PC-NRLF 
 
 DE 
 

 
 AUSTIN ELLIOT 
 
 HENKY KINGSLEY, 
 
 AUTHOR OF * RAVENSHOE," ETC. 
 
 B O 
 
 TICK NOR AND FIELDS. 
 
 1863. 
 
UNIVERSITY PRESS: 
 
 WELCH, BIGELOW, AND COMPANY, 
 
 CAMBRIDGE. 
 
f 12- 
 
 TO THE 
 REVEREND JOHN MILL CHANTER, 
 
 AND 
 
 CHARLOTTE CHANTER, 
 
 IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED 
 BY THEIR BROTHER, 
 
 THE AUTHOR, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 IT so happened that, in the early spring of the year 1789, 
 three young men, each equally full of health, hope, honor, 
 courage, and curiosity, separated at the gates of Christchurch 
 College, Oxford, to pursue divergent paths across that world, 
 which at that time seemed, to those three, only a sunny fairy 
 land lying betwixt them and the grave, only some enchant 
 ed land full of glorious adventures, and they three young 
 knights ready to achieve them. 
 
 To one of the three the youngest and the most famous, 
 by name Jenkinson we shall only allude incidentally. With 
 regard to the other two, George Hilton and JSmes Elliot, we 
 shall have to be a little more explicit. 
 
 George Hilton, the handsomer and cleverer of the two, 
 went abroad, and, having met his friend Jenkinson at the 
 storming of the Bastile, came home again in September, 
 bringing with him a lovely, fragile little being of a French 
 wife, a daughter of the Due de Mazagan, who had been 
 pleased that his daughter should marry this fine young Eng 
 lish merchant, and be out of the way of those troubles, which 
 he saw gathering so darkly, and so swiftly, over the head of 
 his devoted order. 
 l 
 
2 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 ^* 
 
 He could not foresee that she would be dead before Christ 
 mas ; still less, that in the Conciergerie and on the guillotine, 
 he should rejoice that there was one loving heart the less to 
 mourn for him. But so it was ; the poor gentle, happy, lov 
 ing little creature died in her husband s arms, almost before 
 that husband knew how well he loved her. The grand old 
 Duke made his last bow, when he took precedence of his old 
 friend the Marquis de Varly, on the scaffold, looked at the 
 sovereign "people through an eye-glass, shrugged his shoulders 
 with infinite contempt, and died. The gallant young Vicomte 
 Tourbillon, who should have been duke George s dear friend 
 yielded to circumstances,- and entered the Republican army; 
 and George Hilton, disgusted with the world, from sheer want 
 of anything to do or care about, plunged headlong into com 
 merce. 
 
 Bringing apparently a keen, clear head, a reckless courage, 
 and a vigilance which slept not by day or by night, to the 
 assistance of his father s house, he tided that house success 
 fully through those terrible revolutionary years, and raised it 
 at last to be one of the great commercial houses in England. 
 From very shortly after he assumed his place as an active 
 unit in the firm, his father and his father s old partner sub 
 mitted to him; and from that time these two terrified old men 
 found themselves dragged (if one may use such an expression) 
 by the heels through a seething whirlpool of audacious specu 
 lation, powerless and hopeless, only to emerge again with 
 wealth and credit such as they had never dreamt of before 
 this valiant, gloomy young man had joined them. There 
 might be terror on Change, or panic in Lombard Street; but, 
 though these two might sit cowering in their chairs, fluttering 
 papers which they scarcely understood in their trembling 
 fingers, yet there was always one figure before them in which 
 they felt forced to trust, the figure of George Hilton, the 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 3 
 
 figure of a tall, handsome man in dark clothes, with a set, 
 austere face, who rarely spoke, into whose eyes they gazed 
 with a look of awe, and a look of supplication painful to wit 
 ness. Always kind, he was always undemonstrative ; and 
 they looked up to him as some god who held their fate in his 
 hands. 
 
 Once he broke out. When an old clerk came into the 
 room where they sat, and, with a face only more ashy pale 
 than their own, told them the terrible disaster of Austerlitz, 
 the two old men fell to feebly wailing ; but the younger, leap 
 ing from his chair, gave a wild hurrah, which made the re 
 spectable old ledgers on the shelves shake the dust off their 
 leaves against him. 
 
 People began to talk. They said, "This man married a 
 Frenchwoman. His favorite brother-in-law has notoriously 
 deserted the traditions of his family, and become a rabid 
 Buonapartist. He is a colonel in the Guards. This man, 
 Hilton, is making money in some underhand way by means 
 of his brother-in-law." It was partly true. George Hilton, 
 with a keen and well-judged confidence in French arms, had 
 advanced an immense sum shortly before this to his brother- 
 in-law, with which to speculate in the French Funds. Aus 
 terlitz had been won, the coalition broken, and the Hiltons 
 had pocketed forty thousand pounds. Since Lord Loughbor- 
 ough and Sir John Scott passed their Treason Act in 1792 
 no man had driven his coach-and-four through it to greater 
 profit than George Hilton. 
 
 Some sharp and traitorous trading went on in those times ; 
 and we are sorry to say that the house of Hilton & Co. were 
 always looked upon as being deeply engaged in transactions 
 which, even by the commercial world in those days, were con 
 sidered dangerous and odd. Even at that time, when certain 
 trades were paralyzed, and there were so many needy mer- 
 
4 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 V 
 
 chants ready to sacrifice almost any principle to keep them 
 selves afloat, the house of Hilton & Co., with their enormous 
 ly increasing wealth, were looked on askance. They always 
 seemed to have such wonderfully correct information from 
 abroad. The Jews might follow George. Hilton about the 
 Exchange with bent body and sliding foot, to listen and see 
 whether some priceless hint might not fall from him ; but the 
 Christians were only distantly polite to him, although, when 
 he had once been known to take a commercial step, there were 
 hundreds eagerly ready to follow his example. 
 
 We have hardly to do with the ways by which his enormous 
 fortune was made : our business is more with what ultimately 
 became of it. There are plenty of houses, eminently respec 
 table now, whose books, from 1790 to 1815, would hardly 
 stand a closer examination than those of Hilton & Co. 
 
 And also the history of the accumulation of this fortune 
 must be told, because, in the mad and successful pursuit of 
 his wealth, George Hilton had reached the age of fifty years 
 before he bethought him that there was no one to inherit it. 
 
 The gold that he had wallowed in for thirty years had left 
 its dross upon him ; and the George Hilton of 1819 was a 
 sadly different man from the George Hilton of 1789. The 
 sarcastic young dandy had developed into a cold, calculating 
 man of fifty, a man who seldom spoke in the House, but 
 always shortly and to the purpose ; a man who had refused 
 office, some said ; an odd man ; a man no one liked very 
 much, but a man so careful in his facts that when he spoke he 
 put every one else, save four or five, in a flutter ; a man who 
 would contradict the king on his throne, and had never had a 
 genial smile or a joke for any man in the House, save for one, 
 Lord Hawkesbury. After 1806 he laughed and joked no 
 more in Parliament. Lord Hawkesbury never forgave him 
 the Austerlitz affair before mentioned. He kept on speaking 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 5 
 
 terms with him for a time ; but after his removal into the 
 House of Lords, in 1808, George Hilton found himself with 
 out a friend in the House, and only one friend in the world, 
 that is to say, James Elliot, the third of those we saw at 
 Christchurch Gate in 1789. 
 
 In 1819, then, he married. The wife he selected was a 
 Frenchwoman. She was a cousin of his first wife s, and a 
 daughter of an emigre" count, Commilfaut, very little, very 
 pretty, and an intensely devout Huguenot in religion. This 
 marriage was a happier one than his first. She was soon the 
 mother of two children, Eleanor and Robert. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 WITH, perhaps, less energy and talent than his friend 
 George Hilton, James Elliot, the second of the two men men 
 tioned in the first page of this book, contrived, in after-life, to 
 land himself in a higher position in the world than did his 
 friend. His taste would have led him into political life, for 
 who could have been at Christchurch with Canning and Jen- 
 kinson, and not have been ambitious ? but his fortune was 
 far too meagre to allow him to think of it. He remained at 
 his college, living on his studentship and his small fortune 
 very happily indeed ; keeping up a constant correspondence 
 with the richer and better-born men who had gone out into 
 the world to fight in the great battle which was then raging. 
 
 So his politics were confined to the common-room. But 
 sometimes he appeared before the world, and had his say with 
 the rest. He wrote a pamphlet once which made a sensation ; 
 he found this very charming. Here was a way to make him- 
 
6 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 self heard. He wrote another pamphlet, and then another. 
 They were all good. His assumed signature began to be 
 looked for, and people began to ask who he was. These 
 pamphlets of his were very humorous, and full of stinging 
 allusions, which, we dare say, made men laugh then, but 
 which now fall dead on the ear of any but a very old man 
 indeed. Some of them have absurd titles, such as one (1801), 
 " Choking the Black Dog with Butter " ; and again, same date, 
 v" Shall we have the Doctor s Boy or the Constable ? " By 
 which last delicate allusion to Lord Sidmouth it appears 
 not that it is of any great consequence that he was in favor 
 of a vigorous prosecution of the war, and that his enthusiasm 
 was slightly too strong for his manners. 
 
 The art of pamphleteering becomes, like most others, more 
 easy by practice. James Elliot got to a great perfection in 
 the art. He had considerable humor, and so his half-truths 
 were put forward under a cloud of ridicule, and before people 
 had done laughing, the question had gone by. He never 
 spared but one man, Mr. Jenkinson. Once this gentleman 
 (developed into Lord Hawkesbury since 1796) was accused 
 of having written one of these pamphlets himself, but the very 
 next one which appeared under the same signature entirely 
 dissipated that notion. Lord Hawkesbury came in for his 
 share of good-humored railing abuse with the rest. It was 
 evident that this man, this " Beta, as he chose to sign him 
 self, was a man of great ability. Nobody was safe with him. 
 His principles wanted fixing ; he had no principles at present. 
 They must really be fixed. Such a man was lost to the public 
 business of the country. 
 
 In 1808, then, his old friend, Lord Liverpool, with the full 
 consent of all his colleagues, offered place to his old friend and 
 correspondent James Elliot ; the place of Inspector of Shoals 
 and Quicksands, worth 1,500 a year. And of all the ap- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 7 
 
 pointments made by the good Lord Liverpool during his long 
 tenure of office, this was perhaps the best. It was made in 
 quieter and less anxious times than those which followed, 
 in the merry old war times, when a man s friend was his 
 friend still, and one knew one s friend from one s enemy, 
 when one s heart could warm up at thinking of dear old Jim 
 Elliot s delight at getting this place, and one still had wit or 
 folly enough left in one to put a few lines of doggerel into the 
 postscript of the letter giving him the offer of it, in the times 
 which came before the Peace, and before those weary fifteen 
 years when one sat and drove, or tried to drive, four such ter 
 rible horses as Peel, Wellington, Huskisson, and Canning, 
 four-in-hand, only to drop down -dead from sheer anxiety and 
 over-work at the end of it all. Peace be with Lord Liver 
 pool s ashes ! We very strongly suspect him of having been a 
 gooc^ind noble man. 
 
 The last Lord High Inspector of the Shoals and Quicksands 
 was Admiral Sir Foreland North, who died in 1707. He 
 accumulated a fortune in that office, and was made Lord 
 Sands of Godwin. It was found that he had scandalously 
 neglected his duties, and the peculiar revenues of the office 
 being found remunerative, it was put in commission, my Lords 
 of the Shoals and Quicksands being required to pay an inspec 
 tor so much a year, and to pocket the rest of +^ revenues 
 themselves. This was found to work very well ; it created 
 patronage ; and the Inspector being liable to forfeiture of his 
 office for neglect, the work was better done than in the old 
 times. 
 
 The revenues of the office of Lord High Commissioner of 
 the Shoals and Quicksands were derived from several sources. 
 Heavy tonnage dues were demanded from all ships which 
 passed through the Needles, came within three miles of Eddy- 
 stone Rock, passed St. Michael s Mount without letting fly 
 
8 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 topsail-halliards, threw empty bottles or garbage into the sea 
 within three miles of any one of the Cinque Ports (counting 
 from Old Hythe, and including eight miles east of Deal), 
 passed through the Steat of Skye, and did many other things 
 too tedious to mention. These revenues, though they doubt 
 less cost a great deal to collect, paid in a great deal of money. 
 The office might sometimes once a year have a grand battalion 
 day in the Arches, and might have to spend several thousand 
 pounds in proving " that John Smith, of the Hope schooner, 
 master mariner, was within three miles of the port of Sand 
 wich, when, on the day aforesaid, he did then and there, not 
 having the fear of God before his eyes, wilfully, maliciously, 
 and devilishly, cast into the sea, sundry, that is to say, five 
 hundred glass bottles, against the peace of our Lord the King," 
 &c., &c. ; yet, in spite of all this, the revenues of the office 
 were, for many years, a very pretty provision for five lords, 
 and an inspector to do their work. There were good years 
 and bad years. Sometimes John Smith would prove his case, 
 prove " that he was a good five miles off Sandwich ; that, 
 being disguised in liquor, he had only thrown his empty 
 brandy-bottle at his apprentice s head, and that it had gone 
 accidentally overboard, and had floated within the prescribed 
 limits " ; in which case, my lords would take it up to Chancery, 
 and have to pay. But the Inspector always got his salary ; 
 and my lords made a pretty good thing of it on the whole. 
 
 But after sixty years or so, master mariners began to have 
 the fear of God before their eyes, to go round the Isle of 
 Wight, to let fly topsail-halliards in the right place, to keep 
 clear of the Eddystone, to kick the apprentice into the lee- 
 scuppers before they threw the brandy -bottle at him, to 
 conform, in fact, more or less, to all laws, human and divine ; 
 which proceedings had this result : that the Lords of the 
 Shoals and Quicksands were left without money to pay their 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 9 
 
 Inspector. It became necessary to supplement their revenues 
 by a parliamentary grant, which was done. But the parlia 
 mentary grant was so small, that, since 1795, the position of a 
 Lord of the Shoals and Quicksands had been merely an hon 
 orary one. Parliament paid their Inspector. Sometimes they 
 got twenty pounds apiece ; sometimes they did not. But 
 Government allowed them a yacht, and the Inspector had the 
 use of it. 
 
 When Mr. Elliot took the place, in 1808, he found every 
 thing in confusion. There were fifty squabbles on hand with 
 the Lords of the Admiralty on the one hand, and with the 
 Trinity Board on the other. He set to work like a young 
 giant, although he was now forty years of age, and brought 
 everything into order. 
 
 He had no special knowledge of his subject, but he soon 
 knew more about it than any one. When a man has learnt 
 how to learn, he can soon learn anything. The " experts " 
 connected with his office, coasting skippers, pilots, lighthouse- 
 keepers, and such people, came to him with their facts, put 
 them before him, and looked at him, as much as to say, " Here 
 are our facts, can you generalize from them ? " They very 
 soon found that he could. They were perfectly contented. It 
 was a very good appointment. 
 
 My Lords of the Admiralty were high, and the Trinity 
 brothers were mighty with him. There had been " heats " 
 between these two great bodies on the one side, and the Com 
 missioners of Shoals and Quicksands on the other, in which 
 my Lords of the Shoals had left their Inspector to bear the 
 brunt. The story of my Lords of the Admiralty having 
 threatened to fire into the yacht of the Shoals and Quicksands, 
 on the Motherbank, must be untrue, for the Admiralty yacht 
 had no gun on board. Therefore, how could they have threat 
 ened to fire ? 
 
 l* 
 
10 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Mr. Elliot composed all these difficulties, and got his office 
 into noble order. His beloved Lord Liverpool used to point 
 to him with pride : " My man, gentlemen." 
 
 But what with soothing my Lords of the Admiralty, and 
 doing battle with the Trinity House, for leave to do their 
 work, it was five years before he thought of marrying. When 
 he did think of it, there was no doubt about the lady what 
 ever. He married a certain Miss Beverley, a lady of thirty- 
 one, gentle and good, like himself; and on his forty -ninth 
 birthday she bore him a noble boy. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 IT is with the fortunes of this boy, Austin Elliot, and with 
 the fortunes of George Hilton s little girl, Eleanor, that we 
 have principally to concern ourselves. 
 
 Mr. Elliot had lived in an atmosphere of politics ever since 
 he was nineteen, and had known, and known well, some, nay 
 most, of the leading men of his time. He had his grievance, 
 his crotchet, like most other men, good or bad ; and his griev 
 ance was this : That he, James Elliot, might have succeeded 
 in public life, if he had not been so unfortunately poor. He 
 was very likely right. No one will ever know whether he 
 was right or not ; the thought was a little, carefully unex 
 pressed, grievance to him. He never got sour over it, he 
 never expressed it in words ; but the thought that he had 
 been only prevented from holding a very high place in the 
 world by his poverty, was at times a source of vexation to 
 him, more particularly whenever he saw a beggar on horse 
 back, or a fool in a high place. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 11 
 
 He was poor no longer ; he had a good place, his wife suc 
 ceeded to a very good fortune, and his boy, Austin, was grow 
 ing to be one of the handsomest, cleverest, bravest lads ever 
 seen, a boy who at ten years old showed, as his father 
 thought, most singular and precocious talent. 
 
 At this time, when Austin was ten years old, and when 
 there was no doubt of his being a very clever boy of his age, 
 Mr. Elliot took the great resolution of his life. That boy 
 should be educated as a statesman. "That boy should be 
 prime Hush ! don t let us talk nonsense," said Mr. Elliot 
 to himself, with a radiant smile, as he sat one night over the 
 fire, and saw various things in the hot coals. 
 
 The idea was rather a grand one. Mr. Elliot s creed was, 
 that statesmanship was a trade, and that a man must serve his 
 apprenticeship to that trade as to any other. A man should 
 be trained to politics early, if he was going to succeed. Look 
 at Pitt the younger. (He could not have read Lord Macau- 
 lay s " Life of Pitt " ; it would have killed him. Lord Ma- 
 caulay s atrocious suggestion, that Pitt was not the most sub 
 limely wise of the human race, would have cut the ground 
 from under his feet.) Yes, a statesman must be trained ; of 
 that there was not the least doubt in the world. 
 
 And he, James Elliot, would train and educate one. His 
 own boy. If he, with his intricate knowledge of every politi 
 cal twist and turn for forty years, could not do that, who could ? 
 And see the material he had to work on ; was there ever such 
 a boy ? " Never," said Mr. Elliot ; " Seldom," say we. He 
 certainly was a boy of the very highest promise, and the man 
 who doubted that Mr. Elliot would succeed in making a lead 
 ing statesman of him must have been a foolish person. It is 
 no use for that man to say that Mr. Elliot did not succeed. 
 By all rules he should have succeeded, therefore the charge 
 of folly stands. 
 
12 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 So Mr. Elliot was going to educate his son for a statesman. 
 But how ? 
 
 This was the most delightful problem. The thought of it 
 made Mr. Elliot s good face glow with happiness. Here was a 
 beautiful soul, a noble intellect, ready to receive any impression 
 whatever. Mr. Elliot worked at his task with a will, but he 
 perhaps began it a little too early. The young ambition must 
 be excited by the recital of noble deeds, and so little Austin 
 heard many a long story of great debates, grand political tricks, 
 and so on, which were far from interesting. At the same time, 
 Mr. Elliot was very furious with the conduct of a certain 
 great statesman on the Catholic question, and found it rather 
 pleasant to denounce him to the wondering Austin, who, at 
 ten years old, had -acquired a distinct idea that Parliament 
 was a place something like school : and that Sir Robert Peel 
 was a traitor many degrees worse than Guy Fawkes ; had a 
 distinct belief, indeed, that, when every one had their due, the 
 right honorable gentleman would be carried about on a chair, 
 with his boots on hindside before, and all the straw coming out 
 at his knees. 
 
 When Austin was ten years old, his mother died, and he 
 was left more exclusively to his father s care. And then these 
 two contracted a strong personal affection for one another, 
 which lasted to the very end, and which was never clouded 
 for one instant. It was well for Austin to remember that 
 hereafter; well to remember that he had never cast one 
 shadow on his father s kind, gentle face. 
 
 This boy Austin grew so rapidly in both moral and physical 
 beauty, that the absurd chimerical plans of his father seemed 
 to become, year by year, more probable of fulfilment, and his 
 old friends began to leave laughing at him and to confine 
 themselves to shaking their heads. 
 
 There can be no doubt that the boy was not perfect, but 
 

 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 13 
 
 really he was one of the finest and noblest boys ever seen. 
 He made a , great success everywhere. Possibly it would be 
 better, instead of cataloguing his various perfections, to ask 
 you to think of the handsomest and most amiable boy you 
 ever knew, and call him Austin Elliot. You will know him 
 as a man ; let us skip his psedeia. 
 
 One of Austin s earliest recollections was that of going to 
 play with Eleanor and Robert Hilton ; for, after Lord Liver 
 pool s death, James Elliot resumed his intimacy with his old 
 friend George Hilton once more. He had always kept up his 
 acquaintance with him, but it had not been very close for 
 many years. Lord Liverpool had never forgotten the affair of 
 the French funds. It was the sort of thing that he could not 
 forget ; and, indeed, it is not a pleasant subject to dwell on. 
 James Elliot never mentioned George Hilton s name before 
 him, but he would not throw his old friend entirely overboard. 
 And after Liverpool and Canning died, with the harness on 
 their backs, the world was very lonely to him, and he once 
 more grew intimate with his old friend, whom he had always 
 tried to defend, even against his own conscience. 
 
 Eleanor Hilton was not, as a child, beautiful, or even pretty. 
 At first, lier features were too square and prononce ; but, from 
 the very first, she was as gentle, good, and sensible as a child 
 might be. Robert, on the other hand, was peevish and some 
 what violent. He had, also, a strange, wayward mendacity, 
 at times refusing to tell a lie to save himself from punish 
 ment, at another lying without an object. A still more fatal 
 Aace had not hitherto shown itself, but w r as developed after 
 wards. 
 
 When Eleanor was twelve and Robert ten, their mother 
 died ; and, nearly at the same time, Austin Elliot went to 
 Eton, and Robert was left with Eleanor to the care of a 
 governess. Had old Hilton known as much about the boy as 
 
14 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 the governess and Eleanor, he would never have, in all proba 
 bility, sent the boy to Eton ; but so it was. He followed 
 Austin to Eton after two years ; and we need hardly say, 
 after the character we have before given to Austin, that he 
 was affectionately kind to his old playfellow, and did all for 
 him he could. But Robert soon began to go wrong : he was 
 always in trouble. Nothing serious, however, took place till 
 after several months. 
 
 There came to Eton the very same half, and to the very 
 same house as Austin, a certain Lord Charles Barty, of the 
 same age as Austin, and by no means unlike him in person 
 and manners. In a very short time, a great boy-friendship 
 sprang up between the two. In the very first letter he wrote 
 to Eleanor his new friend was mentioned, in most enthusiastic 
 terms ; and his intimacy with this friend seemed to increase 
 as it went on. It is useless to describe Lord Charles Barty as 
 a boy, for we shall see him hereafter in manhood, in far more 
 terrible places than the old playing-fields, or the Brocas or 
 Surly, or any of those places one hears Eton men talking 
 about ; nevertheless, it is necessary to tell you that, like Aus 
 tin, he was a noble and manly fellow, and that he was as 
 worthy of Austin s honest love as Austin was of his. 
 
 When Robert Hilton appeared, after two years of friend 
 ship between these two, whether it was through jealousy, or 
 through mistrust, or what, it is impossible to say, but Lord 
 Charles Barty took a violent dislike to him. To obviate this, 
 and to interest his friend in poor Robert Hilton, Austin told 
 him what he had not very long known for himself, that he 
 was in love with Eleanor Hilton, and that this was her 
 brother. 
 
 All the chivalrjwin Charles Barty s heart fired up atjthis. 
 One sharp pang of jeajousy shot through him when Austin 
 told him that there was one in the world preferred to himself, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 15 
 
 but it was instantly smothered and killed. He would have 
 liked a few more years of his friend s undivided love, but it 
 was not to be ; Austin was in love, fiancee. Mrs. Austin s 
 brother must be taken up, whatever might be his faults. 
 
 It is no use trying to laugh at all this, by saying that Lord 
 Charles Barty and Austin were neither of them fifteen. They 
 were quite as much in earnest, if not more so, than if they had 
 been five-and-twenty. Lord Charles took up Robert Hilton 
 and patronized him-and was affectionate to him and fought his 
 battles for him to the death, but all in a high and mighty man 
 ner, and under protest. 
 
 But the catastrophe came. One day, while Austin and 
 Charles Barty were out at cricket, or what not, a boy, at 
 home in disgrace, came into Lord Charles s room and found 
 Robert Hilton at his desk. He seized him and raised an 
 alarm. The master was fetched, and the wretched boy s 
 boxes were searched. Everything which had been missed in 
 the house for a long time was found there. The habit which 
 the governess and Eleanor had noticed in him, and which they 
 dared not mention to his father, was confirmed with a ven 
 geance. The lad was a thief ! When Austin and Lord 
 Charles came innocently home, laughing, they found the whole 
 mine sprung under their feet. Either one of them would have 
 given their right hands to save the lad, whom neither liked, 
 but it was too late. 
 
 He was so very, very young, they pleaded for him. Austin 
 and Lord Charles went personally round to the other boys 
 whose things had been stolen and begged their forbearance. 
 He was so very, very young. I need not say what English 
 boys did under those circumstances. There was no scandal : 
 he was sent home. 
 
 So it cam* about that George Hilton s inordinate and 
 somewhat unprincipled love of gain began to be revenged on 
 
16 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 him in the person of his only son. He knew it and felt it as 
 keenly as any one, but he hardened his heart. He refused to 
 see the boy for some time, and he saw him but very seldom 
 until he died. 
 
 It becomes necessary that we should follow Robert Hilton 
 to the end, before we return to Austin and Eleanor, and it is 
 very shortly done. 
 
 This case was the one on which the Rev. Letmedown Easy 
 gained his present enormous and justly-earned reputation for 
 keeping young bears from growling, by feeding them with the 
 toast from under the asparagus, with the ends of the twists, 
 the eggs out of the pigeon-pies, and other soothing dainties, 
 until the whole thing was blown over and everybody had 
 forgotten all about it. He well earned the thousand pounds 
 which James Hilton paid him for keeping his son five years 
 without scandal, and for sending his father a good character 
 of him each half-year. The Rev. Letmedown was not such 
 a very great rogue ; he undertook to whitewash the boy, and 
 he whitewashed him. He kept him at his parsonage in Essex 
 safe out of temptation for five years, until the whole thing was 
 forgotten. He was paid for doing it, and he did it. 
 
 Our already old friend, James Elliot, begged his son not to 
 renew his acquaintance with Robert Hilton, and Austin acqui 
 esced. Old Hilton never allowed his son to come into the 
 house, and so Austin never saw Robert after his unfortunate 
 departure from Eton. It was no fault, however, of Austin s ; 
 if Robert had ever been allowed to come home by his stern 
 old father, they would have seen enough of one another. For 
 Austin s love for Eleanor grew stronger year by year, and he 
 AViis always with her. 
 
 More of this immediately. Just before Austin went to 
 Oxford, Eleanor wrote to him that Robert and Ijer father were 
 reconciled at last, and that Robert had got his commission. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 17 
 
 At this point Mr. Easy s fictitious respectability suddenly and 
 lamentably broke down. Before Robert had been three 
 months in the army, people began to talk. Gossip was fol 
 lowed by open accusations, accusations by court-martial. 
 The end was swift, sudden, and sure : Robert Hilton was 
 disgracefully expelled from the army. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE private residence of the Inspector- General of Shoals 
 and Quicksands was at Mortlake, his official yacht generally 
 lay at Gravesend, and his / office was on the terrace of 
 Somerset House. 
 
 The duties of the Inspector of Shoals and Quicksands are, 
 to inspect them, and to report on the state of them to my 
 Lords. This is done firstly by examination of local witnesses, 
 and secondly by personal experience. The former of these 
 two methods is, of course, in some measure performed at the 
 office, and the second mainly by means of the yacht. 
 
 The office is one of the freshest and breeziest in London. 
 On a summer s day it is a very cheerful spot ; the steamers 
 dashing ceaselessly up and down, and the river running in a 
 great gleaming band eastward towards St. Paul s. When the 
 w r ind is blowing strongly from the east or southeast, bringing 
 with it, in spite of miles of brickwork and smoke, a fresh 
 whiff of the wild, glorious sea, and lashing the river into 
 waves, it is a pleasanter and fresher place still. But the best 
 time to be about that office, is in a gale of wind from the 
 southward or southwestward ; when the glass rattles in the 
 windows and the driving rain comes spinning into the lobby, 
 
 B 
 
18 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 when the door is opened ; and when the most prosaic clerk, 
 wearily copying the " statement of William Grumble, master 
 of the light-ship on the St. Margaret Sands, concerning the 
 shifting of the N. E. Channel," cannot help staying for an 
 instant to wonder how it fares with William Grumble in his 
 light-ship just now ; when the chimney-pots are flying, the 
 water barometer varying four or five inches every quarter of 
 an hour, and the gulls up the river in dozens. 
 
 Ever since he was a boy, and a very small one, Austin had 
 been very fond of the office : it had always been a great treat 
 to him to be allowed to come to the office, and plague his 
 father, at his great square leather-covered table. When his 
 father would n t stand him any longer he used to go out and 
 " skylark " with the clerks, who, you may depend, did not ob 
 ject to that sort of thing. But presently, he being a very 
 noisy boy, his father would come in, and turn him out of the 
 clerks rooms into the lobby, to disport himself there. 
 
 And an uncommonly merry, gentlemanly set of fellows were 
 those aforesaid clerks as one could wish to meet with. No 
 chief of any department had his clerks better in hand than 
 James Elliot, and no one scolded less; but we will say no 
 more of this. Though the clerks were merry young gentle 
 men, yet when turned out of their rooms, Austin found in the 
 lobby men he liked still better than the clerks. 
 
 Men with calm, clear eyes, and deliberate, thoughtful speech. 
 Most of them men with brown, horny hands and grizzled hair. 
 A few of them dressed in rough pilot-coats ; more, in old-fash 
 ioned long-tailed coats, with brass buttons ; more of them still, 
 soberly dressed in unobtrusive black, but all with the same 
 calm, clear eye. These were the lighthouse-keepers, or such 
 as they, men of the storm, of the lee-shore, of the reef, of 
 the quicksand, men from the lonely station standing far sea 
 ward on the thunder-smitten cliff, or from the solitary light- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 19 
 
 house, on the surf- washed ledge, miles out in the raging 
 sea. 
 
 It was well for this golden-haired lad, with his beautiful 
 face, to stand at the knees of such men as these, and listen to 
 them ; to hear from one, how on a night, when sea and air 
 were all mixed together in deadly turmoil, the light-ship he 
 commanded broke loose without their knowing it, and was 
 carried over dangerous sands, and thrown high and dry and 
 safe on the beach ; and from another one, how he and his male 
 sat up one such night in the lonely lighthouse, five miles from 
 land, watching the corpse of the third and oldest of them, who 
 had died that morning, and how, while they sat there, they 
 heard, but could not see, an unmanageable and dismasted ship 
 strike the rock and go to pieces, a hundred feet below them ; 
 and that, creeping down and opening the lower door, and look 
 ing out into the black horror of darkness, they could hear in 
 the night, close to them, the crashing and cracking of timbers, 
 and the sound of men, women, and children calling on God 
 Almighty for help! There was nothing there in the morning, 
 said this one, in answer to an unexpressed inquiry from Aus 
 tin s blue eyes. She had struck at low tide. 
 
 Yes ; the office was a pleasant place enough, but there was 
 something better than the office, the yacht. Once a year, 
 in the beginning of recess, there would come a long blue letter 
 from my Lords of the Admiralty (not our Lords), the gist of 
 which was that the Inspector of Shoals and Quicksands was 
 to hold himself in readiness to accompany their Lordships in 
 their annual inspection of buoys. Austin, of course, went 
 with his father on these occasions, and enjoyed it mightily ; 
 for, as he says in his reckless, disrespectful way, that my Lords 
 are a deuced jolly set of fellows. When they were accom 
 panying the Admiralty yacht, they used to see a great deal of 
 very pleasant society, and Austin had quickly won the hearts, 
 
20 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 not only of the Quicksand Lords (who held him being their 
 own property), but also the hearts of all the Admiralty Lords, 
 excepting one dreadful old sea Lord, with a cork leg and a 
 grievance about his wife s nephew, whom nobody could man 
 age. 
 
 Golden, glorious days were these. Sometimes the two 
 yachts would come steaming swiftly and suddenly into the 
 harbor of some great arsenal, by the ugly hulks, and under 
 the rolling downs, flattened on the summit by dismantled for 
 tifications, and so through her Majesty s fleet. But however 
 swiftly and suddenly they came, they could never take them 
 by surprise. Always, as the Admiralty yacht passed the first 
 ship, the great guns began booming out their salute, and ship 
 after ship took up with the glorious music, until the vessels of 
 the ear began to throb with the concussion of the air, and in 
 calm weather the harbor would be filled with drifting smoke ; 
 for the time when these things happened was long ago, before 
 gunpowder was so much needed for other purposes as now, 
 and before we saved 30,000 a year by stopping unnecessary 
 salutes. 
 
 And once it came about that there was a discussion, as to 
 whether or no a red buoy should be put at the outer edge of 
 the swing, to mark the entrance to the Mary Anne Channel. 
 Mr. Elliot went to the chief Admiralty Lord, and represented 
 that he thought it necessary. As a general rule, Mr. Elliot s 
 suggestions were promptly attended to ; but on occasion, my 
 Lords hum d and hah d a great deal. One said that there 
 had been a good deal said about naval expenditure lately, and 
 that if it were necessary to have a buoy at all (which, mind 
 you, he did not for one instant admit), he was for having a 
 blue buoy instead of a red, because every one who knew the 
 least about their duty were well aware that blue paint could 
 be got a farthing a pound cheaper than red. Another denied 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 21 
 
 this in toto, and said that red paint was cheapest. A third 
 denied the existence of the Mary Anne Channel altogether. 
 A fourth contradicted him flatly ; but said that if the wreck 
 of the Mary Anne was moved, the sand would silt in again, 
 and then what was the use of your buoy ? Mr. Elliot, like a 
 man of the world, contradicted their Lordships, individually 
 and collectively, and insisted on a buoy, and a red one too ; 
 the red paint was just as cheap as the blue. As Mr. Elliot 
 had foreseen, their Lordships had a squabble among them 
 selves, which ended in their turning on him, and ordering him 
 to proceed at once on board his yacht, the Pelican, and pro 
 ceed to Portsmouth to await their Lordships orders. At the 
 same time, a curt, short message was sent quickly down by 
 the telegraph which at that time was a thing like a windmill 
 gone mad to the commander of the Admiralty yacht Fal 
 con, to hold himself in readiness to proceed to sea with their 
 Lordships at once ; and then their Lordships departed to Bel- 
 grave and Grosvenor Squares, and where not, to pack up their 
 things, and told their Ladyships that it was getting intolerable, 
 that they could not and would not stand being dictated to by a 
 subordinate any longer, and that they were going to see into 
 the matter for themselves. 
 
 The cause of all this dire anger, and all this Spartan self- 
 denial, was as follows : The Commons were adjourned, leav 
 ing Daniel O Conn ell to the mercy of the Lords, but Parlia 
 ment was not prorogued. The August sun was shedding a 
 mellow, sleepy light over cape and island ; a gentle west wind 
 was blowing up channel, scarce strong enough to whiten the 
 purple waves. And well ! If their Lordships in such case, 
 having the power to go to sea, had stayed on shore, they would 
 have deserved impeachment, or a contempt worse than im 
 peachment. However this may be, however angry their 
 Lordships may have been with Mr. Elliot, there was no 
 
22 . AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 clond, not the faintest speck of one, on any of their faces, 
 when he boarded the Falcon at Spithead, and reported him 
 self. Three days afterwards, Austin, expressing himself in 
 that low, slangy way which the young men of the present day 
 seem so anxious to adopt, said that my Lords were " uncom 
 monly larky." This, however, is certain, that Austin and his 
 father dined on board with their Lordships ; and before the 
 soup was off the table the great paddles got to work, and the 
 Falcon, with the Pelican close in her wake, went thundering 
 down the Solent, and so out into the leaping summer waves 
 of the channel; and that, as the summer sun went down, 
 Portland was hanging to the north, a vast purple wall over 
 run by threads and bands of green ; and that Austin and his 
 father were put on board their own yacht at eight bells, speed 
 being slackened for the purpose. And when they got on 
 board, Austin remarked to his father that they seemed to be 
 in for rather a jolly spree. 
 
 Then followed the short summer night; and soon after 
 dawn, Austin was on deck looking at the Start towering up 
 to the north, blue, purple, with gleams of golden green. And 
 while Austin is looking at the Start, let us look at him once 
 for all, because his personal appearance will not greatly 
 change before this story gets wellnigh told. 
 
 A very short description will suffice. We only wish to give 
 you such an idea of his personality as to make him real to 
 you. From a beautiful boy he had grown to be a very hand 
 some young man, as some said, one of the handsomest ever 
 seen. He was light-haired, with a rather delicate, brilliant 
 complexion, and blue eyes. His figure was very good, his air 
 graceful, his manner winning and gentle, his dress always per 
 fect, his conversation easy, clever, and inexhaustible, all of 
 which things caused every woman, high or low, whom he met, 
 to get uncommonly fond of him. But, besides, he not only 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 23 
 
 had the women on his side, which many a handsome young 
 dandy has had before, but also the men. 
 
 The reason that he had the men on his side was, that he 
 was a good fellow, and that means a good deal, so much so, 
 that it is impossible to describe, with any exhaustive accuracy, 
 what it means. Although we all of us know a good fellow, it 
 is hard to be made 4o define one. Austin was one, certainly. 
 He laughed with those who were merry, he condoled with 
 those who were sad, nursed those who were sick, lent money 
 to those who were poor, was a good companion to those who 
 were rich, and carried comfort to those who were in love. 
 Many others do all these things, and yet are not good fellows. 
 Austin was a good fellow, for he was in earnest, and any one 
 who took the trouble might see it. He was now at Oxford ; 
 and although his diligence might have been greater, yet his 
 tutors had great hopes of a very high degree for him. Rarely 
 does one find a young man of prospects more brilliant than 
 those of Austin, as he stands this morning on the deck of the 
 yacht, looking northward at the Start. 
 
 So the two yachts went tearing down channel, as though 
 their errand were to arrive at the Swing before the channel 
 was silted up ; and before the second sunset they were passing 
 St. Michael s Mount ; the third they were gazing in amaze 
 ment at the Worm s Head, rising like a serpent out of the 
 sea ; the next they were at the Swing. 
 
 Here there was an accident.* Austin was on board of the 
 Falcon, and, as they approached the shoal, their Lordships all 
 began wrangling once more on the buoy question, which had 
 
 * If Austin is correct about this accident, there must have been two 
 accidents to the Admiralty yacht, very similar; for it is a matter of history 
 that my Lords bumped themselves ashore in the Bristol Channel in 1846. 
 They should be more careful. What should we do if anything were to 
 happen to them? 
 
24 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 been shelved just now, in the pleasure of the voyage. There 
 was no need for them to have troubled themselves about it, 
 Mr. Elliot would have explained, but no, they were not 
 coming five hundred miles for nothing, and so they began to 
 wrangle. 
 
 The commander asked, should he steer by the Admiralty 
 chart, or by Mr. Elliot s directions ? Mr. Elliot must be 
 made to know that their Lordships were not going to be hood 
 winked by a subordinate. By the Admiralty chart, if you 
 please. 
 
 Thump, bump ! up goes her nose two feet in the air, and 
 down she goes on the port side. The senior Lord goes into 
 the lee-scuppers, and Austin indecently bursts out laughing. 
 The Falcon was aground hard and fast. This is Austin s 
 account of the matter. It seems somewhat apocryphal. 
 
 She was off again at high tide, with the loss of some cop 
 per. But the effect of the accident was, that they rounded 
 the Lleyn and made for Liverpool. 
 
 It was a very important voyage, this, for Austin, and the 
 conclusion of it more important still. Austin had been by 
 this voyage thrown into such close and intimate familiarity 
 with some one or two leading men, as commonly happens on 
 board ship, where intimacies are so rapidly made as to aston 
 ish those who are not in the habit of going to sea. Austin had 
 used his time well. He was as irresistible as usual. He had 
 never been presented to their own senior Lord before he went 
 on board, and considered such an event rather a great one for 
 a lad at the University, without any pretensions to birth. But 
 after four days at sea, he had laughed when he picked that 
 Lord out of the lee-scuppers, and that Lord had somewhat 
 eagerly appealed to his opinion, against another Lord, as to 
 whether or no he had prophesied the accident. Which was 
 getting on very well indeed. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 25 
 
 \ 
 
 But better than this happened to him. They turned into 
 the Strait, and dropped anchor at Caernarvon, the senior Lord 
 of the Quicksands was going to disembark there, and post to 
 his estate in Merionethshire. Austin s ears actually tingled 
 with delight when the senior Lord asked him to come with 
 him, and spend a fortnight with him and his family among the 
 mountains. 
 
 Austin was ambitious, and he knew that one of the roads 
 to political greatness was the being well thought of in certain 
 quarters. But he was no tuft-hunter, and he knew besides 
 that the only way to gain a footing in a house was, to come 
 in at the front door, and not at the back. From his first 
 acquaintance with Lord Charles Barty at Eton, he had had 
 the full run of Cheshire House, but, since he had been at the 
 University, his sense had told him that he had better not go 
 there till he was asked. In spite of Lord Charles Barty s 
 friendship for him, which developed as they both grew older, 
 Austin had, for the last three years, managed to avoid enter 
 ing the house, until the time should come when he might be 
 asked to do so by much more important people than his old 
 schoolmate. 
 
 But here was a real triumph. The senior Lord was a very 
 great man indeed. There were very few greater. Austin 
 had only been presented to him four days before, and had 
 laughed at him but yesterday, when he picked him up out of 
 the lee-scuppers, and yet here was his Lordship insisting on 
 his coming home with him. It was a very great stroke of 
 business to a young man so anxious to push himself in the 
 world as Austin. 
 
 Even at Caernarvon Austin s wonder was excited, not 
 
 merely at the reverence which was paid to his Lordship, but 
 
 also at the, if possible, greater reverence paid to himself. lie 
 
 was very much amused by, and puzzled at it. The landlord 
 
 2 
 
26 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 at Caernarvon bowed to him, and called him, " My Lord." 
 " Simple people, these Welsh," thought Austin. 
 
 But he did not think so very much of it, for this day was 
 an era in his life. For the first time he saw mountain scenery, 
 and I think that the reader will agree with the author that, 
 of all the introductions to mountain scenery, that of the road 
 from Caernarvon to Llanberis is one of the most sudden, most 
 startling, and most beautiful. 
 
 My Lord, whom we will now call Mr. Cecil, sat opposite to 
 him, and was very much pleased with his boyish enthusiasm ; 
 and, indeed, the enthusiasm of a young person, when they 
 first find their visible horizon tilted up some ninety-five 
 degrees, is very pleasing. Mr. Cecil sat and smiled at him, 
 with an air of calm pride on his face, as if he had made it all 
 himself, and was pleased to find that his trouble was appre 
 ciated. But as we all do this, when we introduce a friend to 
 some new scenery, we must not be hard on -Mr. Cecil. 
 
 In the very middle of the finest part of the Pass, there came 
 riding towards them a very tall, important-looking gentleman, 
 with very black whiskers. He stopped and saluted Mr. Cecil, 
 and looked with such lively interest at Austin, that the poor 
 young gentleman felt inclined to laugh. The gentleman with 
 the black whiskers asked, with a sweet smile, to be introduced. 
 When Austin was introduced as Mr. Elliot, the gentleman 
 looked very much disappointed and aggrieved, and was many 
 degrees shorter in his speech towards Austin than the latter 
 had supposed, from previous symptoms, he would have been. 
 
 It was a memorable and delightful day. A lucky rogue was 
 Austin, to be shut up tete-a-tete in an open carriage with one of 
 the most agreeable and famous men in England, and driven 
 through a continual succession of such beautiful scenery. Mr. 
 Cecil, on his part, was delighted with Austin s charming man 
 ners and ingenuousness. He listened kindly and with interest 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 27 
 
 to his confidences, to his anticipations of a career in the world ; 
 and made Austin blush with delight by saying, that, from all 
 he had seen of him, there was nothing whatever to prevent 
 the realization of a very great portion of his hopes. 
 
 But the most beautiful among all the beautiful objects seen 
 that day was the one seen last. More beautiful than a million 
 silver threads of water, streaming from ten thousand crystal 
 line peaks. More beautiful than all the soaring ranges of 
 feathering birch, which hung purple over the winter snow, or 
 shone golden over the summer fern, in all glorious Caernarvon 
 shire. 
 
 And it was this. As the summer sun was still blazing on 
 the topmost crag of Snowdon, and as each of the fourteen little 
 lakes of that most exquisite of mountains was sending up its 
 tribute of mist to wreathe all night around the brows of the 
 sleeping cliffs, at such time Mr. Cecil and Austin came to a 
 wall, inside of what was a dark band of plantation, and Mr. 
 Cecil stopped the carriage, and said, " This is the beginning 
 of my park. Let us get out and walk ; we shall be at the 
 house as soon as the carriage, if we go by the short cut." 
 
 So they got out, and the carriage drove on. Mr. Cecil 
 opened a gate in the wall, and said, " Come on." 
 
 And Austin, standing in the road, and looking at Snowdon, 
 answered : " One minute more, only one minute more, with the 
 mountain ! Remember, this is the first time I have ever seen 
 this sort of thing. See ! the black, purple shadow is creeping 
 up, and gaining every instant on the golden jglory lingering 
 around the summit. And look, Mr. Cecil, every wreath of 
 mist from every wrinkle and hollow among the great slate 
 buttresses is turning from fleecy white to a pale, ghostly blue. 
 I beg pardon, I am keeping you waiting. People generally 
 make asses of themselves when they are first introduced to 
 mountain scenery." 
 
28 AUSTIN ELLTOT. 
 
 " Generally, yes," said Mr. Cecil ; " but you are slightly 
 poetical for a young gentleman who proposes to succeed in 
 politics. Come on, I have something to show you finer than 
 that mountain before you get any dinner." 
 
 He was right. The path grew steep and rocky as it wound 
 down through the dark wood, and to the right Austin began to 
 distinguish a dim abyss, and to hear a sound as of a mighty 
 wind coming through the trees ; and then suddenly they stood 
 upon a slight bridge, and were looking up at a broad cascade 
 which, streamed and spouted a hundred feet over head. 
 
 He gave a cry of honest delight at the glorious spectacle. 
 He was standing, still absorbed in it a few minutes afterwards, 
 when he was touched on the shoulder. 
 
 He turned, expecting to see only his host, but beside him 
 was standing the most beautiful girl he had ever seen, with 
 her arm round her father s waist. 
 
 " My daughter ! " But was it really his daughter, or was 
 it some beautiful fairy of the stream, some being born of the 
 amber-colored water, of the white foam, and of the last rosy 
 tints that hung on the cliffs over head ? Such, for one instant, 
 was his silly fancy, as he looked on this sudden apparition, at 
 her light-brown hair, her pure red cheek, and her white gown. 
 Was it fated that every one who met him this day should look 
 disappointed ? Miss Cecil, the most amiable as well as the 
 most beautiful of women, even she seemed to have some slight 
 shade of disappointment on her face. It was inexplicable, but 
 very annoying. 
 
 If her beauty showed to advantage amidst the seething mist 
 of the waterfall, it did not show to less advantage under the 
 shadows of the woodland, as she, her father, and Austin 
 walked home together. Not to less advantage, at all events, 
 to Austin, but to greater. And in his eyes her beauty seemed 
 to increase as he looked at her, and grew even more and more 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 29 
 
 divine at each turn of the head, and at each fresh expression 
 of the face. Austin had never seen such beauty before : Mr. 
 Cecil had. The beautiful girl s dead mother was even more 
 beautiful than she. 
 
 From the windows of Tyn y Rhraiadr (the farm of the 
 waterfall) you can see, on a fine summer s night, Snowdon 
 hanging aloft like a purple crystal, and the arch of twilight 
 creeping along behind it from west to east, through the short 
 summer night, until it begins to flash and blaze into a dawn 
 more glorious than the scarce-forgotten sunset. 
 
 And all through that night, until the arch of sunrise had 
 grown from dull orange to primrose, and even after, when the 
 sun himself had looked over the distant Glyder, and the long 
 shadows of tree and rock were cast along the dewy sward, and 
 the mowers began brushing through the grass, and the mur 
 murs of many waters, which had waxed and waned dully on 
 the ear through the night, had died before the jubilant mat 
 ins of a thousand birds, until such time did Austin sit at the 
 open windows of his bedroom, and look out on the glorious 
 prospect, and all the wonderful changes of color which take 
 place between dawn and sunrise, but as one who saw them 
 not. 
 
 For the arrow had gone home this time up to the very 
 feather. 
 
30 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 AUSTIN sat and thought what he could recollect to have 
 heard about her. He had not been much into society where 
 he would have been likely to have heard much about her. 
 Many of the clerks in his father s office would be likely to 
 know more. 
 
 He remembered one thing, however. He had heard that 
 she was an only daughter and an immense heiress, and that 
 all the estates in four counties would go to this young beauty. 
 And he was desperately in love with her. 
 
 He saw nothing absurd in this ; he did not get up in the 
 dead of night and stealthily fly the house, without looking 
 back for terror. No ! he waited impatiently for day, that he 
 might see her again, and get more madly, hopelessly entan 
 gled with her than ever. 
 
 If she had shown a trifling disappointment when he came 
 the night before, she seemed to be very much pleased with 
 him next day. She met him with ease, and almost with fa 
 miliarity, with so much familiarity, indeed, that he, not 
 knowing the cause of it, was very much delighted indeed. 
 
 She had gone into her father s dressing-room that morning, 
 and said, 
 
 " Father dear, who is this Mr. Elliot whom you have 
 brought home ? " 
 
 a He is a young Oxford man. He promises uncommon 
 well. They say his degree will be very good indeed, and he 
 is very ambitious. He may end by being a man of some 
 mark : who knows ? " 
 
 " Is he nice ? " 
 
 " Can t say, I am sure. That is your business. He is to 
 marry that old scoundrel Hilton s daughter, and go into Par- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 31 
 
 liament with her money, I believe. I have brought him down 
 here for a few days to make his acquaintance, and introduce 
 him to Mewstone. He will be useful to him. He must pack 
 off soon, for he takes his degree in the October term." 
 
 " When is Mewstone coming ? " said she, with a sigh. 
 
 " When he chooses," said Mr. Cecil, laughing ; " you will 
 find that out." 
 
 Miss Cecil laughed, the most charming, merry laugh you 
 ever heard, and then sailed away down-stairs, to entertain 
 that poor fool, Austin Elliot. 
 
 Before she had been five minutes in the room with him, he 
 saw that his first estimate of her extraordinary beauty was by 
 no means too great. Not only was her face as nearly as per 
 fect as possible ; not only were her brilliant, yet quiet, hazel 
 eyes, the most beautiful eyes he had ever seen ; not only was 
 her golden brown hair, looped so carelessly and so gracefully 
 around the perfect-shaped head, beyond comparison in the 
 world, as he thought, all these things he had seen ap 
 proached, but her grace of manner, a grace he had read 
 of as being achieved by some great actresses, was something 
 which he had never seen approached, a grace seen only in 
 repose, and her repose was continual. She moved, of course ; 
 but there was no point of time about any of her movements : 
 you could not say that at such a time she did so and so. She 
 only slid from one posture of infinite grace into another. Aus 
 tin thought that there was as much difference between her 
 motions and those of another woman, as between those of a 
 doe in the wild woodlands, and those of a soldier doing his 
 exercise. 
 
 " I am so glad my father brought you home with him," she 
 said. " I was rather dull here, all alone with the waterfall 
 and the dogs. Will you please tell me about the yacht run 
 ning ashore ? Please make me laugh about it. I am sure 
 
32 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 you can if you choose. I can always like people who can 
 make me laugh." 
 
 Austin certainly could do that. He described their Lord 
 ships squabble, the heartless obstinacy of the commander, 
 his sardonic grin when he had made their Lordships run the 
 yacht ashore, and the extraordinary infuriated heap of admin 
 istrative talent of the highest order, which lay kicking on the 
 deck, at the first bump on the sand. He would have given 
 five pounds, he said, to have been on board his father s yacht 
 at the time, and seen his father s face. The expression of fun, 
 he said, tempered with propriety, which would have been seen 
 in that face, would have been better worth seeing than the 
 whole of their seven Lordships fighting together in the lee- 
 scuppers. 
 
 She laughed very heartily, and she said, " I think I shall 
 like you very much indeed. Will you come and walk with 
 me this morning ? my father will be busy on the farm. My 
 father tells me you are going into politics. Will you tell me, 
 for I have not seen a newspaper, what are people saying about 
 this O Connell business ? " 
 
 " Well," said Austin, " they are saying all kinds of things. 
 Mr. Cecil hopes that the Lords will reverse the judgment of 
 the lower courts. I entirely disagree with your father. 
 There is something very charming in that. I, Austin Elliot, 
 distinctly tell you, Miss Cecil, that I disagree with a Privy 
 Councillor and first Lord of Shoals and Quicksands. It makes 
 one feel taller to say it. I have a good mind to tell him so 
 himself." 
 
 " Better not," she said, laughing ; " such presumption might 
 ruin your prospects. And now let us leave politics and come 
 and see the dogs." 
 
 There was, in and about the kennel, almost every variety 
 of dog conceivable. There were deep-jowled dogs, with 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 33 
 
 sunken eyes and wrinkled foreheads, at the first distant note 
 of whose bell-like voice, the hunted slave in the Cuban jungle 
 lies down and prays for death ; yet who here is a stupid, blun 
 dering, affectionate brute, who will let you do as you like with 
 him, and casts himself on his back at Miss Cecil s feet. Eng 
 lish bloodhounds, too, stupid, sleepy, good-natured, slobbering. 
 St. Bernard s, too, dogs of the snow-storm and the ava 
 lanche, wise-looking dogs, self-contained, appearing to know 
 more than they chose to say, but idiots withal notwithstanding, 
 and very great idiots, as are many self-contained and wise- 
 looking animals beside they. A great, rough Newfoundland 
 dog, chained up. Marry, why ? Because he had been the 
 pet of the house, until one day he had become Must, jBerserk, 
 or what you choose to call it, until the devil, or the seven 
 devils, which lurk in all Newfoundland dogs, gentle^and docile 
 as they are, had broken loose, and Mr. Cecil had had to fight 
 with him for his life in his own dressing-room. There were 
 two French poodles, which, as Mr. Sala says somewhere, so 
 truly, " you can teach to do everything but love you." There 
 was a British bull-dog, white, with small eyes ; so short-sighted 
 as to be obliged to examine everything with his nose (which 
 gave Austin a creeping up his back), and with a wicked, low 
 ering, face ; yet which bull-dog turned out, like most other 
 British bull-dogs, to be a good-natured, kind-hearted fellow, 
 and a firm friend, as soon as he had (by smelling the calves 
 of their legs, a .nervous proceeding) found out his friends from 
 his enemies. 
 
 And Austin, finding that the bull-dog, instead of biting his 
 legs, wagged his tail at him, and proposed to accompany him 
 farther, broke out into raptures. 
 
 " Miss Cecil, I have never seen such a collection of dogs as 
 this ! And I am a great fancier of dogs." 
 
 " You have not seen them nearly all yet," she said. " This 
 
 2* C 
 
34 AUSTIN KLLIOT. 
 
 is, I believe, the best collection of dogs in England ; or rather, 
 I should say, better than any in England, for we are in Wales. 
 1 ou know how they came here ? " 
 
 No." 
 
 " My poor brother chose to have the best dogs in England ; 
 it was a passion with him ; and since his death, my father has 
 chosen to pursue his hobby. You know about my brother s 
 death ? " 
 
 " O yes," said Austin, who knew nothing at all about it, 
 but who did what was possibly the best thing he could do, 
 utter a fa$on de parler (for it was nothing more), and try to 
 turn the subject. At the same time he reflected, that it would 
 be well for young men like himself, not in society, before they 
 went into a house, to inform themselves somewhat about the 
 history of that house, to prevent mistakes. 
 
 " Do you really know about my brother, Mr. Elliot ? " said 
 Miss Cecil. 
 
 " Well, no, "said Austin, " I do not, since you ask me twice. 
 Remember, I am only an undergraduate at Oxford, and that 
 I knew nothing, even of Mr. Cecil, except that he was one of 
 the first men in England, and had given such and such votes, 
 until he asked me here." 
 
 " I like you very much," said she ; " you are so well-bred, 
 and have so little pretension. I only wanted to mention my 
 poor brother, whom I hardly remember, to warn you what not 
 to talk about with my father. He was drowned boating at 
 Eton. And you will find that it is as well to know all this 
 sort of thing in the world." 
 
 Miss Cecil, the oracle, was much younger than Austin ; 
 but she had been out two seasons, and knew a great deal of 
 the world ; and he was at the University, and knew absolutely 
 and entirely nothing. If he had, he would Lave known what 
 a consummate fool he was to fall in love with her, recklessly 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 35 
 
 to go on feeding his passion ; and above all, what an utter 
 fool he was to hope that it would have any other than one 
 conclusion. 
 
 " I know nothing of the world, or about people, yet," he 
 | said ; " I suppose the knowledge of people and their belong 
 ings will come to one in time. It seems tiresome to get it up. 
 Do you know that none of the best fellows who I know are 
 up in that sort of thing. Now, there is Lord Charles Barty, 
 he is coming on very well indeed ; but, mind you, I believe if 
 you were to put -him into a corner he would not be able to tell 
 you who his grandmother s father was." 
 
 Miss Cecil laughed. " I daresay not," said she. " / know. 
 His grandmother was a Leyton, daughter of Sir Robert- Ley- 
 ton, of Broadash. Leave the pedigrees to the women. One 
 of the great uses of a woman in society is, I take it, to tell 
 her husband who people are." 
 
 So she talked to him, as one would talk to an intelligent 
 boy sent to one for a holiday ; and yet the fool loved on more 
 madly than ever. 
 
 " Come on," she said, " and let us see the rest of the dogs " ; 
 for this conversation took place at the fountain in the centre 
 of the kennels, and they had only come up one avenue, and 
 only seen one fourth of the dogs as yet 
 
 And as they turned to go, she said : 
 
 " I like you very much, as I told you before. And to prove 
 to you how much I like you, I will give you, out of all these 
 hundreds of beautiful dogs, the dog you choose, the dog you 
 think that you will love best ; and I only annex one condition, 
 that whenever your heart warms towards that dog, that you 
 will think of me, and think how much I like you. I have 
 heard a very great deal of you. I rather believe that you 
 did not know of my existence before you came here. But I 
 have been in love with you for a long time." 
 
 
3G AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Miss Cecil and Eleanor had been friends and correspond 
 ents ; Austin did not know this. He was not coxcomb enough 
 to take her cool free-arid-easy expressions as advances to him 
 self, and yet he was foolish enough to think that they formed 
 a basis of operations. He had hopes. 
 
 He was a great fool ; but I would not have cared to write 
 his history if he had not been. Let us be Jacobin, democratic, 
 and revolutionary for a season, until our reason returns. If a 
 man is thrown into intricate relations with a woman, however 
 much his superior in rank, that man is justified, if he so please, 
 in falling in love with that woman. A man may fly from a 
 hopeless passion, and be miserable. Granted. A man may 
 yield to a hopeless passion, and may behave like a gentleman, 
 and keep it all in his own breast, and tell no one but the friend 
 of his heart, and be miserable. Also granted. But if a man 
 comes to me and says, that although he was with such and 
 such a woman, but didn t allow himself to foil in love with her 
 because she was above him in rank, I choose to tell that man 
 that he is no man at all, and no more knows what love means 
 than a horse or a dog. 
 
 Now they began looking at the terriers. There was one 
 snow-white English terrier of such amazing beauty, that Aus 
 tin very nearly chose it, but fortunately did not. Then there 
 were some black-and-tans, equal in beauty to the white ; Dandy 
 Dinmont terriers, as long and as lithe as otters ; and pert, 
 merry, sharp little Skyes ; rough long-legged English fox ter 
 riers, which ran on three legs, like Scotch terriers, and held 
 their heads on one side knowingly. Austin was more and 
 more delighted every step. He knew all about every dog ; 
 but at the last he was stopped. He came across four little 
 dogs, the like of which he had never seen before. 
 
 Little long-bodied, short-legged dogs, a dull blue-gray color, 
 with clouded black spots ; sharp, merry little fellows. 
 
 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 37 
 
 " What dogs can these be, Miss Cecil ? " he said. " I am 
 quite at fault." 
 
 " Cannot you guess ? Why, they are turnspits, and all with 
 the turnspit peculiarity. The right eye is not of the same 
 color as the left. I suppose you will hardly see such dogs as 
 these in England. Will you choose one ? " 
 
 Although one of the queer, merry little rogues begged at 
 him, he said no. " They are a sight," he said, " a sight worth 
 seeing, but I will not choose one. In an artistic point of view, 
 they are ugly, and they suggest to one the blue dogs which the 
 Chinese fatten for table. No. I hardly dare to say so, but of 
 all the dogs here I would soonest have that incomparable 
 white terrier. I have dreamed of such a dog as that, but I 
 never saw such a one." 
 
 " It is hardly possible that you can have. He is yours with 
 a thousand welcomes. I hope he may live long to remind you 
 of me." 
 
 " I need no dog to do that," said Austin ; " but I cannot 
 take such a princely present." 
 
 She laughed. " It is done," she said ; " the election is made 
 for good or evil. Come and take possession." 
 
 The election, so terribly important as it turned out, was 
 nearly made. Who could guess, on that happy summer s day, 
 how much was to depend on the choosing of a dog ? 
 
 " For the want of a nail the shoe was lost ; 
 For the want of a shoe the horse was lost ; 
 For the want of a horse the rider was lost ; 
 For the want of a rider a kingdom was lost." 
 
 If it were not that we knew that a tender, loving Father 
 watches over us with all-seeing providence, each action of a 
 prudent man s life would be accompanied witlr such a feeling 
 of terror of ultimate consequences, that life would become a 
 
38 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 burden, and the grave rest ; or we should run, like the Turks, 
 and some of the West country sects, into the opposite extreme 
 of saying that it was all " Kismet," that it mattered not what 
 we did. 
 
 The white terrier was so nearly chosen, in spite of Austin s 
 strong repugnance to accept such a valuable present, that they 
 had turned, and Austin s hands were eager to seize the beauti 
 ful little animal, and call him his own, when, in the wood be 
 hind them, there was a wild jubilant bark ; in another instant 
 there was a rush past them, as of an eagle coming through a 
 forest ; in the next, a dog, different to any they had seen be 
 fore, was madly, joyously careering round and round them in 
 ever-narrowing circles ; and in another he was leaping on both 
 of them, and covering them with caresses. 
 
 But he saw that Austin was a stranger, and paused to look 
 at him, and after a moment he reared up against him, and said 
 with his beautiful soft hazel eyes, as Austin thought, " Choose 
 me, choose me, and I will follow you through it all, even to 
 the very end." 
 
 It was a most beautiful Scotch sheep-dog, black and tan and 
 white, with a delicate smooth head, the hair of which began to 
 wave about the ears, until it developed into a deep mane upon 
 flie shoulders. The author has described such a dog before. 
 The Scotch sheep-dog is the highest development of the brute 
 creation, in beauty, in sagacity, and in other qualities, which 
 one dares, by leave of Messieurs of the Holy Office, to call 
 moral. This was the most beautiful dog of that variety ever 
 seen. If the reader wishes to realize the dog to himself he 
 can do so thus. In Landseer s picture of " The Shepherd s 
 Bible," the dog which is standing up is very like him ; though 
 the dog I am describing is drawn from the life, and from a 
 handsomer dog than he. 
 
 " This is the dog for me," cried Austin. " Why, you beauty ! 
 
AUSTIN "ELLIOT. 39 
 
 Miss Cecil, I would give anything for -this dog. Just look at 
 his eyes, will you. Can I have him ? Does he belong to any 
 one ? " 
 
 " Yes," she said, laughing. " He belongs to you. He is 
 worth all the white terriers that ever were born. I like you 
 the better for your choice of Robin." 
 
 At this moment a harsh voice behind them said : 
 
 " How d ye do, Miss Cecil ? By Jove ! that dog is a 
 deuced clever dog. He began by pitching into me, but when 
 your father said, Go find, Robin, he became docile, and 
 brought me on your track like an Indian. Is he yours ? " 
 
 " He is Mr. Elliot s. How do you do, Captain Hertford ? " 
 said Miss Cecil, very coldly. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 CAPTAIN HERTFORD, the man who had just found the 
 group, was a man whose personal appearance requires some 
 slight notice, and but very slight. He was a very big, thick 
 set man. He had a broad red face, the principal features of 
 which were lowering, bushy eyebrows, beneath which were 
 cruel, deep-sunk, light-blue eyes ; and a thick, coarse mouth, 
 too big to be entirely hidden by the moustache which met his 
 deep-red whiskers. The expression of his face was, towards 
 men, scowling and insolent ; what it was towards women I 
 know not, but should fancy that, if it was intended to express 
 admiration, it was more repulsive than his ordinary look of 
 defiance and ill-temper. 
 
 He looked with intense eager curiosity at Austin. Austin 
 did not look with much curiosity at him, or he would have 
 
40 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 seen him bite his lip impatiently. He might have been flat 
 tered had he heard the Captain say to himself, " Consume the 
 young beggar, he is infernally handsome." 
 
 * You are unexpected, Captain Hertford," said Miss Cecil ; 
 " but not the less welcome. Whence have you come ? " 
 
 " I have been at Brussels with Mewstone. I stayed a day or 
 two there after him. He got hold of the old Countess Dcn- 
 telles, and carried her off to Malines with him. They seem to 
 have been pretty busy those two days. The bill has come to 
 me in the course of business." 
 
 " Is it very large ? " said Miss Cecil, laugliing. 
 
 " A little over thirty thousand francs." 
 
 " That is very extravagant." 
 
 " I don t know," said Captain Hertford. " I don -t think it 
 is so very bad. Remember what it must have cost to get the 
 old Countess to leave her box at the St. Hubert, with Levas- 
 seur starring from Paris, and pack off to Malines with him, 
 with her rheumatism and her monkey. When I looked at the 
 bill, I pointed to an item of five thousand francs, and I said to 
 him, That s the old woman s share ; and he laughed and 
 said, Yes. He got her uncommon cheap, I think, at that. 
 She is the best judge in Europe. They would have cheated 
 him horribly if she had n t gone with him." 
 
 Austin had no more notion what they were talking about 
 than the man in the moon. He looked at them both with 
 wonder. Miss Cecil began again : 
 
 " Well, on the whole, he could not have clone better. I 
 suppose the poor old devotee will put it on the shoulders of 
 some Bambino or another. Poor old lady ! " 
 c u What a delightful rummage she must have had. There 
 must have been a great excitement at Malines at her ap 
 pearance." 
 
 " What detained you in Brussells, Captain Hertford ? " 
 

 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 41 
 
 " Well, a very unpleasant affair. An affair touching my 
 personal honor." 
 
 " Have you been out again ? " she asked, turning shafply 
 upon him. 
 
 " No," said Captain Hertford. " A young fellow, an Eng 
 lishman, had forged Mewstone s name to a large amount. I 
 followed him to Namur, to see whether I could recover any 
 thing. But when I got to Namur he had escaped me. My 
 honor was concerned in catching him, for he was my acquaint 
 ance, not Mewstone s." 
 
 " Did you follow him no farther"? " she asked. 
 
 " There was no need. By the by, Mewstone is in Lon 
 don, and will be here the day after to-morrow." 
 
 " Is any one there to act for him, as the Countess Dentelles 
 did at Malines ? " 
 
 " No," said Captain Hertford. " I turned him into Rundell 
 and Bridges, as I would turn a young colt into a clover-field. 
 They won t cheat him. It is all convertible property. Will 
 you introduce me to Mr. Elliot ? " 
 
 She did so. Captain Hertford did not scowl on him, but 
 smiled. Austin thought possibly that his smile was not a 
 pleasant one, but he did not care for that. This man had been 
 talking for ten minutes to this woman, and Austin had not the 
 least idea of what they had been talking about. This man 
 could talk to her and amuse her, when he sat mumchance. 
 He would make himself a pupil of this man. This must be 
 one of the men of the world his father talked of. But had 
 all the men of the world scowling eyebrows, and great coarse 
 mouths, like this one ? 
 
 Austin laughed as he asked himself this question. He had 
 seen other men of the world. His father, and Mr. Cecil, and 
 the seven other Lord? of the Shoals and Quicksands, quite 
 different in appearance to Captain Hertford. He did not like 
 
42 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 the look of this gentleman, but he would be his pupil. He 
 was as eager for Captain Hertford s acquaintance, as Captain 
 Hertford was for his. 
 
 They walked back, all three towards the house, and Miss 
 Cecil went in. Captain Hertford proposed that they should 
 extend their walk, and smoke a cigar. 
 
 Austin was delighted. As they turned on the broad gravel 
 walk, Austin noticed for the first time that the dog Robin was 
 at his heels. His tail was down, and his ears were down. He 
 was waiting for orders from his new master. The dog had 
 taken to him. What that means I cannot tell you. I don t 
 know, and you don t know, any more than this, that sometimes 
 dogs take to men, and sometimes they don t. And we shall 
 none of us know any more about the matter until the kye 
 come hame. 
 
 Apparently, also, Captain Hertford had taken to Austin. 
 His sudden affection for Austin is not nearly so mysterious a 
 business as that of the dog s. We shall find out the reason of 
 that before the kye come hame. 
 
