-chamber, the most inter- esting personage in New York to-day is Mr. Crowley, thechimpanzee. From early morn- ing through the long summer days he holds his levees, and to get a satisfactory look at him one must take his place in the jam, and patiently work his way step by step as one after another retires, till he has penetrated to the rail that defines the ‘‘safety point’’ be- fore the cage. The animal is fully aware of his position is entertainer to this ever-varying crowd. 2 28 He is also perfectly competent to the task ; in fact it is no task at all, for he delights in it, and enjoys the shouts and laughter as much as an actor his applause. Sometimes, if one can get into the build- ing before the public is admitted, Crowley will come to the front, sit down and exam- ine his visitor, exchange the compliments of the morning, that is to say, listen gravely to the remarks of his guest, and answer by most expressive pantomime. Under these circumstances he appears gentle and friendly, and as if he might be made companionable.

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298 He looks one steadily in the eye, without that furtive glance that makes us always suspect the next move of a monkey ; he ob- serves dress and manners with an air of interest. That he has thoughts and opin- ions of his own no one who studies him closely can doubt, and the stranger often feels inclined to offer his next of kin a friendly hand through the bars. But the ropes at the entrance are taken down, and the waiting multitudes troop in; men and boys, if it is early ; women and children at a laterhour. Instantly the human disappears, and the monkey comes to the front; the thoughtful fellow-creature becomes a buffoon —a transformation possible to none but our Simian neighbors. He springs from his seat, takes a flying leap to the roof, crosses it by two or three swings of his long arms, and flings himself upon his two trapezes—which are, perhaps, six feet apart—with a violence that would destroy anything less strong than those inch-thick iron bars. On and around these he performs mad capers that make the spectator hold his breath lest he get his death- blow from the erratic movement of the heavy iron swings. The ape has no misgivings; his agility is equal to the demand, and he keeps both trapezes in violent and irregular motion while he plunges over, under, around, through, between, before, behind, and every other possible way, all so rapidly that there appears only a mass of swaying and tossing iron and wood, and a kaleidoscopic vision of legs and arms inextricably mixed up there- with. He soon tires of this, leaps to his spring-board, turns a somersault or two, and stands on his head, with feet on the board be- side it and hands on the floor below; then like a flash slips around under the board, em- braces it with all fours while he jounces himself up and down, bumping his back on the floor at every jolt. This lasts but a minute, for he is versatil- ity itself. After a bounce or two across the cage, and a swarming all over the bars of the front, he suddenly comes to the floor with a thump, gallops around near the walls, one hand slyly sweeping the floor, and quick as thought flings a handful of damp sawdust into the faces of his laughing audience out- side. While they cough and rub their eyes, and brush their clothes, he chuckles with delight, and turns somersaults all around his cage, or runs around at full speed, driving THE COSMOPOLITAN. his head through the dust of his floor like a plow. Sawdust-throwing is his favorite insult. While his portrait was being painted, a year or two ago, he resented the personal atten- tions of the artist, Mr. James H. Beard, by showering this material, not over the gentle- man himself, but with discriminating under- standing of where it would be most annoy- ing, upon the fresh paint of the portrait, whence it had to be picked bit by bit. If a moment arrives when Mr. Crowley does not frantically desire to play some prank, he comes to the front, makes faces, and jumps up a few inches with arms and legs held stiff, and body upright, coming down on the floor again and again with a thump, as if feet and hands were made of iron. In fact, his footsteps, at least during his public exhibitions, are usually of this character. Unless he is on some sly mischief bent, he goes about like an iron-shod horse, galloping over the boards, though he weighs but ninety pounds. The baby in the adjoin- ing cage—for there is a baby, Crowley’s future spouse—does the same thing, so it must be achimpanzeeidiosyncrasy. On the whole, Mr. Crowley irresistibly reminds one of a boy at the ‘‘showing-off’’ period of de- velopment ; and with these fantastic tricks he keeps his constantly varying jam of ad- mirers in roars of laughter the whole day. We have no reason to look for anything different, for since he came to New York an infar.t of about eight months, weighing be- tween ten and twelve pounds, his life has been passed almost entirely on the exhibi- tion .stage. At that remote time in his existence Crowley was very attractive, fora young chimpanzee is one of the drollest of beasts, although so much like the babies of the genus homo as to be almost painful to look at. All the anthropoid apes—our next of kin—resemble us in infancy in a much greater degree than in age. As years go over the head of man he becomes wiser, and generally more amiable in temper; while the ape, on the contrary, grows wary, sly, and more brutal. The baby chimpanzee is of all his family the most rollicking and jolly youngster, full of play, affectionate yet willful as well, and displaying anger like the human infant by shrieking, kicking, and throwing himself on the floor. In those early months, too, he

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MR. CROWLEY, THE CHIMPANZEE. 3 4 si SF an le Eacrer Dagon M i (lp y y y INSTANTANEOUS POSTURE SKETCHES, shows his strongest propensity—imitation. He readily learns to use a key properly, to open doors, boxes or drawers, to manage tools, to wear clothes, to eat like the people about him, even to relish their food and drink. Mr. Crowley was at this agreeable age when he came, three years ago in June ; he is now, therefore, about four years old, or nearly half-grown. He had also the advan- tage of a training by refined people ; conse- quently no bad habits or tricks had devel- oped. He passed almost from his mother’s arms into the family of Mr. Smythe, United States Minister Resident at Liberia, who, with his wife, cared for the little beast as tenderly as they could for a child. On the passage he shared the comforts of the cabin ; at hotels his board was paid ; thus he had every attention, and reached New York in perfect health and showing a pleasing will- ingness to respond to the friendly advances of everybody.

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THE COSMOPOLITAN. MISS KITTY. In the first winter of his residence in Cen- tral Park Mr. Crowley had a dangerous attack of pneumonia, during which there were daily bulletins in the papers, as though he were a public personage. The best medi- cal advice was secured, and he was treated exactly like a child. Hesubmitted cheer- fully to poultices and remedies, and com- pletely recovered his health, though ever since, as a precautionary measure, he has after dinner his daily spoonful of cod-liver oil, which he enjoys greatly. Mr. Conklin attributes Crowley’s perfect health and condition to the fact that he has been thoroughly acclimated, and never made tender by living behind glass. In most mu- seums these natives of Africa are housed in glass, and thus not only never get used to the climate, but in the bad, close air grow dull and lazy withage. Mr. Crowley, onthe contrary, passes his days in a cage, perhaps twelve or fifteen feet square, open on one whole side to the air of an animal house, which has both ends wide open to the outside. He goes daily back and forth, in the arms of his keeper, from this show-room to his sleeping-room in another building, uncovered and without taking cold. In the winter, it is true, when con- stant fires become necessary to us, he is removed to a closed building ; but even then he has the air of an ordi- nary house, with its varying temper- ature. His diet also is a subject of care. He has never been allowed some of man’s indulgences—which, because they appear funny for an an- imal, are often given to him; tea and coffee, strong drinks, candy, meats, and the many things we use, are never seen on his table. Rice or oatmeal and milk, with fruit of dif- ferent kinds, and sometimes boiled eggs, form his frugal bill of fare, and his robust health bears witness to the wisdom of this course. Susceptibility to training is one of the most attractive qualities of these great apes. It is to be regretted that Crowley’s capabilities will prob- ably never be known, since he is so constantly on exhibition that the necessary quiet and leisure are not obtainable. His dear five hundred friends never would consent to spare him from society long enough for an education. His ‘‘culture,’’ therefore, is limited to the table manners that he brought with him. These table ceremonies are a source of ever fresh interest. As the hour for his breakfast —half-past ten, or for his dinner, five in the afternoon—draws near, the crowd grows more dense in front of his reception room. A table is brought in, the cloth spread, a chair placed before it, and a soup plate of rice and milk served. If Mr. Crowley happens to be hungry, he rests from his performances, and comes, like anybody else, at once to the table; but if he had rather more fruit at his early morning luncheon than usual, or if very much excited about anything, he acts precisely as does a naughty child under the circumstances—he will not come; he prances around the cage, jounces on the spring- board, sets the trapezes in violent motion, runs up a ladder with his hands, and hangs

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MR. CROWLEY, THE CHIMPANZEE. head down over the table as if he would drop and annihilate it. The keeper meanwhile scolds, threatens to ‘‘ give it to Kitty,’’ and, in fact, behaves exactly like an exasperated nurse in the presence of a willful youngster. When he does come, he seats himself decor- ously, spreads his napkin over his knees, or sometimes crumples it in his left hand, takes the spoon in his right, and devotes himself to the business before him. That this is not play, but a serious matter, he fully recog- nizes, and he conducts himself accordingly. He handles the spoon as dexterously as any- body, and readily puts the napkin to its proper use when necessary, though occasion- ally his memory needs jogging by his keeper, who is at this moment table waiter. ‘‘ Mr. 301 Crowley ! where’s your napkin?”’ sternly asked, never fails to bring the proper response. The soup plate emptied and tipped up to scrape the last drop, it is removed, and there follows a plate of fruit, sliced, but not small enough for mouthfuls. Here the knife and fork come in, and Mr. Crowley is as skillful in cutting pieces and thrusting them into his mouth—always with the fork—as any per- son. He even goes so far in imitation ofthe manners he has seen as to pause now and then with a mouthful held up on his fork, ready to shove in as soon as he has made room in that very capacious receptacle, his mouth. After fruit comes a cup of milk, which he takes by the handle and drinks, and lastly the cod-liver oil, and a lick or two THE CHINESE MUST GO.

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302 of the spoon while his keeper is replacing the cork and so not looking. If he ison his good behavior, he revires from the table like a gentleman, and perhaps springs into his waiter’s arms to be held while dinner is removed by help of an assist- ant outside, or mounts the table and dances a jig while his attendant beats time for him. But if he is in a mischievous frame of mind, with the disappearance of the last course he suffers a sudden relapse into monkeyism, kicks over table, dishes, oil bottle, and all, and darts to the roof of his cage out of the reach of vengeance. Even on these occa- sions, however, it needs only acommand from his keeper—of whom he is plainly fond—to bring him down meekly to lay his knife and fork properly and replace his napkin, after which he immediately gives vent to his feel- ings by a few dozen somersaults, a fresh frolic with the trapezes, or a lively tattoo with his feet, while clinging to a bar with his hands. Another custom of civilized life to which Mr. Crowley takes kindly is sleep- ing ina bed. When evening comes on, he is always very tired from his all-day’s per- formances, and glad to be carried over to his room, where he quickly springs into bed and draws the blankets around him. He sleeps till awakened by the light of morning, when he calls loudly for his early breakfast of fruit, and then is ready for another day’s entertainments. One point still at issue between the super- intendent and Mr. Crowley is the wearing ofclothes. As yet the ape is not convinced that the dress of his human neighbors is either useful or ornamental, while it cer- tainly interferes with his freedom of move- ment. Without his own consent he can not be clothed, for no fabric has ever been con- trived strong enough to resist his mischiev- ous fingers. Crowley’s worst quality is the irresistible propensity to destroy every object he can lay his hands on, including live animals. A dog or cat he will almost instantly tear to pieces ; in fact, the sight of a small animal seems to put him into a fury. A tiny monkey brought by a lady on her shoulder made him so wild that he acted like a maniac ; he threw handful after handful of sawdust all over his audience ; he shook the bars of his cage with suggestive violence; he put up his lips like a trumpet and cried ‘‘ Hoo! THE COSMOPOLITAN. hoo !”’ at it; he tore around the cage in a transport, and lastly he spit atit. This is one of the bad tricks he has learned from ill- bred and teasing boys who visit him, and he has become so expert that he can reach his mark eight feet away. During the above exhibition of temper the unfortunate little creature, a beautiful squirrel monkey, six inches long, was out of its senses with fright, chattered, and fairly screamed in terror. This lamentable destructive tendency de- mands a strong guard-rail before the cage at the length of Mr. Crowley’s arm, for he is always ready to thrust out one of those long, sinewy members and snatch at hat, parasol, or anything he can reach; once in his clutches it is lost. A Park policeman stood one day talking to him, inside the rail by virtue of his office. Crowley sat on the floor close by the bars, absorbed. in contemplation of his brand-new white gloves. Very gently he pulled the tips of the fingers one after the other, quietly loosening them, till suddenly, like a flash, he snatched it off and bounded to the back of his cage. In vain the hapless policeman commanded and coaxed, begged and threatened. Mr. Crowley, entirely un- moved, sat calmly down to enjoy his prize. First he put it on his hand, using his teeth to help, and then held it up for the audience to see, with every finger spread, grinning with delight. But not being able to arrange it to his satisfaction, he tore it tostrings, and passed a happy fifteen minutes while reduc- ing it to its primitive state of thread, hold- ing one part in the bend of the thigh--the monkey’s convenient pocket—while he worked on another. On another occasion one of the Park men went inside of the rail tospeak to the chim- panzee. Crowley sat quietly on the floor looking at him, and thrusting his hands out to play, as is his custom. ‘* Look out, there !’’ warned the keeper. “‘Oh, Mr. Crowley knows me,”’ was hardly out of his mouth in response before Mr. Crowley fastened his fingers upon the lapels of his coat, one each side, and gave them such a jerk that the man was dashed vio- lently against the bars, and the coat split down the back like so much paper. This animal has proved so attractive to the public that the Park Commissioners be- thought them to provide him with a mate. An order for a young female chimpanzee

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MR. CROWLEY, THE CHIMPANZEE. was therefore sent out, and after two years of waiting a promising young personage named Kitty was brought to New York, and a most unique courtship began. The baby, for she is but an infant still, being two years old and about haif his size, is very pretty— for an ape—and a charmingly amiable and frolicsome little creature. Not possessed by the mania of tearing everything to bits, she can be trusted with a hammock, in which she plays all sorts of amusing pranks, and a red shawl, the delight of her heart. She was introduced to Mr. Crowley by placing her in the next cage to his, separated by a close par- tition, in one part of which are narrow open- ings, hardly more than cracks, through which he can see and hear, but not touch. His reception of her was not very gallant. He went mad with rage; he ached to tear her to pieces ; he shouted at her; he pounded the partition ; shook the bars; he fairly jumped up and down in passion. If any- thing was given to her, he raised a riot ; and when his audience paid attention to her, he behaved like a tiger out of thejungle. In fact, he showed himself to be a ferocious wild beast. There is no doubt that he would have killed her instantly had she been in his power. But Kitty was protected by her bars, and gradually he is getting more amiable, though with occasional relapses into his original sentiments that augur ill for Miss Kitty’s future. He grew wily after a little, and made use of other tactics to get her within reach. He came to the bars, coaxed, and chattered, and was very sociable till she came near, when heblinded her with a hand- fulof sawdust. Poor Kitty retired in dis- gust, while Crowley scampered around his cage in a frenzy of joy, chuckling, turning somersaults, and indulging in the maddest of frolics. Again he thrusts his long arms outside his cage in front, and around into her cage, his hand feeling around to seize whatever it might touch. Sometimes Kitty avoids it, sometimes she takes hold of it, occasionally she gives ita playful bite, upon which he jerks it back, rushes around his floor to gather a handful of sawdust, again puts his arm through the bars, and flings it at her. Hate her as he may, hecan not help being interested ; if any sound comes from her side of the wall he hurries to the opening and 303 glues his ear or his eye to the crack, as an eavesdropper toa keyhole. One day each of them had a stick to play with, Kitty amused herself biting hers to a point, pressing it into a hole too small to admit it until it was reduced in size, and breaking it off, then biting it again, and repeating the operation, apparently liking the noise it made. Crowley used his stick to annoy her ; he pushed it between the bars and tried to reach her with it. She would take hold of it, when he jerked it away, and was so pleased that he chuckled and grinned most unpleasantly. After tormenting her a long time, he grew careless,and she snatched it out of his hand. Then his fury was terrible to see ; he raged round likea demon, pelted her with showers of sawdust, and be- came so obstreperous that one of the keepers took a long iron rod with a scraper on the end, and tried to discipline him. But so far from succeeding, Mr. Crowley turned the tables on him by snatching it out of his hand, and then he had a weapon with which he might easily kill half a dozen of his pack- ed spectators. He had the strength to do it, too ; he handled that six-foot rod as if it were a bamboo cane. There was a sort of panic outside; the crowd backed; the keeper snatch- ed a longer iron of the same kind and kept the enraged beast so busy defending himself that he had not a chance to think of the power in his hands till the rod could be dragged out. When cold weather forces Mr. Crowley to take refuge in a warmed room, where the usual jam of visitors is not admitted, he misses the excitement, and often finds time heavy on his hands. Now he is sometimes treated to playthings. A ball he is fond of, and he has the important advantage of four hands to play with. He has even evolved a new and original way to play with that very popular toy: he lies flat on his back and takes all fourstoit. An exceedingly com- ical picture he makes of himself too. Ten-pins he enjoys, though he refuses to set up the pins. When his obliging friend aud servant, his keeper, sets them up, he runs across the room and rolls the ball, making very good shots with it. A doll that was given to him he made use of in his peculiar fashion, first beating it soundly with a stick, sitting on it, jumping on it, and at last tearingit torags. Hecan blow a whistle as well as a boy, but his

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THE COSMOPOLITAN. THE UNSOPHISTICATED POLICEMAN. supreme treat is winding a stem-winding watch ; a ‘‘ Waterbury ”’ isa treasure to him, for he dotes on a half-hour of steady wind- ing. Crowley certainly understands much, if not all, that is said to him. He is grieved by reproaches and pleased by kind words, and he manages to express his emotions clearly to his friends, though he is evidently not so fluent as some of his kind have been incaptivity. This may be because he has had no companions nor even neighbors who might be supposed to understand him, and so make it worth his while to talk. Per- haps when he becomes reconciled to Kitty, and on friendly and social terms with her, we may learn the chimpanzee language. Meanwhile he is a deeply interesting sub- ject of study, as well as the funniest fellow in New York. AVICE. By ROBERTSON TROWBRIDGE. How she had longed for it ! ‘‘ It seemed A great way off,’’ she said, Though even then the maples burned With autumn’s gold and red. And when the later, browner tints In wood and marsh were seen, We smiled to watch how she began To count the days between. But ere the first light snow-flake fell Our little bird had flown And left us, bowed and bruised, to face Our Christmas-tide alone. O little, busy mind, and heart We knew so blithe and gay ! In what far country do you keep Your happy Christmas Day ?

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A POLITICIAN AND A SAINT. By JAMES BRECK PERKINS, Author of “ France Under Richelieu and Mazarin.” HE house of Condé was among the most illustrious of France. Heroic Condés led the Huguenots in the wars for their faith and fought side by side with Henry of Navarre. They were closely related to that King, and thesecond Prince Henry of Condé was first prince of the blood. But though he stood near to the throne, he was far re- moved in character from his gallant ances- tors. He did not espouse the faith for which they had died; in his youth he indulged in a fruitless turbulence, and in his maturity he was given over to an absorbing avarice. This Prince married Charlotte of Mont- morenci, the most beautiful woman in France. . Her beauty gained for her varied and illustrious admirers. Kings and car- dinals and dukes and diplomats united in their adoration. One lover just failed of being a pope; another lover would have been glad to have made her a queen. The violent passion which she excited'in Henry the Fourth made her to a certain extent an historical character. She was a girl of fif- teen and he was a king of fifty-five. When we read of the gray-headed veteran of many battles disguising himself as a huntsman, or standing by the road in livery with a plaster over his eye to catch a glimpse of the adored object, we smile with the consciousness of su- periority tosuch weaknesses. But if we had the heroic soul of the great King, we might have the strength of passion that went with it, and which seems ridiculous to colder and weaker natures. The fire of genius that made Henry a king of men kindled the warmth of feeling, the romance of sentiment, that years could not quench. The leader at Ivry when young, could be the lover of Charlotte of Montmorenci when old; he heeded the ridicule of courtiers as little as he had heeded the bullets of the enemy. We, who can be sure we should never be heroes, may have the melancholy consolation that we are probably too phlegmatic to become absurd in the eyes of our fellows. rhe Prince of Condé engaged in plots and revolts that resulted finally in his being im- 29 prisoned forethree years. His wife joined him in his confinement, and in 1619 their daughter, Anne of Bourbon, was born in the gloomy dungeon of Vincennes. Evenin her cradle she brought good fortune, and two months after her birth her father was released from prison and restored to power and wealth. The young princess was reared as befitted her illustrious rank. She did not have a profound education ; she knew much less than the young ladies who now receive degrees from learned universities, but she was taught the things that would fit her to occupy a great place in the world. Much of her time was spent at the convent of the Carmelites. Many persons of high rank were members ofthis order. The heads of great families were often quite willing that their superfluous daughters, for whonr it might be difficult to find proper earthly alli- ances, should become the brides of the church. Devotional feeling also was strong, and many gladly sought an escape from the dangers of a worldly career in the safe and peaceful life of a religious recluse. Anne of Bourbon was greatly attracted by the char- acter and piety of those with whom she was thrown ; she had naturally strong religious tendencies, and she would have been con- tent to have taken the vows of the order and occupied her life on earth in preparing her- self for life in heaven. Her mother was one of the patrons of the convent, and gave to it liberally. The young princess sent it gifts more precious than money. She obtained from the Pope the remains of seven holy and martyred virgins, and gave them to the Sis- ters of the Carmelites. They received with ecstasy the relics of the saintly maidens, and cherished with religious joy these venerable trophies of virginal piety. But the parents of Anne of Bourbon were unwilling that she should fly the world. She was their only daughter ; she was attract- ive and beautiful, and they insisted that she should enter the brilliant society that stood ready to receive her. Orders were therefore given that she should attend her first ball.

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306 The young girl was alarmed at this prospect, and her pious and unworldly teachers were still more apprehensive. They consulted in what manner she should be protected from the perils of the ball, and it was decided that she should wear a haircloth cuirass under her party dress. Such a garment the sisters hoped might keep worldly pleasures and earthly joys from stirring too deeply the bosom of the novice. The princess attended the ball arrayed with this secret breast-plate. But, alas! what armor can withstand the darts of love and the voice of praise? weapons a cuirass of haircloth avails no more than a panoply of steel. The beauty of Anne of Bourbon excited universal admiration ; her heart beat fast with the joy of life ; her bosom swelled with the incense of flattery, the fervent glances of men, the honeyed words of women. She left the ball to discard the cuirass of the Carmelites, and to sigh no more for the tranquillity of the convent. Mlle. de Bourbon was one of the most beautiful women in France. Her eyes were of a tender blue, her hair was flaxen and juxuriant, and her locks descended in profuse waves over her shoulders ; she had an oval face and a complexion of peaches and cream. Though she was not witty, her conversation had an ease and justness of expression that made it more charming than the talk of the most brilliant. There was added to this a certain delicious languor of manner, the per- fect repose of one highly born and highly bred, who moved in such celestial heights that petty cares and annoyances could not disturb her. Men of letters had free entrance to the best society of the day, and the young princess re- ceived the homage of wits and poets as well as of warriors and nobles. Innumerable verses, most of them, it must be admitted, of very moderate merit, describe her charms. She was likened to all the attractive person- ages of mythology and fable ; all the pleasing metaphors that have been applied to pretty women since men first made verses were brought into use forher. As we read them two hundred years later they seem a little lacking in freshness ; but when the young and beautiful woman is alive and present to listen, the poetry of devotion, like the lisp- ing of love, though an oft-told tale, is for- ever new. Mlle. de Bourbon affected to be a Against such THE COSMOPOLITAN. patron of letters and a judge of literary mer- it. Her criticisms were probably not as dis- criminating as those of Boileau, but her praise gave delight to those who received it ; and if she added to the happiness of authors, she accomplished more than most critics. Many great alliances were suggested for one who combined rank and beauty and grace. The marriage ofa girl of high posi- tion was left wholly in the hands of her pa- rents ; the future bride was hardly consulted in the matter, and her love was left to spring, obedient to duty, for the man whom oth- ers selected as its object. The Prince of Condé at last ehose the Duke of Longueville for his son-in-law. He was a man of high rank; he was the governor of Normandy; he was descended from Dunois ; he had wealth and power ; but he was a rather disagreeable duke of forty-seven, and his bride was a very romantic princess of twenty-three. Their relations were always those of mutual indif- ference, except when they quickened into those of mutual dislike. The Duke did not atone for his years and his defects by the doting devotion which el- derly husbands sometimes show to youthful wives. He was exacting with his wife, and friendly with other women. Mme. de Longue- ville, however, accommodated herself to her new position, and for some years she lived with her husband in outward amity. Their hotel was a social center ; she led a brilliant life of pleasure, but with a propriety of conduct above all criticism. Her brother, the future Prince of Condé, was then at the heightof his glory ; he had won the great battle of Rocroi when a youth of twenty-two, and his fame 1nade his sister's position still more conspicuous. She became the occasion for a duel between representatives of the historic houses of Co- ligny and Guise, but it involved no reflection on her own character. The young Coligny had admired Mme. de Longueville, and the young Guise had taken part against her in some social complication. Coligny insisted on a duel, but his zeal for the lady’s vindi- cation unfortunately exceeded his skill and valor in the hour of conflict. Coligny had the worst of theduel, and it was claimed that his conduct was not only unsuccessful but inglorious. Popular stanzas told Mme. de Longueville that if he was afraid to meet death it was excusable, for it was to be her

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A POLITICIAN lover that he wished to live forever. The un- fortunate Coligny derived no comfort from such consolation, and he died of shame rather than of his wounds. The Duke of Longueville was sent as am- bassador to the Congress at Munster. Very reluctantly, and aftera year’s delay, Mme.de Longueville followed him there. She was received with great honor, but this did not compensate for what she had left. She found German gutturals very unmusical, and the compliments of formal and pedantic diplo- mats very stupid. They addressed her as the goddess of peace and concord, but she did not find sucha rdéle an exciting one. She sighed for the easy badinage and the pol- ished courtesy of Paris. After a few months her husband resigned his position in a huff, and his wife returned to the city of her choice. Mme. de Longueville was now approaching thirty. She had reached the age when the passions combine the fervor of youth with the force of maturity ; when the most deep- rooted and absorbing attachments are formed. At this critical period she came under the influence of the person who was to change the course of her life. Thus farshe had been almost as indifferent to her admirers as to her husband, but she was capable of an affection that should absorb her being, and the man now appeared who was able to excite it. The Duke of Rochefoucauld is known to posterity as the author of the most cynical maxims in literature. But these embody the feelings of his later years, when he had been disappointed in his hopes and ambi- tions, and avenged himself on the world by delineating the meanness and weakness of human nature. The elements of selfishness were strong in his own character even when young; but they were concealed from others, and perhaps from himself, by an active am- bition and a certain amount of romantic knight errantry. He had endeavored to rescue an injured queen from the tyranny of Richelieu ; he was young and brave; his wit had not yet become cynical, his ambition had not yet become wholly selfish. His own confessions say that he first sought to win Mme. de Longueville’s favor on account of her influence with her brother, Condé. Perhaps, however, when he wrote the record of his life, after his love had died and his heart had grown cold, he ascribed to himself lower motives than had really actuated him. AND A SAINT. 307 His love for Mme. de Longueville was less strong artd elevated than hers for him, butit seems to have been fervent and sincere. At all events, he was soon successful in obtain- ing her entire affection, and for many years he controlled her thoughts and her deeds, and was the arbiter of her fate. It was Rochefoucauld who first turned the attractive woman of society into an active and aspiring politician ; he had sought to obtain her aid for his ambitions, and under his in- fluence she soon abandoned salons for council tables, and left social triumphs to intrigue with politicians and plan campaigns with generals. The troubles of the Fronde began. Rochefoucauld had not received from the gov- ernment all that he demanded, and he threw in his lot with the opponents of Mazarin. Mme. de Longueville followed his example and becamea rebel. She aspired to be among the foremost in the insurrection, and her counsels soon received as much attention as those of any of the nobles and judges who were the leaders of the motley party of the Fronde. It was undoubtedly her position and family that rendered it easy for her to become at once a leader of men, but the same thing could be said of most of those who were her associates. When the city of Paris first took up arms against the government, her brother Condé continued faithful tothe regent. There was, however, a younger brother Conti, weak in body and mind, but possessed of a great name and rank, and completely under the influence of his beautiful and ambitious sister. He was declared generalissimo of the armies of the Fronde, and Mme. de Longue- ville installed herself at the Hotel de Ville. The burgesses and aldermen were somewhat dismayed at receiving such a visitor, but she established herself there ; and when she pres- ently gave birth to a son, the patriotic alder- men acted as godfathers, and the boy was named Paris, in honor of the city. The insurrection was speedily ended, but the heroines who had tasted of the ex- citement of war and politics could not rest content with giving balls and attending to their children. In 1650 het husband and her two brothers were arrested, and Mme. de Longueville at once went to Normandy and raised the signal of revolt. The people were deaf to her appeals, and she was obliged to fly in hot haste. While attempting to reach

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308 a vessel on which she might embark, she fell into the sea in a furious storm and nar- rowly escaped drowning. After she had been rescued from the water she nearly perished from the cold ; but she was warmed and cared for at a little hamlet, and as soon as she was able, she dressed herself as a man, obtained horses, and in company with some other martial nymphs continued her flight. At last she obtained passage on a ship and reached Holland in safety. There Mme. de Longueville led a very agree- able life. Rochefoucauld sent her constant reports of his own progress in the insurrec- tion, and mingled love messages with war news. She went to Stenai, and induced Tu- renne to espouse her brother’s cause. The great general was a cold, patriotic man ; but he could not escape the charms of so beautiful an intriguer. The duchess never became so much of a politician that she lost her taste for coquetry ; and when she could have men both listen to her ad- vice and admire her charms, she asked no more of life. She joined in a treaty with the Spanish Archduke, she was declared guilty of high treason by the government, and her political prominence satisfied her utmost ambition. The insurrection ended in the liberation or her brothers and husband and in the exile of Mazarin, and she returned to Paris in tri- umph. She had attained an extraordinary position. Though a woman she had made treaties with foreign powers; she had dictated terms of war and peace; she had liberated prisoners of state and overthrown their op- pressors. It was no longer di//lets-doux that she deigned to receive, but dispatches of state, plans of government, and secrets of administration. Men might admire her, she never became so unfeminine a politician as to be averse to that; but still more it de- lighted her heart to have ministers and car- dinals recognize her power, secretaries of state ask her advice, and leaders of parties entreat her support. But though Mme. de Longueville was beantiful, and charming, and brave, she was as far from really being a great politician as any of the Sisters of the Carmelites. She succeeded in embroiling her brothers with influential allies, because she did not want Conti to marry a woman who was thought to be more beautiful than herself. She longed THE COSMOPOLITAN. for the excitement of war, and she was eager that Condé should again take up arms. Domestic complications increased her zeal for insurrection. The Duke of Longueville wea- ried of having a general and a stateswoman for a wife, and he desired her to return to him and enjoy domestic peace. But she had no thought of exchanging the sword for the dis- taff. Her career might end in the Bastile, but she preferred that to her husband’s cha- teau. ‘‘I do not love to play at games or to walk through the woods,’’ she said, and in- stead of rejoining her husbandand sharing in such amusements, she went to Guienne with her brother, and took an active part in the insurrection which he incited in that prov- ince. She succeeded in alienating not only her husband but her lover. Rochefoucauld was weary of civil war, and it is not improbable that he was also somewhat weary of the Ve- nus whom he had transformed into a feminine Mars. He had taught Mme. de Longueville to bea politician, but the pupil had become too eager in the rdle to pleaseherteacher. If he was ready fora breach, she gave him some provocation. The Duke of Nemours accom- panied her to Guienne ; he was brave and handsome and gallant. Whether Mme. de Longueville merely sought to render him zealous in the cause by her attractions, as she had done with Turenne, or whether she allowed herself to become involved in en- tanglements of the heart as well as in the meshes of politics, Rochefoucauld declared that he was wronged, and the romance of four years’ standing came toanend. Even if the duke had any just cause for complaint, his conduct was unworthy of a gentleman. He showed the bitterest hostility toward one for whose faults he was chiefly respon- sible ; and when his memoirs were published years later, he did what he could, and that was much, totarnish her reputation. When the great satirist described in his maxims so much that was despicable in human na- ture, he could have learned some of the qualities he depicted from a study of his own character. Mme. de Longueville remained for two years in Guienne, advising her brother to make no peace unless he should be restored to complete control of the government and Mazarin be driven from power. Ambition for her family, zeal in her brother’s interest,