 " Where shall we go ? " said Captain Hertford. 
 
 " Anywhere you like," said Austin, with the frankness of a 
 boy. " I want to talk to you. I want to make your acquaint 
 ance. And any one place is as good as another for that." 
 
 Captain Hertford turned and looked at him as he said this. 
 There was almost a smile on his face, as he heard Austin say 
 this ; but when he looked at him, and saw how handsome he 
 was, he scowled agajn. It is just possible that this was an 
 important point in Captain Hertford s life. Austin, with his 
 fresh innocence, might have won him back to better things 
 possibly. Who knows ? But Austin stood between him and 
 the light. 
 
 Hertford walked in, puffing his cigar. He began the con 
 versation. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 43 
 
 " By the by, Elliol;, you know the Hiltons, don t you ? " 
 
 " Infinitely well." 
 
 " Then I am afraid that the beginning of our acquaintance 
 won t be very pleasant. I was detained in town on their 
 account." 
 
 Indeed." 
 
 " Yes. You heard me speaking about an affair concerning 
 a young Englishman, which detained me at Brussels." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Did you ever know Robert Hilton ? " 
 
 " Yes ; at Eton, poor lad. But I have never seen him 
 since." 
 
 " You will never see him any more." 
 
 " Oh ! Captain Hertford, don t say that. Do you mean to 
 say he is dead ? " 
 
 " If you are going into the world, you must learn to bear 
 these things with composure, Elliot. Now, lean against that 
 rock, and look me in the face. Robert Hilton committed 
 suicide the week before last at Namur." 
 
 " Suicide ! " 
 
 " Yes, suicide." 
 
 " God forgive me. I was going to say, that he would not 
 
 have been so bold ; so Poor lad. Yet, I don t know. 
 
 Was there anything new against him ? " 
 
 " Yes. I will tell you what there was against him. He 
 forged Mewstone s name." 
 
 Good God ! " 
 
 " Yes. And when he thought it must be discovered, fled 
 to Namur. I sent a man after him. A letter from Hilton, 
 to me, crossed him on the road. It announced his intention 
 of making away with himself. I was furious. I thought it 
 was a miserable ruse to escape. I followed my friend to 
 Namur. And there I found the whole business unfortunately 
 true." 
 
4i AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " Does Mr. Hilton know of this ? " said Austin, eagerly. 
 
 " Yes ; I broke it to him." 
 
 " How did he take it ? " 
 
 " Very quietly. You know the whole thing is very sad, and 
 very lamentable ; but Hilton is a man of the world. And 
 with regard to this boy, the bitterness of death was passed. 
 You must know that. He was a mauvais sujet. I don t 
 mean to say that the old man was not deucedly cut up, and 
 all that sort of thing, but he took it very quietly." 
 
 " Poor Eleanor ! " said Austin. 
 
 " You mean Miss Hilton," said Captain Hertford. Well, 
 she was very much cut up. But she will be consoled. You 
 see this leaves her in undisputed possession of nine thousand 
 a year at her father s death." 
 
 " She ! she weigh nine thousand, or nine millions, against 
 her brother s life ! You don t know Eleanor Hilton, Captain 
 Hertford." 
 
 " Nor you either, I fancy," said Captain Hertford, laughing. 
 " Did I say she weighed money against her brother s life ? 
 Don t I know that she would pitch it all to the dogs to have 
 him back again ? All I said was, that she would console her 
 self ; and you will find that inexorably true. So she will." 
 
 " Indeed," said Austin ; " I suppose she will. After all, 
 the poor fellow was a sad source of anxiety to them. It is 
 perhaps better she should forget him." 
 
 " What a child you are, Elliot ! " said Captain Hertford. 
 " Five minutes or less ago you were ready to fight me I 
 saw it in your eyes for saying she would console herself. 
 Now you indorse it, repeat it, and say it were better she 
 should do so." 
 
 This was what some gentleman in "Martin Chuzzlewit" 
 calls " dreadful true." Austin had the good taste to acknowl 
 edge it. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 45 
 
 " I ought," he said, " to go home, I think." 
 
 " Why ? " 
 
 " I don t know. I should like to be near poor Eleanor in 
 her trouble." 
 
 " Are you caught there, then ? " said Captain Hertford, 
 turning the other way, and adding, " I wonder if he has any 
 head of grouse here." 
 
 " I ? " said Austin ; " O dear ! no." 
 
 " I thought you had been." 
 
 " No," said Austin, blushing and hesitating ; " Eleanor Hil 
 ton and I have been brought up like brother and sister, you 
 know." 
 
 " O, indeed ! I had heard that you and she were very good 
 friends. What a beautiful girl this Miss Cecil is ! " 
 
 " Is she not ? " 
 
 " I suppose you are not caught there ? " 
 
 " After twenty-four hours," Austin had voice enough to say. 
 " No ; I don t think I am." 
 
 " Then you must be a great fool, Elliot," said Captain Hert 
 ford. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 ONE cannot help doubting whether or no Austin would 
 have written to Eleanor about his new passion, even had she 
 not been in trouble about her brother s death. At all events, 
 he did not. He merely wrote her a kind, affectionate letter, 
 full of condolence, but said no word of Miss Cecil. 
 
 This was an exception to his general rule ; for he usually 
 fell in love with a fresh young lady, more or less ineligible, 
 every three months, and invariably told Eleanor all about it : 
 
4G AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 so that poor Eleanor used to get into a state of confusion, and 
 was in the habit of confounding the last young lady and the 
 last but one, to Austin s great vexation. 
 
 But he wrote to Lord Charles Barty. He told him about 
 Miss Cecil, her beauty, her wit, her grace, and how he was 
 madly in love with her ; and he directed the letter to Turin. 
 For in this year the Duke and Duchess of Cheshire invaded 
 Italy with an overwhelming force, exacting tribute from the 
 various people over whose necks their chariot-wheels passed, 
 taking with them also scholars and experts, to show them the 
 best things in the way of art, on which to lay their hands, as 
 did Buonaparte, but, unlike Napoleon, paying for them, in 
 hard cash, about twenty per cent above their actual value. 
 
 Lord Charles Barty had a long letter written to Austin, and 
 ready to send, when he got Austin s. Lord Charles s letter 
 was full of flippant good-humored nonsense. He had tried to 
 whet his wits upon everything he had seen, and it is quite 
 possible that he had made an indifferent success. We shall 
 never know about this, however, for when he got Austin s 
 letter he burnt his own, wrote a new one to Austin, an eager, 
 hasty one, of only six or seven lines, put it in the post-office 
 himself, walked up and down until he saw the diligence depart 
 for Chambery, and then bit his nails and stamped when he 
 considered that his letter would be too late to do any good. 
 
 Lord Charles Barty was not very clever ; in fact, the Bar- 
 tys are not a clever family. But they have higher qualities 
 than cleverness. " In the house of Waverley the qualities of 
 honor and generosity are hereditary." So it may be said about 
 the Barty s. Lord Charles Barty would have telegraphed to 
 his friend Austin ; but alas ! in 1844, the only piece of tele 
 graph working was from London to Slough, and from Vaux- 
 hall to Woking ; consequently there was none to Turin. He 
 would have given up his holiday, and posted home, but he 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 47 
 
 knew he would be too late. He could only fret and fume, 
 until he told his father, who looked very grave, and said that 
 either Mr. Cecil, or Austin, or Miss Cecil, must be very much 
 to blame. 
 
 And meanwhile poor Austin continued making a fool of 
 himself with Miss Cecil. Her manner was very affectionate 
 towards him. She had known Eleanor Hilton, having stayed 
 with her at a country house, and she had done what every one 
 else did who saw Eleanor, got very deeply attached to her. 
 This she told to Austin the very first morning of their acquaint 
 ance ; but she had, of course, not told him something else. 
 To wit, that some one had told her of Eleanor s having been 
 engaged to marry a young gentleman, by name Elliot, ever 
 since she could talk. She was very anxious to see the man 
 on whom so much of Eleanor s happiness depended. And she 
 was delighted and charmed to find him so worthy of her. 
 That \vas all. 
 
 And so he walked and rode and drove and read with her 
 day after day, getting more hopelessly entangled. Captain 
 Hertford was very busy, or seemed to be, with her father, and 
 left Austin to cavalier Miss Cecil. Mr. Cecil and Captain 
 Hertford did really seem busy ; but if they had not been, the 
 latter would have contrived to leave them alone together. He 
 had his reasons. ^ 
 
 Once in the week or ten days, he went out with the Captain 
 to walk idly across some farms to see some improvements. 
 The bailiff was with them. A farmer, catching sight of them 
 at a long distance, made towards them, and then, hat in hand, 
 and addressing Austin every tenth word as "my Lord," began 
 with Welsh volubility to lay a case about draining improve 
 ments before him, and pray his assistance. He had gone on 
 ever so far before the. steward had time to stop him in a few 
 hurried words of Welsh. The man scowled on Austin, turned 
 on his heel, and departed. 
 
48 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 When lie was alone with Captain Hertford, Austin said to 
 him, " It is a very curious thing, do you know ; but in the 
 few days I have been here, that same thing has happened in 
 different ways, not once, but a dozen times. I met a man 
 in the pass of Llanberis, when I was coming here with Mr. 
 Cecil, who first of all asked, with the greatest empressement, to 
 be introduced to me ; and then, when he heard my name, 
 looked very much inclined to kick me. I hope no one will do 
 that. Has any man called Elliot done anything very bad in 
 these parts ? " 
 
 " Not that I know of. But I will tell you what I think. I 
 fancy, mind, that seeing a handsome young dandy like you, 
 brought down here by Mr. Cecil, mind, I only fancy, 
 that the people think that you are going to marry Miss 
 Cecil." 
 
 " Then why," said poor Austin, " the moment they hear 
 my name, do they find out that I am not the man ? " 
 
 This was awkward. Captain Hertford laughed, and said, 
 " I am sure I don t know." In another moment Austin would, 
 according to all laws of probability, have asked him whether 
 Miss Cecil was engaged to any one. Possibly Captain Hert 
 ford knew that, for he said, before Austin had time to say 
 anything, " Miss Cecil tells me that she gave you the choice 
 of all the dogs in the kennel. Rather a compliment, eh ? 
 What the deuce made you choose that infernal sheep-dog ? " 
 
 Austin was on his own dunghill immediately. Captain 
 Hertford knew he would be. " Why did I choose him ? " he 
 said. " Because he is the best specimen in the kennel." 
 
 " The most perfect specimen ! " said the artful Captain, 
 scornfully. 
 
 Yes." 
 
 " What ! a finer specimen than that glorious white terrier ? 
 You must be a fool, Elliot. Why, there is not such another 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 49 
 
 dog in the world as that white terrier. Snow-white as he 
 seems, you can see, in certain lights, the markings of a perfect 
 black-and-tan under his white hair. There is no dog like him 
 in England." 
 
 "He is only an Albino black-and-tan," said Elliot, scorn 
 fully. " He is a beautiful beast, and he is worth thirty 
 guineas, I allow ; but do you know the points of a Scotch 
 colley, eh ? " 
 
 " Can t say I do," said Captain Hertford. " Can t say, either, 
 that I know the points of a costermonger s donkey." 
 
 " Ah ! " said Austin, " then you see I do. I know the points 
 of any dog under the sun. This dog Robin is perfect in all 
 points. Here, sir ! here ! Look at him." 
 
 Captain Hertford looked at Robin, but Robin did not look 
 at Captain Hertford. He caught his eye for a moment, and 
 then laid his leaf-like ears back, drooped his tail, went behind 
 Austin, and loped, or lurked, in his walk, which means, that he 
 moved the two legs which were on the same side of him to 
 gether. 
 
 Captain Hertford laughed, and changed the subject. He 
 had done what he wanted. He had prevented Austin from 
 asking an awkward question. There were three or four days 
 to spare, by his calculations. He saw that Austin had fallen 
 deeply in love, poor fool, with Miss Cecil ; he wanted him to 
 get deeper and deeper in that hopeless passion. Eleanor Hil 
 ton was heiress to nine thousand a year. He had an intro 
 duction to Eleanor through her brother s unfortunate death. 
 Austin must be entangled with some one else for a time. 
 
 Captain Hertford, however, was playing a very dangerous 
 game. He was " necessary-man " to Lord Mewstone. He 
 had been sent to Tyn y Rhaiadr as his avant courier. He 
 had found Austin there, m the very act of falling in love with 
 Miss Cecil. 
 
 3 D 
 
50 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 He had come to England from Brussels, with the idea that 
 Eleanor and her nine thousand a year were worth getting at. 
 He had heard that Austin was supposed to be engaged to her. 
 He had come to Tyn y Rhaiadr, and found him, of all men in 
 the world, there, and he had acted as above. His plans were 
 not well developed, and might be changed ; but he had no 
 doubt of this, that if he let him commit himself deeply to 
 Miss Cecil, it must be better for his plans in the long run. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 BUT, on the eighth day, Austin s eyes were opened to the 
 true state of the case in this manner : 
 
 It was Sunday morning ; Mr. Cecil and Captain Hertford 
 had not gone to church, pleading that the service was in Welsh. 
 Miss Cecil had gone, however, and Austin had gone with her. 
 
 They returned by the path which led past the waterfall, 
 where he had first seen her, and there, upon the giddy bridge, 
 in the presence of the great sheet of rushing foam, he knew his 
 fate. On the rocky path above them stood a tall and handsome 
 man. Miss Cecil gave a little cry when she caught sight of 
 him ; and when Austin saw her two little gloved hands trem 
 bling out from under her shawl towards him, he knew every 
 thing. The eager movement of those little hands was as stern 
 a death-blow to his hope as though the man who stood above 
 her, and held out his arms to her, had taken her in them and 
 cast her into the seething cataract a hundred feet below. 
 
 Alas, poor Austin ! He was a gentleman, and looked ear 
 nestly at the waterfall, lest he should see the meeting. When 
 he looked round again, they were standing side by side, radi- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 51 
 
 ant, handsome, and joyous; and he could see that she was 
 talking about him. 
 
 So he went up to them, and was presented by Miss Cecil to 
 Lord Mewstone. 
 
 Every one had known of the engagement between- Miss 
 Cecil and Lord Mewstone for months, every one except, 
 apparently, poor, ignorant Austin. All Mr. Cecil s enormous 
 estates went to his daughter. These estates bordered, in two 
 counties, on those of Lord Mewstone. His marriage with 
 Miss Cecil would wellnigh double his already great wealth. 
 Mr. Cecil had refused a peerage, because he saw that it would 
 take place, and it was not worth while leaving the House of 
 Commons, having no male issue, and being in full work, 
 at least, not at present. There was as much land as goes to 
 make some independent states. There were deep political 
 considerations at stake in this great match. It was an affair 
 of enormous importance ; and here was poor, ignorant, self- 
 confident little Austin flying his kite in the middle of it all, 
 with a calm unconsciousness of the fact that the only human 
 being there who guessed his secret Captain Hertford was 
 at one time laughing at, at another time admiring, his amazing 
 impudence. 
 
 " By Gad! " said Captain Hertford to himself; "what the 
 deuce is it ? Is it innocence, or is it mere vanity ? If I had 
 had that amount of unconscious impudence early in life, I 
 might have done better." 
 
 People said that this marriage of Lord Mewstone with 
 Fanny Cecil was a family and political arrangement. If so, 
 it was an uncommonly fortunate one, for each of them loved 
 the ground which the other walked on. Let us wish them 
 good-by forever. Our way lies in a very different direction. 
 We must quit this happy house among the Welsh hills ; but I 
 am sorry to say we must take away Captain Hertford with us, 
 and keep him with us altogether, or nearly so. 
 
52 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Austin s adieux were easily made. The poor, miserable 
 lad had only to say that he would take the opportunity of 
 travelling as far as Chester with Captain Hertford (there was 
 no railway farther than Chester in 1844), for that he must 
 join his reading party. He received a hearty farewell from 
 every one, and jumped into the carriage beside Captain Hert 
 ford, to go to Bangor. 
 
 And when Captain Hertford looked at him, he saw that his 
 face was changed since yesterday. Yesterday it was the face 
 of a remarkably handsome young man, with merry blue eyes. 
 To-day it was the same : the features, as regular as those of 
 Buonaparte or Castlereagh ; the firm-cut mouth, with the 
 lower lip slightly pouting ; the short, curling brown hair ; the 
 pure complexion, were all there ; and yet there was a dif 
 ference since yesterday. Austin, as he sat in the carriage, 
 was as handsome as Buonaparte or Castlereagh, but had now, 
 though his face was at rest, a look which Lord Whitworlh 
 must have seen on the face of the one, and Mr. Raikes on 
 the face of the other, a look of angry, furious defiance. It 
 was expressed in only one feature, in the eyes. Austin s 
 great blue eyes, always set a trifle too near his eyebrows, were 
 now prominent, surrounded with a black ring ; and whenever 
 Captain Hertford spoke to him, he turned them on him angri 
 ly, though his speech was gentle. Those eyes seemed to say, 
 " How dare you disturb me ? " And as Captain Hertford 
 looked on them, that veteran warrior and bully said to him 
 self, " The fellow will do. He has power." 
 
 And he remembered the look of those eyes when Austin 
 was in that humor. The old, calm look soon came back 
 again ; and Captain Hertford never saw that look in them any 
 more until the 16th of May, 1846, the night on which the 
 Corn Law Bill was read the third time in the Commons. 
 
 But after a very few miles scarcely more than one a 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 53 
 
 change took place. Austin was disappointed and humiliated 
 beyond what one can well conceive ; and he also fancied, and 
 most properly, that he had been deceived by Captain Hert 
 ford. But the great, good heart which, in spite of alf weak 
 ness and conceit, dictated all his actions, told him that he must 
 speak to some one. There was no one but this red-faced, red- 
 haired soldier, with his sly little eyes, his coarse moustache, 
 and his great, gluttonous mouth ; and so he must talk to him. 
 He had the strongest repugnance to him personally. Yes. 
 He had deceived him and played with him, and hurt his pride. 
 But Well, the man was a man. The fellow could ride, for 
 all his little, deep-set eyes. Not only could ride, but would 
 ride not only would ride, but had ridden so deep into a 
 regiment of infuriated Affghans, that the squadron, which 
 hated him while they followed him, could see nothing of him 
 but the sword which flickered about his head. 
 
 So he was a man at all events, though he might be only a 
 led Captain of Lord Mewstone s. And Austin must speak to 
 some one. And so the expression of the eyes changed alto 
 gether when he next spoke to Captain Hertford. He had the 
 dog Robin s head between his knees, and was smoothing his 
 round forehead, when he looked up suddenly, and said to 
 Captain Hertford, in a low voice, 
 
 " I was in love with that woman." 
 
 Captain Hertford looked uneasily at the coachman, but 
 Austin had calculated on that, and spoken very low. Captain 
 Hertford said, 
 
 " Well ! well ! and are in a rage with me, are you not ? " 
 
 Austin was easily disarmed ; he said, quietly, " No ; I am 
 in a rage with no one but myself. What right has a poor 
 ignorant boy, like me, to be in.a rage with a man of the world 
 like you?" 
 
 Captain Hertford turned suddenly upon him, and then 
 
54 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 turned suddenly away again. " I thought," he said, " that 
 you might be angry because I did not tell you that she was 
 engaged to Lord M." 
 
 " No. You were not called on to do so. What a fool I 
 must have been on the other hand, eh ? " 
 
 " Well, I don t know there : you are singularly handsome, 
 and very ambitious. That sort of thing happens very often. 
 There was Charley Bates and Miss Dawkins, for instance. 
 Charley had led a deuce of a life with her uncle, old Fagin, 
 and Jack Dawkins, her brother, a fellow that every one knew, 
 but who had gone to the devil lately. Old Fagin got hung, 
 no one ever found out what for, and Charley had n t got a rap. 
 So what does he do ? Makes up to Miss Dawkins, who had 
 come into the old man s money (her mother was a Moss 
 one of the Monmouth Street Mosses who had married 
 Fagin s brother, about which there was a story, sir, and a 
 devilish queer one, if you come to that) and married her, and 
 made her cut the shop, and went into a quiet farm in the 
 grass shires," &c., &c. 
 
 Mutatis nominibus, this was about the value of the consola 
 tion which Captain Hertford administered to Austin, as they 
 drove to Bangor. It was possibly as good as any other ; for 
 the way of consoling a gentleman in Austin s circumstances has 
 got to be. discovered, as far as the author is aware. 
 
 When Austin got to town, he found a letter from his father. 
 Mr. Elliot had not returned from Liverpool. Certain breth 
 ren, feeling that they had quite as good a right to a holiday as 
 my Lords of the Shoals and Quicksands, had made the discov 
 ery that the man Elliot had taken all the Shoals Lords up in 
 their yacht, and that they were (no doubt) tampering with the 
 buoys on the Sarn Padrig, which buoys were their business. 
 It was intolerable. They started in their yacht in hot pursuit, 
 overtook the miscreants in Beaumauris Bay, had a wrangle, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 55 
 
 and then steamed off to the island of Mull, the two yachts ra 
 cing till the boilers primed, to see whether the new lighthouse 
 had been painted red, according to Mr. Elliot s suggestion, or 
 white, according to their (the Trinity Brothers ) orders. But 
 they had a pleasant time of it, and dined mutually with infinite 
 good fellowship, in spite of all this divine wrath. 
 
 Austin was still smiling over this letter, when he took up 
 another. It was in Eleanor s handwriting, and ran thus : 
 
 "If you do come home unexpectedly, dear Austin, pray 
 come and see me at once. Father is very ill. 
 
 E. H." 
 
 Austin rang for his servant, and asked when the note had 
 come. 
 
 " Not half an hour ago," the man said. Austin started at 
 once. 
 
 The Hiltons lived in "Wilton Crescent. He hurried there 
 as quick as he could. 
 
 He was shown into the dining-room. Of course his" first 
 question was, " How is Mr. Hilton ? " 
 
 He was worse. Miss Hilton would come down at once, 
 however. 
 
 There was a footstep in the passage he knew full well, and 
 he looked out of the window. He felt disinclined to see 
 Eleanor for some reason ; he would have to tell her of this 
 foolish business about Miss Cecil, and was disinclined to begin. 
 He heard the door quietly opened and the gentle rustle of a 
 woman s dress, and he knew that Eleanor Hilton was in the 
 room, so he turned and confronted this terrible lady, and felt 
 his heart beat the quicker as he did so. 
 
 There stood before him a tiny, delicate, dark woman, dressed 
 very neatly, in very quiet colors. She was like a little, fragile, 
 brown moth, a thing you may crush with your finger ; and the 
 wee, little elfin thing stood before him with her hands crossed 
 
56 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 for an instant without speaking. If Austin had looked at the 
 eager twitching of those hands, he would have known some 
 thing even then. He knew what that motion of the hands 
 meant a day or two before, when he saw Miss Cecil raise her 
 hands towards Lord Mewstone ; but he did not notice it now, 
 for he was looking into her face. 
 
 Was it a handsome face ? ah, no ! Was it a beautiful 
 face ? ah, dear, yes ! Her hair was banded closely down 
 on each side of her great forehead, and her eyes, her clear, 
 large hazel eyes, said as plainly as words could have said to 
 him, " I am a poor little body and very ugly, but I will love 
 you if you will let me." All her features were very regular 
 but very small, and though her upper lip was sharp and her 
 chin was short, the mouth was the best feature in her face, 
 though it might be set too near her nose, and too near her 
 chin, yet it was an exceeding tender mouth ; although it was 
 as sharp cut as Sarah Siddons s, it helped almost as much as 
 the gentle eyes and the open forehead to make you say to 
 yourself, " What a dear, fragile, lovable little body it is." 
 
 The author wonders whether or no it would not have been 
 better if he had said at first that she was like a gentle, bright- 
 eyed, little brown mouse. It is possible that it may be so. 
 
 " I knew," she said, coming up and taking his hands, " that 
 you would come to me." 
 
 " Dear sister," he said, looking into her face, " of course I 
 came to you. How is he ? " 
 
 "Worse." 
 
 "Who is here?" 
 
 " No one but Aunt Maria." 
 
 " Is n t she too much for him ? You know / have a pro 
 found respect for Aunt Maria, but at the same time you 
 know " 
 
 At this moment Aunt Maria, always profoundly penetrated 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 57 
 
 with the idea that young people should not be left too long 
 alone together, came into the room. 
 
 She was a big, red-faced woman, with a Roman nose and a 
 protruding chin. A woman of presence, of such powerful 
 presence that when she entered the room at one end and you 
 were at the other, with your back towards her, you knew it. 
 Was it merely by the vibration of the air, one wonders, or is 
 there, after all, such a thing as animal magnetism ? 
 
 She was a stern woman, with bangles and brooches and a 
 shawl. She revolved in her orbit, surrounded by an atmos 
 phere of Patchouli, calculated, by people curious in astron 
 omy, as being from eleven to twelves times greater than her 
 own diameter. 
 
 The moment that Austin found himself within the atmos 
 phere, he spoke, and asked her how she did. She kept her 
 nose in the air, and motioned Eleanor out of the room. 
 
 " My poor brother is dying," she said ; " and, my dear Aus 
 tin, he wants to see your father. What is to be done ? " 
 
 Why, we can do nothing, dear Miss Hilton ; my father is 
 in the Hebrides. Let me see him." 
 
 " It might be unwise ; I really don t know what to say. 
 Whether or no a strange face " 
 
 " Mine is not a strange face, Miss Hilton." 
 
 " No, no ! but I am in terror ; it is your father he wants. 
 When did you come ? " 
 
 " Just now ; Eleanor wrote for me." 
 
 " She did, did she ! It was giving you a great deal of 
 trouble," she said, looking very angry. 
 
 Now Aunt Maria did not want Austin to see old Hilton, if 
 she could decently help it, for these simple reasons. He had 
 been raving to see Mr. Elliot ; and one of his great anxieties 
 was, as they gathered from his talk, that Austin should many 
 Eleanor. Aunt Maria was very strongly opposed to this. She 
 3* 
 
58 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 was selfish. She had great power with Eleanor, and Eleanor 
 Avould be an heiress. Eleanor might never marry at all, which 
 would be for her benefit, and if she did many she might marry 
 a better man than Austin. She was a silly woman as well as 
 a selfish one. She was taken by surprise at Austin s appear 
 ance, and, not knowing very well what to do, did what silly 
 women generally do when they don t see their way, that is 
 to say, did nothing, but opposed everything^ So she tried to 
 prevent Austin from seeing Mr. Hilton. She failed, as we 
 shall see ; and though the interview was not very important 
 at first sight, yet it had some slight effect on the course of 
 the story. Aunt Maria s intrigue against Austin (in which 
 she was, according to her light, conscientious) grew to be much 
 more important afterwards. She was a foolish woman, but 
 her obstinacy, and her want of sensibility, gave her a terrible 
 power. Greater and stronger people than dear Eleanor have 
 submitted to an Aunt Maria for very peace sake. 
 
 Austin would never have seen Mr. Hilton, I believe, if it 
 had not happened that Sir Rufus James, the doctor, had hap 
 pened to be up-stairs, and had come into the dining-room on 
 his way to his carriage. Austin looked in his kind, gentle face, 
 and, ignoring Aunt Maria, said : 
 
 " Sir Rufus, look here. Mr. Hilton wants to see my father, 
 and he is in the Hebrides. Don t you think I might go up 
 and see him ? " 
 
 The doctor looked kindly on him, and said, " Certainly. It 
 may please him. It will do no man any harm to look at you, 
 my boy. You have got your mother s eyes. Yes, go and see 
 him." 
 
 And so Aunt Maria was vanquished, and Austin went up 
 stairs. 
 
 It was hours before Mr. Hilton was sensible again. He 
 was lying in an uneasy slumber. Austin came into the room, 
 went out again, and waited. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 59 
 
 At last the message came. He went in and found the old 
 man sitting up in bed. At first he thought he was sensible, 
 but the first words Mr. Hilton showed him that he was 
 wrong. They showed him that Mr. Hilton mistook him for 
 his father. 
 
 " Ah, Elliot, * he said, " I thought you would not miss com 
 ing to see me at the last, you who stuck to me through it 
 all. And so you have gone before, eh ? " 
 
 Austin muttered something or another. 
 
 " Yes, you are like the others, you speak inarticulately. I 
 can hardly catch what you say. I shall be able to hear you 
 better soon. I could not hear them very well. Why were 
 you not here with them ? " 
 
 Austin again said something. He was beginning to get 
 awe-struck. 
 
 " It was such a pleasant meeting," continued the old man. 
 " It was in the middle of the night. My daughter Eleanor 
 heard me laughing with them, and she came and sat on the 
 bed, just where she is sitting now, and listened to us three. 
 Did you not, my darling ? " 
 
 Eleanor said, Yes, that she had sat on the bed at half past 
 twelve for some time, and she grew pale. 
 
 " Yes," he said, " she sat there ; and who do you think sat 
 in those two chairs on each side of the bed ? " 
 
 " I can t tell," faltered Austin, who began to feel his hair 
 creep. For the old man before him was talking as clearly 
 as ever, and yet he was delirious, and did not know him. 
 
 " Can t tell, foolish. man ! "Why, Jenkinson sat in that chair, 
 and Canning in that, and my daughter heard us laughing, all 
 three of us, and came to listen. Is it not so, little one ? " 
 
 " I heard you laughing, dear father, and came and sat on 
 the bed to listen." 
 
 " See. She confirms me. Jenkinson had on his brown 
 
CO AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 coat, and Canning was laughing at it. But the strange tiling 
 was the alteration in them. They did not look haggard, and 
 anxious, and worn old men, as they looked when we saw them 
 last, but they had round, merry, beardless faces, just as you 
 have now, and as we all four of us had at Christchurch fifty- 
 five weary years agone. 
 
 " I mentioned that unhappy Austerlitz affair to them, but 
 they said that was forgiven years ago ; that where they were 
 everything was forgiven, and that the tears were wiped 
 from all eyes. I will try to sleep a little before I wake and 
 die." 
 
 After this he leant against his pillow for a minute, and 
 then, with an anxious look, turned towards Austin, and 
 said, 
 
 "Elliot! Elliot! are you there still?" 
 
 Austin answered promptly, " Yes." It was no use unde 
 ceiving him now. 
 
 " I was nearly," said Mr. Hilton, " forgetting the most im 
 portant part of it. Elliot, do you think your son will marry- 
 my daughter Eleanor ? " 
 
 Austin dared say nothing. 
 
 " I can t hear you. I wish he would. She is ugly, but she 
 is amazingly gentle and good. She will have an immense 
 deal of money. He is good, clever, and ambitious. With her 
 money, he will be Prime Minister if he sticks to work. I 
 wish it could be managed. I can t hear you." 
 
 " I put the case to Jcnkinson last night. He said she was 
 pretty ; but he is a fool, she is not. He said that he might do 
 anything in the world with her money. Speak louder. 
 
 " Without her money he will be an office-hunter. He may 
 have the world at his feet with my daughter s money. The 
 doctor told me that that old rat, Cecil, had got him home, to 
 throw him against that handsome daughter of his, and use him 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. Gl 
 
 as a foil to bring Mewstone to the point. You must know, 
 Elliot, that he is only fooling the poor boy ; but if he marries 
 my girl, he may have his revenge on fifty prigs like Mewstone. 
 See to it. See to it. Good night." 
 
 We have slightly sketched Mr. Hilton s career, and this was 
 the end of it. He fell asleep, and awoke to die. 
 
 Let the cunning, avaricious, yet generous and high-minded 
 old man sleep in peace. He made one terrible mistake in life, 
 his treasonable investment in the French Funds. He said 
 on his death-bed that " Jenkinson " had forgiven him. I dare 
 say it is true. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 So, after Austin went home, when poor Mr. Hilton was 
 dead, he found these two sentences ringing in his ears : " He 
 might be Prime Minister with Eleanor s money," and " That 
 old rat, Cecil, had him there as a foil to bring Mewstone to 
 the point." 
 
 About the first of these sentences I have nothing to say ; 
 about the second I have this to say, that whoever put that 
 into the dying man s head told, unwittingly perhaps, a very 
 great falsehood. You know that from what has gone before. 
 If ever there was a love-match between two folks, that match 
 was between Lord and Lady Mewstone. 
 
 We have very little more to do with them, or with people 
 in their rank of life. Austin was getting out of his depth, 
 and we must follow him. But Austin was bred to ambition 
 from his cradle ; and that visit to Mr. Cecil s house, combined 
 with one sentence which Mr. Hilton let fall on his death-bed, 
 influenced that ambition, whatever there may have been of it 
 
62 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 at that time, tenfold, although, after the one great effort of his 
 life, that ambition went to sleep again. 
 
 For he began to think, " Who was this Lord Mewstone, to 
 come cranking in that style ? and who was he, Austin Elliot, 
 that a cunning old man of the world should use such a sting 
 ing, coarse sentence about him as that . . . ? " * 
 
 He was both handsomer and cleverer than Lord Mewstone ; 
 he knew that very well, as did every one else. He had some 
 private fortune. What was there in a young fellow in his 
 position which made these men of the world treat with con 
 tempt the idea that he should marry her ? She came of an 
 old county family, hitherto not ennobled ; so did he. Her 
 family had certainly laid house to house and field to field. 
 His family had done rather the contrary. 
 
 There was no earthly reason for it save this, that the world 
 that world in the dread of whose opinion his father had 
 brought him up would n t hear of such a thing. And then 
 he began to say, " What right had the world ? " and so on. 
 He had been a submissive young whelp hitherto; but the 
 world had (as he thought) tried to take his bone from him, 
 and he growled. But, like a good dog, he soon went to ken 
 nel, and behaved himself. 
 
 Another speech of the old man s still lingered pleasantly in 
 his ears, " He might be Prime Minister." That was very 
 pleasant to think of. He might be a greater man than that 
 prig Mewstone still. His degree would be a high one, there 
 was no doubt of that. The world was before him, and all that 
 sort of thing ; but the old man had annexed one condition to 
 his being Prime Minister, and that was, that he should have 
 Eleanor s money. 
 
 And so he took a resolution, not, I hope, unworthy of him. 
 
 * I have abstained from printing that sentence: it is as well to avoid 
 unnecessary coarseness. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 03 
 
 A fortnight after Mr. Hilton s funeral, he ordered his horse to 
 be saddled ; he mounted it, whistled to Robin, and rode off 
 through the pleasant lanes and commons of Surrey towards 
 Esher, where Eleanor was staying, accompanied by her Aunt 
 Maria. 
 
 Sometimes, under very happy influences, men who have 
 just had a terrible disappointment in love will so far forget it 
 as to whistle, and, to outward eyes, appear for a short time as 
 if they had forgotten it. Such was the case now, as Austin 
 rode along the deep, over-arching lanes, and past the pleasant 
 village greens, with his dog bounding before him, and looking 
 back to see if he were coming. 
 
 He had not ridden very far before he came to a deep, dark 
 lane, with a silver ford at the lower end, and a clacking mill, 
 with a pretty flower-garden, and bees. It was a very beauti 
 ful place, and as he stopped to look at it, he heard a horseman 
 riding quickly down the lane towards him. 
 
 He turned, and saw approaching him, on a noble horse, a 
 young man in white trousers, gallantly dressed, who waved his 
 hand to him. Austin took off his hat and waved it in return. 
 The next moment, the new-comer was beside him, and their 
 hands were locked together. 
 
 " Dear Austin ! " said the one. 
 
 " My dear old fellow ! " said Austin. 
 
 Perhaps the miller s daughter, looking out slyly from behind 
 the sunny flower-beds, faint with wall-flowers, at these two 
 noble young men, who rode, 
 
 " A bow-shot from her bower eaves," 
 
 in the summer sunshine, said to herself, that they were the 
 handsomest and noblest pair of brothers she had ever seen. 
 Perhaps she talked too much about them walking home from 
 church next Sunday with her sweetheart, and make him sulky 
 
Gi AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 about them, until he and she kissed and made it up again on 
 the Sabbath eventide, between the tangled hedges of dogrose 
 and honeysuckle, under the whispering elm-trees. Who 
 knows ? But whether this happened or not, she might have 
 walked all England through, and not found a handsomer pair 
 of young men than they. 
 
 The young man who had overtaken Austin was Lord 
 Charles Barty, the friend of his heart, as like Austin in mind 
 as he was in features. Their friendship had begun at school, 
 and had never waned, had never had a shadow cast over it as 
 yet, and it lasted on to the very end, just the same, without let 
 or hindrance, till the whole business was done and finished, and 
 people began to take their partners for the next dance. 
 
 After describing Austin, there is hardly much need to de 
 scribe his friend, for they were not unlike in face at this time. 
 They were both blonde, handsome boys, really nothing more. 
 Not a hair on either of their chins which they dared (not be 
 ing in the cavalry) to let grow. If both faces had ever de 
 veloped, we should, I think, have found that Lord Charles s 
 face was the most aquiline of the two, and that his eyebrows 
 were more lofty. But there was not much character in either 
 of their faces just now. It would require, as any one might 
 see, a great deal of the padding to come off those faces, before 
 you began to see the death s-head underneath. 
 
 " I know where you are going to, old fellow," said Lord 
 Charles, as they rode together. " The butler told me, and I 
 came on after you. I am glad you are going there." 
 
 " I am only going, Charles, to prevent my ever going again, 
 perhaps." 
 
 " Do you mean to say that you are going to give up Eleanor 
 Hilton ? " said the other, looking serious. 
 
 Austin told him what had passed at Mr. Hilton s death 
 bed. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. G5 
 
 Lord Charles rode in silence a little way, and at last said : 
 
 " You can t be wrong, Austin, because you are acting hon 
 orably. But is there nothing else you have not told me of ? " 
 
 " Of course there is. Your letter came too late, and all the 
 mischief was done. All the whole business was inextricably 
 entangled (he used four or five participles, which would not 
 read well, and so we put it like that) before your letter arrived. 
 And besides, before your letter came, Mewstone was there, and 
 I saw it all." 
 
 " I am so sorry, by Gad ! What a nuisance it was you 
 did n t know," said Lord Charles. 
 
 " Old Hilton said, on his death-bed, that Mr. Cecil had taken 
 me there to make Mewstone jealous." 
 
 " Who said that, Austin ? " said Lord Charles. 
 
 Old Mr. Hilton, on his death-bed ! " 
 
 " Well, de mortuis, &c. But he was utterly mistaken, my 
 boy. In his sober senses he never coupled such a vulgar in 
 trigue as that with the name of such a man as Mr. Cecil, much 
 as he might hate him. There were never two fools more in 
 love with one another since the world began. Will you let me 
 burn your wound out, my boy ? It will hurt, but the wound 
 will heal. I know from fifty fellows that these two fell in love 
 with one another at first sight. That marriage happens to be 
 a splendid family arrangement, but it is only a parcel of cack 
 ling idiots who say that it was made up from family motives 
 only. Let us be just." 
 
 " But why, now I know the truth, I still ask why was I 
 to be considered so far below her?" And poor Austin re 
 peated a coarse expression of the old man s, alluded to before. 
 
 " Who said that about you ? " 
 
 " Old Hilton." 
 
 " God forgive him, Austin ; he was a fool. Austin, that 
 man lost every friend in the world but your father, through 
 
66 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 short-sighted cunning. Even Lord Liverpool never forgave 
 him some dreadful business about the French Funds in 1806. 
 You must not think of the words of a soured, ill-tempered man 
 like that. Mr. Cecil is as incapable of saying or thinking such 
 a thing as my own mother. And as for Mary Cecil, she would 
 have married a Welsh curate if she had chosen. But now, 
 old fellow, to be perfectly just, we must remember this, that in 
 the world the marriage of Lord Mewstone and Miss Cecil was 
 as well-known a fact as that Graham opens the letters. Old 
 Cecil never contemplated the possibility of your being ignorant 
 of it. You are not in the world or of the world yet. Neither 
 am I, but I sit and listen even now. I hear all these things : 
 you do not as yet." 
 
 So did Lord Charles Barty comfort his friend. His friend 
 had more brains than he, but knew less on some points. When 
 people begin to swim on the edge of that pool which is called 
 society, they should take care not to get out of their depths as 
 did Austin. 
 
 " How glorious it is," said he, " to have your dear old voice 
 in my ears again, to give me comfort. I am a different man 
 again. Tell me, old Mentor, who is Captain Hertford? " 
 
 " Have you met him there ? " 
 
 Austin told him how. 
 
 " He is Mewstone s henchman. I believe Mewstone has 
 been fast, very fast. Captain Hertford is cruel, brutal, false, 
 gluttonous, and treacherous." 
 
 " Then why has Lord Mewstone anything to do with 
 him ? " 
 
 " Because such men are useful. Let bygones be bygones. 
 I really know nothing more than this. I heard that character 
 of Hertford from my blind brother Edward, who is always 
 right." 
 
 " But does the world know this of Captain Hertford ? " 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. G7 
 
 " I don t know. I don t know the world yet ; but I know 
 that much about Captain Hertford." 
 
 " The world seems to be fond of easy-going, Charles." 
 
 " Let you and I go into it hand-in-hand together, my boy, 
 and see what it is like. And, Austin, I begin to see that there 
 is another great world down below us, of which you and I 
 know nothing, the world of commerce and labor." 
 
 " You are beginning to find that out, are you ? " said 
 Austin. 
 
 " I think I am. It is there ; and it is beginning to mutter 
 and growl under our feet even now. Did you ever read 
 Humboldt s Travels?" 
 
 No." 
 
 " Nor I ; but I have looked into them. He says, in the 
 Andes, that the earthquakes are preceded by the most terrible 
 underground thunder ; it begins/ muttering and growling, and 
 then it swells up into a horrible roar. After this the earth 
 gapes, and those fools who have not moved their property and 
 their persons are swallowed up. Have you heard this under 
 ground thunder yet ? " 
 
 " Yes, but very few else," said Austin. 
 
 " You are mistaken. Many have heard it, and are prepar 
 ing to move their goods* All we want is a leader, to show us 
 what move to make." 
 
 " Is there such a one ? " said Austin. 
 
 " There is." 
 
 " And the gentleman s name ? " said Austin. 
 
 " Robert Peel." 
 
 " And you have found that out, too," said Austin. " By 
 Jove ! Charles, I believe we have only one heart between the 
 pair of us." 
 
 " Hurrah ! " cried Lord Charles Barty, breaking into a mad 
 gallop across a common, and waving his white hat over his 
 
63 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 head. " Come on, friend of my soul, and let us follow him 
 through it all, through misrepresentation, through obloquy, 
 down to political death itself, which will only end in a more 
 glorious political resurrection. ^ An adventure, Sir Knight, an 
 adventure. A Peel ! a Peel ! to the rescue ! Who is the 
 laggard that won t win his spurs in such a cause ? Peel to 
 the rescue. Hurrah ! " 
 
 Now it so befell that there were a great many geese on this 
 common, over which Lord Charles Barty rode so madly, cry 
 ing out the name of a certain right honorable baronet ; and he 
 had the misfortune to ride over one of these geese, and on his 
 return had to pay five shillings to a vociferous old woman who 
 saw him do it. But of all the geese on that common, were 
 there, do you think, two greater geese than Austin Elliot and 
 Lord Charles Barty? But that is exactly the sort of stuff 
 that some young fellows talked in 44. We are all much 
 wiser now, are we not? 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THEIR gallop brought them across the common and to the 
 house where Eleanor was staying with Aunt Maria. Here 
 Austin s friend left him, and went to an inn, and put up his 
 horse to wait for him ; and Austin rang at the bell. 
 
 The house was a great red-brick house, with narrow win 
 dows, standing a long way back, with a wall and two carnage- 
 gates beside the road. There were also two cedars, a big bell 
 in a little pent-house just inside the gate, and a big dog, who 
 barked when you rang it. That house will be taken by a doc 
 tor, and made a private madhouse of some day, as the march 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. CO 
 
 of intellect goes on, and London expands. If it were ten miles 
 nearer town, it would be snapped up at once for that purpose. 
 If you ask, " Why for a madhouse, not for a school ? " the 
 answer is, that the grounds are too large for a schoolmaster, 
 and until they began to build it in, and take the land off his 
 hands, it would n t pay him. The Chouse before which Austin 
 stood will become either a madhouse or an institution of some 
 sort or another. 
 
 A great deal might be said about these old suburban 
 houses. The author would like nothing better than to dwell 
 on their peculiarities, but this is not the place for doing so. 
 He begs the reader s patience for only a very few words 
 about them. They were built, most of them, in the beginning 
 of last century, and have been degraded and degraded from 
 one purpose to another, each one lower than the last, until 
 they are pulled down because they interfere with a new ter 
 race or square. The general fate which awaits all of- them is 
 degradation and death ; but sometimes they are preserved 
 even in the midst of the great flood of bricks, and then they 
 fetch high rents. 
 
 Did any reasonable man ever go to walk through the west 
 ern part of Chelsea on to Walham Green and Fulham, if he 
 could manage to walk anywhere else? Most likely not. 
 And yet there are some houses standing about there which 
 will make a man think of if he choose to think. Take one 
 of those suburban houses built about 1700, and think about 
 it, and people it over again with three generations. Take a 
 long, low, back-lying house in the King s Road, Chelsea, in 
 front of which they have built shops. That was once a quiet 
 gentleman s house, with elm-trees round it, where several 
 generations of children tumbled down-stairs and fell out of 
 window, and lost their tops and balls in the water-butt, and 
 laughed and cried, and quarrelled and made it up, until they 
 
70 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 grew to handsome young men and women. How many pairs 
 of happy lovers went a-courting in that summer-house at the 
 end of the garden ! before Mr. Mullins took it and made a 
 madhouse of it, and the woman who thought she was queen 
 took possession of the summer-house, and hunted us boys out 
 
 of it when we dared go in ; and before they put Miss II , 
 
 a strong, red-faced woman, with a big throat and thick lips, 
 into the old nursery, where she screamed and yelled and tore 
 night and day for above a year, till it pleased God to put an 
 end to her misery. 
 
 And when the madhouse was removed to Putney, Waterer 
 took the house and grounds, and exhibited his rhododendrons 
 and azaleas there ; and all society came down to look at them, 
 and the line of carriages extended far up and down the King s 
 Road. Then the dreary old garden, in which the mad-woman 
 used to walk so wearily up and down, was filled with a blaze 
 of flowering American plants. And on the very same ground 
 where the author, a frightened boy, looking over the palings, 
 has seen poor Miss H , in her strait-waistcoat, cast her 
 self screaming down among the cabbage-plants, and bite the 
 earth with her teeth, on that very same ground all the dan 
 dies and beauties of London were walking and talking. The 
 last I know of that piece of ground is, that the man who lets 
 flys had laid it down in oats. Sic transit, &c. That is the 
 history of one suburban house, carefully told, and there are 
 very many with far stranger histories than that. 
 
 The study of these old red-brick suburban houses has given 
 the author so much pleasure in his time that he has tried to 
 give the reader some interest in them, and make him partake 
 of the same pleasure. This is the only time he means to 
 offend in this way in this story ; and so he casts himself on 
 his reader s mercy. 
 
 Austin, who had dismounted, rang the bell again, and again 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 71 
 
 the big dog barked : this time, also, a door was opened ; and 
 Austin heard a man, apparently a footman, say, " Four ounces 
 is four, and two quarters is a tizzy, and a bob lost tossing 
 makes two half-bulls and a bender, don t it, you aggravating 
 minx ? " And then, instead of coming to Austin s assistance, 
 Austin heard him shut the door again. , 
 
 So he had to ring once more. This time he heard the door 
 opened again, and footsteps approaching. Immediately the 
 wicket in the carriage-gate was thrown back, and in the 
 aperture stood a little, lean old footman, with a cross face and 
 very gray hair, who cried out, " Now then, young fellow ! " 
 
 " Now then, young fellow," said Austin, " how about the 
 two half-bulls and the bender ? " 
 
 The old man laughed. " It s them gals, Mr. Austin, got a 
 shilling of mine among un somewhere, and wants to bounce 
 me out of it. Told me you was the baker s boy, too. Come 
 in afore she sees you, else she 11 not be at home. She is galli 
 vanting in the paddock with Captain Hertford"." 
 
 " The deuce ! " thought Austin ; " who is Captain Hert 
 ford ? " he said. 
 
 " The gentleman as you met in Wales the week afore last, 
 when you fell in love with Miss Cecil, and as you travelled 
 with and told all about it, and as come and told we all about 
 it. That s about who Captain Hertford is, Master Austin." 
 
 " But what is he doing here ? " asked Austin, only half 
 aloud. 
 
 " Making love to the old woman," said the old man, speak 
 ing very loud and plain. 
 
 " Confound you, James, don t be a ridiculous fellow," said 
 Austin, laughing. " Making love to Aunt Maria ? " 
 
 "That s about the size on it," said James. "Now come 
 quick into the stable-yard afore she sees you. You would n t 
 see much of Miss Eleanor if she caught siirht on yc 
 
72 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " How is Aunt Maria ? " said Austin, in the stable-yard, 
 after a groom had gone off with his horse. 
 
 " Owdacious," said James. " Drat her, she always were 
 owdacious, worn t she ? " he continued, scratching his head. 
 When he saw Austin frown and shake his head : " I mean she 
 always were a owdacious fine woman of her age." 
 
 " Where did you say she was ? " said Austin. 
 
 " Where is she ? " said James, getting desperate and rebel 
 lious, " why, she s up-stairs, and she s down-stairs, and she s 
 in my lady s chamber ; all three at once sometimes. Slie al 
 ways were a deuce of a woman to come round a corner on 
 you sharp ; but since the will was read, she shall come round 
 a corner again any woman in England for a new hat, or a 
 tripe supper for eight. The gals is losing flesh over her. 
 They was giggling up-stairs the day before yesterday, and I see 
 her come slipping out of the drawing-room like a old pussy-cat, 
 and so I hits myself down the back-stairs with a tray full of 
 glasses, and brings her that way, and now the ungrateful 
 minxes wants to do me out of a shilling." 
 
 " I hope you caught it, sir ? " said Austin. 
 
 " Catch it ? There, let s talk about something else, Master 
 Austin. However, I can always stop her when I have had 
 enough. Come on." 
 
 " I hope you did n t answer her." 
 
 " I only told her not to regard my feelings, for that I was 
 used to the ways of old people, and that when people came to 
 her time of life, they naturally got brittle in the temper, the 
 same as they lost their teeth." 
 
 " How could you say such a thing, James ? You know 
 if you go on like that she will be obliged to ask Miss 
 Eleanor to discharge you. And I warn you that, deeply 
 attached as I and she are to you, I could not say a word 
 in your favor." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 73 
 
 " She 11 never ask Miss Eleanor to do that. I know too 
 much." And so saying, he opened the drawing-room door, 
 and announced 
 
 "Master Austin." 
 
 Eleanor rose up and came towards him ; she held out her 
 hands towards him, but that was not enough ; she took both 
 his hands in hers, but that was not enough either ; so the poor 
 innocent, silly little body burst out a-crying so piteously that 
 Austin took her in his arms and kissed her. 
 
 " I am so miserable, dear brother," she said. " How kind 
 of you to come to me." 
 
 " And I, dear sister, am so unhappy too," said Austin, who, 
 ten minutes before, had been galloping and shouting with Lord 
 Charles Barty across the common. He did not mean to be 
 hypocritical or untrue. He did really think he was unhappy, 
 and so he was. 
 
 " What is the matter, dear Austin ? " she said. " I ask for 
 a very selfish reason. If you will tell me your sorrows, I 
 shall certainly forget mine. So you have been staying at the 
 Cecils ? " 
 
 Yes." 
 
 "And what did you think of Ah, Austin, you wrote 
 me no merry letters from there. You would not confide in 
 me about that. I expected a long letter, filled, as usual, with 
 wild admiration for the last ineligible young lady ; but when 
 none came, I, knowing Fanny Cecil, knew what had happened 
 at once." 
 
 "What do you mean?" 
 
 " Knew that you had fallen in love for the first time in your 
 life." 
 
 " By Jove ! Eleanor, you are right. How you guessed that 
 I cannot tell." 
 
 " If these two this handsome, noble young lad, and this 
 
 4 
 
74 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 quiet, dark-haired girl had at that moment been in the 
 Palace of Truth, Eleanor would have answered, 
 
 " Because I have loved you and none other ever since I 
 could love any one, and because I shall never love any other 
 man as I do you to the day of my death." 
 
 But they were in an old red-brick house on a common in 
 Surrey, and Aunt Maria was plainly to be seen in the paddock 
 walking with Captain Hertford. They were in a palace which 
 was not of truth, and so she only said, 
 
 " No one could doubt it who knew Fanny Cecil. I eonid 
 have told you that she was to marry Lord Mewstone. I 
 would gladly have saved you this, brother, but I never dreamt 
 that you were to be thrown against her in that way. When I 
 heard you were there, I dreaded that it would happen. 
 Why did rrot Charles Barty warn you ? " 
 
 " He did ; but his warning came too late." 
 
 " Ah ! he was at Turin. Austin," she said, very quietly, 
 "I want to speak to you." 
 
 Austin looked up at her. Her hands were quietly folded 
 before her, her eyes were more brilliant and prominent than 
 usual, and she was very pale. Her mouth was tightly set, 
 and there was not a twitch in the muscles of it. The upper 
 lip and the chin, both too short at ordinary times, seemed 
 shorter than ever now. Austin began to see what she would 
 be like when she was an old woman. 
 
 Eleanor loved Austin so deeply, as never man was loved 
 before, she thought. Better than herself by far ; for by the 
 very slightest management she might marry him, advise him, 
 feed his ambition, give him wealth and ambition, triumph with 
 him in success, console him in disappointment, get him taught 
 the ways of the world, bring him into society by her wealth, 
 nay, more than all, teach him to worship at the same altar 
 with her, to love the same God, to trust to the same hope of 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 75 
 
 salvation, she would do none of these things ; she was going 
 to give him his dismissal forever, with a slight reservation. 
 
 And why ? Because Austin could never love her. Because, 
 if he did not love her, he would merely marry her for her 
 money. And then the consciousness that he was untrue to 
 himself would prey on him, and render him miserable, lower 
 his moral tone, and make him feel that his whole career was a 
 false one. 
 
 That is the way she reasoned, that was the way she 
 accounted for her conduct. She was one of the best and 
 noblest little women that ever lived (as the reader will con 
 fess when he has read the book to the end) ; she reasoned in 
 this way, it was satisfactory reasoning enough ; but, never 
 theless, her own soul said something else, and would make 
 itself heard ; it said : " He shall love me, and woo me, before 
 he win me ! " But she said, 
 
 " Austin, do you remember my father s death-bed ? " 
 
 He said, " Yes ! " He could hardly believe that she could 
 anticipate the very matter on which he was ready to speak. 
 But she did so. 
 
 " I can speak to you quite openly, now your heart is so 
 deeply engaged. You must forget everything that passed, 
 everything he said, every hint he gave, or we must part here, 
 once and for all." 
 
 " I know it," said Austin. " Things might have been which 
 can never be now. My heart is gone ; I came to tell you so. 
 I came to tell you that I would be your brother, your servant ; 
 would go through the world at your side ; that your husband 
 should be the friend of my heart ; but that your wealth alone 
 would render it impossible for me to be more. Therefore, 
 having said this to one another, we can now go through the 
 world hand in hand, on just the same terms as we have 
 hitherto done." 
 
76 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " We will, Austin. I will be Aunt Eleanor to your children, 
 and Sister Eleanor to you ; but don t leave me all alone. You 
 are the only friend I have. I dare talk to you now, brother, 
 you see." 
 
 So they talked confidentially, till there was an alarm of 
 Aunt Maria, and then Austin went away ; this highly platonic 
 arrangement being brought to a satisfactory termination. 
 
 A very satisfactory one, indeed. Eleanor, two minutes after 
 wards, had locked herself into her bedroom, and thrown her 
 self on her bed, in a wild passion of tears, wishing that she 
 never had been born ; wishing that Austin had never seen 
 Miss Cecil; wishing that she might die in her grief; doing 
 everything, in short, but blaming Austin. And there she lay, 
 till the tempest of her grief began to get less strong, and its 
 gusts less frequent and violent, and at last raised her weary- 
 worn little face up, and prepared to go down-stairs, and be 
 furiously scolded by her cruel old aunt. Yes, this half of 
 the arrangement was very satisfactory ; now for the other. 
 
 When Austin got back to Lord Charles Barty, he looked as 
 black as thunder. He quarrelled with his horse, he quarrelled 
 with his dog, and was very much inclined to quarrel with Lord 
 Charles ; but that was not an easy matter at any time, or by 
 any person. So he contented himself with sulking all the way 
 home, and giving short answers. Lord Charles was surprised 
 at this. He had never seen Austin cross so long before. He 
 did what every good fellow ought to do, when his friend is 
 angry : he appeared concerned and anxious, but spoke of in 
 different matters, leaving Austin to open his grief to him. 
 
 When they came to Mortlake, Austin said, " Let us ride on 
 to London, Charles." 
 
 " Yes, suppose we do. I should like it. Will you take 
 Robin ? " 
 
 " Yes, I think so. You can trust him anywhere." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 77 
 
 " Yes, he is a wise fellow, that Robin," said Lord Charles. 
 " Way forrid, Min ! that s what the Scotch shepherds say 
 to their dog. See, he is gone away like a thunderbolt after 
 imaginary sheep. He is a fine fellow." 
 
 " I say, Charles." 
 
 "Ay, ay!" 
 
 " I have made such a cursed fool of myself." 
 
 So the second half of the grand platonic arrangement 
 seemed far from satisfactory also. 
 
 CHAPTEK XI. 
 
 LATE as it was, Austin and his friend posted off to join 
 their reading party at Bangor, and with them went the dog 
 Robin, of course. 
 
 There were nine of them in that reading party, and they 
 spent that summer, one of those happy golden periods 
 which surely comes at least once in a man s life, unless he be 
 an exceptionally unfortunate one. Very unlucky must the 
 man be who has no golden age to look back at fondly in 
 after years. Dull must be the life of a child who cannot say, 
 " Once, in spring-time, I went into a meadow, and gathered 
 cowslips." 
 
 Lucky, again fortunate beyond most men must these 
 nine have been, if any other period ever came, in any of their 
 lives, sufficiently happy to make them forget this summer of 
 theirs at Bangor, in 1844 ; a time of youth, health, hope, 
 ambition, and friendship. Snowdon was behind them, the sea 
 before, Anglesey sleeping in the sunshine, the Ormshead 
 floating like a blue mist in the horizon, and Pemnaenmawr 
 
78 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 towering black and awful above the little white farm in the 
 wood at Aber. Golden sands, blue sea, and slow-sailing 
 summer-clouds aloft. 
 
 Were they idle ? O dear, yes. Seven of them, God 
 bless them, were horribly idle. The good Professor scold 
 ed, predicted that they would all be either " gulfed " or 
 " ploughed " ; said he sincerely hoped that they would be ; 
 said that the foundations of justice would be sapped at the 
 root if they were n t : but it was no use ; they all loved him 
 too well to mind him. They were very good for a few days 
 after one of these terrible jobations ; but then two of them 
 would be missing at their hour, the Professor would go to 
 their lodgings, and find from their landlady, that some idle 
 villain of a university man, who was not going to be in the 
 October term, had arrived promiscuously in the town, and had 
 induced them to go off to Llyn Ogwen, or some of those 
 places, the names of which the good Professor will hate to his 
 dying day. 
 
 Hayton and Dayton went and lodged at Garth, because it 
 was out of the w T ay, inconvenient, and dirty, and a mile from 
 the scene of tuition. Hayton, who was fat, fished for four 
 months from the end of the pier, and caught nothing, but 
 smoked 8 Ib. 9 oz. of tobacco. He also, during this time, 
 made love to Maria Williams, the pilot s daughter, and pro 
 posed to her on Michaelmas-day, after the goose dinner, on 
 which occasion she refused him in favor of Owen Owens, a 
 young ship-carpenter. Dayton, meanwhile, bought the yacht 
 Arhydanos, of 1 cwt. register ; length between perpendiculars, 
 6 feet 4 inches ; extreme breadth, 18 inches ; depth of hold, 
 2 feet 6 inches ; and essayed to drown himself therein ; and 
 did not succeed, merely because, whenever he put forth into 
 the deep, three or four small fishing-boats used to follow him, 
 and when he was capsized, which happened every time but 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 79 
 
 one when he went out, used to pick him up, and fight for 
 him, at the rate of half a crown a head per man, and a shilling 
 for boys ; being at the rate of thirty shillings a voyage. 
 
 Horton and Morton did not live in Bangor, but stayed at 
 Aber, five miles off, because it was out of the way and more 
 expensive ; and they got so attached to the good people there, 
 and the good people there so attached to them, that they 
 refused to move into the town, though the Professor ful 
 minated "about it. They were the most tiresome follows of 
 all ; for, not content with idling about, shooting sea-gulls and 
 stints themselves, they would think nothing of getting half the 
 party to dine with them, and, after dinner, of seducing the 
 whole lot of them up the glen by the waterfall, and over the 
 summit of Carnedd Llewellyn to Capel Curig, a trifling dis 
 tance of fifteen miles or so, and sending them home to Bangor 
 after a couple of days, by Nant Frangon. 
 
 The other seven lived in Bangor, and were not so intolera 
 bly idle as these two. Only two of the whole party read 
 really steadily and well, and those two were Austin Elliot and 
 Lord Charles Barty. 
 
 Was Austin happy? I am afraid so, although he woukt 
 have been very angry if any one had accused him of it. He 
 was, by way of being miserable. He thought he was, but he 
 was quite mistaken. In the first place, he was getting over 
 the disappointment about Miss Cecil ; and in the next, there is 
 pretty nearly as much pleasure as pain in an affair of that 
 sort. For is that strange, wild, yearning jealousy pain ? 
 Catch me a man, a penniless, friendless man, with all his 
 hopes broken, and all his friends gone, and ask him. Ask 
 him what he would give to feel his bitterest disappointment 
 of this kind over again. 
 
 No, he was not unhappy. A nine days affair of the kind 
 does not, in this barbarous island, hit so very hard. The more 
 
80 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 refined French smother themselves with charcoal ; or, as two 
 of them did a few years ago, take a warm bath, put on a clean 
 shirt, and blow their brains out simultaneously, leaving behind 
 them what we barbarians would call a horribly blasphemous 
 paper. But Austin s class was nearly safe, and so he read 
 hard, and made it so. 
 
 This visit of his to Tyn y Rhaiadr was a very important 
 one ; for he not only fell in love with Miss Cecil, in itself an 
 important affair, but he also made the acquaintance of Captain 
 Hertford, and, moreover, had the dog Robin given to him as 
 a present. 
 
 They had been at Bangor about a month, when one day 
 Austin went out to Aber, in the afternoon, with Horton and 
 Morton, for he was rather fagged with work, and left Lord 
 Charles at home at Bangor over his Pindar. They went a- 
 fishing for the smallest sample of trout I know of on the face 
 of the whole globe, that evening, and caught a few of them ; 
 and in the evening stood under the highest waterfall in Wales, 
 and saw the lace-like threads of water streaming over the black 
 rocks from a height of one hundred and eighty feet, and after 
 that turned merrily homewards. 
 
 Between the waterfall and the sea at Aber is one of the 
 most extraordinary shoreless chasms I have ever seen. The 
 stream runs through it, but, as we used to believe, no man has 
 ever been through it since Creation. It is half a mile long, a 
 succession of shoreless lyns and slippery rocks. And Austin, 
 coming to the upper end of it, proposed to swim through. He 
 never did, though some one else has actually done so since ; 
 for as he was beginning to undress himself, with that eager 
 ness and haste with which young. British and Irish men of 
 three-and-twenty hail the opportunity of drowning themselves, 
 or breaking their necks, Robin bounded joyously forward, and 
 some one appeared coming rapidly towards them. They saw, 
 in a few minutes, that it was Lord) Charles Barty. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 81 
 
 " Austin," he said, breathlessly, " the Lords nave reversed 
 the sentence of the lower courts, and acquitted O Connell. 
 The only one of the four who went for him was Brougham." 
 
 " I told you so," said Austin. " What a noble way of 
 smothering him. And old Brougham against him, eh ? Lord ! 
 what a world it is ; old Brougham, eh ? Conceive the sly 
 ness of the man, will you ? " 
 
 " Don t you impute low motives," said Lord Charles ; " it 
 is the habit of a young and unformed mind." 
 
 " Go to Bath," said Austin. " I say, I am going to swim 
 through this chasm." 
 
 " No, don t be an ass," said the other. " Come and walk 
 with me ; I have something to tell you." 
 
 " So you did n t come all this way to tell me about Dan, 
 then ? " said Austin. 
 
 " No," said he. " I got tired of my work, and I thought of 
 you and the other fellows having a jolly evening here, and I 
 came out in a car. Besides, I have seen some one since you 
 left." 
 
 " Who ? " 
 
 " Why, Lord and Lady Mewstone. They have come from 
 Chester, and are going on to Tyn y Bliaiadr to-morrow morn 
 ing. He has called at your lodgings, and he is going to call 
 again ; and, and I thought I would come out and tell you, 
 old fellow ; that is all." 
 
 " By Jove, you are a good fellow," said Austin ; " what the 
 deuce should I do without you ? What had I better do ? " 
 
 " Let us stay here. You don t know what Hertford may 
 have said, or what she has heard. As for him, his nose is 
 far too high in the air for him to suppose that you had ever 
 thought of her otherwise than as a goddess. Hertford would 
 never have -dared to let him hear anything. If he had, he 
 would not be so affectionate." 
 
 4* F 
 
82 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " But do you think that she ever guessed ? " 
 
 " Lord knows ! I don t understand women. Hertford knows 
 that you were deeply taken with her. How do you or I know 
 whether he has n t used that knowledge to keep his position 
 with her ? How do you know, that in a gentle way, he has 
 not let her know that he knows it, and so avoid the conge 
 which he would most certainly get, the moment she came into 
 power ? She is afraid of Mewstone, everybody is afraid of 
 him. I would n t go back to Bangor to-night. Stay here till 
 they are clear off; it won t do you any good to see her again ; 
 and if she sees you, and if Hertford has been saying anything 
 (may the deuce confound : him !) she might look confused, or 
 something. So let s stay here at Lewis s and have a rubber." 
 
 And so they stayed and had a rubber, and poor Austin 
 played very bad, trumped his partner s (of course Lord 
 Charles s, for people generally pay dearly for actions of good 
 nature in small things) knave, led out strong suits of trumps 
 without any suit to follow, " bottled " them when his partner 
 led them first time round, drew two trumps for one, did, in 
 fact, everything but revoke, from which he was kept by a mere 
 brute instinct. Instead of thinking of his cards, he was think 
 ing of Lady Mewstone, about whom he had as much business 
 to think as of Noah s eldest daughter, about whose existence 
 we have no information. But he had a patient, affectionate 
 partner, who only laughed louder at each blunder. Lord 
 Charles would do more for him than lose three-and-twenty 
 shillings. Austin paid him for all his affectionate forethought 
 one clay. We shall see how. 
 
 The next morning, Lord and Lady Mewstone had disap 
 peared in a cloud -of dust towards Caernarvon. And Austin 
 and his friend walked into Bangor, in time to take their hour 
 with the good Professor. 
 
 The next night but one, Austin sat up very late over some 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 83 
 
 work. He had hardly been in bed more than three hours, 
 when he was awoke by being shaken, and, turning over, saw 
 Lord Charles standing over him. 
 
 Let me sleep," he said, " I am so tired. I have hardly 
 got to bed." 
 
 u Get up, Austin," said the other. " We have been down 
 to bathe. There is a screw steamer coming up the Straits. 
 I am nearly sure it is the Pelican." 
 
 Austin was out of bed in a moment, and, dressing quickly, 
 ran down to the point. It was the dear old Pelican, lying 
 about two hundred yards out from the point, with a little 
 steam coming from her steam -pipe, every now and then giving 
 a throb or two with her propeller, just enough to keep her 
 beautiful sharp bows stationary against the green sea-water, 
 for the tide was setting strongly down the Straits towards the 
 bridge. 
 
 They have never improved on the model of the Pelican any 
 more than they have on the model of the Great Britain. The 
 lines of the Pelican, however, were more like those of the 
 Himalaya than those of the Great Britain. If you put your 
 two hands together before your face, expand them till they 
 form a right angle with one another, and then bring them 
 together until they form half a right angle, your two hands 
 will have nearly represented the sides of the Pelican from 
 bow to stern. 
 
 The Professor and Horton and Morton were alj there after 
 their bathe, and, as Lord Charles and Austin came up, were 
 admiring the beauty of the vessel. And, after a moment, Aus 
 tin said, 
 
 u It is the Pelican, and there is my governor. Let s all 
 come on board." 
 
 There never was such a reasonable proposition. They all 
 bundled into a boat together at once. The Professor, when 
 
84 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 they were seated, reminded Horton that his hour came before 
 breakfast, and that therefore they must not be more than ten 
 minutes. Horton, finding himself on the high seas, grew in 
 solent and mutinous, and broached the extraordinary theory, 
 that the powers and jurisdiction of a coach or tutor did 
 not extend beyond low-water mark. The Professor fired up 
 at this, and challenged him to produce his authority, and they 
 were in full wrangle, and both beginning to get angry, when 
 the boat swung to under the yacht s side, and they all had to 
 tumble up on deck. It now appeared that the dog Robin had 
 stowed himself away under a thwart, and, having discovered 
 himself, was walking about in a dangerous way over the top 
 of everything, proposing to do frightful things with himself, 
 unless taken on board. When he was hoisted on deck, during 
 which process he was as good as gold, he smelt Aunt Maria s 
 Pomeranian, head over heels, down the engine-room ladder. 
 