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A POLITICIAN AND A SAINT. and a taste for the excitement of war and in- surrection, combined to influence her views. She was, besides, full of courage, and re- solved to continue in the path which had been chosen. It was a tortuous one; the whole insurrection was founded in greed and folly and disloyalty ; but however mistaken she may have been as to the course that she adopted, when she was once embarked upon it, she showed herself more resolute, more consistent, and less self-seeking than most of the men with whom she was associated. Rochefoucauld and even Condé were will- ing to make terms by which much should be secured for themselves and nothing for her, but she was always loyal to the party and the cause. The Prince of Condé went to Paris, and his brother, Conti, acted as his lieutenant-general in Guienne. He was guided by a council of five, of whom two were women, and one of these was Mme. de Longueville. The situa- tion there needed greater political capacity than was to be found either in Conti or his council. The most radical of the disaffected citizens of Bordeaux held meetings under a spreading elm near the city, and from the tree that sheltered them in their deliberations They they took the name of the Ormée. were in favor of the most violent measures, and were in some respects predecessors of the Jacobins of the Revolution. It was not a judicious measure to form an alliance with such a party. Then, as now, to make common cause with the lowest elements was by no means as shrewd a political device as it is sometimes thought Mme. de Longueville was ardent but not sagacious. She favored a union with the Ormée, and both she and her brother allowed their names to be used to cover excesses and violence that alarmed all respectable citizens. If Conti would have women for his advisers, he needed those of the sagacity of Elizabeth of England or Catharine of Russia. Instead of that, he had in his sister a very charming and a very injudicious counselor, who, in the most delightful manner, formed the most foolish resolutions. Conti, however, was gradually escaping from her control. He was now twenty-four years old. Flatterers and intriguers were ready to suggest that it was time he threw ff his excessive deference to his sister and to be. 309 followed his own judgment. He had very little judgment to follow, but he was in- fluenced by such counsels, and began to make plans for himself. If Mme. de Longueville’s policy was not always wise, it was always honorable. She had urged Condé to take up arms against the government, and though misfortunes were thickening about him, she was ready to stand by the cause until it should be utterly overthrown. But Conti was actuated by no such motives. He was ready to make peace if his own interests could be advanced, and Mazarin was ready to give him whatever he asked. Secret terms were made with Conti, and he only waited for a favorable opportu- nity to declare himself for submission. He showed worldly wisdom in what he did. Ifhe had not agreed to make peace on the promise of liberal rewards, he would have been obliged to surrender on whatever terms might have been granted. Bordeaux was besieged, and its citizens demanded an end to these ruinous and causeless brawls. The city capitulated. Conti was received into favor by the government, and presently married one of Mazarin’s nieces His wife brought him wealth and honors, and made a very pious man of him be- sides. By a timely surrender he gained the good things of both worlds. His sister joined in the submission that had become inevitable. She asked nothing for herself, and she received nothing. She was weary of the strife of which she had once been fond ; her brother was in exile; Rochefou- cauld and herself were foreverseparated. Her own ambition had been excited by the desire to further the ambition of others. Deserted by those who had been dear to her, she lost any taste for the life of intrigue and turmoil which she had so long led. She turned her thoughts to the early counsels of the Carmel- ites ; she felt the emptiness of the worldly pleasures and ambitions in which she had indulged ; she saw how far she had wan- dered from the paths of piety and virtue in which she had once hoped to walk. Her public career had lasted from 1648 to 1653. After being a politician for five years she now began to think: of becoming a saint. But the change was a violent one, and it was many years before she attained to the perfec- tion of character that now became the object of her desires. When Bordeaux capitulated

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310 she went to the Convent of the Visitation. There was her aunt, the Duchess of Mont- morenci, whose husband, the last of his illustrious house, had suffered death on the scaffold over twenty years before. She had sought in religion solace for her sorrow and a retreat from man’s wickedness. She was now joined by her niece, who, in her turn, had found disappointment where she hoped for happiness, and now sought the quiet of the convent in which to repent of her sins and forget the world. Mme. de Longueville 1emained for some time at the Visitation, but she felt that her past misdeeds demanded a severer penance. She sought for a reconciliation with her husband, and expressed her readiness to return to the conjugal society from which she had long been parted. Friends under- took to restore harmony between the couple, and succeeded with little trouble. The duke was willing to receive the former friend of Rochefoucauld, the duchess was ready to cease to be a princess errant, and to brave the monotony of a melancholy chateau in Normandy. The marriage tie among the upper classes was, in those days, a bond of interest and not of affection. It was formed from reasons of policy, and the parties entered into it free from any sentiment and from any expecta- tion of complete devotion on either side. It was like a treaty between foreign nations ; there might be breaches of the peace, and even open hostilities ; but when it was de- sirable that war should cease, the couple would again make terms and return to their relations of distant amity. There was no intense feeling between husband and wife, no tie of entire love and implicit confidence, which, if broken once, was broken forever. The duke therefore bade his wife return, and the varied adventures of each of them during the past few years proved no obstacle to the restoration, not merely of an armed neutral- ity, but of a reasonable degree of friendli- ness. Mme. de Longueville lived with her hus- band for almost ten years, when he died. After this experience she felt that she was almost fitted for Heaven. She had already begun to cultivate inti- mate relations with some of the monastic bodies. The Convent of the Port Royal, which was then at the height of its influ- THE COSMOPOLITAN. ence, had the strongest attraction for her. Not only the eminent men who were associ- ated with it, but their hostility to the Jesuits and the disfavor in which they were held by the authorities, both of the Church and tie State, madethe Port Royal specially interest- ing to Mme. de Longueville. To be identified with it was to be distinguished from the or- dinary throng. It is pleasant to have even one’s piety a little different from that of the rest of the flock. If the political Fronde had perished she could now join a religious Fronde. The persecutions to which the Port Royal was subjected added to the charm. Its in- mates had to live in concealment and do their work by stealth. It was a sort of re- ligious hide-and-go-seek. M. Singlin vis- ited Mme. de Longueville disguised as a physician and arrayed in the enormous peruke which was a part of the dress of a doctor. But his ministrations were for her soul’s health, and they resulted in her en- tire abandonment of the pomps of the world, that she might devote herself to a religious life. In the first excess of her renunciation she found severe penance a pleasure. She fasted often, and wore girdles of iron to mor- tify the flesh. But the religion of the Port Royal, though severe, was tempered by mod- eration and good judgment. M. Singlin ad- vised her that it was the pride of the heart, rather than the lust of the flesh, that needed correction. He guided her bounties, and she gave liberally to relieve distress in the prov- inces that had been ravaged by the civil wars which she had assisted in fomenting. She had a house built at the Convent of the Port Royal in the Fields, and there she spent a large part of her time. The inmates of the monastery were not wholly oblivious to the rank and fame of their illustrious pa- tron. She held among them a conspicuous position, which was pleasing even to a re- generate heart. Indeed, the hardest sin for her to overcome in her penitence was that subtle pride which springs up alike in the sinner and the saint. ‘‘ My self-love,’’ she wrote in her confession, ‘‘ makes me like better to talk evil of myself than not to talk of myself at all. Even my docility comes from my pride, which transforms it- self, so to speak, into an angel of light that it may still live.’’ The desire to be pre-eminent among her

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A POLITICIAN AND A SAINT. 311 fellows, to be unlike other women who were content with the commonplace lot of tran- quil, uneventful, unemotional existence, was the strongest element in her character; it impelled her when she sought worldly fame ; it could not be wholly eradicated when she was in pursuit of heavenly peace. Sorrows followed Mme. de Longueville, even when she endeavored to forget the disappointments of the world. She had two sons, but they brought her more grief than joy. The oldest was little more than an imbecile, and he joined the order of the Jesuits. The younger son caused her much anxiety. ‘‘It is God's justice for my sins,’’ she wrote, ‘‘ that, hav- ing sown for joy, I should reap sorrow.”’ The son improved with years, but, as the mother’s heart was filling with pride, he was killed, when only twenty-four, at the passage of the Rhine. Her grief has been described in a well- known letter of Mme. de Sévigné. Mlle. de Vertus was sent to announce the sad news. ‘This sudden return showed some calamity. ‘Oh, mademoiselle, how is my brother?’ Her thought dared go no further. ‘Madame, he is doing well with his wound.’ ‘There There was no reply. ‘Ah, mademoiselle, my son, my dear child! answer me. Is he dead?’ ‘Ma- dame, I have no words with which to answer.’ ‘Oh, my dear son! Was he killed on the field? Had he not a single moment? Oh, my God! what a sacrifice!’ And then she fell on the bed, with stifled cries and with bitter tears and with tender and heart-rend- ing complaints.’’ The young Longueville had made his reli- gious peace, somewhat after the fashion of the barons of the Middle Ages. He left behind him several mistresses and one ille- gitimate son, but he left also liberal benefac- tions to the church, and so his soul might hope for rest. The favor in which Mme. de Longueville was held at court made her protection of great value to the Port Royal. To a large has been a battle—and my son?’ degree she shielded its inmates from the storms of Louis XIV.’s hostility, which beat heavily upon it after her death. When Ar- nauld and Nicole were seeking to escape their enemies, she had them concealed at the Hotel de Longueville. She was also very active in the negotiations which resulted in the so-called peace of the church, by which a few years of repose were secured to the monastery and to the Jansen- ist party. She took part in the conferences with the zeal which she had shown as an earthly politician, and with greater prudence and good judgment. It was largely due to her that terms of religious peace were granted which insured at least temporary repose and security to her friends, and which could be accepted by them without any unworthy con- cession on questions of faith or conscience. Her connection with the Port Royal did not destroy the early interest she had felt in the Carmelites. She spent much of her time at their convent in Paris, and she requested that in whichever of the two monasteries she died her body should repose, while her heart should be sent to the other. It was at the Carmelites that she met death, on April 15, 1679. Her heart was taken to Port Royal in the Fields, as she had desired. It was borne there on April 26th, in much pomp. Her own carriages, each drawn by six horses arrayed in funereal trappings, formed part of a long procession. In one of them her heart was carried. Twelve pages with lighted torches marched in front. The bells of the convent began tolling as the pro- cession came in view. At-the door of the church it was met by all the ecclesiastics connected with the monastery, and the heart of the patron of the Port Royal was solemnly deposited in its resting-place. Mme. de Longueville was but fifty-nine when she died, and it was twenty-seven years since she had forsaken her ambitions and hersins. ‘‘A penitence of twenty-seven years,’’ said Mme. de Sévigné, ‘‘is a fair road to lead to Heaven so fair a soul.’’

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FROM FOREST TO FLOOR. By J. MACDONALD OXLEY. MONG all the materials wherewith men erect unto themselves splendid edifices to dwell in, stately ships to voyage by, or far-spreading iron roads to travel upon, none have a fairer, brighter history than the wood. Stone is blasted from hideous débris- strewn chasms, in and out whose craggy re- cesses quarrymen labor like ants in some gigantic ant-heap; metal is torn from the bowels of the earth, where, steeped in gloom and oppression scarce endurable, the grimy miners pursue their unlovely toil ; but wood, from the time the first stroke of the lumber- man’s fatal ax sends a shiver through all its shapely form as it rears its head aloft amidst the forest, until when sundered into yellow planks it awaits the joiner’s will, is hardly for an hour away from the glow of sunshine, the ripple of water, or the virgin purity of the snow. As bright and clean as the fresh- sawn boards themselves is the record that lies behind them, and in following them from forest to floor we have before us one of the most romantic, fascinating, and manly occupations in which the children of men can engage. I, In the list of industries upon which the material prosperity of the Dominion of Can- ada depends lumbering holds second place, the ‘‘ produce of the forest’’ being exceeded in export value only by “‘ animals and their products.’’ For the year 1885 the totals under these two heads were twenty-two mill- ion three hundred and seventy-three thou- sand three hundred and five dollars, and twenty-six million five hundred and three thousand nite hundred and ninety-four dollars respectively, while it is safe to say that both will be appreciably increased when the returns for 1886 are all in and the results declared. Before those twenty-two odd mill- ions could be earned an immense amount of work, spread over a vast extent of country, had to be done, for lumbering is not confined to any one place or province. On the con- trary, from where the Atlantic billows break ceaselessly upon the ‘‘cold gray stones’’ of Nova Scotia, to where the Pacific thrusts its fathomless fiords deep into the heart of Brit- ish Columbia, trees were felled, and planks sawn, and spars rounded to the merry tune of dollars and cents, which went steadily to swell the total until the millions were attained. The chief center of the lumbering interest in Canada is the city of Ottawa, which, as it happens, is also the political capital, a con- junction that gave Goldwin Smith a chance for the exercise of his brilliant wit too tempt- ing to be withstood, and so we have his clever but cruelly unjust epigram about Ottawa being ‘‘an ‘Arctic lumber village turned into a political cock-pit ;’’ to which we trust it may be deemed but a venial of. fense to add, that, viewed in either light, there certainly does seem to be a consider- able amount of ‘‘ log-rolling ’’ done there. It will accordingly serve our purpose very well, if, selecting the Canadian capital as our coign of vantage, we proceed from thence to make as full a survey of the whole busi- ness of lumbering as may be managed within the limits of a single article. In the matter of facilities for the carrying ‘on of this important industry, Ottawa would be unique upon the continent were it not for Minneapolis. Asit is, she has in the tremen- dous torrent that pours tumultuously over the roaring Chaudiére an even mightier power than the Falls of St. Anthony ; while, so far as communication with the timber limits by rail and water is concerned, honors are easy, at allevents. But at the falls of the Chau- diére we reach almost the final stage in the passage of a plank from forest to floor, and so, in order to begin at the beginning, we must betake ourselves one, two, or even three hundred miles away up into the bosky recesses of the forest primeval, where the mighty trees are whispering together in blissful ignorance of the fate awaiting them. The first thing to be done by one who pro- poses to engage in the business of lumber- ing is to secure a ‘“‘berth’’ or “limit;’’ that is, an area of natural standing timber. This he does, either directly from the govern-

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FROM FOREST TO FLOOR. CHOPPERS AT WORK. ment, in whom the fee of almost all the tim- ber-producing districts still remains, or indi- rectly from some person who has taken up limits simply for speculative purposes, and without any design of cutting over them himself. Theoretically, a limit is ten miles square ; but, owing to the topographical fea- tures of the country, they arein reality of all sizes, from twenty-four square miles and up- 30 ward. It is not often that one worthy of the name is less than fifty square miles in ex- tent. The amount of territory held under lease by some of the ‘‘ lumber kings’’ of the Ottawa district is so immense that an ordi- nary German principality would sink into insignificance beside these vast landed pos- sessions. Thus the Bronsons, for instance, pay rental on no less than three thousand

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314 square miles ; J. R. Booth, on two thousand nine hundred ; the Gilmours, on two thou- sand six hundred and sixty ; the Hamiltons on one thousand seven hundred ; Perley & Pattee, on one thousand six hundred and fifty, and so forth. Inaddition to the rental, those operating limits pay asmall duty upon each foot of square timber got out and on every log cut, according to its size, the gov- ernment interest being protected by wood rangers, who go from ‘‘shanty’’ to ‘‘ shanty,” turning up just when least expected, so that there may be no evading of the impost. Limits having been secured, the next step is to dispatch a party of experienced scouts, often Indians or half-breeds, to examine the country and seek out the best groves of timber. The skill of these self-taught sur- veyors is sometimes very remarkable. They will explore the length and breadth of the terra incognita, and report upon the kind and value of its timber, the situation and capa- bilities of its streams for floating out the logs (an all-important point), and the facili- ties for hauling and transportation. They often sketch the surface of the country, show- ing the position of its streams and lakes, its THE COSMOPOLITAN. groves of timber, and its mountainous or level appearance, with a skill and accuracy little short of marvelous. The scene of operations having, with the aid of these scouts, been finally decided upon, the limit holder early in the month of Sep- tember sends his gangs of men into the woods, the usual number in a gang being from thirtyto forty, including foreman,clerk, carpenter, cook, and chores-boy. This num- ber is about doubled, however, later on, when the teams come in to haul the logs that have been cut, so that sixty to eighty men may sometimes be found at one shanty. The foremen rule the gangs, and are in their turn subordinate to the ‘‘ bush superintendents,”’ who drive in all weathers from gang to gang, supervising their work, and checking the results. On arriving at their destination the gang proceed immediately to build their shanty. Nothing could be more primitive than the architecture, or better adapted to its purpose than the construction of this edifice, which is placed as nearly as possible in the midst of the ‘‘ bunch ’”’ of timber to be cut, so that no time may be lost in going to and coming fas ¢ 49° j “f ‘4 as ak | : e 3 ¢ oe) BOT & > yon me eee cd ae = cite LUMBERING SHANTY ON THE OTTAWA.