 At the gangway they were met by a handsome old gentle 
 man a genial, good-tempered-looking old gentleman 
 whose eyes brightened up when they met Austin s, and there, 
 somehow, they were all looking another way for a moment, as 
 gentlemen will on certain occasions. But only for one mo 
 ment ; in the next Austin was introducing them to his father, 
 with an air of triumph in his handsome face, as if he was 
 saying, " Come, now, which of you has got such a governor 
 as I ? " 
 
 " Mr. Elliot," said the Professor, " one of my pupils has 
 mutinied in the boat, and has insulted me. He says that my 
 authority does not extend beyond low-water mark." 
 
 " He is perfectly right, my dear sir," said Mr. Elliot. " I 
 know, in the way of business, a little of that sort of thing, and 
 you have n t a leg to stand on. If it were not so, your author 
 ity is merged into mine on my own deck. Ask Phillimore, 
 ask any one. Gentlemen, I request that you will immediately 
 come aft. Lord Charles Barty, a word with you." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 85 
 
 He spoke to him for a moment, and then Lord Charles ran 
 to the engine-room ladder, and roared out, " Go ahead full 
 speed ! " and then ran to the side, and called out, " Cast off 
 the painter, there ! " And cast off that painter was, and 
 ahead at full speed that vessel went, with the Professor pro 
 testing against piracy and deforcement ; threatening to take 
 the matter into the Arches ; protesting that Hayton was 
 coming for his hour at ten, that he would be plucked, and 
 that his widowed mother would sink into her grave broken 
 hearted ; but the cranks were gleaming, and the screw was 
 spinning, and her head was for Holy Island, and they were 
 all laughing at him, and so the Professor laughed himself. 
 
 " Father," said Austin, " you have stole Aunt Maria s dog, 
 and my dog has tumbled it down into the engine-room." 
 
 Mr. Elliot had no time to explain, for, coming aft, they saw 
 that there were two ladies on board, sitting close to the wheel, 
 the one a large, red-faced, ill-tempered-looking lady, who 
 was Aunt Maria, and a sweet, gentle, dark-looking little 
 lady, almost like a Frenchwoman, who was Eleanor. 
 
 u By Jove ! " thought Austin, for an instant ; " Eleanor is 
 really very pretty. And how well she dresses ! " 
 
 Mr. Elliot presented the Professor and the pupils to Aunt 
 Maria, and she received them graciously, though she was hor 
 ribly cross (why, you will guess soon). So Austin and Elea 
 nor had just a few words together by themselves. 
 
 " Dear Eleanor ! " 
 
 " Dear Austin ! " 
 
 " How on earth did Aunt Maria and you come to go to sea 
 with the governor? If she offers to marry him, $-*!! " 
 
 " Don t be ridiculous, Austin dear. Suppose she \vas to 
 hear you ? " 
 
 " She could n t hate me worse than she does. I was only 
 joking. I know the governor too well. But how was it?" 
 
8G AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " I had to have change of air, and Mr. Elliot asked us. 
 We, neither of us, mind the sea, you know. So we came." 
 
 They had time to say thus much, and then it became neces 
 sary to introduce the Professor and Horton and Morton to 
 Eleanor. Austin stood beside her while they were presented. 
 There was one look in all the three faces, that of pleased 
 admiration. He looked at her again. 
 
 "I never thought Eleanor pretty," said his most, serene, 
 illustrious, and imperial high mightiness to himself. " But 
 these fellows seem to admire her. University men always 
 admire every girl they come across," continued the blase man 
 of the world, who had just been confessing to his friend that 
 he knew nothing of that world. "And, besides, she has a 
 sweet little face of her own," concluded the real Austin 
 Elliot 
 
 So she had. At breakfast, in the pretty-decorated cabin, 
 while the green water was seething past them and through 
 every open port-hole, the purple Caernarvonshire mountains 
 were seen over the summer sea, as though set in a frame : at 
 that pleasant breakfast in the fresh, morning air, it was evi 
 dent that both Horton and Morton were quite of that opinion. 
 Whether they talked to her, to Austin, to Lord Charles Barty, 
 or to one another, they always looked at her, and watched to 
 see what she thought of what they said. They were two 
 clever young fellows, but they seemed more brilliant than 
 usual this morning : they were two handsome young fellows, 
 but they seemed handsomer than usual now ; there was a 
 grander air about them than usual. In ordinary times, among 
 their fellows, they could be coarse and rude with the rest ; but 
 here, before this dark-eyed little girl, there was an air of high 
 bred, chivalrous courtesy about them, not only towards her, 
 but towards every one else. There was something about 
 Eleanor which had changed them, had put them on their 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 87 
 
 mettle. There was something in that girl, after all. Austin 
 was getting proud of Eleanor, in the same way as a Scotch 
 man is proud of Glenlyon, as if he had helped to make it. 
 
 And Lord Charles Barty, good soul, sat and looked on, and 
 laughed to himself, things were going on as he wished. 
 
 Aunt Maria was by way of being a clever woman ; and, 
 indeed, she was a clever woman in one way, though possibly 
 if one had told her the grounds on which one considered her 
 clever, she would have been very angry. She could talk about 
 nearly everything, and had so much of the dexterity of a 
 woman of the world, that her knowledge, by no means small, 
 was made to go a very long way. She was very cross at 
 Austin s getting Eleanor at the other end of the table, among 
 his friends ; but she knew it was no use being cross. The 
 Professor had been handed over to her bodily, and she applied 
 herself to her task with a will, and her task was twofold, to 
 show off her own knowledge to him, and to pick his brains for 
 future use. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 AFTER breakfast they all went on deck. Now, Mr. Elliot 
 was an old-fashioned man, who hated smoking, and never for 
 one instant tolerated it on his quarter-deck. But this did not 
 prevent Austin wanting a cigar ; and, besides, he wanted to 
 think somewhat, wanted, in fact, to think about Eleanor, 
 and the cause of her amazing success that morning. " The 
 little brown thing," he thought, " how wonderfully pretty she 
 is!" 
 
 The moment he came on the main deck, Robin loped up to 
 him, and jumped on him ; after that he dropped his tail and 
 ears, and followed him. 
 
88 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 The proper place to light your cigar is in the engine-room, 
 particularly when the chief engine-man is your most particular 
 friend and gossip. So Austin went down the engine-room 
 ladder, while Robin stood atop, with his head on one side, one 
 ear up and the other down, waiting to see whether or no his 
 master would come up that way again, or whether he had to 
 run round and meet him somewhere else. Aunt Maria s Pom 
 eranian came and looked down too, but, not being able to un 
 derstand the situation, sat on the deck and proceeded with his 
 toilet. 
 
 " And how s a wi ye, Master Austin ? " said the chief 
 engineer. " How s a wi ye, my bonnie young gentleman ? " 
 
 " So so, George. Well enough. I say, old man, you 
 have n t got that meerschaum of yours ? Let us have a quiet 
 pull at it, with some of the Cavendish. When I do come to 
 sea, I don t care a hang for cigars." 
 
 Austin had some other low tastes besides dog-fancying, you 
 see. He preferred tobacco to cigars. He had his wicked 
 will, and when he was in the first stage of complaining, he 
 said, 
 
 " How is she, Geordie ? " 
 
 " She s vera weel. She s going her sixty -twa." 
 
 " Those boxwood bearings did n t do, did they ? " 
 
 " They didna do so bad, but the hornbeam are better. 
 Ay, none but a Scotchman would turn ye out such engines 
 as they." 
 
 " Why, they are Penn s, of Greenwich." 
 
 " Ay ! ay ! ay ! they are Penn s, of Greenwich, De il 
 doubt it. There s his name on them. But wha made em ? 
 A Scotchman, sir ; a Falkirk man." 
 
 " I don t believe you, Geordie. I have a good mind to take 
 you by the hair of your head and bang your head against the 
 companion-ladder, for that dreadful story." . 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 80 
 
 " O, ye 11 no do that to yer old Geordie. Hey, my bonnie, 
 bonnie boy, ye Lave got some Scot s blude in ye. Never such 
 a bonnie boy as you came out of England. Where got ye 
 yon dog ? " 
 
 " Miss Cecil gave him to me." 
 
 Geordie turned his noble, Wilkie-like face round on him for 
 one instant, and then turned it away again. He said, 
 
 " Mistress Cecil ! That s my Leddy Mewstone." 
 
 And Austin said, " Yes." That was all they said ; but Aus 
 tin knew that, somehow, his old friend George had heard 
 something about him and Miss Cecil, so he held his peace. 
 
 " Yon s a bonny dog," continued Geordie. " There is na 
 such dogs in the world. No, my bonnie, my gude sir, I 
 mean to say, no man kens what bonnie dogs are yon. That 
 dog would follow you to death." 
 
 Austin peeped up the companion, and saw that they were 
 all come out of the cuddy, and were on the quarter-deck 
 (which, in this ship, was merely the roof of that house on deck 
 which was called the cuddy). He had not finished his pipe 
 yet, and determined to go forward ; so he passed by the ma 
 chinery, and came up by the fore-companion, and found him 
 self among the crew. 
 
 The watch were congregated round something, something 
 with a sharp old voice belonging to it, which Austin thought 
 was tolerably familiar to him, more particularly after he had 
 heard it say, 
 
 " Believe that yarn ? In course I believe it. As a general 
 rule, mind you, sailors is the very drattedest liars as walks. 
 But this here ship s company, mind you, forms the remark- 
 ablest and astoundingest exception to that there rule, ever I 
 hearn on. I should no more think of doubting anythink as 
 any member of this ship s company took in his head to try 
 and make me swaller on, than I should think of sitting on this 
 
90 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 here harness-cask, and a-watching of cook s boy peeling of the 
 taters with his nasty, dirty little hands." 
 
 As the old man to whom the voice belonged was doing 
 exactly what he described, his profession of faith in the vera 
 city of the ship s company was hailed with a roar of laughter 
 by every one except the man who had " pitched the last yarn." 
 Immediately after, they saw that Austin was among them, and 
 drew off, smiling and touching their locks to him. He was a 
 great favorite here, as elsewhere. 
 
 " Well, James ! " said he to Miss Hilton s old footman, for 
 it was he. 
 
 " Well, Master Austin ! " said the old man, nursing one of 
 his legs on the top of the harness-cask, " and so you re come 
 to sea, eh ? and brought a hull biling on em with you. And 
 a elderly cove to walk up and down the quarter-deck along 
 of Aunt Maria, while the young uns makes love to Miss 
 Eleanor." 
 
 " Don t be an old fool, James," said Austin, laughing. 
 
 " You might as well say to a sailor," said the old man, rais 
 ing his voice so that the ship s company might hear him, "you 
 might as well say to a sailor, don t be a liar ! I might as well 
 say to you, Master Austin, don t you be a young fool. Ah, 
 well ! we can t help it, none on us ! We re all as God made 
 us ; we was all born so, and as such we must remain." 
 
 " Were you born an old fool, then, you most disagreeable 
 old porcupine ? " said Austin. 
 
 " No, I warnt," said old James, tartly ; " I was born a 
 young un. My character has deweloped ; yours will dewel- 
 ope in the same way as mine if you live long enough ; which 
 Lord forbid ! " 
 
 " Come, old fellow ! you don t mean that ? " 
 
 " Yes I do, when I see some things. I don t want none 
 that I loves to live too long, and see what I see. And I loves 
 you, and you knows it." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 91 
 
 " What s the matter now, old fellow ? " 
 
 " Drat the whole country of North Wales, say I ! " was the 
 reply, " with its mountains, and its waterfalls, and its new 
 lighthouse on the Lleyn, and its comings on board at Aberyst- 
 with, and its going ashore again at Caernarvon, accause you 
 were at Bangor, and leaving she to stump up and down the 
 quarter-deck, along of a tutor, in her aggravating old lilac 
 jean boots ! Drat it all ! if it warn t for Miss Eleanor, I d go 
 into an almshouse ! " 
 
 At the mention of the quarter-deck and jean boots, Austin 
 looked there. Aunt Maria was walking up and down with 
 the Professor. She had got lilac jean boots; and, what is 
 more, those jean boots were the most important thing which 
 took your eye. For, being eight or nine feet over Austin s 
 head, and her feet therefore more than a yard above his eyes, 
 her whole figure was (to him) unnaturally foreshortened, as in 
 early photographs. 
 
 Austin looked at Aunt Maria for one instant, and saw that 
 James was alluding to her ; he turned round to mildly rebuke 
 the old man, but the old man had been too clever for him. 
 He had gone into the galley, and sat himself down alongside 
 of the great, fat, jolly cook, in front of the coppers, with his 
 heels under him like a tailor, watching the pots and pans on 
 the stove. The cook caught Austin s eye, and gave a fat 
 wink towards Austin, and a nod at the old man, as if he would 
 say, " Here "he is." And lest you may think this a liberty on 
 the part of the cook, I must tell you that Austin had been 
 cook s very good friend, ever since he was six years old. 
 
 The engineer had let him know that Captain Hertford had 
 been on board ; and so when old James had talked in his gro 
 tesque and rambling way about some one having gone ashore 
 at Caernarvon, Austin knew what he was alluding to. Cap 
 tain Hertford ! What could have made his father take him 
 
92 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 on board ? And, moreover, now he came to think, why had 
 his father brought Aunt Maria to sea with him ? He wished 
 he could get his father alone. At this moment the Master 
 came forward. 
 
 " Where is the governor, Mr. Jackson ? " said Austin, sud 
 denly ; " he is not on the quarter-deck." 
 
 " Alone in his cabin, Master Austin," said the Master ; 
 " now s your time or never." 
 
 " Thanks ! " said Austin, and bolted aft at once. He ran 
 through the saloon, and opened the door of his father s cabin ; 
 his father was there, seated before a tableful of papers. 
 
 " My own boy ! " said Mr. Elliot ; " I thought you were 
 never coming to me " 
 
 And we will go on to that part of the conversation which 
 relates to the story which I have got to tell. 
 
 " Father," said Austin, " how come you to have Aunt Maria 
 on board ? " 
 
 " Dear little Eleanor was ordered a sea-voyage," said Mr. 
 Elliot, drumming on the table with his fingers, " and so I 
 offered her one, and she accepted it gratefully. Aunt Maria 
 is her natural guardian, though she is of age." 
 
 "Who? Aunt Maria?" 
 
 " Don t be a puppy to me on board my own yacht. You 
 know who I mean." 
 
 " His own yacht ! Lord ! " replied Austin. " Think of 
 the pride and conceit of the man for an instant, will you have 
 the goodness ? Lord ! " 
 
 " Don t you be a puppy, sir, or I shall be very angry with 
 you. Some one might hear you." 
 
 " Did it cut itself, shaving, in two places this morning, in 
 consequence of the rolling of its own yacht ; and did it pull 
 two tufts of nap off its best hat and stick them on its counte 
 nance ; arid did n t everybody see what had happened the mo- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 93 
 
 ment it appeared on the quarter-deck, and did n t they all grin 
 and giggle most confoundedly ! " 
 
 " Pax I Austin, pax ! " said Mr. Elliot, trying to look 
 grave. " Come, don t waste time here in gibing at me ; you 
 have plenty of time for that ashore." 
 
 " no, I have n t. If you were a civil person, you would 
 come and live near me. There is not a soul in Bangor that I 
 can chaff as I dare to chaff you." 
 
 " Now you are going to be a monkey again." 
 
 " No I am not, only a puppy. Man, do you know how I 
 will pay you out for calling me those two names ? " 
 
 " Austin, my boy, be serious. Aunt Maria will be blunder 
 ing down here presently, and spoiling our tete-a-tete, arid you 
 will find her deuced difficult to dislodge." 
 
 " Are n t you going to marry Aunt Maria, then ? " said 
 Austin. 
 
 " I have not quite made up my mind about that," said Mr. 
 Elliot. " I have very nearly done so, but I think there is 
 something due to her feelings." 
 
 Austin was sufficiently sobered now. He sat down on a 
 form, and watched his father eagerly, with a pale face. 
 
 " She has fifteen thousand pounds," continued Mr. Elliot. 
 " A man at my time of life don t marry for love, Austin. Be 
 sides, you want some one to advise, strengthen, and lead you ; 
 and who is there like Miss Hilton ? Yes, Austin, for your 
 sake, for your sake only, my dear Austin, I have deter 
 mined to " 
 
 Austin leapt up with something like an oath. 
 
 " Your gratitude is very natural, my dear boy," said Mr. 
 Elliot ; " mind, it is for your sake alone that I marry. Say 
 not another word. If my own inclinations were consulted, I 
 should object to marry the most ill-tempered, unprincipled 
 woman I ever met. But you are my first object, of course." 
 
94 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " Father, dear father, you are not in earnest ? " 
 
 " No, but I told you to be a quarter of an hour ago, and you 
 would n t be. So I have taken this means to make you so, 
 you butterfly. You see there are two sides to a joke." 
 
 " Yours was a cruel one," said Austin. 
 
 " Not so cruel as your coupling my name with that old 
 woman s, my boy; don t do it again. Now listen to me soberly 
 and seriously, will you ? " 
 
 Austin did not reply. He was standing behind his father s 
 chair, with his arm round his neck, and their faces so close to 
 gether that they touched each time the vessel rolled. 
 
 Mr. Elliot went on. " Attend closely to what I say, Austin, 
 my dear ; and if anything happens to me, remember every 
 word of it. Coming up the coast, I put in at Aberyswith." 
 
 " So I heard, dad," said Austin ; " /am on your track." 
 
 " And there Captain Hertford came on board. You know 
 Captain Hertford ? " 
 
 " Yes ; go on." 
 
 " I know him pretty well. He almost asked me for a pas 
 sage, but I did not encourage him. But Aunt Maria, as we 
 will call her, came to me and asked for him in set terms, and 
 then, of course, I treated him with the greatest empressement, 
 and had him on board." 
 
 " Good, father ; speak low." 
 
 " Well, my boy," said Mr. Elliot, with his lips almost against 
 Austin s ear, " there is a secret between Aunt Maria and that 
 man, and I 11 be hanged if I know what it is." 
 
 " Charles Barty, father," said Austin, " gives a very bad 
 character of Captain Hertford. May n t he know something 
 about Aunt Maria ? " 
 
 " Go on," said Mr. Elliot. " Let us hear your say out." 
 
 "You know that Aunt Maria, when five-and-twenty, fol 
 lowed a certain Captain to India, and came home again still 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 95 
 
 Miss Hilton, without improving her condition in any way, 
 except getting herself cured of sea-sickness, to which fact we 
 are indebted for her presence here to-day. You know that." 
 
 " I know it : go on." 
 
 " Do you think that he knows anything to Aunt Maria s 
 disadvantage, eh ? anything of that sort ? " 
 
 " Perhaps ; not a bad guess for a very young man." 
 
 " Do you know who Captain Hertford is ? " 
 
 " I know something about him." 
 
 " I know very little. I know that he is unprincipled, 
 that he is the man who helped poor Robert to his ruin." 
 
 " Robert Hilton ? " 
 
 " Ay, Robert Hilton ; and that he has some secret with 
 Aunt Maria, and that she is helping him to marry Eleanor 
 Hilton and her nine thousand a year : that is all ! " 
 
 Austin brought his fist down on the table with a crash, and 
 said something. 
 
 " Don t swear, sir, don t swear," said Mr. Elliot ; " it is 
 not good ton to swear before your father, sir. The only time 
 when a young man ought to swear, sir, is when he wakes up 
 one fine morning, and finds that he has flown his kite a devil 
 ish deal too high, and that Miss Cecil had thought as much 
 of him as she did of the groom that lifted her on her horse. 
 Then a man might swear, sir, even before his father ; but not 
 when he is leaving a sweet, amiable, beautiful ay, beauti 
 ful ! in your teeth young girl to be the prey of a rogue like 
 Hertford. And Never mind ; you had no right to swear 
 in my presence, sir. / don t care about nine thousand a year, 
 God knows ! You will have about fifteen hundred. But you 
 are a fool ! " 
 
 " But, father, I love Miss Cecil." 
 
 " No, you don t ! You love Lady Mewstone, and are there 
 fore a knave as well as a fool ! D n it ! here s Aunt Maria 
 
90 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 herself. Sit down, and don t begin to grin again, you mon 
 key ! " 
 
 " You had no business, sir, to swear in my presence ! " said 
 Austin, as Aunt Maria opened the cuddy door. " It is not 
 good ton for the father to swear before his son, sir ! The only 
 time when an old man ought to swear, sir " 
 
 " Hold your tongue, sir ! " said Mr. Elliot. 
 
 " Has your father been swearing, then ? " said Aunt Maria. 
 
 " Dreadfully ! " said Austin. 
 
 " Then I wish," said Aunt Maria, " that he -would I 
 don t say swear, because I don t uphold that, even in a saint 
 ed man like your dear father ; but I wish he would say some 
 thing strong about that dog of yours." 
 
 " What has he been at, Miss Hilton ? " 
 
 " At ? nothing. But he is such an ugly cur ! " 
 
 " Well, my dear Miss Hilton, he shall be out of your way 
 in a few hours. By the by, dad, you must set us ashore at 
 Conway. Hayton is waiting for his hour with the Professor. 
 The loss of two hours might pluck him." 
 
 " All right," said Mr. Elliot ; " her head will be that way 
 presently, in fact, is so now. I am going on deck." 
 
 " Well, Austin," said Aunt Maria, when they were left 
 alone, " and how are you, sirrah, eh ? " 
 
 " I am very bad," said Austin. 
 
 " Good heavens ! what s the matter ? meagrims, hyster 
 ics, or what ? " 
 
 " I don t know." 
 
 " They say that you flew your kite at that girl of George 
 Cecil s, who has married that prig, Lord Mewstone. I denied 
 it when they told me. I said you were not very wise, but 
 that you were n t such a fool as that." 
 
 Austin looked at Aunt Maria. What a coarse, violent face 
 it was ! Old Hilton s sister. Well, he had a coarse, violent 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 97 
 
 vein in him, too, and she was something like him. He looked 
 her in the face for a second, and then said, with a smile, 
 " Give me your arm, and come on deck. Don t be disagree 
 able, that s a good soul " ; which course of proceeding puzzled 
 Aunt Maria, and made her do what he told her. 
 
 And Mr. Elliot was as good as his word. He took them 
 for a cruise on that glowing summer s day ; and there was not 
 one of them who did not, ever after, connect the memory of 
 the kind, good, and just old man with one of the most delight 
 ful days in their life. 
 
 They went to Holy Island, where the preventive men had 
 grown pale and flabby from eating rabbits, and the atmosphere 
 was laden with the scent of onions, and where the oldest of 
 them looked, with his long gray hair in the wind, not at all 
 unlike an old rabbit with a lot of onion-sauce emptied over 
 his head ; and where Mr. Elliot frightened the population out 
 of their wits by telling Lieutenant Hodder, of the Coast 
 Guard, that if Sir R. B. didn t repair a certain wall, he 
 should be forced to " look him up," which, being understood 
 by a Welsh bystander as " lock him up," and as such being 
 translated into Welsh, caused a report that evening, in the 
 taverns at Beaumaris, that the Queen had sent down an Eng 
 lish Lord in a frigate, to seize the persons, not only of Sir R. 
 B., but of the Hon. Col. D. P. and Mr. A. S., and commit 
 them all to the Tower, till they had purged themselves of their 
 contempt, which circumstance illustrates the advantage of a 
 portion of her Majesty s subjects talking Welsh while the rest 
 talk English. 
 
 Arid re-embarking they went eastward, and at lunch-time 
 were steaming merrily under the limestone slabs of the Orm s 
 Head, watching the brimming sea leap on to the black ledges 
 in fountains, and pour from them in cascades, and Pen- 
 maenmawr hanging fifteen hundred feet aloft behind, a 
 
 o 
 5 G 
 
98 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 wrinkled mass of purple stone. Then Conway Castle, and 
 affectionate farewells in the pleasant summer evening, Eleanor 
 and Mr. Hilton, standing on the quarter-deck, arm in arm, and 
 waving their hands at them, to the very last. A glorious day 
 finished by a pleasant drive home, under the overhanging 
 crags, with Robin leading the way, a hundred yards ahead, 
 barking joyfully, as if he so approved of the whole proceedings 
 that he could not hold his tongue. 
 
 " By Jove ! " said liorton, as they drove under Penmaen- 
 mawr, " what a glorious creature it is ! " 
 
 Ah ! " said Lord Charles, is she not ? " 
 
 Austin looked suddenly and stealthily at him, and Lord 
 Charles took the opportunity, suddenly and stealthily also, of 
 making a face at Austin. 
 
 " Is she French, Elliot ? " said Horton. 
 
 " French ! dear, no," replied Austin. " She was built 
 by White, of Cowes." 
 
 * Who was ? " said Horton, in amazement. 
 
 " The yacht. The Pelican," said Austin. 
 
 " I was talking about Miss Hilton," said Horton. 
 
 " Ah ! I was n t," said Austin. 
 
 " But is she French, you stupid ? " said Horton. 
 
 " No, she ain t," said Austin. 
 
 " She looks like it," said Horton. 
 
 " Does she ? " said Austin. - 
 
 " The island of Anglesea, at which we are looking," said 
 the Professor, suddenly, " is the Mona of the Agricola of 
 Tacitus. The Mona Cesaris is evidently the Isle of Man. In 
 the latter case, a corruption of the Latin has been retained ; in 
 the former " 
 
 * Well, you need n t be sulky, Elliot," said Horton, rudely 
 stopping the Professor s good-natured attempt at changing the 
 subject, by saying the first thing he could think of. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 99 
 
 " I ain t sulky, old fellow," said Austin, eagerly, " by 
 Jove ! no. I 11 tell you all about it. Her mother was a 
 Frenchwoman. It was a deuced good guess of yours. She 
 is a noble little body, is she not ? I am so proud at all of you 
 admiring her so, you can t think. She is, as it were, my sister, 
 you know." 
 
 The Professor, who was sitting next to Austin, quietly 
 patted him on the back. They were all merry again directly. 
 Xo one ever could withstand Austin s good humor, and it was 
 quite useless to try. Even for Aunt Maria. 
 
 That day, Hayton had come for his hour s logic, and had 
 met the Professor s mother in the hall. The kind old lady 
 was in profound despair. Hayton was the only " shady " man 
 of the lot ; the only " pass " man of the whole. The Professor 
 never took mere pass men. He had made an exception with 
 regard to Hayton, because he was one of the most popular 
 men in the University. Every day was of importance. It 
 would be so dreadful, thought old Mrs. Professor, to have one 
 of their men plucked, and poor Hayton, too ! of all others, the 
 general favorite. She was nearly in tears when she met him 
 in the hall. She told him that the Professor had been carried 
 to sea, and was at that present speaking hull down. What 
 was it ? Was it Tacitus ? She would gladly lend him Bonn s 
 translation for an hour. If it was Latin prose, she thought - 
 she said it so kindly and hesitatingly " she believed, nay, 
 she felt sure, that she could detect any any grammatical 
 error, if he would n t be offended. But what use was it?" she 
 said. " The Professor might be away for months. The Duke 
 of Cheshire s yacht had come, and carried off Lord Charles 
 Barty and the rest of them. And who could tell when they 
 would be back ? This came of having noblemen* in the party. 
 She had always been against it." 
 
 " It s very kind of you," said honest Hayton, " but it s the 
 logic. I am afraid you cannot help me." 
 
100 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 At this moment, Dayton came flying round the corner. " I 
 say, old fellow," he cried out, "shall I give you an hour s 
 coach ? " 
 
 Old Mrs. Professor shed tears of joy ; and the two patient 
 young men sat up in the window, with their heads together, 
 working at the logic, while the others took their holiday on the 
 shining summer sea. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 AUSTIN S political education was going on famously. The 
 ultra-Tory opinions, carefully instilled into him ever since he 
 could talk, by his father, were bearing fruit. Austin, at the 
 age of one-and-twenty, was a very advanced Radical. 
 
 I suppose that the very best and cleverest men have a hobby 
 of some sort, which the rules of society prevent their mounting 
 out of the bosom of their families. I suppose that every man 
 could bore you to death on some one subject, if you would only 
 let him. Mr. Elliot had a hobby, and had ridden it continu 
 ously before Austin was old enough to rebel. He had bored 
 him with his hobby, and that hobby was political talk. 
 
 By the time Austin was ten, he determined that, by hook or 
 by crook, he would be bored no longer. Being too young to 
 know that there were two sides to the question, he first began 
 his rebellion by going to sleep, upsetting things, playing with 
 the dog, and so on, while his father was talking. These efforts 
 were utterly futile. Mr. Elliot not only wanted to instil Tory 
 principles into his son, but he also wanted to hear himself talk. 
 If he could not do the one thing, he was most fully determined 
 to do the other. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 101 
 
 However Mr. Elliot started in one of these political dia 
 tribes, he always arrived at the same result, that of praising 
 Mr. Pitt arid the Duke to the skies. Whenever Austin heard 
 one of those two names mentioned, he used to get desperate. 
 He began to hate them. And, on the other hand, hearing Fox 
 and Sir Robert Peel so steadily and systematically abused, he 
 began, out of mere obstinacy, to long to hear what they would 
 have had to say for themselves. If he could only get hold of 
 facts about these two men, he thought he could at all events 
 have a wrangle with his father, which would be better fun than 
 sitting mumchance, and hearing about that intolerable person, 
 Pitt. 
 
 But there was no hope left for him whatever. His father 
 had determined that he should be a Tory, and took care to 
 form his opinions from his own facts. He, good man, so thor 
 oughly succeeded in boring the boy, that, at twelve, Austin was 
 mad to get hold of some facts on the other side, and fight his 
 father. He did not care about the truth, how should a boy 
 of twelve years old care much about political questions ? He 
 hated the name of politics, but he hated Toryism worse. He 
 had, by his father s management, imbibed liberal opinions be 
 fore he had heard a single argument in favor of them. 
 
 The first weapon he got into his hands was this. Mr. Elliot, 
 most temperate of men, let out one day that Mr. Pitt used to 
 drink a great deal of wine. Austin seized on this, and used it 
 with amazing dexterity. It is surprising what a desperate 
 man will do with a very inferior weapon. A Roman would 
 show good fight with his stylus. On occasion, I myself have 
 seen Mr. Dennis Moriarty, junior, do the most magnificent 
 battle with an old fire-shovel, till overborne by numbers. 
 Yesterday only, I was shown a wooden dagger which had just 
 been brought from Naples, a specimen of those which are 
 made in prison by the Bourbonists, for purposes of assassina- 
 
102 . AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 tion, after their knives are taken from them ; and a very ugly 
 weapon it was. Austin used his lath dagger Mr. Pitt s 
 excess in wine with the greater success, because his father 
 had always impressed on him that the great vice of Fox and 
 his companions was drunkenness. 
 
 But, after Austin s first half at Eton, he came home with a 
 large quiverful of barbed arrows, which he discharged at his 
 father with enormous effect. He had got into bad company 
 there. 
 
 The very first day he had been turned into the playground 
 there, he, feeling lonely and somewhat scared, found himself 
 beside another new boy, from the same house, in the same sit-"* 
 uation. They made friends that day, and their friendship only 
 ended with death. 
 
 This was Lord Charles Barty, a noble boy of twelve, 
 with some brains and more ambition. He came of a great 
 Whig house. Whiggery, as Mr. Elliot would have called it, 
 had been his " life element " from his birth. When Austin, 
 after a few days, told him his leading grievance, that young 
 gentleman, aged only twelve, was enabled, by the help of his 
 eldest brother, Lord Wargrave, to supply Austin with a few 
 smooth pebbles from the brook, to sling at the Tory giant, and 
 promised to bring some more soon. 
 
 When Austin began casting these pebbles at his father, in 
 the holidays, Mr. Elliot was both amused and pleased ; at all 
 events, his boy was turning his attention that way. He would 
 sooner see him a Radical than see him without opinions. 
 
 Half after half, the merry battle went on between father 
 and son. The old Tory sub-secretaries, and such men, who 
 formed Mr. Elliot s little society, grew grayer under the au 
 dacious speculations which Austin brought from Eton each 
 half. " These opinions," said they, " were answered when we 
 were boys." " But never refuted," quoth Austin. At which 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 103 
 
 his father would rub his knees and laugh, and the sub-secreta 
 ries would say to one another, that Elliot was getting into his 
 dotage, and " that boy would go to the devil, sir, as sure as 
 you are born ! " 
 
 Fired by Austin s speculative questions, Lord Charles 
 Barty supplemented his usual holiday amusements, which 
 were not generally very varied, by gaining a little political 
 knowledge, by picking up stones for Austin to fling at his 
 father. His usual holiday amusements were these, to in 
 terrupt his sister s lessons as much as possible, and, in the 
 absence of the governess, to (as he called it) make hay in the 
 school-room. When she came back, boxed his ears, and turned 
 him out, he would go to the stables, and coax and wheedle the 
 stud-groom into giving him a surreptitious mount. Lastly, he 
 would take his blind brother, Edward, out for a ramble 
 through the park, through the wood, over the broad turnip- 
 fields, up to the topmost height of Kingsdown, where Lord 
 Edward might lie on the short turf, staring to heaven with his 
 sightless eyes, and listening to the music of the five tall firs 
 that moaned in the summer air overhead. 
 
 The way he gained his political information was this. 
 Whenever he dined at table, he used to stay until his father 
 went into the drawing-room. And in his father s house he 
 was pretty sure to find himself, after the ladies \vere gone, 
 sitting next to a pretty strong Whig. And from this tolerably 
 strong Whig he would get opinions ; the ultimate destination 
 of which was, that they were poured out on the head of Mr. 
 Elliot senior, to his great amusement. 
 
 So by this process, by Lord Charles Barty getting argu 
 ments and giving them to Austin, and by Austin letting them 
 against his father, both these young gentlemen found them 
 selves, at twenty-one, in a state of very advanced Radicalism. 
 And, as all young men at twenty -one, if they are worth any- 
 
104 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 thing, have their hero, so these two young gentlemen had 
 ! heirs. I need not say that that hero was Sir Robert Peel. 
 These furious young democrats had been ashamed to confess 
 the fact to one another, the fact that their fetish was a so- 
 called Tory, before the time wjien Lord Charles galloped over 
 the goose on Putney Common. But so it was. 
 
 What was the reason that the wildest young Radicals of 
 those times pinned their faith on Sir Robert Peel ? I suppose 
 because they knew, that, should a pinch come, he would act. 
 Would pitch party formulas to the winds. Horner s resolu 
 tions and the Catholic question had shown them that. Their 
 instincts showed them that he was a true Radical. As he was 
 in one sense. 
 
 When these two young gentlemen were elected members 
 of the Union, then the Thames got afire indeed. They 
 uttered the most dreadful opinions. They came down to that 
 house, sir (that was little Pickles of Brasenose ; he was Presi 
 dent), and they held in their hands all sorts of dreadful docu 
 ments ; and they had yet to learn : and they saw the honor 
 able member opposite in his place, and played the deuce with 
 him. They were the two most terrible Radicals at the 
 Union, these two. There was no doubt of that. 
 
 But after all said and done, they were Neither of them true- 
 blue Radicals. The metal never rang clean and clear. They 
 both stopped short. Austin politically, and Lord Charles 
 socially. 
 
 Austin thought Lord Charles went too far. Perhaps he 
 did. His proposition was to pull down the old house, and 
 then begin to think about building it up again, with such 
 materials as heaven should think fit to send ; or should heaven 
 send no materials, to let it build itself (which no house ever 
 did yet, except the American house, which has tumbled 
 down, and will have to be built all over again) : this dis- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 105 
 
 pleased Austin. Lord Charles also seemed to think that no 
 one should do anything as long as any one else existed who 
 could do it better ; that we must have the exactly right man 
 in the right place, or we were naught. At this Austin fired 
 up, and said that in that case, Lord Charles and he might 
 find themselves in the position, the one of a crossing-sweeper 
 and the other of a shoeblack. 
 
 But in Lord Charles s model republic, there were to be 
 no crossings, and no shoes. So Austin s illustration fell to 
 the ground, and, like many other silly people, he abandoned 
 the argument, from shame of having made a clumsy illus 
 tration. 
 
 " Then what the deuce is to become of us ? " asked Austin. 
 
 " What does it matter ? What are a few worthless martyrs, 
 like myself, in comparison to the great cause ? " 
 
 Austin submitted that it did matter, and that they had 
 better not be in too great a hurry. He would sometimes, 
 indeed, laugh at the more wild of his friend s speculations. 
 In theory Austin was a real Radical; but he did not wish 
 his theories to be put into practice. 
 
 Lord Charles also stopped at a certain point. He had 
 certain Radical theories concerning marriage, with which 
 Austin one-half agreed. For instance, that the human race 
 were all of the same species, and that no bar should be put 
 to marriages between young people, if they fell in love. He 
 was a high Tractarian, and made High-Church thought fit 
 into his political theories with the most admirable dexterity ; 
 his reverence for marriage and women was of the highest 
 kind ; and he used to say, that of all things he would admire 
 a nobleman who would marry his gardener s daughter. Austin 
 agreed ; but when he put the converse of the proposition 
 about the gardener s sen marrying eh ! Lord Charles got 
 in a pet, and said that Austin never would be serious, and 
 5* 
 
106 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 delighted in talking infernal nonsense out of pure aggrava 
 tion. 
 
 " Don t be cross, Charles," said Austin. 
 
 " I ain t cross," said Lord Charles, angrily, blundering over 
 Robin, and giving him a kick, at the same time using a word 
 which will never be used in the great republic. 
 
 He ivas cross. Austin had no right to say such horrible 
 tilings. Amelia and the gardener s boy. Good God ! 
 
 Austin did not laugh at him. He had tripped him up, and 
 was content. The human-race theory would not hold water, 
 it appeared. 
 
 Lord Charles was sulky for a time ; but he called Robin to 
 him, and put his cheek against the dog s face, in that way 
 asking forgiveness for having kicked him. Robin begged him 
 with his great eyes to say nothing about it, and laid his beau 
 tiful head on his knee. 
 
 " You have been a fool, Austin," said Lord Charles, sulkily. 
 Englishmen are generally sulky when they have their own 
 weapons turned against them ; have got out of temper with 
 their friends, and want to make it up. 
 
 " Ah ! I know," said Austin, laughing. " You mean about 
 Miss Lady Mewstone, you Jacobin! Come, let as argue 
 the converse of your proposition on this case. Come on. 
 There is nothing offensive here. I am Lord Mewstone s 
 equal in talent, and in manners. Why should I not have 
 married Miss Cecil ? I consider she has thrown herself 
 away." 
 
 " I don t think that. I think that you are his superior in 
 everything, and yet I think you made a fool of yourself." 
 
 Why ? " 
 
 " Because they two were in love with one another, and 
 because you passed by a girl who is far superior to that 
 highty-tighty, ambitious, politics-chattering daughter of old 
 Cecil s." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 107 
 
 " Well ; I know that now." 
 
 " O, you do, do you ? And confess yourself a fool ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Then what a sublime fool you will look if you allow Aunt 
 Maria to bully her into marrying Captain Hertford." 
 
 " Charles, you are mad." 
 
 " Raving mad," said Lord Charles ; " but that is what the 
 dear old soul is after. She has got the whip-hand of Hertford 
 about something, and he, I suspect, has got the whip-hand of 
 her." 
 
 " How do you find all this out ? " said Austin, aghast. 
 
 " I listen to the old women talking," said he ; " they know 
 a precious sight more about it than you do." 
 
 " Well, but I can t listen to the old women. Tell us what 
 you know." 
 
 " There s Tom going," said Lord Charles ; " had n t we 
 better go on with our Livy, if we are going to do so at all ? " 
 
 Come, no nonsense," said Austin ; " tell me what the old 
 women told you." 
 
 " The old women did n t tell me anything. But I want to 
 ask you a question. Why should not Eleanor Hilton marry 
 Captain Hertford ? " 
 
 " Why ! why ! " said Austin. " Do you want to drive me 
 mad ? Because I would cut the infernal scoundrel s throat, if 
 he dare to look at her. That s why." 
 
 " But it don t matter to you. You have got no interest in 
 her." 
 
 " Charles, I love her." 
 
 " You always did, I know, in a sort of way ; but, with the 
 memory of that sad affair with the Right Honorable the Coun 
 tess of Mcwstone so fresh on your heart " 
 
 " Don t chaff. The thing is serious." 
 
 " I know it is," said Lord Charles ; " but tell me one thing 
 
108 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 only. Do you really mean that you will ask Eleanor to be 
 your wife ? " 
 
 " I do." 
 
 " Hurrah ! Now I 11 tell you all I know. I was in town 
 last night." 
 
 "Well," said Austin. 
 
 " I heard a conversation between my mother and Lord Sal- 
 tire. You know Lord Saltire ? " 
 
 " He always speaks to me," said Austin. 
 
 " Now then," continued Lord Charles, " old Hilton made a 
 faux pas about some French business, in 1806, and every one 
 cut him, except your father. At this time, Lord Saltire, who 
 had only had a trifling acquaintance with him before, thought 
 that he would follow his favorite amusement of flying in the 
 world s face, by taking him up, saying that he had a profound 
 admiration for a man with so few prejudices, or some piece of 
 cynicism of that kind ; and although Hilton saw that Lord 
 Saltire was only amusing himself by offending the world, yet 
 friends were scarce, and Lord Saltire s humor suited his own, 
 and they two knocked up some sort of a friendship. 
 
 " How did you find out all this ? " asked Austin. 
 
 " I>y listening to the old women at their gossip. Don t in 
 terrupt." 
 
 " Just one moment. Have you heard Lord Saltire and her 
 Grace speak of this before ? " 
 
 " I have gathered what I have told you from another con 
 versation. I will now give you the gist of the last. 
 
 " Lord Saltire began by saying, You don t know any eligi 
 ble young gentleman who wants nine thousand a year, do 
 you ? And she said, There is Charles listening to us, he is 
 in want of exactly that sum, and then there was some fun 
 about it, and he went on. He said that Eleanor was, from 
 some reason, completely under her aunt s thumb, and that 
 Captain Hertford was eternally about the house." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 109 
 
 " He is never there when I am," said Austin. 
 
 " Never mind that. He is there when you ain t there, 
 which is much more important. He said that he had been to 
 call on her, after what he had heard, and that it did really 
 appear to be true; that the poor girl appeared cowed and 
 beaten, and that her aunt seemed a dragon. But he said, 
 in conclusion, That is not all : the girl is left utterly friend 
 less, and without society, with this enormous fortune, to the 
 care of this old dragon of an aunt, and to a captain of dragoons, 
 who is a great rascal. But what is uglier than all is this : old 
 Hilton had a son who went to the dogs and died, and the last 
 man who knew anything about him was this Captain Hertford, 
 who has been a flame of the aunt s. Now all this don t look 
 over particularly nice." 
 
 " Now we had better get on with our work," said Austin. 
 
 " By Jove, we must ! " said Lord Charles ; " but you will 
 let me know what you are going to do." 
 
 " Of course ! How can I thank you enough ? Come on." 
 
 And on they went like young heroes. At half past three, it 
 was found that Lord Charles s handsome blue eyes could not 
 keep open any longer, in spite of coffee and tobacco, and that 
 the curly head kept tumbling down on the " Riddle and Ar 
 nold." Austin roused him up, and started him across Tom- 
 quad to his rooms in Peckwater. And Lord Charles walked 
 straight across the grass, which he had, we believe, no right to 
 do ; and while in that bland, intoxicated state, into which men 
 get at three or four in the morning, a week before examina 
 tion, he was thinking that there must surely be more than 
 seventeen thousand stars visible. He so nearly walked into 
 the pool, or pond, called Mercury, that he felt it necessary to 
 sit down and congratulate himself on his narrow escape. 
 
 And there he found that Austin s dog, Robin, had followed 
 him. He was glad of this, for he could talk to Robin ; and 
 
110 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 
 Robin was most charmed by the whole proceeding, and sat 
 
 complacently down by the stone rim of the pond, prepared 
 for any amount of conversation. 
 
 " Robin," said this silly young gentleman, "let us look .into 
 the pond, and see whether we can tell our fortune." So he 
 leant over the pool, and saw, at first, nothing but the gold 
 tassel on his cap. He took his cap off, and looked. Still not 
 one hint of the future, only the outline of his handsome head 
 reflected in the water. The stars were behind in the dark 
 blue. Not one single black cloud between him and them. 
 O lying stars ! false, false water ! 
 
 But the happy, heavy head fell down on something, and 
 Robin nestled up against him, and dog and man fell fast 
 asleep, there and then, in the middle of the quadrangle. One 
 of the porters, who rose early to let the scouts in, saw him 
 lying there, and roused him up. In times long after, a tall 
 gentleman, stone-blind, unknown to the porter, but whom you 
 will know soon, came to the porter, and asked about the cir 
 cumstance. And the porter took him to the place, and 
 pointed it out. " His Lordship lay here, sir, with his head 
 on his dixenary, and *Mr. Elliot s dog along with un ; and I 
 thought he d a caught his death of cold, surely." 
 
 " But it never hurt him, you see," said the blind stranger. 
 
 " Ah ! no, poor dear ! it never hurt he. Talk about your 
 tufts, he were a tuft." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. Ill 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE very night on which Lord Charles slept by Mercury, 
 Austin, dog-tired as he was, sat up and wrote this letter to his 
 father : 
 
 "Mr DEAR CHILD, 
 
 " If you don t take my advice about having your razors 
 properly set by an l expert, the end of it will be that you 
 will be carried off to Bow Street, and charged with attempting 
 self-destruction. The last time I came into your dressing- 
 room, you had an open razor in your hand, and had hacked 
 your chin so, that you were all in a gore of blood. Besides, it 
 does not look nice to go down to your office with your face 
 stuck all over with patches of hat nap. If you have no self- 
 respect, think of me. 
 
 " Now attend to what I say, and don t argue, or fuss. 
 Charles Barty and I go into the schools in five days. The 
 responsibility 1 feel in leaving you to take care of yourself 
 will probably spoil my degree. Don t a^d to it, but obey me. 
 
 " Dear father, will you do this ? Call on the Hiltons, and 
 see what is going on there. Catch Lord Saltire, and make 
 him tell you. It is an ugly business. I don t know what to 
 do, I trust it all to you. Only go there and watch Captain 
 Hertford and Aunt Maria. 
 
 " I will come up as soon as the examination is over. I 
 shall not wait for the class list. I may get a fourth, and I may 
 not. But I shall be equally dear to you either way, you self- 
 willed, conceited young person." 
 
 The answer was : 
 
 "Mr DEAR BOY, 
 " You have made me so happy. I will see to what you 
 
112 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 mention. I thought you had given her up ; and I have heard 
 nothing new about Captain Hertford. It will be difficult for 
 me to get anything out of Lord Saltire, for I hardly know him ; 
 and I don t think he likes me; however, I will try. I will 
 watch for you like a terrier at a rat-hole. 
 
 " What care I what degree you take ? Suppose you are 
 plucked, come home to me, my boy, and I will teach you to 
 forget it. I had rather, in fact, that you did not take honors. 
 .1 think that you would do in the world quite as well without. 
 Why don t you slip in quietly for a pass ? but, by the by, it 
 is too late, and I am sorry for it." 
 
 (Are there such things as white lies, after all ? This was 
 either a black one or a white one, for the old man was in a 
 feverish state of anxiety about his son s degree, if it were only 
 a fourth.) 
 
 " Don t you be an impertinent young jackanapes about my 
 cutting myself shaving ; it will be a long while before you do 
 that, you monkey ! " 
 
 Lord Charles Barty and Austin went into the schools de 
 voutly hoping that they might not be "gulfed" (left among 
 the pass-men). But diligence and pluck will do great things. 
 Lord Charles and Austin, having compared notes, came to the 
 conclusion that it was all over with them, and Austin posted 
 off to his father with the cheering intelligence that they were 
 both probably " gulfed." Austin had certainly got his testa 
 mur, and so had his friend, but they were both quite hopeless, 
 so hopeless, that on the terrible day Lord Charles actually 
 went into the school s quadrangle, and up to that dreadful little 
 door, and pushed into the crowd to hear the lists read. He 
 thought one of them might be among the fourth. So he heard 
 the first Class read through with indifference, but when Class 
 II. was announced, and the first name in that Class was 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 113 
 
 " Barty, Carolus, ex JEde Christi," his ears tingled in his 
 head with joy ; and when, after reading through two C s and 
 a D, the clerk of the schools came to " Elliot, Augustinus, ex 
 JEde Christi," he sent his cap flying in the air, and fairly 
 mad : Austin and he, to their unutterable amazement, had got 
 seconds. 
 
 Then an insane terror possessed him lest any one, flying on 
 the wings of the wind, should carry the news to Austin before 
 himself. So he posted home to his rooms, told a servant to 
 pack up a carpet-bag, and away he went, after getting a most 
 fearful "jobation" from the Dean for daring to appear in his 
 presence without his cap and gown. 
 
 " What do you mean by this impertinence, my Lord ? E[ow 
 dare you ? " 
 
 " I am very sorry, sir. I have got a second, and I am ex 
 cited." 
 
 " Got a second ! bah ! The University is going to 
 the" 
 
 " Deuce ? " suggested Lord Charles, who was afraid of 
 something worse. 
 
 " Dogs, sir, dogs ! How dare you say deuce in my pres 
 ence ! You can go down, my Lord." 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 "Now, father," said Austin, the first night of his arrival, 
 " what have you observed ? " 
 
 " I have been a diligent and dutiful watchman, Austin ; I 
 have been there every day for six days, but, unfortunately, 
 I have observed nothing at all." 
 
114 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " Then you think that the letter I wrote to you is all 
 nonsense ? " 
 
 " Far from it ; I think you are quite right. I know that 
 woman, Maria Hilton, my dear lad ; I have known her almost 
 all my life, and, unless she has much altered, she is just this, 
 a selfish, unprincipled shrew." 
 
 " She always struck me as being something of that sort." 
 
 " I guess, I need not tell you why, that something of this 
 sort is the matter. You know that she is independent?" 
 
 " No ; I never knew it." 
 
 " She had fifteen thousand pounds by her father s will." 
 
 " I did not know that ; I always thought she lived on her 
 brother. But what has that to do with it ? " 
 
 " Silly ! it makes her independent, it gives an impudence 
 to her face, and a loud tone to her voice towards her little 
 niece, which she would never have if she were dependent on 
 her bounty." 
 
 " Good ; you are wiser than I." 
 
 " That is very easy to be, goose ! Well, she has sailed her 
 boat in troubled waters, and so has Captain Hertford. I sus 
 pect that they have some sort of mutual confidence, and that 
 both of them would like to have the whip-hand of Eleanor, 
 and of Eleanor s six thousand a year. She has no friends, 
 her father took good care that she should have none, by his 
 obstinate pride, and at this present moment I believe the 
 case stands thus: that Aunt Maria is trying to bully and 
 wheedle poor little Eleanor into marrying Captain Hertford." 
 
 "Then," said Austin, "I ll tell you what we ll do, that 
 is, you and I and Robin." 
 
 "And what is that?" 
 
 " Why, we il go to Wilton Crescent, when both Aunt Maria 
 and Captain Hertford are there, and I will take a thick walk 
 ing-stick and beat him about the head with it, while Robin 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 115 
 
 bites her heels, and you pull her nasty old cap and wig off, and 
 chuck them out of window." 
 
 " I think that will be the best plan," said Mr. Elliot. " Then 
 I will come with you at two to-morrow, if I can get away 
 from the office. Don t bring too big a stick, or else you will 
 kill the man, and get hung, and that is very disagreeable, 
 there are always such a lot of people to stare at you." 
 
 " Then that plan of proceedings is settled," said Austin, 
 . \vlio knew how his father loved a " dry joke." 
 
 " Yes, that is settled ; don t be later than two, and don t 
 bring anything thicker than a malacca cane. Now let us 
 change the subject. Do you know the Isle of Ronaldsay, by 
 Jura ? " 
 
 " I have never been there," said Austin, knowing that, now 
 his father had had his joke, his real plan was coming. " I 
 know the song : 
 
 On Jura s heath how sweetly swell 
 
 The murmurs of the mountain bee; 
 How sweetly mourns the writhed shell 
 On Jura s shore, its parent sea. 
 
 Is that any use to the present discussion ? " 
 
 " A great deal. I see you are in love with the island, and 
 I shall probably want, you to start there to-morrow night, if 
 you can get ready." 
 
 "Hadn t I better start to-night ?" said Austin, very much 
 amused, but knowing perfectly well that his father had a 
 scheme in his head, and a good one too. 
 
 " No, not to-night. Before you start, I want to see whether 
 Miss Elliot, senior, has any objection to come for a cruise in 
 the Pelican. She has two strings to her bow, and I am the 
 second one. She will probably come, and bring her niece. 
 The Pelican is lying at Liverpool, waiting to take me through 
 the Western Islands. If Miss Hilton dreams that you are to 
 
116 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 be one of the party, she either won t come, or won t bring her 
 niece. Therefore, I order you, as soon as I have my answer 
 to-morrow, to depart suddenly and secretly to Glasgow, and 
 from thence to get the best way you can to Jura, from Jura 
 to Donaldsay, from thence across the Kyle to Ronaldsay, and 
 find out as much as you can about the set of the tide through 
 the Sound of Islay before I arrive in the Pelican." 
 
 " By Jove," said Austin, " you are a jewel." 
 
 " So the plan of pulling off Aunt Maria s wig falls through 
 for the present, then," said Mr. Elliot. 
 
 " For the present," said Austin. 
 
 " O, only for the present, of course," said Mr. Elliot. 
 " Good night ; mind your candle against the curtains." 
 
 The next evening Austin waited for Lord Charles at Pad- 
 dington, for he knew that he would come with the news of the 
 class-list. He heard the astounding intelligence of his friend s 
 good fortune and his own ; and, just giving himself time to tell 
 his friend the neat little plan about the Island of Ronaldsay, 
 he jumped into a Hansom cab, and told the man to go to 
 Mortlake. 
 
 The man did not seem to know where it was, so Austin 
 said, " Go to Putney, then ! " 
 
 Now, in the year 1845, telling a man to go to Putney was 
 the same as telling a man to go to the deuce. And so the 
 cabman took off his nose-bag (or rather, the horse s nose-bag), 
 and said, Bar sell ! " 
 
 " What s the matter with the man ? " said Austin. " Did n t 
 you hear me tell you to go to Putney ? " 
 
 The man strapped the nose-bag under his seat, took up the 
 strut, and mounted the box ; then he opened the trap-door 
 above Austin s head, and, looking down on him, said, 
 
 <l I think you told me to go to Putney just now." 
 
 " Confound it ! What is the matter with the man ? " 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 117 
 
 " Well, noAV, look here," said the man. " A cabman has 
 his feelings the same as any other man. You, and such as 
 you, may think that he ain t, but he have. And when them 
 feelings is lacerated, he naterally cuts up rough. I never said 
 nothink to you, but without provercation you tells me to go to 
 Putney. Now I tell you what it is, I m blessed if I don t go, 
 and you may take your change out of that ! " And go he did. 
 
 If it had not been for this little escapade on the cabman s 
 part, he would have started an instant sooner, and would not 
 have seen Lord Charles walk past him just before the horse 
 got in motion, walking between Captain Hertford and a man 
 whom Austin knew as Captain Jackson, a trifling circum 
 stance, but well remembered after. " Charles has got among 
 the Tories," he said to himself. And so Charles had. 
 
 We must pass over Mr. Elliot s sensations on hearing of 
 Austin s good fortune. He was both astonished and delighted. 
 
 " Good heavens ! " he said to himself, " if the dear boy has 
 got a second with so little exertion, his talents must be of first- 
 rate order. See how idle and giddy that lad has been, by 
 Jove ! That lad can do anything after this. An idle, giddy 
 young butterfly, and a second : by Jove, it is amazing ; he will 
 take the world by storm : for with his manners, and temper, 
 and talents, he 11 take the world by storm. I am glad he was 
 idle ; it is a great comfort to me that he was idle. It has 
 shown whtit he is made of. A second, too ! " 
 
 Mr. Elliot either did not know, or did not choose to remem 
 ber, how painfully Charles had worked, and he did not know 
 the awful gulf there was between Austin s second and a first. 
 Austin would not have undeceived him for ten thousand 
 pounds that night. 
 
 They dined together alone. If any young gentleman, read 
 ing these pages, makes the reflection that it must have been 
 rather a bore for Austin to dine tete-a-tete with his father, let 
 
118 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 me assure him that on this occasion it was not the case. 
 Neither of them bored the other. Once, just after dinner, 
 Mr. Elliot, looking across, under the lamp, caught Austin s 
 eyes gazing affectionately at him. He took no notice, but 
 Austin looked so handsome, so good, so triumphant, that the 
 good man went up to his dressing-room for a moment to look 
 for his spectacles. 
 
 Perhaps that was the happiest night of all. I cannot say, 
 for Austin had, from childhood, waded on breast-high among 
 summer flowers, and had hardly known sorrow. That merry 
 face had, however, the capability of a different expression, 
 an expression of sorrow and furious anger combined, such as 
 one sees in the face of a child \vhen it is what we call " very 
 naughty " ; a look which at the same time pleads for pity and 
 hurls defiance. No man but one had ever seen that expres 
 sion on Austin s face, and that one man only on^one occasion. 
 The man was Captain Hertford, and the occasion was that of 
 their drive together from Lyn y Rhaiadr to Ban go r. 
 
 " And now, dad," said Austin, lolling on the sofa, " about 
 I beg pardon anent Ronaldsay." 
 
 " You ought to have started to-night, monkey ; and you 
 should have, if you had got a beggarly third, or anything of 
 that sort. Of course, I am bitterly disappointed at your miss 
 ing your first ; and I think that, after such a fiasco, you had 
 better get out of the way till people have forgotten all about it." 
 
 "Child, child," said Austin, without moving, "you are out 
 of your mind ! " 
 
 " I think it will be the best way. Start for Glasgow to 
 morrow morning, and after Glasgow you must go north by 
 post." 
 
 " How many stamps shall I want ? " 
 
 " By post," said Mr. Elliot, scornfully, " and get across the 
 Kyle of Ronaldsay in one of the fishing-boats." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 119 
 
 " Very well," said Austin ; " now tell me this. What do 
 you think of Eleanor ? " 
 
 " You mean really ? " 
 
 " Yes, I mean really." 
 
 " Well, I think she has more determination and strength of 
 character in her little, close-set mouth than fifty Aunt Marias, 
 and that if well, if there is what you young fellows coarsely 
 call a row, that she might beat Aunt Maria. But she is an 
 affectionate and sensitive little thing, and it will require some 
 thing very much out of the way to make her show fight at all ; 
 and Aunt Maria is coarse and ill-tempered, though cowardly ; 
 and she will bully that little thing, and frighten her into sub 
 mission, until until something or another happens to make 
 little Eleanor show fight. There ! " 
 
 " A lame and impotent conclusion," said Austin. " Good 
 nhrht." 
 
 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 ALL the coast of Argyleshire, and the Mull of Cantire, and 
 the mountains beyond, were wakening up under the same sun 
 which decorated Ben More of Ronaldsay with ribs of gold. 
 Those who stood on the rough little pier in front of the few 
 fishing huts which make the village of Ronaldsay, and looked 
 eastward, saw the fields on the mainland gleaming with the 
 gold of spring, and behind them, a wilderness of purple moun 
 tain flecked and dotted with wreaths of silver mist, flying and 
 dissolving before the morning sun. Those who turned and 
 looked westward saw the sheets of heath rolling up into the 
 great sharp mountain, embroidered with a curious fretwork of 
 bright green grass from beside the rocky watercourses. But 
 
120 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 whether they looked east or west, there was a softness in the 
 air, and a gladness in their hearts, which told them spring was 
 come, and that the winter, so terrible to them, poor souls, had 
 gone howling off to the northward. 
 
 The wind was south, and the tide, pouring down the Kyle 
 of Ronaldsay, knocked up a little sea. And through that sea 
 a boat with two sails came leaping, and springing, and plunging 
 towards the shore ; and when she was near enough, three or 
 four fine fellows jumped into the surf, and had her high and 
 dry in no time. 
 
 And then from this boat there dismounted a young gentle 
 man, and his portmanteau, and his dog: the like of which 
 young gentleman and his portmanteau they had never seen 
 before ; but the like of whose dog they had seen very often 
 indeed. It was Austin and Robin. Austin stood, splendidly 
 attired, handsome, good-humored, looking among the surround 
 ing highlands ; and Robin was making friends with three or 
 four collies exactly like himself, and half a hundred short- 
 legged terriers. 
 
 And as he stood upon the beach, an old man almost the 
 only one who could speak English with that courteous inde 
 pendence which we admire so much in the Scotch, both High 
 land and Lowland, when it does not develop into impertinence 
 asked " what he could do for his honor ? " . 
 
 " A very well-timed question, sir," said Austin. " I want 
 to stay here for a week." 
 
 The old fisherman at once did what Scotchmen always 
 seem to do in a difficulty, sent for the minister ; and the 
 minister did what Scotch ministers always do when they are 
 sent for, came. 
 
 " There is not a place in the island into which you can put 
 your head, sir, except my house," said he, the instant he 
 caught sight of Austin, saying i Gaelic, " Take that gentle- 
 

 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 121 
 
 man s portmanteau up to the manse instantly." At all events, 
 up to the manse it went ; shout the gentleman, " Hi ! " and 
 " Hold hard ! " never so loudly. \ 
 
 " My dear sir," said Austin, " I never dreamt of invading 
 you like this. But, to answer for my respectability, I have 
 got a letter of introduction from " 
 
 " Never mind, sir. Just think what an enormous windfall an 
 educated gentleman is to me. A week only, said you, sir ? " 
 
 "Not more." 
 
 " I would it were a year. Are you in Parliament, sir ? " 
 
 "Not yet," said Austin, blushing. 
 
 " If you were, I would ask you to say a word for us poor 
 islanders, sir. The winters here are unco long, sir, and we 
 are very, very poor. I will show you the wonders of our island, 
 sir. I cannot show you a natural temple, like Staffa, or an 
 artificial one, like lona ; but I will show you how men can 
 keep body and soul together under very adverse circum 
 stances, and be patient, honest, and godly the while. And 
 when you are in Parliament, you 11, may be, remember the 
 Island of Ronaldsay, and speak a word for the Scottish poor." 
 
 " But what does your landlord do for you ? " 
 
 " The island is a loss to him ; and who could be foolish 
 enough to pitch money into these bogs? Our place is in 
 Canada, I fear. The winter is very long, and we are very, 
 very poor." 
 
 " I beg to call your attention to the fact, my dear sir, that 
 you have not read my letter from the Mactavish." 
 
 " And I beg to observe, my dear sir, that I welcomed you 
 to my house before I knew you had one," answered the minis 
 ter. "Why, my dear sir, if you were deaf and dumb, the 
 mere sight of your clothes would make you welcome. We 
 see no dyed garments from Bozrah here. The Mactavish 
 would pine and die in breeks, sir." 
 6 
 
122 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " He is a good fellow, though." 
 
 " He is, sir. He has the inexcusable fault of poverty ; but 
 that is nigh his only one." 
 
 " How come the family to be so poor ? " 
 
 "An old story. In 1545, or thereabout, his grandfather 
 went away to Edinburgh, with some long-legged, young High 
 land chiels ; and he wandered south, the loon, past Dunbar 
 and Carlisle, to a place they call Derby, or some such name. 
 The daft, rintherout callant. And the government asked 
 where he was going, and he said to London. And so they 
 hanged him at Carlisle, and the present estates came into the 
 family by his son s wife." 
 
 " And this happened so long ago as 1545 ?" said Austin, 
 laughing. 
 
 " I am not sure," said the old gentleman, with a sly laugh. 
 "It may have been 1545, 1645, or even 1745. I am only 
 sure of one thing, that it was na 1845." And, by the time he 
 had made his little joke, they had got to the manse. 
 
 " By the by," said the minister, before going in, " you 
 know that we had him here for two nights in this very 
 house." 
 
 " What, the Pr " 
 
 "The Prince, sir." 
 
 Indeed ! " 
 
 "Yes, sir. Two nights after the Stornaway business, he 
 landed here. The wind was strong from the west, and he 
 was driven across to Ronaldsay." 
 
 " Yet I thought I could have accounted for every hour of 
 his time between Lewis and Benbecula," said Austin. 
 
 "A mistake, my dear sir. I* can show you the bedroom 
 where he slept. Is it true that Sir Robert is going to continue 
 the income-tax in spite of the surplus (not that it matters to 
 me, God knows) ; and can you explain me why ? Only as a 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 123 
 
 matter of curiosity : for we are too poor here to mind income- 
 taxes ; but, God be praised, we are not so poor as the Donald- 
 say folk." 
 
 " Not so poor as the Donaldsay folk." Those words dwelt 
 with Austin. He had never seen poverty before, and he told 
 the good minister so frankly. He saw enough now. Chronic 
 poverty and want of the most hideous kind. The row of cot 
 tages, or rather hovels by the harbor side, were miserable 
 enough ; but it was up among the little cot farms in the hill 
 that he saw, for the first time, what utter poverty meant ; up 
 in these hovels on the hillside, built with loose stone (there is 
 no lime in Eonaldsay), through which every wind of heaven 
 blew, summer and winter ; with their little patches of oats and 
 potatoes. Here, indeed, was more than Irish misery. 
 
 " We depend," said the minister, " mostly on our potatoes 
 here. Ronaldsay is a cold island, and oats are sweer to ripen. 
 The potatoes here look nice." 
 
 Poor fellow ! He did not dream, that these same potatoes, 
 their only hope, would have turned to stinking carrion before 
 August. 
 
 As for Austin, he went in and out of these hovels with his 
 friend the minister all the first morning ; and then began 
 thinking for himself, perhaps for the first time in his life : with 
 what degree of correctness the reader must judge. " All this 
 silly windy turbulence in Ireland," he thought, " has origin in 
 very great part from chronic poverty. And yet here are a 
 race of men, as poor as the poorest Irish, superior to the Irish 
 in physique and intelligence, by the most enormous interval ; 
 a race who in courage and endurance are notoriously not sur 
 passed in the world ; a race attached to particular religious 
 tenets as firmly as the Irish ; one might almost say a priest- 
 ridden race ; and yet what does one find ? Patience instead 
 of turbulence, manly independence instead of servility, and 
 
124 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 an almost entire absence of crime, instead of continued horri 
 ble outrages. It was a puzzle. 
 
 " How do you account for it, Mr. Monroe? " said he, address 
 ing the clergyman. 
 
 " For what, sir ? " said the old man, looking quietly up. 
 
 " For what I have been saying." 
 
 " You have been saying nothing." 
 
 And no more he had, but only thinking. 
 
 He apologized, and stated his case. 
 
 " The Irish," said the minister, strongly, " are a priest-rid 
 den people." 
 
 " So are the Scotch," said Austin. 
 
 " I wish ye were just a minister yersell, ye d ken how much 
 truth there was in that ; if ye had the handling o em, ye d 
 find na a thrawner lot than ye are thinking," replied the old 
 man, laughing. " But, even if there were a grain of truth in 
 your assertion of their being priest-ridden, you must still allow 
 that your Scottish minister is a superior man altogether to 
 your Irish priest." 
 
 " Why should I allow that? ""said Austin. 
 
 " For politeness sake," said the minister. " But I will tell 
 you a secret. Not only are the Scottish ministers a higher 
 class of men than the Irish priests, but, what is of more im 
 portance, the Scottish population is as superior to the southern 
 Irish population as a horse is superior to a donkey." 
 
 " That is a libel," said Austin. 
 
 " The greater the truth the greater the libel, Master Oxon 
 ian," said the minister. 
 
 " But I won t have it," said Austin ; " I have seen very 
 noble Irish people." 
 
 " Well, then, we must put some of it down to education. 
 There is the fact, account for it how you may." 
 
 " But look here, my dear sir," said Austin. " Can t- one do 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 125 
 
 anything among these folks ? I mean, can I do nothing ? I 
 have money. If you were to point out proper cases to me, 
 could n t I leave money with them ? You hesitate, because 
 the lark is singing overhead. Think of the horrible long 
 winter which will come on us so suddenly, and then say 
 whether or no you dare refuse my offer." 
 
 " We are not beggars, Mr. Elliot. We have no claim on 
 you." 
 
 " I tell you that you have. These are the first poor I have 
 ever seen, God forgive me. I have no tenantry. I have no 
 poor with more claim on me than these poor souls. Why, I 
 gave nine pounds for this pin which is in my scarf, the other 
 day. No claim, quotha!" 
 
 The old man sat silent for a moment, and then spoke low 
 and quiet. " I dare not decline to take any money that you 
 may leave, Mr. Elliot ; no, I dare not, when I think of the 
 winter which is coming. I may never account to you for that 
 money, but I will account to Christ. He will be a more inex 
 orable auditor than you, Mr. Elliot. You have guessed, sir, 
 in some way, what we want. We want money. We have 
 no circulation of money. We have here potatoes and oats, 
 every bit of which we require, and fish, which we want also ; 
 but which, being our only staple of trade, must be sacrificed 
 in Glasgow, to get cash for tobacco and groceries. We have 
 no circulation of money. The Mactavish, who would give the 
 coat off his back, has to educate his sons, and gets no rent 
 from the island. He leaves us alone. We can ask no more, 
 and have no right to ask so much. But he sins against his 
 tenantry and himself." 
 
 "How?" 
 
 " His stomach is too high to let the shootings. It lies with 
 you and him to make Konaldsay almost a Paradise. You are 
 rich. If you could persuade him to let you the shootings, and 
 
126 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 were only to live here three months in the year, it would make 
 a wonderful difference in Konaldsay. You have no idea what 
 the circulation of another three hundred pounds a year in the 
 island would be." 
 
 " Is there any game ? " asked Austin. 
 
 " JN"ot much," said the minister, " at present ; but if you 
 would take the island, / would take care there should be. I 
 would use my influence, my dear sir. If " 
 
 " Priestcraft ! " said Austin. 
 
 " You are a daft young gentleman, sir, and I am very angry 
 with you. But listen to reason. You will want a moor some 
 day : go round our island, and examine its capabilities." 
 
 " I will. Now here is an envelope, which you must pledge 
 yourself not to open till I am gone." 
 
 This envelope contained an I O U from Austin to Mr. 
 Monroe for fifty pounds. The reader must form his own 
 opinion on this piece of extravagance. 
 
 Austin was there for ten days ; and before three days were 
 passed, he had managed, by a careless bonhommie, or possibly 
 by some quality far, far higher than that, to make himself be 
 loved by every one in the island whom he met ; for there was 
 about him a great-hearted geniality which no one could resist. 
 The Duchess of Cheshire had said that Charles s new friend 
 seemed a very lovable person ; and now old Elspie Macdon- 
 ald, whose grandsons had been across to Ireland, hobbled up 
 to the manse, with her dreadful, wrinkled old face below her 
 shoulders, and gave him a great shell, "a Chama cor," 
 and refused the half-crown that Austin offered her. Austin 
 knew as much about shells as about the Rosetta stone or the 
 Fonetic Nuz ; but he saw that the old crone meant him a 
 high compliment, and let her see that he did. 
 
 A noble young kilted Highlander was told off, by reason of 
 his speaking English, to show him the round of the island. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 127. 
 
 " A remarkable laddie, sir/ said the minister ; " a Franken 
 stein monster of my ain making. I was fearful at one time 
 that I had lent my hand to the making of a poet, but that sin 
 has been spared me among others. He bolts knowledge in a 
 brutal and gluttonous way, sir, without chewing, like a dog 
 swallowing meat, a gobble and a swallow, and then ready 
 for more. But he has a dog s digestion, sir ; it doesna turn 
 to wind wi him, for which we must be thankful. If ye have 
 lent your hand to pit seven devils of education into a man, ye 
 would choose a man of smaller carcass. For if such a one as 
 Gil Macdonald gangs awa among the tombs, it will be no 
 safe for the passers-by." 
 
 So for eight days Austin brushed the heather, led by his 
 long-legged friend, returning to the manse at nightfall, as 
 happy as a king and as tired as a dog. His eight happy days 
 were gone before he could look round. 
 
 The two young men, starting early one morning, walked 
 westward through the great bog which fills up the centre of 
 the Island of Ronaldsay, with the sharp crystalline peak 
 of Ben More of Ronaldsay right before them, lying in a dark 
 brown cone above the mists. And as they toiled across the 
 bog, through the morning, they saw that mist dissolving, curl 
 ing, brooding, in dark hollows, like piles of wool ; rising in 
 fantastic wreaths, which were melted and swept away by the 
 sea-breeze ; and, as a last poor resource, hiding in clefts and 
 glens, only to perish ignominiously before the steady blaze of 
 the sun, as he towered stronger and stronger each moment 
 over the distant hills of Argyleshire. 
 
 So on through the bog, until the heather began to roll and 
 rise, and then leap up into scarps and terraces, and then run 
 into long ribs, along which they walked, and saw mirror-like 
 lakes, hundreds and hundreds of feet below. Some were per 
 fectly calm, and some streaked with bands of frosted silver, as 
 
128 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 the wind, wandering into the sheltered corries, caught the sur 
 face here and there. Then there was no more heather, but a 
 steep cone of yellow grass and gray stone. And last of all 
 the summit, a breezy platform twelve feet square. Below, 
 the ocean, with a hundred fantastically shaped islands ; above, 
 the vast blue sky ; and around, silence, except the gentle 
 whispering of the south wind among the grass stalks. 
 
 " Gil ! Gil ! " said Austin, after a pause. " This is a glori 
 ous country." 
 
 " Ay, it s a braw country," replied Gil, " in summer time. 
 But we are unco poor, and the winters are very long." 
 
 " I shall think of you in the long winter nights, Gil," said 
 Austin. " The winter nights are very long." 
 
 " Ay, indeed they are, both cold and long." 
 
 " If you feel them so, Colin," said Austin, " here in this free 
 island, think what they must be to poor prisoners, alone iii 
 jail. Think of that. Suppose you or I had to spend the 
 Avinter in jail, what should we do ? " 
 
 " I should ding out my brains against the wa , and dee like 
 a man," said Colin, rapidly, snatching at the grass. " What 
 gars ye think such things ? " 
 
 " I don t know," replied Austin, looking out over the sea ; 
 " the rule of contrairyj I fancy. Being so wild and free up 
 here, half-way between earth and heaven, makes one think of 
 the other extreme, I suppose." 
 
 " Ay," said Colin, " if the gentles are no miserable by 
 visitation of God, it is forced upon the puir bodies to make 
 themselves miserable. It would be a hard business for some 
 of them if it were na for the de il, who, like a true gentleman, 
 is aye ready to assist a neighbor. Well, some amount of 
 misery is necessary for the enjoyment of life, I suppose. I 
 suppose you have no wish ungratified in life, that ye make 
 yourself miserable with thinking of jails ? " 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 129 
 
 "I have one wish," said Austin. 
 
 " I may not speir what it is ? " said Colin, looking up 
 eagerly. 
 
 " Ay, and get your answer, my boy. When will the swal 
 lows be here ? " 
 
 " In a few days." 
 
 " I am waiting for one of them, a little house-martin, that 
 shall be on my bosom till one of us die. I tried to tame a 
 peregrine once, but she has soared to her eyrie and left me." 
 
 Colin understood him so perfectly that he said not one word. 
 And if you turn on me and tell me that there are not here 
 and there such Highlanders as Gil Macdonald, I turn on 
 you and tell you that you have been staring at mountains, 
 while you should have been studying men. 
 
 So Austin, Gil, and the dog Robin sat for a while on the 
 summit of Ben More of Ronaldsay, and heard nothing but the 
 wind among the grass-stalks. 
 
 " There is not one cloud in the sky," said Austin, at last. 
 
 " There is one," said Gil. " I have been watching it this 
 ten minutes. Look southward." 
 
 " By Jove ! " said Austin, " it is the smoke of a steamer." 
 
 " The Swallow is coming," said Gil. 
 
 " I think so, indeed, Gil," said Austin, peering eagerly to 
 the southward. " That must surely be the Pelican. Let us 
 hurry down." 
 
 And as they went, Gil said, " Listen to me, Mr. Elliot. We 
 are going to lose you ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Austin ; " I am away with the Swallow." 
 
 " Will you take me with you ? I will follow you like a dog, 
 for as long a time as you appoint, without wages. I " 
 
 " 0, stop," said Austin ; " don t say any more. It is quite 
 impossible, Gil. I don t deserve this confidence. And I 
 have a servant already. You cannot tell how you distress me." 
 
 6* I 
 
130 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " You should think twice before you refuse me," said Gil, 
 eagerly. " You don t know the Highlanders ; we are so cun 
 ning, so brave, so devoted. Think twice." 
 
 " It is quite impossible. Don t think me unkind, but it is 
 quite impossible." 
 
 " I 11 think of you in the long winter s nights," said Gil. 
 " Will ye no come back to us ? " 
 
 " Ay, that I will," said Austin, eagerly. 
 
 Gil said no more. By the time they got to the town the 
 population were all out on the beach, looking at the Pelican 
 as she approached, stemming the surf s current of the Kyle of 
 Ronaldsay with her beautiful sharp bows. 
 
 Austin had been prepared for this. His portmanteau was 
 ready packed and in the boat. The good minister was ready 
 in the stern sheets, and two sturdy Highlandmen were ready 
 to stand to their oars. 
 
 " Ye 11 come back to us again ? " said an old man, as he 
 jumped into the boat, acting as spokesman to the population. 
 
 " Ay, that I will," said Austin. And so he did. 
 
 " Are we to say good-by forever, Mr. Elliot ? " said Mr. 
 Monroe, after they were in the boat. 
 
 " Forever ! ah, no ! " said Austin. " I will come back 
 again. Think of me in the winter-time." 
 
 " See here," said Mr. Monroe, " I have opened this envel 
 ope. You should take it back. Can you afford it ? " 
 
 " Tush, my dear sir, perfectly. If I cannot, it is not for you 
 to stand between me and the poor. Come on board, and let 
 me introduce you to my father." 
 
 But the old man would not. He was shy of strangers, he 
 said. He begged Austin would excuse him, and Austin 
 did so. 
 
 As the boat neared the yacht, the steam was shut off. The 
 swell in the Kyle was short and bubbling. Before Austin 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 131 
 
 had time to say good-by, there were alongside. In the next 
 minute, Robin was on board, and the. portmanteau. In the 
 next, he saw there was only Eleanor to receive him, and 
 then, looking over the side, he saw that the yacht was under 
 way, and that the boat had sheered off for the shore, drop 
 ping astern every instant, as the sturdy rowers plied their 
 oars in the short, chopping sea, and the yacht slid on against 
 the current. 
 
 Then he hurried Eleanor up on the empty quarter-deck, 
 and drawing her arm through his, bade her wave her hand 
 kerchief, while he stood bareheaded. She did so, and there 
 came a wild cheer from the shore. Soon after, the village 
 was hid by a turn in the Kyle, and that was the last of 
 Ronaldsay for a season. 
 
 Gil Macdonald had climbed up on a little cliff near the 
 end of the village, and stood watching it all, with his hand 
 shading his eyes ; and then and there he determined that if 
 Austin did not come back in a year, that he, Gil, would go 
 south, and seek him again. For the most extraordinary thing 
 was, that our merry, gentle Austin had, after only one week s 
 acquaintance, become a sort of necessity to this noble young 
 Highland lion. Here had appeared to Gil MacDonald, fret 
 ting, after the manner of his nation, in his miserable little 
 island prison, for the chance to go forth into the world, and 
 do battle with his peers, here had appeared to him a noble 
 young Englishman, a high-bred gentleman, from the crown 
 of his head to the sole of his foot, in carriage and dress far 
 beyond anything Gil had ever seen before; and yet this 
 apparition had treated Gil like a gentleman and an equal 
 all the time he had been with him. The country where such 
 as he came from must be the country for a Highland lad to 
 win his way in. And as for Austin himself, he would follow 
 such a man as that to the very world s end. 
 
132 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 He felt something in his hand. It was the gold Austin 
 had given him. He^almost felt inclined to throw it away, 
 but he put it hastily in his sporran and resumed his watch. 
 
 The yacht slid round the farthest black promontory of 
 Ronaldsay, and the spring twilight came creeping over Argyle- 
 sliire from the east, till only the summit of Ben More of 
 Ronaldsay had a faint gleam of pink on the side towards the 
 sun, who had now fairly northed from his equinox. But still 
 Gil stood looking after the ship, with his hand over his eyes. 
 
 We shall see how he came south before Austin came north, 
 and when and where he found him. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 Do you care for the man at the wheel ? I do not, one 
 farthing ! Elsewhere he may be a good man or a bad man, or 
 may have eyes or ears ; but when he is at the wheel, he be 
 comes the man at the wheel, and is not supposed to have any 
 more consciousness of passing events than the spanker-boom. 
 
 As a rule, you will find that people do not mind the man at 
 the wheel. They are very apt to take uncommon little notice 
 of the officer of the watch, but of the man at the wheel they 
 take actually none whatever. And Austin and Eleanor on 
 this occasion never troubled their heads about there being 
 such a person in existence ; and as for Mr. Slapper, the sail 
 ing-master, he was in the forecastle telegraphing with his 
 arms, like a madman, to the helmsman. 
 
 Eleanor, it appeared, had been taken by surprise. She lutd 
 run up on deck without her bonnet ; >she had thrown a loose 
 gray-hooded cloak (what was irreverently called in those days 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 133 
 
 a fool s-cap and bells) over her shoulders, and she had her 
 hand on her head, to prevent her hair blowing about. She 
 looked positively beautiful; and when Robin leaped upon 
 her, mad with joy, and her hair got loose, she looked more 
 beautiful still. 
 
 Three times they walked up and down the deck in silence ; 
 but in all her Majesty s dominions nay, in all the woiid 
 there were no two hearts so light as theirs. 
 
 Eleanor spoke first. "I thought," she said, "your dear 
 father looked guilty. I felt sure we should pick you up some 
 where." 
 
 " Did Aunt Maria guess ? " 
 
 " Foolish ! no, or we should not have been here. And how 
 did you like Ronaldsay, Austin ? " , 
 
 " Very much." 
 
 " Have you fallen in love with any one there ? Remember, 
 I insist on being told. I always have been told." 
 
 " Yes," said Austin, " I have fallen in love at last." 
 
 " I should like to see her." 
 
 " You shall." 
 
 " You will tell me all about it." 
 
 " Yes," said Austin, " I will tell you all about it." And, as 
 he said so, he drew her towards him, and kissed her ; and, as 
 he did so, his eyes met hers, and she saw it all now. And her 
 heart was filled with a peaceful, happy content, and she laid 
 her head upon his breast. 
 
 She had won him ; won him from all of them ; the gentlest, 
 handsomest, cleverest man in all England ; so she thought iu 
 her pride. I should like to have seen the flash of furious scorn 
 which would have come over that noble little face if any one 
 had told her that she was throwing herself away, and that with 
 her vast fortune she might have married an earl. She was 
 proud of her money, and knew the value of it. She was 
 doubly proud of it now. It would be Austin s. 
 
134 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " And so I caught you all alone," said Austin. 
 
 " Yes, all alone. Mr. Elliot is in the cabin." 
 
 " He is most impertinent and disrespectful," said Austin. 
 " He should have been on deck to receive me. How dare he ? 
 Where is Aunt Maria ? " 
 
 " O good gracious," said Eleanor, eagerly, " have n t you 
 heard ? " 
 
 " Of course I have heard," said Austin. " The sea-gulls 
 and cormorants told me, while I was at Ronaldsay. But I 
 should n t mind hearing your story ; for they all spoke at once, 
 and quarrelled, and contradicted, and I could n t make out the 
 truth of it." 
 
 " Why," said Eleanor, " the day before yesterday, she was 
 scolding old -James on deck, and he answered her just as she 
 was at the top of the companion, and she turned on him in her 
 lofty, imperious way, and she caught her foot on the sill, and 
 down the ladder she went, head over heels, and she has 
 bumped and bruised herself all over." 
 
 " Has she hurt herself much ? " 
 
 " No ; but she is terribly cross. She sent for your father to 
 her bedside, and requested him to put her on shore on a desert 
 island, with a week s provisions, and some beads and toma 
 hawks. For she said, that might possibly purchase the for 
 bearance of savages, although she could not that of a pampered 
 and ungrateful domestic." 
 
 " She is afraid of old James," said Austin. 
 
 " I know she is ; and I am afraid of her." 
 
 " You must not be," said Austin. 
 
 " But I am, and I shall be. You don t know what a terrible 
 woman she is. Sometimes only, she is violent. But, at ordi- 
 dinary times, she has a continuous voluble way of scolding, 
 which is more dreadful still. She does not raise her voice, but 
 goes on for half an hour together, indignantly asserting her 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 135 
 
 own case, from different points of view, until I am confused 
 and frightened. Any statement of my case only makes her go 
 over the old ground, a note higher, for another half-hour. She 
 can fairly scold me into submission. And I warn you that I 
 am completely and utterly in her power. When she takes to 
 scolding me in that way, I have neither temper nor courage to 
 oppose her. Remember this." 
 
 Austin reflected for a moment. I am glad, he thought, that 
 old James forms part of that household. " Eleanor," said he, 
 " do you know who old James is ? " 
 
 " Very well. He was a shoeblack-boy, whom my father 
 picked up out of the streets for charity. They were nearly 
 the same age. He came to be his servant when they were 
 both sixteen. He was at the taking of the Bastile with my 
 father and Lord Liverpool." 
 
 " It might be considered only decently polite," said Austin, 
 " if I were to go and see my father." 
 
 " And I ought to go to Aunt Maria." 
 
 " She will be in a pretty way when she hears of this," said 
 Austin. 
 
 " Of what ? " said Eleanor. 
 
 " Of my having proposed to you, and of your having ac 
 cepted me," said Austin. At which Eleanor ran away, and 
 Austin went down to see his father. 
 
 Mr. Elliot was sitting in the old place, at the head of the 
 cuddy table, over his maps and plans, and Austin said, " Well, 
 young fellow." 
 
 And Mr. Elliot said, " Aunt Maria has tumbled down the 
 companion, and abraded herself." 
 
 " And I have proposed to her niece, and have been accept 
 ed," said Austin. " Come on deck, and let me see your dear 
 old face by sunlight." 
 
 So the father and son went on deck, in the spring twilight, 
 
136 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 as the yacht sped out from the Kyle of Ronaldsay, into the 
 more open sea beyond, towards South Uist and Benbecula. 
 The man at the wheel may have smiled at the little passages 
 he may have noticed between Austin and Eleanor ; but he 
 did not smile .when he saw Mr. Elliot s arm round Austin s 
 neck, and the two heads, one so old and the other so young, 
 bent down together in consultation. 
 
 And so, through the long spring evening, the steamer 
 throbbed on her peaceful way, against the current, through 
 the Kyle of Ronaldsay. Right and left, the rocky shores 
 stooped down into the green sea-water, and everywhere land 
 and water were divided by a slender thread of silver surf. 
 In one place the rocks came down gray, wrinkled, and bare, 
 clothed for the last few feet only with a band of black sea 
 weed. In another the rock was less abrupt, and partly 
 feathered with ivy and yew, and here and there a pleasant 
 lawn of short green turf. In some places the rock fell away 
 altogether, and a sheep-cropped, limestone down, came rolling 
 and sweeping to the sea, which here was bounded by a half- 
 moon of bright yellow sand. In one place there was a large 
 fishing village, of whitewashed stone cottages, where the 
 women sat at the doors netting nets, and the old men were 
 hobbling about tinkering old boats, and where the boys 
 cheered them, and ran bare-legged along the shore. And, 
 soon after, they met the able-bodied men of this village, in 
 their fishing-boats, drifting homewards on the tide. In one 
 place, along this beautiful strait, there was a flock of sheep, 
 feeding high overhead, watched by a little Highland laddie, 
 whose dog barked, arid ran to and fro when he saw the ship, 
 and whose bark was joyously echoed by happy Robin from 
 the deck. And, at another place, there was a wee bit kirk 
 and a manse, on the hillside, with the minister out in his 
 garden, who took off his hat to them, and whose courteous 
 salute they returned as the ship sped on. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 137 
 
 " A happy land, Eleanor," said Austin ; " a land of settled 
 faith, of intelligence, of truth, and of order; a land not so 
 over-populated but that the best men may be recognized and 
 revered. Would you like to live here ? " 
 
 " I would live anywhere with you, Austin, even in Italy." 
 
 And at night, as the sun went down in the west, the ship 
 began to plunge, and then to roll, and she plunged and rolled 
 under the reeling stars, across the water which lay between 
 the Kyle of Ronaldsay and Benbecula, for the south wind, 
 blowing steadily, met the tides pouring southward through the 
 sleat, and the sea was heavy. 
 
 Eleanor and Austin walked the deck until the stars came 
 out, and the ship began to dive and leap, and send sheets of 
 spray flying to leeward, and then she went below. The stew 
 ard was superintending the laying of a cloth for supper. Mr. 
 Elliot was in his own cabin ; so Eleanor, with an anxious 
 look, feeling that her time was come, that there was no one to 
 delay and gossip with, made towards Aunt Maria s cabin. 
 
 Aunt Maria was sitting up in her bed, with her maid beside 
 her. She was in an ill temper, and her coarse, violent face 
 looked more coarse and violent than ever. There was some 
 thing worse than coarseness or violence in those deep-sunk 
 eyes and knotted eyebrows, but no one saw it as yet. 
 
 "Aunt, dear," said Eleanor, "what shall I bring you for 
 supper ? " 
 
 "You wicked girl!" said Aunt Maria; "you miserable 
 girl ! So your lover has come on board, has he ? So all this 
 voyage was a settled plan between old Elliot and you to meet 
 this profligate young idiot at Ronaldsay ! 0, how I do hate 
 meanness and ingratitude ! And look at the low meanness of 
 this proceeding ! and then, when you have reflected, if you 
 can reflect, on all that I have done for you, think of the in 
 gratitude ! " 
 
138 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 What Aunt Maria had done for Eleanor was . to live at 
 her expense to save her own income, and to worry her life 
 out. Eleanor knew this. But in the presence of this scold 
 ing woman, with her straight, overhanging upper lip, her 
 bushy eyebrows, and her deep-set eyes, she began to feel 
 guilty ; she was, as she told Austin, a coward, and she said 
 nothing. 
 
 " How long has he been on board ? " snarled Aunt Maria ; 
 " and what has he said to you ? " 
 
 " He has been on board about four hours, aunt," said 
 Eleanor ; " as to what he has said to me, all I care for is this, 
 he has proposed to me, and I have accepted him." 
 
 " And you have dared ? " said Aunt Maria, furiously. 
 
 " Yes," said Eleanor, quietly, " I have dared ; I dare do 
 anything when he is beside me. If you can get me away 
 from him, you may do anything with me. I am afraid of you, 
 and you know it ; but you are afraid of him and of his 
 father." 
 
 " Then you have accepted this boy, you wretched girl ? " 
 said Aunt Maria. 
 
 " I have, aunt." 
 
 " And Captain Hertford." 
 
 " Captain Hertford ! " cried Eleanor, the warm French 
 blood of her mother coming to her help, " that villain ! that 
 blackleg ! How dare you couple my name with his ? " 
 
 " How dare I, you silly girl ? " 
 
 " Ay, how dare you ! You would like him to get possession 
 of me, and then, by his sheer brutality, to get the management 
 of my nine thousand a year, you would like that ! " 
 
 " I think you want guiding, child ; but you are out of your 
 mind to talk to me like that." 
 
 " I am not. You and I and Captain Hertford are bound, 
 together by a tie of deep disgrace ; no one knows the truth 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 139 
 
 but we three. Now, I am a coward, but I am no fool, if 
 you press me with that man s attentions, I will tell Austin 
 everything." 
 
 " You tell him ! " said Aunt Maria, scornfully ; " suppose 1 
 were to tell him ? " 
 
 " In that case," said Eleanor, " he and I should be married 
 just the same ; only, if I know the chivalrous soul of the man, 
 more quickly than if you held your tongue. And in this case, 
 also, our secret would be worthless. You would be turned out 
 of our house, you would have to live on your fifteen thou 
 sand pounds, and Captain Hertford would have to live on 
 you ! " 
 
 " Then," said Aunt Maria, scornfully, " if you have this 
 hold over us, why not get rid of us at once ? Why not tell 
 him ? " 
 
 " Because he is going into public life, because I should 
 ruin him by hanging such a chain round his neck." 
 
 " You are a fool ! " said Aunt Maria ; " there is hardly a 
 public man in the country without his skeleton. Tell him : I 
 defy you ! You know if you told him he would not marry 
 you ; that is the truth ! " 
 
 u It is not the truth, Aunt Maria. You are like all entirely 
 worldly people, one half of you, a very foolish person ; you cal 
 culate only by the lowest motives, and never take higher 
 motives into consideration. Austin is a pure, noble, high- 
 minded man, utterly incapable of anything mean, and I also 
 am acting, I believe, on the highest motives, in keeping this 
 disgraceful secret from him. He would marry me to-morrow 
 if he knew it. But he shall not know it, for he would never 
 have the same fearless pride as he has now if he knew it." 
 
 " If he marries you, he shall know it, and all the world be 
 sides!" 
 
 " I think, aunt," said Eleanor, quietly, " that it will be bet- 
 
110 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 ter for you not to break with me, and my devoted old squire, 
 James ; I think it will be better for you ! " and, without wait 
 ing for Aunt Maria s reply, she left the cabin. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 THIS was the last voyage of the good old Pelican under her 
 present master ; what has become of her now I know not. I 
 have not even heart to inquire whether or no she is still used 
 as the yacht of the Secretary to the Shoals and Quicksands. 
 Those who loved every timber, plank, and bolt in her sail in 
 other ships now. Our interest in them was the connecting 
 link between us and the ship, and when they leave her, our 
 interest in the ship must cease. She becomes, as far as this 
 story is concerned, only a mass of wood and iron. 
 
 In life it is not so. Our affection for a ship one has once 
 known well is similar to our affection for a house one has once 
 lived in, but intensified. Only last year, I went down to the 
 East India Docks, and I came across the Orwell. It was like 
 meeting an old friend. There was a board which said that I 
 must not go on board, and a steward, who tried to prevent me, 
 until I said I knew her, upon which he yielded at once, and 
 let me go over the old deck, from stem to stern. It is hard 
 when on board a ship in the docks, standing so unmovably 
 still, to realize that one has seen those steady, tapering masts 
 sweeping wildly across the blotched stars, or those sharp bows 
 leaping madly up towards heaven in the agony of the storm ; 
 to recall the reeling and rolling and plunging of the vast 
 inert mass under one s feet, now resting so quietly from her 
 labor. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 141 
 
 * 
 Before the morning dawned the Pelican had threaded her 
 
 way through the intricate channel between North Uist and 
 Benbecula, and was steaming easily along under the cliffs of 
 the latter island, and about nine a preventive boat came off, 
 and Mr. Elliot went on shore in her. 
 
 " The glass is dropping, sir," said the sailing-master, " and 
 it is banking up to the west." 
 
 " Make haste, father," said Austin ; " don t be long. The 
 glass is really falling very fast." 
 
 " Them as wants to know about dropping glasses," said a 
 voice behind Austin, "should take my place, (and Lord 
 amighty knows they re welcome to it), and then they d 
 know what it meant. Them huzzies of ours is always at 
 it. Why, I dreamp last night as I see the hull bilin of em 
 come down the kitching stairs, one atop of the other, with no 
 less than six dozen of pipe-stemmed wines, and all the cut 
 custards." 
 
 " The young women do break a great deal of glass, I sup 
 pose, Mr, James," said the good-natured sailing-master. 
 
 " Ah ! " said James, " I believe you there. They gets a 
 tittling one another on the stairs, and down they goes. And 
 out she comes in her dirty old flannel dressing-gown, and gives 
 em all warning over the banisters. She s been a-trying 
 falling down stairs herself now ; but I ain t hearn of anybody 
 giving she warning." 
 
 This strong personal allusion to Aunt Maria forced Austin 
 to stop a silent internal laughter, which, like Mr. Weller, he 
 was trying to " come," and turn round. 
 
 " Well, James, how are you ? " said he. 
 
 " Breaking up rapidly, sir, and thank you kindly," said 
 James. 
 
 " I am sorry to hear that," said Austin, with perfect 
 gravity. 
 
142 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 The old man was going to make some cynical reply ; but 
 he looked round and saw they were alone : his whole manner 
 changed at once. 
 
 " Master Austin, my dear," he said ; " I see you and she on 
 deck last night. Is it all as we should wish it ? " 
 
 " Yes, James," said Austin. 
 
 " I thought so," said he. " Now you mind an old rogue, 
 and you keep close to her. It would be a good thing for she 
 (the old man so cordially hated Aunt Maria that he never 
 named her if he could help it), if she could bully Miss 
 Eleanor into marrying Captain Hertford, and then that the 
 pair on em should have the bullying and bally-ragging of 
 nine thousand a year. That would be a good thing, hey ! " 
 
 " It will never happen," said Austin. 
 
 " You mind it don t," said the old man, and walked forward, 
 leaving Austin musing. 
 
 The glass was dropping very fast, and it was clouding rap 
 idly up from the southwest. Lunch-time passed, and Mr. 
 Elliot was still on shore ; they began to get impatient. They 
 could see him through their glasses, walking about the light 
 house, looking into everything, directing here, consulting there, 
 as if time were not of the slightest value. 
 
 " By Jove, sir," said the sailing-master to Austin, " I wish 
 we had ten miles more sea-room. Boatswain, run up second 
 pennant and 3474." 
 
 It was done. Mr. Elliot was seen to notice it for an in 
 stant, and then turn away. He put up a cross staff in the 
 middle of the lighthouse-keeper s potato-garden, and then 
 sent a preventive man, a quarter of a mile away, to the top 
 of a hill, to get a line between the lighthouse and a sunk 
 rock. 
 
 The sailing-master took a sharp turn on the deck, and mut 
 tered something. " Run out that gun and fire it." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 143 
 
 Mr. Elliot did mind the gun. He came down to the beach 
 with provoking deliberation, and at last got into the boat; 
 before he reached the ship, two sharp squalls had passed sing 
 ing through the rigging, and a third, fiercer than either of the 
 others, swept over her as he scrambled on deck. There was 
 scarce time to cast the boat off, before the storm was upon 
 them in all its fury. They were relieved by seeing the boat 
 cast up on shore, with her crew safe ; then they had to think 
 of themselves. The blast was so terrible and violent, that the 
 yacht, although steaming ahead at full speed, was making no 
 way at all, and the rocks of Benbecula not half a mile to 
 leeward. 
 
 " I am afraid I have been very remiss," said Mr. Elliot, as 
 he walked away aft, and the sailing-master followed him. 
 
 " Dare you run for the lee of Monach ? " said Mr. Elliot. 
 
 " We should be broadside on to Grimness in ten minutes, 
 sir," said the sailing-master. 
 
 " Then God forgive me ! " said Mr. Elliot, and went to hid 
 cabin. 
 
 He had certainly stayed too long. Even now, at four 
 o clock in the afternoon, they were steaming for bare life, 
 and it seemed losing ground ; the night was coming on, and 
 the gale was increasing. 
 
 All that steam and iron could do, backed by a steady Scotch 
 head to manage them, would be done ; but the storm was too 
 strong for them, and the rocks were close to leeward : their 
 danger was very imminent. Mr. Elliot and the sailing-master 
 knew it, and Austin guessed at it. 
 
 Eleanor, seeing Austin look so calm, was not frightened, or, 
 at least, did not show it. She stayed on deck with him through 
 all the furious turmoil. They were wrapped in the same 
 plaid ; and, in spite of the rush and boom of the seas, and 
 the scream of the cordage, each could hear every word spoken 
 
144 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 by the other as plain as though they were walking together in 
 a garden on a summer afternoon. 
 
 At last Eleanor went down, not long after dark. She 
 looked into her aunt s cabin. That good lady was sleeping 
 quietly, unconscious of all danger ; and so Eleanor went to 
 her own cabin, and lay down. 
 
 She had looked into the main cabin, and seen Mr. Elliot 
 busy with his papers and charts. She was quite reassured, 
 and slept peacefully. But Mr. Elliot was not busy with his 
 papers : far from it. He was quite enough of a sailor to 
 know their extreme danger. When Eleanor passed into her 
 cabin, he was leaning his head on his hands, and anxiously 
 musing. Presently the sailing-master came into the cabin 
 and spoke to him. 
 
 " She is actually making leeway at times, sir," said he. 
 "As the sea gets up, she will make more. The danger is 
 very extreme, sir." 
 
 " And no anchorage ? " said Mr. Elliot. " If we could only 
 bite ground, we might, by steaming at anchor, weather it." 
 
 " We are in blue water, sir," said the sailing-master. " If 
 there is no change, it will be all over in an hour." 
 
 " And all my fault," said Mr. Elliot, 
 
 " Nonsense, sir. You were detained ashore by duty." 
 
 " Well, let us say so," the old man replied. " It will be all 
 over in an hour ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir, thereabouts," said the sailing-master. 
 
 When he was gone, the old man lay down his head and 
 prayed. He prayed for his son Austin ; that such a noble 
 young life should not be cut off untimely, through his own 
 carelessness. If he had seen a little further into the future, 
 perhaps he might have prayed that it might all be over now, 
 and that Austin and he might sleep together under the wild 
 fretting waves of the Atlantic, and be spared the evil to come. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 145 
 
 The brave little ship was leaping madly, and creaking in 
 every timber ; and underneath him where he sat the screw 
 was spinning and clanking, and buffeting the wild waters ; 
 sometimes coming half out of water, with an angry, jerking 
 hiss, and then throbbing bravely and diligently at its work 
 ten feet below the surface. It was a mad fight between winds 
 and waves on the one hand, and iron and steam on the other, 
 and he and all dear to him were the prize. 
 
 The noise was so great that he could hear no one approach 
 him. A hand was laid on his arm, and he started and looked 
 up. Then he stood up altogether, and looked with astonish 
 ment at the figure by his side. 
 
 It was Aunt Maria. But she did not look as he had ever 
 seen her look before. She wore the dirty flannel dressing- 
 gown which that impudent old fellow James had mentioned, 
 but on her head was a brilliantly gay cap, full of flowers, and 
 in her hand she clutched an ivory fan, which she held upside- 
 down. But, startling as her dress was, it was her face that 
 startled Mr. Elliot most. Her thick, bushy eyebrows almost 
 concealed her deep-sunk, small eyes, and those eyes did not 
 appear very steady, and her complexion, usually such a 
 deep red, was now a dull, sickly yellow. 
 
 Mr. Elliot had been in many lunatic asylums in his life, but 
 neither he, nor any other man, ever went into one yet without 
 seeing a middle-aged lady there, who was uncommonly like 
 Aunt Maria, as she stood before him this night in, his cabin. 
 
 He rose, in his alarm, and looked keenly, at her, trying to 
 catch her eye. Hers would not meet his, but she broke 
 silence first, in a hoarse, unequal voice. 
 
 " I heard every word that your sailing-master said to you 
 just now. I know that in an hour we shall all be all 
 be drowned." 
 
 " I hope not," said Mr. Elliot, politely. " The ship is in 
 7 J 
 
146 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 danger of going ashore, certainly, but there is every chance for 
 us, Miss Hilton." 
 
 " Nonsense ! " said she, catching his eyes, and dropping hers 
 again at once. "I know that the end of us all is near. I 
 curse the day when you deluded me into this voyage, that your 
 scatter-brained son might make love to my niece, and have her 
 money. Do you know what you have done ? " 
 
 " No," said Mr. Elliot, looking steadily at her. 
 
 " I will whisper to you." And she whispered to him, and 
 his face grew a little graver as she spoke. 
 
 " Now what do you say ? If by any chance we were to be 
 saved, would you break off the match ? " 
 
 " No," said Mr. Elliot. " In the first place, it don t affect 
 the property. I am an executor, and I know that." 
 
 <k I thought you had set your heart on your son s public 
 career ? " 
 
 " So I have." 
 
 " It will be a noble one with that round his neck." 
 
 " He and I may have our own opinion about that. Why, 
 if you believe that we are all to be drowned in an hour, do you 
 tell me this ? " 
 
 " Because I hate you, because I always hated you ! " 
 
 " Always ? " said Mr. Elliot. 
 
 " No," she said, fiercely, " I loved you once. How dare you 
 remind "me of it? I showed it, and that was my fault. I al 
 ways hated you, and Jenkinson, since that day when I heard 
 you laughing at me. How dare you ! I came to tell you this 
 because I believe that you have not an hour to live, and that 
 I thought it would annoy you." 
 
 " May God forgive you as I do, Maria," said the old man. 
 
 She turned to go. 
 
 " Won t you say good by, Maria, for old times sake ? " 
 said Mr. Elliot. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 147 
 
 Aunt Maria would not go so far as that, but she came half 
 way. She burst into a wild wail ; she broke her fan into a 
 hundred pieces, said that she was a miserable, ugly, mad old 
 woman, who had never had justice done her by those bhe had 
 loved, and so went weeping and wringing her hands, back to 
 her cabin. 
 
 " Poor thing ! " said good old Mr. Elliot. " I wish I could 
 get her out of Hertford s clutches. Small chance of that ! I 
 must tell Austin all this some day, that is clear, but not yet. 
 His love is a little too young to stand it yet ; I shall wait till 
 she has become a necessity to him. By the by, I forgot we 
 are all going to the bottom ; we shall be ashore on Benbecula 
 in half an hour." 
 
 But when Mr. Elliot said this, it was nearly twelve o clock 
 at night, and the yacht, so far from tailing on to the coast of 
 Benbecula, was driving (that is supposing her to go clear of the 
 stage of Broad-harran, Lion s-head, and Eagle-island, which, 
 as every school-boy knows, are the farthest projections of the 
 county Mayo, in Ireland, to the west), was driving, I say, 
 straight towards that part of the Atlantic where I am inclined 
 to place the still undiscovered island of St. Borondon, in spite 
 of the impudent lies of Marco Verde before the worthy Pedro 
 Ortez de Funez, inquisitor of the Grand Canary, who ought 
 to have fried him in a frying-pan for insulting the Holy Office 
 with his cocks and bulls. And how it came that the good 
 Pelican had turned her tail S.W. by S., I will tell you in a 
 few words, before we bid her good-by forever. 
 
 Austin, finding the deck untenable for the driving spray, 
 bethought him of the engine-room, and he went down there. 
 Old Murray, the engineer, was standing steadfast before his 
 gleaming cranks and leaping pistons ; and he saw that the 
 engine was being worked at a speed he had never seen be 
 fore. 
 
148 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 The engineer shook his head without turning round. " If 
 aught gives. Master Austin ! " 
 
 " Is there any danger ? " 
 
 " She 11 just hold her own if naught gives." 
 
 " I suspect our lives are in good hands, old friend," said 
 Austin, " and I know no one to whom I would sooner trust 
 mine." 
 
 The old man looked lovingly on Austin, and Austin stood 
 beside him some time. Suddenly the voice of the master was 
 heard inquiring for Mr. Austin. 
 
 Some one said he was in the engine-room. 
 
 " Tell him to come quick. Say I have something to show 
 him." 
 
 Austin dashed out of the engine-room, and up the only open 
 companion-ladder. As he got on deck, the press of wind nearly 
 suffocated him, but the ship was steady. There was very little 
 sea, the wind had beaten it down. Above, all was black as ink, 
 but the sea around them was a wild mist of white foam. The 
 master shouted in his ear, 
 
 " Look ahead and aloft ! " 
 
 He did so. A head of the ship s bows, high aloft, there 
 was a brighter patch in the inky sky, a patch of blue, in which 
 were three or four stars, which seemed to reel, and dip, and 
 rise again, as he staggered on the slippery deck ; and across 
 this patch, wreaths and wisps of storm-cloud were flying quick 
 as lightning ; but, awful as it seemed to Austin, these wreaths 
 of cloud were not going with the wind, but from right to left, 
 nearly dead against it. 
 
 " Good Lord ! " he said, " why the clouds are flying against 
 the wind!" 
 
 " It is a new trick they have got then," said the master ; 
 " wait and watch, Master Austin, you won t see the like again 
 out of the China seas. This is what / call a typhoon. I 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 149 
 
 reckon they have another name for it hereabouts. Watch 
 what happens, sir." 
 
 The patch of blue sky approached them, though not very 
 fast, and as it approached them, grew larger. At last it was 
 over head, and as they became aware of it, they became aware 
 of these things also. That it was a great funnel into the sky, 
 through a circular whirlwind of storm-cloud; and that the 
 moment they were under it, the ship was becalmed amidst a 
 heavy sea, which slopped about, here and there, in every direc 
 tion. 
 
 They were actually becalmed, while all around they could 
 hear the tempest howling and raving. The ship began to 
 make splendid headway now, with her head S. W. 
 
 But in twenty minutes, the engines were ordered to go at 
 half speed, and her head was put N. E. straight for the island 
 which they had dreaded. Ten minutes after, the storm struck 
 them from that very quarter, with increased fury, and the 
 good Pelican saved, with her engines going quarter speed, 
 was drifting slowly and safely out into the Atlantic. 
 
 And in the morning, when the storm was past, she was 
 leaping and bounding southward, over the bright blue waves, 
 with a thousand happy sea-birds skimming, and diving around 
 her. And Austin and Eleanor were on deck together, already 
 forgetful of the hideous night which had passed. 
 
 And now we must bid good-by to the Pelican, and to 
 Murray, the engineer, and the sailing-master, for our way lies 
 in a different direction. Austin was about to part from these 
 friends of his youth, these friends who had pampered and 
 petted him, and to start in the world for himself. With what 
 success, we shall see. 
 
 A month after his return to London he was on his way to 
 make the tour of the East, with Lord Charles Barty. At 
 Alexandria he picked up a letter, which told him that his 
 
150 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 father was dangerously ill. He turned homeward, and his 
 faithful friend came with him. At Malta he heard that his 
 noble old father was dead. His burst of grief was wild and 
 childlike, but his good friend, Lord Charles Barty, stayed him 
 and comforted him, and took him home gently and kindly, and 
 Austin rewarded him for it, one fine morning, as we shall see. 
 lie got home only to find the funeral ^sometime over, and to 
 take possession of his property. 
 
 And now we must skip a few months, and pick up our 
 story again at the end of them. These last events took place 
 in the spring of 1845. We shall take it up again in the, 
 beginning of 1846. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 THE year 1846 had begun, Parliament had met, and the 
 murder was out. Everybody had been perfectly certain of it, 
 ever since Lord Stanley s refusal to join the new ministry ; 
 but everybody now said, that they would n t have believed it. 
 After Sir Robert had got up, immediately after the seconding 
 of the address, and, in less than twenty minutes, announced 
 that the failure of the potatoes had necessitated his resigna 
 tion, and that his ideas on the subject of protection had under 
 gone a considerable change, some people, by far the larger 
 number, were struck with profound admiration, some were 
 violently angry, some were intensely amused, and all very 
 much excited. 
 
 A new political star had arisen, though as yet it was very 
 near the horizon, and its orbit was unascertained. Some time 
 before Parliament met, the Daily Intelligencer, a paper which 
 prides itself on the earliness of its political intelligence, an- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 151 
 
 nounced that " they were informed-" that the address would 
 be moved, in the Commons, by the newly elected member 
 for Granitebridge. But Sir Robert Peel knew better than, 
 that. The address was, on that occasion, committed to the 
 older and wiser head of Lord Francis Egerton. 
 
 The newly elected member for Granitebridge was no other 
 a person than Lord Charles Barty. A vacancy for that bor 
 ough having occurred by the death of old Sir Pitchcroft Cock- 
 pole, the borough had been contested by Lord Charles and 
 Captain Blockstrop. The gallant Captain was fearfully beaten, 
 to his own great surprise. 
 
 The Captain had argued in this way. That Lord Charles, 
 though coming of a Whig house, must, being a duke s son, be 
 at heart a Tory. That was .Captain Blockstrop s unalterable 
 opinion. So he issued a rather liberal address, as he thought, 
 expecting to be opposed by the very faintest and mildest form 
 of gentle Whiggery. When he read Lord Charles Barty s 
 address, Austin says that his hair stood on end, and emitted 
 electrical brushes, and his whiskers crackled like a cat s 
 back. 
 
 Lord Charles s address was the most atrocious and revolu 
 tionary document which had appeared for many years. The 
 Captain had said " that, should it appear that the supply of 
 food was likely to be seriously diminished by the failure of the 
 potato crop, he for one would listen patiently to any arguments 
 which might be adduced in favor of a temporary (mark him, 
 a temporary) suspension of the duties," for many of the popu 
 lation of Granitebridge were bucolic and Protectionists. Lord 
 Charles Barty had disposed of this question, and conciliated 
 the Protectionists by saying " that the Corn Laws were a 
 festering ulcer on the body politic, and that every hour they 
 were permitted to remain was another hour of humiliation and 
 disgrace to the country." The Captain thought that, at some 
 
152 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 future time, a slight enlargement and redistribution of the 
 suffrage might possibly be advisable. Lord Charles Barty 
 proposed manhood suffrage arid the ballot, to be taken im 
 mediately, as his specific for the potato-rot, and every other 
 disease. The Captain, who seemed really to have taken some 
 pains to inform himself of facts, thought that, in case of a 
 suspension or abolition of the corn duties, some relief should 
 be granted to the agricultural interest, say in a consolidation 
 of highway districts, or in an alteration in the law of settle 
 ment. But Lord Charles either knew nothing (which is most 
 probable) or cared nothing about highway rates, or the return 
 of worn-out paupers from rich manufacturing towns to impov 
 erished rural districts. He finished his address by telling the 
 Protectionist constituency of Granitebridge that, if the agri 
 cultural interest could not take care of itself, it was no one 
 else s business to take care of them. 
 
 But he was elected by 258 against 164, for these reasons. 
 
 In the first place, the good and gallant Captain had made a 
 most awful and Jack-a-shore sort of blunder. His strong 
 point, the point on which he dwelt most, was that of Admi 
 ralty reform. Now it so happens, that Granitebridge is not 
 more (as the crow flies) than one hundred miles from the 
 great arsenal of Plymouth ; and all the trim stone villas about 
 the town have been built out of the proceeds of filchings of 
 copper and nails and rope s ends from the dockyard there. 
 The inhabitants of those cottages and villas had each of them, 
 at that very time, three or four relations down in Plymouth, 
 in the dockyards there, filching away their hardest, at the 
 copper and rope s ends, that they also might retire, and build 
 villas like their relations. Now, you know, this was not 
 the sort of constituency to which to broach Admiralty reform. 
 The Captain argued that, being so near Plymouth, they must 
 be familiar with, and interested in, dockyard mismanagement. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 153 
 
 This was eminently true, but not in the sense the Captain 
 meant. 
 
 Another point in Lord Charles Barty s favor was, that his 
 name was Barty. The mighty sheets of deep red corn-land, 
 which stretched west from the town, lying in pleasant slopes 
 towards the south, were all his father s, as far as the eye could 
 reach. The town itself, and the land about it, belonged to Sir 
 Pitchcroft Cockpole. They always had a Cockpole or a 
 Barty for one of their members. They knew them, and could 
 trust them : and these Bartys too ; they were all wild young 
 hawks at first (except the blind Lord Edward), but they al 
 ways turned out steady, devoted, useful public servants in the 
 end. " I m a Protectionist," said one old farmer on the hust 
 ings, " but I d sooner have Lord Charles and Free-trade, than 
 e er a one else with Protection. Though he is a owdacious 
 young Turk, surety drat un ! " 
 
 And a third reason for Lord Charles s return is this : when 
 he and his friend Mr. Elliot came down canvassing, there was 
 no resisting them. They were such a handsome, noble, merry 
 pair of fellows, that they took the warm Devon hearts by storm. 
 Lord Charles went about uttering the most atrocious revolu 
 tionary sentiments, in an airy, agreeable sort of way, and Aus 
 tin went with him and laughed at him. 
 
 One great event of the campaign was the attack on old Mr. 
 Pilgrim, the Quaker, in the upper Croft. It will illustrate 
 their very free and easy sort of tactics. 
 
 On the very first day of their arrival, as Charles Barty, 
 Austin, and the attorney were sitting together after dinner, 
 Brentmore pointed him out as an important and influential 
 man, a man who, if the Captain ran them close, might make 
 or mar the whole business. 
 
 " You must go to him to-morrow morning, my Lord." 
 
 " I 11 be hanged if I do. I shall say something terrible, 
 7* 
 
154 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 and set him against me. I cannot converse with a quaker, 
 I never tried." 
 
 -" You will have to try," said the attorney. 
 
 " Would n t it be better fun," said Lord Charles, "seeing he 
 is such an influential man, for me to send a letter to him say 
 ing that I consider him a broad-brimmed old idiot, and that 
 I 11 tweak his stupid nose for twopence. There would be 
 some fun in winning the election after that." 
 
 " There would, indeed, my Lord. You must go to him to 
 morrow. When the Tory man came down, before the breath 
 was out of Sir Pitchcroft s body, to see how the land lay, he 
 just called on Mr. Pilgrim, and from what he heard there, 
 went away again." 
 
 " Who was the gentleman, who was the base Tory who 
 dared to show his face at Granitebridge ? " 
 
 " A certain Captain Hertford," said the attorney. 
 
 Lord Charles and Austin became attentive. 
 
 " He has done a good deal of dirty electioneering work in 
 his time, and now he is looking out for a seat for himself. lie 
 is engaged to be married to Miss Hilton, a great heiress, I 
 believe." 
 
 " Will you be kind enough to tell him, the next time you see 
 him," said Austin, " that he is a confounded liar, and that I 
 told you to say so." 
 
 " No, Mr. Elliot. A man of my figure, sir, as broad as he 
 is long, and only ten stone after all, can t do it, sir. It would 
 be no use doing it, and putting it in the bill. No one is rich 
 enough to pay me for the consequences of telling that gallant 
 Captain that he is a confounded liar. Suppose, sir, that you 
 were to tell him so, and to say that /told you." 
 
 " You mark my words, I will," said Austin, " the abom 
 inable villain ! " 
 
 "I understand," said the attorney, "that the young lady 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 155 
 
 is quite under the influence of her aunt, and by the by, 
 we must look over the lists, gentlemen," he added, quickly, 
 for Lord Charles, after three or four attempts, had managed 
 to give him a violent "drive" on the shins under the table. 
 
 Just outside the town at Granitebridge, there is a long 
 lime avenue by the river side. Here, at ten o clock that 
 night, Lord Charles Barty and Austin walked up and down, 
 smoking their cigars. 
 
 The winter s moon was overhead above the leafless trees ; 
 and far up to the north, in the moor, they could hear the 
 river, here so calm, chafing among his granite boulders. 
 
 "Austin, old fellow," said Lord Charles, "when are you 
 going to get married ? " 
 
 " I wish I knew," said Austin. 
 
 " There is no cloud between you and Eleanor, is there ? " 
 said he. 
 
 " Not one vestige," said Austin. " There was a time, 
 Charles, when I was not in love with that woman ; but there 
 never was a time when I did not love her." 
 
 " And your love for her grows stronger ? " said he. 
 
 " Day by day, and hour by hour," said Austin. " But she, 
 does she love me as* I love her ? " 
 
 "Ten thousand times better, Austin. I will go bail for 
 that." 
 
 "Theh why does she put me off?" 
 
 " I do not know. Because, I take it, she is in the hands 
 of her aunt. You should make a bold push of some kind. 
 Look at her position, my dear old friend, just look at her 
 position. God help her if anything happens to you ! " 
 
 " Her position is not good, certainly," said Austin, pen 
 sively. 
 
 " It is simply horrible ! Here is a young lady a lady, 
 mind with aii enormous fortune, very handsome, in her 
 
156 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 way ; clever and charming beyond conception, without a soul 
 to speak to in her own rank in life. My blind brother, and 
 you and I, are the only friends she has in the world. She is 
 utterly debarred from all society. 
 
 " You see," said Austin, " her father did some queer things 
 in his time, and so no one takes her up." 
 
 " The world is very cruel, Austin, but it is not so cruel as 
 all that. The reason that no one goes near her is, that no one 
 will have anything to do with her aunt." 
 
 " I suppose that is it," said Austin ; " and she is getting 
 worse and worse." 
 
 " Does she drink ? " said Lord Charles. 
 
 " I fancy so. She is always terribly excited." 
 
 " Did you hear of her kicking up a row in church, last 
 Sunday ? " 
 
 " No," said Austin. Was Eleanor with her ? " 
 
 " O no ; she and Edward were philandering at St. Paul s, 
 bless the two sweet Puseyites. Austin, why are you not 
 jealous of Edward ? " 
 
 " And thereby deprive Eleanor of the only happy hours of 
 her life. Why, if it were not for your brother,- and his sitting 
 to play her piano, and his taking her about to the churches 
 and cathedrals on a week-day, she d go mad. Jealous of 
 your brother ! I watched them one day last week, creeping 
 in under the shadow of the abbey wall. She was leading 
 him, for there was some anthem to be sung, which they had 
 heard of, and had gone posting off across the park to hear. 
 It was Advent time, you know ; and there are fine anthems 
 sung then about Christ s coming, and that sort of thing. And 
 I followed them in, and, when the organ had done snarling and 
 booming, and the voices began, I watched them, and there 
 they sat, with their hands folded before them, like two stone 
 angels. Your brother has a beautiful face of his own, blind 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 157 
 
 as he is. Somewhat too much of this. One is talking non 
 sense, or near it. One always does, if one walks up and 
 down at midnight, with -the friend of one s heart." 
 
 " May the deuce have a man who don t," said Lord Charles. 
 " That brother of mine has a noble face." 
 
 " Was Lord Edward always blind ? " 
 
 " Always. He began to sing when he was five years old." 
 
 " He never sings now." 
 
 " No, he lost his voice at fourteen. Before that, he used to 
 go wandering about the house, singing some ballad, or hymn, 
 which had taken his fancy, to some tune of his own choosing, 
 in a strange, shivering, silvery voice. Once, I remember 
 George and I were in the school-room, kickipg up a row with 
 our sisters, and plaguing Miss Myrtle; and we heard him 
 come singing along the gallery, and we all grew silent and 
 listened. And we heard him feel his way to the door, singing 
 all the time. And he was singing * Lord Ullin s Daughter. 
 And he threw the door open, while we all sat silent ; and you 
 never saw a stranger sight. He thought no one was there 
 (for we were all very silent), and went on singing ; and his 
 blind face was flushed with passion : 
 
 And still, as wilder grew the storm, 
 
 And as the night grew drearer, 
 Adown the glen rode armed men, 
 Their footsteps sounded nearer. " 
 
 " Yes, he is a fine fellow. Let us, however, return to what 
 we were talking about." 
 
 " That includes a great many things," said Austin. " For 
 instance : about Aunt Maria making a fracas in church." 
 
 " O, ay, she did. My people were at St. Peter s, and she 
 came in, and the pew-opener had put some one in her pew. 
 And she kicked up a row, by Jove, and spoke out loud. She 
 was either mad or drunk." 
 
158 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " Was there any disturbance ? " 
 
 " Why, no. She recovered herself when every one looked 
 round. But no one minded their prayers much. Well, I 
 don t want to distress you, old fellow, but you had better know 
 the truth. It was a very ugly business. She utterly lost 
 command of herself. People were talking of it in London, 
 and said she was drunk." 
 
 " What the deuce am I to do ? " said Austin, impatienly. 
 
 " Make Eleanor appoint a day for marrying you. Don t be 
 put off any longer." 
 
 " There s where it is," said Austin. " She has appointed a 
 day. She has appointed a day in next April twelvemonths." 
 
 " Next April .twelvemonths ? " 
 
 " Ay," said Austin, " and stuck to it." 
 
 " That looks like reading the bill this day six months," said 
 Lord Charles. 
 
 " No," said Austin, " she don t mean that. She is in her 
 aunt s hands." 
 
 " She must be very weak," said Lord Charles. 
 
 " No ! " said Austin. " She loves me, as you know. There 
 is some scandal in the house, most likely about her brother, 
 who is dead, who robbed you at Eton. Aunt Maria knows 
 something, and whips her in. What shall I do with that 
 black-hearted villain, Hertford ? " 
 
 " Leave him alone. Give him rope enough to hang him 
 self withal. If she allows her aunt to bully her into marrying 
 him, you are well rid of her. By giving him rope, you may 
 bowl out Aunt Maria." 
 
 " You are right. Meanwhile, your brother Edward is there 
 continually ; and she, with her true toad-eating instinct, allows 
 him to come unchallenged, when my appearance would only 
 make a scene for poor Eleanor, after I was gone. Lord Ed 
 ward is stone-blind, but not, as I have heard, deaf. On some 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 159 
 
 occasions, Aunt Maria has behaved as though she considered 
 that the loss of one sense involved the loss of all. I say, 
 Barty ! " 
 
 "Well, old fellow." 
 
 "About Hertford. I know that his scheme is to marry 
 Eleanor if he can. The end will be, that he will try to get rid 
 of me by forcing me to go out with him." 
 
 " Damn duelling ! " said Lord Charles, suddenly. 
 
 " So say I," said Austin ; " but that is his game." 
 
 Lord Charles chucked his cigar into the road, and walked 
 silent for a few minutes ; at the end he said, 
 
 " Dear old fellow ! will you pay attention to me ? That is 
 his game ; I know it, Edward knows it. He will, in case of 
 his finding himself outwitted, do that ;*he is a dead shot, he 
 will force you out and kill you, if it becomes worth his while, 
 you must be very careful and gentle with him." 
 
 " I have been, Charles," said Austin. " I know what you 
 say is true, and I have been very careful." 
 
 " Ay, but it has not been worth his while yet. There is a 
 strong talk about enforcing the law against duelling. He 
 knows that. It will be his last resource. If he could get her 
 and her aunt safe abroad, he would shoot you to-morrow." 
 
 The interview with Mr. Pilgrim, the Quaker, was eminently 
 successful. It took place next morning at eleven, in this 
 wise : 
 
 Lord Charles was perfectly snapping to Austin as they 
 walked towards the house ; and Austin laughed at his woe 
 begone look, till he assaulted him in a by-place where no one 
 was looking. When they got to the Quaker s house they Were 
 shown into a cool parlor, to await the great man. Austin took 
 down books from the shelves, poked the fire, and dropped the 
 poker, made jokes, laughed loudly at them, and generally mis 
 behaved himself. At last he came round to the cellaret, and 
 
ICO AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 seeing it was unlocked, prompted by a noble curiosity, he 
 raised the lid. At this moment a heavy footfall was heard 
 outside the door, and Austin dropped the lid with a terrible 
 slam, just as the quaker entered the room. 
 
 He was a noble-looking old man, and he went straight up 
 to Austin, with a sweet smile 
 
 " Lord Charles Barty, I believe," said he. 
 
 Austin, as red as fire, pointed to the real man ; and the 
 candidate, looking as red as Austin, said, 
 
 " I am Lord Charles Barty, Mr. Pilgrim." 
 
 " And this gentleman," said the Quaker, sweetly, " who has 
 done me the honor to look into my poor cellaret ? v 
 
 " That s Mr. Austin Elliot," said Lord Charles, " and con 
 found him, he is always up to some of his fool s tricks in the 
 wrong place. But he is mad, you know, as mad as a hatter. 
 "No one can manage him but me. I would n t have allowed 
 him to take anything ; I don t think he meant to. He has a 
 monomania for looking into people s cellarets. All his family 
 had. His his his grandmother died of it ; and by Jove, 
 sir, it s hurrying him to his grave ! " 
 
 " Indeed ! " said Mr. Pilgrim, with his mouth twitching at 
 the corners. 
 
 "0 yes," said Lord Charles; "but that don t matter. I 
 say, Mr. Pilgrim, I wish you d vote for me, and get the other 
 people you can manage, to vote for me. I assure you that I 
 will make a good, diligent member. All I care for is to get 
 into the House and find my place in the world. It may seem 
 a conceited thing to say, but I think I shall make you a better 
 member than Captain Blockstrop, though he is a gentleman, 
 and a good fellow. I was going to make you a speech, but 
 that fellow Elliot has put it out of my head. Perhaps it is all 
 for the best. If I remember right, there was a lie or two in 
 the speech I was going to make you. Now I have blurted 
 out the whole truth." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 161 
 
 The Quaker looked on him with a smile. 
 
 " I have two conditions, my Lord." 
 
 Lord Charles recovered himself, and looked keenly at him. 
 
 "Let me hear them," he said, "just to see if they tally 
 with my own foregone conclusions. But mind, I don t change 
 one iota of my programme, at your or any other man s bid 
 ding." 
 
 "There spoke a real obstinate Barty," said the Quaker. 
 " My conditions are these, You are pledged to sweep the 
 corn-laws into the dust-bin of the past once and forever. Do 
 I understand that ? " 
 
 " You may certainly understand that." 
 
 " And you and Mr. Elliot are pledged to dine with me the 
 day after to-morrow, and see what is in the cellaret ? " 
 
 " I am pledged to that also." 
 
 " Then all shall go well. My Lord, I know you and your 
 worth, and I know Mr. Elliot and his worth also, though he 
 has peeped into my cellaret. I wish you a good morning, my 
 Lord. I have done one good service for you already. I sent 
 that that military officer, Will Hertford, out of the bor 
 ough pretty quick. There is a great advantage in lending 
 money at times ; you can get rid of a man. My old acquaint 
 ance George Hilton used to say that. Ah ! poor fellow. 
 Sad for him to die and leave his poor little girl all alone in 
 this wicked world. Good morning ! " 
 
 So Barty was returned by a noble majority, and Blockstrop 
 once more went down into the sea in his ship, and put forth 
 into the deep, taking his naval reforms with him ; and so the 
 Admiralty was left in peace. 
 
1G2 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 ELEANOR lived at the house her father had occupied for 
 many years, in Wilton Crescent. It was not a large house, 
 and her household was small. She saw actually no society. 
 Sometimes the monotony of her life was broken by the visit 
 of an old schoolmate, but they never stayed long, nor did she 
 press them. Hers was not a house for bright young girls to 
 stay in. She felt it. She knew it. There was something so 
 indefinably coarse, something so beyond and beside all gentle, 
 domestic love, in her aunt, that she never pressed those girls 
 to stay, and never of her own will invited them. 
 
 She was a strange little being. She had to dree her weary 
 weird, and she did so, with a depth of love, courage, self-sac 
 rifice, and shrewdness, which you will appreciate when you 
 know all. The fairy which had given her such boundless 
 wealth had given her counterbalancing gifts whreh made that 
 wealth worse than worthless. She would gladly have given it 
 all away, on certain conditions. 
 
 There was one reason why she clung to this wealth. 
 There was one reason why she still rejoiced that, disgrace 
 her as they might, that wealth was still her own. It would 
 be Austin s. If he would only wait, and trust her through 
 everything, it would all be his. If he would only wait, and 
 trust her. 
 
 She was sitting at her piano. She was alone in her draw 
 ing-room, and the light of the level winter s sun was on her 
 face. If there was, at ordinary times, a fault in that face, it 
 was, that the under lip and chin were somewhat too short, and 
 the mouth rather too closely set. That fault, if it were a 
 fault, was not perceptible just now ,- for she was leaning over 
 the keys, with her fingers upon them, studying the score of 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 163 
 
 the music before her. Every now and then she would try it, 
 and, each time she did so, the music grew towards perfection, 
 until at last it rolled away triumphant and majestic. It was 
 an old Huguenot hymn-tune, which she had found in her dead 
 mother s portfolio. 
 
 The door opened. Her mouth grew close-set again in an 
 instant. She turned round, and confronted her aunt. 
 
 Aunt Maria looked very flushed and odd. Eleanor said to 
 herself, " She has been drinking." She sat down before the 
 fireplace, and, after a pause, said, peevishly, 
 
 Well, child ! " 
 
 " Well, aunt, dear ! " 
 
 " Well, aunt, dear ! " she repeated, sharply. " Eleanor, 
 may God save you from the bitterness of having a sulky, ob 
 stinate niece when you are got old like me ! a niece who 
 loves to lacerate a poor old woman s feelings by making her 
 ask and cross-question before she can get one word of infor 
 mation. There, God forgive you, after all I have done for 
 you ! Don t you know that to-day is the fifteenth, you wicked 
 girl?" 
 
 " Alas, I know it well ! " 
 
 " Have you been out this morning ? " said Aunt Maria. 
 
 " Of course I have," said Eleanor,. in a low voice. 
 
 " Well ! " 
 
 " I have nothing to tell you. Captain Hertford went with 
 me." 
 
 . " Dear man ! " said Aunt Maria. " Dear, blessed, sainted 
 man ! Arid, ! he loves the very ground you walk on ! " 
 
 " I am sorry he should so far waste his love," said Eleanor. 
 " I am, I am sorry to say, wicked enough to have the very 
 strongest personal dislike for him. In this unhappy business, 
 however, he seems to have behaved kindly and well. I do 
 not judge his motives, I only judge his actions, aunt. He has 
 
1G4 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 behaved kindly and delicately towards me, and I will try to 
 reward him." 
 
 " Ah ! " said Aunt Maria, "if you would " 
 
 " Now, aunt, neither you nor he can possibly be silly enough 
 to suppose that I shall marry him. When I talk of reward 
 ing him, I mean this. He is gone to stand on the Tory in 
 terest at Glenport. Before he went, I told him that, if he 
 would, as soon as he had ascertained the cost of his election, 
 have an interview with my man of business, he would proba 
 bly find those expenses provided for." 
 
 " Why, you fool," said Aunt Maria, " that is giving the man 
 two or three thousand pounds without an equivalent." 
 
 " Well, he has a heart somewhere, I suppose," said Eleanor, 
 " or, supposing he has n t, he is a gentleman ; and having 
 taken his price to leave me alone, will do so." 
 
 " I tell you he loves you, you fool. I tell you that he loves 
 the ground you walk on. He is a man ; he is worth fifty 
 coxcombs. , You " 
 
 " Don t scold, aunt. If he does love me so deeply, I must 
 say he has taken the price of his election expenses rather 
 coolly. Don t begin to scold. I am not afraid of your scold 
 ing now. Austin will be with me to-day." 
 
 " I wish he was dead," said Aunt Maria. " I wish Charles 
 Barty was dead ; I wish Edward Barty was dead." 
 
 " When they are dead, or when they have deserted me, 
 aunt, you may take me and do what you will with me. God 
 knows they are the only friends I have on this earth. All 
 houses are shut to me, aunt. You know that. But I have a 
 heaven that you don t know about. When Austin comes in 
 and talks to me in his sweet, gentle voice, or when Charles 
 Barty comes branking in with his merry nonsense, I am- in a 
 different world to the one you know of, aunt ; and when blind, 
 noble Edward and I are at our music together, then, then, 
 
r 
 
 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 1G5 
 
 aunt, ah ! where are Captain Hertford and all the misery 
 then? miles, miles below our feet, aunt?" 
 
 " You go rambling about to church, with that blind, fiddling 
 idiot, in a way which in my time no girl would have dared to 
 do. People will talk of it. Have you no sense of what is 
 correct ? People will talk about you as sure as you are born." 
 
 " Very few people are likely to talk about you and I, aunt," 
 said Eleanor. " We have learned that much, in spite of our 
 wealth. If we keep quiet, we are at present insignificant." 
 
 Whereupon Aunt Maria began to scold, rambling on from 
 misstatement to misstatement, until she had no new misstate 
 ment to make, and then beginning da capo with the original 
 grievance. And that is the true art of scolding in all countries^ 
 I believe. s?^ 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 THERE is a place I know which is unlike any other place I 
 have ever been in. It is only the transept of a cathedral, and 
 yet for some reason it is different to all other transepts. I 
 cannot tell you why, but so it is. Possibly the reason is be 
 cause I have been more familiar with it than with any other, 
 and because I love it far better than any other. The place I 
 speak of is Poet s Corner. 
 
 On a certain day Austin Elliot was in Poet s Corner, sitting 
 upon Chaucer s tomb. Those who walked up and down in the 
 transept only noticed that a very handsome and well-dressed 
 young man, with appearance of extreme youth, was sitting 
 upon Chaucer s tomb. No one knew the profoundly deep 
 schemes which were revolving within that youth s head, or 
 under that youth s curls. 
 
1G6 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Austin had taken to heart what Lord Charles had said to 
 him at Granitebridge, and, after a long pause, had acted on it. 
 The mere fact that he had taken time to deliberate, instead of 
 rushing off headlong and doing just what his friend had sug 
 gested, proved to him most satisfactorily that he was getting 
 old, sagacious, knowing, nay, even sly. He had developed 
 a scheme by which every possible obstacle to the happiness of 
 all parties was to be removed. He had matured it, and now 
 he was going to broach it. It required the consent of four 
 or five people, who were about as likely to agree as his Holi 
 ness the Pope and his Majesty the King of Italy ; but still his 
 plan was a good one, and the idea of failure was not to be 
 thought of. 
 
 Things were very unsatisfactory. Eleanor was engaged to 
 him. He and she loved and trusted one another beyond the 
 way of ordinary lovers. There had never been a shade of 
 anger or jealousy between them for one second. He was his 
 own master. She was of age. And yet things were most 
 unsatisfactory. 
 
 The fact was that, as we have heard before, Eleanor refused 
 to be married before the next spring, a whole twelvemonth. 
 And meanwhile she was living, as it? were, under the protec 
 tion of her aunt, an awful woman, who looked red and wild, 
 who had made a disturbance in church, who knew no 
 one, whose very appearance was keeping people in mind of 
 the scandals against Eleanor s father, which they would have 
 laughed at and forgotten long ago if they had not been re 
 minded of them by the appearance of this terrible woman in 
 the Park, in Eleanor s own carriage, every day. 
 
 And again, Captain Hertford was a man of very odd 
 character, and he was continually in Aunt Maria s company. 
 Captain Hertford was known to be a desperate, though suc 
 cessful gambler, and a man of such courage and skill in the 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 1G7 
 
 noble art of duelling that he could still hold his head up 
 among the very best in the land. Every one knew all sorts 
 of things about him ; but any man who would have refused to 
 go out with the gallant Captain would probably have had to 
 withdraw his name from his Clubs. Captain Hertford was, in 
 short, a notorious blackguard, a weed which can only grow 
 under the infernal, devil-invented system of Duello ; and yet 
 a man with whom it was necessary to be on good terms, and a 
 
 member of Parliament. He sat for a small port in D shire. 
 
 The people there had rather wanted a Tory member. 
 
 They had very much wanted their railway. Captain Hert 
 ford had undertaken their railway, and everything else they 
 had asked, had spent a moiety of Eleanor s two thousand 
 pounds, and got in handsomely. 
 
 Such were the two persons who seemed to use Eleanor s 
 house as their own home. Austin s brilliant plan was, to 
 marry Eleanor, and buy these two people off, to bribe 
 them to leave her alone. 
 
 It was a good plan. Eleanor had behaved with the most 
 consummate discretion. She had never appeared in public 
 with her aunt ; she had only a few old schoolfellows for her 
 friends ; and, as for going out to any sort of party, in any rank 
 in life, she never dreamed of such a thing. Every one (for 
 people were getting interested in her strange espiegle style of 
 beauty, her immense wealth, her curious menage, and also her 
 excessive modesty and good taste), every one knew of her 
 engagement to that young Elliot, and thought him lucky. 
 Every one knew that she saw nobody except Austin and his 
 two friends, Lord Edward and Lord Charles Barty, and after 
 every one had seen the mother of these two young noblemen 
 wait at the door of St. Paul s (Knightsbridge) until the curi 
 ous little being came out, dressed in quiet gray silk, with a big 
 diamond clasp to her cloak, and had seen the Duchess introduce 
 
1G8 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 herself, and speak kindly to her; after this every one knew 
 that she was a meritorious young lady ; and they were right, 
 for the Duchess was never wrong. It was perfectly evident to 
 every one after this that there nothing stood between Eleanor 
 and entire recognition, save the elimination of Aunt Maria and 
 Captain Hertford. 
 