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FROM FOREST TO FLOOR. from work. With all hands helping, a shan- ty twenty-eight feet by forty can be put up in five days, the men in the mean time living in tents. The method of construction is as follows: Huge logs, cleared only of their branches, are piled one upon another to the height of eight feet. Great wooden girders are then stretched across, supported in the middle by four massive pillarscalled ‘‘ scoop- bearers,’’ and upon these girders hewn tim- bers, resembling elongated railway ties hol- lowed out on one side, and designated as ‘‘scoops,’’ are placed with convex and con- cave sides up alternately and overlapping each other. Thus arranged, they constitute the roof, and afford perfect protection from the heaviest of fall rains. The floor consists of a single layer of flattened timbers, and then all that remains is to fill-in every chink with moss and mud, and throw up a bank all around the outside, and your shanty is— no, not complete, after all, for lo! a most important part of it has been overlooked, to wit, the ‘‘camboose,’’ or fire-place. This occupies the place of honor in the center of the room, and is about as simple an affair as could well be. A thick bank of sand and stones is laid upon the floor to hold the fire, while up above a large square hole is cut in the roof, and topped with a rude chimney, the whole arrangement affording perfect draft and ventilation, and a fine view of the stars at night to the men lying on their bunks,* but demanding the constant main- tenance of a huge fire in order to secure com- fort. At two corners of the hearth are fixed strong wooden cranes, which the cook can adjust to any required position for his various pots and boilers. Along three sides of the room run sloping platforms called ‘‘ bunks,”’ on which the tired toilers, rolled in their blankets, rest after the day's exertions with their heads turned to the wall, and feet to the central fire, which is kept well supplied with fuel all night. This description applies to a shanty of the ‘‘ good old-fashioned sort.’’ In recent years the march of improvement has reached even the backwoods, and such luxuries as stoves, windows, tables, etc., have found their way to the lumberman’s abode, where, it need hardly be said, they are cordially welcomed. * The thermometer quite frequently drops to thirty degrees and even forty degrees below zero in midwinter. 315 Shanties for men and stables for horse satisfactorily completed, the campaign against the forest giants begins forth- with. The thirty-five men are divided up into sets according to the nature of their work. In a gang of that size there will probably be three pairs of choppers, and twice as many road-cutters, who, together with the teamsters, sawyers, chainers, and the home guard of clerk, cook, and so forth, make upthenumber. The work of the road- cutters is to prepare a main road from the bunch of timber attacked to the nearest available water, be it lake or stream, and also smaller roads branching out from this according as the choppers extend their opera- tions. Over these roads, which are some- times made very hard and smooth by the use of a sprinkler, the teamsters transport the logs from the roll-ways upon which they have been piled, and drop them beside the borders of the stream, or upon the icy bosom of the lake, there to await the coming of spring. No part of the work is more interesting than that which devolves upon the choppers. The foreman having gone ahead, and marked with a ‘‘blaze’’ the trees he wishes felled, they set to work in pairs (and occasionally in trios) at opposite sides of the trunk, and, handling their heavy, keen-edged axes as though they were mere trifles, chop swiftly into the heart of their helpless victim. The white chips fly fast and thick as the axes swing steadily to and fro, and presently the tree begins to tremble, a few more skillful strokes, a warning crack, and then with the sudden sweep of an eagle the huge mass comes crashing down to earth, making a wide swath in the smaller trees standing unsus- pectingly around. Having felled their tree, the choppers next trim off the branches, and then with cross- cut saws divide it into lengths of thirteen and ahalf or sixteen and a half feet, according to its quality. Two, three, four, or even five logs may be got out of a single tree, and with such rapidity do experienced choppers work that on new limits where the timber is thick and heavy, eighty logs is not an out- of-the-way day’s work for a pair; while, when “‘ striving’’ is begun, that is, one pair pitting themselves against another pair, it is not an uncommon thing for six hundred logs to be unexpectedly turned in as the

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316 handsome result of a single week’s work, a showing that even so redoubtable a woods- man as the ex-Premierof England might well envy. The foreman has no difficulty in check- ing the work, as the logs are daily piled on roll-ways,* where they await their turn to be hauled to the waterside. It is a fine, hearty, healthy life, this of the lumberman’s. From dawn to dark he works in the open air, exercising both lungs and muscles to the utmost extent that is good forthem. Once the autumn rains are over, and the snow has come, he breathes for four long months the clear, cold air of the Cana- dian winter, made fragrant with the health- giving aroma of the pine and cedar. No matter how bibulous may be his tendencies, not one drop can he have from the cup that inebriates, although he may, and does, drink potations long, deep, and unlimited from the cup that cheers. His food is not very varied in character, nor in the style of its * A roll-way is simply two tree trunks placed parallel and some little distance apart, upon which, and off which the logs can be easily rolled by the teamsters. THE COSMOPOLITAN. cooking, pork and beans, beef, bread, and tea being almost the invariable items of his menu, with a bit of game now and then as a rare treat. But there is plenty of it; and the bread, baked in pots buried deep in heated sand, can not be beaten in the whole country, while of that sauce which surpasses the most cunning concoction of Lazenby or Lea and Perrins, to wit (if I may adapt a Falstaffian expression), ‘‘a divine hunger,”’ who has a more unfailing supply than the Canadian lumberman ? His forest life is not by any means all work either. With the early dusk of winter his toil ceases for the day, and after tools are put away, ablutions performed, and due justice done to the tea and bread and bacon, there is along evening to be spent in song, and dance, andstory, when, aided bya simple but effect- ive orchestra of fiddle, concertina, jewsharp, and flute, he can make the low-roofed shanty ring with whole-souled merriment. Then Sunday brings opportunity for rest, and also for mending, darning, patching ; or, if this happily be all attended to, for excursions HAULING LOGS.

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318 into the farther forest in search of fortuitous deer, hare, or partridge, that may afford a welcome change in the dyspeptic monotony of pork and beans. Twenty-five thousand logs will be a good winter’s work for such a shanty as the one I have been describing, and when the warm spring sunshine comes, unlocking the bars and bolts of winter, the labor of the lumberman enters upon its most exciting and perilous stage; that is, the ‘‘drive.”’ The winter’s cut of logs having been piled in heaps beside the river bank, or lake mar- gin, or better still, upon the ice itself, when in mid-April the Frost King’s rigid grasp is finally relaxed, they go tumbling pell-mell into the water to begin their long journey mill-ward. And now it is the business of our hardy, fearless toilers to follow this great fleet of cumbrous tree-trunks in their devious varied course by brawling mountain torrent, swift-running stream, and placid lake, as they go leaping headlong over roaring waterfalls, or shooting like arrows through the slippery ‘‘slides,’’ dislodging those that fain would tarry by the way, and lifting stranded ones into the current again until the broad bosom of the Ottawa is reached, and the logs, now gathered into ‘‘booms,”’ can be towed by powerful steamers to their destination. Each ‘‘river-driver,’’ as the men now are called, is armed with either a long pike-pole, a ‘‘cant-dog,’’ ora hand-spike, and in flat-bot- tomed boats, yclept ‘‘ bonnes,’’ or tramping along shore, they keep the mighty mass in movement, having constantly before them the danger of a ‘‘jam;’’ that is, the logs catching mid-stream against some projecting rock, and piling one upon another until a barrier is formed that puts a veto upon all farther progress. Then comes the most thrilling experience in all the lumberman’s career. The jam must be broken at all hazards, and without a moment’s delay, for the longer it is left the worse it becomes. To accomplish this the ‘‘ key-piece,’’ the log which was the first to stick, and has caused all the trouble, must be found and disen- gaged—if necessary, chopped to pieces. The precision with which an experienced * By a series of well-devised hydraulic works a fall has been rendered available for the mill purposes, which at the lowest water ever known yields a power equal to thirty-four thousand horse-power, while at high water THE COSMOPOLITAN. river-driver will ascertain the key-piece of a jam is only less remarkable than the skill with which he will escape the rush of the suddenly liberated logs. Maintaining his balance almost miraculously upon some slippery cylinder, he will with strenuous strokes chop the offending log in two, or drive it back into deep water, and then, as the whole mass thus set free charges madly down upon him, he will leap from log to log with the sure-footedness of a chamois, until safe out of harm’s reach, or perhaps dive headlong into mid-stream, and thus avoid the danger. Dexterous as these men are, however, not a season passes that lives are not lost in these perilous ventures; and there is hardly any announcement more un- welcome to the lumberman’s ears than that one of the dreaded jams is forming. Once the logs are fairly afloat in the deep waters of the Grand River, as the lumberman loves to call the Ottawa, the river-driver’s work is at an end, and he either finds em- ployment at the mills or idles away his time at home until the approach of fall again bids him make ready for the winter’s work. II. HAVING been gathered together at the booms, and sorted according to the marks of ownership they bear, the logs are then sent forward to the mills in tow of strong paddle- wheel steamers built for the purpose ; and fol- lowing in their wake, we come in due time to the immense lumber mills that have the spring of their most profitable existence in the exhaustless floods that fling themselves in unappeasable fury over the chasm of the haudiére.* One of the first impressions made upon the visitor is that of wonder at the way in which the rushing, roaring river has been tamed and trained by many a deep device in solid stone and massive timber until it cheerfully submits to do man’s bidding, and patiently revolves the huge machinery whereby a whilom forest monarch is rapidly reduced to yellow planks. A man named Philemon Wright, who hailed from New England, was the first to make the Chaudiére his slave, and compatriots of his still hold the the available power is no less than one hundred and sixty-eight thousand seven hundred and forty-five horse- power, the greater portion of which is still unutilized.

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lead there, the establishment of works by them upon a large scale dating from 1853. The most interesting time at which to visit these mills, which run day and night all summer long, is after dark, when they are illuminated by the electric light that in- vests the scene with a weird picturesqueness not unworthy the pencil of a Doré. The swift, swirling torrent of the mill-race, the dark, mysterious pools, where, all uncon- scious of their coming fate, the rough red logs huddle close together, the pulsating roar of ponderous machinery, broken every moment by the startling shriek of the circu- lar saw, or the strange cries of brawny toilers, all bathed in whitest glow, or plunged in darkest gloom, combine to form a picture that photographs itself forever upon the memory. Another writer* has so graphically de- scribed the operation of log-sawing that, as I can not improve upon his description, I will borrow it: ‘‘ Set thirty or more in a row, the tremendous saws form what is called a ‘ gate,’ and toward this uncompromising combina- tion the logs, having first been drawn up out of the water on an inclined plane, deftly han- dled and coaxed into position, are irresistibly impelled, one succeeding the other, day and night. For a moment the glistening steel *Mr. F, A. Dixon, in ‘‘ Picturesque Canada.” FROM FOREST TO FLOOR. 319 dances before the forest innocent—a veritable ‘dance of death,’ then with acrash and a hiss the ugly-looking teeth make the first bite, and for five or six minutes eat their way steadily through the tough fiber, till that which enters the machine’s mighty jaws a mere log emerges as sawn planks, and after a few more rapid operations becomes well- trimmed lumber ready for the markets of the world.”’ Some idea may be formed of the propor- tions of this Chaudiére lumber business from the statement that the amountof capital invested is not less than fifty million dollars, and that nearly three hundred million feet of lumber were manufactured there during the season just closed (that is to say, within seven months); to which handsome total Messrs. Bronson and Mr. Booth contributed sixty millions each ; Messrs. Perley & Pattee, and Mr. Eddy, fifty-five millions each, and smaller mill-owners the remainder. While, of course, the sawing of deals and planks constitutes the chief business at the mills, there are also large quantities of box shooks, laths, railroad ties, pickets, etc., turned out there. The process of lath-mak- ing is very interesting to watch, especially as it is entirely in the hands of boys. Odds and ends of planks are first cut by circulars into the length of a lath, and then passed through a machine where a set of tiny circu- RAFT OF SQUARE TIMBER WORTH FORTY THOUSAND DOLLARS.

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320 lars slices them into lath with amazing rapidity. Into one side goes the strip, out at the other come the laths, to be caught up by a quick-fingered lad, and sorted with a speed almost bewildering, the defective ones disappearing into a hole at his feet, the per- fect ones being laid in a kind of cradie beside him, where they accumulate until there are enough to make the regulation bundle, when another boy whisks them off to be tied up for market. For six days of every week, between the coming down of the logs in the spring and the closing of the river in the autumn, the buzz, and whirr, and shriek of wheel, and pulley, and saw cease not day nor night. The workmen are divided into day-shifts and night-shifts, each putting in eleven hours, steady work. The wages paid are good, the highest being one hundred dollars a month to the mill foreman, the sawyers getting from forty to sixty dollars, edgers and trim- mers from thirty to forty dollars, and the general help about thirty dollars a month. A more cheerful, contented, or active lot of workers could hardly be found anywhere. ’Tis true, the fine old days have somewhat gone by when the ‘“‘lumber kings,’’ as the THE COSMOPOLITAN. great mill-owners were called, exercised an authority over their mills and tributary territory that was so regal. in many of its aspects as to give good ground for their grandiose title. Yet much of the old semi- paternal, semi-despotic influence lingers, and it may with pride be recorded that so far at least those hateful, harmful things called ‘*strikes’’ and ‘‘lock-outs’’ are unknown to the twelve thousand hewers and fashioners of wood in this Ottawa district. An important and indispensable adjunct to the mill is the piling ground. Having been in the water for months before they are sawed, the logs are, of course, thoroughly ‘‘water-logged,’’ and after they have been converted into lumber it is necessary to get them thoroughly dry again. This is ac- complished by piling them up in huge stacks constructed in such a way that the air has free play all round each plank, and thus dis- posed, they remain from three months to a year, until sometimes the outer ones, instead of being a golden yellow, become a dirty gray, oreven black. Looking out from the cliff behind the Parliament Buildings, one sees miles upon miles of these lumber piles, extending far up and down the river-banks, THE OTTAWA SLIDES—RAFT GOING TO PIECES.

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FROM FOREST TO FIRE. 321 and constituting a very prominent, if not picturesque feature of the landscape. While,as a rule,the pick of the logs are cut into deals for the English market, yet a very large proportion is sawn into ten, twelve, and fourteen-inch boards, which are exported to the United States. Part of the latter go by rail, but the majority by canal barge, and every summer the Ottawa River is crowded with fleets of these cumbrous craft. They are usually owned by the captain, and he often takes his whole family on board with him, so that it is a common thing to see a bunch of these boats moored in one of the coves awaiting a cargo, and in the mean time festooned with the family washing, and swarming with troops of dirty but happy and, evidently, well-fed youngsters. The barges are towed by steamer down the Ot- tawa to the St. Lawrence, and along that mighty stream to Sorel, whence they pro- ceed up the Richelieu River and across Lake Champlain to Whitehall, then down the Hudson to Albany or New York. III. I HAVE left for treatment by itselfa branch of the lumber business which, although much smaller in its proportions than the pro- duction of sawn lumber, and, indeed, steadily decreasing, is still of too great importance to be passed by unnoticed. I refer to what is called the ‘‘ square-timber trade.’’ In earlier years, that is, before the forests had been seriously ravaged by fire and ax, the output of square timber was very large, but the rate at which it is falling off is shown by the difference between nine million cubic feet for 1882-83 and only four million in 1885-86. By square timber is meant whole tree trunks roughly squared with broad axes and separated into lengths that vary according to the quality of the tree, but, as a rule, fall within forty feet. These great, unwieldy timbers are made up into ‘‘cribs,’’ a crib be- ing about twenty-four feet wide by thirty to forty feet long, and containing some twenty- five pieces held together by cross-pieces called ‘ traverses,’’ strongly pinned on, four of the largest timbers being ‘then laid upon the traverses, and fixed firmly. The cribs are in their turn combined into rafts, some of which are of such immense size, comprising, 31 perhaps, one hundred cribs, as to constitute regular floating islands. Were the course of the Ottawa smooth and regular, these great rafts with their little cabins, which look ‘like magnified dog-ken- nels, for the crew to sleep in, and fire-places to cook their meals at, might pursue their solemn, stately course by the aid of sail, and oar, and current, down to the St. Lawrence intact. But, broken as the river is into fre- quent falls and riotous rapids, this is quite out of the question. So, at each of the falls, there are ‘‘slides’’ prepared whereby the perils of the watery precipice may be avoided. These slides are very elaborate and expensive affairs, and are, in most cases, maintained by the government, a toll being exacted from the rafts that use them. They are simply artificial channels constructed in close prox- imity to the falls, the walls and bottom be- ing lined with smooth, strong timber-work, and ballasted with mighty stones. In order to go through the slides the great rafts must, of course, be resolved into their component cribs, and then made up again after the swift descent is accomplished. The longest and steepest slides are those at the Chaudiére Falls, and ‘‘shooting the slides ’’ is an expe- rience of thrilling novelty which no tourist visiting the Canadian capital should think of neglecting. Itmay notinaptly belikened to tobogganing on water. Let me try to convey some idea of what it is like. Ascending to the slide’s summit, you jump aboard a passing crib before it is fairly under way. Soon you are conscious of gathering speed ; the slide slants sharply downward, the water begins to ripple and splash beside you ; in another moment, with a sudden shock, your unwieldy bark having taken its plunge, is gliding down the smooth descent at a pace that makes you hold your breath and tightly hug the biggest beam. Now you have reached the bridge, and as you shoot beneath, you just have timie to see what is before, and you feel your heart leap to your mouth as, with a shudder and a groan, the great crib, poising for an awful moment on the watery verge, dives headlong into the dark, foam-flecked whirlpool. The tim- bers strain and spread apart, the waves burst fiercely up between your feet, the spray springs high and falls in drenching showers. For one harrowing second you bitterly re- pent your rashness in making the venture ;

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322 then, with quick buoyancy, the crib rises again, shakes off its aqueous burden, and hurries onward, dipping and rising, until, with one last dive, the perilous passage is over, and you are floating quietly out on the placid river. Many distinguished visitors, from the Prince of Wales and Princess Louise down- ward through the social strata, have enjoyed the experience of shooting the slides. Cribs put together with more than usual care, and planked soas to prevent wetting, are used on such special occasions. And this is very necessary, because there is a certain amount of actual danger to be reckoned with in tak- ing one’s chances upon the first crib that happens along. You may get to the bottom with nothing worse than a soaked coat, or you may, just at the most critical moment, find your loosely compacted craft summarily separating into its individual ‘‘sticks,’’ and then it is a case of ‘‘jump for your life.’’ When the writer went down, three summers ago, the crib immediately in advance of him and thecrib behind him broke up completely, happily without injury to anybody, although the one he had selected preserved its integ- rity to the finish. With a leisureliness that irresistibly re- minds an on-looker of one of those glaciers which Mark Twain proposed to utilize for the purposes of ‘‘ slow freight,’’ the rafts creep on down the Ottawa and St. Lawrence to Quebec, where they are stowed away stick by stick in the gaping holds of waiting ships, and car- ried off across the ocean to Great Britain. IV. THE important part played by the products of the forest in the commerce of Canada has been already indicated in the form of dollars and cents ; but it would defy the skill of the profoundest statistician to set forth through the same medium, or in any other way, the part that these products play in the domestic interests of the country. The traveler in Canada can not fail to be struck by the lavish way in which lumber is used for the bridges that span the rivers, the fences that divide the fields, the side- walks of our villages and towns, and for al- most every conceivable purpose. Through- out the country and, in many of the towns, the buildings are of wood, the country roads have their foundation of wood, and the new- THE COSMOPOLITAN. est method of paving the city streets is with wood blocks. And finally, in nearly every part of Canada, outside the cities, wood is the only material used for fuel. In view of this enormous consumption, such questions as the following are already forcing themselves upon the attention of men who take thought for the future: Is the forest wealth of Canada inexhaustible ? Can her people go on forever mowing down the forests as though they were hay-fields, or can a time be predicted when they will awaken from their reckless extravagance to find that they have killed the goose of the golden egg, and impoverished themselves beyond retrieval ? Were the ax the only enemy the trees have to fear, these questions would not, perhaps, be asked for some time yet, so vast is the ex- tent of tree-covered territory still untouched. But while the ax slays its thousands, the fire slays its tens of thousands. From where the dusky spruce grows thick upon the Aca- dian shores to where the Douglas pine climbs heavenward upon the shoulders of the Cas- cade Mountains, the devastating blight of the forest fire is felt year by year. In the year 1881, from ten to fifteen millions of dol- lars’ worth of timber were destroyed by autumn fires in the Province of Ontario alone. So that there is no risk of being set down as a needless alarmist if, in answer to the questions asked above, one replies that instead of Canada’s forest wealth being boundless, its proportions may already be es- timated. There are, in fact, those whose life-long intimacy with the whole subject en- titles them to speak, and to be heard with respect, who plainly state that a quarter ofa century at the farthest will see the close of Canada’s career as a lumber producer, if the business continues to be carried on with its present heedless prodigality. There is but one way of warding off the danger. A thorough system of government control must be instituted. The annual in- crement to the forest wealth must be com- puted carefully, and then that increment, and no more, must be allowed to be cut. For it is no use shutting one’s eyes to the fact that unless some such action be taken, and that without delay, Canada must inevitably, in time, find herself, so far at least as arboreal possessions are concerned, a hopeless bank- rupt.