 A curious thing was, that Eleanor never appeared in public, 
 except to go to church. On Sunday morning she was always 
 at her place at St. Paul s (Knightsbridge) ; but in the after 
 noon, and every day through the week, she went anywhere 
 and everywhere, the Abbey, Margaret Street, nay, between 
 ourselves, Moorfields, and Gordon Square. She always walked. 
 If no one else was with her, she took old James ; but this was 
 seldom. Sometimes Austin would go with her ; but generally 
 her companion was blind Lord Edward Barty. They used to 
 walk very fast, for they were a very strange-looking couple, 
 and people used to stare at them. They never went anywhere 
 where they had to make many crossings, for Eleanor was ner 
 vous about taking him over them. For this reason, the Abbey 
 was their favorite week-day resort, because the only difficult 
 crossing is at the top of Grosvenor Place ; after this you are 
 in the Parks, and all is plain sailing. 
 
 Lord Edward knew every organist in London, and always 
 knew what music there would be. He used to come to 
 Eleanor s house, and they two would try to render it on the 
 piano until it was time to start, and then they would go down 
 to the Abbey and hear their crude attempt rendered for them 
 by the master s hand, with every magnificent accompaniment 
 which their hearts could desire. 
 
 On this day Austin had called at Eleanor s house, and 
 had learned that she was gone to the Abbey, but alone. This 
 determined him, instead of calling again, to follow her there 
 and walk home with her ; and so we find him sitting on 
 Chaucer s tomb, and watching for her. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 1G9 
 
 The place w.as very quiet, for very few people were saun 
 tering about and looking at the monuments ; but presently 
 the organ snarled out its last magnificent dismissal, and two 
 or three hundred feet came whispering across the pavement 
 from the choir. 
 
 Eleanor was nearly the last. The little gray, ghostly figure 
 came stealing on from light to darkness so gently that her 
 footfall could not be heard amongst the others, the little 
 gloved hands were hanging at her side, her face was very 
 calm and peaceful, and her eyes were set straight on Rare 
 Ben Jonson, until she came opposite Chaucer s tomb, and 
 she turned to glance on it as usual; and then her face lit 
 up with joy, for Austin was sitting there, defiant of vergers, 
 and laughing at her. 
 
 They were together in one instant, and her hand was on 
 his arm ; for a minute they were both too happy to say one 
 word. 
 
 " My darling bird," whispered Austin, for they were in 
 a sacred edifice, " were you going to walk home alone in 
 the dusk?" 
 
 " Old James is with me, Austy dear," said she. " When 
 Lord Edward is not with me, I always bring him." 
 
 " He is not here now," said Austin. " I wonder if he has 
 gone to sleep. What a lark if he should be locked in." 
 
 At this moment a terrible disturbance was heard in the 
 choir. 
 
 " Austin, whatever shall we do ? " said Eleanor. 
 
 " Stay here, my love," said Austin ; and he ran back. 
 
 A verger was just locking the gate in the screen, and 
 seemed inclined to dispute passage ; but Austin pushed past 
 him, and on entering saw a sight which turned him to stone. 
 Old James had got hold of a verger by the hair, had dragged 
 him down across a bench, and was beating him about the back 
 8 
 
170 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 of the head with Eleanor s best prayer-book. On benches 
 around .stood angelic, white-robed choristers in groups, who 
 were saying, as loud as they dared, " Crikey ! " " Bray vo, 
 Kous ! " and " Evans, if you please, gentlemen ! " and making 
 other low-lived remarks, which prevailed among the youth of 
 our metropolis in the year of grace 1845 4G. 
 
 Austin garotted and pinioned James, and turned him round. 
 James, thinking Austin to be another verger, who had taken 
 him in the rear, made savage bites at him over his shoulders, 
 until Austin put him down in a safe place, upon which James 
 remarked, " Well, you are a pretty sort of a friend ! If 
 you had let me a gone on till he got stupid, 1 d have shifted 
 my hand and got the clasp-side of the book on the back of his 
 head. Lord! I d have killed him in three minutes." 
 
 " It is better that he should be allowed to live, to complete 
 the measure of his crimes," said Austin, pretty well knowing, 
 from long experience, that old James had a very strong case, 
 that, if not actually in the right, he was uncommonly near 
 it. It appeared, from the choristers, and from the good mas 
 ter, who had fle d for assistance, and from the other vergers, 
 that old James was in the right, after all. He had fallen 
 asleep, until he was awakened by the departure of the last of 
 the congregation ; he had then rapidly slid up to where Elea 
 nor s gold-clasped prayer-book lay, to follow her with it as his 
 duty was. The verger had got into the bench before him, and, 
 thinking he was stealing the best prayer-book he could see, 
 had very properly caught hold of old James by his coat, and, 
 on his resisting, had struck him. As Austin and the master 
 pointed out, it was only a case for mutual apologies, and a 
 sovereign, given by Austin to the conscientious verger, made 
 matters infinitely comfortable, and so he walked the old man 
 off triumphant. 
 
 Old James had burst his braces in the melee, and insisted 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 171 
 
 on stopping to mend them with a knife and some string, before 
 he rejoined Eleanor. 
 
 Austin took this occasion to ask, " "Why did you go to sleep 
 in church, James ? Just think what it would have been for 
 Miss Eleanor if I had not been here." 
 
 " Ah ! lucky you was. Uncommon seldom you comes to 
 church a week-days, God forgive you ! Why don t you take 
 her to church a week-days, like Lord Edward do, blind though 
 he is ? I m not one of they as holds there s any harm in 
 coming to church a week-days." 
 
 " Neither am I," said Austin. 
 
 " Then why don t ee ? " said the old man. " Lord Edward, 
 he is a gentleman ; he d be a gentleman if he were led down 
 Piccadilly by a brown, curly-tailed, mongrel dog, and a wicker 
 basket in his mouth, for the boys to put bits of backer-pipe 
 and oyster-shells into it. Ay, he would, although, mind you, 
 I m not one of they as holds with blind folks in generally, 
 they re mortal sly." 
 
 " But why did you go to sleep in church ? " said Austin. 
 
 " Because I had too much to drink in the morning," snapped 
 the old man, who was undeniably sober now. " You d have 
 done the same if you had had they wardens to deal with all 
 the morning. What s your name, and what do you want ? 
 says one as has drunk with me fifty times. Seggetary State s 
 order, I says, and none of your nonsense ; Lamb and Flag 
 at half past one, old boy. How is he ? And I seen him. 
 And Lamb and Flag it was at half past one, and drat they 
 warders and all belonging to em. Here s Miss ! " 
 
 Austin and Eleanor dismissed old James, and walked home 
 together across the Park, through the gathering darkness. 
 
 They hardly spoke one word, until, wending through the 
 shrubberies they came on the lake, and then Austin spoke. 
 
 He gently and delicately laid the whole case before her, as 
 
172 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 we have made it out for him above. He laid before her the 
 doubtfulness of her position in the world while those two peo 
 ple, Aunt Maria and Captain Hertford, occupied the house ; 
 and she agreed with him. in both. 
 
 " My dearest ! " she said, " do you not think that I must 
 feel all this more acutely than you ? I am not a foolish little 
 body by any means ; I should get on well in society, and I 
 should be immensely fond of society. Do you think that I 
 willingly live with two such millstones round my neck as those 
 two people ? " 
 
 " There is a remedy at hand," said Austin. 
 
 " I know it, but an impossible one." 
 
 " If you marry me at once, you will never be plagued with 
 them any more. I shall have authority, and will banish them. 
 My father s old friends would flock round you, and you would 
 take the place that your wealth and talent entitle you to." 
 
 " All this, my dearest, is mere truism. But I cannot marry 
 you before next April twelvemonth, Austin." 
 
 " Now why not, my own ? " 
 
 " Ah ! there you must trust me, my Austin. There is a 
 skeleton in our cupboard. You are going into public life, 
 and I am going with you ; you will win a peerage perhaps, 
 at all events, be prominently before the world. We must 
 have the road quite clear before we start our coach." 
 
 " And am I not to know what this skeleton is ? " 
 
 " Certainly not, until I tell you. It must not be said that 
 we married while such and such was the case. If it be pos 
 sible, I would rather that you never knew." 
 
 " But others know." 
 
 " We can buy them. You always knew that there were 
 queer stories about the Hiltons. You have heard the stories 
 about my father ; you know all about my poor brother ; you 
 know about Aunt Maria. You love me, my Austin. I have 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 173 
 
 great wealth, which is all your own, and with which you must 
 make your way in the world. There are scandals about our 
 family which must be smothered. Until they are smothered 
 and the road is clear, it would be fatal to your prospects for us 
 to marry. I am at work day and night with you only in 
 my thoughts, God knows, my darling ! to clear the way for 
 you towards honor and fame. I am working for you, Austin, 
 like a patient little mole, so diligently and slyly. If you claim 
 my promise next spring, I will, at all events, lay all the facts 
 before you, and you shall say whether you will have me or no." 
 
 " You will not tell me now ? " 
 
 " No. It may happen that you may never know. On that 
 wild chance, I keep you in the dark. But still, if you demand, 
 before you marry me, an account of everything, I shall have to 
 give it you. At present, your happiness and mine is, as far as 
 I see, bound up in your trusting implicitly to me. Will you 
 trust me, Austin ? " 
 
 " I will trust you implicitly, my own Eleanor," he answered, 
 slowly, looking down into her eyes, who would not have 
 trusted those patient, quiet eyes ? " for I will trust you im 
 plicitly. I were a dog else, I think." 
 
 " Mind one thing, Austin ; keep near me, let me see you 
 continually. Never forget what I told you before. She can 
 scold me and frighten me into submission at times." 
 
 " Cannot you get rid of her ? " 
 
 " No. She would create a scandal when I want all things 
 quiet. You must do that. you must get rid of her." 
 
171 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 . ALTHOUGH Austin resolved to trust Eleanor most fully and 
 entirely, yet, if we said that he was altogether satisfied and 
 pleased, we should be saying that he was something more or 
 less than human. He was a little, ever so little, nettled, and 
 it was a trial to him that the great coarse-faced brutal bully 
 should be always in her house, and, moreover, should know of 
 things which he might not. He hated Captain Hertford worse 
 than ever ; he hated Aunt Maria worse than ever ; but, never 
 theless, he felt sure that in a worldly point of view Eleanor 
 was right. The Hiltons were a queer family. If there was, 
 as Eleanor said there was, something wrong, still it was better 
 that matters should be let down easy, and the road cleared 
 before they started*- He determined to trust Eleanor im 
 plicitly. 
 
 It must not be supposed that Austin had come to this resolu 
 tion without assistance. After the conversation detailed in the 
 last chapter, he had sat in his room for an hour or more, and 
 had found himself getting peevish, almost for the first time in 
 his life ; had begun to feel dreadful thought ! that he was 
 being fooled. Men like him, men who had never been tried, 
 and have looked only at the surface of things ; men who believe 
 only in the words which represent things, and have no actual 
 knowledge of the things they represent, are more apt to be 
 jealous and suspicious than those who have had their noses 
 actually to the grindstone, and know from experience what 
 good faith and falsehood, trust and mistrust, really mean. 
 
 He was in a fair way to get jealous, when there was a 
 bounding foot on the stairs, dog Robin leapt up and barked 
 joyously, and the next minute Lord Charles burst into the 
 room, crying, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 175 
 
 I 
 
 " Come, come, laggard ! to the House ! Stafford O Brien is 
 
 on his legs, and there is all sorts of fun in the wind ! " 
 
 Austin came at once. On their walk from Austin s lodg 
 ings in Pall Mall, he had told his friend everything ; and 
 under the influence of his friend s affectionate shrewdness, all 
 the mists had cleared away ; and by the time he had left his 
 friend, and had squeezed into a tolerable place in the gallery, 
 he was himself again, prepared to enjoy the noble sport which 
 was going on in the arena below. 
 
 Lord Brooke was speaking, but the people in the gallery 
 were whispering to one another about Lord Granby s speech, 
 which seemed to have been telling. Before Austin could hear 
 anything of it, Lord Brooke sat down, and Lord Worsley rose. 
 He made some terribly hard hitting. When Austin heard his 
 quotations from old speeches of Sir Robert Peel s and Sir 
 James Graham s, terribly telling as they were, he certainly, 
 mad Peelite as he was, did wish that they had never been ut 
 tered ; and he also wished, most piously, that the noble Baron 
 was on board his yacht, or at Appuldercombe, or anywhere, 
 save in that House, quoting those confounded old speeches. 
 
 Yet these attacks on his hero made him somewhat angry. 
 Of course they were easily answered, but it was very provok 
 ing to have to eat one s words in a laughing house. Austin 
 began to grow warm with the rest of the world, and left 
 Eleanor pretty much to herself for a week. 
 
 On the thirteenth he bethought him that he would have a 
 joke with her, so he sportively sent her a valentine, and on 
 Saturday morning, the fourteenth, he went to visit her, intent 
 on hearing the fate of the valentine he had sent her. The door 
 was opened by old James, who said, " Hush !" 
 
 Austin asked what was the matter. 
 
 " Did you ever hear she when she was carrying on ? " asked 
 the old man ; " listen to her now ! " 
 
176 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Aunt Maria s voice was sadly audible indeed ; hoarse, loud, 
 and irregular, coming from the drawing-room. Austin mut 
 tered something between his teeth, and went quickly up-stairs. 
 
 He opened the door, and she ceased when she saw him. 
 She looked very red and wild, and Eleanor sat opposite to 
 her, with her hands folded in her lap, perfectly patient, and 
 careless of what the old woman might say. The old woman 
 had evidently been scolding her hardest at her. As Austin 
 came in, Aunt Maria held her tongue, and Eleanor looked up 
 and smiled ; but Austin, being her lover, could see what oth 
 ers perhaps could not. He had previously once or twice found 
 her in a state of depression after one of Aunt Maria s scold 
 ings, but on these occasions she had always been herself again 
 immediately: on this occasion such was not the case. She 
 looked up at him and smiled, but Austin could see that she 
 was not herself ; that she looked wan and pale and anxious, 
 strange to say, Austin thought he had never seen her look 
 so handsome before. 
 
 He could not help wondering what Aunt Maria s ingenuity 
 had found to say so very disagreeable as to disturb Eleanor s 
 equanimity ; but in spite of thinking about this, he could not 
 also help thinking how very handsome Eleanor looked. She 
 was sitting opposite her aunt, and was dressed for walking, 
 with the exception of her bonnet, which lay on the floor 
 beside her. She wore the long gray cloak which ladies wore 
 just then, which covered everything ; her chin, after her first 
 look at him, had dropped once more on her breast, and her 
 hands were folded in her lap before her, with quiet patience : 
 and the dull gray color of her habit, and its almost foldless 
 simplicity, harmonized so amazingly well with the dull patience 
 of her face, that she formed a picture, and a study of quiet 
 endurance, which made Austin think he had never in his life 
 seen any one so beautiful. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 177 
 
 Aunt Maria was in a blind fury at something. She rose 
 and left the room without looking at Austin. 
 
 " Has she been scolding you, my own ? " asked Austin, 
 bending over Eleanor and kissing her. 
 
 " Yes, Austin. Where does she learn it all ? Where has 
 she lived ? What has she done ? Austin, dear, take me to 
 church." 
 
 " Let us come." 
 
 " Ay ! That is good of you," she said. " If it was not for 
 the church, I should die under it all. They should leave the 
 churches open as they do abroad. Come on ; we shall be in 
 time. Sometimes, Austin, when she is like that, I get away 
 and go over to the church and find it shut, and then ah ! 
 then you don t know what it is, my own." 
 
 " I don t know," said Austin ; " but if it distresses you, my 
 love, I can be sorry. I don t like going to church. You must 
 teach me to like it." 
 
 " I will. Austin, should you be very angry if I were to 
 join the Romish Church?" 
 
 " I ! Angry ! No. I should not be angry. You would 
 find it a mistake, though. It won t hold water." 
 
 " Will the English Church hold water ? " said Eleanor. 
 
 " Why, yes, distinctly so. But what on earth do you want 
 to subscribe to the whole business for ? Surely you get as 
 much or more at St. Paul s as you do in Cadogan Street. 
 Have you ever been there ? " 
 
 Yes." 
 
 "I wouldn t go again. I don t think you have thought 
 much about it. You don t know how much you subscribe to. 
 Have you been there often ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Don t go again. I don t like your going there. Did 
 Edward Barty take you there?" 
 
 8* L 
 
178 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " No ; I went there by myself. I tried to get him to go, 
 but he got angry." 
 
 " He was quite right. Why did you go ? " 
 
 " Because it always stands open. And if you were a 
 woman, and had Aunt Maria to live with you, and a bitter 
 trouble which you can t tell to the love of your heart, yon, 
 Austin, would be glad to slip away sometimes and get into the 
 quiet church, and kneel and forget it all." 
 
 " It may be so," said Austin. " Meanwhile, you must pray 
 for me. Here we are at the church-door. I wish we might 
 sit together." 
 
 " We may pray together," said she. " Austin, will you 
 come to the Abbey with me to-morrow morning ? " 
 
 " Surely I will," said he. And they went into church, he 
 to one place and she to another, as is the custom in some 
 churches. .When he met her again at the church-door she 
 was still anxious and silent, and seemed to have a different 
 expression on her face to any Austin had seen before. 
 
 On the pleasant Sunday morning he came to take her to 
 the Abbey. The look of yesterday had deepened. She 
 looked very worn and anxious, and he was much distressed. 
 The morning was a bright, slightly frosty one, and the sun 
 streamed into the old Abbey through the southeastern win 
 dows, and fell upon the beautiful young pair of lovers as they 
 sat together. Eleanor was absorbed in her prayers, but Austin 
 was vacantly watching the lines of light in the thick atmos 
 phere, how they shifted and crossed one another as the sun 
 went westward, was wondering how the deuce those old 
 monks got it into their heads to build such a beautiful place, 
 and why the fellows of the present day could not, in that re 
 spect, hold a candle to the men of the thirteenth, fourteenth, 
 and fifteenth centuries. He thought of these things in a 
 vague, ruminant, ox-like frame of mind, instead of attending 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 179 
 
 to his prayers, with about as much earnestness as a fly in the 
 sunshine, and very nearly determined to ask some one about 
 it. Possibly he might have asked some one some day, but 
 they had to stand up at this point of his cogitations, and the 
 mere act of standing up set him thinking about the Bill, and 
 what an awful sell it would be for Lord Lincoln if Hilyard 
 were to beat him for South Notts. He went on thinking 
 about the chances at Newark long after they sat down again. 
 He was actually smiling at the thought of the Duke s anger 
 against the renegade, and thinking how much better it would 
 be if the Duke would keep his god-like rage penned in his 
 own bosom, when he felt Eleanor s hand on his arm. 
 
 He had been very inattentive, and he blushed and looked 
 down on the prayer-book which lay open between them. Her 
 finger was on the very passage in the Litany which the priest 
 was intoning at that instant, we humbly venture to think 
 one of the most sublime pieces of uninspired prayer put up by 
 man to his God ! 
 
 " That it may please thee to preserve all that travel by land 
 or by water ; all women laboring of child ; all sick persons and 
 young children ; and to show thy pity upon all prisoners and 
 captives." 
 
 Those who do not appreciate fully that passage in the 
 Litany, had better hear it read out by the captain in latitude 
 sixty south, when the sea is thundering and booming, and the 
 ship is reeling and rolling, and the wind is screaming, and the 
 cruel icebergs are gleaming, half seen in the snow-fog, and 
 the horrid long night is settling down over the raging ocean. 
 They will find out what "travelling by land or water" means 
 then, I 11 warrant them. The time came when Austin real 
 ized one part of this glorious prayer, and not the part by any 
 means that he ever dreamt of realizing ; and when he did so he 
 remembered that, as soon as this one paragraph in the Litany 
 
180 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 was finished, Eleanor removed her hand from his arm once 
 more, and went on with her devotions ; and that he began to 
 think how quietly Lord Henry Lennox had got in for Chi- 
 Chester, and of the meeting of the laborers in Wiltshire, and 
 what a strange business that was ; and of Lucy Simkins s 
 speech and Mary Ferris s speech. 
 
 And of Lord Charles Barty s furious blind rage when he 
 read those speeches aloud ; and how, when he had come to 
 the passage, " I biled they challucks for my children, and 
 the neighbors said they was poison ; and I says, then, they d 
 better die with a full belly than a empty one " ; that young 
 nobleman had rushed up and down the room crying out 
 for free-trade or revolution. And so, feeding his soul on his 
 own indignation against the Protectionists, Austin, not regard 
 ing the service, went on until he was nearly as furious as Lord 
 Charles himself. And, all the time, quiet, patient Eleanor was 
 sitting at his side, leaning ever so slightly against him. She, 
 too, had within her causes, deep enough, of anger and indigna 
 tion, deeper possibly than Austin s indignation on account of 
 the Wiltshire laborers, and his anger against the Duke of Rich 
 mond and Mr. Miles. But the mere feeling of her lover s 
 shoulder against her own made her quiet and contented ; and 
 although the cloud on her face grew darker and darker, as time 
 went on, yet still, though her face was pinched and anxious, 
 she was happy. She would have sat there, leaning against his 
 shoulder, and have died as she sat, with perfect contentment. 
 When the sermon was over, and they rose up, she took up her 
 
 l^/V ^**^* 
 
 burden on& more, and carried it. 
 
 " My Eleanor," said Austin, as they walked home, " you are 
 looking worn and anxious." 
 
 " I am, Austin. To-morrow afternoon I shall be myself 
 again." 
 
 " Shall I come to you to-morrow morning ? " 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 181 
 
 " No. To-morrow is penance day. You have often laughed 
 at me as a Tractarian, dear Austin. I do penance once a 
 month." 
 
 " What kind of penance ? " said he, trying a harmless 
 joke. 
 
 " A pilgrimage, Austin." 
 
 Whither ? " 
 
 " You must not know. You must not follow." 
 
 " I will not follow, if you give the order," said he. 
 
 " Then I give it," said Eleanor. 
 
 Austin was quite contented. In the first place, he had 
 thorough confidence in Eleanor, and had a shrewd suspicion 
 that it was best not to know too much about the Hilton family 
 history ; in the next, there were affairs to the fore, which en 
 gaged his attention more than the easy, confidential courtship 
 to which he had committed himself. This was the spring of 
 1846. All England had gone politically mad, and Austin 
 among the rest. His father had always placed political suc 
 cess before him as the great object on this side of the grave, 
 while he had spoken with truly ministerial reserve about suc 
 cess on the other. Old Mr. Elliot had been very anxious to 
 make Austin ambitious, and Austin had refused to be made 
 ambitious ; but had gone about, with his hands in his breeches 
 pockets, laughing at the whole business, until 
 
 Well, until this year, 1846. Ever since he was a child, he 
 had read about great political struggles, just as we used to 
 read about the old European wars, until the Crimean cam 
 paign came upon us, and turned all the familiar printed words 
 about the deeds of our fathers into letters of blood ; which we 
 eagerly compared with those which told of the deeds of our 
 brothers ; and the history of war became once more a terrible 
 reality. 
 
 Austin had thought that great political earthquakes had 
 
182 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 come to an end in 1831 ; that politics were certainly the occu 
 pation of a gentleman, but were not likely to be very interest 
 ing, because there was no question, nor was there likely to be 
 one. Sir Robert Peel s statement in January undeceived him. 
 The change of opinkm of three of the first men in the country 
 showed him that there was sport a-field ; and, after the first 
 leonine roar of the Duke of Richmond, he began to go mad 
 with the rest. 
 
 And in this manner the leaven of political ambition, which 
 his father had so carefully worked into him, had begun to act 
 with a vengeance. And so, just at the time we speak of, his 
 courtship of Eleanor, his attention to her affairs, his jealousy 
 of Hertford, and his distrust of Aunt Maria, were quite second 
 ary objects : had his jealousy been excited before, so much as 
 to make him extort an explanation from Eleanor, it would 
 have been better for them both. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 AUSTIN sat the long debate of Monday out, and left the 
 House at half past two. There was news from India, which 
 was announced by Lord Jocelyn ; and then the weary corn- 
 law debate began, and Sir Robert Peel, getting on his legs, 
 spoke calmly and deliberately for four hours, explaining what 
 had taken place in the autumn, and other matters, while 
 Austin sat and listened as patiently as a reporter. So the 
 next morning, instead of riding out before breakfast, he lay 
 in bed, in a happy sleep, till eleven, dreaming, among other 
 trifles, that Sir Robert Peel had sent Aunt Maria with a 
 hostile message to Sir John Tyrrell, and that Colonel Evans 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 183 
 
 was escorted to the hustings opposite Northumberland House 
 by a troop of Sikh cavalry, headed by old James. He slept 
 so long, that his servant would not stand it any longer, and 
 woke him ; and as soon as he had breakfasted, he went off 
 westward to see Eleanor. 
 
 She was quite herself again, though she looked very pale. 
 He had a happy morning with her. He gave her, from 
 recollection, the heads of Sir Robert Peel s explanation. She 
 sat sewing at her needlework all the time, and every now 
 and then asked a question. She not only appeared interested, 
 but she was so. When he had done, she put her needle into 
 her canvas, and deliberately expressed her opinion that it 
 was unsatisfactory; that the one hitch in it was, that he 
 ought to have gone to the country, and had not done so. 
 And Austin argued with her, and tangled her wool, and said 
 she was obstinate and disagreeable ; but she stuck to her 
 opinion about the dissolution, and would not be talked out 
 of it. And so they passed a long happy morning together, 
 and were both of them sorry when old James announced 
 luncheon, and they had to go down to the dining-room, where 
 was Aunt Maria, boisterously good-humored, and very red in 
 the face, who amused herself by continuous railing abuse 
 against Sir Robert Peel. 
 
 And a most exciting and delightful month it was. The 
 four friends the brothers Barty, Eleanor, and Austin were 
 more together this month than ever they were afterwards. 
 Lord Charles Barty spoke once, and spoke very well indeed ; 
 and Austin and blind Lord Edward, who had sat patiently in 
 the gallery to hear him, brought him home in triumphant 
 delight to Eleanor, and made her give them supper in honor 
 of the great event ; and a right pleasant supper those four 
 noble souls had. Then all sorts of things happened, and kept 
 them alive. Sir De Lacy Evans got in for Westminster, at 
 
184 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 which Lord Charles and Eleanor were glad, though Austin 
 would have preferred Captain Rous, as he liked a snack of 
 Toryism in his politics. Then Lord Lincoln was rejected for 
 Notts, which made them all sorry, and made Lord Charles 
 say what he would have done if his father had dared to 
 influence his election for Granitebridge. Then there was a 
 Polish insurrection, which caused quiet little Eleanor to utter 
 the most ferocious and revolutionary sentiments about the 
 Emperors of Russia and Austria, and which incited Lord 
 Edward to compose a piece of music expressive of the woes 
 of Poland and their triumphant redressal ; which was played 
 by hammering away at the black keys until they were all out 
 of tune, and then beginning on the white, and, when they 
 were finished, putting on the pedals and working both to 
 gether in one magnificent crash. But, in spite of all this, the 
 Polish revolt ended as all other Polish revolts will, until the 
 cows come home ; and the Poles got lovingly corrected by 
 their father, Nicholas. 
 
 Then came the news of Moodkee and Ferozeshah ; and 
 Eleanor cried about Sir Robert Sale ; and Lord Edward got 
 into the organ-loft at St. Paul s, and induced the organist to 
 let him play the people out ; and he played such a triumphant 
 symphony, that the people all came back again, under the im 
 pression that, this being Lent, the organist had incautiously 
 refreshed himself with strong liquors on a fasting stomach ; 
 a 11 3. the organist had to go secretly to the back part of the 
 organ and let off the wind. It was a happy month for these 
 four innocent souls, and before their golden happy laughter 
 Aunt Maria retired into her dressing-room, and had her meals 
 and scolded her maid there, to every one s great content. 
 
 And Captain Hertford came but seldom that month, 
 whether he was busy, or because for a time he felt himself 
 beaten by the young people, we cannot say. It was the hap- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 185 
 
 piest month that these four had had since they had known 
 one another. 
 
 Did either of the three others know of the weary grief that 
 was at Eleanor s heart, of the dark cloud which settled 
 down on her face each night, as soon as they were gone, and 
 had left her alone to the long night-watches ? Not one of 
 them, or they would surely have said that she was the most 
 valiant and noble little martyr on earth. Many things had to 
 happen before Austin found it out ; and one of that group 
 never found it out at all. 
 
 Patiently she would sit at her window, looking southward 
 across the crescent, at one light in some sick person s room 
 opposite, and wondering whether their burden was so heavy 
 as her own, until the last footfall died away in the deserted 
 street. Sometimes Aunt Maria would send for her after they 
 were gone, and say such terrible things to her as only one 
 woman can say to another, nay, as only a woman well 
 practised in scolding like Aunt Maria can say. But Eleanor 
 would only sit and listen, with folded hands. She had a grief 
 deeper than Aunt Maria, a grief which made Aunt Maria s 
 furious scolding sound like the singing of a mosquito outside 
 the net, a sound which makes your sleep uneasy, but which 
 does not wake you. 
 
 That happy month drew to a close. On the 14th they were 
 all together. The cloud, which had settled on Eleanor s face 
 every night after they had left her, grew visible by day. On 
 the 14th of March, when they were all together again, Austin 
 noticed that she looked anxious and pale. Lord Charles s 
 wildest Radical sallies only brought a faint smile into the 
 close-set mouth, and a feeble flash into the great gray eyes. 
 Austin knew that the time of her monthly pilgrimage was ap 
 proaching, and did not wonder ; the others thought she was 
 ill. Lord Edward formed a theory of her having caught cold 
 at church, and she encouraged it. 
 
 
186- ^ AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 It was Sunday evening. Lord Edward had gone with her 
 to the Abbey, and the two sinners, Lord Charles and Austin, 
 had not gone with them. They were spending the evening at 
 her house, and laying out plans for the next week. There 
 would be no important debate the next night ; and Lord 
 Charles said that if Eleanor would promise to give a supper 
 afterwards, that he would go down to the House, and speak on 
 the Silk question ; but she said, 
 
 "You must not come here to-morrow, or the next day. 
 Austin knows that I cannot receive to-morrow. I have to 
 meet my man of business to-morrow, and that always agitates 
 me so that I am fit for nothing the next day. If any of you 
 are going to be kind, you may call on Tuesday, and ask how I 
 am, but I cannot receive you. I have passed a very happy 
 month. If we four young people should never pass such an 
 other together, let us always look back on this one. Good 
 night." 
 
 The next month was not such a pleasant one by any means. 
 Politics were becoming embroiled. Mr. Disraeli was saying 
 the most terrible things, and Sir Robert s temper was not al 
 ways equal to bearing them. Every one was getting hot and 
 angry, and saying things they did not mean. And Austin, 
 having less to do with the matter than most others, was rather 
 hotter and angrier than anybody else. They saw but little of 
 Eleanor, and she for her part wished that the corn-bill was 
 done with forever, either one way or another. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 So little did Austin think about the matter which had 
 troubled him before, that the day of Eleanor s monthly pil 
 grimage would have passed by altogether without his having 
 noticed it, had it not been for a mere accident, the history of 
 which is this. 
 
 Austin had a very good habit of riding out early in the 
 morning before the streets were full, and the smoke had set 
 tled down ; and on the 15th of April he woke early, and said 
 that he would ride out. 
 
 He rang the bell, and when his servant came he ordered 
 his horse to be saddled while he dressed, and called " Robin." 
 
 The servant called " Robin " too, but Robin was not in his 
 usual place at the foot of the bed, and on further search it 
 became evident that Robin was not in the house, nor in the 
 street either. 
 
 " I brought him in last night," said Austin. " Run round 
 to Miss Hilton s, and see if he is there." 
 
 By the time Austin had done dressing, and was standing on 
 the doorstep, in a pair of yellow riding-trousers, and a blue 
 neckcloth, his man came back. The dog was not there. It 
 became evident that the dog w r as stolen. 
 
 Austin was vexed and irresolute. At last a foolish scullion- 
 wench, in the lower regions, incautiously volunteered informa 
 tion. Austin s servants immediately claimed that she should 
 be haled before him, and interrogated. 
 
 She came up-stairs in pattens, with a mop in her hand, her 
 hair all tumbled and tangled in a dreadful fright. Austin s 
 valet offered to hold her mop for her : she refused. He tried 
 to take it from her ; she fought him and beat him, and was 
 ushered into Austin s presence, red, triumphant, with her mop 
 in her hand. 
 
188 / AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Her mysterious communication about the dog amounted to 
 very little indeed. She had found the dog scratching at the 
 door, and had let him out for a run, " Which the Milk had 
 seen her." 
 
 " Find the policeman, and tell him," said Austin ; " as I 
 come home I will ride round by James s." 
 
 Riding about the west end of London before nine o clock on 
 an April morning is a very pleasant pastime. The streets are 
 nearly empty, and you can dawdle as much as you like, while 
 in Piccadilly and such places the air should the wind have 
 anything of welt in it is as fresh as it is in the country. 
 Everybody s horses are out exercising, too, and you can see 
 their legs, eyes, tails, and noses showing out of their clothes, and 
 may, if you like, drive yourself mad by calculating on the " ex 
 pede Herculem" plan, by an effort of comparative anatomy 
 far beyond Owen, what sort of horses they are, and how 
 much they are worth apiece. You can also see the British 
 cabman free from the cares of office, and many other strange 
 sights not to be met with later in the day. 
 
 It was a very pleasant ride that Austin had on this spring 
 morning. He rode slowly over the piece of wood pavement 
 between Sackville Street and Bond Street, and then trotted 
 till he came to the small patch opposite Devonshire House 
 (both these are laid down in good granite now), where there 
 was a horse down as usual. Then he walked slowly down the 
 hill, and, turning into the newly opened park, had a gallop 
 along Rotten Row, and, passing out by Kensington Gate, 
 began to feel his way slowly eastward once more. 
 
 Through fresh squares, where the lilac was already bud 
 ding, through squares and streets which grew grander and 
 grander, till they culminated in Belgrave Square itself, and 
 then into the lower part of the town which lies southeast 
 of it. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. , 189 
 
 It is astonishing how rapidly the town degenerates to the 
 southeast of Belgrave Square towards Vauxhall Bridge ; or, 
 to be more correct, did degenerate, in those days. From great 
 mansions you suddenly find yourself among ten-roomed houses. 
 So you rapidly deteriorate to six rooms, to four, to old bank 
 rupt show-vans taken off their wheels, and moved on the 
 waste ground, like old worn-out hulks ; and after them, dust 
 and ashes, and old paper-hangings, and piles of lath and plas 
 ter, and pots and kettles, and swarms of wild children, to 
 whom this waste of ash-heaps are mountains, and the stagnant 
 fever-pools, lakes, who build here for themselves the fairy 
 castles of childhood, with potsherds and oyster-shells, and who 
 seem to enjoy more shrill wild happiness than the children of 
 any other class in the community. 
 
 Austin paused before he came to this range of dust Alps. 
 At the junction of two low streets, between Vauxhall Bridge 
 and Millbank, there stood a house by itself, with a garden in 
 front, and a leafless arbor. This was James s, and James him 
 self, in his shirt sleeves, was in the front garden, drowning 
 some puppies in a bucket. 
 
 As Austin reined up, and paused before this house, the 
 population turned out to see the splendid apparition. Such a 
 handsome young gentleman, so nobly dressed, on such a beau 
 tiful horse, before half past ten, w r as really something to look 
 at. Was there never a lady of Shalott among those busy 
 worn needlewomen, stitching behind the dirty blinds, who 
 looked out and fell in love with this noble young Camelot ? 
 Who knows? 
 
 " She left the web, she left the loom, 
 She made three paces through the room, 
 She saw the helmet and the plume, 
 And she looked down to Camelot." 
 
 Poor things! Sitting there feeding on their own fancies, 
 
190 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 month by month, it is a wonder how respectable, as a class, 
 these poor folks are. If it were not for the cheap novels, 
 what would become of them ? 
 
 Austin drew up. Mr. James was so busy drowning the 
 puppies that he did not hear him. So Austin cried out, 
 " Hallo ! " 
 
 Immediately he heard an unknown number (he says nine 
 hundred, but that is an exaggeration) of dogs dash out of 
 barrels in the back yard, arid choke themselves with their col 
 lars. Before they had got wind to bark, a sound was heard 
 as of a strong man swearing. At which these dogs (number 
 unknown, Austin saw afterwards thirty-five bull-dogs, and a 
 cloud of black-and-tan terriers, which, to use his own vigorous 
 expression, darkened the air) all rattled their chains, and went 
 silently back among the straw. 
 
 All except an invisible small dog, who, from the volume of 
 his voice, seemed to be the very dog in the " Arabian Nights " 
 which came out of the walnut-shell. He, continuing to bark, 
 was audibly kicked by the strong man, and Mr. James, having 
 drowned the last puppy, came towards Austin, hat in hand. 
 
 Mr. James, a great, handsome giant, was, and is, one of the 
 most remarkable men in the country. He was the greatest 
 and most successful cynoclcpt, or dog-dealer, in England, and 
 consequently in the world. If a Chinese Mandarin had sent 
 an order to Mr. James for a dozen fat, blue, hairless dogs, to 
 be cooked for a fete champetre at Pekin, Mr. James would 
 have executed the order by the next mail, without winking his 
 eye. Mr. James was the greatest dog-fancier in England, 
 and I am exceedingly sorry to say that Austin was one of his 
 best customers. 
 
 I have hinted at Austin s low taste for dogs before this. 
 With all his high political ambition, this low taste was one 
 black spot in his character. He had an ambition to possess 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 191 
 
 the smallest black-and-tan terrier in England, apparently for 
 the delectation of his groom, for they were always kept at the 
 Mews with his horses. The groom became, to a certain ex 
 tent, debauched through these dogs. Prize-fighters, and far 
 worse, used to make court to that young man, and take him to 
 public houses, free of expense, for the mere privilege of hand 
 ling these wonderful dogs, the largest of which did not weigh 
 more than four pounds. Austin had sometimes given at the 
 rate of four guineas a pound for them. Robin had never con 
 sidered them to be dogs at all, and had treated them accord 
 ingly. 
 
 The enormous sums paid for these dogs, and the fact of 
 their being regularly stole once a week, and recovered and 
 sent home by Mr. James, had ended in Mr. James, great man 
 as he was, being a creature of Austin s. He considered Aus 
 tin to be a type of the real English gentleman, the last hope 
 of a degenerate age. Consequently, when he had done 
 drowning his puppies and saw Austin at his gate, he advanced 
 towards him with a very low bow. 
 
 " James," said Austin, " I have lost Robin." 
 
 " What o clock, sir ? " 
 
 " About seven." 
 
 " Then I can t let you have him before to-morrow morning, 
 sir. My cads were all out before that. Will half past eight 
 to-morrow morning do, sir ? " 
 
 " It must, I suppose," said Austin, " unless he comes home 
 by himself." 
 
 Mr. James was much amused by this supposition. He said 
 that Mr. Elliot would have his joke, and requested that Aus 
 tin would dismount. 
 
 Austin did so, and Mr. James called for Sam. Sam came. 
 The invisible strong man before mentioned, a young man, in 
 his shirt and trousers, who had not washed himself, and who 
 
192 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 looked like a prize-fighter under a cloud, which indeed he 
 was. With him came Mr. James s own favorite dog, a 
 white bull-terrier, who smelt Austin s legs and gave him a 
 creeping up his back. After which he went into James s yard, 
 and bought the dos which came out of the walnut-shell for 
 
 Mr. James had not done with Austin. It appeared that in 
 the next street, towards the river, there was a dog, belonging 
 to a master sweep, which Mr. Elliot must see, if he wanted to 
 know what a dog was. Austin, having given a shilling to the 
 obscured prize-fighter, who was waiting for an opportunity to 
 wash, mounted his horse and accompanied Mr. James and Mr. 
 James s bull-terrier. 
 
 The master sweep was in his gateway, and between his legs 
 was a white bull-terrier, exactly like Mr. James s. Mr. James 
 took his dog by the neck, the sweep did the same. Austin 
 called out, " James, I won t have it ! " but it was too late, the 
 dogs were at one another s throats, and the douce respectable 
 Mr. James was transformed into a shouting blackguard ; while 
 Austin found himself, in spite of his feelings of shame, looking 
 on at the most brutal sport in the world. Every man who 
 sets two dogs to fight ought to be beaten with a good thick 
 stick. 
 
 Whether it was that the residence of such a great cynoclept 
 as Mr. James had debauched the neighborhoods and given to 
 it a tendency to keep surreptitioufe dogs, or whether the fact of 
 its being what Mr. Dickens calls a " shy " neighborhood, with 
 infinite facilities of sending all dogs to play with the children 
 on the dust-heaps, in the rear, on the appearance of the tax- 
 gatherer, induced every householder in the-e parts to keep a 
 dog, I know not. But there was a dog in every house ; and 
 the moment the sound of the fight began, they rushed forth to 
 see the fun. Some leaped out of the windows of garrets, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 193 
 
 where they had been confined for their sins ; others walked 
 staggeringly along the tops of walls, bristling with glass bot 
 tles; some squeezed themselves, panting, through impossible 
 places ; and one fell into a water-butt, where he paddled and 
 sneezed, until his mistress took him out by his tail, and banged 
 him about the head with her shoe ; but the result was that 
 Austin, standing there on horseback, with the hope of stopping 
 the cruel work at the first opportunity, found that his horse s 
 legs were in, as it were, a bath of dogs, who yelped and 
 snapped and snarled round the two rearing combatants in the 
 midst. 
 
 And then suddenly he became aware that his own dog 
 Robin was in the midst of them. Whether he had dropped 
 from the skies, or risen out of the earth he knew not, but 
 there was Robin his own Robin going round and round 
 the dogs, and through and through the dogs, asking this one 
 how it came about, and that one who was getting the best of 
 it. and another one what they had better do ? Robin gay, 
 handsome, rollicking Robin was there, making himself 
 agreeable to the ladies, giving the best advice to the gentle 
 men, under the very nose of his own master s horse, not having 
 recognized either horse or master in his excitement. 
 
 Austin heard some one call the dog by name behind him. 
 He turned round, and he felt sick and faint, as well he might. 
 
 For there, in the midst of all this squalid blackguardism, 
 was Eleanor, Eleanor herself. She was dressed in com 
 mon, almost shabby, clothes. Her veil was up, and her eyes 
 were red with weeping ; and on her face was the very expres 
 sion which he had expected to see there on this very day of 
 the month, worn anxiety, grief, and shuddering terror. 
 
 She was standing on the pavement feebly crying, " Robin ! 
 Robin ! " but when she saw his face she cried out, " Austin, 
 Austin ! come to me ! " 
 
 9 M 
 
194 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 AUSTIN caught Mr. James s assistant, and got him to lead 
 his horse home. And in the next moment he was by Elea 
 nor s side, and Robin was bounding gladly around them. 
 She took his arm, and they walked homewards together. 
 
 Poor Eleanor was very much distressed, and agitated. She 
 had her veil down, and was crying, and Austin gently com 
 forted her. When she had partly recovered from her tears, 
 she said, " It was so naughty of Robin to run away from me 
 after those dogs." Austin would have liked to ask an ex 
 planation of her appearance there, but he did not like to. 
 Eleanor was very much distressed and hysterical, and he 
 wisely held his tongue. 
 
 Nevertheless, he was very much inclined to be angry with 
 her. She had been going to church a great deal lately, 
 going on week-days too, and always to what he would 
 have called " Tractarian " churches. Once she had asked 
 him if he would be angry, if she were to turn Papist. Now 
 Austin s sole religious creed at this time was a political 
 hatred, derived from his father, of the " Catholics," and never 
 having risen so high in religious thought as Tractarianism, 
 he felt a nearly equal jealousy of them. He got it now into 
 his head, that Eleanor had some spiritual adviser, either very 
 High Church or Papist, who had persuaded her to take these 
 monthly journeys in this garb, to this neighborhood, on the 
 grounds of religious mortification. It was by no means an 
 unnatural conclusion. He was inclined to be angry with her, 
 and determined to argue with her on the folly of it, 
 
 He was very much inclined to be angry. He had very 
 nearly succeeded in making himself so, when she pressed his 
 arm, and said, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 195 
 
 " Are you angry, Austin ? " 
 
 " No," he said, "I mean yes. I am furiously angry, my 
 darling. How do you think that you can please God, by 
 appearing in such a place as that where I found you, in such 
 a dress? Don t you suffer penance enough at home, every 
 day of your life, without allowing a priest to bind a grievous 
 burden on your back, which he himself would not touch 
 with one of his fingers?" 
 
 Ah ! if she had told him the truth ! She saw his error. 
 She saw that he thought she was making some kind of relig 
 ious pilgrimage, and she encouraged his error. In her deep 
 love for him, in her anxiety for his honor and fame, she en 
 couraged it. It was not so very long after this, that, sitting at 
 her dressing-table, she noticed that her hair was slightly gray. 
 She put down her brushes, and thought of her foolish, foolish 
 falsehood. 
 
 " Austin," she said, " let me get to heaven my own way. 
 Don t talk of this again. If you were sick, or in prison, would 
 I not visit you ? " 
 
 He comforted her, and said no more about it, and indeed, 
 after a few days, did not think very much ; for there was 
 much to think about elsewhere, of a far different sort. 
 
 The tiresome iteration of the Corn-law debate began, as 
 time went on, to be relieved by fiercer and fiercer personali 
 ties. Honorable members were saying things to one another 
 such as they had not said since 1831, and have not said since. 
 In the House it was bad enough, but in the clubs it was worse, 
 by all accounts. Honorable and gallant members at the Carl- 
 ton were threatening to pitch Right Honorable Members and 
 future Chancellors of Exchequer out of window, in the direc 
 tion of the Reform Club. " Or did so, in at least one in 
 stance," as Mr. C might say, in hedging a general state 
 ment of this kind, and might also continue, " future Exchequer 
 
196 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Chancellor not pitched out of window after all. Honorable 
 major, threatening that same, hereafter apologizing with a 
 certain leonine simplicity and honesty, not without grandeur. 
 On which occasion, also, we find that leonine major savagely, 
 and with feline snarl (yar-r-r ! To thy Cairn, Vermin, lest a 
 worse thing befall thee !) turning on a certain too eager jackal 
 of his, a Captain Hertford. Jackal apparently (judging from 
 infinite annual register, and newspaper file crudities) without 
 even the jackal merit of cunning. Only merit, apparently, 
 having teeth, and biting nobler than he. But a poor thing in 
 jackals, now happily passed away into limbo, forevermore 
 let us hope." 
 
 To add to the confusion, in this same pleasant month of 
 May, an opinion began to obtain, among those who were in 
 the same position, of knowing but little about the matter, but of 
 talking a great deal, that, although the bill was safe enough in 
 the Commons, it was not safe in the Lords. This caused a 
 great deal of fidgety irritation, and Lord Charles Barty went 
 about (to use a trope) with a pan of burning charcoal on his 
 head, threatening utter annihilation to his order should they 
 impudently dare to follow their own convictions. 
 
 In the midst of it all, Mr. Smith O Brien, driven to the 
 verge of madness at not making a sensation equal to his merits 
 (0 Council extinguished a year since in a blaze of high-handed 
 justice, and no successor of sufficient mendacity and talent ap 
 pearing), conceived the noble idea of refusing to sit on Saxon 
 railway-committees, and got himself shut up, in more ways than 
 one, if the reader .will forgive a piece of harmless slang. He 
 was rewarded for his heroism, by appearing the next week in 
 perhaps the best caricature in Punch, " The Naughty Boy 
 who did n t care." 
 
 Altogether, in this month of May, people were getting un 
 wisely excited about this Corn-bill, and non-electors began to 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 197 
 
 stand about at street-corners and discuss it in a loud voice, 
 which is an ugly symptom in a close-packed city of two mil 
 lions, the most open part of it, a mere St. Antoine, not cut up 
 east, west, north, and south by the boulevards of a paternal 
 government, anxious to remain a government. People were 
 getting very much excited in the* House and out of the House; 
 and what would have happened in 1848, if the Lords had 
 thrown out the Bill, we are almost afraid to think. 
 
 In the middle of all this, Lord George Bentinck got up and 
 made, what we must all, I think, confess, a most terribly telling 
 speech against Sir Robert Peel. He unluckily tried his hand 
 o n a proposition about the admission of oats, showing a degree 
 of ignorance or carelessness almost incredible in a man aspir 
 ing to lead a party. Mr. Goulburn went about with him 
 amidst the laughter of the House. In the discussion which 
 ensued, Captain Hertford spoke for a few minutes, and suc 
 ceeded in making Lord George s case worse than before. 
 The instant he sat down Lord Charles Barty was on his 
 legs. 
 
 It is possible that the House was relieved to find the quar 
 rel transferred to two such insignificant members as Captain 
 Hertford and Lord Charles Barty. At all events, they ap 
 peared so. Lord Charles did not speak for more than five 
 minutes ; he did not speak well ; he did not speak like him 
 self. His heart was so full of furious animosity against this 
 man Hertford, that he said things he ought not to have said. 
 He insulted Captain Hertford, and there were cries of order. 
 He had gone too far. When he sat down again beside Mr. 
 Huddersfield, the lawyer, radical member for a city in the 
 West, that gentleman said to him, " You have gone too far, 
 Barty. That man will have you out." 
 
 But Captain Hertford took no notice of it. People were 
 saying all sorts of things about one another just then. Lord 
 
198 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Charles had not said anything about Captain Hertford, much 
 worse than what Mr. Disraeli had said of Sir Robert. 
 
 Austin had that evening led Lord Edward Barty up into 
 the gallery, and they two had heard it all. When the debate 
 was over, and they were waiting for Lord Charles in the old 
 place under the end of Henry VII. s chapel, Lord Edward 
 said, 
 
 " Austin, Charles has insulted that man. He will have a 
 message to-morrow morning." 
 
 Austin said he hoped not. No message came. And then 
 poor blind Lord Edward got an idea into his darkened head, 
 which he acted on, the full effect of which we shall see. 
 
 We are obliged, however, to follow Captain Hertford on his 
 way home this evening. We wish we could take the reader 
 home in better company. 
 
 If any one had been able to see in the moonlight the vin 
 dictive scowl that was on his coarse face, they would have 
 augured ill for any one who should venture to thrust his com 
 pany on the Captain in an obtrusive manner that night. A 
 handsome young Frenchman, either not knowing or not caring 
 what his state of mind might be, came up, took him by the 
 arm, and burst into the most exaggerated form of French 
 laughter. 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! but Milor used you sadly, my dear friend. By 
 the prophet ! but he laughed at the most sacred beard of my 
 own Hertford. Come, let us shoot him. How say you, is 
 Milor to be kill ? " 
 
 Captain Hertford showed no outward irritation at this man s 
 presence or manner. He answered quietly enough. 
 
 " Milor may go hang, rot, anything he likes, for the present, 
 my friend. Commilfhut, where have you sprung from ? " 
 
 " From the gallery of the Imperial Parliament of Great 
 Britain, where I have been listening to the burning, furious, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 199 
 
 and yet lucid eloquence of my friend Hertford on ze oat. 
 T was a droll subject, but nihil tetigit quod non ornavit/ 
 like Doctor Goldsmiss in the triste old Abbey." 
 
 " Don t be a fool, Commilfaut." 
 
 " I will not when I am dead and buried, perhaps. Till then 
 fool I shall always be, dear Captain. Come and play the bil 
 liard, one game, by dam ! Only one game." 
 
 After a few moments consideration, Captain Hertford said 
 yes, and they went towards a billiard-room near the bridge, 
 which was still open, at all events to the Captain. 
 
 The billiard-marker was a rather gentlemanly-looking young 
 man, though with a decidedly dissipated air about him. Some 
 day, some wise man will write the lives of eminent billiard- 
 markers. It ought to be a very interesting book, for the 
 lives of most of them have been singularly erratic and tragical. 
 
 They began playing, and talked about indifferent matters in 
 English ; but after a time Monsieur De Commilfaut, having 
 made a hit, turned to the marker, anji said in French : " That 
 was a good stroke, was it not ? " 
 
 The marker looked stupidly at him, and said, " I beg your 
 pardon, sir ? " M. de Commilfaut repeated the question, and 
 the marker turned with a puzzled air to Captain Hertford for 
 explanation. 
 
 " The man don t understand French, don t you see," growled 
 the Captain ; " go on." 
 
 " I perceive that the pig-headed brigand does not, as you 
 remark, understand the language of Europe, which is a charm 
 ing discovery, as we can now discuss a few little matters which 
 I would be glad to have discussed." This was said in French, 
 and from this time the conversation was carried on in French, 
 a language which Captain Hertford spoke like- his mother 
 tongue. 
 
 " And how is my sweet cousin ? " said De Commilfaut. 
 
200 . AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " She is a fool," said Captain Hertford, sulkily. 
 
 " Slie is. She don t appreciate me. Has, in fact, refused 
 me an absurdly small loan of nine thousand francs. Eleanor 
 Hilton is a young lady of incorrigibly bad taste. She pre 
 fers, for instance, you to me. Can anything be worse taste, 
 my Captain ? " 
 
 " Nothing, I suppose," said the Captain, wincing. " Women 
 are strange creatures ; they will sometimes like a man better 
 than a monkey." 
 
 The Frenchman was so delighted with this elegant sally of 
 the Captain, that he went into the wildest fit of laughter. He 
 gave his cue to the stupid marker, sat on a bench, and laughed 
 till he cried. After a time he took his cue again in a feeble 
 manner, but before he could strike the ball the fit came on 
 again, and he laughed till he cried again ; by degrees he be 
 came quieter, and went on with his game. 
 
 " But I am glad to hear, my little pig, if, as you say in 
 your Parliament, you will allow me to call you so, that you 
 are at the best with this infinitely rich, espiegle, but very 
 obstinate little cousin of mine, Eleanor Hilton ; and for this 
 reason among others, that since she has refused me (by the 
 mouth of an aged mountebank, whose ears should be served up 
 au gratin at the Devil s next dinner-party) this trifling loan, I 
 am at this moment in nubibusj which means under ze cloud, 
 unclassical cabbage ! " 
 
 At this moment the marker broke out into a short laugh, 
 and they both quickly turned on him. The marker ex 
 plained. 
 
 " The French gentleman has played your ball, sir. I 
 always notice that too much talk don t do at billiards any more 
 than at whist." 
 
 The mistake was rectified, and they resumed the game and 
 the conversation still in French. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 201 
 
 " I suppose," said Captain Hertford, " that you are going to 
 mention my little debt to you ? " 
 
 " His little debt ! Holy gray ! the wealth of these islanders ! 
 Forty thousand francs a little debt ! " 
 
 " / don t call it a little debt ! It is mode of speech," said 
 Captain Hertford. "You cannot get blood out of a stone, 
 though, my friend." 
 
 " Alas, no ! I know it. For this reason I am overwhelmed 
 with joy to hear that you are at best with our determined little 
 cousin ; that you are about marrying her, and about paying 
 me my poor forty thousand francs." 
 
 " You will have your money if you wait," said Captain 
 Hertford, sulkily. " I shall certainly marry her, and you will 
 be paid in good time." 
 
 "I am sure, dear Captain. She has, then, thrown over 
 board this handsome young scoundrel, this Elliot ? " 
 
 "No, she has not." 
 
 " I shall watch your play, then, with the greater anxiety. 
 I have seen him, he is amazingly handsome, and I have 
 seen them together. I followed her when she was leading a 
 blind Milor, a Sir Edward, and she met him, this Elliot, 
 and I watched her ; and I have had my good fortunes like 
 another, and I can see. And she loves him." 
 
 " I am quite aware of it," said Captain Hertford. 
 
 " And what are you going to do ? " 
 
 " You asked me to-night," replied the Captain, " why I did 
 not take a shot at Lord Charles Barty, for his cursed inso 
 lence in the House. I ll tell you why. If I. had out Lord 
 Charles Barty, and even hit him, it would necessitate a slight 
 seclusion abroad, and the leaving the field in the hands of the 
 enemy. I am waiting for an opportunity of insulting this 
 fellow Elliot, and killing him." 
 
 " Recommending yourself to my little cousin s good graces 
 9* 
 
202 AUSTIN ELLIOT, 
 
 by killing her lover," said the Frenchman. " Well, 1 have 
 heard of that succeeding. But that course also, my friend, 
 will involve a temporary seclusion in the centre of European 
 thought and intellect, Paris ; and our cousin will be left to 
 lead about the blind Milor, and will, as I hear, probably take 
 the veil, which will be the devil itself." 
 
 " Not at all," said Captain Hertford. " If she was got 
 away from Elliot and his confederate, Lord Charles Barty, 
 (who would, too, were he his second, have to retire also,) her 
 aunt could bring her abroad, and we might do anything with 
 her. Marker, go and fetch me some soda-water and brandy." 
 
 The marker departed. 
 
 " Do you suspect he understands French, then ? " said 
 Commilfaut. 
 
 " No ; but one can t be too cautious. If that girl refuses to 
 marry me, I have a secret of hers which is worth three thou 
 sand a year to me." 
 
 " And what is that ? " 
 
 " Dear friend," said Captain Hertford, " would it be a secret 
 if I told it you ? " 
 
 " Why no," said the good-natured rascal of a Frenchman, 
 laughing, " only remember my forty thousand francs, or I will 
 force you to challenge me, and choose swords, old cabbage." 
 
 And so these worthies departed, infinitely satisfied. But 
 their interview compels me to call attention to a little story 
 which I have to tell. And which I will tell as dramatically 
 as I can, so that it may not be dull. 
 
 This billiard-room, where these two worthies had just held 
 their villanous conversation, was at that time the nearest 
 billiard-room to the House of Commons. 
 
 Austin Elliot was exceedingly fond of two things. The one 
 of hearing debates in the houses, the other of playing billiards. 
 When waiting for a debate to come on, what more natural 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 203 
 
 than that he should beguile the time with a game of billiards ? 
 Still more natural that he should play his billiards at the house 
 nearest handy, so as to run off at any time. More natural 
 yet, that he should, with his hearty manner and open hand, 
 get well known there, say very well known to the proprietor 
 Perkins. 
 
 At this point in our narrative, we must go back to a period 
 ten years antecedent, and begin all over again. 
 
 When Austin and Lord Charles were at Eton, there had 
 been an agreeable plucky boy there, whom they both knew, 
 by name Mapleton. This boy had gone to Brasenose, Oxford, 
 and from thence to the dogs, horribly in debt, disappearing into 
 outer darkness, having, in fact, in his wanderings, rambled into 
 that land in which policemen and low persons of that kind have 
 power. It was a sad business, the only thing to do was to 
 forget that such a lad ever lived. 
 
 But, about six months before this time, Austin had received 
 a letter from this lad Mapleton, out of the Queen s Bench, 
 praying for help for the sake of old acquaintance ; and Austin 
 had gone away to him at once, with his good heart full of old 
 school recollections, steadily ignoring all later passages in this 
 lad s life. Only reflecting that he might be saved yet. 
 
 He heard the young man Mapleton s story, he paid the debt 
 for which he was in prison, and both he and Lord Charles 
 promised that if he should deserve it they would help him up 
 the ladder again. 
 
 At this time it happened that the then billiard-marker at 
 Perkins s forged Perkins s name for 96 10s., and got the 
 money. He found this so pleasant, it being vacation time, and 
 billiards slack, that he begun to steal the billiard-balls by 
 twos and threes, and sell them in Greek Street, Soho. This 
 thriving also, and the 96 being capital untouched, he stole 
 Perkins s cash-box, and absconded. But, remembering that 
 
204 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 there was one more set of new balls left, he, so to speak, mi- 
 absconded again, and came back to fetch them. But the meas 
 ure of his sins being full, it fell out that Perkins met him on 
 the stairs, and essayed to arrest him. They fell down-stairs 
 together, Perkins cut his head open against the umbrella-stand, 
 and the marker would have escaped had not Mrs. Perkins 
 rushed out of the parlor, stunned him with the hearth-broom, 
 and got in the police. After this there was no marker at Per 
 kins s but Perkins himself, who pathetically told Austin and 
 Lord Charles that his tobacco business was going to the very 
 deuce for want of a billiard-marker, and they both cried out, 
 " Mapleton," and Mapleton came, and stole no cash-boxes ; 
 but passed on into higher walks in life after a time. 
 
 And this was the young marker who marked for Captain 
 Hertford and M. de Commilfaut, the night they had their im 
 portant conversation. Add to this, that in consequence of 
 five years Continental experience, more or less disreputable, 
 he understood French better than Captain Hertford, and from 
 old Eton recollections, knew a little more Latin than M. do 
 Commilfaut; which made him nearly betray himself, at the 
 Frenchman s new construction of in nubibus. 
 
 No wonder, then, that he, only now the poor ghost of what 
 he might have been or what he might be yet, but with his 
 poor weak heart full of gratitude, took his post in front of 
 Cheshire House, very early next morning. 
 
 By and by the Duke came out, rosy and fresh, eager to get 
 some pure air before the smoke came down ; to take his two 
 turns round the square, and his look in at his stables, and wish 
 to goodness he was back at Esham, among his beasts. Next 
 came Lord Edward, blindly staring, with his hand on his 
 valet s shoulder, away to the northeast for prayers, at Marga 
 ret Street. Lastly, Lord Charles, in white trousers, tall, 
 handsome, and gay, going one knows not whither ; ready in 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 205 
 
 his happy, youthful vitality, to go anywhere where a gentle 
 man might. Him the poor billiard-marker stopped, and into 
 his attentive ear poured all he could remember of the last 
 night s conversation. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 ALL he could remember. It amounted to this, as for as 
 Lord Charles could understand it, that this billiard-marker 
 had heard Captain Hertford say that he intended to provoke 
 Austin and shoot him ; and that he (the Captain) was as 
 sured that Eleanor would marry him, as soon as that was ac 
 complished. With all the poor fellow s eager honesty, he 
 made a game of " Russian scandal " of his information, after 
 all. 
 
 The marker and Lord Charles Barty played at Russian 
 scandal with a vengeance. Lord Charles thought that if he 
 were to tell Austin of it first hand, there would be a furious 
 outbreak on Austin s part, and that there would be a duel, 
 in which, as a matter of course, Austin would be shot stone 
 dead by Captain Hertford. So he went up and waited out-: 
 side of the chapel till his blind brother came out, and told 
 him (with Russian scandal variations), and they both agreed 
 that Lord Edward should tell the story to Austin, softening 
 it in every way ; just to put him on his guard against quarrel 
 ling with Captain Hertford, until there had been a grand 
 consultation as to what the three friends were to do. 
 
 Blind Lord Edward performed his commission (in the 
 Russian scandal way) ; he contrived to make Austin under 
 stand that Captain Hertford had in a public billiard-room, 
 
206 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 in the presence of witnesses, asserted that he was engaged 
 to Eleanor, and also that he was only waiting for an oppor 
 tunity to pick a quarrel with Austin, and shoot him. 
 
 About the first part of this communication Austin laughed 
 heartily ; about the second he looked very grave. 
 
 " Edward Barty," he said, " surely you do not distrust 
 Eleanor?" 
 
 " I would answer for her with my life," said the blind man. 
 
 " And I," said Austin. " This Hertford is a creature of 
 hers. She paid his election bills. He knows something 
 which she wishes to have hidden from me. That is the 
 reason of their familiarity. I will challenge her about it, 
 and have it explained. But I know her w r ell enough to know 
 that the idea of her marrying him is preposterous, mad, not 
 to be entertained by a sane man. She hates him. She knows 
 and despises him as well as we do. I am surprised that you 
 should have even repeated such a report to me." 
 
 " Dear Austin," said Lord Edward, " we are all agreed 
 about that part of the matter ; no one is anxious about that ; 
 it is about you that we are anxious. / have no doubt but that 
 Captain Hertford believes that if he could get you out of the 
 way, and get Aunt Maria to take her abroad, that he would 
 have his way. He believes that we know Eleanor too well. 
 But, old boy," continued Lord Edward, feeling out into his 
 eternal darkness for Austin s well-loved face, " if the dog shot 
 you, in pursuing his villanous plan, what would there be left 
 for the rest of us but misery and remorse, and impatient 
 waiting for death, that we might feel your dear hands again ? " 
 
 There was no one to see the expression on Austin s face 
 now, an expression seen by Captain Hertford two years 
 ago on that face at Tyn y Rhaiaclr, and to be seen by the 
 worthy Captain once more, an expression of mingled fury 
 and fear. He burst out with a snarl, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 207 
 
 " Damn him ! Is he the only man who can shoot with a 
 pistol ? What sort of country is this we live in, that a dog 
 like that, by possessing a certain dexterity, a dexterity 
 which a Sikh Soubadhar, or a French chevalier d industrie, 
 could communicate to my own groom, should hold the hap 
 piness of us all in his hand like this ! By God, Edward, it is 
 shameful ! Nothing to be said, nothing to be done, but by the 
 grace of this low blackleg, who has the one accomplishment of 
 hitting a man at twelve paces with a pistol-ball ! " 
 
 " It is an inevitable evil, Austin." 
 
 " It is not inevitable. The land is groaning under the sys 
 tem of the duel, and the land will be rid of it. Curse on the 
 fool who invented it, and a curse on all fools who follow it. 
 Therefore, Edward, a curse on myself; for let him beware, I 
 will play Best to his Camelford, mark me, I will ! " 
 
 " I only know this," said Lord Edward, " that I will not 
 have it; you shall not go out with that man. I will take 
 measures " 
 
 " Your measures, my poor Eddy," said Austin, " would only 
 necessitate my blowing my own brains out instead of his. 
 Remember, that any step taken to prevent a meeting between 
 this man and me, after what has passed, can only end in utter, 
 irretrievable ruin to me." 
 
 " I know ! I know ! alas, how well ! But you will be care 
 ful, Austin." 
 
 " I will not go within a hundred yards of the man," said 
 Austin, " my anger is over in that last burst. If you could 
 see my face, you would know it." 
 
 At this time they were walking arm-in-arm round the gar 
 den in Grosvenor Square. 
 
 " See your face ! " said Lord Edward, " ay, I wish I could 
 see your face. Does it seem strange to you, to know a man 
 who does not know what seeing means ? I was born blind, 
 
208 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 you know, and ever since I could think I have tried to com 
 pare the things I love. They have told me that you were 
 beautiful, and I have tried to realize your face. Sometimes I 
 have thought that it was like the scent of violet?, sometimes 
 like the noise I hear on the terrace at Esham on a summer 
 evening, when the children are playing on the village green 
 down below ; and sometimes when you and Charles get wild 
 over your politics, that it is like the mad scream of Ernst s 
 fiddle, when he makes all the muscles of your back tingle, and 
 the nerves about your face quiver again. What a fool you 
 would be, if you were blind, Austin." 
 
 So Captain Hertford, by such talk as this, was removed 
 millions of miles from Austin s consideration. But when his 
 clothes were off and he was horizontal in bed, the inexorable 
 Captain reappeared. And Robin, the dog, who slept with 
 Austin, got impressions, whether of thieves or fire I know not, 
 which made him sit up till morn, and pant ; for which he got 
 his reward from the boot-rack at various times in the night ; 
 but still, after divers more or less dexterous retreats from fly 
 ing boots, he sat up and panted conscientiously until morning 
 dawned. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 WHAT was to be done ? Lord Charles, his brother, and 
 Austin all consulted, and the answer was, " Nothing as yet." 
 What could be done ? The very slightest motion on their part 
 would bring on the very meeting they dreaded, unless they 
 resorted to civil protection, in which case there would be 
 absolutely nothing to be done, according to their code, but for 
 Austin to blow his brains out. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 209 
 
 Poor Lord Edward, sitting in eternal darkness, not being 
 able to know men s faces and what expression accompanied 
 such and such words, formed a project which no one but a 
 blind man or a madman would have formed. His project was 
 this, to speak to Captain Hertford himself. He had been 
 in Captain Hertford s company three or four times, and al 
 ways when Eleanor was present. He had never seen his 
 cruel, gluttonous face, and he had only heard his voice ; and 
 the Captain s voice, in the presence of Eleanor, his benefac 
 tress, was not so unpleasant : it was subdued to a sulky, re 
 spectful sort of growl. And, judging from his voice alone, 
 and pluming himself on his shrewdness, Lord Edward came 
 to the conclusion that he was not quite so bad as the others 
 wanted to make him out; that, at all events, he would try 
 what could be done with him. I must tell you how he 
 fared. 
 
 Captain Hertford s plan of operations just at this time was 
 most certainly nearly the same as that which he unfolded to 
 the Frenchman at the billiard-table. But we must remember 
 that he was a stupid man, whose cunning was of a very low 
 order. He had, as he most truly said, a secret of Eleanor s 
 by which he might extort money from her ; but when that 
 secret was known to Austin, as he felt sure it would be on the 
 very day of their marriage, he had cunning enough to know 
 that it would be worth much less in Austin s hands than in 
 hers. Moreover, were Austin out of the way, and he safe 
 abroad, he felt sure that Aunt Maria had still power enough 
 to scold Eleanor into going abroad, in which case he hoped to 
 get her to consent to marry him. 
 
 Here is where the man s low cunning failed him utterly. 
 Eleanor had always been so gentle and so kind to him, for the 
 sake of what he had done for her and for the power that he 
 still held in his hands, that the fool never dreamed that she 
 
210 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 loathed his presence, and that she hated the day when she first 
 saw him. 
 
 Eleanor, in addition to her own terrible domestic troubles, 
 tangible, every-day troubles, which she and her faithful old 
 footman bore patiently together, had got, from her native 
 shrewdness, a terror lest Captain Hertford should conceive the 
 plan of doing exactly what he was thinking of doing now, 
 involving Austin in a quarrel, killing him, and getting her 
 abroad, under the sole protection of her aunt, whose madness 
 was developing day by day. 
 