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SHARKING OFF NANTUCKET. By ARLO BATEs. VERY sea port town has its own peculiar savor, and if it chance to be an island town as well, the individuality will be doubly apparent. In this age of abounding glorifi- cation of the individual, we have come to be very fond of the racy, nautical personality of the old settlements along our sea-board, each like unto nothing but itself ; most of all, perhaps, does Nantucket stand out as redolent of a personality distinctly different from allitskind, and consequently agreeable, to the modern taste. Nantucket is by no means what it once was. Ina season of unprecedented prosper- ity some score or more of years ago the in- habitants were attacked by an iconoclastic fury for pulling down the old dwellings, and much of the architectural quaintness of the place was lost. Still remain, however, the queer, cobble-stone paved lanes, the almost medizval streets, apparently never wholly sure whether they are to continue on as streets or are to be turned suddenly into dooryards. For inconsequence and deli- cious irregularity the streets of Nantucket areunrivaled. They are all carefully labeled at one end, the titles being for the most part as curious as the shapeless spaces of cobble- stones to which they are applied. ‘‘ Vestal,”’ ‘‘Candle,’’ and the like probably have in the mind of the mousing antiquary some rea- son why they should be thus instead of other- wise, but such names mean little in these latter days. to anybody else. The typical Nantucket house is founded upon a basement, and its front door is gained by a short flight of steps running parallel with the side of the house. This is by no means a graceful architectural device, but perhaps it served to remind the nautical in- habitants of the sensation of climbing the cabin stairs. These mansions are decidedly erratic in the matter of windows. The build- ers of none of the old houses that remain were content with anything so commonplace and conventional as windows set symmetri- cally to match each other. The openings for light and air were of any size, shape, and number which suited the individual whim of the dweller therein, and most extraordinary were the fancies of many of the old-time in- habitants in this respect. A square window was set side by side with one oblong or tri- angular ; one would be placed close up to the very eaves, and its nearest companion seem to have slipped half-way to the basement ; indeed, some ancient dwellings convey the impression that they were originally built with unpierced walls, and that the owner hewed a hole through wherever he chanced to be on the instant a fancy seized him to look upon the outer world. Onthe top of these willfully planned dwell- ings is placed, astride the ridge-pole, a platform surrounded by a railing ; the whole being technically known as a ‘‘ walk,”’ ‘and serving in days when there was more to ob- serve as a place of observation, whence the inhabitants could watch the in-coming or the out-going of the many craft that roamed from Nantucket over the waves of the world’s farthest seas. II, But the glory of Nantucket has departed. There still remain clusters of old men, like clusters of withered berries on a leaf-stripped bough, who prate garrulously of the days when flicets of whalers came over the bar, and the town was alive with maritime activity. Quaint figures are these old gossips, with their woful falling away about the mouth and their uncanny sharpness of chin. Often their ears are adorned with worn gold hoops, between which and their volubili- ty there seems some mystic connection, since those not thus adorned are apt to be more quiet than their fellows. They are apparently partially mummified by exposure to salt air, and of an age to be uncertainly reckoned by centuries, one or two hundred years being of no especial account in reck- oning the taleoftheir days. They exchange mild remarks ofa day-before-yesterday flavor, always addressing each other as ‘‘cap’n,”’ and comparing opinions on the adventures

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324 of ships whose timbers dissolved to dust or sea-ooze many a long year ago. They have very definite if somewhat antiquated notions concerning all things nautical. They .are wonderfully wise in sails and hulls and ropes and winds and clouds and currents and waves. ‘They give vent to a dry chuckle over modern improvements which is so withering in its scorn that could inventors of new devices for vessels be sent to Nantucket all further modification of the old-time rigs would be checked at once and forever. They tell endless yarns of old whaling voyages, and perhaps it is from some lingering fond- ness for anything even remotely suggestive of this deep-sea hunting that the old cap’ns of Nantucket look with a kindly tolerance hardly to be distinguished from approbation on the sport of sharking. III. SHARKING is one of the few pastimes of this disappointing world which come up to one’s expectations. ‘‘No summer experi- ence at ’Sconset,’’ observes A. J. Northrup in his pleasant little volume anent cottage life at that breeziest corner of wind-swept old Nantucket, ‘‘is complete without at least one ‘sharking’ expedition ;’’ and he might have made the observation general to all the island. Even the man who cares nothing for ordinary fishing, and who regards Isaac Walton as an amiable but misguided enthu- siast, finds in sharking a virile and barbar- ic delight which makes every fiber in him tingle, and which perhaps awakens, more- over, whatever of the savage generations of civilization have left still uneradicated in his nature. To pull a sleek, dappled trout, dainty and decorated, from his retreat in the cool, trans- lucent shadows of a dusky woodland pool is a very different matter from fighting with an enraged monster of a shark for his life. Once a sportsman has known the fierce excitement of the latter struggle, ordinary angling he must expect to find somewhat tame ever after. One starts out ina whale-boat, the sides of which are protected by stout wire netting, a precaution which in itself suggests danger and stirring times ahead, giving the fisher- man a certain wholesome respect for the game he is after, and inciting him to call upall his THE COSMOPOLITAN. prowess. The tackle with which he has been provided looks amazingly large to his eyes, accustomed, in all probability, to the Liliputian hooks with which cunners are enticed from their home about the seaweed- fringed shore rocks. Hooks a dozen inches long, fastened to a yard or so of substantial chain, followed by a like length of stout rope before the hand-line—in itself no slender thread—is attached, look to him like the sort of gear with which Gargantua might have provided himself were he minded to angle for fish of a size to match his own. But shark-fishing is no child’s play, and ordi- nary tackle these vicious ‘‘ hyenas of ocean’’ would scorn as the Leviathan a hook. Their teeth are not only sharp, but are backed by powerful muscles, so that sometimes even chains are bitten off in their struggles to escape, and anything weaker would not hold them an instant. For bait there has been provided an abun- dance of lobsters, or, in these degenerate days, when overfishing is making these scarce and valuable, preparatory to destroy- ing them altogether, a supply of perch, freshly caught. The cap’n in charge of the expedition, to judge from the bunch in his cheek, is moved by the excitement to in- dulge in unwonted rations of tobacco ; while the landsmen aboard have made such pro- vision as depends upon their individual temperaments, and the antipathy they may feel toward the principles of the Prohibition Party. The boat, a score and a half feet long, is sometimes brought to a pier, but such a de- parture from robust manners indicates an unusual and reprehensible willingness on the part of the cap’n to yield to the effemi- nacy of his passengers. The true way is to begin by running the whale-boat off through the surf; and the rollers at ’Sconset beach require dexterous seamanship for passing them safely. It is a very pretty sight to see the Nantucket fishermen go out or come in over the rollers, watching with keen eye for the wave which bends its neck to give them opportunity, and sturdily holding their own against the breaker’s effort to swamp them which follows quickly. The sea seems hardly less aliveto the situation than seem the men themselves, and the excitement of a start over the surf is the only proper beginning to a sharking expedition.

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SHARKING OFF NANTUCKET. IV. It is a pity to havetoo fresh a breeze when one is going sharking. It interferes with the talk and the tales of the cap’n. There are certain things that he should say after the sail is up and the boat well under weigh, which belong to such an exhibition as the march from ‘‘Lohengrin’’ belongs to the opening half of a church wedding. He has to tell, in the first place, of his innumerable adventures with sharks. He pours forth in a dialect for which a phonetic system of record has yet to be invented, the details of sharks he has caught, their length, their weight, their struggles, their devices to escape, the final struggle and desperate cap- ture. He remembers, with a minuteness that is amazing and confusing to people whose heads are stuffed with so many things that one idea has constantly to be moving on like ‘‘poor Joe’’ to make room for another, the exact particulars of each catch, even if years have intervened between the event and the time of his telling. He never makes the mistake of saying that the blue shark he caught eleven years ago bit off the end of an oar ; that feat was performed by a sand-shark that yielded to his prowess the following summer. The blue shark in question, which was the biggest ever seen in his time on the island, ran up from the bottom the instant he felt the hook, and dodged about with the agility and evasiveness of a politician. The cap'n is exceedingly accurate and minute, and knows the wind and the weather of the day of each of these bygone excursions as well as he does the catch. He delights to tell, moreover, pleasant in- stances of accidents that have befallen in the gentle sport upon which the party is em- barked. He has tales galore of sharks that have been taken into the boat to all appear- ance as dead as door-nails, but which have mysteriously and most inconveniently re- vived to take a vicious nip out of some luck- less fisherman's calves.as a final taste of the banquet of life from which tkey are being so rudely removed. He does not forget, too, as a fitting climax to these enlivening reminis- cences, to mention the ‘‘ bone,’’ or basking shark, sometimes half a hundred feet long, by which boats have been overturned, men slaughtered, and even vessels fastened to the monster by irritating harpoons dragged 325 along like egg-shells ; and the cap’n shakes his grizzled head with a sigh for the degen- eracy of the times at being forced to add that these pleasant creatures are by no means as plenty as of old ; indeed, that they have well-nigh disappeared altogether: By request, and being moved thereto by questions of land-lubbers, for whose ignor- ance he can not wholly conceal his con- tempt, the cap’n generally adds to his enter- taining historical sketches some practical information in regard to the proper method of fishing for sharks and of handling them after they have taken the bait. He directs that the hook be dropped pretty nearly to the bottom, and that when the fisher feels a bite he be not too precipitate in jerking at the line. There is a deal of caution in a shark, and he generally examines the bait thoroughly before he is fully ready to turn over upon his back, after the awkward fashion of his kind in dining, and swallow it fairly. Once the prey is fairly insnared, however, the cap’n sententiously remarks that ‘‘a feller’d better pull for all he’s worth;’’ adding, with a contemptuous glance at the amateur fishermen he is instructing, that even then the chances are fair that the shark will pull the man overboard before the latter gets him into the boat. Various other bits of wisdom he enunciates, delivering every- thing with the utmost deliberation and in a delightful nautical dialect impossible of at- tainment by any “‘ off-islander’’ whatsoever. V. WHEN the fishing grounds are reached, those easiest of access lying about a mile from the shore, the big hooks are strung with half-a-dozen perch each and plumped overboard. Deep excitement reigns in every breast save that of the imperturbable cap’n, whose calmness has in it something of the awesomeness of fate. There are the usual number of false alarms. One man gets a bite and excitedly pulls too suddenly, securing nothing for his pains but a lofty sneer from the cap’n. Another, warned by this example, is far too deliberate, and allows some denizen of the vasty deep to partake of a free lunch at his expense, leaving the huge hook entirely bare of bait, to be drawn up and refurnished amid a silence on the part of the cap’n more derisively cutting than speech. The boat, turned broadside to the

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326 current, rolls and tumbles in a manner hu- miliatingly distressful to the land-lubberly stomach, and more than one secret wish is formed that land instead of water were be- neath, when, at length, some lucky fisher actually hooks a shark. Then the fun begins in good earnest. The shark tugs viciously at one end of the line while the fisher pulls with desperation at the other ; but as the man has the advantage of having something substantial to brace himself against, the struggle gradually turns in favor of the latter. With threshings and whirlings the big fish rises angrily through the water until his ugly snout is dragged to the upper air. The water is beaten to foam by his strong tail, while the jerks of his powerful head put the muscles of the fisher toa pretty severe test. If the shark be a big one, often two or three men are required to haul him in. The concentrated brutal rage of the fish is something that can not be even approximately conveyed in words, and it is only the excitement of the struggle that prevents a panic on board the whale-boat. Should a shark come to the surface in this mad fashion unattacked the chances are that the inmates of the craft would huddle into the bottom of the boat in a fit of ab- solute craven fear. With the exhilaration of conflict, however, comes courage. There is, moreover, some- thing very definite todo. If the capture be a sand-shark, he is dispatched with stout blows of a boathook over the head. It is no easy thing to hit the creature just right, especially if one is at all flustered ; and the cap’n has generally to lend a hand before the shark is properly made way with. Doubly difficult is the slaughter of the blue- dog (the man-eater), When a blue-dog shows his devilish snout with its rows of cruel teeth, white and glistening, and lashes the green sea-water like a paddle-wheel run mad, the cap’n, with a sudden look of alert determination on his weather-beaten phiz, makes a quick lunge for the lance. The shark does not waste all his energies in churning the water to a foam. He sturdily attacks the boat itself with a vigor and determination which amply justify the wis- dom of the foresight that has protected the sides of the craft with wire netting. There is a certain splendid recklessness in the way the fish rushes in desperate assault upon the THE COSMOPOLITAN. boat despite all disparity of size which fairly makes the blood tingle with excitement and admiration. He throws himself forward with gleaming teeth so fiercely that the fisher half expects the cruel head to come bodily through the planks, and already seems to feel the terrible fangs crunching into his own flesh. All the beast in the man awakes to match itself with the fierceness of this beast of the sea, and for the moment the gentlest shark-fisher is as brutal and blood-thirsty as a Vandal chieftain mad with joy of carnage. The cap’n’s eye, although it glistens with unwonted fire, is still clear, and his hand still steady. He feels something the same pro- fessional pride about the manner in which he plunges the clumsy lance into the raging blue-dog, as an espada does in regard to the way his slender sword finds out the vital spot between the shoulders of a fierce Anda- lusian bull, maddened in the ring. The lance should slide swiftly and deftly through the gills and down to the heart ; and to place it properly is by no means an easy feat when the shark is writhing and beating in the wild energy of his life-and-death struggle. The blood follows the weapon’s quick withdraw- al, and all the sea reeks with its sicken- ing odor, and is dyed a horrible dull red as the crimson stream mixes with the dusky water. The struggles of the captive grow speedily fainter, and soon he is rolling to and fro in the waves like a log of driftwood. The cap’n, though brave, is cautious ; and he is particularly careful that the prey shall by no means be taken on board until he is well assured that the creature is really dead beyond all peradventure. He is ready enough to relate the experiences of luckless wights who have taken apparently defunct sharks in, to be painfully aware, by a vicious nip from the powerful jaws, that enough of life for a last vengeful bite still remains in the fish ; but he has no ambition to serve as a practical illustration of the plausibility of such tales. The man-eaters, in particular, he likes to ‘‘tie out’’ awhile, leaving the body to sway up and down with the waves until there is no possibility of an inconven- ient resuscitation on shipboard. VI. By some subtile natural law that has always eluded my comprehension—albeit I

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YSEULT. make no pretensions to being wise in matters nautical—a man's first shark is always eight feet long. Afterward he catches them of any length, even down to two or three feet ; but I have never yet met a man who had caught sharks at all who did not reply in substance to a question in regard to the dimensions of the first one which fell a prey to his prow- ess : ‘‘ Well, that one was eight feet long, that first one. He was a terrible-looking custo- mer, I tell you.’’ If he is a modest man, and one who carries his conscientious scruples to the absurd length of sometimes telling the truth about his fishing exploits, he will occasionally ad- mit that his first capture was not a man-eater but only a sand-shark ; but from the length he abates nothing. That the first shark was eight feet long is a statement in attestation of the truth of which he will, if need be, die at the stake, and if now and then a sports- man be found who says ‘‘ about eight feet,”’ the qualifying word is not to be set down to modesty. It always means that the fish was really more rather than-less the conventional measurement. When the sharks are caught there is noth- ing in particular to do with them. The liv- ers are cut out forthe oil they yield, and the bodies are sometimes applied to malo- dorous use as fertilizers ; but the object of catching sharks is to catch them. Moralists sometimes attempt to justify their sport by declaring that they war upon sharks as en- emies of mankind, and they talk with vir- tuous air of the danger to bathers from these formidable ocean rangers. But the truth is that they go a-sharking for the ex- citement, and they deceive nobody by hypo- critical pretensions to philanthropic aims therein. The truth is that sharking is a stirring, though somewhat brutal, pastime. There is a fierce zest to it that belongs to nothing else. It has all the thrill of danger added to the exhilaration of salt winds and heaving waves, and if the danger is pretty nearly all imaginary, there is very little sport in a civilized land of which this is not true. It is merely the pleasant tingle of the appear- ance of danger that the sportsman seeks; an zesthetic peril, so to speak ; and perhaps no- where else in all our Eastern venturing can he so thoroughly experience this as in a live- ly day of sharking off Nantucket. YSEULT. By PauL DIaz. I. AN I go into my aunt’s room, Jo- séphine ?”’ The servant who was passing through the vestibule, with a dose of medicine in her hand,’shook her head. ‘‘Oh, no, mademoiselle ; Mme. de Bieu- vre hasn’t asked for you, and I wouldn’t advise you to goin now; you wouldn’t get a very cordial reception.’’ ‘“ Why not?’’ ‘“‘Why not? Because this paralytic at- tack has disfigured her, and she doesn’t want any one to see her in such a condition, you least of all. Now I ask you whether at her age, and sick as she is, she ought to be thinking about her looks? But that’s the way with these selfish old women, hateful- ness and vanity hold the field until they draw the last breath. She’s changed a good deal since yesterday, I can tell you. Your aunt, Mademoiselle Yseult, is as ugly phys- ically as she is morally, which is saying a great deal. It’s no fool’s job to take care of her, and Miss Hudson, the nurse, and I are completely fagged out.’’ ‘ ‘‘Then Miss Hudson won’t give me any lessons this morning ?’’ interrupted Yseult d’Arminge, endeavoring to cut short José- phine’s ill-natured remarks. ‘‘ Neither this morning nor this evening, nor perhaps any other day—at least not until Mme. de Bieuvre, tired of having her wait on her, sends her back to her duties as a governess. Meantime you are free, mademoiselle, to employ your time as you choose ; and, since the weather is fine, I’d advise you to take a walk and try and amuse yourself. And mind, make the most of your time ; I don’t believe you often get the chance.”’