 That is what was the matter with Aunt Maria. She was 
 getting mad. Her fierce fits of scolding were becoming fiercer, 
 and sometimes her maid would come up terrified into Eleanor s 
 room in the dead of night, and they two would listen to the 
 dreadful old woman scolding away to herself below, as if her 
 maid was present. 
 
 Poor Eleanor did not know which way to turn among all 
 these terrible apprehensions. But she made a solemn vow to 
 herself, that if Austin were killed and she forced abroad, that 
 she would embrace the Popish faith, and claim the protection 
 of the good Archbishop of Paris, whom she knew. 
 
 So that as Captain Hertford s scheme stood at present, she 
 would have utterly wrecked it. But Lord Edward Barty 
 changed the Captain s scheme, and it was never put in execu 
 tion. Captain Hertford formed another one, and we shall see 
 how that succeeded. 
 
 One pleasant morning in this May month, date I should say 
 about the 12th, Eleanor and the worthy Captain sat together 
 in Eleanor s drawing-room in Wilton Crescent. They were 
 quite silent. Some commonplaces had passed, Hertford had 
 brought her some Cape jessamine, and she had thanked him, 
 and relapsed into silence, wondering whether he had anything 
 to say ; rather wishing he would go, but on the whole taking 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 211 
 
 rather more notice of Robin, who had come to her on a furtive 
 visit, than of the honorable and gallant gentleman. 
 
 Her regular, rather small features, had become somewhat 
 pinched and worn lately, and her air was a little languid. 
 Her eyes were as brilliant as ever, but her mouth was more 
 closely set ; and altogether her face was more marked, and she 
 looked older. She had had riot very much of artificial educa 
 tion, but she had inherited a certain grace of posture from her 
 mother, and I know not how many grandmothers and great- 
 grandmothers. Every attitude which she put herself into was 
 graceful. Her present one was very so, it was the one in 
 which one most commonly saw her : sitting in perfect repose, 
 with her hands folded on her lap, without one fold in her 
 drapery awry or out of place. She had the art of sitting abso 
 lutely still for any length of time with the most perfect grace ; 
 and that is a most difficult and rare art, and also a most useful 
 one. 
 
 It puzzled Hertford on this occasion. He had something to 
 say to her, but he was a very stupid man, and he never could 
 start a subject of conversation without assistance. On this 
 occasion he got none. Judging from appearances, and know 
 ing her as well as he did, there did not appear the slightest 
 reason why Eleanor should not sit in that posture, with her 
 hands folded in her lap in that exasperating manner, for the 
 next two hours. The Captain got angry, and at last he said : 
 " I beg your pardon, Miss Hilton." 
 
 Eleanor merely turned her head, and looked at him with an 
 expression of languid curiosity. She changed her attitude, 
 but it was only more graceful than before. Hertford had to 
 go on, 
 
 " There is a knock at the door. I am glad of it, for it will 
 cut me short. I have to thank you for your extraordinary 
 generosity about my election business. I am grateful, I assure 
 you." 
 
212 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " My dear Uaptain Hertford," she said, quietly, " no one 
 could have deserved my assistance more than yourself. I will 
 always be your friend, as long as you deserve it." 
 
 The door was opened, and James snarled out, 
 
 "Lord Eddard and Lord Chawls. That gal Susan have 
 dropped my best cut water-jug and broke it. She were a- 
 washing on it at the scullery sink, and she let go on it, and 
 down it come. Says she s all of a tremble cause she dreamt 
 last night as the carpenter she keeps company with in the 
 country cut her throat with a bevilling-plane, and buried her 
 body in a old saw-pit. Drat her, I wish he had." And hav 
 ing said this, he departed, and banged the door behind him, 
 while Eleanor s face was lit up with a smile. 
 
 On seeing Hertford, Lord. Charles paused for an instant, 
 and consequently Lord Edward, who had his hand on his 
 brother s neck, and was being led by him, paused too. A 
 singular pair. Both very handsome, singularly alike in feature, 
 dressed similarly from top to toe, and yet with such a strange 
 difference between them. Charles had a pair of bright, hon 
 est blue eyes ; Edward was stone blind. Looking at Lord 
 Charles first, and then at his brother, had the same effect as 
 if you looked at the well-known face of a dear friend, and 
 immediately after at a sightless, staring, marble bust of him. 
 
 " Miss Hilton," said Lord Charles, " I have piloted Eddy 
 here ; he says you will take him to church. Do, that s a dear 
 soul, for I must go. Good by." 
 
 Hertford had risen too, and when Lord Charles was gone, 
 looked towards the door ; Eleanor said, " Captain Hertford, 
 would you mind stopping, I have something to say to you ? " 
 And on this the Captain sat down again. 
 
 The bell was even now ringing for church, and Eleanor 
 must hurry away, and put on her bonnet ; and so Lord Ed 
 ward was left alone with Captain Hertford, and Hertford sat 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 213 
 
 and stared at the blind man, who groped his way to the piano, 
 and began softly playing snatches of sacred music. He had 
 never been introduced to Captain Hertford. There was no 
 reason why Captain Hertford should speak to the brother of 
 the confounded puppy who had insulted him, and so he sat 
 and stared at those sightless eyes. 
 
 Those sightless eyes ! The darkened windows of a house 
 in which sight lies dead, shrouded in grave-clothes of strange 
 misconceptions, until the dawn of the Resurrection shall begin 
 to gleam in the East, and the dead shall rise upon their feet. 
 The eyes of the blind are more awful to look at than the eyes 
 of the dead. 
 
 Yes, more awful ! The eyes of the dead have looked (at 
 one time) upon the earth in which their time of probation has 
 been passed, and their eyes have carried the outward sem 
 blance of their fellow-men into their soul. But the blank, 
 staring eyes of those who have been born blind have looked 
 on naught but darkness from the beginning ; and the soul im 
 prisoned behind them has only groped about in the night of 
 its living tomb, and has learnt to love only by the sense of 
 hearing and touch. 
 
 What a strange riddle the earth must be to a man born 
 blind. We all know of the blind man, who thought that red 
 was like the sound of a trumpet ; and we remember it, be 
 cause it was, in some sort, a good guess. But think what a 
 puzzle the whole world must be to a man in this state. Try 
 to remember if you have ever awaked at night, in pitch dark 
 ness, and how the nibbling of a mouse was to you the stealthy 
 working of the burglar s centre-bit ; and the rustle of a few 
 withered leaves in the night wind became the fierce crackle 
 of burning beams. 
 
 Try to think of a man in a chronic state of misconception, 
 and do not blame Lord Edward Barty for what he did. 
 
214 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Living in a very small circle, under his terrible affliction, 
 with few hopes, few amusements, his source of information the 
 being read to by his valet, he, laboring under the conscious 
 ness of a want of information, avoided conversation and society. 
 By this means he had not got the great lesson which society 
 teaches, knowledge of the value of words ; and so 
 
 And so, after playing at the piano for a time, he stood 
 up. Captain Hertford sat at the other end of the room, and 
 silently watched him. 
 
 " What a devilish curious thing," thought Captain Hertford, 
 " to be always in the dark, like that fellow." 
 
 Lord Edward began to feel over the nearest table" to him 
 with his fingers, as though looking for something. Captain 
 Hertford was right. There was something very strange and 
 weird in watching the long fingers wandering about among 
 the china and bijouterie, or what not, which lay on the various 
 tables ; something very strange in that beautiful, darkened 
 face, which, with an instinct, the depth of which no man can 
 fathom, was always turned towards those white hands, which 
 its eyes had never seen, and never would see. 
 
 " It is uncommon curious to think of," thought the Captain, 
 " but that fellow has never seen any other fellow in his whole 
 life. There is something very horrid about it." 
 
 There was. Lord Edward was feeling his way softly round 
 the table, towards Captain Hertford, in sightless silence, getting 
 nearer and nearer every instant with his long, thin fingers ; it 
 was very horrid. Hertford held his breath, and felt a strange 
 creeping come over him. One of his big hands was on the 
 table, and Lord Edward s long hands were coming slowly 
 towards it, feeling their way through the books and press- 
 papiers and paper-knives, and yet Captain Hertford kept 
 his hand still on the table ; there was a kind of fascination 
 about the blind man s eyes. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 215 
 
 At last, Lord Edward touched his hand, he took it up in 
 his, and Hertford did not resist. Lord Edward spoke, and 
 Captain Hertford listened, listened to strange words, words 
 which at first made him sit dumb with terror, brave man as 
 he was. 
 
 " Feeling about in the everlasting darkness which surrounds 
 me," said Lord Edward, " I have come across the hand of a 
 man. It is a hand which has held a sword, and used that 
 sword at the gates of death. It is the hand of a brave man. 
 And yet that hand will soon be slippery with innocent blood. 
 It will be the hand of a murderer soon ! " 
 
 Before. Captain Hertford had made, up his mind whether or 
 no the man who was talking was a madman, as well as blind, 
 the other went on. 
 
 " Captain Hertford ! I cannot prevent you killing Austin 
 Elliot. It were almost better that he should be dead, than 
 that he, with his feelings of honor, should live on, if I were to 
 interfere and prevent you fighting him. I do not speak of 
 him. I speak of yourself. I know that you have laid a plot 
 to assassinate him. Every detail of your plot is known to 
 me. That rascally gambling cousin of Eleanor s, that Com- 
 milfaut, might be brought into court to-morrow to convict you 
 of a conspiracy. You are quite in my hands if anything 
 should happen to Austin ; but I am held down from taking 
 steps to save him, for the reasons I have mentioned. I only 
 tell you this, that if anything does happen to him, nothing 
 shall save you. If you were ever on any provocation to figlit 
 him after this, nothing could save you. I am in possession of 
 your whole scheme, Hertford ; now what will you do ? " 
 
 It seemed, from the expression of the Captain s face, had 
 any one seen it, that what he would do, would be to take Lord 
 Edward by the throat, and beat his brains out against the 
 wall. All he said was, "Wait, my Lord, wait, will you? 
 You are presuming very considerably on your infirmity." 
 
216 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " Not I. I am quite without fear, I assure you. If my 
 life would save Austin s, I would gladly give it. I will wait. 
 Think for a little, Captain Hertford, and tell me what you 
 mean to do." 
 
 Captain Hertford saw quickly that he was in a scrape. 
 That if they had got hold of his conversation with Commilfaut, 
 it would be impossible for him to fight Austin, without incurring 
 far more serious penalties than those consequent on an ordi 
 nary duel. He felt, in one instant, that his plan of having 
 Austin out and shooting him was gone to the winds. He gave 
 it up. Austin was safe from that moment, if he had sense to 
 stay in England. 
 
 But Lord Edward s words, coming as they did upon the 
 strange fit of superstitious terror, arising from the fact of his 
 creeping towards him in that strange, silent way, had raised 
 a very mad devil in him. It is a mere silly truism, a thing 
 hardly worth repeating to an intelligent person, that bad peo 
 ple are never so cruelly vindictive, as w T hen they are recover 
 ing from a fit of terror. He would have liked to revenge 
 himself on Lord Edward, but that was impossible. But 
 
 But therte was Lord Edward s brother. He could hit him 
 hard there. They talked of enforcing the laws against duel 
 ling, but was not P acquitted ? They would not dare to 
 
 do more than they ordinarily did on such occasions, if he had 
 out Lord Charles Barty. The young prig who had insulted 
 him in the House, till even the Whigs called order. Now he 
 rapidly began to reflect, now that his rage was turned that 
 way, that his reputation would be a ragged one if he did not. 
 It would be a political duel. He had precedent here. Can 
 ning and Londonderry ; Wellington and Winchelsea. Yes, 
 that handsome young dandy should be scapegoat. He had 
 brought it on himself. 
 
 And also Austin would have to go abroad, if anything hap- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 217 
 
 pened. And Messieurs the French Officers were dexterous, 
 and, yes, on the first blush of it, it would do. So he spoke. 
 
 " Lord Edward." 
 
 " I listen." 
 
 " I will take an oath to you. Austin Elliot shall, if he be 
 so minded, spit in my face, and I will not go out with him, 
 unless he corner abroad. Will that content you ? " 
 
 " I always said," said Lord Edward, " that you were not a 
 bad man. I thank God I am right. Let me call you my 
 friend, Captain." 
 
 " No, I will not do that. You have insulted me, and in a 
 cowardly way, because you knew I could not resent it I will 
 not meddle with you. You have a shrewd tongue, Lord 
 Edward." 
 
 And before they had time to say anything more, uncon 
 scious Eleanor came in ready for church, and led off Lord 
 Edward. They went to church, and sat like two stone angels 
 through it all, until some one, who had come up from Oxford, 
 played out, in a triumphant hurling storm of sound ; and, 
 when the last echo had done humming in the roof, they waited 
 together at the bottom of the organ-loft stairs, till they heard 
 the well-known sound of his wooden leg stumping down ; 
 and, after an affectionate greeting, carried him off to lunch at 
 Eleanor s. 
 
 And this was the result of Lord Edward s interview with 
 Captain Hertford. 
 
 10 
 
218 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 IT was a wild week this which followed. The " non-elec 
 tors," who had begun by merely sneering at Peel s tergiversa 
 tion, and rather laughing at the Bill, now had got earnest 
 about it, in one way or another, and were showing a slight 
 tendency to congregate. The more intelligent among them 
 had found out, or had thought they had found out, what the 
 intention of the Bill was. The great fact that the duty was 
 to be reduced at once from sixteen to four shillings was 
 enough to excite them somewhat, for bread was dear. Their 
 excitement was over pretty much on Saturday morning, when 
 the Bill was passed, though, as far as this story is con 
 cerned, the Corn-bill was never passed at all. It was read 
 a third time at four on Saturday morning, but, before we 
 come to that period, we shall not be thinking much about 
 corn-bills. 
 
 Austin was in a very vexed and excited state that week, and 
 he said it was the Bill, nay, more, he actually believed it 
 was the Bill, with which he had nothing whatever to do, not 
 even having a vote for Westminster. He was excited and 
 angry about Captain Hertford. 
 
 There was no doubt about one thing, according to the code 
 of honor of those times : Austin had heard of threats uttered 
 against him by a bully and an enemy, and had taken no notice 
 of them. 
 
 This consideration was driving him mad all that week. He 
 felt like a guilty man. What would the world say if they 
 knew all ? if they knew that he was in possession of Captain 
 Hertford s language about him, and knew that he had not 
 noticed it. It was terrible. 
 
 " What would the world say if it knew all ? " Unluckily 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 219 
 
 the world knew a little too much ; and, as to what it would 
 say, Austin found that out on Thursday. 
 
 Lord Charles was in his rooms with him in the afternoon, 
 and making or trying to make Robin sit up in a corner, and 
 hold a pipe in his mouth. His father had given his sister 
 Minny a dog on her birthday a spaniel dog, with long, 
 drooping ears on each side, like the Speaker s wig which 
 would sit up, and smoke a pencil-case ; and so why should not 
 Austin s dog ? Which circumstance shows that this desperate 
 young Jacobin thought of something else beside the salvation 
 of his country. 
 
 Austin was very silent and anxious. Whatever he thought 
 about, the question always came back : What would they 
 think if they knew ? 
 
 Presently a man came in, an old friend ; a very tall, awk 
 ward man ; a man who at Eton had been a long, shambling 
 lad, whose shoes were always coming off, and who never could 
 be taught to swim, or to row, or to do anything in that line, 
 except get in the way ; a fellow who was always getting his 
 eye blacked at cricket, and his ankle sprained at football ; a 
 fellow who was always top of his form, and was always up 
 half the night doing other lads impositions (or whatever they 
 call those inflictions at Eton) : a fellow who was always get 
 ting into trouble for some one else; who would have died 
 sooner than betray another boy ; who, as a boy, had been be 
 loved, reverenced, and bullied by every one who knew him ; a 
 maker-up of quarrels ; a pleader at school with masters, at the 
 University with dons ; a high-hearted, noble creature, whose 
 shoes were never tied, whose hair was always tangled, whose 
 coat was never brushed, who went on till he developed into 
 one of the shrewdest and most clear-headed lawyers of the 
 day. Early in his career he had been christened " Daddy," 
 which name always stuck to him, and will stick to him, even 
 if he gets on the bench. 
 
220 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 He had been to the United University Club, and had 
 heard conversation there which made him go and seek Lord 
 Charles. He had found Lord Edward, and having told him 
 what was the matter, had heard from him of his last con 
 versation with Captain Hertford. He had at once determined 
 to speak to Austin himself. Also, hearing of what passed 
 on that occasion, he thought that Austin was perfectly safe, 
 or he would have cut his tongue out sooner than say what 
 he did. 
 
 " Austin, I have been at the Club. Charles Barty, attend 
 to me, and leave that dog alone. They have been talking 
 of you there." 
 
 "Ay!" said Austin. 
 
 " Yes ; a certain blackleg bully has been taking your name 
 in vain ; and they were wondering why you have not noticed 
 it. I, as a man of peace ; a man who, if need were, would 
 make no more of falling on this man Hertford, and beating 
 him myself, sooner than that anything should happen to you ; 
 I, even I, think that you ought to notice it. Go about with 
 this fellow in some public place, and bring him to account. 
 If I did not know that he will not take it up, but will put 
 his tail between his legs, for uncommonly good reasons, I 
 would not give this advice ; you know I would not. Go about 
 with him, and force him to deny what he has said.* I will 
 go bail that nothing follows." 
 
 So sadly right, so sadly wrong. 
 
 " What has he been saying ? " said Austin, quietly. 
 
 "Well go down to the Club and ask the men there. I 
 will not tell you. Well, he has been coupling his own name 
 and Miss Hilton s." 
 
 "Indeed!" said Austin. 
 
 " Yes, old boy, and you should contradict him, if only for 
 her sake. Don t go too far. Send him quietly to his kennel, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 221 
 
 and he will go. If he don t, send him to me. I will not have 
 you talked of by a fellow like that. Now, good by, go to 
 the Club." 
 
 And so he went. Lord Charles rose, and began walking 
 up and down the room, looking very grave, as soon as they 
 were alone. 
 
 And Austin said, " Well ! " 
 
 Lord Charles said, " Well, Austin." 
 
 " There is no doubt about it now, I think you will allow." 
 
 " I am afraid not. I am afraid you must do it. God help 
 us. All this that Daddy says about his not having you out 
 may be true or may be moonshine. Whichever it is, you 
 must .tax him with what he has said. You may have to go 
 out with him. However, it will be time enough to think of 
 that when he asks you, which Daddy says he won t." 
 
 " I don t care which way it goes now. I am perfectly happy 
 again," said Austin. " Charles, for the last day I have felt 
 like a thief; now that I am committed to the adventure, I am 
 myself again. I ought to have been committed to it two days 
 ago. It is not too late to remedy that. Let us go down to 
 the Club, and talk as loud of Hertford as he has talked 
 of me. My reputation will be right again in ten minutes. 
 Wait for me till I brush my hair." 
 
 When Lord Charles was left alone, he sat for a few minutes 
 with his hand on Robin s neck. And then he bent down his 
 head on the table and prayed. 
 
 What strange kind of prayer was that ? Was it a prayer 
 for guidance ? No. It must have been a prayer for mercy 
 and forgiveness. For he had made the resolution to watch 
 Austin and Captain Hertford, lest they should come together ; 
 to insult Captain Hertford himself, and go out with him, and 
 to save Austin at the sacrifice of his own life. 
 
 Why ? Ah ! that is hard to answer. Some natures, how- 
 
-222 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 ever darkened with regard to a higher system of morality, 
 have in them a kind of dull, blind chivalry, which will lead 
 them to all lengths, and, at five-and-twenty, if we can remem 
 ber so long ago, friendships are very warm. Why is Bill led 
 out of the dock to ten years penal servitude ? because he won t 
 turn evidence against Tom. Explain me the one thing, and 
 I will explain you the other. I take it that Bill and Lord 
 Charles Barty act from much the same motives, only that Bill 
 would not have wilfully compassed the death of a fellow-creature. 
 Lord Charles Barty s life is a more graceful one to write about 
 than Bill s, with his beer and his skittles, and his vague notion 
 that the policeman, protector of society, is also the enemy of 
 mankind. But, ah ! what a poor fellow r would he be who 
 would not acknowledge that both are capable of most chiv 
 alrous devotion. 
 
 Perhaps the advantage lies with Lord Charles in this, that 
 he would actually go to death for his friend ; whereas poor 
 Bill, were it a capital matter, would, after standing all day in 
 the hot court, staring with eager eyes, hot lips, and lowering 
 face at the counsel for the prosecution, and with the same hot 
 lips, but with more eager eyes, at his own counsel, after all 
 this, I say, would, in the end, not being held up by a certain 
 something which some call chivalry, give way and tell the 
 truth for the sake of dear life, and would afterwards go away 
 a free man and take to drinking, and drown himself ultimately 
 in the Regent s Canal, as the only solution : which we can only 
 hope he will not find to be an eminently unsatisfactory one. 
 
 Lord Charles s resolution was taken, and when Austin had 
 brushed his hair and had come back, Austin only saw that he 
 looked grave, and wished that he had looked gayer. 
 
 " Come, cheer up, Charles," said Austin, " I am not dead 
 yet. Faithless friend, you ought to keep up my spirits." 
 
 Lord Charles smiled, but did not laugh. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 223 
 
 "I know why you can t laugh, old fellow," said Austin. 
 " Do you think I could laugh if I was going out with you ? 
 Come on, let us go to the Club and kick up the preliminary 
 row." 
 
 So they went. At the Club, among the old University set, 
 such few of them who happened to be there, Austin expressed 
 his intention of morally or physically pulling Captain Hert 
 ford s nose to-morrow, which was quite satisfactory. Lord 
 Charles slipped away, and went to Captain Hertford s lodgings 
 in Pall Mall. 
 
 An obtuse maid, being inquired of, represented that the 
 Captain was not at home, that he had gone out of town that 
 afternoon, that he had gone to Malta on business by the two 
 o clock train, but would be back to dinner the next day at five. 
 This being, on the face of it, an impossibility, in the present 
 imperfect state of our international communication, it became 
 necessary to call in the Captain s landlord, Runciman. The 
 King of Bootmakers deposed that the Captain had been down 
 to Malsam, the town he represented, to see if the other mem 
 ber, Mr. Nogo (C), would be well enough to come up and 
 vote, and that, also, the Captain would most certainly be back 
 late the same night, and that the maid s story about his coming 
 back the next day at five was a fiction. 
 
 The next morning Lord Charles, never for one instant 
 flinching from his purpose, rose somewhat earlier than usual, 
 and having dressed himself with great care, and after taking 
 a few turns in a certain passage, knocked at the nursery- 
 door, and at once passed in. 
 
 He was greeted with a wild cry of welcome. His little 
 brothers and sisters ^were in the position of "being got up," 
 and were strewed about like rosy apples. Two of them, still 
 in their night-gowns, were dramatizing a scene in real life, 
 which was at the same moment enacting in another part of the 
 
224 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 room, that is to say, they had stripped a doll stark naked, 
 and were washing it in a washhand basin, a process which 
 (her bust being of wax, and the rest of her being of calico and 
 sawdust) rendered her unavailable in her capacity of doll for- 
 evermore. Another was sitting up in his crib, and was driving 
 four-in-hand to the " Star " at Richmond, with a pair of list 
 garters, lent by the youngest nursemaid ; and another was 
 being tubbed. This fellow leapt from the hands of nurse to 
 embrace his brother ; but seeing the door open and the way 
 clear, some sort of devil entered into him, and caused him to 
 run, stark naked as he was, violently down stairs. He reached 
 the hall with great success, but was captured by a solemn 
 young footman, and led back again in a proud and vainglori 
 ous state of mind. Half-way up the stairs he bit the footman, 
 who hoped that his Lordship was not going, to be naughty; 
 which speech, being addressed by a very tall man to a naked 
 child of three, struck Lord Charles as wonderfully funny. 
 Meanwhile, above stairs, while all the nurses were out on the 
 landing looking for the fugitive, Lady Florence held a regatta 
 in the hip-bath with her brothers and sisters shoes, three of 
 which were unfortunately swamped and sunk. 
 
 Lord Charles kissed them all. His brother George was at 
 Eton, and his eldest brother, Lord Wargrave, in Italy ; so 
 nothing remained but to see his father and mother. 
 
 His father was in high feather. Lord (somebody or an 
 other) had accepted his offer for a certain mare. She had 
 been sent home, and he incited Lord Charles to come down to 
 
 
 
 Esham on a secret journey with him, and see her. Lord 
 Charles pleaded the debate, and his father wondered whether 
 poor Edward would like to come. At all events, he might get 
 some flowers from the gardener, and give them to that quiet 
 little girl that his friend Elliot was going to marry. That girl 
 seemed very kind to Edward ; his mother said she was a good 
 little body, and so on. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 225 
 
 His mother was in her dressing-room. He did not trust 
 himself much here. He said he had come to wish her " good 
 morning." He kissed her and left her. 
 
 He asked the servants where was his brother Edward. His 
 Lordship had gone to church. It was as well. He left his 
 father s house a house of order, domestic love, of old renown 
 and of chivalrous honor to pursue his adventure with a 
 worthless bully. When he thought of what that house might 
 be by this time to-morrow, he grew sick, but he never flinched. 
 
 Was it ridiculous and out of place, that even now he should 
 go round to the stables, to have a look at the horses, and to 
 speak a word with the men ? It was not very absurd in him. 
 In his father s house the servants took rank after the children. 
 The servants were all from the estates. Forgiveness was 
 extended till seventy times seven, and discharges for miscon 
 duct were very rare ; generally attended with utter despair on 
 the part of the culprit, and with tears and a temporary seclu 
 sion on the part of the Duchess. No ; on the whole there was 
 nothing ridiculous in his visiting the stables. 
 
 He went into every stall, and he spoke to every man and 
 boy there. He was the favorite of the family. He never re 
 buked but gently, and he always stood in the breach between 
 the culprit and his father s anger, to the very last. People 
 who know about these things say, that in some large old- 
 fashioned establishments of this kind, there is a certain de 
 voted affection which arises between master and servant, quite 
 apart from interest. One would fancy that such a thing was 
 quite possible. One has known of convict s ervants risking 
 their lives for a good master ; is such a thing impossible among 
 footmen and grooms ? Or is Jenkins, selfish, cowardly, and 
 effeminate, to go down to posterity as the type, instead of the 
 exception, merely because his master dresses him like a 
 Tom-fool ? 
 
 10* o 
 
226 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 We know not. "We only know that these servants were 
 glad to see Lord Charles, and that he was, in his way, wishing 
 them " good by " ; for at this time he believed that he would 
 never see them again. He ordered the man who was sup 
 posed to have the care of his person, to bring his cab to Mr. 
 Elliot s lodgings at four, and then he went back to Captain 
 Hertford s. 
 
 The Captain had come back late last night, but was gone 
 out early that morning. There was nothing to do but to 
 go on to Austin s, and keep him in sight all day. But Austin 
 was gone out too : his servant did not know where. 
 
 So Lord Charles got breakfast at his club, and waited 
 impatiently. These two men might meet. Austin might 
 have gone in search of Captain Hertford. Men came and 
 talked to him. There was very little doubt that the Corn- 
 bill would pass that night; there would be a long, fractious 
 debate, an iteration of every argument on both sides, but it 
 would be read. Not that Lord Charles cared much about 
 it now. 
 
 And where was Austin ? He had come home, and, going 
 to bed, had asked for Robin, his dog. Miss Hilton s servant, 
 old James, had called and fetched Robin away that evening. 
 Miss Hilton s footman had reported, in the course of conver 
 sation, that one of Miss Hilton s maids had lit a bit of fire 
 in old Miss Hilton s room, with the register down, and finding 
 the room full of smoke, had run through the streets bare 
 headed, raising the town, till she fell down in a dead faint 
 at the engine-house door. 
 
 Austin knew that the next day was the day of Eleanor s 
 monthly pilgrimage ; if any one had told him that he meant 
 to watch her, he would probably have struck him. And yet, 
 in his feverish state of mind, he went down early next morn 
 ing, and looked at Mr. James s dogs. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 227 
 
 He was in that worthy s front garden, listening to that 
 worthy s platitudes with a deaf ear, when he saw his own 
 dog, Robin, come bounding out of a by-street, from the di 
 rection of Millbank, and hunt a hen who was taking her 
 breakfast in the middle of the road. He watched the street 
 out of which he had come. 
 
 He saw Eleanor come out of that street. She was lean 
 ing on Captain Hertford s arm, and was talking eagerly to 
 him, she, who was his by every tie and vow that could 
 be made, was leaning on the arm of the man who was seek 
 ing his life, she, who could keep a secret from him, could 
 be in confidence with that bully, that assassin ! There was 
 no doubt about his purpose now. Either that man or he 
 should die. The time came soon when he got his lesson ; the 
 time came when he would sooner have blown out his own 
 brains than fire a pistol at the most worthless man alive, 
 but the time had not come yet. 
 
 It was no use following them then ; Hertford would be down 
 for the debate that night. He went home, and soon after Lord 
 Charles came to him. 
 
 Austin poured out his furious indignation to him, not only, 
 alas! against Captain Hertford, but against Eleanor. Lord 
 Charles only continued to assure him quietly that the time 
 would come when he would be sorry for what he was saying ; 
 that he, Lord Charles, would go bail for Eleanor with his 
 life. 
 
 The weary day wore on. The day which both of them had 
 looked forward to with such hope. There was no doubt that 
 the Bill would be read a third time that night, and the Lords 
 dare not Alas, how little either of them cared for the Bill 
 now, or for the Lords either ! 
 
 At half past five they both, by tacit consent, went down to 
 the House ; Lord Charles to his place, while Austin fought 
 
228 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 his way into the gallery. At this time affairs might have 
 arranged themselves anyhow ; the way they did arrange 
 themselves was this. 
 
 Captain Hertford and Lord Charles were both eagerly 
 anxious to meet, as we know. But at about ten o clock 
 Lord Charles remembered that his father would be soon leav 
 ing the House of Lords, as he knew that he was going to Lady 
 Something s party or ball or drum or what not, for he had 
 heard him say so. He had a desire to see his father again. 
 He saw Austin, as he thought hopelessly wedged in the gal 
 lery ; he saw Captain Hertford sitting sulkily opposite ; he 
 thought that he might safely slip out for five minutes and see 
 his father once more. 
 
 Austin saw him rise and go ; he saw Captain Hertford rise 
 and follow him. Then he turned on the crowd behind him in 
 the gallery, and fought his way out like a madman. 
 
 When he felt the cold night wind on his face he found him 
 self among a crowd, a crowd of all sorts of people, fidgeting 
 and talking about what was going on inside the House.* He 
 felt puzzled and confused among so many fresh faces, until he 
 saw a policeman whose face he knew, and asked him whether 
 he had seen Captain Hertford. 
 
 The policeman, touching his hat, said yes ; that Captain 
 Hertford had followed Lord Charles Barty in the direction 
 of the Peers entrance. Austin hurried that way as fast as he 
 could go. 
 
 At that time the passage to the Peers entrance was a 
 squalid sort of alley. With high slab palings on the right, 
 and on the left a strange wooden building, beyond all again an 
 archway. On the left, also, was a high wooden screen, perfo 
 rated with square holes, which represented, unless we forget, 
 Dr. Reid s ventilating apparatus. ("I tell you," said Lord 
 
 * The author left that crowd at a quarter past eight or so. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 229 
 
 Brougham once, " that I don t want explanation, I want air.") 
 Altogether it was an odd sort of transition place, rendered 
 more untidy by a low railing which ran along one side of it, 
 nearly half-way across. 
 
 Up this passage Austin hurried. He was too late. He 
 heard voices in dispute, raised above the common tone of con 
 versation. When he came up there were three people in a 
 group. One a peer ; Lord Charles Barty, who leant with his 
 back against the railings; and Captain Hertford, who was 
 opposite him. These were the three. 
 
 "You have heard what passed, my Lord," were the first 
 words that Austin heard. " I have told Lord Charles Barty 
 that he is a liar." 
 
 "And you also heard, Lord Sayton," said Lord Charles, 
 " that I, walking up here with you, and seeing Captain Hert 
 ford following me, turned on him, and without the least prov 
 ocation, told him that he was a bully and a scoundrel, and that 
 I also repeat my assertion now. I suppose there is nothing 
 more to be said, unless we intend to scold and fight like two 
 costermongers." 
 
 " Well, I should say not," said Lord Sayton. " The affair 
 seems plain, though I am devilish sorry for it ! " 
 
 " This quarrel is mine ! " said Austin, breathless. 
 
 " It should have been, by all accounts," said Lord Sayton ; 
 " but you are rather late, ain t you ? Do you want me ? " he 
 added, turning round towards the two others. 
 
 " No, thank you, Sayton," said Lord Charles. 
 
 "I shall be glad of your assistance, Lord Sayton," said 
 Captain Hertford. 
 
 "I spoke to Lord Charles Barty, not to you," said Lord 
 Sayton. " You can notice that if you like : you will not find 
 me packed in the Strangers Gallery of the Commons, when 
 you want me!" 
 
230 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " You shall answer for that speech, Lord Sayton," said 
 Austin. 
 
 " Very well," drawled that most stupid of men. 
 
 They separated, and Lord Charles and Austin went away 
 together. After a few steps, Lord Charles ran back and over 
 took Captain Hertford. 
 
 " Shall you send your man to-night ? " 
 
 " It will be better." 
 
 "Send him to Elliot s lodgings; I v shall not go home. We 
 shall never speak again. If anything happens to either of us, 
 don t bear any malice. I shall see you in the morning." 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 LOBD CHARLES went home at once to Austin s lodgings, 
 which were very close to Captain Hertford s. Austin per 
 suaded Lord Charles to go to bed, which he did without 
 much persuasion. Austin waited up for Captain Hertford s 
 friend. 
 
 He was not long in coming. He was a Captain Jackson, 
 whom Austin had seen before, the man whom he had seen 
 before walking with Captain Hertford and Lord Charles 
 Barty just before he had started for Ronaldsay. He had been 
 to India since, and had come home wounded from one of the 
 Sikh battles, almost with the news of Feroseshah ; a man of 
 the Indian army, a good-natured, gossiping man, a great 
 Shickaree by his own account. Austin had listened to his 
 tiger-stories often, and wished it had been some one else who 
 had come with the message now, some one possibly, with 
 whom he could have picked a quarrel. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 231 
 
 Captain Jackson began : " Is there no way out of this mis 
 erable business ! " 
 
 " Do you see any, Jackson ? " said Austin, eagerly. 
 
 " Well, I am sorry to say that we are determined (utterly 
 against my wishes, mind you) to go through with it. And I 
 am sorry to say that we (utterly against my wish), having 
 been insulted in the House, when we passed it over, and being 
 again grossly insulted to-night, are determined to have a public 
 apology." 
 
 " That is impossible," said Austin. " But I 11 tell you what 
 I will do." 
 
 " I don t think you have anything much to do with it, have 
 you, Elliot ? You should say what we will do." 
 
 " What / will do is this," said Austin. " Barty is in bed 
 and asleep. I will myself meet Hertford, and exchange shots 
 to-morrow morning, before Barty awakes." 
 
 " I am sorry to say," said Captain Jackson, " that we, know 
 ing your nobleness of character, have anticipated that course 
 of action, and that we won t have it at all. Lord Charles 
 Barty must apologize, come out, or " 
 
 " God help us," said Austin. 
 
 "Amen!" said Captain Jackson, sincerely. "You have 
 never been at this sort of thing before. You will have to 
 leave a good deal to me. If you will trust me, before God, 
 to whom we both must give an account of to-morrow morn 
 ing s work, I will see everything fair. You have no pistols ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Will you let me bring mine ? They are smooth -bored and 
 devilish bad. We may get out of it in that way. Got pass 
 ports ? " 
 
 " No, never thought of it." 
 
 " Then you must come with us. Hertford warned me that 
 something was in the wind yesterday, and made me get a 
 
232 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 family passport, in which our worthy Captain figures as Mr. 
 Jones pere, and Lord Charles, you, and I as his promising 
 sons. If one of us is taken ill, we can account for it. Hert 
 ford, of course, having the character of a man rather too 
 ready for this sort of thing, wishes to stand with the world as 
 the soul of chivalry. So he made me get the passport. God 
 grant it may not be needed." 
 
 " God grant it," said Austin. 
 
 " Once more, amen. With regard to time and place ? " 
 
 " What do you propose ? " 
 
 " I am sorry to say," said Captain Jackson, " that we, hav 
 ing provided the aforesaid family passport, are more in a posi 
 tion to insist than to propose. We, unless you can bring 
 strong reasons against it, propose the firs at Hampstead, at 
 half past seven to-morrow morning. It must be so, my dear 
 Elliot, or we shall be stopped. The quarrel has been heard 
 of, and the affair will be stopped else. If you oppose an early 
 meeting, your man s reputation won t be worth an old shoe." 
 
 It was undeniable. Austin agreed, and the Captain de 
 parted. 
 
 Austin went round to the stables, where his own horses 
 were kept, and to his terror found that all was dark and shut 
 up. He did not know exactly where his own servant slept, 
 or he would have tried to arouse him. What between his 
 terror for his friend s reputation and his terror at his friend s 
 danger, he was nearly mad. lie was at this moment very 
 nearly going to the police-office and putting the matter before 
 them, but he dared not. If he had done such a thing as that, 
 his friend would forever after have been socially and politi 
 cally dead. The difficulty now was to rouse a sleeping groom 
 without awakening the others. Lord Charles s groom must 
 be sleeping with one of his. It was a ridiculous difficulty, 
 but it made him stamp, and curse the day he was born. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 233 
 
 Luck assisted him. A man came into the mews, and as he 
 walked aside to let him pass, he saw it was Charles Barty s 
 servant. He ordered him to bring the cab to his lodgings at 
 five. 
 
 " Are you going out, sir ? " asked the man." 
 
 " Yes," said Austin. " You must be secret and quiet. I 
 will reward you well." 
 
 " I am sorry for it, sir. You was always a kind gentleman. 
 I will be there, sir, punctual." 
 
 Then Austin went back, and going up to his room, where 
 Lord Charles lay asleep in his bed, he sat in a chair all night, 
 listening to the long-drawn breath of the sleeper. 
 
 He sat and thought all night. Ah Lord ! it had all come 
 to this. His own reputation tarnished, and the friend of his 
 heart going out next morning in a quarrel which by rights 
 was his. He knew that, however this business turned out, his 
 own reputation was gone. He had had two hints to that effect 
 these last few days, and both of those had come from men 
 eminently friendly to himself. 
 
 His reputation tarnished ! Ah, it was maddening. How 
 lucky that his father was dead, and that his death did not lie 
 at his son s door, for that would have killed him outright. 
 This man Hertford had been taking his name in vain. Austin 
 had heard of it. His own friends at the United University 
 Club had talked about it. Austin himself had gone down to 
 the Club and talked threateningly of Hertford. The little 
 world he lived in was expectant ; how would that expectation 
 be satisfied ? By finding that he, Austin Elliot, had allowed 
 the friend of his bosom to fight his battle for him ; by allow 
 ing Lord Charles to go out with one of the deadliest shots in 
 England. 
 
 It was unendurable, but there was no remedy in his code 
 of morality. Therefore, although it was unendurable, it was 
 endured, like most other unendurable things in this world. 
 
234 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 But his own disgrace was not one quarter of the mischief. 
 Suppose anything were to happen to Lord Charles ? Suppose 
 he were to be wounded ? Suppose he were to be lamed for 
 life, for that was possible, how would Austin feel then ? The 
 cloud he himself was under now might be cleared away. He 
 might force Captain Hertford to go out with him, nay, he 
 was already determined to do so. It would be necessary. But 
 if his friend was maimed in this encounter, he felt as though 
 he could never hold up his head again. He determined that 
 if any one proposed more than one shot, that the shots should 
 pass through his own body. 
 
 So the short night wore on, and he sat in his chair without 
 sleeping, trying, from time to time, to make out the outline of 
 his friend s face in the dark. As the east began to grow 
 bright, and the sparrows began to twitter outside the window, 
 he dozed ; but he must have wakened again within half an hour. 
 The room was quite light now, and he could see his friend. 
 
 He was sleeping as peacefully as a child. The beautiful 
 face was turned, in its expressionless repose, towards Austin. 
 One bare arm was thrown half out of bed, with the palm of 
 the hand uppermost, and the fingers relaxed ; the other was 
 laid under the sleeping man s head, among his close brown 
 curls. It seemed a happy sleep, for he smiled, and babbled 
 inarticulately in his dreams, a happy school-boy sleep ! 
 Austin had awakened him from such a sleep at Eton, in old 
 times, more than once, to come bathing or boating or bird-nest 
 ing. Pie remembered how that face had changed, from the 
 half-unconscious expression fixed on it by some happy dream 
 into consciousness, into loving recognition of the friend who 
 had awakened him. He remembered all that, and knew that 
 he had to awaken him once more, to what ? What expres 
 sion would the face take now ? What kind of curse would 
 shine out of those eyes as soon as the lids of them were raised, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 235 
 
 and the soul behind them awoke to the appreciation of the 
 lamentable truth ? 
 
 So there grew on poor Austin a horror and a dread of the 
 sleeper s awaking ; and as he slept on, a new dread, the 
 dread of having to awaken him himself. But it must be done, 
 and be done soon. Now there came into his head a something 
 long forgotten, as long-forgotten trifles will come into men s 
 minds, at times of awful anxiety like this. It would have 
 made him smile at another time, but he remembered it now. 
 He had read in some blackguard book about prize-fighting, 
 that the men who trained the prize-fighters never awoke them 
 in the morning, but that they put the window open, and that, 
 after a short time, as soon as the fresh morning air reached 
 the poor fellows faces, they quietly awoke. He remembered 
 this now, and opened the window. In a short time, Charles 
 Barty turned in his bed and awoke. His eyes met Austin s, 
 and he smiled affectionately ; but as consciousness came to 
 him, that smile faded mto an expression of anxiety, and al 
 most of horror. If he had sat up in bed, and heaped curses 
 on Austin s head, Austin could have borne it better than that 
 look. 
 
 But it was late, they must hurry : that was something. 
 They would have breakfast when they came back. The other 
 people were to bring a doctor with them, so there was nothing 
 to do but to drive fast. They spoke very little, and on indif 
 ferent subjects ; Austin drove. Once Lord Charles turned 
 round, and talked to the groom standing at the back of the 
 cab, and gave orders about his hack being brought somewhere 
 that afternoon. The groom said that his father s cob was 
 lame, and perhaps his Grace might like to borrow his Lord 
 ship s hack. Whereupon Lord Charles confounded his fa 
 ther s cob (to Austin), and wished to God that his father would 
 find -himself in horses, and not be everlastingly borrowing his. 
 
236 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 They were late. When they got on to the heath, they saw 
 a dog-cart standing, with a groom at the horse s head, and 
 farther on, they saw three men waiting for them, Captain 
 Hertford, Captain Jackson, and the doctor. 
 
 They hurried forward. Captain Jackson and Austin went 
 apart, and matters were soon arranged. " We must be quick, 
 Elliot," said Captain Jackson. 
 
 They were very quick. The men were placed twelve paces 
 apart, back to back, and their seconds gave them their pisto.ls. 
 Captain Jackson was to give the word. Austin and he re 
 tired, and Captain Jackson said, " Gentlemen, are you ready ? 
 Fire ! " 
 
 They both faced one another at the same instant. Charles 
 Barty raised his hand high over his head, and fired in the air. 
 Captain Hertford took deliberate aim, and fired two seconds 
 afterwards. The instant he had done so, Lord Charles leapt 
 a foot off the ground, and then bringing his heels sharply down 
 upon the turf, toppled over headlong on his left shoulder, and 
 lay perfectly still. 
 
 Austin was beside him in an instant, but he was quite dead. 
 Austin turned the heavy head over, and saw the last sign of 
 life which appeared in that beautiful face. Two nerves in the 
 hollows beneath his eyes quivered and throbbed for half a 
 second, and then stopped forever. 
 
 If I were to pile Pelion upon Ossa with grand words, I 
 could give you no idea of the catastrophe more terrible than 
 this. Lord Charles Barty was shot through the heart, and 
 was lying, stone-dead, at the feet of Austin Elliot. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 237 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 AUSTIN had never seen death before. This was his first 
 introduction to it. He was holding the face of the dead man 
 between his two hands, and looking down with a strange in 
 credulous terror into the sightless eyes. 
 
 And the dead man was his friend, a man he loved, as 
 David loved Jonathan. He had never done anything, or 
 thought anything, for he knew not how long, without this man 
 coming into his mind. " What will he think about it ? " 
 " What will he say about it ? " had always been his first 
 thought after he had done anything. Now, now 
 
 The two others were with him in a moment. Captain 
 Hertford said, " This has all been fair. I am off for France." 
 Jackson broke out into tears. " By God," he said, " this is a 
 most horrible business ! I wish he had struck me dead before 
 I came out on this accursed errand ! " But Austin said 
 nothing. He was kneeling on one knee, with the dead man s 
 face between his hands, and a claw like that of an eagle 
 griping at his heart. 
 
 " We must get away," said Captain Hertford. " We had 
 best be quick. Elliot, you will have to come with us." 
 
 " I shall stay where I am." 
 
 " You are mazed," said Captain Hertford, impatiently. 
 We shall be in trouble for this. Time is precious. You 
 must cross with my passport." 
 
 " I tell you I shall stay where I am," said Austin, looking 
 up at Hertford with that painful look of mingled terror and 
 anger which Captain Hertford had seen before, and which he 
 now remembered. 
 
 " Then I have done my duty, and must go," said Captain 
 Hertford. " Jackson, we must make haste." 
 
238 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 They left him kneeling at the dead man s head. In a few 
 moments Jackson ran back, while Captain Hertford waited for 
 him. 
 
 " Elliot, don t be a madman. Come away. There will be 
 the devil to pay for this, God forgive us ! You must come 
 with us. You shall ! " 
 
 " I shall stay here." 
 
 " You are mad ! Think better of it, and come with us. 
 Your mind is gone ! " 
 
 " I know it is. Good by ! " 
 
 So Captain Jackson went reluctantly away, and left Austin 
 with the dead man. 
 
 Lord Charles s groom came next. He touched Austin 
 on the shoulder. " Mr. Elliot," he said, " is my Lord 
 wounded?" 
 
 Austin looked up in his face, and said, " Your Lord is 
 dead ! " He saw the man turn pale and sick. Then he saw 
 him kneel down beside what had been Lord Charles, and 
 untie the dead man s neckcloth. Then he opened his shirt, 
 and felt his heart. And lastly, by some strange instinct, he 
 closed the dull, staring eyes, which were never to open again. 
 Then the two stood silent for a time. 
 
 " What is to be done now, sir ? " said the groom, at last. 
 
 " * What is to be done ? " said Austin. " < Done/ says he ? 
 Why, bring him to life again, and let me lie there dead and 
 cold in his place. We have been hardly used, Tom. There 
 is no mercy in Heaven, Tom ; or, if there is, it is all kept for 
 those who whine and cringe, and I have never done that, nor 
 has this dead man. What have he and I done, that this has 
 nappened? Answer me that. What have he and I done, 
 that things should come to this?" 
 
 Tom was only a poor groom, a man not worth your notice 
 in any way ; but even he had a dull feeling that Mr. Elliot, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 239 
 
 dear gentleman ! was beside himself, and was blaspheming in 
 his grief. If you had given Tom a week to answer, he would 
 have answered, " You have both of you done many things to 
 deserve this ; and the mere fact of your being here this morn 
 ing proves it." But Tom did not get a week to think of his 
 answer. He was thinking of how his dear dead Lord s body 
 was to be decently moved, before people came about, and 
 gathered into a crowd. 
 
 The problem was solved for him. Two policeman came 
 up, and the elder of them said, " Is this gentleman dead, sir ? " 
 
 " He is quite dead," said Austin, quietly. 
 
 " A duel, sir ? " said the policeman. 
 
 " Yes, a duel," said Austin. " This dead man is, or was, 
 Lord Charles Barty, the Duke of Cheshire s son. I am 
 Mr. Austin Elliot, of the United University Club. I was his 
 second, and I give myself into custody. Now, do be quick, 
 or the people will be about." 
 
 He had not made many turns up and down before an in 
 spector appeared, and Austin told him everything. " You will 
 not take that groom into custody, will you, inspector ? " said 
 Austin. 
 
 " I ought to, sir," said the inspector. 
 
 " But don t do it," said Austin. " If it lay in the sphere of 
 your duty to burn down Somerset House, you would not like 
 to be taken into custody and leave the business to some one 
 else. Now, see what that groom has to do. He was bred on 
 the estate, and will do it quietly. He has got to go to Chesh 
 ire House and burn it down over their heads. He will go 
 into the servants hall and ask to see the old nurse who nursed 
 them all. And he will tell her ; and she will tell the Duke ; 
 and the Duke will tell the Duchess, and they will curse my 
 name, and the day I was born, and shut up the house close 
 and dark. Lamentation and mourning and woe ! I beg 
 
240 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 pardon. My head is going over this. If you knew all the 
 circumstances, you could not wonder at it." 
 
 " God help you, sir ! " 
 
 " Amen. But you will let this poor groom go ? You were 
 less than a man if you did not." 
 
 That was easily arranged. And then came the terrible 
 business of removing the corpse; and I will go no further, 
 only hoping J;hat I have not gone too far already. But if I 
 thought that I could do more than I have done to give honest 
 men the contempt and the loathing that I feel myself for the 
 system of duelling, for the principle of making the Devil 
 arbiter of differences instead of God, I would go further. 
 I would go all the length to which Jules Janin, or the younger 
 Dumas, have gone in a very different cause. 
 
 Austin walked away with the inspector of police like a 
 man in a dream. It seemed to him as if all the universe had 
 sunk round him and left him standing on a pinnacle far above 
 the reach of human sympathy. It was so horrible. It was 
 not so much that he was sorry or grieved, or that he could have 
 wept wild tears for the fate of his friend ; that state of mind 
 was not come yet, and was not to come for a long while. At 
 present, the whole business was ghastly, horrible, unbelievable. 
 It must be untrue. Charles Barty, merry, handsome, clever, 
 the most lovable of human beings, so gentle, so good, such a 
 thorough gentleman, Charles Barty, the man whose life 
 had hitherto been a sort of beautiful, merry joke, yet who had 
 shown promise of great things, should occasion arise, this 
 man could not be dead ! It was impossible that Death could 
 have dared ! But Austin had seen his body put into a baker s 
 cart, and had seen the legs fall. 
 
 Alas ! Austin, he was dead enough ; and you, my poor 
 butterfly, having lived three-and-twenty years in a fool s para 
 dise, your religious faith absolutely nothing, your political 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 241 
 
 creed only built up out of the formulas used by your forefa 
 thers, in discussing questions which have been extinct many 
 a long year agone; your social creed being, that it was a 
 good thing to get asked to such and such a party, and that 
 you ought to get up pedigrees and know all about everybody, 
 you, poor Austin, when you saw Lord Charles put into the 
 baker s cart and driven slowly away, were at the edge of a 
 very black hell indeed. No wonder that you clung to the 
 police inspector as a reality, at all events, as the link which 
 connected you with the world which seemed to have sunk 
 away under your feet. 
 
 It was well that Mr. Elliot was dead, or this would have 
 killed him with a broken heart. That he who had brought up 
 his son on formulas, social and political, which meant some 
 thing in his time, but which now meant little or nothing, 
 should be out of the way, and not see that painful look of 
 puzzled horror on his son s face, that was well. Poor Austin 
 was the Louis Sixteenth of duelling, the last, the kindest, 
 the best of those who struck to the old rule, the one most 
 severely punished. 
 
 When they got to the police-office, the magistrate was try 
 ing the people who had got drunk the night before. Austin 
 sent several special messengers, at the inspector s advice, to 
 old friends of his father s, and sat wearily at one side of the 
 court, listening to the other cases. 
 
 A chimney-sweep, for nearly murdering his wife. He had 
 been remanded and remanded again, until the house-surgeon 
 had pronounced his wife sufficiently recovered to go and give 
 evidence. There she was, a drunken drab, with her head all 
 plastered up with bandages. The house-surgeon had thought 
 her dying at one time, and had sent for the magistrate to take 
 her evidence ; then, under fear of death, she had told the truth, 
 but now, when in the dock, looking at the miserable, degraded, 
 11 p 
 
2-12 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 brutal hound she loved so well, she lied and lied in his favor, 
 till the magistrate threatened to commit her for perjury ; and 
 at every fresh lie (God help us !) her face seemed to grow 
 grander and nobler, till she looked almost beautiful. " She," 
 thought Austin, " would die for that wretched cur, and I " 
 
 Two boys, brothers, ages seventeen and eighteen. They 
 had got the trick of going to Cremorne and such places, and 
 spending too much money. They had put their silly heads 
 together and committed a clumsy forgery, a forgery than 
 which nothing more idiotic ever entered into the mind of rn;m. 
 They had torn a check out of their master s book, filled it 
 up for ten pounds, and with the most clumsy imitation of their 
 master s signature, had gone together to the bank and presented 
 it. They were given into custody at once, and there they 
 were in the dock, huddling together like two frightened sheep. 
 The evidence was conclusive, and the magistrate asked them 
 what they had to say. Whereupon Tom, the elder brother, 
 moistening his dry lips with his tongue, confessed his guilt, 
 and said that Bob, his younger brother, knew nothing about 
 it. But Bob would n t have this by any means ; he asserted 
 shrilly that he had stolen the check, forged it, and had took 
 Tom to the bank with him when he presented it, because they 
 knew Tom and did n t know he, and also that Tom was a 
 devil to lie, and always had been, which ask their mother. 
 The chivalry of these two poor fools towards one another was 
 one more stab in Austin s heart. Now that the horrible catas 
 trophe had come, he could see, that by rising to the level of 
 a higher law, he might have saved his friend. 
 
 Then they shoved into the dock a boy who scuffled, and 
 lost one shoe, and had it handed to him by the policeman ; and 
 after he had put it on, stood up again. A boy, gentlemen, of 
 the sort worth, attending to, because his clay has not been 
 burnt to brick, but is still plastic. A boy who may yet be 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 243 
 
 made a man if you can get hold of him. The very boy, 
 gentlemen, of all persuasions, from Roman Catholic to Uni 
 tarian, that you are, thank you, getting hold of, all honor to 
 you. A boy with a shock head, his hair down over his fore 
 head, who, when spoken to, puts his fists into his eyes and 
 lifts his elbows up above his ears, expecting a blow. You 
 know him, messieurs the Scripture readers, brothers of the 
 holy order of St. Francis, district visitors of the Sweden- 
 borgian, or whatever you call yourselves, you know the 
 young dog ; and, in spite of all your attempted proselytizing, 
 and your squabbling, you all mean him well. Have we not 
 seen your good works ? 
 
 This shock-headed boy being put into the dock, and accused 
 of being concerned, with his elder brother, still at large, in the 
 tripping up of an old gentleman, and the stealing his watch 
 " did n t know nothink about it ! " and in spre of the truculent 
 cross-examination of Mr. Barney Moses (from the office of 
 Ikey Moses and Son), and the hints of the magistrate, that in 
 consequence of his youth he would be held innocent, he still 
 aggravatingly and perversely persisted in " knowing nothink 
 about it," without orders from his elder brother. 
 
 Then was this thieves honor higher than gentlemen s 
 honor ? Was it the same article, or a spurious one ? There 
 was no time for Austin to think out the question, or he would 
 probably as a reasonable man have settled it this way : 
 That up to this year, 1846, the best and highest men in the 
 land had never had moral courage to decline the test of the 
 duel ; that he was one of the first victims of a new state of 
 things ; that, acting on the old rules of honor, he had done 
 nothing with regard to this miserable business but what was 
 inexorably right and necessary. That, through mere ill-luck, 
 his own reputation was tarnished, and his friend killed. That 
 was the truth ; but Austin could not see it just now. He 
 
244 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 placed the honor of these thieves and prostitutes above his 
 own, and wished for death. 
 
 The charge against him was made. The magistrate re 
 quired two sureties of 500 each. They were instantly 
 forthcoming, from two, or if need were, from a dozen of his 
 father s friends ; and Austin, after thanking them, went rapidly 
 away and took a passport for France, and then went to his 
 lawyer. 
 
 He and his lawyer sat late. He gave him orders to pre 
 pare deeds, conveying all his property to Eleanor in case of a 
 conviction (which was inevitable),* and told him that he would 
 appear and sign them in good time. He then made a short 
 will, leaving all his property to Eleanor, in case of his death 
 before his conviction. Then he wrote to her a short note, 
 requesting her to make good, out of his effects, the loss of his 
 father s old friends, with regard to his bail. And then he 
 went home. 
 
 His servant was waiting for him. He paid the man s 
 wages, and gave him a paper, which authorized him to sell his 
 three horses, his cab, and his dog-cart, at Tatter-sail s, and to 
 pay the money into his banker s. This paper was not worth 
 very much in a legal point of view, but he knew his man, and 
 knew that he could trust him. He told him also to take care 
 of his dog Robin ; and should anything happen, to take him to 
 Miss Hilton. Then he had his landlady, Mrs. Macpherson, 
 up, and settled with her, while his man packed his port 
 manteau. 
 
 * It seems doubtful whether or no this document or documents would 
 have been worth the paper they were written on. The law about duelling 
 may be found in Mr. Samuel Warren s article in " Blackwood," on the duel 
 between Lord Cardigan and Captain Tuckett. Our legal knowledge is in 
 sufficient to decide whether or no the conveyance of the property of a man 
 under bail, to a friend, will hold good. Our own ignorance on this point is 
 not very surprising. But it is surprising that the question, so very impor 
 tant, seems not to be decided yet. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 245 
 
 It was four o clock in the afternoon before all this was done, 
 and then he sent his man for a cab. His fool of a servant 
 cried, and prayed him that he would let him go with him, but 
 Austin was pale and resolute, and went alone. 
 
 A strange journey. One of the maddest, silliest journeys 
 ever undertaken. First he went to Calais, and very soon 
 found that Captain Hertford was not there, and had not been 
 there. Then he posted to Boulogne, and spent three days 
 there making inquiries. Captain Hertford had evidently not 
 been there either. The Police Bureau knew nothing of him 
 at all. Monsieur must have been frightfully deceived by in 
 terested persons ; no such person had been there. Monsieur, 
 weary of life, feeling hot about the head, thought he would go 
 bathe, and did so. The bathers sat on the shore and ate hot 
 gawffres, and read " Le Juif Errant," not yet grown stale, and 
 " Monte-Christo," which will never grow stale. But no one 
 knew anything of Captain Hertford, or any such man. 
 Had not Prince Louis Buonaparte shaved off his moustaches, 
 put two planks on his shoulders, and walked out of Ham ? 
 What did Monsieur think of that as an instance of French 
 courage ? Hey then ! Monsieur was forced to confess that 
 the Prince had shown courage of the very highest order. 
 But finding no intelligence of Captain Hertford, he crossed 
 again to Dover. 
 
 There seemed only one port left now to which Captain 
 Hertford would be likely to have gone, he must have taken 
 passage from Brighton to Dieppe. He might have gone to 
 Havre ; that was still possible. Austin remembered that he 
 had said, " I am off for France," and felt sure that he would 
 get on his track. He was more likely to have gone to Dieppe 
 than to Havre. Austin went down to Brighton, and crossed 
 in the steamer Venezuela, which steamer, I sincerely hope, is 
 gone to the bottom long ago ; for having endured a gale of 
 
246 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 wind in her through one night, about two years before the 
 time I speak of, and having endured many gales of wind, in 
 many ships, in all sorts of strange seas since, I have come to 
 the conclusion that the steamer Venezuela is (or I hope was) 
 the worst, wettest, and most abominably dangerous sea-boat 
 ever built. 
 
 Mrs. Taylor, of the "Hotel d Angleterre," dead, I fear, 
 many years agone, the best and cheeriest landlady that ever 
 roared out of an upper window, " Alphonse (you stupid 
 lout, may God forgive me !) Venez-ici toutedesweet, pour 
 brusser les souliers de,jeune Mossoo! Drat the man, he s 
 a iling of his hair ; cochon ! entendez-vous ? " Mrs. Taylor, 
 I say, knew nothing of Captain Hertford ; but Austin, going 
 into the public room at the Hotel Angleterre, met a man 
 whom he knew, who gave him the information required. 
 A University man, in ill-health, com<3 over for change of air 
 and scene. 
 
 " This is a bad business," he said. " But, Elliot, mind 
 me, I don t believe one word of what they say against you. 
 I know you too well, to think it possible that you thrust for 
 ward that poor fool of a nobleman to fight your quarrel. 
 It is a lie!" 
 
 " It is, indeed," said Austin. 
 
 " I know it is. I think that this Captain Hertford is sorry 
 for what has happened. We must be just to all men, Elliot. 
 My cousin went in the same boat with him to Antwerp last 
 week, and he says that he looked as pale as death, and as 
 wild as a hawk." 
 
 There was still time. The Dart was getting up steam 
 outside the hotel windows. Austin was not very long in 
 getting on board of her. Next morning he was at Brighton, 
 the same day in London. The same night with a pour 
 voyager passport, on board the Antwerpen ! In twenty-four 
 hours at Antwerp. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 247 
 
 At the bureau of police, he got on Captain Hertford s trail 
 at last, and he followed it like a bloodhound. Captains Hert 
 ford and Jackson, it appeared, had arrived suspiciously, with 
 very little luggage, and had taken tickets for Aix-la-Chapelle. 
 He followed on. At Aix-la-Chapelle he was puzzled again. 
 He was in Prussian territory, and the police were not so 
 communicative. But he luckily remembered that Herr Niel 
 sen Keilleter, the greatest man in Aix-la-Chapelle, was an 
 old friend of his father s. He called on him, and the good old 
 man, little dreaming what he was doing, gave him his as 
 sistance. Captain Hertford and Captain Jackson had gone 
 on to Cologne, farther than which, IL Jiose days, the railway 
 did not go. 
 
 Here, at Cologne, he was once more left to his mother wit. 
 He got hold of a lacquey de place, who desired to show him 
 the cathedral, the eleven thousand virgins, the sculls of Gas- 
 par, Melchoir, and Baltasar, and, as old James would have 
 said, " the hull biling," for one thaler. Being interrogated, 
 the commissionaire deponed that Captain Hertford was, at 
 that same speaking, staying in the hotel at Deutz. Austin, 
 having paid his thaler, repaired there, and found only a 
 gentle old Indian colonel, by name Hanford, whom he dis 
 turbed at his dinner. He was quite at fault again, and had 
 to leave the old man s presence abashed. 
 
 Ah ! it was a weary journey. Hope quite dead, and life 
 quite worthless. He went out, and sat upon the wharf at 
 Deutz, and looked at the river, sweeping, hissing, boiling on, 
 under the young May moon. 
 
 A great river. The first he had ever seen. It came, they 
 said, spouting in a thousand cataracts out of the everlasting 
 snow, and then went gleaming and sparkling on through such 
 wildly beautiful scenery of feathering woodland and hanging 
 rock as no one could realize without seeing. There was a 
 
248 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 grand catastrophe at Seliaff hausen. After that, it was a mere, 
 dull, sweeping waste of waters ; and at last, down there below 
 Dusseldorf, the mighty river, born in the eternal snow -crystals, 
 begins to creep ignominiously towards the sea through fifty 
 sluggish canals. 
 
 So poor Austin sat there for a time, trying to compare his 
 life to that of the Rhine, quite forgetting that the river only 
 became useful and beautiful after its catastrophe at Schaff- 
 hausen, and that its real usefulness and its real beauty in 
 creased with every mile till it reached the sea, and was lost in 
 the eternity of the ocean. And after a time he held his way 
 across the bridge of be.,..-, towards the great cathedral, which 
 heaved up its mighty ribs above the sleeping town. 
 
 He gained no further intelligence of Captain Hertford. 
 But in his eagerness of purpose his wit was sharp. He 
 knew that Captain Hertford gamed, and would be very likely 
 to be found near gaming-tables. His ignorance of the world 
 generally, and the Continent in particular, were so very great 
 that he did not know which were the places hereabout, where 
 men came to lose their money. So, with an Englishman s 
 instinct, he sent for the landlord. 
 
 The landlord s son came ; a handsome young fellow, who 
 had had his nose slit in some childish Burschen duel. At 
 Austin s question he seemed puzzled. Answered that there 
 were tables at Aix-la-Chapelle, at which Monsieur (they spoke 
 in French) could have played (being a foreigner) to his heart s 
 content. 
 
 Austin told him that he did not want to play. That he 
 wanted to find a man, whom he was most likely to find in the 
 neighborhood of a gaming-table. 
 
 " An affair of honor, then," said the young man. 
 
 " Well," said Austin, " it is something of that sort. I feel 
 sure you would not betray me." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 2 19 
 
 The young man at once grew heroic and mysterious. He, 
 too, had had his affairs, but what imported it to speak of them. 
 He laid his finger on his wounded nose, and Austin did not 
 laugh ; though when he compared in his mind the childish 
 fencing-match, in which the young man had been engaged, and 
 the affair in which he would find himself in a few days, he felt 
 very much inclined to do so. 
 
 This young man informed him that the next place on the 
 general route of tourists where one played was a place called 
 Ems, in the Duchy of Nassau. That one went from hence by 
 steamer to Coblence, and by diligence or voiture, as one 
 pleased, to Ems. That there were two companies of vapor 
 vessels on that river, both of which professed to take one to 
 Coblence. The one, the Cologne company, possessing a mag 
 nificent fleet, swift as the wind, officered by gentlemen, sup 
 plied with every luxury ; the other, the Dusseldorf company, 
 composed of miserable and rotten boats, slow, dirty, officered by 
 abusive villains, who too often succeeded in the dearest wish 
 of their hearts, that of abimer in the depths of their noble river, 
 not only their rotten boat, but also their deluded passengers. 
 
 Austin having been previously recommended by a friend to 
 go by the Dusseldorf company, as being the best of the two, 
 felt very much inclined, after this exhibition of spite, to do so. 
 He decided to go on by the first boat, and did so. It was a 
 Cologne boat. 
 
 He remembers that after they got beyond Bonn there was 
 some fine scenery, or he thinks there was, because a noble 
 young American,, with whom he made immediate acquaintance 
 on board, kept calling his attention to it. But he was too 
 anxious to care whether the hills were ten feet high or ten 
 thousand. His time was getting short. His bail would be 
 forfeited in little more than a fortnight, and Captain Hertford 
 as far from being found as ever, 
 ll* 
 
250 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 He slept that night at the " Giant," at Coblence, and the 
 next morning rumbled quietly away towards Ems, up the 
 pleasant Lahn valley, before the mists had fully rolled away 
 from the summits of the sheets of feathering woodland, which 
 rose overhead on all sides. 
 
 He put up at the Hotel de Russie, and, after breakfast, 
 went down to the Kursal, which round the Kessel and the 
 Kranken was thronged with all sorts of people drinking the 
 waters ; and here he loitered for something like half an hour, 
 until some one pushed against him accidentally in the crowd, 
 and apologized to him. It was a magnificent Tyrolese, the 
 first that Austin had ever seen. The man s enormous stature, 
 the honest repose of his face, his grand dress, and his elegant, 
 easy carriage, attracted Austin. It was a new animal, and a 
 very remarkable one. He smiled and returned the man s cour 
 tesy in French. Following him with his eyes, he saw that, grand 
 as he was, he was only the keeper of a stall for the sale of 
 Tyrolese knick-knacks, but he determined to have some talk 
 with him. He went up and bought some trifle or another, 
 and engaged him in conversation for a little time. At last he 
 asked, " Had he a chamois head ? " The man had not, " but 
 if Monsieur would accompany him to his brother s stall, he 
 should have his choice of several." 
 
 Monsieur did so, and as Monsieur approached our younger 
 brother s stall, he became aware that Captain Hertford was 
 standing in front of it, bargaining for a pair of gloves. 
 
 Austin turned to the Tyrolese and raised his finger. The 
 man, with instinctive high-bred courtesy, bowed and turned 
 back to his own stall, and Austin stood, not quite certain how 
 to proceed. 
 
 Captain Hertford bought his gloves, and turning into the 
 main room of the Kursal, approached the counter in front of 
 the spring. It was evident that he was going to drink his 
 waters. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 251 
 
 He had the. red Bohemian glass raised to his lips, when 
 Austin came behind him and said, quietly, " Captain Hert 
 ford ! " 
 
 Captain Hertford was no coward ; but he knew the voice, 
 and when he turned he was as pale as death. When he saw 
 Austin s wild face, the glass he held fell from his hand, and 
 flew, splintered in a hundred ruby crystals, about the stone 
 pavement at his feet. 
 
 " I suppose you know what I want of you," said Austin. 
 
 " Do you want satisfaction ? " said Captain Hertford, in a 
 low voice. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " It is a mistake. That last business was devilish horrid. 
 Do you repeat that you want satisfaction ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Very well, your blood is on your own head. Shall you 
 send to-day?" 
 
 " Yes. Who am I to send to ? " 
 
 "Jackson and I are at the Hotel d Angleterre, over the 
 river. Good morning." 
 
 He did not know a soul there ; he had to go and find Cap 
 tain Jackson to get an introduction to some one. Captain 
 Jackson found him a Frenchman, who was much pleased with 
 theH5usiness, and who proceeded to make all arrangements. 
 He returned soon to Austin, and told him that they were to 
 walk out that very evening to a place called Dausenau. 
 