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328 Joséphine was right. Such an oppor- tunitv seldom came to Yseult d’Arminge, whose youth, in the gloomy Chateau de Bieuvre, was wasting away as “‘ cribbed, cab- ined, and confined ’’ as if she were expiat- ing some crime within prison walls. In- deed, I believe that since she had been stranded as an infant on this estate in Anjou, the feeble survivor of a shipwrecked family, she had not had, between Mme. de Bieuvre and Miss Hudson, such a chance before. For years Yseult had been her aunt’s sub- missive slave, in constant attendance upon her person, save during the few hours daily that were devoted to the formal instruction Miss Hudson was pleased to call her ‘‘ educa- tion,’’ In this way Yseult had grown up, without affection and without recreation. When, therefore, she suddenly found herself mis- tress of her time through the accident of her aunt’s illness, she was more surprised than delighted. Quite bewildered, she slowly de- scended the great marble staircase and aim- lessly wandered into the garden. She had not taken many steps beyond the common- place grass-plots where her short daily walks had hitherto terminated, and passed through some shrubbery,when she uttered an exclamation of delight. Before her stretched one of those parks, common in Anjou, shady, ancient, apparently boundless, which give to that section of France a kind of melan- choly grandeur. The negligence of an owner who never entered it had long since left it to an isolation that enhanced its beauty. One could almost have imagined one’s self transported into the midst of the forest primeval, so entirely had the vegeta- tion been left to grow at will, and to hope- lessly depart from the original design. Attracted by the triple charm of the sum- mer weather, the solitude, and the freedom of the forest, so potent with repressed natures, Yseult plunged still deeper into the under- growth, and went forward with as genuine a spirit of discovery as ever inspired Crusoe on his island, hunting birds’ nests, watch- ing for insects, and steeping herself in the liberty of her unaccustomed independence. With her hands full of flowers, her hair fallen down her back, and a delicate rose tint on her cheeks, she had reached the end of the park, and was about turning into a path THE COSMOPOLITAN. that skirted the dividing moat, when she suddenly found herself face to face with a tall young gentleman of twenty-four or five, with an open, bronzed countenance,who had just leaped over it. The two young people stood looking at each other for a moment in undisguised amazement. ‘*What ? Monsieur Jacques Launay? You are not in Senegal ?’’ ‘‘Nor you in school, cousin ?’’ ‘*My aunt is ill, and nobody has any time to attend to me.”’ ‘* And I have only been back a week, ab- sent on sick leave.’’ ‘*Well, cousin, you gave mea nice fright.” ‘*Oh, I’m sosorry. But how could I ex- pect to meet you in this corner of the park, which is usually so deserted? It was the fault of the sun. You see it was so hot on the highroad that I couldn’t resist the temp- tation of walking through the woods. For- getting all discretion, I leaped over the em- bankment and—— ’’ ‘‘And got caught in indulging your ma- rauding propensities,’’ concluded the girl, with a slight smile. ‘But don’t be afraid ; I sha’n’t tell on you.’’ ‘*Then I may stay awhile in the shade of the forest ?’’ ‘Why, certainly.”’ They went on, walking this time in the same direction, and while following the winding path they continued their conver- sation. It was the first time they’ had seen each other alone. Hitherto they had only met at long intervals during the formal calls that Jacques was accustomed to make with his mother on Mme. de Bieuvre, and their constrained intercourse on those occasions had been limited to a few stiff bows. The latter had never pardoned the widowed Mme. de Launay for having married a poor officer, nor been drawn towards Jacques, brilliant pupil of the school-ship Borda as he was, and a sub-lieutenant at twenty-four. ‘You can’t live all day long in that gloomy chateau,’’ said Jacques as they were parting. ‘‘Won’t you allow my mother to ask permission of Mme. de Bieuvre to let you stay with her afternoons at least ?”’ ‘‘Oh, yes, that would be so nice! I wish she would,”’ replied Yseult, in a transport of delight at the suggestion ; ‘‘but I’m afraid my aunt won’t consent.’’ ‘‘No matter; we’ll make the attempt,”

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YSEUL T. said Jacques. have.”’ To the girl’s surprise the suspicious dow- ager granted the permission asked, and a brief era of happiness began for Yseult. For a whole month she was left to enjoy the de- lightful society of her friends. Miss Hudson did not at first fancy being transformed into a sick-nurse, but soon perceiving that she might be able to turn her employer’s illness to her own advantage by influencing the character of the latter’s will in her favor, she took up her position by the bed-side and never left it from morning till night. José- phine, from similar motives, was quite ab- sorbed in the invalid, and thus neither of the women had any leisure to devote to Mile. d’Arminge, who was thus permitted to enjoy a period of unalloyed happiness. In company with Mme. de Launay and Jacques, she would indulge in the long ram- bles that were not less necessary to restore the latter’s strength than to bring back the color into her own cheeks after so long a period of seclusion. When they were tired of exploring the neighborhood, they would return to the park, and selecting a shady spot, rest after their wanderings. While ‘‘ Nothing venture, nothing the ladies prosecuted some light handiwork, Jacques would read aloud from a favorite Then the book would fall from his hands, and he would forget himself in con- templating the graceful outlines of Yseult’s youthful figure, never growing weary of gazing at this pale, silent girl—a lily set in a background of verdure. As in the case of all young men whom stern necessity has early developed into manhood, Jacques’ heart was still tender; and although a mother’s love had till then sufficed for his happiness, it was not long before he be- gan to feel drawn toward the unprotected orphan, and to picture how the charming girl would appear when grown to woman- hood. One day Yseult did not come to the end of the park. Her aunt, cured of her illusions by a second paralytic attack, more disfigured than ever, but with her vanity conquered by the over-powering dread of death, and having become weary of the too assiduous attentions of Miss Hudson and Joséphine, had sent them both away and insisted on her niece’s return. The poor child was thus compelled to sub- author. 329 mit in solitude to the tyranny of the sick woman, and when, after three weeks of in- cessant watching, she left this chamber of torment for the last time, weakened and stu- pefied, behind a coffin, Jacques Launay, his furlough having expired, had left for Brest. The funeral over, and Miss Hudson and Joséphine having departed, after being re- warded by the legacies they had wrung from the whimsical old woman, Yseult found her- self alone in the great Chateau de Bieuvre. Of all ‘her relatives there was only one who could act as her guardian-—-Mme. de Launay, and she and the young girl were indulging the hope that they would be able to live together, when an unwelcome notary, who appeared to have shared Mme. de Bieuvre’s ideas regarding her young relative, brought them a copy ofa will made by Yseult’s father, in which it was stipulated that his daughter, on the death of her nearest relative, should enter the Convent of St. M——, at Paris, and not leave it until her eighteenth birthday, when she was to come forth to be married. Mme. de Launay had not even the satis- faction of taking Yseult to the convent. ‘* At least you will write to me, will you not, my child?’’ she said to the girl, who was weeping as she was held in a last em- brace. Yseult promised ; but scarcely had she had time to keep her word, when she was in- formed of Mme. de Launay’s sudden illness and death. Attacked with congestion of the lungs, the poor woman passed away after a few days of suffering. This unexpected affliction, which affected Yseult a hundred times more than the de- mise of her aunt, occurred during the son's absence. Recalled from Lisbon, where he was to spend several months, by the news of his mother’s sudden attack, he returned with all speed to Bieuvre, having with great dif- ficulty obtained a few days’ leave of absence ; but in spite of his haste the grave had closed over her who had so longed for him on her death-bed before he arrived. In the first violence of his grief he shut himself up in the house, desperate and overwhelmed, going over the mementos of the deceased, of which the house was full. But before returning where inexorable duty called him, the soothing and comforting image of Yseult rose before him, and his thoughts of the dead were mingled with an

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33° irresistible desire to see, if only for an in- stant, the child who had loved his mother, and who, henceforth, was the only tie that bound him to life. He hastened to Paris. On arriving at the convent, he had scarcely finished his first sentence, when the Lady Superior of the convent silenced him with a polite courtesy. The pupils were ‘‘in re- tirement’’ and could not be seen until the following day. ‘But, mother,’’ exclaimed the young man; ‘‘T leave in a few hours for Heaven knows how long. Can you not, in consideration of the exceptional circumstances, grant me a ten minutes’ interview with Mlle. d’Ar- minge?’”’ ‘‘Impossible, monsieur,’’ replied the Lady Superior, coldly ; ‘“‘the rule of the house must not be broken by naval officers any more than by ordinary people. Besides,’’ she added, after a second’s silence employed in curiously examining Jacques from head to foot, ‘‘ Mlle. Arminge has been brought here to remain until she is eighteen, under special injunctions as to her seclusion, which com- pel us to be very strict with those who ask to see her in the ‘parlor.’ In order to con- verse with her you must at least have a per- mit from her notary.’’ Jacques made no answer. His eyes were following, through the carefully curtained windows of the room, a file of the inmates slowly marching toward the chapel, and vainly seeking to make out, under the ample folds of the violet capes behind the head- + gear of the ‘‘beguins’’ who led the proces- sion, the graceful figure of Yseult. ‘* Tt will be hard,’’ he muttered to himself, ‘*to leave without a look, without a word. Three years ! I shall probably be absent my- self as long as that. What a tedious sepa- ration.”’ ‘‘Well, so be it, madame,’’ he said, with an effort to appear calm under the lady’s cold, penetrating gaze. ‘‘I will not insist, hard as it is for me when I am about to place hundreds of leagues between my only rela- tive and myself, to leave without first being allowed to press herhand. But I presume I can at least write ?’’ A second courtesy, as profound but as re- lentless as the first, again buried the tall figure of the Lady Superior in the folds of her dark robe. ‘ ‘‘So sorry, my dear sir, not to be able to THE COSMOPOLITAN. comply with your request,’’ she said in a slightly ironical tone, ‘‘but you are only Mile. d’Arminge’s cousin. Now, our rule does not permit one of your sex to write to our dear girls besides their fathers or their confessors. If you should disobey it I should be compelled to retain your letters.’’ Before this last blow the young man stood dumfounded, and in the bitterness of his disappointment permitted himself to be shown to the door with a few words of sym- pathy and without a protest. But once on the way to Lisbon, his natural energy re- asserted itself, and he decided on the course he ought to pursue. ‘* After all,’’ he said to himself, ‘‘ Yseult is only fifteen, and it would have been too soon to talk to her of love. Judging from my own reception, she is beyond the reach of temptation. Since I can not do anything toward deciding the important question now, I will wait patiently for the end of her im- prisonment within those ugly walls, and in the mean time strive to make myself more worthy of her. When I can speak plainly, I shall return to France.”’ As the Lady Superior never mentioned Jacques’ call, Yseult naturally inferred, when months passed without her hearing from him, as she was also unaware that he had been forbidden to write, that he had forgot- ten her and that the one innocent friendship of her life was at anend. This caused her much sorrow; a settled meiancholy came over her, and she grew hardened under the ill treatment of fate. Those who should have loved her had rendered her unhappy, and she had seen those to whom she had been attached disappear or taken from her. Of what avail, therefore, to trouble her- self about others? In the convent she felt herself a stranger, and had’been relegated to the ranks of the pupils without influential relatives. She at first felt this neglect keen- ly, but disdain soon came to her aid. Re- solved to make no claim on the affections of those around her, she took refuge in a perfect obedience to the rules, and was equally stud- ious, polite, and docile. This alienated her young companions, but for the indifference of one heart more or less Yseult cared little. She had no regret for the past, no hope for the future. The years rolled by, making her a woman, but gliding into her being without awaken-

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a YSEULT. ing it, while she preserved the mystic fresh- ness of a closed flower. As one grows ac- customed to everything, notably inside of convent walls, the inmates became accus- tomed to her queenly beauty, which daily grew more striking, to her fondness for seclu- sion, and to her careless grace. One day two new pupils, the little De Chesniers, asked her to be their “‘ petite maman,’’ and, according to custom, she was called into the ‘‘parlor’’ every time they received visits from their relatives. This had gone on for several weeks, and Yseult had thus made the acquaintance of three or four middle-aged ladies, and as many stupid cousins, who, under the pretense of bringing cakes to the little ones, had filled the room with their rich dresses and their fashionable chatter II. ONE afternoon the Lady Superior sent for Mile. d’Arminge to come into her oratory. This was a small, wainscoted room, having little in it besides a priedieu and a beauti- fully carved Italian crucifix, where this haughty and clever woman retired to medi- tate, and where she discussed only the most important questions. Drawing achair near her own, the Supe- rior made Yseult sit down in the deep em- brasure of a window, and inquired affection- ately regarding her health and her studies, and expressed sympathy for her lonely posi- tion in life. ‘‘ Have you never thought, my poor child, of what will happen when you leave this peaceful retreat and go out into the world ?”’ ‘“No, mother,’’ replied Yseult, quietly; ‘‘ that will not come to pass for three months yet, and I have made it a rule to concern myself only with the present.” ‘‘ But I, my child, who have had the care of your soul for nearly three years, can not help thinking of our approaching separa- tion with real sadness. What will become of you, young, beautiful, and ignorant of life, in this tempest they call the world, without advice, without protection of any kind? How will you struggle against the dangers of a corrupt society where those bet- ter armed than you daily come to grief?”’ The Lady Superior then entered on a de- tailed description of this unknown world, which her pupil was about to enter alone. 331 Never was raging sea covered with wrecks, never were caverns filled with brigands sworn to demand the most extortionate of ransoms, painted in colors more glowing and more terrible. A young girl left to her- self would encounter only perfidy and snares. She was the destined prey of the worst of men ; misery, shame, and despair would follow her footsteps. After this brilliant oratorical effort the nun paused, and resuming a more conversa- tional tone, continued : ‘“There is but one way of escaping the dangers that I have pointed out and that make me shudder for you, my dear child, and that is to enter life leaning on the arm of one able, not only to keep you from going astray, but to protect you from insult—in short, to marry before leaving the convent.”’ ‘‘But my father’s wishes,’’ said Yseult, greatly surprised at this conclusion. ‘* Your father wished you to marry a man worthy of you, one who should gain the consent of his notary, my own, and yours. On complying with these conditions, you are at liberty to wed a little before the fixed time; such is my opinion and also Maitre Rochard’s. Now, Providence has provided the husband, one bearing an illus- trious name, and possessing a splendid for- tune. These qualifications have already ob- tained our consent, and, I trust, will also gain yours.”’ ‘* And his name?”’ ‘*The Duc de Nemouse.’’ Yseult opened her great eyes very wide. ‘‘What?’’ she exclaimed, ‘‘the Duc de Nemouse, the uncle of the little De Ches- niers, whom I’ve only seen four times in the ‘parlor’!”’ ‘“The very man. God has so touched his heart by your beauty that he has asked me for your hand.’” The figure of a worn-out fop, with a hol- low chest, hair turning gray, and dull, heavy eyes, presented itself to the young girl’s mind, and her patrician blood flamed in her cheeks. ‘‘Oh, mother!”’ she cried indignantly, ‘*how can you propose such a marriage to me?’’ ‘‘My dear girl, I propose it,’’ replied the Lady Superior, ‘‘ because he seems to me to be every way calculated to make you happy.”

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332 ‘* But he’s three times my age; he’s ugly, he’s supercilious, he’s——’”’ ‘*My dear child, at your time of life you judge of men by the outside, and you judge very badly. You think the Duke is old and ugly, and you are displeased. It is true he is wanting in the grace of youth ; but if you knew how many women are dying to call themselves by his name, how anxious they are to wear the ducal coronet he offers you to- day, you would perhaps be more blind to his physical imperfections, less irritated, and more grateful fora piece of good fortune that proves your power over a man whom two gen- erations of coquettes have not been able to turn from a bachelor to a Benedict. Besides, the Duc de Nemouse has sterling qualities that a Christian woman should rank above the temporary attractions of age and figure. He is trustworthy, discreet, and generous. He is the mentor, the friend, your inexperi- ence needs; prudent enough to be your guide in life, and kind enough to excuse your blunders should you commit any in spite of his counsels.’’ The Lady Superior continued in this strain for over an hour, clothing her patron with many imaginary virtues, and at the same time endeavoring to read the effect of her words in Yseult’s face. But the latter had resumed her usual mask of impassibility. ‘* You have heard my proposal ?’’ asked the nun at last, rising from her seat. ‘‘Yes, madame, and I spurn it. I have no wish to be the Duke’s wife. I shall wait and see what other suitor the next three months may bring, and if the world is as terrible as you say——”’ ‘‘Hush, my child, don’t talk like that; I don’t ask you for a decided answer, and you must not give it to-day. Consider ; you have ample time and the Duke is too honor- able a man to urge you. All he asks is to be able to see you on Wednesdays.’’ ‘‘The Duke must have lost his head,’’ mused the Lady Superior to herself, when Yseult had left her, ‘‘to fall in love with this singular creature. I wonder what he sees in this piece of alabaster that was evi- dently designed for the self-effacement of a contemplative life.’’ Which showed how little the Lady Supe- rior knew of the mysteries of the masculine heart. It was precisely this marble-like ex- terior that had at first attracted the Duke’s THE COSMOPOLITAN. attention, then piqued his curiosity, and finally lighted, amid the ashes of his heart, one of those untimely passions that often prove with the d/asé in love affairs more violent and obstinate than those of their youth. The Duke was careful never to speak of marriage to the young girl at any of their interviews, while the Lady Superior kept plying her with arguments, and the other pupils, at her suggestion, overwhelmed Yseult with attentions, and congratulated her on the good fortune that awaited her. Lady acquaintances of the De Chesniers also called frequently, and complimented her in- directly on the prize she had secured, until poor Yseult, in spite of herself, without friends to advise her, alone in the world, as the Lady Superior had pointed out, and appa- rently deserted by her only relative, Jacques Launay, found herself engaged almost with- out being conscious of it. ‘* A duchess, Yseult, with a millionaire for a husband, and the queen of the Faubourg St. Germain! What a fortunate girl! Howl envy you!’’ Such was the tone of the com- ments poured into her ears from morning till night. And Yseult, tired of struggling against her fate, allowed herself to be car- ried along by the current that was bearing her into the Duke’s arms. However, when she was urged to fix a day for the marriage, she made one last struggle to recover her liberty. ‘‘Oh! not yet,’’ she exclaimed ; ‘‘I will decide later.’’ ‘*But the three last months of your stay here will soon be over.”’ ‘*No matter ; I wish to wait.’’ Wait for what? Yseult would have found it difficult to say. The Duke was burning with impatience; and the Lady Superior, anxious to have the affair off her hands, endeavored with ill-disguised harsh- ness to overcome what she called Mlle. d’Arminge’s ‘‘inertia;’’ but the latter re- mained firm in her resolution, buoyed up by some vague, undefined hope. As she was leaving the oratory on the day of the first important interview, a letter had been handed to the Lady Superior bearing a foreign post-mark. It was signed ‘‘ Jacques Launay,’’ and read: “You have forbidden me to write to Mlle. d'Arminge, and I have obeyed the rule of your house at whatever

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YSEULT. cost to myself. But the time during which my cousin is to remain with you is drawing toa close, and when you receive this letter she will be on the eve of entering the world again and taking a husband. NowI have loved Mile. d’Arminge for three years, and I wish, before she sees any other suitor, to warn you that I shall propose for her hand on my return to France, which I hope will be in a few weeks.”’ The Lady Superior pondered for a moment over Jacques’ missive, so touching in its straightforward brevity, and then said to her- self: ‘It is too late; the Duke has my prom- ise.’’ This highly-favored Duke came near losing all control over himself when Yseult, at last yielding to entreaties when the three months had ended, consented to fix a day for their marriage. Recovering the agility of youth, he hurried on the preparations for the wedding, and took genuine pleasure in superintending the repairing of a magnificent place at Fon- tenay aux Roses, where he proposed spending the honeymoon. One evening, worn out with his unaccus- tomed exertions, as he was about to drop into his club to take a look at the papers, he met a young naval officer. ‘Jacques Launay!’’ heexclaimed. ‘‘ What good wind has blown you back to France?”’ ‘‘A wind that didn’t trouble itself to blow very hard,’’ replied Jacques, laughing. ‘I ought to have been here at least a fortnight ago, but have only just landed.”’ ‘“VYes? Delighted, I am sure, to be one of the first to welcome you. Do you know that two whole years have rolled by since we parted at Lisbon? I thought we should never meet again.’ ‘Tt is very kind in you, my dear Duke, not to have forgotten me.’’ ‘‘Just as though you are one of those who are easily forgotten! Itseems to me that you work too hard tomake people talk about you forthat. Do you know that your exploration of the interior of Java, and your last romance, have placed you in the front rank of current celebrities? You’ll be quite the fashion. And in the first place I wish to introduce you to my club ; rest assured that you'll receive a hearty welcome. I presume you're not going to sea right away again.”’ ‘“Ma foi!’ returned Jacques, ‘‘I must acknowledge that I’ venointention of ever go- ing again. I’m tired of traveling, and what you are pleased to call my celebrity is quite ; 333 sufficient for me. I propose to live here- after in that corner of the provinces around which my fondest memories cluster.’’ ‘*In other words, you’re thinking of mar- riage. Capital, my young captain ; there’s nothing like it. I pledge you my word asa convert to matrimony.”’ ‘* What !’’ exclaimed Jacques, in amaze- ment ; ‘‘ you married ?”’ ‘*Not yet, but just as good as married, since the ceremony is to occur at noon to- morrow in the chapel of the St. M Convent. I beg you’ll accept an informal invitation, which the want of your address prevented me from sending you at the proper time—an invitation to the mass, the break- fast, the dinner, the ball—in short, for the entire day. , ‘*You look at me as though you thought I had taken leave of my senses, but when you’ve seen my wife you'll grant me absolu- tion. Ah, how charming she is! but I can’t have a handsome fellow like you making love to her. Here I stand chattering and I’vea thousand and one things todo. Well, good- bye fora while! I guarantee you a cordial welcome home again.”’ The two men shook hands, and Jacques, scarcely recovered from his surprise, saw the gray-haired bridegroom pass into the vesti- bule of the hétel. As he was about to dis- appear, he turned and said : ‘*By the way, my dear fellow, I forgot to tell you the name of the future duchess ; it is Yseult d’Arminge.”’ III. As the Duke had said, the nuptial mass was to be celebrated in the convent chapel. It was somewhat of an infraction upon the rules of the house, which usually provided only for the union of virgins with the Lord; but Yseult’s peculiar situation, her isolation in the midst of Paris, and the high social standing of the Duc de Nemouse had prevail- ed on the Lady Superior to make the conces- sion. She had promised that the ceremony should be as brilliant as possible, and a bishop 7x partibus, a relative of the groom, was to pronounce the blessing. The following morning there was much coming and going of upholsterers, much ar- ranging of draperies, lights, and great boxes with orange trees and palms. Nuns and pensionnaires had been carefully kept out of

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334 the way of this worldly turmoil, only the necessary servants taking part in it; and while the Lady Superior, with her field-day expression, herself watched the transforma- tion of her chapel into something resembling a fashionable salon, and gave strict orders for the preparation of the bishop’s chocolate and the candles and the tapers to be held by the young couple, Yseult, in her cell in a re- mote part of the building, was silently mak- ing her toilet. She was assisted, or rather hindered, by two of the nuns, whose awkward fingers were unused to the work of a lady’s maid. The chairs in the narrow room, with the red brick pavement, were entirely hidden be- neath the elegant trousseau. This latter had been purchased by the Duke’s sister, who insisted that everything should be of the most magnificent description: heavy velvets, white as newly fallen snow, watered silks with opal reflections, veils and laces of filmy fineness. The good sisters had never even dreamed of such splendor, and their glances betokened a stupid wonder. Every few moments one of Yseult’s curious school-mates would press her slender body through the half-opened door and stand wrapped in ecstatic admira- tion of the scene. Then another and another followed, until the little cell was filled with a chattering crowd. Suddenly Mme. de Chesnier dashed in like a whirlwind. ‘*What!’’ she cried. ‘‘ You are still here, little one, and the Duke waiting for you? And not ready yet? Ah, reverend sisters, you are not at all skillful. Come, girls, hand me the pins, and you, mignonne, bend your goddess-like head a trifle while I arrange the veil.’’ And with much rattling of bracelets on her bony arms, the Marquise busied herself about Yseult’s person. ‘*There,’’ she said, after a while, ‘“‘ you are ready at last, and you are handsome enough to drive my brother out of his head ; however, leave him a little sense for the requirements of married life !’’ And kissing her on both cheeks, she hur- ried her away. IV. In the little chapel, brilliant with lights and flowers, were assembled members of the THE COSMOPOLITAN. most representative families of the Faubourg St. Germain. The men, who, of course, had never been there before, looked at the pict- ures, at the pulpit in holiday attire, and at the sumptuous altar ornaments; while the women, delighted at finding themselves tak- ing part in a fashionable gathering in the chapel where, as young girls, they used to attend mass every morning, recognized their friends and whispered discreetly : ‘‘Ah! good day, baronne, I didn’t expect to see you here. The heat is stifling, but it’s ever so much more ‘select’ than at St. Augustine.”’ ‘‘ What do you think of our humble sanc- tuary, dear friend? Delicious, isn’t it? The Lady Superior is a woman of taste !’’ ‘* Not more so than the Duc de Nemouse. How do the altar decorations strike you ?”’ ‘Did he arrange it? Well, I suspected as much.’’ Thus the tide of conversation flows on. A hive-like hum, mingled with the rapid movement of fans, filled the place and rose with the heavy perfume of orange flowers to the rainbows formed by the ancient stained glass over the choir. When Yseult appeared, surpassingly beau- tiful beneath her veil, accompanied by the Duke in a state of mental and moral intoxi- cation, there was a general murmur of ad- miration and the whispering increased. ‘*Well, madame, what do you say to a young girl like that ?’’ ‘*Tdeal! She is certainly a sufficient ex- cuse for De Nemouse’s madness; such a walk, such a figure, such eyes—like Galatea’s !’’ ‘Yes, like Galatea asleép.”’ ‘*Excellent ; but her husband will awaken her.”’ ‘If hecan. I shouldn’t like to wager on it. Poor Duke, he takes no care of him- self.’’ ‘Really, countess ?’’ ‘‘Hush, you gossip. Widor is going to improvise on the organ. Listen!’’ The great artist played a pastoral. Was it a breath of spring that had floated in through a window, or the young girl in her white attire kneeling down there amid the green palms under a variegated nimbus? Through the sudden stillness of the chapel, over the bowed heads of the worshipers, passed the rustic airs that seemed to come from the depths of some forest. To Yseult,

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YSEULT. lulled into momentary forgetfulness by the waves of sonorous sound, the music recalled to hera certain day in the month of June when she was fifteen—long forgotten, but delightful. The last days of her sojourn at Bieuvre came back to her, bringing again the high park hedges, the slopes covered with lilies of the valley, the path where she had met her. cousin for the first time. Then there were the excursions, the rambles through the woods, and Jacques’ readings. It was the only happiness she had ever known. If it had only lasted longer! At that distance of time this unfinished page in her life’s history shone with an exquisite idyllic freshness, and while she was dream- ing of it with a tinge of sadness, Jacques Launay—he who had helped to make the past so precious to her—was only a few steps away. He, too, had conjured up that pict- ure of the past, and was endeavoring to stifle the beating of his bruised and broken heart. At the announcement of Yseult’s marriage he had staggered backward, thunderstruck, ~ and scarcely able to believe his ears. Yseult engaged to another when he thought her so secure from temptation of that kind, when he even believed her—such was his secret hope—inclined to listen to his pro- posals! was such a thing possible? An overpowering desire to assure himself of the truth, to know how everything had happened in his absence, how Mlle. d’Arminge had been able to choose the Duke, took posses- sion of him. Compelling himself, by a superhuman ef- fort,to preserve an outward calmness, he had followed the man of Yseult’s choice. Then, when his desire for details had been satisfied, the Duke narrating them with the vanity of one who had just made a splendid conquest ; when he came to know of the long siege the successful suitor had laid to the young girl’s person, and the open advocacy of his cause by the Lady Superior, Yseult’s consent no longer surprised him; he also realized that the misfortune was irreparable. There was but one course left for him to pursue: he must fly ; he must take himself and his despair away, far, far away to the other end of the world. But he felt that to leave Paris without once more seeing her whom he had so pas- Sionately loved was a sacrifice beyond his 335 strength ; and thus, without any other in- tention than that of looking for the last time into the face of the adored one, he had come tothe chapel. And now he regretted it, so great was the agony the sight had caused him. ‘*Mademoiselle d’ Arminge, you consent to take for your husband the Duc de Nemouse here present?’ The young girl shuddered. The organist had ceased playing, every one in the chapel was standing up, and before her was the bishop’s imposing figure, robed in the gor- geous vestments of his office, pronounc- ing the formulas of the marriage rite with a gold ring in his hand. Yseult looked at her intended, who was standing very close to her. In the opaline light that shone on them he seemed more bony and thinnerthan ever ; while his yellow cheeks and dull, lusterless eyes appeared more prominent than usual. With a feeling of repulsion she placed her hand in his ; the bishop made the sign of the cross over them, and they were married. The ceremony over, and having returned from the convent, the bride and groom, stand- ing at the entrance of their grand salon, saw the crowd of guests pass before them—guests for the most part unknown to Yseult, who only recognized a few of the relatives of the pupils whom she had seen in the reception- room of the convent. The young Duchess bowed gravely to each, but at last grew weary of being pre- sented to so many strange people. Among the late comers, she was startled at the sight of the bronzed face of one she believed to be at the antipodes. ‘‘What, cousin?’’ she exclaimed, with a frank smile, ‘‘isit really you? Iam delight- ed to see you again.”’ Jacques bowed, muttering some unintel- ligible compliment. ‘‘You arrived yesterday, didn’t you, my dear Jacques,”’ interrupted the Duke ; ‘‘ but how do you happen to be related without my being aware of it? I anticipated dazzling you with the recital of his exploits as an ex- plorer and a writer of romances, madame, and it turns out that you know as much re- garding them as I do.”’ ‘‘ You are mistaken,” replied Yseult. ‘‘ The fame of my cousin’s achievements has not penetrated the walls of the convent, and as