 They, at the time appointed, sauntered up along the road, 
 to the quaint old village, and turned up to the left, into a ro 
 mantic, deeply-wooded glen ; through the bright green mead 
 ows of which a bright trout-stream came flashing and pausing, 
 and babbling pleasantly of peace and spring-tide and hope. 
 Austin for one instant, mad, ruined, and desperate as he was, 
 felt the influence of the June evening tide, and longed to be 
 
252 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 at rest, in his grave if need were, to be anywhere but 
 where he was. Feeling no fear, but a mixture of grief, re 
 morse, and horror, difficult to bear, preserving reason at the 
 same time. 
 
 "While in this frame of mind, he passed near a mill and out 
 into a meadow, and there was the author of all this misery 
 and woe before him. In less than ten minutes he was stand 
 ing cool and calm, face to face with him, with a loaded pistol 
 in his hand. Surely Hertford s day of reckoning was come. 
 Not yet. 
 
 Austin had no more intention of firing his pistol at Captain 
 Hertford, than he had of blowing out his own brains. The 
 last affair had been, as Captain Hertford said, so horrid, that 
 Austin was determined that he would never again have any 
 hand in a repetition of such a thing, unless he himself were 
 the victim. So when Captain Hertford had fired, and he 
 heard the ball whistle close by his head, he turned coolly 
 away and fired at a piece of rock among the copse on the 
 right of the meadow. 
 
 But Captain Hertford insisted upon another shot ; and this 
 brought on a general wrangle, during which it became pain 
 fully evident that the gallant Captain had been drinking. 
 There was nothing to be done, but to place the men again, it 
 seemed. This time Austin again fired away to the right, and, 
 luckily for himself, was very slightly grazed on the leg. The 
 affair was, of course, instantly stopped. Austin had fought his 
 first and last duel. He had satisfied every requirement that 
 the most punctilious bully could make. He had hunted Cap 
 tain Hertford over the Continent till he had found him, had 
 had him out, and had been unluckily wounded by him. He 
 appealed to the three others ; they confirmed him. Jackson 
 said that he would take care that everything should be known 
 in London on his return ; and Austin limped off back to Ems, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 253 
 
 somewhat lighter in heart than before. He had faced one of 
 his troubles successfully ; his reputation was secure again ; he 
 could look a man in the face ; he had made due pilgrimage to 
 the outraged idol, honor, and had done sacrifice. The god 
 was slightly in his debt, or, at all events, things were about 
 square between them. This was, so far, satisfactory. He 
 knew (who better?) that this fetish he had been taught to 
 worship was a cruel and vindictive demon ; but, like a true 
 idolater, he believed that, by overloading his idol with sacri 
 fices, he might lay it under obligations, and, so to speak, have 
 a case against it, a case which, under some sort of law, would 
 hold good, and must be attended to. 
 
 " Was it for this," says the old nigger in that most beautiful 
 book, "The Cruise of the Midge," after he had pitched his 
 idol into the lee-scuppers in his wrath, " was it for this that I 
 gave you chicken, and stick fedder in your tail, eh ? " He, 
 like Austin, had a strong case against his fetish. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 AUSTIN made his appearance in due time at his attorney s 
 office in Lincoln s Inn. The clerks looked very grave, and 
 one of them showed him into the presence of the old man. 
 Austin saw him rise hurriedly and turn pale when he ap 
 peared ; Austin shook him warmly by the hand. 
 
 " So you have come back," said the attorney. " Ah, fool 
 ish, foolish boy. How I have hoped and prayed that you 
 might be too late. But stay ; there is time. My dear 
 Austin, let me beg you on my knees, for the sake of your 
 good name and your father s memory, to go back to France this 
 night. Think that in three days it will be too late forever." 
 
2-H AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " I cannot, old friend, in honor. The wrong I have done to 
 the law shall be punished by the law. Say no more about it." 
 
 The old man said no more. He did not hide from Austin 
 that he feared a conviction ; that he hardly knew how it was 
 to be avoided. 
 
 " God s will be done. You feel sure of a conviction ? " 
 
 " Almost." 
 
 " The jury acquitted P last March," suggested Austin.* 
 
 " In direct opposition to Erie s summing up," said the old 
 man, eagerly. " And why ? Because they believed that it 
 
 was Liston s operation which killed S , and not H s 
 
 bullet. That is why. They gave him the benefit of that 
 doubt, because because well, because their sympathies 
 
 went with P . They considered him blameless, only a 
 
 young fellow who had done what fifty others had done before 
 him, gone out with his friend." 
 
 " And their sympathies will not be with me, then ? " said 
 Austin. 
 
 " No," said the old man, steadily. " If it kills me to say so 
 to your father s son, I will say it. This duel has been talked 
 about a great deal. Lord Charles Barty was a young man 
 of great promise, and the newspapers have written leading 
 articles about it. It has made a great stir in London. But all 
 ranks and all parties agree in condemning you. Everybody 
 knows, or think they do, that you and Captain Hertford were 
 rivals for the hand of this Miss Hilton. Everybody has heard 
 that you went to the United University Club, and spoke 
 threateningly about Captain Hertford. Everybody (except 
 myself and those who know you) believe that you let Lord 
 Charles fight this duel for you. Among others who believe 
 this are the jury. The judge will tell them, in summing up, 
 to banish from their minds all that they have previously heard 
 
 * Referring to the Gosport duel. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 255 
 
 about the case, but they won t, not if I know em ; they never 
 
 do, confound em. Look at P s acquittal, Austin, my 
 
 poor boy, and there read the story of your own conviction." 
 
 u I see what you mean very well," said Austin ; " that in 
 P s case they knew, from what they had heard else 
 where, that he was, as near as possible in such a case, blame 
 less ; that in mine, from what they have heard elsewhere, they 
 believe me more morally guilty than the principals them 
 selves ; and, therefore, that they will convict. Is it not so ? " 
 
 " That is the state of the case. But there is time to get 
 out of the way. You can make everything good, and so on. 
 It is nothing. You ought to be off now. Come, let us go." 
 
 " No," said Austin, " I think not. I think, old friend, that 
 we will see this matter out to the very end. I am so careless 
 of life now, that I would rather be punished in this world 
 somewhat. It would, at all events, give me the feeling, to the 
 end of my wretched life, that if I had sinned, so also had I 
 suffered. It may not, you say, abate one jot of my eternal 
 punishment hereafter ; but, speaking in a selfish point of view, 
 I would sooner let this matter take its course. I will not have 
 the whole of the retribution, which must come on me sooner 
 or later, left for the next world." 
 
 " I do not know what more to say, Austin Elliot," said the 
 attorney. " Must we go on ? " 
 
 " Certainly, I have broke God s laws, as well as man s. I 
 have been mad. Do you know what I have been doing 
 abroad ? 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Committing another crime. I hunted that man, Hertford, 
 till I found him, and then had him out. I need hardly tell 
 you that I would have died sooner than fire at him. But in 
 doing this I have committed another crime, I fired away from 
 him, but still I gave him the chance of adding to his guilt in 
 
256 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 murdering me. I will take my punishment for both, and try 
 to bear it. But. I shall die. Let us speak of business. 
 About those papers which you were to get ready?" 
 
 " This plan of yours," said the attorney, after a long pause, 
 " of conveying your property won t do. I have had the best 
 opinion about it. Lord Cardigan tried it six years ago, and it 
 is the opinion of the best men that you had better trust to the 
 mercy of the Crown. In Lord Cardigan s case, it was a fla 
 grant attempt to defeat justice. It would not be allowed again. 
 It must not be even mentioned. Your chance is submission. 
 If you choose to sign your will, do so. You will go and see 
 Miss Hilton to-morrow ? " 
 
 " No ; Eleanor has made her bed, and must lie on it. I 
 love her, old friend, but she could keep a secret from me which 
 she could tell to that cutthroat bully, Hertford." 
 
 " I wish I was in possession of facts," said the attorney. 
 " If I was, I should find that you were utterly wrong. I 
 know that as surely as I know that the sun shines. Come, go 
 to her." 
 
 " I ought not, I dare not, I will not. Have it which way 
 you will. She, by her absurd affectation of mystery, helped to 
 make me mad and jealous. If she cares for me, let her come 
 to me in prison, and make it up there. In prison, I say. 
 They won t hang me, will they ? By Gad ! they won t dare 
 to do that." 
 
 " Erie," said the attorney, looking steadily at Austin, 
 
 " when summing up in P s case, laid down that every 
 
 one present at a duel, either as principal or second, was guilty 
 of murder. They could hang you, you know. Perhaps they 
 won t. Indeed, I don t believe they will. Transportation for 
 life is generally the next sentence, after that twenty-one years, 
 then fourteen. Fourteen years is a devilish long time, and 
 you might be at Boulogne to-morrow morning." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 257 
 
 This was the hardest assault that Austin had had. He 
 stood firm under it, and the attorney, seeing nothing was to be 
 made of him, told him that, if convicted, he would probably be 
 imprisoned for a month, possibly for six. And after this they 
 
 parted. 
 
 * * * * * 
 
 Let her come to him in prison, if she really loved him. Let 
 her explain her deceit there. And there let him tell her that 
 he had forgiven her, that he was a ruined man, that it 
 did not consort with his honor that their engagement should go 
 on, that his pride would not allow him to link an heiress of 
 such brilliant prospects with his own desperate fortunes. 
 Then let them part forever. 
 
 Austin went to prison in due time, and dreed his weird 
 there, as we shall see. But she never came near him there. 
 And yet have I done my work so very poorly that you dis 
 trust her ? I hope not. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII 
 
 IT was a most interesting case, and the court was crowded. 
 
 The newspapers had been clamoring for a conviction. P , 
 
 they said, had been acquitted through false sentimentality on 
 the part of the jury. The newspapers did not complain of 
 
 this. P was as innocent as a man might be under such 
 
 circumstances, a noble young fellow, who could not have 
 acted in any other way ; a man who bore the highest charac 
 ter in every way. But still a conviction was wanted, and this 
 was the very case in which to convict. This young man, 
 Elliot, had notoriously thrust his friend Lord Charles Barty 
 
 Q 
 
258 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 into a quarrel which should have been his own, and had 
 sneaked out of it himself. By every law, human and divine, 
 by civil law and by the laws of honor, this Elliot was the man 
 to make an example of. 
 
 The question was, " Would he put in an appearance ? " 
 The more long-headed and shrewd people said, " O Lord, no ! 
 there was not a chance of it. That you might make your 
 mind quite easy on that score, my good fellow. That they be 
 lieved they knew something of the world, and that they put it 
 to you, as a judge of human nature, and a reasonable being, 
 whether it was likely that he would put in an appearance after 
 three weeks law." The men who knew Austin best thought 
 quite differently, and had to endure what the deep dogs before 
 mentioned said of him, which, accompanied as it was with that 
 peculiar contemptuous smile which the deep dogs aforesaid 
 generally assume when they are being deeper than usual, was 
 very hard to bear, but which had to be endured (as we said 
 before of unendurable things) nevertheless. 
 
 " It was against Austin Elliot s interest to appear. There 
 fore, he would not appear." Conclusion not all right, by any 
 means, in consequence of the omission of a rather important 
 middle term. It is astonishing how some shallow men, merely 
 from the fact of denying the possibility of a man acting on high 
 and disinterested motives, get to think themselves worldly 
 wise ; and it is still more astonishing how wiser and better 
 men than themselves shake their heads, and give them credit 
 for worldly wisdom and knowledge of human nature. Why, 
 the pickpockets and thieves in any police-court will show them 
 what nonsense they talk, when they place self-interest as the 
 only source of human action. But if you bray a fool in a mor 
 tar, he will only turn round on you, and offer to prove that he 
 was right from the beginning. 
 
 So, when Austin s name was called, and he stepped quietly 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 259 
 
 into the dock, and stood there pale and anxious, but perfectly 
 calm, the wise men were slightly puzzled, but made out in a 
 few minutes the theory that Austin s game was to submit, 
 throw himself on the mercy of the court, and save his property. 
 Oh ! deep-dyed idiots ! So utterly unable to appreciate the 
 grief, the despair, the horror in that wild young heart ; and the 
 strange, half-heathenish feeling which was there too, that he 
 might, by suffering in his own person, atone for his sin ; and 
 that by faithfully and unflinchingly going through this adven 
 ture to the end, by enduring courageously all the consequences 
 of it, that he might perhaps raise himself to the level of his 
 dead friend. So the mainspring of all human action is self- 
 interest, gentlemen ! So you have never had a friend, and 
 never want one ! Let us grant you, that the Samaritan was 
 going to stand for Jericho, and was glad of the opportunity of 
 striking a blow at the Levite interest, and let us have done 
 with it. He only gave the landlord two pence, and we never 
 hear of his having come back and paid the rest of the score. 
 Is that the way you would argue ? Very well ; he did the 
 thing very cheap. He was a long-headed man. You will 
 probably, however, not find him in the same circle of the 
 Paradise of Fools with yourselves. 
 
 It all turned out as Austin s attorney had predicted. Every 
 member of the jury had been talking about the duel this three 
 weeks past. 
 
 The escape of Prince Louis Buonaparte from Ham, and 
 the Barty-Hertford duel, had been the main subjects of con 
 versation among them for that time. When they sat in that, 
 box, they were requested to dismiss from their minds all that 
 they had heard outside that court. A modest request this, to 
 ask twelve men to forget what they had been talking about 
 for the last fortnight. It was not complied with ; it was child 
 ish to suppose that it could be ; no one ever did think that it 
 
2GO AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 would be ; Austin was condemned before he came into court. 
 Counsel spoke on each side. The counsel for the prosecution 
 were very moderate, the counsel for the defence did their best, 
 which was nothing. The judge summed up almost in the very 
 words of Mr. Justice Erie two months before, in a similar case, 
 but every one of the jury had formed their own opinion ; and 
 that opinion was identical in all the twelve of them, to wit, 
 that Austin had not acted " honorable," and so they found him 
 guilty of manslaughter. A perfectly just finding, but on per 
 fectly unjust grounds. 
 
 The judge gave a glance at the jury, in which, said some 
 who watched him, there was a slight gleam of contempt. He 
 paused before he passed sentence, and when he began to speak, 
 he spoke rather low. " It had pleased Almighty God," he 
 said, " for some inscrutable reason, to strike down the prisoner 
 at the bar, in the very beginning of what some had thought 
 would have been a very noble and glorious career. He, as an 
 old man, earnestly prayed the prisoner at the bar, that in the 
 solitude and seclusion to which he was now to be condemned, 
 that he would take this lesson to heart, and remember that 
 God only chastened in his infinite love." 
 
 A pause, and a profound silence. The jury felt uneasy, 
 
 and began to wish they had done like P s jury, and let the 
 
 young gentleman off. 
 
 The judge went on, though his voice was a little husky. " I 
 would not add one iota to the terrible remorse which I know 
 you feel. Nay, I would lighten it. Remember my words in 
 prison. If this chastisement is taken to heart, the time will 
 come, Austin Elliot, when you may bless the day in which you 
 stood in that dock. I am condemning you to social and politi 
 cal death. At this moment a cloud passes over your life, 
 hitherto so bright and happy, the shadow of which will remain, 
 and will never wholly pass away from you again on this side 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 261 
 
 the grave. The jury have done their duty. It remains for 
 me to do mine. 
 
 " One year s imprisonment." 
 
 The turnkey tapped him on the shoulder, and he followed 
 the turnkey out, and was given over to a policeman. He 
 brushed the shoulder of the next prisoner, a young man, a 
 burglar, who looked at him curiously, and laughed, and said 
 that it was a good thing that the swells got it sometimes, 
 though if he had the giving on it to em Austin did n t 
 hear -any more than that, and did not appreciate or care about 
 what he had heard. He was confused, and felt as if he was 
 going to be ill. He asked for some water, and they gave it 
 to him, and then he sat down and began thinking. 
 
 A year. This was 1846. Then it would be 1847. What 
 was the day of the month? He could not remember, and 
 asked the policeman. 
 
 The eleventh of June. The policeman repeated it twice, 
 and then Austin thanked him, but his mind was elsewhere. 
 A woman who sat opposite to him, a weary witness, had got 
 on odd boots. They were both black jean boots, and were 
 both for the right foot. One was trodden on one side, and 
 the other was gone at the toes, but Austin was wide awake 
 enough to see that they were both right-foot boots. You 
 could n t take him in. What a fool the woman must be ; 
 perhaps she was drunk when she put them on. She looked 
 a drunken sort of a drab. But there was something funny 
 in it. Austin, God help him, had a quiet laugh over it ; and 
 soon they told him it was time to go. 
 
 And so he went, patient and contented enough, for happily 
 he was just now past feeling anything acutely. As he was 
 going down the corridor, something struck him. When he 
 had started from home that morning, his dog Robin had 
 followed him, and would not be driven back. Pie remem- 
 
262 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 bered that now. He asked a policeman, who was standing 
 by, to see after the dog for him, and take him to Miss Hil 
 ton s, in Wilton Crescent, and said she would give him five 
 shillings. The man said, " Yes, he would," and Austin 
 thanked him, and as he stepped through the crowd into the 
 prison-van, he looked round for his dog, but could not see him. 
 
 Robin had seen him, though, and was quite contented. His 
 master, thought he, was busy to-day, and was now going for a 
 drive. Robin had waited for Austin in all sorts of places, for 
 all sorts of times, and had seen Austin get into all sorts of car 
 riages, and drive away, without thinking about him. His 
 custom, on these occasions, was to tear along the street, in 
 front of the vehicle into which Austin had got, be it cab, car 
 riage, or omnibus, with joyous bark, ready to take his part in 
 the next pleasant adventure which should befall. So now he 
 dashed through the crowded Old Bailey at the hazard of his 
 life, racing and leaping in front of the prison-van, which held 
 his ruined and desperate master, as if this were the best fun 
 of all. 
 
 The van took Austin to the great bald prison by the river 
 side, and he was hurried in. The cruel iron door clanged 
 behind him, and sent its echoes booming through the long, dis 
 mal, whitewashed corridors. And the clang of that door fell 
 like a death-knell on his ear. " I am condemning you," said 
 the judge, " to social and political death." He knew it now. 
 The door jarred and clanged, and the world knew Austin 
 Elliot no more. 
 
 Outside that great prison-door all was glorious June sun 
 shine ; the river flashing on, covered with busy craft, towards 
 the tall blue dome which rose into the air above the drifting 
 smoke, far away eastward. The June sun smote fiercely on 
 the long prison-wall, on the quiet road which passed it, on the 
 great iron door which had shut in Austin Elliot, and all his 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 263 
 
 high-built hopes and fancies. There is not a duller place in 
 all London than that river-terrace beneath the prison-wall. 
 There is never anything to see there. People who have cause 
 to go that way generally hurry past : there is nothing to see 
 there in general. 
 
 But, for many days after this, people who had passed in a 
 hurry came dawdling back again ; for there was something 
 to attract them, though they would have been troubled to tell 
 you what. There sat, all this time, a dog against the prison- 
 door, in the burning sunshine, a dog who sat patient, and 
 spoke to no other dogs, but who propped himself up against the 
 nails and bars, and panted in the heat, and snapped sometimes 
 at the flies. Those who turned and came back again knew, 
 by their mother-wit, that the dog had seen some one go into 
 that prison, and had set himself to wait till he came out again ; 
 and they spoke in low tones, the one to the other, and tried to 
 get the dog away, but he would not come. And one slipshod 
 drunken woman, whose husband was also behind that door, 
 urged by some feeling of sickly sentimentality, which we will 
 charitably attribute to gin, if you please, lest we should be 
 accused of sentimentality ourselves, brought the dog what we 
 strongly suspect to have been her own dinner, and stood by 
 while he ate it. Robin, poor dog ! made many friends during 
 his solitary watch, under the burning prison-wall ; for the 
 people who pass by Millbank are mostly of the class whose 
 highest idea of virtue is a certain blind self-sacrificing devotion 
 (reasons of such devotion, or merit of object, not to be in 
 quired into by respectable folks, if you please). 
 
 So Robin kept w r atch in the burning sun, and got himself 
 precariously fed by thieves and thieves wives. Sometimes 
 the great door behind him would be opened, and then he would 
 lope out into the middle of the street, and, with his head on 
 one side, peer eagerly up the dim vista of whitewashed pas- 
 
204 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 sages beyond. The blue-coated warders would whistle to 
 him, and say, " Here, poor fellow ! " but he would only shake 
 his long drooping tail for an instant, almost imperceptibly, and 
 stand where he was. If there was a stranger present, the 
 blue-coated warders would tell him that that was the dog of a 
 young swell they had got inside for duelling, and that that dog 
 had been there for above a week. Then the door would be 
 shut again, and Robin would take his old post in the sun, and 
 catch the flies. 
 
 For more than ten days he stayed there. At the end of 
 that time he went away. The great door was open one day, 
 and three or four warders were standing about. Robin had 
 gone into the middle of the street, when a very tall, handsome 
 young man came walking by with his eyes fixed on the prison. 
 
 He nearly stumbled over Robin. When Robin saw him he 
 leaped upon him, and the young man caught him in his bosom. 
 And the young man was of the Scotch nation, for he said, 
 
 "It s his ain dog, if it s no his ain self. What, Robin, boy, 
 do ye mind Gil Macdonald, and the bonny hillsides of Ron- 
 aidsay ! " 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 So went matters outside the prison-door, in the bright sum 
 mer sunshine. Inside that door a generous, noble-minded, 
 unselfish young man ; a young man who had, in his time, 
 according to the light which had been shown him, his lofty 
 aspirations towards the only good he knew of, political and 
 social success; was left without a friend or a hope, beating 
 himself to desperation and death against his prison-bars. Dare 
 you come in ? 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 265 
 
 But, in going, we may take this comfort with us : Austin 
 would have required very long drilling to have made a high 
 place in public life. Of that I feel quite sure. He was far 
 too impulsive and thoughtless far too prone to believe the 
 last thing which was told him, to accept the last theory put 
 before him, and to say that it must be the best to have suc 
 ceeded. Practice would have given him the power of closing 
 his ears to argument, and acting only on foregone conclusions. 
 Practice might have given him the trick of listening to his 
 opponent, and, ignoring all his sound arguments, catching him 
 when he tripped ; would have, in time, formed him into a 
 shallow and untruthful debater, of the third class, like 
 (Heaven help us, where are we getting to now?) He was 
 born for nobler things than to be a little dog, doing the barking 
 for big dogs, with thick skins and strong nerves, who meant 
 biting. He would, I fear, have dropped into a low place. 
 His habit of seeing the best side of all opinions, and of hav 
 ing none of his own, his terror of adverse criticism, and his 
 almost childish anger against opponents, would have made him 
 but a poor man for public life. He would have successively 
 believed all creeds, till he had none of his own. 
 
 That June morning we know of, they shut the gate behind 
 him, and he knew that it was all over and done. He felt that 
 he had died his first death, and that the clang of that door was 
 as the rattling of the earth on his coffin. At that moment, he 
 saw, so great is Divine mercy, among the burnt ashes of his 
 past life, one gleaming spark of hope ; he had, at all events, 
 seen the worst, short of death ; he was young and the worlt 
 was large; his imprisonment would be over soon, only a year. 
 The world was very large. There were other worlds besides 
 this cruel, inexorable English one. 
 
 * But that spark of hope disappeared- for a time, when the 
 sordid, unbeautiful realities of his prison-life began to be felt. 
 12 
 
266 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 His idea was, that he would be locked up between four walls, 
 and left to eat his heart, until his time was out. Lucky for 
 him it was not so. There were rules in that prison so degrad 
 ing that his mere loathing of them kept him from going mad, 
 little acts of discipline and punctuality, which, in his sane 
 mind, he would have acknowledged as necessary, but which 
 now irritated him. He had to go to chapel in the morning ; 
 he had to come out to the door of his cell, and touch his cap 
 to the governor ; and to do other things worse than this, 
 little things, which he would not so much have cared to do 
 when free ; little things which, had he been travelling in the 
 desert or the bush, he would have laughed over, yet which 
 now, when he was forced to do them, degraded him. He did 
 not know till afterwards that, by powerful interest, all prison 
 rules possible to be relaxed had been relaxed in his favor. 
 He did not know that the honest martinet of a governor was 
 in a state of indignation about the relaxation of those rules, 
 and held, very properly, that there was no such thing as rank 
 and influence, in his republic. Austin did not know this. He 
 did not notice, until he came out among the other convicts, 
 that he, of all there, was the only one whose hair was uncut, 
 and who wore his own clothes. Then he began to have a 
 faint inkling that he was being treated leniently, and to think 
 that they had done kindly by him in not yielding to his wi.-h ; 
 for he had asked them the first morning, when they made him 
 go to chapel, why they would not let him lie on his bed, and 
 die quietly. 
 
 It was a long while before he mixed with the other convicts 
 there. The first night he was brought in he did not sleep at 
 all ; there was a booming in his ears all through the short 
 summer night, and the power of connected thought was gone. 
 
 At seven he had dropped into a short, uneasy slumber; 
 then a great bell had runs , and the warder had waked him 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 267 
 
 for chapel. He asked him why he could not let him die in 
 peace. But he must come to chapel. 
 
 So he slouched in with a hot, heavy head, and slouched out 
 again. At the door he saw a warder, and, looking on him 
 with eyes which, though dull and lustreless, had a momentary 
 
 spark of ferocity in them, asked him where the he was 
 
 to go next ? 
 
 " To his cell," the man said, quietly, and not unkindly. 
 
 Poor Austin blundered on, he knew not whither, he knew 
 not for how long. He knew not where his cell was. He 
 went on for, what seemed to his fading intellect, hours. 
 Through one long whitewashed corridor after another ; at last 
 there were stairs, and he went down, down, holding on by the 
 balustrade. 
 
 At the end was an open court where many convicts were 
 washing themselves ; when they saw Austin they began 
 whistling and jeering at him. He did not mind it, but stood 
 blinking in the sunshine, peering about him, till they all 
 stopped whistling and talking, and remained quite silent, 
 quite silent, poor wretches ; for Austin, as he stood there in 
 the sunshine, was a strange sight to look on. His personal 
 beauty, always great, was rather enhanced by the /ever-flush 
 on his check, and the great passionate gfjg 1 eyes i were* now, 
 with the pupils enormously dilated, staring with the fixed look 
 of incipient delirium. 
 
 Unimaginative fellows, these convicts. After a moment s 
 silence, one of them, as spokesman, said, " That cove s ill ! " 
 and this so well expressed the feelings of the community, that 
 they went on washing themselves, and comparing notes about 
 the Past and the Future ; about what had been done, and what, 
 please Heaven, would yet be done (in their line of business), 
 leaving Austin to the care of the warder. 
 
 Austin petulantly appealed to him. " They told me to go 
 
2G8 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 to my cell, but I can t find it. They have taken all my money 
 away, or I would give you five pounds to take me back, and 
 put me on my bed; and I can t promise you anything for cer 
 tain, because the Crown has a claim on my property ; but if 
 you will take me back to my bed, I pledge you my honor as a 
 gentleman, that Miss Hilton will give you five pounds. It is 
 all broken off between us now, you understand, and, per 
 haps, she has not used me well, but she will give you that. I 
 want to lie down and die. Come, now, I would do it for you. 
 "VYe are all the same flesh and blood, convicts and warders, and 
 "Whigs and Tories. If I had taken care, and not broken God s 
 laws, I might have been a warder, in time, you know, when I 
 was fit for it ; and if you had gone out with the friend of your 
 heart on one accursed May morning, and seen him tumble 
 dead at your feet, you might have been a convict. If I had 
 been warder, and you convict, and you had come to me with 
 your head whirling round, and ten thousand remorseless devils 
 tearing at your heart, and asked me to lead you to your cell, 
 to die in peace, I would have done it ; by God, I would ! 
 Come, now ! " 
 
 Poor Austin ! He was near getting release from all his 
 troubles for a time ; he was in the first stage of a brain-fever. 
 The warder quietly and kindly took him back to his cell, com 
 forting him with such comfort as a prison-warder has to give. 
 He never claimed five pounds from Miss Hilton or from Aus 
 tin ; he never thought about what Austin had said any more. 
 But his kindness to poor, delirious Austin was the best day s 
 work he ever did in his life. Austin was partly delirious, 
 and never remembered one word of what passed. The man 
 never told his own story ; therefore, how came it, that after 
 all this miserable business was over, in happier times than 
 these, this warder found his private affairs inquired into ; found 
 that the inquirers had discovered that he, the warder, had 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 2 GO 
 
 started in life as a farmer, and had incontinently failed in 
 consequence of trying some of Mechi s experiments without 
 Mechi s money, and had been bankrupt, and glad to be made 
 a warder at Millbank ? How was it that this warder found 
 himself asked, as a personal favor, to come, with a salary of 
 250 a year, and superintend a certain model farm on a cer 
 tain island ? Which splendid rise in life was the consequence 
 of his kindness to Austin on this morning. 
 
 Austin was delirious, and remembered nothing of it. He 
 never told his story. There were none but -convicts by. One 
 of them must have told his story for him. Yes, there was one 
 convict, a very young man, with a foolish, weak face, who had 
 come towards Austin the moment he saw him come into the 
 yard, and had watched him with a look of eager curiosity, who 
 had heard it all. This young convict was the maker of that 
 warder s fortunes. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 AUSTIN got back to his cell, and somewhat regained his 
 head in solitude. He lay on his bed all day, and a little after 
 dark the warder before mentioned came in, and got him to go 
 to bed. 
 
 He slept for a time, not, luckily, for very long. Then he 
 woke with a feeling of horror upon him, a feeling that some 
 thing terrible was coming. He got out of bed, and felt for 
 the bell. 
 
 Round and round the room, from end to end ; how damp 
 and cold and strange the walls felt! and where the devil 
 was the bell-rope? His servant, he knew, slept in the room 
 overhead. He was ill; it would be better to call for him. 
 
270 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 He called out, " Edward ! Edward ! " many times, and 
 \vaited to hear the door above open ; but it did not. Con 
 found the lad ! why should he choose this night, of all oth 
 ers, to be out ! He had better feel his way into bed again, 
 and wait till he heard Edward go up-stairs. He began feel 
 ing his way towards his bed again, but he did not get to it. 
 In a moment the whole ghastly truth came before him. For 
 one instant he remembered all that had happened, and he 
 knew where he was. Then he gave a wild cry, and fell down 
 on the cold stone floor insensible. 
 
 The warder heard him, and came in. He got him on to 
 his bed again, which was a lucky thing for Austin, for if he 
 had lain long insensible on the cold stone floor, in his fever, he 
 would have died. 
 
 His fever was violent and obstinate ; he was often delirious 
 for a day at a time. He knew the doctor and the warder now 
 and then. At the end of ten days he was still delirious, but 
 he recognized some one who came to see him then. 
 
 Gil Macdonald, pondering about many things, after the last 
 terrible famine winter, during which the Ronaldsay folk had 
 lived on rotten potatoes, seaweed, and limpets, had gotten it 
 into his head, that he must, as soon as he could see things a 
 bit right, and save money enough, go south. South, from 
 his barren, mountain highland home, where mighty men, such 
 as he, were eating their hearts in starvation and idleness, 
 down to the rich country of England, where there was a 
 career and fair play for all; where a " long-leggit hieland 
 chiel" might find his place among these broad-shouldered, 
 gray-eyed, thoughtful English, and be welcomed as a friend, 
 riot as a rival. Gil had heard the Mactavish call these men 
 " Cockneys," by which he, Gil, understood a set of effeminate 
 fellows, enervated by living in a warmer climate. But Gil 
 was far too true a Scotchman to set his watch by the Mactav- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 271 
 
 ish s clock, or by Christopher North s clock, or by Professor 
 Blackie s clock ; and so he had come to the conclusion, having 
 heard Englishmen, who had come north, talking of England 
 and the English, that they were a very manly and noble set of 
 fellows ; and argued, that if the English were fools, as some 
 tried to make out, so much the better for him, who had a 
 strong notion that he was not a fool. If they were the fellows 
 he thought, why then it would be all the better to live among 
 them. 
 
 Besides, Austin Elliot was an Englishman, and lived in 
 England, and Austin Elliot was the one person around whom 
 most of Gil s hopes for the future grouped themselves. Aus 
 tin was the most heroic and amiable person he had ever seen, 
 and the memory of him was, perhaps, brighter in the Scotch 
 man s mind than the reality. But he must first get south and 
 see Austin. If Austin could help him, he would ; if he could 
 not, at all events Gil would see him again, that would be 
 something. So strange was the admiration of this young man 
 for Austin, he being in many points not unimportant ones 
 somewhat Austin s superior. 
 
 One brilliant June morning he landed from the Leith steam 
 boat, and strode wondering along the streets, looking at the 
 names over the shop-doors to see for a Highland one. Hav 
 ing " speired " of one MacAlister, who was taking down his 
 shutters, and whose personal appearance gave Gil the highest 
 hopes, he did as he was told ; he walked " aye west " for eight 
 miles or more toward Mortlake, where Mr. Elliot had lived. 
 He found Stanhope House, and rang, waiting for an answer 
 with a beating heart. 
 
 Old Mr. Elliot, the servant told him, had been dead above 
 a year; young Mr. Elliot lived at such a number in Pall 
 Mall. 
 
 So Gil, resting a little and taking a frugal meal at a public 
 
272 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 house, strode eastward again, carefully asking his way at 
 Scotch shops only, not that he was distrustful by nature, 
 but only cautious ; and it was an unco muckle city, arid a 
 stranger didna ken. So he asked his way at the Scotch shops 
 only. 
 
 Feeling his way, with many mistakes, he came at last to 
 Pall Mall. Here he made his only non-Scotch inquiry that 
 d:iy. Seeing a handsome, good-natured-looking young dandy, 
 very like Austin, standing at a corner, he took courage to ask 
 him whether or no that was Paul Maul. The young gentleman 
 answered civilly that it was Pell Hell. This made poor Gil 
 fancy that he had gone wrong again ; he determined to trust 
 none but his fellow-countrymen for directions. He walked on 
 till he saw a Highland name over a shop, and went in and 
 asked. He was right this time. The house at which he de 
 termined to ask was the very house where Austin lived ; he 
 saw that by the number. He asked the landlord, who was in 
 his shop, unscrewing the breech from a rifle, whether or no 
 Mr. Elliot lived there. 
 
 The landlord, hearing the dear old music of his native ac 
 cent, took off his spectacles, and said at a venture, in Gaelic, 
 
 " He did live here, God forgive us ; but he ,is fretting out 
 his brave heart in prison now, my son." 
 
 Poor Gil sat down. In prison. He remembered almost 
 the last words they had spoken together at Ronaldsay, and he 
 felt as if the hand of God had smote him. 
 
 "In prison!" 
 
 " Ay, the weary day." 
 
 " I have followed him all down from Ronaldsay, all the 
 weary ! weary way, and I find him in prison at the end. Do 
 you mean the same man as I ? Do you mean Mr. Austin 
 Elliot, the young Saxon Lord, with the laughing eyes, that 
 were blue like Loch Oil and Loch na Craig, when the wind 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 273 
 
 sweeps down on them from Ben More on a June morning ? 
 Have they dared to tie up the stag in the byre ? Have they 
 dared to put the salmon in the goose-dub ? Had they dared 
 to chain the scolding peregrine on the popinjay perch ? " 
 
 Thus, in his anger, in furious Gaelic, Ossiaiiically spoke 
 poor Gil. Alas ! it appeared they had dared to do all this, 
 and that there was no undoing of it at any rate whatever. His 
 fellow-countryman had him into his parlor, aftd told him all 
 about what had happened. And when Gil had grown calmer, 
 they had together a regular good Gaelic palaver, towards the 
 end of which this astounding fact was discovered, that Gil s 
 great-uncle s second wife was sister to the Reverend David 
 Macpherson, a placed minister, who had served Glen Rams- 
 horn for forty years ; and that the Reverend David s third 
 sister had married the gunmaker s own uncle s third cousin, 
 an Aberdeen stonemason, whereby it was as clear as day that 
 Gil was the gunmaker s nephew. So Gil was good for a bed 
 in Pall Mall, and, if need were, ten pound or so, for the rest of 
 his life. 
 
 That afternoon Gil walked down to the prison, by the river, 
 to see what he could do with regard to getting at Austin. And 
 there he found Robin, as we saw. And when he had spoken 
 to one or two of the warders, he came back again to Pall Mall, 
 and brought Robin with him ; and then, taking off his coat and 
 baring his great arms, he set to work and cleaned guns, while 
 Robin lay beside him, with his nose between his paws, and 
 watched him contentedly. Long into the night he worked, a 
 patient, intelligent giant, holding the creed that a man was born 
 to do the work he found to his hand, and that when the work 
 was done it would get paid for in some form. And, next morn 
 ing, when the sleepy apprentices came lumbering down-stairs, 
 there was Gil again, hard at it, having had a few hours sleep 
 on the sofa, in the parlor, with Robin. A true Scotchman, 
 
274 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 going on their old good plan of showing what they were worth 
 before they bargained for their wages. 
 
 This appearance of Gil Macdonald was very important for 
 Austin, or I would not have dwelt on it. For the fact is this, 
 that Gil Macdonald was the only person who ever went near 
 Austin during his imprisonment. Some cast him off, and some 
 were prevented from going near him ; we shall know who 
 were in the former and who in the latter category soon. 
 Meanwhile Gil Macdonald was the one link between Austin 
 and the world he had left. 
 
 The gunmaker, Austin s landlord, Gil s kinsman ! was a 
 west-end tradesman, and knew intimately some very great 
 people. So, next morning, when Gil, after doing the work of 
 ten men, proposed, at breakfast, the utterly untradesmanlike 
 scheme of adopting the plan of the creature Donald, in " Rob 
 Roy," to wit, getting himself made warder, letting Austin 
 out, pitching the keys into the Thames, and then and then 
 (that part of the plan not developed yet), at this time, I say, 
 the gunmaker, seeing that his kinsman s notion of morality 
 would not do in such a southern latitude, rebuked him severe 
 ly ; but, at the same time, bethought himself of a certain great 
 man, a customer, and coolly waited on that great man, in his 
 dressing-room, for the purpose of showing his Lordship the 
 most beautiful pair of barrels ever forged. 
 
 When he got into the great man s presence, on these cre 
 dentials, he put the barrels on the ground, and coolly told him 
 that he had merely used them as an artifice to gain an audi 
 ence with his Lordship. He then told, shortly and quickly, 
 knowing that time was precious here, Gil s story, and made 
 Gil s request, that he might be allowed access to Austin. 
 
 His Lordship was very much interested and pleased. " By 
 Gad, Macpherson," he said, " this is a wicked world. They 
 are all leaving that poor fellow there to die in his desperation. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 275 
 
 I don t say anything about Edwa*rd Barty ; but conceive that 
 wicked little thing that Miss Hilton having had the in 
 decency to bolt abroad, and follow that blackleg bully Hert 
 ford. It is utterly atrocious. Your request is granted to the 
 full. Let this young fellow have access to this poor boy. 
 You are a good fellow, Macpherson, and this young High 
 lander must be another. I will write to Captain Somes at 
 once. Good morning." 
 
 So Gil Macdonald had the entree to Austin, and he went to 
 see him that afternoon. 
 
 How did he find his hero, his gallant young gentleman, the 
 man to whom he had meant to come, asking humbly that he 
 might follow his glorious fortunes ! He had found him at 
 last. 
 
 Here he was, on the narrow prison-bed, in the half-lighted 
 cell, in a close, dead atmosphere, which made poor Gil breathe 
 hard, as though he had been running. Here he was, deserted 
 by every one, all his beauty gone, with his great blue eyes 
 staring in the madness of his fever ; here he was, delirious 
 and alone, crying continually for help, night and day, to those 
 who never answered and who never came. 
 
 But he knew Gil, and Gil said, " Thank God for that ! " 
 He knew him even in his madness, and stretched out his 
 fevered hands towards him, and said how long he had been 
 coming ; but that now he was come, they would get away 
 together to the glens of Ronaldsay, and wander by the cool 
 streams among the green shadows of the wood by the water 
 falls. And they would go together up into the dark, cool 
 caves, and watch the blue sea out beyond, in the burning sun ; 
 and he would bathe in the linn, and his head would get cold 
 again, and then his reason would come back. But he would 
 never come near the wicked town any more. His head, he 
 told Gil, had got heated with sitting up in the gallery of the 
 
276 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Commons so long, and hearing the weary debates. But that 
 was all past and gone forever. Charles Barty was dead, and 
 they were all dead but he and Gil ; and they, too, must get 
 away to Ronaldsay, and leave the hot streets and the cruel, 
 lying crowds, that haunted clubs and such places, and lied 
 about men until they went mad. .They must get away from 
 these into the mountains, and end their days in peace. 
 
 Gil told all this to the gunmaker and his wife that night, 
 over a frugal supper. It was not told or heard without tears. 
 Those three leal and trusty Scotch bodies made a compact, 
 that, though all the world had deserted poor Austin, yet they 
 would stay by him to the death. Then the gunmaker and his 
 wife went to bed, and Gil and Robin went into the shop. 
 
 Gil cleaned guns till there were no more to clean. Gil 
 cleaned guns, making himself grimy beyond conception. Then 
 he remembered that one of the apprentices had been ordered 
 to clean a certain gun-lock the first thing to-morrow morning. 
 And he got possession of this lock and a certain book, and 
 pored over them both, while Robin lay with his nose on his 
 paws, and watched him with bright clear eyes. After half an 
 hour with lock and book before him, Gil began to understand 
 the difference between main-spring, sear-spring, sear, and the 
 rest of it, as well as he would have done after a wet morning, 
 in the class-room at Hythe. Then he asked himself what Avas 
 the matter with this particular lock ? Then he compared it 
 with a newly cleaned one, and came to the conclusion that 
 the sear-spring was clogged with oil. And then at twelve 
 o clock he took the work to pieces. This was a bold and 
 remarkable action, but what is more remarkable, before half 
 past one he had cleaned that lock, and put it together again 
 (which is not so easy a matter, particularly when you have no 
 one to show you the difference between the bridle-pin and the 
 other pins). When he had done this he felt proud, and almost 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 277 
 
 happy, in spite of his poor hero, who was raving there in his 
 prison cell. 
 
 Almost happy ; nay. possibly quite, for this reason. Gil had 
 the great want of his heart, the great craving of his whole life, 
 satisfied at last. He hardly knew it. He knew only this, that 
 in Ronaldsay. he had always felt that he was a man lost and 
 thrown away, a man capable of he knew not what, and with 
 out means of finding out. Now he found that this gunsmith s 
 work, little as he knew of it, little as he had done of it, was 
 in some way filling up a void in his heart. The fact was, that 
 Gil, for the first time in his life, had got to WORK, and he was 
 as satisfied over it as is a dog when he gnaws a bone. The 
 feeling of an Englishman, a Scotchman, and one kind of Irish 
 man, over his work, is similar to that of a Turk over his pipe. 
 It is a sedative. But in the one case, the results contribute 
 more towards human well-being than in the other. 
 
 In spite of his late night over the work, Gil was tinkering 
 in the shop before the two apprentices came sleepily squab 
 bling down stairs. He went to Austin again that day, but 
 Austin was as bad as ever, and was as bad as ever for many 
 days. Still Gil w r as always with him.* Gil grew grimier 
 and smelt stronger of train-oil as time went on, until the 
 brave young kilted Highlander had grown into a smudgy 
 gunsmith in a leather aporn ; all the romantic beauty of his 
 personal appearance gone clean away to the free winds of 
 heaven. Sad degradation indeed ! That he, the untamed 
 stag of the mountain, should condescend to this ! That Gil, 
 the idle Highlander, should develop into Gil the sage, shrewd, 
 diligent young smith ! Worse still, that our taste should be 
 so depraved, as to make us admire him the more, the more 
 eager, diligent, and grimier he grew. 
 
 There came a morning, when the warders reported to Gil, 
 on his visiting the prison, that Austin was better, and had 
 
278 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 gone to sleep. He waited till he woke, and then Austin s 
 reason had returned, and he knew Gil in reality ; not as he 
 had in his fever, as only one of the figures in the perpetual 
 shadow-dance which went on before his eyes, in which Gil s 
 figure was only a little more real than the others. In a week 
 from this time he was convalescent, and then they began to 
 consult. 
 
 The first thing done was this: Austin wrote to his at 
 torney, Mr. Compton, asking him whether or no the Crown 
 had made any claim on his property. He wrote a very cold, 
 stiff note, for he was indignant. The old man had never 
 come near him in his illness. His note was answered by 
 the old man s junior partner, Mr. Brogden. It appeared that 
 the anxiety and worry caused by Austin s trial and convic 
 tion had ended by Mr. Compton s being laid up by a very 
 serious attack of illness. Mr. Brogden proceeded to tell 
 Austin that the Crown had made no claim on his property, 
 and would certainly, he believed, make none, provided Mr. 
 Elliot remained perfectly quiet, and let the whole matter slip 
 by. It would be better for Mr. Elliot not to communicate 
 with their office any more till better times. Clerks would 
 talk. Some of the newspapers had been troublesome over 
 his case. The new Secretary was very well disposed to Mr. 
 Elliot, but they must be quiet. Mr. Elliot might trust them, 
 and 
 
 " The new Secretary ! " bounced out Austin. " Is Peel out 
 then? Good heavens! Surely the Lords have not dared! 
 But what does it matter to me ? " 
 
 Gil felt horribly guilty. The fact was, that he had been 
 so busy with his guns, that he did not actually know whether 
 Peel was in or out. He felt very foolish, and spoke of other 
 things. But that night, when we went home, he made his 
 kinsman prime him with the details of the great Corn-law 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 279 
 
 storm, which had passed so high over his head, without mov 
 ing his hair ; and the next day was enabled to tell Austin that 
 the Lords had not dared ; that the Bill was law ; and that Sir 
 Robert had come to grief over the Irish Arms Bill. He was 
 so busy over his gun-cleaning business, that he had not time to 
 ask what Irish arms were. If he had been made to say what 
 his notion of the Irish Arms Bill was, he would probably have 
 thought that it was the account rendered to Parliament, for 
 certain casualties at Donnybrook Fair. After this he in 
 formed himself about politics, but on this occasion he was 
 relieved, when Austin said to him, 
 
 " Gil, never let you and I speak of these things again. My 
 imprisonment here renders me politically dead. I cannot tell 
 you, because I have no strength to tell you, how hideous my 
 silly boy s dream of succeeding in politics, without one single 
 qualification, seems to me now. The Corn-bill has passed, 
 and has crushed me under its wheels in passing. Let us talk 
 no more of these things. I have to begin life again ; I will, 
 God help me, begin it in another spirit." 
 
 It was all very well for Austin to talk like this to Gil, but 
 it had not very much effect on him. Austin s sad example 
 was no use to Gil. His kinsman was a politician ; and after 
 his first inquiries into politics for Austin s sake, he began 
 making more for his own. He began to take a strong interest 
 in the matter, and in a month could give his opinion, and defend 
 it. His frame of mind at the end of a month was Radical. 
 
 Gil s next enterprise, on Austin s behalf, was to go secretly 
 to Wilton Crescent, and to find out where Miss Hilton was, 
 and what. she was doing. This was to be a very secret expedi 
 tion indeed. Gil performed it with all his Scotch caution. 
 But his caution was unnecessary. He, knowing nothing, 
 bluntly brought back this intelligence, that Miss Hilton, 
 with her aunt, her butler, and the rest of her household, had 
 
280 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 started for the Continent, the day after the duel. There was 
 no one in the house but a charwoman. 
 
 Then Austin turned his face to the wall. This was the 
 hardest of all. She had deserted him, then ! He could for 
 give Lord Edward Barty, nay, he would dread to see him. 
 He could forgive his father s old friends ; they had never liked 
 him since he had turned Radical. But for her to have de 
 serted him, and thrown herself into the arms of that dog Hert 
 ford, ah ! this was very, very bitter ! 
 
 That she, who could make those religious pilgrimages to 
 such strange places in such strange company, could not have 
 come to see him, or to ask after him, in his misery ! If she 
 had only sent old James ! Could she have known that he 
 distrusted her after that morning, that miserable morning 
 before the last debate, when he had seen her in company with 
 Hertford? Cvuld she have known of the cruel words he 
 spoke of her to Lord Charles Barty ? If she knew these 
 things, it might account for her neglect. She might be angry 
 with him ; she might have gone abroad in a pique. 
 
 No, no ! she could not have known it. She must be false, 
 false ! She must be falser than it is possible to conceive. 
 And he, poor fool ! loved her more than ever, loved, that is 
 to say, the quiet, calm little woman who used to sit with folded 
 hands in church, loved her, in fact, as she used to be, the 
 old, quiet, patient Eleanor, who existed no longer. 
 
 He did not love her as she was now, then ? Ah, yes ! that 
 was the bitterest part of it. Fallen, base as she \vas, he loved 
 her more than ever. It was well that he should turn his face 
 to the wall. 
 
 I have shown you, with most inexorable justice, all the 
 worst points in his character. Most of them such as his 
 flippancy, his want of earnestness, and other faults of this 
 class, which he shared with many young men were faults 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 281 
 
 of education. These died a natural death the moment the 
 prison-gate slammed behind him, and he was brought face to. 
 face with reality. But his worst fault a certain jealous 
 pride, showing itself outwardly in almost hysterical anger 
 remained there yet. And now, before he rose from his nar 
 row-prison-bed, he saw that it was there, and set to work to 
 conquer it. 
 
 He thought over his life, and he saw that fault staring 
 out on two or three occasions, in a very ugly manner. He 
 remembered Miss Cecil, and his furious anger at everything 
 in heaven and earth, when he found out that she was to marry 
 Lord Mewstone. He blushed at this, and tried to forget it, 
 but could not. 
 
 Then he began thinking of the poor fellow who was dead, 
 of poor Lord Charles. How often had he half quarrelled 
 with him at school, when he had been jealous because the 
 dead man had been friendly with some other boy, and Austin 
 had fancied himself neglected. How often, later than this, 
 had he been fractious and rude with him, merely because their 
 social positions were so different, and because he, Austin, was 
 afraid of being called a tuft-hunter. He remembered now 
 five hundred things which he had said to his friend who was 
 gone, which he would have given the world to recall, but 
 which could never be recalled. 
 
 Again : had he done his duty by that poor, dead brother of 
 Eleanor s, at Eton ? No, he had not. He had been too much 
 ashamed of him. He had been angry and indignant at that 
 boy s very existence. That he and Lord Charles, with their 
 sublime, high and mighty boy-aspirations, should have a boy 
 given to thieving forced en their company, it had been in 
 tolerable. Now that he was in prison himself, he thought that, 
 perhaps, a little more genial kindness, a little less high-handed 
 patronage, might have saved that boy. But it was too late. 
 
282 AUSTIN ELLIOT. ^ 
 
 Lastly, he began thinking about Eleanor herself. The old 
 Adam was a little too strong for him here, yet. For he had 
 trusted her as woman was never trusted before. lie had let 
 her go those mysterious pilgrimages of hers, down into this 
 very Millbank quarter, dressed in her maid s clothes, and 
 asked no questions. And at last, he had found her walking 
 arm in arm, in the lowest part of the town, with the accursed 
 Hertford. He could not accuse himself here. Not yet. 
 
 And now she had deserted him in his trouble, and gone 
 abroad after that man 
 
 Still he recognized the fact, that all through his life there 
 had been a tendency to jealousy and suspicion, and he deter 
 mined, even now, that if Eleanor could ever clear herself to 
 him, that he would forgive her, would tell her so, and part 
 with her forever. But still, could she clear herself ten times 
 over, his duty was evident. He would never link his ruined 
 fortunes to hers. If she had been penniless, it would have 
 been a different matter. But as it was, it was perfectly clear 
 it would be dishonorable, after what had happened, to renew 
 his intercourse with her. The world would never hold him 
 blameless if he did. 
 
 The end of poor Austin s illness was also the culminating 
 point of his misfortunes ; after this, his affairs began to mend, 
 very, very slowly, but still to mend. When he rose from 
 his sick-bed, and began to walk about his prison, there were 
 still nine months of confinement before him. They were weary 
 months to look forward to, but he felt he could get through 
 them without maddening himself, now that Gil Macdonald was 
 coming to see him almost daily. In his present state of weak 
 ness and depression, he tried to think, tried to hope, that, by 
 mere patience, he might live on till things came right again. 
 One thing only now was unendurable. Poor Eleanor was 
 abroad, alone and unprotected, in the power of Captain Hert- 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 283 
 
 ford and her aunt. That was maddening to think of. Badly 
 as she had treated him, something must be done there. He 
 thought the matter over as well as he was able. There seemed 
 only one hope. He got leave from the governor, and wrote 
 the following letter to Lord Edward Barty : 
 
 " MY LORD, 
 
 " I know that we can never meet again as friends on this 
 side of the grave. I know the horror and detestation in which 
 you must hold my name, after the late catastrophe. But I beg 
 you, in God s name, to listen to what I have to say. 
 
 " You used to love Eleanor Hilton. She is gone abroad un 
 protected. Her aunt has taken her away into a foreign country, 
 where she will be in the power of the man who has caused all 
 this misery, and his disreputable companions. 
 
 " Now I ask you, who have so often knelt and prayed by her 
 side, whether you will stand by, and let this go on. If you 
 have a grain of chivalry in your composition, Edward, you 
 cannot, you dare not. I swear to you, Edward, deeply as I 
 love you, if you, knowing what you know, stand by and do 
 nothing, that I will cast you off with the same loathing and 
 contempt, which you now feel for me. Eddy ! Eddy ! for the 
 sake of the love we once -bore to one another, you will save 
 her. 
 
 " I remain, my Lord, 
 
 " Your Lordship s obedient servant, 
 
 " AUSTIN ELLIOT." 
 
 Gil had instructions to take this letter to Cheshire House, 
 and to put it into Lord Edward s own hands, and get an an 
 swer. Admiral Villeneuve had instruction to form a junction 
 with the fleet of Admiral Gravina, and to pound and blast the 
 British fleet from off the face of the waters. Neither Gil 
 
281: AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Macdonald nor Admiral Villeneuve were successful, and they 
 both had strong doubts of their success before they began to 
 execute their orders. 
 
 When Gil (having got off as much of his grimness as was 
 possible) reconnoitred Cheshire House, his heart sank within 
 him. The house stood a long way back from the street, and 
 was fronted by a high wall, in which were two carriage-gates. 
 In one of these gates was a wicket, and Gil, after a quarter of 
 an hour s watching, became aware that this wall and gate were 
 the outworks of the place, and must be carried, either by strat 
 agem or force, before he could hope to do his errand. 
 
 He saw a great many people come and ring the bell. Most 
 of the people who brought letters had them taken by the por 
 ter, and had the door shut in their faces. This would not do. 
 Austin had told him to put his letter into Lord Edward s 
 hand, and get an answer. 
 
 At last he opened his first parallel. He rang the bell, and 
 asked to see Lord Edward. The porter answered civilly, but 
 shortly, " Out of town," and Gil retired and leaned against a 
 lamp-post. 
 
 The thing had to be done, and must be done somehow. Gil 
 only knew this much : that this was the house of poor Lord 
 Charles s father, that the mention of Austin s name might not 
 be a good passport there, and that he must be cautious. He 
 was very much puzzled. If Austin had sent any one but a 
 very cunning Scot, his mission might have failed altogether. 
 But Gil, with his patient, vulpine cunning, succeeded better 
 probably than an Englishman or Irishman would have done. 
 He had waited some time, and was thinking of doing all sorts 
 of things, when the wicket was opened, and a fine boy of about 
 sixteen, in deep mourning, came out, and walked away slowly 
 along the street. Gil had heard the porter call him, " My 
 Lord." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 285 
 
 Gil instantly gave chase, and overtook this lad. 
 
 " I beg yer pardon, young sir, ye re no Lord Edward Barty, 
 I m thinking?" 
 
 "No; my name is George Barty. My brother Edward 
 is abroad. Can I do anything for you?" 
 
 Gil paused an instant ; but when he looked again into the 
 honest face of the lad he took his resolution. 
 
 " Yes, young sir I mean my Lord ye re a Lord, are ye 
 no ? Open this letter, and gie me the answer to take back 
 wie me ; for he loves you and yours, dearer than his heart s 
 bluid, after all done." 
 
 The boy opened the letter, and read it. He gave no 
 ans\ver at first; he bit his lips hard, and tried not, but the 
 tears would come. Gil walked a little way off, and looked 
 at the sparrows upon the house-top. 
 
 At last the boy came after him, and touched his arm, and 
 said, 
 
 " Do you see Mr. Elliot ever ? " 
 
 " Nigh every day." 
 
 " Are you in his confidence ? " 
 
 " I should be. I am only a poor Highland lad. But when 
 ye, all of ye, left him to rot in his prison, I was the only 
 one faithful to him." 
 
 " You are wrong," said the boy, eagerly. " Others are 
 faithful to him. I am faithful to him. Edward is as true 
 as steel to him. "We know how blameless he was in the 
 matter. We know that he followed this man abroad, and 
 got wounded. Take this letter back to him, and tell him to 
 burn it. Tell him that Edward followed Miss Hilton abroad 
 instantly, and has been with her ever since. They are at 
 Ems now. She is in trouble about her aunt; but don t tell 
 him this. How is he ? How does he bear it ? " 
 
 " He has been at death s door, and no one nigh him." 
 
286 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " Poor fellow ! Give him my love, George Barty s love ; 
 and say, we have not forgotten him." 
 
 Gil came back and reported all this. Austin was glad 
 that Lord Edward was with her. That was very good news. 
 So Lord Edward was as true as steel to him, was he ? Per 
 haps. But he might have written a line to say so. As true 
 as steel, hey ? 
 
 " God forgive him ! " he said, the next moment. When 
 did Lord Edward ever write letters, blind as he was from 
 infancy ? He could write in a way, so Austin had heard ; 
 but since Austin had known him, he had always dic 
 tated his letters to his valet. He would cast this miserable 
 jealousy out of his heart once and for all. Edward Barty 
 was true to him ; his delicacy had only prevented his writing. 
 It was easy to find excuses for a blind man ; but who could 
 find excuses for Eleanor ? Why had she not written ? Not 
 one line ; not one short word to say that she had thrown him 
 off. His anger against her increased day by day ; but, alas ! 
 his love for her grew none the les-s. He loved an eidolon, 
 an Eleanor who never had been, except in his own fancy, 
 a true, faithful, patient little being, who always sat with 
 folded hands, whose face never grew animated, save when 
 he was present. He had loved such an one, but she had 
 never existed. Eleanor Hilton who lived was false and 
 cruel. Not one line all these three weary months. How 
 wicked these women could be at times ! 
 
 Poor Austin s resolution to uproot from his heart his fatal 
 error of causeless jealousy seemed to hold well enough, until 
 he began to think about Eleanor ; about the very person 
 whom he loved best in the world, and whom, if he had only 
 known it, he had best cause to trust, the one who had suf 
 fered more on his behalf than any one else who cared for 
 him. It was natural possibly that he should be most jealous 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 287 
 
 about the one he loved best, but it was very hard upon 
 Eleanor. 
 
 She had written to him again and again, letters full of w r ild 
 love, tenderness, and comfort. Lord Edward Barty had dic 
 tated several notes to him also, and enclosed them in hers. 
 They had left them to go to post with the other letters. 
 
 But Aunt Maria s maid, acting under orders, had brought 
 them all to her mistress, who had read them, and then put 
 them all into the fire. 
 
 Eleanor s troubles began to get more heavy to bear than 
 Austin s ; Austin s silence aggravated them very much, she 
 did not know what to think. Was he desperate, under his 
 terrible misfortune, or did he know of her secret ? He was in 
 Millbank prison himself; could he know ? She told Lord 
 Edward everything. He advised her to say nothing ; he was 
 getting angry ; Austin ought to have written. 
 
 At this time Lord Edward received the following letter : 
 
 " DEAR BROTHER, 
 
 " I met a big fellow, an awful big fellow, as big as old Hos- 
 kins, but not so fat, in the square yesterday. He spoke like 
 an Irishman, and said that Austin was anxious for you to take 
 care of Miss Hilton. I said you were doing so. He said that 
 Austin had been dying, but was well again, and that every one 
 had deserted him. 
 
 " Florence has shoved the mignonette-box out of the school 
 room window, and broke the geraniums in the drawing-room 
 balcony, and has caught it. Jim was sitting on the edge of 
 his tub, kicking nurse, and the tub turned over him, and the 
 water has gone down and spoilt the library ceiling. He 
 caught it, too, but not so bad as Florence. The houses are 
 up, and we leave town to-morrow. 
 
 " Your affectionate brother, 
 
 " GEORGE BARTY." 
 
288 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 On the receipt of this, they wrote to Austin again ; but 
 again Aunt Maria s maid was terrified into stealing the letter, 
 and again Aunt Maria put it into the fire. What old James 
 was doing at this time we shall see directly. But the effect 
 of this wicked old woman s plot was this, that Austin thought 
 they had both utterly deserted him ; that he thought that 
 Eleanor, at least, should have written to him ; and that he 
 was very angry and very jealous. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 AUSTIN had never been moved into the hospital ; the doctor 
 preferred dealing with him where he was. After a time he 
 began to get better, and was able to walk about. 
 
 At first he always waited for Gil Macdonald, and took his 
 arm for a turn up and down the long corridor, and then lay 
 down again ; but after a time he felt the want of more exer 
 cise, and used to rise, and walk out by himself. At first, when 
 he began to do this, he would wait till the long corridor was 
 empty, and then come out, and begin his solitary walk. To 
 show how villanously penal sentences are carried out in certain 
 cases, I may mention that, when Austin began to recover, the 
 governor called on him every day (under protest) ; and that 
 if Austin, in his solitary walk, wanted the support of a ward 
 er s arm, it was his own fault if he did not have it. He was 
 their Picciola, their " poor little thing," their prison- 
 flower ! the only innocent man among nine hundred. What 
 wonder that they (officially) petted him ? Poor, handsome, 
 patient, innocent young gentleman ! Yes ! they grew very 
 fond of Austin : they were just like every one else. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 289 
 
 But after a time Austin began to feel the want of new faces, 
 although those faces were those of convicts. One night, when 
 he was getting strong, he lay on his bed and thought ; and a 
 strange thought came into his head. This thought put itself 
 into many forms before it came to this : Could not he, Austin, 
 do some good, infinitesimal it might be, if he mixed with the 
 other convicts ? In the eye of the law he was no better than 
 the worst of them, but he was still higher than the highest of 
 them. Surely he might do some good. 
 
 " By merely mixing with them, and talking to them, we 
 might raise their moral tone," thought he. Speaking to them 
 of higher things would must do them some good. One 
 does not like to say that he was wrong ; but still it becomes 
 apparent that he had not acquired what we may call the 
 Australian instinct, that is to say, did not know a convict 
 or jail-bird when he saw him ; did not recognize the class of 
 man as a distinct one; did not perceive the extraordinary 
 difference in appearance between an honest man under 
 a cloud, and a rogue. In fact, I am sorry to say, he came 
 to the conclusion that he might raise the moral tone of 
 the convicts around him by talking to them on an empty 
 stomach. 
 
 He determined to go out into the yard and talk to them ; 
 but he was still weak, and a little nervous ; and so, putting 
 it off from day to day, he contented himself by walking up and 
 down the corridor in front of his cell. 
 
 One day there was a fracas there : it was only a few 
 days after he was able to walk up and down alone. It 
 was not a very great riot: it was a loud dispute between 
 a warder and a tall young man in a convict dress. Austin, 
 weak as he was, walked down to see if he could assist the 
 warder. He found him in high dispute with the convict, and 
 in the convict he recognized the young man who had looked 
 13 s 
 
290 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 at him so eagerly the morning after he had been brought to 
 prison. 
 
 And as Austin looked on the young man, he had sense to see 
 that he was not quite recovered from his fever ; that his brain 
 had not quite got the better of the delirium yet. However, 
 he was far too sensible a fellow to be deluded by any mad 
 fancies. " If a lunatic," he said to himself, " only knows that 
 he is mad, and can keep that faith in his head sufficiently 
 long, he may defy all the Masters in Lunacy put together." 
 Austin knew that, probably, his brain was not quite right, and 
 so he banished a certain idiotic fancy from his mind indig 
 nantly. He banished his first mad fancy, and took a practical 
 view of things. Here was a young convict in high dispute 
 with a warder. He would intercede for this young convict ; 
 would get hold of this young convict, and talk to him about 
 Shakespeare and the musical glasses, until all the other con 
 victs should come and listen with this one. And so Austin 
 would elevate the moral tone of all of them, until they should 
 become penetrated with an abstract love of virtue (for Austin, 
 in his political creed, ignored the religious element), and so 
 they should all become reformed, which meant, although he 
 did not know it, that all their foreheads should become broader 
 and higher, their eyes should look straight at another man s, 
 and they should give over fiddling with their buttons when 
 they spoke to an honest man. 
 
 It appeared that the dispute with this convict and the 
 warder was rather a strange one. The young man had been 
 corning up to speak to Austin, when the warder, too zealous 
 in Austin s cause, had turned him back. Austin thanked the 
 warder for his kindness, and allowed the young convict to 
 speak to him- 
 
 The young man spoke first. " Your name is Elliot ? " he 
 said. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 291 
 
 . Austin said, " Yes." 
 
 " I knew that the first moment I saw you, that morning 
 when you came out in the yard among the rest of us. I had 
 not seen you for a long while, but I felt sure it was you." 
 
 " Then you have seen me before ? " said Austin. 
 
 " Ah yes, often." 
 
 " What is your name now," said Austin, " and where have 
 you seen me?" 
 
 " Then you do not remember me ? " 
 
 " No," said Austin. " I had a silly fancy about you just 
 now ; but I don t remember you. If you have known me, tell 
 me where ? " 
 
 " I knew you when you were at Eton. Do you remember 
 Tolliday s boy, Jim Charlton?" 
 
 Yes." 
 
 " I am that boy." 
 
 " Indeed, you are nothing of the kind," said Austin. " Jim 
 was a light-headed boy, your hair is black. What is the good 
 of lying ? " 
 
 " I don t know ; no one speaks the truth here. I remem 
 ber you, though. You were always kind enough to me ; you 
 used always to be with a young swell there, Lord Charles 
 Barty. How I hated that boy. What has become of him ? " 
 
 " D n you," said Austin, "you had better take care." 
 
 As he turned fiercely on the man, he saw nothing but a look 
 of puzzled curiosity ; his wrath was stayed at once, and when 
 he had looked at the young man s face for an instant, he con 
 sidered whether or no he was going mad again. 
 
 " Don t get in a rage, Austin Elliot," said Charlton. " What 
 has become of that cursed young prig ? " 
 
 " Dead, shot in a duel. I was his second, and am here 
 for it. Will you hold your tongue ? " 
 
 " Yes, directly. One question more. What has become 
 
292 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 of that other fellow who was always with you and Lord 
 Charles, Robert Hilton ? " 
 
 " He is dead ; he died three years ago, at Namur," said 
 Austin. 
 
 " May the Devil take him," said Charlton. " I shall be out 
 of this in six months, and I was depending on him. I know 
 enough about him to bring me in a tidy income. So he is 
 dead. Well, no loss, except to me. He was a worthless 
 young scoundrel." 
 
 " He was nothing of the kind," said Austin. He was half 
 witted, but he was neither worthless nor a scoundrel. How 
 dare you speak so of Miss Hilton s brother ? He stola things. 
 He was half witted, I tell you. What have you done that 
 you are here ? I 11 tell you what, little Bob Hilton, poor 
 little devil, was in some respects immeasurably your superior 
 Come now." 
 
 This was, do you perceive, the way in which Austin carried 
 out his plan of elevating the moral tone of the convicts 
 around him, by talking about Shakespeare and the musical 
 glasses. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 
 AUSTIN grew to like this young convict. He had, it ap 
 pears, behaved pretty well, and was a somewhat privileged 
 person. When Gil was not with him, Austin used to walk a 
 great deal with this young fellow, Charlton. Gil was glad 
 at Austin s having found some one in the prison of whom he 
 could make some sort of a companion ; he wondered at Aus 
 tin s choice, but respectfully acquiesced. He did not like 
 Charlton, but that was his fault, of course, for Austin must be 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 293 
 
 right. Austin s heroic nature, thought Gil, though in other 
 words, could not err : so he accepted Charlton. 
 
 The fact was that Austin, so far from having become less 
 heroic in Gil s eyes, since his misfortune, had become infinitely 
 more so. When he had found his hero in misfortune and dis 
 grace, his hero worship only grew the stronger for those cir 
 cumstances. Pity was, in his thoroughly chivalrous mind, 
 superadded to his old admiration, and made his love for Austin 
 only stronger. But when Austin grew well enough to tell 
 him the whole story, his admiration grew into a sort of bar- 
 barons reverence, combined with self-congratulation, at his 
 having been shrewd enough to have picked out Austin as the 
 very man to follow to the death. 
 
 The fact of Lord Charles Barty having succeeded in thrust 
 ing himself forward into the quarrel before Austin was cer 
 tainly a distressing accident, but Austin s hunt after Captain 
 Hertford, his wandering hither and thither after him, with the 
 dread of his trial hanging over him all the time, his patient 
 search after him, the cunning he displayed in it, his calm be 
 havior when he brought the wolf to bay, and his noble gen 
 erosity in refusing to fire at him, after all, formed, in Gil s 
 Highland imagination, the most beautiful and glorious tale 
 he had ever heard. I suppose that it is true, that heroic 
 natures are apt to worship an idol which they suppose to 
 possess the qualities they most admire themselves. Faithful, 
 high-souled valor, were the qualities for which Austin was 
 getting worshipped, and his worshipper was showing those 
 qualities to a higher degree than ever had Austin. 
 