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336 he did not personally give me the slightest reason to believe that he was alive, I——’’ Jacques suddenly looked up; he did not yet know how far the treachery of the Lady Superior had extended. ‘*What!’’ he asked; ‘‘did they not tell you of my visit three years ago, and my letter of only two months ago ?”’ ‘* Not a word of either,’’ answered Yseult, simply ; and as he kissed her forehead to . conceal the pang this new blow caused him, she believed that he was offended at her reply. ‘“We will renew our acquaintance pres- ently,’’ she said with more meaning in her tones than she usually infused into them, as another guest took Jacques’ place. ‘‘I hope you intend going with us to Fontenay.”’ She held out her hand with old-time friendliness, and Jacques could not resist the graceful gesture. ‘‘Yes, madame,’’ he murmured in a low tone, adding to himself: ‘it is madness to follow her, but she is so beautiful I can not leave her yet.”’ Ms SINCE it is now the custom for the most plebeian of the dourgeoisie to goon a wedding tour, and to start for Switzerland or Italy the moment the ceremony is ended, the grands seigneurs are obliged, in order to mark the difference between themselves and the vulgar herd, to remain athome. But Parisin June has a sad, deserted aspect, and the Duc de Nemouse had conceived the idea of taking his bride away to Fontenay that the festivi- ties might be concluded after the time- honored manner. Invitations had been sent out for a ball in the evening, while the peasants of the neigh- borhood were bidden to a /éte champétre, the preparations for which had been hurriedly made. While within the chateau was newly furnished throughout in the most luxurious manner, without the servants were busy in arranging the lights among the foliage and placing the chairs. Lines of Chinese lan- terns ornamented the facade of the building, while the flower-beds of the garden had their special arrangements for illumination. Workmen were also engaged in arranging Chinese lanterns in the trees, and construct- ing a platform for the musicians and tables for the refreshments to be offered to those THE COSMOPOLITAN. who had been invited to the fe. Every- thing gave promise of a brilliant entertain- ment. Meantime, the few intimate friends who had partaken of the wedding breakfast wan- dered through the grounds at will, watched the preparations, and penetrated to a seclud- ed garden, accessible from the private apart- ments, which the Duke had laid out in the English style. From the precincts of this inclosure, the master of the house had banished all but white flowers—acacias, lilies of the valley, roses, snowballs, syrin- gas, the jasmine, the cactus, pinks, petunias, hydrangeas, tube roses, and the rest—the whole massed on a background of dark green. Yseult, slight, pale, and charming, as she walked back and forth leaning on her husband’s arm, seemed like the fairy crea- tor of this oriental garden. As the Duke excused himself fora moment to look after the welfare of some specially distinguished guest, the Marquise approached the bride. ‘* Mignonne,’’ she exclaimed, ‘‘my brother is indefatigable, but if you keep on your feet much longer you won’t be able to dancea step this evening. Come, there’s a seat in the shade by the lake which is almost as deep and limpid as your eyes. Sit down and ask M. Launay to tell you something about the hot countries. Here he’s been delighting us for a whole hour with the most sparkling con- versation you can imagine, but not a word have we been able to get from him about his travels.’’ ‘“My travels were only dreams,’’ said Jacques. ‘‘Now I am awake again. We don’t tell our dreams.”’ ‘*Certainly we do,’’ replied Yseult, ‘‘if they are agreeable ones. Happy are those who have them.”’ She sat down sedately, somewhat disar- ranging her bridal finery, on the marble bench in the shade of aclump of old syca- mores, by the edge of the water, brilliant with the reflection of the setting sun, and where two swans sailing about seemed to form part of hertrain. Jacques seated himself near, but a little behind her, not being able to command himself when looking full into the face of the woman he loved. He had sworn that he would be strong, that he would smile on this day of suffering, even should it prove to be the last day of his life, and since morning he had forced himself to maintain

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YSEULT. 337 a factitious animation; but every time his eyes met Yseult’s a sudden pang darted through him. It was not exactly jealousy. Yseult did not love the Duke; she did not love any one. Her manner revealed a tranquillity of soul that passion had never ruffled. The sailor knew, too, that the young girl had been in- fluenced neither by avarice nor by ambition. She had accepted this suitor partly through ignorance, partly in obedience to the wishes of others ; she could not be charged witha crime. He had only to blame the Lady Superior for having arrived too late, he said to himself, to stifle his despair ; but when he looked at his darling, so young, so pure, handed over to the Duke, it seemed as though he saw her sinking in mid-ocean with no human help within reach. Perhaps he would have preferred such a catastrophe. Thus, to escape from the present, he began to talk with feverish excitement, not turning his head toward Yseult, but throwing him- self into the past, returning in imagination to the burning islands of the other hemi- sphere, to those distant lands where he had nursed his vanished hopes. : Yseult, her eyes fixed on a distant bit of country seen between the trees, seemed to be looking, as through a magic frame, on the landscape which Jacques’ recital had called up, on the journeys through yellow rice- fields, blinded by the sun, and overpowered by the heat; on through the lowlands watered by stagnant pools and rank with a luxuriant vegetation ; on hunting excursions, with the heavy paraphernalia of the elephants and the cloud of half-naked ‘‘ beaters ;’’ ona quite regal procession resplendent with flashing harness, and bristling with strange arms, starting out with discordant cries through the jungles in quest of some agile beast of prey. Then the enervating szesfa hours in the recesses of the palace, under silken cur- tains, in the silence of marble courts, where the tired body sinks into the meshes of the hammock, while the mind wanders off on the scent of the nutmeg tree, or the chant of the fountain ; and the starry but dreadful nights in the desert, or those others on the terraces bright with lights and gay with dancers, where glide figures lithe or gro- tesque, but both alike never to be forgotten, On Yseult these vivid descriptions had the effect of some fairy tale. She at first 32 seemed to have returned to Bieuvre and to be seated near Jacques in the midst of a sum- mer landscape. But this was no longer a big playfellow making a companion of a child ; it was a man, a hero, whose tones thrilled with strange emotion as he narrated his adventures by land and sea. And this emotion gradually took possession of her, opening her intellect and her senses as with a golden key. It seemed as though he had awakened within her a new, intense life that had hitherto been latent. Overpowered by curiosity, admiration, enthusiasm, she held her breath the better to drink in his words, surprised to find her heart beating more quickly. ‘“ You must be a real magician, Monsieur Launay,”’ suddenly exclaimed the Marquise de Chesnier, as she heard a clock strike. ‘‘We thought we'd been listening to you about ten minutes, and here it is time to change our dresses for dinner.’’ Every one at once rose. The Duke had been back a long time, but no one had no- ticed his presence, not even Yseult, who forgot that she was married until she saw him come up to offer his arm. As she ascended the steps into the house, she heard the Marquise say behind her in a low tone : ‘* You must have fallen in love with many women in that land of delight, Monsieur Launay.’’ ‘*In that land of dreams,’’ replied Jacques, ‘‘I loved a young girl with whom I had played in the depths of Anjou three years ago, and—I loved no other.’’ ‘* What absurd constancy.”’ ‘‘Absurd indeed, madame, as the young girl never suspected it, and when I returned to claim her I found that she had not waited for me.’’ ‘‘Madame la Duchesse, are you ill?” asked the Duke respectfully. ‘‘I thought you shuddered.’’ ‘‘No, monsieur, there’s nothing the mat- ter—only a little fatigue. I’m not accus- tomed to the open air, and it has intoxicated me. VI. ALTHOUGH it was now one o’clock in the morning, so well had the illumination been arranged that not a single lamp had yet gone out. In the great salons, overheated

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338 despite the open windows, flowers were fading in the ladies’ corsages, and fans moved less briskly in idle hands. In short, the critical moment had arrived when Pleas- ure and Fatigue, daughters of the Dance, contended for supremacy. Yseult, still im- passive and white, and framed like a statue in the red velvet of an easy-chair, was re- plying abstractedly to the compliments of a circle of admirers lost in admiration of her superb shoulders. The evening had been a fatiguing one for her, as she had not sat up so late since the far-off days when she had played back- gammon with her aunt by the light of a red candle. Thrown for the first time into the intoxicating atmosphere of a ball-room, under the glare of chandeliers, and the target of acouple of hundred pairs of eyes, whose owners were ready to pick her to pieces, she had been compelled to do the honors of the house, to placate august guests, open the bal champétre and the formal quadrilles, and to be consigned as a partner in turn to all her husband’s friends, from the heir of a scepter to an old general on half-pay. Yseult, statue-like in her attitudes and cor- rect in her language and deportment, had come triumphantly through the ordeal, and more than one woman of thirty envied her careless grace. The Duke was radiant with proud satisfaction, while Jacques Launay, quite the lion of the evening, was distracted by an inward struggle between an inclina- tion to fly, and a wild desire to ask her to dance. He finally decided to solicit her hand for a waltz. Without replying she rose, a little more slowly than usual, placed her hand lightly on his shoulder, and they began to dance. They had waltzed for some time, although to Jacques the minutes had seemed like seconds, when he suddenly felt his partner sinking backward on his arm. ‘‘T am suffocating,’’ she said faintly ; ‘*take me out into the air.”’ He pushed through the circling throng, and without being noticed, they descended the short flight of steps leading into the private garden. The bustling animation of the rest of the chateau and of the grounds intensified the quiet of this retired spot. A warm breeze moving among the motionless foliage. brought faint snatches of music from the distant salons in capricious puffs, THE COSMOPOLITAN. mingled with the trills of some half-awak- ened nightingale singing at the end of the valley. All nature was in repose, and over its untroubled slumbers the moon, enamored of the white flowers, cast an ethereal light. ‘*Are you better?’’ asked Jacques, in a voice which he managed to steady, but only after a great effort. ‘*Oh! it’s all over now,’’ replied Yseult, ‘‘but I needed air. What a charming night, and how stupid of people to remain indoors when itis so delightful outside. Shall we take the bench under the sycamores?’”’ Why should they not?—and cross this fairy garden with her, her gliding steps keeping time with his, her queenly gar- ments brushing against him, and her hand unconsciously pressing heavily on his arm! What would he not have given, either in this life or in that which is to come, to walk thus to the end through the perfumed night ! They reached the bench. and sat down in the shadow of the old trees. The little lake glistened in the moonlight, and the sleeping swans floated passively on its bosom. A gust of wind passed over the »sgarden, shak- ing the trees and blowing the closed petals of a climbing rose in a white shower over the young couple. They looked at each other and Yseult smiled. This smile seemed to test Jacques’ self-restraint beyond endur- ance; he hid his face in his hands and wept. Then the bride did a singular thing : she fell on her knees before him. ‘*Jacques,’’ she said, ‘‘ you loved me; why didI not know it? I have made you suffer ; you, who deserve to be so happy. Pardon me.’’ ‘*Alas!’’ said the sailor, ‘‘what is it you are doing? I have nothing to forgive. If I am wretched, it is through my own fault. I should have spoken at Bieuvre, where I already loved you. But you were so pure, so artless, I was afraid of making you less happy. I believed you would be unpledged on leaving the convent, and that I could still find the way to your heart. I had no ducal coronet to offer you, but I dreamed of happiness amid the woods you loved so well. Nowallis over. And I am weak enough to weep before you. What could you have done? Of what avail are compassion and friendship to me? I had better have kept my wretched secret than raising her,

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YSEULT. have saddened you to no purpose. But my sufferings have been so poignant. To live three years on an illusion, to carry it in one’s breast like a talisman that shields from dangers and cures one’s wounds ; to have a gentle face day and night before one’s eyes, and just at the moment when the dream was to be replaced by the reality, to see it shattered forever by another! You can not understand this, Yseult ; you, whose heart has, never throbbed tumultuously. You can not know either the anguish or the despair of love!”’ ‘‘Are you quite sure of that, Jacques?”’ said Yseult, in a changed tone. He looked at her dum founded. ‘Do you think that I have only a sterile compassion to offer you in return for your suffering ?’’ she went on ; ‘‘ and has it never occurred to you that love like yours de- serves something better than friendship? ”’ Trembling, and fearing that he had mis- understood, he drew closer to her and turned her beautiful face so that the moon shone full upon it. Oh, miracle! This was no longer the cold, statue-like Yseult of the early part of the day. Like Galatea, whose marble feat- ures were infused with life, on the inviolate are of her lips, on the delicate satin of her cheeks, ‘Love had placed its smiles, its con- fusion, and its blushes, while her great eyes seemed to shine like stars amid her tears. ‘“What, Yseult!’’ cried he, beside him- self, ‘‘ you love me !’’ “T love you, Jacques, to-day for the first time, but more than all the world besides. You have captured my heart. I love your eyes, your voice, your courage, your noble deeds, and your affection that has stood the test of time and separation. I love every- thing that is yours—your glances and your breath make my heart beat violently. Oh! how happy and proud should I be could I belong to you, could I be your wife! Alas! less fortunate than yours, my love has never known hope.”’ “You love me, Yseult! Oh, my well-be- loved! we can still be happy. Leave the Duke, let us fly together, let us seek a nest beyond the seas in those enchanted lands where all nature smiles on happy lovers.”’ She shook her head with a sad but reso- lute expression. ‘‘No,’’ she said bitterly, ‘‘it is impossi- 339 ble. When I promised to be faithful to my husband, I was free either to accept or to refuse. My oath was voluntary ; nothing can absolve me from it but death.’ I love you, Jacques, and I have told you so; but you are a good man and will not take undue advantage of my confession. This must be our last interview. To-morrow I may not have strength enough to force you into exile. I insist on your leaving to-night. Go back to the East; seek employment and adventures ; they will divert your mind, and at length—cure you. I do not wish to see you again.’’ He pleaded with her, sobbing at her feet ; but she only responded by a heart-rending smile, and he saw that she would not yield. ‘‘And you?”’ he said, completely over- come. ‘‘I? What matters it what happens to me? I shall whisper your name with my latest breath.”’ ‘Oh, Yseult, to find you enchanting, adorable, to know that you love me and to —leave you !’’ ‘* Jacques, it must be.’’ ‘‘Oh! have pity, do not drive me away yet; let us remain in this perfumed para- dise a few moments longer, if they are in- deed to be the last of our brief happiness. Give me your hand that I may hold it for an instant, just a single instant, in mine.’ She gave him her hand, and they remained silent. The breeze had died away, and the perfume in the motionless air weighed upon their senses until it seemed to them as if these exquisite odors were a chorus of subtle voices celebrating the loves of the flowers. Jacques had at first kept Yseult’s hand in his, without daring to press it; but the voices of the flowers stole into his soul, and he not only tightened his grasp upon it, but he could not restrain himself from kissing it once, nay, five, nay, tentimes. Then his kisses passed up to the round, white arm that lay listlessly on the white velvet of the dress. Yseult made no resistance, a strange languor having taken possession of her. Every time Jacques’ moist lips touched her flesh she shudder- ed, but with a delicious agony. He, with senses enthralled, his heart beating tumultu- ously, leaned farther and farther over the un- resisting form. Then his arm stole around Yseult’s waist, and their lips touched for an

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340 instant. Suddenly she freed herself from his embrace and stood before him whiter than her bridal robe. ‘* Jacques,’’ she cried, ‘‘ have pity on me!”’ ‘*T love you, Yseult.’’ ‘‘ Jacques, in the name of our love, do not profane it. Leave me—go!”’ ‘‘Leave you, my well-beloved, to the Duke's caresses? You do not know what you areasking.”’ ** Jacques !’’ ‘‘To become in an hour this old man’s bride? No, Yseult, it is impossible. The thought drives me wild. I shall not permit | His face had assumed an expression of vindictive hate, almost of insanity. She gazed wildly around her, seeking some pro- tector for her good name, for her love vacil- lating between honor and duty. Her eyes fell on the water. ‘* Jacques,’’ she said suddenly, ‘‘ if Ishould swear to you that I would never be the Duke’s, would you go?”’ ‘‘How could you? He has the law on his side.”’ ‘“No matter; that is my affair. If I should swear to you here that no arm but yours should ever enfold me, that no lips but yours should ever press mine, would you obey me ?’’ ‘* Alas ! poor, dear, artless, adored one, you know not to what you are pledging your- self.’’ ‘‘Jacques,’’ she exclaimed with wild energy, placing her hand on the bouquet in her bosom, ‘I tell you that no one shall touch these flowers that you have respected.’’ She was standing erect in the white, trans- figuring light of the moon. The young sailor was about to resort again to protests and entreaties, but a new expression in her face held him spell-bound, and, conquered by the atmosphere of stain- less purity that surrounded her like an aureole, he bowed his head in submission. Then she took his hand gently and led him into the path. ‘‘My well-beloved,’’ she said, and she spoke with the tone of one who would not be disobeyed, ‘‘ let us part here forever. Keep your promise ; I shall keep mine. Such as you see me now, such I shall remain, and THE COSMOPOLITAN. you may carry my image with you in your heart. Live and be happy,: Jacques. You are young and attractive ; other women will no doubt love you, and will return the ca- resses that I can not grant you; but I—I shall remain for you the pure remembrance that will sweeten your life, an image to be in- voked in days of sadness, and that will re- main eternally young and beautiful at the bottom of your heart.’’ She paused and he understood that all was over. Incapable of uttering a word, not daring to look at her, he seized her hands, kissed them convulsively, and hurried away without once glancing back. She watched him pass out of sight. ‘‘Ah!’’ she murmured, ‘‘ how he loved me !’’ Then she returned slowly to the little lake. The moon still shone on it and on the sleep- ing swans. The nightingale’s song and the music of the dance had ceased. For an in- stant she remained plunged in reverie,stand- ing amid the silence of the garden. Then she heard the sound of doors opening and shutting in the direction of her private apartments, and she knew that the ball was over and that the Duc de Nemouse was prob- ably even then looking for her. A shudder passed over her. ‘* No, no,’’ she cried, ‘‘ rather death a hun- dred times. What is life to me without Jacques? He has taken away my soul! Alone with the Duke I could not protect myself, while the nuptial couch, on which I am going to stretch myself without regret, will help me to remain true to my oath and to my love.’’ Then modestly gathering her dress about her, she stepped into the lake, and lay down upon its bosom. Like a shining covering the waves received her into their embrace. Without a struggle, she sank gently, robed in ermine white, and so peaceful were her features one would have said that they were those of a sleeping child rather than of a dying woman. For an instant her long train floated in a kind of snowy eddy, then she disappeared entirely under the moonlit water, and after a few ripples that did not even awaken the swans the placid expanse of the tiny lake resumed its uSual tranquil aspect.

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Drawn by Geo. Wharton Edwards. Engraved by K. C. Atwood, ‘““THE PASSION EBBED, AND HE SAW THE PEDDLER ON THE GROUND.”’ (Micah Rood's Crime. P. 383.)