 Gil had made friends with the apprentices. They were two 
 good-hearted, ordinary, English lads, who were not so much 
 learning their trade as having the details of their trade 
 knocked, so to speak, into their heads. Gil Macdonald was a 
 fellow of genius and energy. A Quentin Durward of a fellow ; 
 
294 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 a man who would not consent to be starved at any price, and 
 so had come south. The apprentices had asked " Scotchy " 
 to have some beer with them, but Scotchy would not, because 
 he were n t sure whether or no he could treat them in return. 
 They wanted Scotchy to go to Highbury Barn with them ; but 
 Scotchy would n t. They could n t make friends with him : 
 Scotchy did n t want them to ; he wanted to make friends with 
 them. He did so ; he appealed to their generosity ; and it is 
 a queer sort of English apprentice who can stand that appeal. 
 Gil got first one of them, and then another, to show him little 
 tricks in - gun-making which he did not know, and they had 
 gladly done so ; after this Gil would sit up half the night 
 easing them of their work. Yes, Scotchy was a good fellow, 
 though he would not go to Highbury Barn. So Gil and the 
 apprentices got fond of one another, as English and Scotch 
 lads always will, if there is no fool by to make mischief 
 between them. 
 
 So much for Gil ; and he deserves so much at least. We 
 must return to Austin. 
 
 This young convict which he had taken up, or, to be more 
 correct, had taken up with him, persisted for a long while in 
 calling himself Charlton. He was a fellow of very few words, 
 but when he did speak he showed some knowledge of educated 
 society. He was, to a certain extent, a companion to Austin. 
 He was evidently, thought Austin, not a gentleman, but he had 
 seen a great deal of gentlemen. One day Austin fancied that 
 he might have been a billiard-marker, and asked him the 
 question. 
 
 " Yes," said Charlton, " I was a billiard-marker once. God 
 bless you ! I have been all sorts of things. I drove a Hansom 
 cab once." 
 
 "Did you?" 
 
 " I drove one of the cleverest horses ever you saw. The 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 295 
 
 horse had been in Astley s, and was almost like a Christian, 
 by Jove ! And one day, when I was in the public house, a 
 fellow hails my cab, and the waterman runs away after me. 
 And the fellow gets in, by George ! without noticing that there 
 was no one to drive, and roars out Treasury ! and away 
 goes the old horse like a steam-engine, by himself, and when 
 he gets to Downing Street he comes up short, and sends the 
 fellow forward with the crown of his hat against the splash 
 board ; and when the fellow gets out to slang the cabman, by 
 gad ! he finds there s no cabman there. Yes, that was a 
 devilish clever horse, I say!" 
 
 " You can t expect me to believe that," said Austin. 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " Why not ? I 11 tell you. Because you are always lying. 
 Why do you ? " 
 
 " I don t know. If you tease and plague me about my 
 lying and thieving, I will not come and walk with you any 
 more." 
 
 " But you must tell me one thing," said Austin. " Your 
 name is not Charlton." 
 
 " No," said the other, sulkily. " My name is Goatley." 
 
 "What, are you little Bob Goatley, at Tolliday s? I 
 thought I knew you." 
 
 The other, whom we must now call Goatley, walked sulkily 
 away. 
 
 By the end of August Austin had recovered his health 
 completely. Goatley and he were still together a great deal. 
 Goatley always grew sulky the very instant Austin tried to 
 learn anything about his former life, and at last he desisted 
 from asking questions. As these few weeks went on, Austin 
 talked a great deal with him. He so continually attacked, by 
 scorn and ridicule, his habit of lying, that the poor fellow 
 made some improvement. Before the end of September a 
 great event occurred, no less a one than this. 
 
296 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 It happened suddenly. It came on Austin and Goatley 
 like an earthquake or a whirlwind. They were both dazed 
 by it, like two bats in the sunshine. 
 
 Goatley had told Austin, on the 26th, that there was a dis 
 turbance in the prison. He had not taken much notice of it. 
 One of the warders, the last thing at night, had confirmed it, 
 and had stayed a moment and told Austin the cause of it, but 
 he had nearly forgotten all about it next morning. 
 
 At eleven he was let out to walk in the corridor, and Goat- 
 ley was there waiting for him. He told him that in two of 
 the corridors the riot had been most serious. That the prison 
 ers were all confined to llieir cells, except he, and a few others 
 who could be trusted, and that one of the officers had been 
 nearly murdered. 
 
 Everything was quite quiet for two days. At the end of 
 that time the cells were unlocked, and the convicts were let 
 loose again to their exercise. 
 
 Austin was shrewd enough to see that there would be 
 another riot. The instant that the men were let out of their 
 cells, they began to gather in knots, and to talk and gesticu 
 late. The efforts of the warders to keep them apart, and 
 make them move on, were quite unavailing. The confusion 
 grew worse every instant ; the warders were being pressed 
 on, and mobbed. They tried to get the men back to their 
 cells, but they would not go ; they were encouraging one an 
 other to violence, but as yet no blow had been struck. The 
 warders were as one man to twenty. Affairs looked very 
 terrible indeed. 
 
 Austin whispered to Goatley, " Keep with me," and pushed 
 his way through the crowd, towards the governor s lodgings. 
 They met him running, five steps at a time, up the long stone 
 staircase which led from the lodge. 
 
 " Stop, for God s sake, sir ! " said Austin. " The slightest 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 297 
 
 spark will fire the powder, now. Your appearance might 
 be ruin." 
 
 He had paused for an instant, but he said, "I must go 
 on, I tell you. My poor officers will be murdered. I must 
 be with them. I have a company of the Guards in the yard. 
 It is a matter of a moment. Stick by me, Mr. Elliot, as 
 you are a gentleman." 
 
 At this moment there was a shout and a yell from one 
 distant part of the prison, and immediately, in every long- 
 drawn corridor, it was repeated tenfold. Eight hundred con 
 victs had suddenly burst out into aimless furious madness ; 
 and there were forty poor unprotected warders among them. 
 
 The governor ran madly on towards the riot. Austin and 
 Goatley ran with him. As Austin, who had met the gov 
 ernor, turned to follow him, he saw that the great gate was 
 opened, and that a company of the Grenadier Guards was 
 coming on, out of the sunshine into the semi-darkness of the 
 prison, swinging steadily forward, with sloped arms and fixed 
 bayonets. Order tramping on inexorably, to sweep away 
 disorder, by the mere sight of it. He heard Sir Robert 
 Ferrers give the word, "double," and then he was after the 
 governor, with Goatley close behind him. 
 
 The whole of the corridor was filled with a crowded mass 
 of angry, desperate men. Those nearest them had made some 
 preparations for an attack on this side. So the instant the 
 poor governor ran towards them, Austin saw him felled to 
 the earth like an ox, with the leg of an iron bedstead. 
 
 But- before the man who did that had time to strike another 
 blow, Austin was upon him. He saw, with the eye of a gen 
 eral, that this man was the only one there who was armed, and 
 that the possession of this weapon might save the governor s 
 life. He caught the man s arm in his, and, bending down his 
 head, bit his wrist until he let go his hold ; and then, with a 
 13* 
 
298 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 rapid, dexterous blow, sent him tottering, and reeling, and spin 
 ning round and round, till he came headlong down upon the 
 pavement like a dead man. 
 
 He glared defiantly about him, but he was the only man 
 there who was armed. The governor was sitting up, looking 
 wild and rnazed ; before him were two men, both in the con 
 vict dress, fighting on the ground, rolling over and over. The 
 convicts were crowding round these two men, and kicking one 
 of them whenever he came uppermost : their attention to those 
 two men saved the governor s life. 
 
 Austin had just time to notice these two men fighting, 
 when the convicts began whistling in a sharp, shrill way, and 
 whooping and yelling. In one instant were all gone. No 
 one was left but the man he had knocked down, who was 
 snoring heavily, the governor himself, and the two still-fighting 
 convicts 
 
 And Sir Robert Ferrers. The mere sight of that kindest 
 and gentlest of men, in uniform, with a drawn sword, had been 
 quite enough for the convicts. Profound tranquillity was 
 restored, even before they had seen a single man of his 
 company. 
 
 All this took exactly as long to happen as it took Sir Robert 
 Ferrers to double across the hall, up some sixty stone steps, 
 and through the corridor. He rapidly ordered his lieutenant 
 to see everything quiet instantly, and, putting up his sword, 
 ran to separate the two convicts. 
 
 One had got the other down, and the one underneath was 
 getting black in the face. When they got them apart, it was 
 found that the winner was our friend Goatley ; and that the 
 other was one of the most desperate characters in the prison. 
 Goatley had saved the governor s life : there was no doubt of 
 it. The governor, weak and stunned as he was, called Sir 
 Robert s attention to the fact ; but Goatley was found to be in 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 299 
 
 a state of wild feline excitement, breathing short and hard, 
 thrusting every one aside who got between him and the object 
 of his vengeance, showing the strongest inclination to go in, 
 and, as Sir Robert said, " finish " his man. As they were 
 leading the other off, Goatley made a rush at him, and Sir 
 Robert, interposing, he and Goatley came down together on 
 the floor, and Sir Robert s sword got broke in two ; but he 
 stuck to Goatley long enough to prevent mischief. And Goat- 
 ley was marched off to his cell in a furious, mad, cat-like frame 
 of mind, ready for any amount of assault and battery. 
 
 That evening Sir Robert waited on a certain great person 
 age with a note from the governor, and gave an account of the 
 whole business. The great man told Sir Robert something 
 which made him stare. 
 
 " By Gad," said he, " that is the sort of thing men put into 
 novels. How very extraordinary ! " 
 
 " Is it not ? " said the great -man. " But mind, it is all in 
 confidence. It is best to say nothing." 
 
 The next morning an order came down to the prison for 
 the immediate release of Austin Elliot and William Brown 
 ing. William Browning, it is necessary to say, was the young 
 man whom we have known by the aliases of Charlton and 
 Goatley. 
 
 Austin slept late, and they would not wake him. Was it 
 that they had a disinclination to lose him ? I think so. When 
 he woke at last, the warder who had led him back to his cell 
 on the first miserable morning of his imprisonment, stood be 
 side his bed, and told him that the gate was open, and that he 
 might walk out into the world a free man. 
 
 After several repetitions, he realized it at last. He tried 
 to thank the man ; he tried to pray. He succeeded in neither. 
 He laid his forehead between his knees, and did the best thing 
 he could do, he sobbed like a child. 
 
300 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 He saw the governor in his bed, and in bidding him good-by, 
 earnestly thanked him for his kindness. He went into the lodge. 
 They were all waiting to say good-by to him. He must think 
 of them sometimes, they said. They did not like to say that 
 they were sorry to lose him, but such was the case ; there was 
 not one honest face left behind in that gloomy prison now. 
 Austin did not know till after, that, sooner than sadden his 
 dismissal, they had kept from him the fact that two warders, 
 whom he knew, were killed the day before. " They were on 
 duty," they said. " They would give Austin s love to them, 
 and tell them how sorry he was not to have wished them 
 good-by." He did not know till afterwards that he had sent 
 his love to two poor, cold corpses, which lay under sheets in 
 the dead-house. No ! they closed the great iron door behind 
 him without telling him that. And he stood blinking and 
 trembling without, in the blazing autumn sunshine. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 A well-dressed young man was standing in the sun under 
 the prison wall, and he came to meet him. Austin saw it was 
 Goatley. 
 
 " I did not know you at first," he said. " I have only seen 
 you in your prison dress. You got your discharge, too." 
 
 " Yes. I thought you were going to cut me. I was only 
 waiting here to say good-by." 
 
 "Why good-by?" 
 
 " We can never see anything more of one another. I am 
 far too disreputable a person for you to know. Say good-by, 
 and let us part forever, Austin Elliot." 
 
 " I shall say no such thing," said Austin. " You are com 
 ing with me to Canada, and there you and I and Gil Mac- 
 donald will die respectable old men. Come along. It were 
 strange, indeed, if I deserted you now, my boy." 
 
 " If you had," said Goatley, " I would have been back 
 there in a very few days." 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 301 
 
 So patient Gil, filing grimly over his guns, looked up from 
 the vice, wiped his eyes with his big black hands, and said, 
 " Gude guide us ! " for Austin Elliot was standing in front of 
 him, and bidding him good-morrow. And that same night, 
 Gil took the two apprentices to a Scotch store he knew of, 
 arid, at his own expense, made them, and himself also, so very 
 drunk on whiskey and water, that the outraged majesty of the 
 law required that they should be all three locked up at Bow 
 Street until they had purged themselves of their contempt. 
 They were not back before eleven the next morning. But 
 Mr. Macpherson was not angry ; he only winked. And Mrs. 
 Macpherson said, " He s no awake yet. It does my heart 
 good, Gil Macdonald, ye daft devil, to think that he is back in 
 his ain house again, after a . If all the world were like you 
 and he and our gude man, Gil, why it would be no muckle tho 
 \vaur, hey ? " 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 WE must leave Austin here for a short time, and this is 
 almost the first time in this tale in which we have left him. 
 But we must leave him, and see how matters were going on at 
 Ems. If sternest fate did not say " no," we would have pre 
 ferred to make Ems the place in which some pleasant genial 
 story got itself wound up, in which every angle in one s 
 tale was rounded off, in whose mountain meadows happy 
 lovers met, and parted no more. But that cannot be. With 
 all its wonderful beauty, it is a wicked little place. Under 
 the auspices of the Duke of Nassau, the play runs higher than 
 at most places on the Continent ; there are many men who 
 curse the day on which they first saw its lovely winding 
 valleys and hanging sheets of woodland. 
 
302 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 The morning of the duel, old James went off into town on 
 some errand or another. Towards two o clock he heard the 
 terrible news, and brought it home. He looked so wild and 
 scared that his old enemies, the maids, grew frightened too. 
 They forbore to tease him, or to laugh at him, but besought 
 him, in eager whispers, to tell them what was the matter. 
 At last he did so, and then they stood all silent and terrified. 
 " Who is to break it to her ? " asked one at last. 
 
 No one knew ; it was a business no one would undertake. 
 Even the very housekeeper, who had nursed Eleanor when a 
 baby, shrank from the taek. Lord Charles killed, and Mr. 
 Austin in prison. God spare her from telling such news. At 
 last, the youngest and most heedless of the servant girls sug 
 gested that they should send for Lord Edward. 
 
 It was a good idea, but James would not agree to act on it. 
 He said she must be told at once, lest the news should come 
 to her any other, way ; and, after a long pause, he undertook 
 to go and tell her himself. 
 
 He went up to the drawing-room, and found Eleanor alone 
 there. She saw that disaster was written in his face, and she 
 prayed him, for old love s sake, to be quick, and strike his 
 blow. He did so ; he told her all as quietly as he could ; and 
 then she fell back in her chair speechless. She never said 
 one word, good or bad. She tried to undo the handkerchief 
 round her throat, but could not ; then she feebly clutched her 
 hair with her hands, until one long loop of it fell down across 
 her face ; and then she clasped her hands in her lap in her 
 old patient attitude, and sat pale and still. 
 
 Old James was kneeling at her feet, and praying her to 
 speak to him, when he heard the door locked behind him. 
 He started up, and Aunt Maria was standing between him 
 and the door. Old James, valiant old soul as he was, grew 
 frightened. She had got on her dressing-gown only, her hair 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 303 
 
 was all tumbled and wild, her great coarse throat was bare, 
 and her big black eyebrows were nearly hiding her cruel little 
 eyes ; she looked redder, angrier, madder, than ever. He saw 
 that she had heard every word ; he saw that she had locked 
 the door behind her, and was standing silently scowling at 
 them ; and for one moment he trembled. 
 
 But only for one instant. His darling Miss Eleanor was 
 there, arid his courage returned ; he faced her furiously. 
 
 " Give me that key, you old Atrophy ! " he said (meaning, 
 possibly, Atropos ; Lord knows what he meant !) Give it up 
 to me, I tell you ! " 
 
 " Come and take it, you old dog ! You old thief! you beg 
 garly, old, barefooted shoeblack boy ! that my fool of a brother 
 picked out of the gutter, fifty years ago, because you had a 
 face like a monkey, and made him laugh ! Come and take it ! 
 Do you hear ? " 
 
 James was politic. Aunt Maria was decidedly the strong 
 est of the two. He fell back on his tongue, which was nearly 
 as good a one as Aunt Maria s. 
 
 " Your brother ! " he said ; "your brother ! O Lord ! " 
 
 " Put it in Chancery," she said. " Put it in Chancery, you 
 penniless old rogue ! Aha ! " 
 
 James gave a glance at Eleanor, and saw that she was quite 
 unconscious of what was passing. With infinite shrewdness, 
 he remained perfectly quiet, and let Aunt Maria begin at her. 
 
 She came towards her, pointing at her with the key. 
 
 "You little snake! You little devil! You little sly, 
 smooth-faced, pianforte, playing minx ! So you set on your 
 two gallant bully lovers to murder Will Hertford, did you ? 
 He has given a gallant account of them ! He is a man ! why, 
 his little finger is worth ten of your Bartys and Elliots ! One 
 dead and the other in prison ! O brave Will Hertford ! Get 
 up, do you hear, get up ! you little devil ! " 
 
304 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " Leave her alone," said old Jarnes ; " or by the Lord, 
 I ll " 
 
 " Assault your mistress s aunt, and be walked off to the po 
 lice-station, is that it ? I am going to use you, Master James, 
 and when I have done with you, pitch you On one side, like an 
 old shoe. I have won the game ! Take this key, open the 
 door, and send her maid to her. I have won the game, old 
 snake!" 
 
 It would have puzzled Aunt Maria to say what game she had 
 won. Originally she certainly was very fond of Captain Hert 
 ford, and was so still. She had had a plan of marrying him 
 to Eleanor, and gaining some sort of power over her wealth ; 
 this had given her her intense hatred of Austin ; but what with 
 -drink and incipient insanity, all power of keeping one plan be 
 fore her had gone long ago. Passion had supplanted reason. 
 She loved Will Hertford still, in a way, and she hated Austin 
 and the Bartys ; she had nothing left to guide her now but a 
 mad woman s cunning. 
 
 She displayed a considerable amount of it this day. She 
 went out, and ordered the maids to pack up everything for a 
 long journey, and shortly afterwards made her appearance, 
 dressed in the height of fashion, looking quite sane and col 
 lected. She ordered the carnage, went to the bankers and 
 got money, went to the passport-office, and got passports ; she 
 went to Mivart s, got a courier recommended to her ; went to 
 the Hotel Sabloniere, in Leicester Square, and fetched the 
 "gentleman home. Then she gave directions to the house 
 keeper about shutting up the house and discharging the ser 
 vants, and, lastly, she sent the courier to secure berths on board 
 the Soho, for Antwerp. 
 
 Then she went up to Eleanor. She was sitting near the 
 window, weeping bitterly. Aunt Maria was in good temper 
 now, and was very gentle with her. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 305 
 
 " My love," she said, " I am glad you are better. In my 
 grief this morning I used harsh words to you. Are they 
 forgiven ? " 
 
 " I know nothing of them, aunt ; yet, if you used them, they 
 are forgiven." 
 
 " Are you better, dear ? " 
 
 " I am quite well, aunt ; only my heart is broken." 
 
 " Nonsense ; everything will come right. See here. Aus 
 tin will be liberated on bail, and will go abroad. We ought 
 to go abroad instantly. Can you travel ? " 
 
 " You can do as you will with me, aunt. Only, dear aunt, 
 I have been so patient and loving to you, I have never re 
 turned you one angry word. Aunt, for God s sake, don t 
 scold me ! " 
 
 " Tut, tut, silly one. Who is scolding ? Come, we start 
 to-night, bid your maid get ready." 
 
 The next night they were at Brussels, and old James made 
 one of the party. It was his first expedition into foreign parts 
 since the taking of the Bastile, and his prejudices against 
 foreigners were as strong as they were in 1792. But there 
 he was, and there were three strong reasons for his being 
 there. First, Eleanor had asked him to go ; second, he was 
 most fully determined that, happen what might, he would 
 never lose sight of Eleanor ; and, thirdly, that Aunt Maria was 
 most fully determined that she would keep this dangerous old 
 fellow under her own eye. 
 
 What could the old fellow do ? His dread of what might 
 be the end of Eleanor s being carried abroad was boundless. 
 But old Mr. Hilton had managed his affairs in life so well 
 that he had died, leaving not one single personal friend behind 
 him, but Mr. Elliot, and now he was dead. There was actually 
 no one left to appeal to for help but blind Lord Edward 
 Barty. James scrawled a letter to him, and Lord Edward 
 
 T 
 
306 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 started on the trail at once, and overtook them at Brussels. 
 Aunt Maria showed no disgust at his appearance ; she was 
 very gracious and genial, and kept her temper for her maid, 
 whom she kept in the most terrible subjection, partly by her 
 tongue and partly by wielding against the unfortunate woman 
 a certain supposed clause in her will susceptible of instant 
 alteration, on suspicion of the poor wretch s having exchanged 
 a single word in confidence with old James. 
 
 Aunt Maria found walking exercise necessary, and so she 
 used to walk out every day to take and fetch the letters from 
 the post-office, near the Place de la Revolution. Meanwhile, 
 Eleanor had a piano in her room, and Lord Edward used to 
 come and play it, and wonder why on earth Austin had not 
 answered their letters. 
 
 Old James, both here and elsewhere, was far too much en 
 gaged in a vast, chronic, ceaseless squabble, with the whole 
 Belgian nation, to be at all available for any reasonable busi 
 ness ; his life was one great wrangle about the food. And, 
 moreover, he had a most vivid remembrance of holding Mr. 
 Jenkinson s coat-tails tight in one hand, and Mr. Hilton s in 
 the other ; of looking cautiously between the shoulders of those 
 gentlemen, and of seeing all St. Antoine seething and howling 
 and leaping and raging over the bridge into the Bastile. He 
 fully believed that people in foreign parts did that sort of 
 thing once a month or so, and that the Place de la Revolution, 
 where they lived, was the spot set aside by the Government 
 for the performance, at stated periods, of the same sort of 
 Devil s dance, which he had witnessed in Paris fifty years 
 before, for a week or so. He had always been very particular 
 about his money too, and now was worrying himself to death 
 from having to change good money into coins with whose 
 value he was totally unacquainted. In short, the poor old 
 fellow was in a totally unavailable state for all reasorable 
 business. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 307 
 
 When they had been there a short time, Aunt Maria ex 
 pressed her intention of breaking up the camp, and going to 
 Ems. She was the only person in the house who read Galig- 
 nani. She read one morning a short account of the duel at 
 Ems, between Austin and Captain Hertford : she determined 
 to follow him to that place. 
 
 Nobody opposed her, and they went. When their carriage 
 drove up the street, Captain Hertford was standing by the 
 arch which crosses the street by the Kursal. When he saw 
 her face, he cursed and swore so awfully that Captain Jack 
 son, who was standing by. said, 
 
 " I say, Hertford, don t use such language : it is n t good 
 taste." 
 
 " I can t help it," said he, " when I see that cursed old 
 woman s face. It makes me mad to think what she ha^ 
 brought me to. I can t go to England ; I don t care so much 
 about that. I must resign my seat in Parliament ; that is the 
 very deuce : but it is n t that. It is that young dandy, Charles 
 Barty. I can t get him out of my- head. I was n t sorry at 
 the time ; I don t know that I am sorry now. But he came 
 down so sudden ! it was so devilish horrid ! Did you ever 
 see anything more horrid? I ve killed my man before, but 
 not such a lad as he. It is always coming back to me ; the 
 brandy is no good against it. I tried that, and it made it 
 worse ; so I dropped it." 
 
 " I wish to God you would drop it ! " said Jackson, fiercely. 
 " Why the devil do you go on harping on this wretched busi 
 ness ? What do you think / must feel about it ? " 
 
 Captain Hertford remained silent. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, Hertford," continued the other ; " don t 
 let us mention that duel again. I should be very glad if you 
 would tell me the truth about your connection with Miss 
 Hilton." 
 
308 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 "I will do so, Jackson, I think you are a good fellow. 
 Don t pitch me overboard. I shall blow my brains out if you 
 do. Old Maria Hilton had always a great admiration for me, 
 which was not reciprocated. But I always kept in with her, 
 and kept friendly with her. Well. Hang it, sir, she bought 
 my company for me. There ! " 
 
 Captain Hertford paused. They walked together down the 
 terrace which hangs over the river ; but Captain Hertford had 
 come to a dead stop. 
 
 " You were going to tell me " said Jackson. 
 
 " About little Miss Hilton. Well, Jackson, if you had been 
 brought up such a neglected Arab as I, you would have been 
 as bad as I." 
 
 " I might be worse." 
 
 " Well, you might. However," resumed he, slowly, " through 
 Miss Hilton, I, of course, grew to be acquainted with her 
 nephew Robert. He had been expelled from the army for 
 stealing everything he could lay his hands on. She asked me 
 to see him at Brussels. I did so. I took him up rather be 
 cause I thought she was fond of him. Never mind why I 
 took him up. He robbed me of some letters belonging to 
 Lord Mewstone, and got the signature copied by a clever 
 rogue on to a check. Finding himself discovered, he bolted 
 to Namur, where he committed suicide." 
 
 " A tender-conscienced thief." 
 
 " Yet he was well brought up ; he was Miss Hilton s brother. 
 I brought the news back to England. There old Miss Hilton 
 pointed out to me that Eleanor Hilton would be a great 
 heiress, and that I ought to marry her ; and so the scheme 
 was begun. I went down to Wales, and found Elliot, the 
 fool, falling in love with my worthy half-brother s future 
 Countess. I encouraged him." 
 
 " But how went your scheme with Miss Hilton ? " 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 309 
 
 " Hot and cold ; hot at first, and afterward, Avhen she paid 
 my election expenses, very cold indeed. Still I always had 
 hopes, and the old woman kept them going. What led to this 
 miserable affair was this : I got cleaned out on the City and 
 Suburban, and some tradesmen were troublesome, and -then I 
 went about and said that I was to marry her. I was very 
 familiar with -her. Well, I had a secret. I did not exactly 
 trade on it, but I used it. I was a great deal with her. I am 
 a needy man, and I talked about marrying her, and Elliot 
 heard it." 
 
 " People say that you had a plan to shoot Elliot and to get 
 the girl abroad, and that that plan got blown upon, and that 
 you had out Lord Charles Barty instead. Is there any truth 
 in that?" 
 
 " Yes, a great deal. That was the plan proposed to me by 
 the old woman." 
 
 " It seems to have been attended with the most brilliant 
 success." 
 
 " The most brilliant," replied Hertford, bitterly. "*I have 
 lost my seat in Parliament, I cannot go to England, and if it 
 were not for my wonderful luck at the tables, I should be very 
 poor." 
 
 " Well, you have not told your story altogether consistently, 
 Hertford. I could not expect you to do so. But at the same 
 time you seem to have succeeded. You have shot one man, 
 got the other locked up in prison (that is no fault of yours), 
 and now the girl has followed you here." 
 
 " That is true," said Hertford. " The scheme has succeeded 
 wonderfully. I wish to God I had never heard of it. I am 
 not rascal enough to go on any further with it, Jackson." 
 
 " I don t think you could, could you ? " said Captain Jack 
 son. 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
310 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " She would hardly see you after what you have done. 
 This Lord was her friend, and they say she was fond of 
 Elliot." 
 
 " I tell you," he said, " that if I were rogue enough I could 
 make her aunt bully her into marrying me in a month. You 
 don t know the old woman." 
 
 Lord Edward Barty and Eleanor had a very peaceful and 
 quiet time at Ems. I believe that Captain Hertford was in 
 earnest about not prosecuting the villanous scheme which had 
 ended in the death of Lord Charles Barty and the imprison 
 ment of Austin. But if he had ever so much intended to 
 take advantage of Eleanor s situation, the presence of the 
 trusty Lord Edward Barty rendered it impossible. 
 
 He was continually with her. He could not be happy with 
 out her. SJie, with her patient ways, had become a necessity 
 to him. As- for his falling in love with her, he simply never 
 knew what it meant. He had loved his brother Charles much 
 better than he was likely to love her ; he at present loved his 
 brother George much better than her ; he liked her better 
 than Lord Wargrave, and not so well as Lord George, that 
 was all. She was kind to him, and he liked her, nay, he 
 loved her ; but he thought that it would be much pleasanter 
 when all this trouble was over, and Austin came and married 
 her. Then there would be glorious times indeed. 
 
 Of course the little world of Ems not an entirely respec 
 table little world talked about them, but I don t think any 
 one was the worse for their talking. The two people whom 
 they talked about never heard it, and so it does not much 
 matter. Eleanor and Lord Edward were left in peace all 
 that summer without much to disturb them, except their 
 anxiety at not hearing from Austin. 
 
 Aunt Maria was never troublesome now ; they hardly 
 noticed what she did with herself. Old James called their 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 311 
 
 attention to her first, after they had been there nearly a 
 month. 
 
 Eleanor was sitting at the piano alone, in her great high 
 bare room, trying some music. James opened the door very 
 quietly and came in. She heard him, and turned round on 
 the music-stool. 
 
 She looked ten years older than she had looked before all 
 this had happened. She had shown her sorrow to no one. She 
 had been eating her heart in secret ; keeping her griefs for 
 the long dark hours of night, and showing a brave front in the 
 daytime. She had been doing this months and months before 
 this unhappy duel. Her hair had gray streaks in it before 
 things came round again. 
 
 " James," she said, " where have you been so late ? " 
 
 " I ve been to Marksburg to see they sqjers a marching. 
 They re a marching from St. Goar to Coblentz, pretty nigh 
 two regiments on em. And I goes over in a boat to see em, 
 and there they was, with kitching candlesticks on their elmets. 
 Fine men to look at, ah. And then I went in over the 
 way, and seen ern playing. Lord, worn t she taking the 
 money in ! " 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 " She. Have she made her will ? " 
 
 " Do you mean Aunt Maria ? " 
 
 " In course I do. Do you know that she have won a thou 
 sand pound in eight days ? " 
 
 " My aunt ! Is she playing ? " 
 
 " Ah ! and winning, too. And so is Captain Hertford. He 
 and she have had a tussle, acause he hain t been to see her 
 often enough." 
 
 This was Aunt Maria s employment. She was gambling 
 desperately. One day in September the end came. 
 
 She had at first won, as James had told Eleanor, above a 
 
312 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 thousand pounds. Then her luck turned. She lost. She 
 nearly recovered herself again, lost once more, began to 
 lose terribly. She was more than five hundred pounds " to 
 the bad " one evening when she went to play for the last time. 
 
 She had had a quarrel with Captain Hertford. His luck 
 had been terribly good this season ; he had been winning and 
 winning. She took her place opposite to him that evening, 
 and for the first time cut him dead. 
 
 He won beyond all precedent. As he won, she seemed to 
 lose in proportion ; she wrote check after check. At last, 
 when she had lost eight hundred pounds, she got up, and made 
 a scene which no one there ever forgot. 
 
 She rose up, and in a sharp snarling voice denounced Cap 
 tain Hertford. She called him an ungrateful hound, unfit 
 to live ; she screamed out before them all the plot against 
 Austin and Lord Charles Barty, and then said that he, Cap 
 tain Plertford, had known all along that she was only an ille 
 gitimate half-sister of old Mr. Hilton s. She said fifty other 
 frantic things, which, of course, no one attended to. The end 
 of it was, that the gamblers huddled away out of the room like 
 a herd of frightened sheep, and left the terrible old woman 
 standing there in the middle, perfectly insane, trying to bite 
 at the hands of the two croupiers who held her. 
 
 After a time they were able to move her. They had a ter 
 rible journey with her to England. Her reason never re 
 turned. Eleanor got her safe home at last. Their old house 
 at Esher had, as I prophesied, been taken as a madhouse, 
 Aunt Maria, poor soul, was taken there, and there she stayed 
 till she died ; always under the impression that it was their 
 own house still, and that the other patients were only so many 
 visitors. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 313 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 
 AUSTIN slept long the night after his release. He slept 
 late into the day, like a tired child ; and at last when he 
 woke he lay still, waiting for the dreadful bell which in prison 
 had summoned him and the other convicts to rise from sleep, 
 to quit the paradise of dreams, and come back to earth, to 
 the cold, hard, reality of the dull, squalid, hideous prison-life. 
 
 At first, when he had wakened to consciousness in jail, he 
 had always, for a moment or so, fancied that he was back safe 
 in his old room at home, and that the past was merely a series 
 of bad dreams ; and he would sit up in his bed to shake them 
 off, sit up and look round, to find his worst dream only too 
 terribly true. 
 
 After a time he grew to be cunning in his sleep ; to know 
 that he only awoke to misery, and so to hold on, with obstinate 
 tenacity, to the fag-end of a dream, as long as possible, in 
 order that he might keep it going until he was roused by that 
 dreadful bell ; for he found, in practice, that the poorest dream, 
 underlain as it might be with the sickening dread of waking 
 from it, was preferable to the waking itself, and to seeing the 
 four whitewashed walls. The very stupidest old dream a 
 dream that he detected and laughed at while he dreamt it 
 was better than waking, and seeing the prison walls around 
 him. 
 
 On this morning he dreamt that he was hunted through 
 Hyde Park by something or another which was called 974 
 until he came to Apsley House, at which place he managed to 
 rise into the air, and triumphantly flew nearly over the Green 
 Park, leaving 974 to come round by Constitution Hill. He 
 wished to keep in the air until the bell rang, but he could not. 
 He came down in front of Buckingham Palace, and woke. 
 
 14 
 
314 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 He waited for the bell. That bell never rung any more for 
 him : it rings still for eight hundred miserable souls, but not 
 for him. After a few minutes he began to see that he was in 
 his old room again ; he sat up, and found that it was true. 
 For a minute he thought that the whole past had been dreamt, 
 but, the next, he knew that it was real, that he had been in 
 prison, and was free. He fell back again, and tried to pray, 
 but the utterance of his prayer was swept in a whirlwind of 
 passion. 
 
 He rose and dressed himself. His resolution had been 
 made long ago in prison ; he rose from his bed calmly deter 
 mined to act upon it at once. It was the result of long, calm 
 thought, when his head was cool, and his intellect perfectly 
 clear and unbiassed. He had said to himself in prison : " What 
 is the right thing to do ? When I get free I shall be excited, 
 my judgment will not be so clear as it is now. The resolution 
 made now must be inexorably carried out, without reason or 
 argument, when I am free." 
 
 What was his resolution ? Possibly the most foolish one 
 ever made, at all events, very foolish, as are all resolutions 
 made in the same spirit ; that is to say, resolutions made with 
 out the saving clause, " that they may be altered by circum 
 stances and after thoughts." These are indeed, if persisted 
 in, not resolutions, but obstinacies. Austin had made himself 
 a non possum, and he was going to act on it at once, lest the 
 non should be swept away, and high-souled martyrdom should 
 become a more difficult matter. His grand resolution was this : 
 To see Eleanor safe under the protection of the Duchess of 
 Cheshire (who was very willing to be kind to her), and then 
 himself go to where ? Why, Canada ! and see her no 
 more. And he carried out his resolution most inexorably. 
 He knew that she loved him as he loved her, and he would 
 not be so base as to follow her with his ruined fortunes ; that 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 315 
 
 was one argument, and the great one. Besides, she had shown 
 her good sense and propriety by deserting him, which was 
 another. 
 
 " Gil," said he, sitting by the forge that evening, " I have 
 been to see my attorney." 
 
 " May the deil d n a attorneys, barristers, and writers to 
 the signet, and him first of all," was Gil s reply. 
 
 " Why ? " asked Austin. 
 
 " Why ! " said Gil, " why ! After lee ing till the deil dinna 
 like to hae him, could he no lee loud eneuch to keep ye out of 
 prison ? Being paid for his work in hard guineas and ever 
 lasting perdition, and then no doing it after all. Why ? quoth 
 he." 
 
 " Don t you be an old fool, Gil. Mr. Compton is as noble 
 and good an old man as any in the kingdom. You will know 
 it soon ; you shall meet him." 
 
 " Meet him soon ! I m no saying contrary. Life is short, 
 and no man s salvation is sure. But I 11 no speak to him." 
 
 " I hope you will, Gil." 
 
 " I in obleeged to you ; but there as here I 11 choose my 
 own acquaintances." 
 
 " Don t be cross with me, Gil." 
 
 " Cross wi you. God forgive me ! Cross wi my ain mas 
 ter (ye 11 no get a Highlandman to say that every day of the 
 week), cross with ye ! " 
 
 " I thought you were. Look here ! that Mr. Compton has 
 watched my interests very carefully ; he has been a very faith 
 ful friend. The Crown has not claimed my property, and he 
 has taken good care of it." 
 
 " The Crown no claimed your property ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Have you got your own wealth back again ? Has the 
 Queen gi en ye back your siller ? " 
 
316 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " She never took it, God bless her ! " 
 
 " So ye 11 no want to learn the gun trade, so we 11 no 
 have to sit pontering here together over the dommed old gun- 
 stocks, so all the happy days I had pictured to myself are all 
 blasted awa to the winds. T is a weary, ungrateful world." 
 
 " It is nothing of the kind, Gil. Listen to me." 
 
 " I 11 listen to ye. But I did hope to see your lang, white 
 fingers grimed with the rust and the oil, and to hear ye say, 
 4 We ve done well to-day, Gil. Born an aristocrat, die an 
 aristocrat. Are ye never to know the weariness of thirsting 
 for work, and the peace and happiness of getting work to do 
 at last, master ? " 
 
 " Don t call me master, Gil ; call me friend." 
 
 " The tane involves the tither, I m thinking, or should, if I 
 understand it right. Now I m listening." 
 
 Then I will speak, Gil, faithful old friend. There are 
 better trades than gunmaking." 
 
 " I m no denying it. The trades of Prime Minister, news 
 paper editor, or keeper of a disorderly house, are a muckle 
 deal more remunerative ; but all three more precarious." 
 
 " Now don t be a fool," said Austin, laughing, " or I won t 
 speak to you." 
 
 " A fool ! quoth he," replied Gil, smiling, and hammering 
 away. " I thought we were Radical. If my master is going 
 to turn Tory, and object to an honest bit of Radicalism from a 
 puir working-man, why I must turn too, and sing my last song, 
 like a hooper in the death thraws : 
 
 The Deil was aince a Tory, 
 
 Tory ! Tory ! 
 But he heard another story, 
 
 Story ! Story ! 
 
 " Every gentleman now is a Whig," says he, 
 " And each Devil must dance the new jig," says he; 
 " And Russell and Grey 
 Are the men of the day " 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 317 
 
 " Where did you get that infernal doggerel ? " said Austin, 
 interrupting him. 
 
 " My father s uncle s first cousin singed it at the Deuk of 
 N : s door, not long agone. They would no have fleered 
 at the puir Deuk had they kenned that his ain flesh and blude 
 would turn against him. Say yer say, master." 
 
 "If you will let me. Let us be serious, Gil. Will you 
 come with me to Canada ? " 
 
 "Hey?" 
 
 " To Canada." 
 
 " Ay, to the world s end. But there before all places." 
 
 " There is a most brilliant career before us both there. I 
 must not stay in England. If, after what has happened (I 
 speak to you as the only friend I have in the world, Gil, and 
 the best, save one, I ever had), if, after what has happened, 
 I should stay in England, I must get thrown against some one, 
 and that would end in dishonor. Let us come to Canada. 
 Are you willing ? " 
 
 He looked at Gil s face, and saw that he need not have 
 asked the question. Gil s face was radiant. He murmured, 
 
 " Sawmon and park deer, and muckle red deer, called wa 
 piti, whilk they misname elk ; and real elk, whilk they misname 
 moose ; and a rink at the curling in winter time ; and corn 
 land five shilling the acre. And he asks me will I go ? " 
 
 " I see you are willing. Let us go. Let us take that poor 
 convict Goatley with us. Let us try to do something for him. 
 Who knows what his opportunities have been, Gil ? Do you 
 agree about that ? " 
 
 " God s wrath should light on us if we left him behind. 
 Poor creature ! There is good in him somewhere, or he d no 
 have stuck by you and the governor the day before yesterday. 
 Canada, quoth he. And you with your wealth there. Think 
 of the poor starving Ronaldsay folk, master ; think how leal 
 
318 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 and trusty and quiet they have been through this horrible 
 winter. It is no business of yours," continued Gil, laying his 
 hands on Austin s shoulders, " but, for my sake, and it s the 
 only favor I 11 ever ask, help some of them over. I 11 go bail 
 that, in mere money, they will pay everv farthing of which 
 you advance ; but that is only insulting you. You know what 
 a grand work is before you. I see you know that." 
 
 " I do, Gil ; and, please God, I will do it. Is there no 
 nobler work than griming my hands with rust and oil, hey ? 
 Is mechanical work the highest or the lowest kind of work, 
 hey ? Would you have me cast aside all my education, and 
 set to work cleaning gun-barrels, hey ? How now, old 
 man ? " 
 
 " I was wrong ; and wealth, in a good man s hands, is one 
 of God s greatest blessings. I had a fancy that you and I 
 might have gone through the world together as equals. And 
 the fancy was dear to me, I m no denying. But it is gone ; 
 you have nobler work in hand than gun-cleaning." 
 
 So he had. Austin had a grand life s work before him, and 
 he did that work gloriously well. But neither he nor Gil 
 knew where his life s work lay at this time. It did not lay in 
 Canada, but in a far different place. 
 
 " Gil," said Austin, " we will go through the world as 
 friends and equals, though you may choose to call me master. 
 We will go to Canada, and Mr. Monroe shall send us over the 
 Ronaldsay folks, and we will call the estate Ronaldsay. But 
 I have something to do first. I shall have to go abroad. I 
 must start to-morrow ; I cannot leave England before I have 
 done something. I must see Lord Kdward Barty, and also, 
 if it be possible, the Duchess of Cheshire. By the by, where 
 is Robin?" 
 
 Gil pursed up his mouth as if he was going to whistle, and 
 said, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 319 
 
 " It was no my fault." 
 
 " Is he dead ? " said Austin, in a low voice. 
 
 " No, he s no deid." 
 
 "Is he lost?" 
 
 " No, he s no lost either. It was no my fault ; a dog who 
 will to Cupar, maun to Cupar. I whistled till my een danced 
 in my heid, and I cried, Here ! lad, here ! The cow s in the 
 potatoes ! But he d no listen. He kept leaping up on her 
 braw gray silk gown, and she kept bending down to him, and 
 saying, Eobin ! Robin ! my own darling Robin ! till it 
 would have garred ye greet, sir, to hear her. And he caught 
 sight of Lord John Russell s gray cat (it was in Cheshara 
 Place, ye ken), and hunted it into his Lordship s ain area, and 
 ran between his Lordship s legs, as he was approaching his 
 ain door, and misbehaved like any Tory ; and so he went with 
 her round the end of the railings, and into her house with her, 
 and the door was shut." 
 
 " With her ! with whom ? " 
 
 " With Miss Hilton." 
 
 " Is she in London ? " 
 
 " I dinna ken. She was twa days ago. But with these 
 here-to-day and gone-to-morrow railways, a body must bo 
 cautious in speaking." 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 
 So she was safe in London: that was something off his 
 mind. He gave Gil long instructions to try and get hold of 
 old James, and to cross-question him (a hopeful plan) ; but 
 Gil was not required to act. A note came from Eleanor the 
 very next morning : 
 
320 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " DEAR AUSTIN, 
 
 " I sent James to tlie prison yesterday, and he brought back 
 the news that you were free. Is this to continue ? Are we 
 never to see one another again ? " 
 
 He replied promptly, and at once : 
 
 " DEAREST ELEANOR, 
 
 " It is impossible, considering everything, that I should ever 
 meet you, or Edward Barty, again. Our eternal and final 
 parting must come soon : it is better that we should not make 
 it more bitter by another meeting." 
 
 This letter was despatched, and, of course, there was no 
 answer to it. 
 
 Eleanor wept bitterly and wildly over it, but she saw no 
 remedy. She said that misfortune had soured Austin s noble 
 nature, that he was not himself. She must get speech with 
 him ; there must be something unexplained. In an evil mo 
 ment she read the two letters to Lord Edward Barty. 
 
 He was furiously angry ; he made her a scene about the 
 matter. He said that Austin s wrong-headed, obstinate pride 
 was below contempt. He, after all, had suffered no more than 
 the rest of them ; and here was he, in his insane vanity, refus 
 ing to answer their most affectionate letters until he was out 
 of prison, and then sending such an answer as that ! " I tell 
 you, Eleanor," he said, " that if we want to get our own dear 
 Austin back to us, we must let him go at present. He will 
 come to us in the end, my dear creature, but we must show 
 him that we are angry now. We have sacrificed everything 
 to him, and he treats us like this ! It is monstrous ! " 
 
 " Lord Edward," said Eleanor, " Austin has been deceived." 
 
 " By whom ? " 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 321 
 
 " By me. I have deceived him. He has found it out, and 
 he distrusts me." 
 
 " Deceived him ? about what ? " 
 
 " Never mind. I did it, as I thought, for the best. I fear 
 he has great cause of complaint against me." 
 
 " Fiddlededee ! I won t ask any questions, because I know 
 something about your family history ; but take a blind fool s 
 advice, don t run after him. Let him come to you. He 
 will come, Eleanor. Let Mm come, and make his explana 
 tion. Wait until he is thrown against you, as he must be in a 
 week or so. Come, now ; trust me you will find yourself the 
 more hereafter." 
 
 " But if I were never to see him again ? " 
 
 " Pish ! The very fact of your having his dog with you 
 will bring on some sort of communication. Leave things to 
 time, Eleanor ; he will come back to us when he is tired of 
 isolation." 
 
 This would have been most excellent advice had it not been 
 for this, that Austin was just now making every preparation 
 for the start to Canada, and that the getting no answer to his 
 last note hurried his movements. 
 
 " It is all for the best," he said, " she is right not to answer. 
 She is wise ; it is my fault. She deceived me shamefully, 
 and she knows it ; she does not know that I love her better 
 than ever ; my honor, as a man, would bo tarnished, if I made 
 her any further advances. I wish to God that her nine thou 
 sand a year was gone to the Devil. I wish she was penniless ; 
 in that case I would go to her to-morrow. But she deceived 
 me, and she has nine thousand a year, and the whole thing is 
 impossible." 
 
 So the Canadian preparations went on, and Austin and 
 Goatley took a lodging in the Commercial Road, to be near 
 the docks, and to see after the shipping of their " notions." 
 14* u 
 
322 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Gil deserted the gun trade, and came with them after a 
 week. They were very busy. Austin was making great 
 preparations ; he was going to buy a great tract of land in 
 Canada, and to introduce a new system of husbandry. He 
 was not in the least aware that all kinds of agricultural 
 implements might be bought in Massachusetts and Connecti 
 cut cheaper than in London. So he bought away, bought 
 implements from Deane and Dray, to the tune of hundreds, 
 which implements were the best in the world for English 
 use ; bought, for instance, two or three broad-wheeled carts, 
 with Crosskill s axles, eminently adapted for macadamized 
 roads, but hardly for the backwoods ; and so on. But he was 
 very busy, which was something. 
 
 One night, sitting gloomily in his lodging, in the Commer 
 cial Road, after having been on board the ship all day, he 
 thought of his dog Robin ; and a desire arose in him to have 
 that dog back again. The dog was with Eleanor, and he 
 determined to go after it the next day. He did go after it, 
 and he got it, and in this adventure, he, as nearly as possible, 
 met Eleanor herself, face to face. 
 
 He did not meet her, but if he had they would have 
 explained everything to one another, even that dreadful 
 circumstance, which rankled in Austin s heart deeper than 
 all, his finding her walking with Captain Hertford in Mill- 
 bank. This was the fact which made him so obstinate with 
 her. He could have forgiven her desertion of him, he 
 could have forgiven everything but her deceit, and his discov 
 ery of it. 
 
 So he went for his dog. He watched at the end of the rail 
 ings in Wilton Crescent, and he saw her come out. . The dog 
 was not with her. She was going to church. He waited 
 patiently till she came back, and still he waited on. 
 
 By and by, after more than an hour, the little gray figure 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 323 
 
 came out again. Ah, Lord ! How Austin loved her. Why 
 did he not go up to her, and speak ? Because the jealous 
 devil, which he had made believe to banish, was holding high 
 court in his heart. 
 
 Robin was with her now ; he came out of the door like a 
 thunderbolt. There were five sparrows in the middle of the 
 road ; at dinner. Robin would have nothing of that sort ; he 
 sent them flying up into the lilac-trees and chimney pots, for 
 their bare lives, and then he danced, barking, round Eleanor. 
 
 Eleanor was walking towards St. Paul s Church, probably 
 going to Westerton s. Austin was standing behind the corner 
 of the railings, at the southwest corner of the Crescent. He 
 saw that the dog was going with her the other way, and he 
 whistled shrill and sharp. " I wonder if she will know my 
 whistle," said Austin. 
 
 She did not, but the dog did. He paused, with one ear up, 
 and the other down ; and his head on one side. Austin 
 whistled once more. This time, Robin came rushing towards 
 him like a race-horse ; and left Eleanor calling, " Robin ! 
 Robin ! you naughty dog, Robin, come here, sir ! " 
 
 When Austin saw that the dog was on his trail, and that 
 Eleanor had not recognized him, he ran round into Motcomb 
 Street. An instant after, Robin came tearing round, on the 
 grand circle-sailing principle (that is to say, that a circle is a 
 circle, and that the nearest way from one place to another is 
 a straight line drawn between them), combined with that of 
 circular storms, which is, that you go one fifth per cent to lee 
 ward for every revolution. He, Robin, sailed on these prin 
 ciples, but violated both. The first, because he assumed 
 himself to be sailing on a convex surface, instead of (as was 
 the case) practically a plane. The second, because he did not 
 allow sufficient latitude for his progressive momentum. The 
 combination of these two errors, acting together, caused him 
 
324 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 to make too wide a circle in coming round the corner, and to 
 bring himself against what we may be allowed to call the lee 
 ward area railings of Motcomb Street, and to give a short 
 howl, at having bruised himself against them ; which last fact 
 would be better theorized on by Dr. Brown than by either 
 Maury or Reid. 
 
 By the time that Robin had picked himself up, Austin was 
 at the end of the street. He whistled again, and Robin came 
 tearing on once more. Austin stepped round the corner, into 
 Lowndes Street, and waited ; he was safe here. Robin found 
 him by Gunter s shop, and leaped up, frantically yelping in 
 the madness of his joy ; and Austin then and there, the street 
 being empty, or nearly so, took Robin to his bosom, and 
 hugged him. 
 
 " You never see such a queer start in your life," said one 
 of the young men at Gunter s to one of the young ladies at 
 Miller s (to whom he was engaged), that evening, "/know 
 him, and all the whole business ; how he was in prison, and all 
 that. And I see him come cutting round the corner like a 
 lunatic ; and I says, He s broke out, and the police is after 
 him ! And I run out to see if I could get him through the 
 shop, or up-stairs, or anythink. And then I seen him hugging 
 of his dog to his bosom. And well I knew the dog. He used 
 to come into our place with the whole lot on em, Lord 
 Charles, poor fellow, and Mr. Austin, and the blind .one, and 
 Miss Hilton, from number fifteen ; and he used to chivy the 
 cat into the window among the bon-bons, and play the deuce, 
 and all. And one day he upset the table with Lady Dumble- 
 dorc s wedding-cake on it, and then there was the dickens to 
 pay. /never see such a dog." 
 
 " And so poor Mr. Elliot was glad to get his dog back 
 again," said the young lady from Miller s. 
 
 " He was so, poor gentleman ; you never see anything like 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 325 
 
 it. Here he stood, as it might be me, and there was the dog, 
 as it might be you, and he catches the dog to his bosom " 
 
 And the young man from Gunter s immediately received 
 two sound boxes on the ear, as a caution that prose narrative 
 must not be assisted by dramatic action. 
 
 The Canadian preparations went briskly on. Gil worked 
 like fifty Gils ; and Austin, partly in the novelty of feeling 
 free again, and partly to extinguish thought, worked as hard 
 as he. 
 
 He would not think : he would not pause. His resolution 
 had been taken when his head was cool, and must be acted 
 on now : so he was intensely busy. 
 
 Goatley, the convict, worked as well as he could ; but that 
 was not very well. He had a careless, sleepy way of doing 
 things, which provoked Gil very much. He never let Goatley 
 see that he was provoked ; for Goatley was a kind of sacred 
 person to Gil. He was an unaccountable being, and he had 
 played the man at the right time. Gil was kind to him. 
 
 Austin kept him near him continually ; for he was afraid of 
 his meeting some old companion, and getting into trouble ; but 
 Austin hoped to keep him straight till they got to Canada. 
 He was an odd, wayward, unaccountable creature. He never 
 gave Austin much account of himself that Austin could rely 
 on. If Austin pressed him too much, he became vacant and 
 irritable ; if further, a kind of dumb, sulky devil would take 
 possession of him, and he would hardly answer at all, or only 
 in the most transparent lies, which he could see irritated 
 Austin. 
 
 He at ordinary times spoke but little. Sometimes he would, 
 after a long silence, break out with an abrupt question. After 
 sitting a long while one day, he broke out, 
 
 " If I was in your place, I should take out a large quan- 
 
326 AUSTIN ELLIOT. - 
 
 tity of potatoes. May be they have n t got the same sorts 
 there." 
 
 There was nothing more in this than the mere silliness of 
 an utterly ignorant person. But there was a great deal more 
 in the way in which, after he had once started this notion, he 
 ran it to the death. He got it into his head that there was 
 something in it ; and walking about the Commercial Road 
 with Austin, he was continually stopping him at every potato 
 shop, and making inquiries about ash-leafed kidneys, and 
 regents, and so on. He was fully persuaded that he would 
 make his fortune in Canada by taking over new sorts of pota 
 toes. Austin told Gil that the poor fellow seemed mad on the 
 subject. Gil replied, 
 
 " A good thing, too. He had better go mad on one single 
 subject. Mad he is, and will be. He had better gang mad 
 on ane point than on a dizzen." 
 
 " Do you think he will go mad, Gil ? " said Austin. 
 
 " Deil doubt it ! A this leeing and this talking so and so 
 shows that his brain is softening. It will end in general 
 paralysis ; a slight dropping of the lower jaw, combined with 
 occasional violence." 
 
 " Who told you that ? " 
 
 " Naebody. I just, thinking about the young man, ran my 
 eye over Dr. Tuke s book the ither night. I m no agreeing 
 with the doctor in all things, but he has muckle experience." 
 
 Since Austin had taken his degree, he had confined his 
 reading to the newspapers. He changed the subject. 
 
 One day, when all things were nearly ready, and Austin 
 had come to be as well known on board the good ship Amphion 
 as the skipper himself, he took Goatley with him to help him 
 in stowing some packages. They worked together all the 
 morning. When, at noon, they came out on the wharf agaiiij 
 Goatley said, suddenly, 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 327 
 
 " I am going away from you to-morrow." 
 
 "Whither?" said Austin. 
 
 " To a public house. To the Black Bull in the Commer 
 cial Road. I have business there." 
 
 " You will come to me in the evening," said Austin, " for 
 you will not sleep away from your lodgings. I am so fearful 
 of your getting among your old companions, my poor fellow." 
 
 " Is that why you watch me so ? " said Goatley. 
 
 " Yes, that is the reason," said Austin ; " you are so weak 
 and foolish, my poor lad. I think how much I owe you, and 
 think how anxious I am to give you a new start in life, with 
 out temptation. I do watch you, and I will." 
 
 " Very well," said Goatley, " you are quite right. But 
 you need not watch me to-morrow, I am going to see a rela 
 tion, the only relation I have, who is coming to wish me 
 good-by." 
 
 " You never told me that you had any relations," said Austin. 
 
 " I daresay not," said Goatley, sulkily, " but I have. And 
 one of them is coming to bid me good-by to-morrow." 
 
 " One of them ? " said Austin. " You said there was only 
 one just now." 
 
 " Never you mind what I said ; you Ve often called me a 
 liar. Don t you ask any questions, may be I won t tell you 
 any lies." 
 
 Austin knew enougli of his man to let the subject drop. At 
 noon the next day Goatley left the ship ; and Austin, going 
 the same way, saw him walking rapidly up the Commercial 
 Road. 
 
 " It would be mere charity to follow him," thought he ; " I 
 think I had better follow him. I do not like to trust him. 
 Robin! Robin!" 
 
 It was time to call " Robin ! Robin ! " A marine-store 
 keeper s cat had been over to visit a puffing grocer s cat oppo- 
 
328 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 site, and was picking her way homewards across the muddy 
 street. Robin ran after her. She, like an idiot, ran away, 
 and Robin, by the law of gravity, or some similar law, bolted 
 after her. The cat, not being able to make her own port on 
 the present tack, in consequence of the enemy being to wind 
 ward of her, put her helm down, altered her course four 
 points, and made all sail for the nearest harbor to leeward, 
 which was the pigeon-fancier s ; and Robin, disregarding the 
 law of nations, made a perfect Wilkes of himself, and chased 
 her right into the neutral harbor, overturning a cage contain 
 ing five-and-twenty "blue rocks" in his career, and at last 
 succeeded in forcing an engagement in the pigeon-fancier s 
 back parlor, under his table. 
 
 Here he found himself under the guns of several neutral 
 batteries, which opened fire on him and the cat with perfect 
 impartiality. The cat bolted up the chimney, but Robin, as 
 in duty bound, returned the fire of the neutral batteries, 
 that is to say, setting our figure aside, that the pigeon-fancier 
 and his wife (who were at dinner) tried to kick him out, and 
 that he showed fight, and snapped at their legs. 
 
 At this moment, when war seemed inevitable, diplomacy 
 stepped in, in the person of Austin. Robin was rebuked. 
 The affair was gone calmly into. Apologies were given on 
 the one side, and frankly received on the other, and the whole 
 thing was comfortably settled. Then Austin walked away 
 up the Commercial Road with Robin, laughing, with no more 
 notion of what was going to happen to him than has the 
 render, perhaps not so much. 
 
 He went into the " Black Bull." He asked the landlord 
 whether a young man had come in just now. The landlord 
 said what sort of a young man, and Austin described Goatley. 
 
 " What, Browning ? " said the landlord. Austin had never 
 heard of him by that name, but felt sure of his man, because 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 329 
 
 the landlord had recognized him from his description. The 
 reader will most probably not remember that this was the 
 name given by the Secretary of State to the convict Goat- 
 ley. 
 
 Austin said, " Yes," feeling sure of his man. The landlord 
 said that he was there, that he was going to Canada, and 
 that one of his relations had come to bid him good-by ; they 
 were in an inner parlor now. 
 
 Austin was glad to find that Goatley had not deceived him. 
 He told the landlord that he would go inside and take a glass 
 of ale and a biscuit, and wait for the young man. 
 
 So mine host showed him into a rambling old room on one 
 side of a passage, with some fifty angles in it. There was a 
 bagatelle-board there, and Austin ate his biscuit, and sipped 
 his ale, and knocked the balls about. Robin had some biscuit, 
 and lay down on the hearth-rug. 
 
 Austin began to be aware that there were voices talking 
 low in another room, in the room on the other side of the 
 passage. Robin became aware of it too, and began to be 
 naughty. 
 
 At first he only put his nose against the door and whined. 
 Austin went on knocking the bagatelle-balls about, and making 
 the most wonderful strokes. He got petulant with Robin, and 
 ordered him to lie down ; but Robin would not, he reared 
 himself up against the door and scratched at it. 
 
 Austin made a beautiful stroke, there never was such a 
 stroke. Some of these bagatelle-boards were very good. He 
 was placing the balls to see if he could do it again, when 
 Robin reared up against the door and began barking. 
 
 Austin hit him a tap with the cue. But it was no Ui=e, 
 the dog was mad. He did not mind the blow. He began 
 barking furiously, and tearing at the door with his teeth. 
 
 Austin d d him, and opened the door for him. The 
 
330 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 dog dashed across the passage, and threw himself against a 
 door on the other side, which burst open. Austin followed to 
 apologize. 
 
 Only two steps. There he stood like a stone image in the 
 squalid passage, with the billiard-cue in his hand. 
 
 He saw a public house parlor before him, and a dirty table, 
 and a picture of the Queen, and a horse-hair sofa. And on 
 that sofa sat Eleanor Hilton, and beside her the convict Goat- 
 ley. The convict had his arm round Eleanor s waist, and 
 Eleanor was tenderly smoothing his close-cropped hair with 
 her hand. 
 
 He was amazed for one instant, only for one. When 
 Goatley turned his head towards him, attracted by the sudden 
 entrance of Robin, Austin saw it all. Now he understood 
 Eleanor s mysterious pilgrimages, now he knew her secret, 
 now he knew why he had found her walking with Captain 
 Hertford on the 15th of May, now he knew why he had 
 thought himself mad when he had first seen this man in 
 prison. All the truth came to him suddenly like a blaze of 
 lightning on a dark night, when Goatley turned his face 
 towards him, and he saw it beside Eleanor s, he understood 
 everything. This Goatley this convict was Robert 
 Hilton, the thief at school, the swindler in the army, 
 the forger of Lord Mewstone s name. It was Robert Hilton, 
 Eleanor s own brother. And he dropped the billiard-cue, and 
 cried out like a strong man in pain : " Eleanor ! Eleanor ! I 
 see it all. Can you forgive me ? can you ever forgive me ? " 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 CHAPTER XL. 
 
 THERE was no great need of explanations after this, for 
 there was but little to be explained. In the happy peace 
 which he felt in having her beside him once more, he never 
 thought of asking her why she had deserted him. That had 
 been the thing which had angered him more than any, but it 
 was nothing now. She had run into his arms with a low, glad 
 cry when she had seen him ; and he was sitting with her, with 
 her hand in his. He was listening to her dear, dear voice 
 again. Explanation? One half of her conduct had been 
 explained ; if she could not explain the other, why, then 
 What mattered it ? He had got her back again ; what cared 
 he for explanations P 
 
 She opened the question. " Why did you never answer 
 my letters, dear Austin ? " 
 
 " Your letters, faithless woman ! why did you never write 
 to me ? " 
 
 " Edward Barty and I wrote to you, until hope was dead, 
 Austin. Did they all arrive during your fever ? The gov 
 ernor has not dared to suppress them." 
 
 " The governor dare do a great many things, Eleanor. He 
 dared to run unarmed among eight hundred outcasts, for in 
 stance. I don t know whether he dare suppress my letters ; 
 but I know that he would not, if he dare." 
 
 They were much too happy to think about the mystery. 
 They found it all out afterwards. Aunt Maria s maid con 
 fessed everything when taxed with it, and threw herself on the 
 ground and prayed for forgiveness, let her hair down, kicked 
 her shoes off, made them a lady s maid s scene about it, and, 
 being forgiven, was carried off whooping and plunging, arid 
 holding on tight by everything she could get hold of. And 
 
332 AUSTIN ELLTOT. 
 
 after her departure, when old James came back into the room 
 to pick up her shoes and her hair-pins, and so on, he looked 
 very much ashamed of himself, and confessed that she, meaning 
 poor Aunt Maria, had been " too many for him." 
 
 Robert s statement was this, as far as they could trust 
 it. lie said that when he ran off to Namur (he would not go 
 into particulars), Captain Hertford followed him. That he 
 told a friend of his (Robert Hilton s) to spread a report of his 
 suicide. That his friend met Captain Hertford and told 
 him. That Captain Hertford had, without making any further 
 inquiries, returned to Brussels. And also that Captain Hert 
 ford was uncommon glad not to see him (Robert Hilton) in 
 the dock. 
 
 This was all Austin ever got out of him : from this he 
 formed the theory that there was something "queer," some 
 gambling transaction, or something of that sort, between 
 Robert Hilton and Captain Hertford. He never proved it, 
 and poor Hilton getting more stupid every day, now never 
 told him ; but he thought that it was the case. Another thing 
 which puzzled Austin was this, did Captain Hertford ever 
 really believe that Robert Hilton was dead ? That puzzle was 
 never solved either. 
 
 Eleanor s statement was this : Captain Hertford had re 
 turned from abroad, and brought the news of her brother s 
 death at Namur. Aunt Maria introduced him as an old friend. 
 She had seen him a good deal from that time (summer of 
 1844) until October, 1845. Then one day he came and told 
 them, not only that her brother was alive, but that he was in 
 Millbank for swindling. That Lord Mewstone was a most 
 vindictive man, and that the secret of Robert Hilton s exist 
 ence should be kept from him. He was very vindictive about 
 that forgery, for instance. 
 
 Eleanor and Austin, when they came to think about it, were 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 633 
 
 of opinion that Captain Hertford was very anxious that Robert 
 Hilton should not appear in the dock in the matter of the 
 Mewstone forgery. They may have done him an injustice, 
 they never made out anything clearly against him here. 
 
 Eleanor, hearing this terrible news, determined that her 
 brother should be free and out of the way, before she con 
 sented to marry Austin. It would have been such a death 
 blow to all his high hopes to marry a convict s sister. She 
 kept the secret from him out of mere love and consideration 
 for him. No one knew the secret but Aunt Maria, Eleanor, 
 old James, and Captain Hertford. She used to go and visit 
 the poor fellow once a month, on the fifteenth of each month ; 
 and Hertford, who seems to have pitied her at one time, some 
 times went ; it was on returning from one of these expeditions 
 that Austin met her, holding Captain Hertford s arm. 
 
 Yes, everything was explained. The black cloud had passed 
 suddenly, and beyond lay the prospect of the future, glorious 
 and golden ; peaceful beneath the calm summer s sun. 
 
 CHAPTER XLI. 
 
 WHEN Austin left Ronaldsay in May, 1845, the potatoes 
 were just coming out of the ground, and the women and chil 
 dren, in the lengthening spring evenings, were weeding them, 
 and opening the earth between the rows, and regarding them 
 complacently. The rich dark-green leaves were showing 
 handsomely above the dark ground. It made one s heart swell 
 with thankfulness, to see the noble promise of a harvest. The 
 old wives no longer knitted, looking towards the sea, where 
 the good man and brave young sons and husbands were toiling 
 
334 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 at their weary fishing, but they took their knitting into the 
 potato-yard, and watched here how the plants came on. And 
 little Ronald and little Donald and little Elsie and little May 
 gave over paddling at the pier-end, and came home and 
 weeded the potatoes, and made believe that they were sorting 
 the lilies and roses in the MacTavish s grand garden at Glen 
 Stora Castle, away yonder in Argyleshire. 
 
 Sweet summer settled down upon the island. The old 
 folks had ease from their chronic rheumatism; the young 
 men stayed late on the quay, and the young women stayed 
 with them. Elspeth, the beauty of the island, did not bring 
 the cows home by herself now ; when she came down the glen 
 there was always some one with her : 
 
 " A voice talked with her neath the shadows cool 
 More sweet to her than song." 
 
 The potatoes throve bravely. Before you were prepared 
 for it, the plants were a foot high, covered with purple and 
 white blossom. And the children gathered them : the purple 
 ones were my Leddy MacTavish s roses, and the white ones 
 were the lilies which the saints in heaven carried in their 
 hands before the throne, ye ken. 
 
 It was a pleasant summer, and the potato harvest promised 
 bravely. For years the island had not been so merry ; there 
 was but one anxious face on it, and that was Mr. Monroe s. 
 He had been, warned of something which the others knew not 
 of. Night after night he wrestled with God in prayer, not for 
 himself, ah, no ! but for those whom God had given him. 
 He prayed that, if it were possible, the cup might pass away ; 
 and it did pass away after they had drank of it. Through the 
 darkest hour of it all, the good man s faith in God never wa 
 vered for one instant ; and he lived to know how much wiser 
 God was than he. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 335 
 
 The minister had a trouble on his mind ; they could all see 
 that. The older Christians would have had him unburden his 
 mind to them, but he would not. They were content. He 
 was a sainted man ; he was one of God s elect. They were 
 content, though they would have liked to share his secret sor 
 row with him. 
 
 One day in July he went to see one of the oldest of his 
 flock, a very old woman, with a very quiet, beautiful face ; 
 a woman who was so calmly assured of her salvation, that 
 heaven had began with her in this world. I talked with such 
 a woman in the West last year, and very awful and beautiful 
 that talk was, although the doctrines which she held were as 
 far apart from my own as the poles. 
 
 Mr. Monroe found the old woman sitting in the sun, knit 
 ting, and looking at the potatoes. The children were busy 
 weeding them, all except baby, who desired to weed with the 
 rest of them, but who was too confused in his mind as to which 
 were the potatoes, and which were the weeds, to be trusted. 
 He had been accommodated with a horn spoon, and a crab s 
 shell with a string let into it, which served for a cart, and left 
 to the care of the colley bitch. 
 
 " God save you, minister ! " said the old woman, in Gaelic. 
 " Will this brave weather not serve to raise the cloud from 
 your brow? Am not I worthy to share the secret trouble 
 which makes wrinkles on the forehead of one whom I shall 
 wait to welcome in heaven ? " 
 
 " Why should you share it ? " said Mr. Monroe, in the same 
 language ; " why should I darken the glorious evening of such 
 a life as yours, before the sunset comes ? I will not. For 
 sixty years you have known nothing but poverty and hard 
 work ; your husband, your son, and two of your grandsons, 
 have sailed away, and the sea has devoured them. Shall I 
 throw a shadow over the few days which remain between you 
 and your rest ? No." 
 
336 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " There is a cloud in the heaven somewhere," said the old 
 woman ; " your eyes are younger than mine, and you see it, 
 though I do not. It will burst over Ronaldsay : I know that 
 by your face. Minister, I would be sorry to take my reward 
 before my labor was done. Let me share your sorrow. The 
 tide flows up and down the Kyle, as of old, and the full moon 
 floods the creeks and caves under the cape. Ben More stands 
 firm in the west. What is your sorrow, minister ? " 
 
 " I cannot tell you." 
 
 " See the brave potatoes. Raise the cloud from your brow, 
 minister, and look at them. The bravest crop for years. 
 Raise the cloud from your brow, and thank the Lord with me. 
 See, they are harvesting * already." 
 
 " Harvesting ! " 
 
 " Go and see." 
 
 He went in among the potatoes. The children had done 
 weeding, and were making nosegays of the potato-flowers. 
 
 " Here s minister ! See here, sir, these ones are the French 
 roses from my lady s garden at Glenstora, and these white 
 ones are the lilies of heaven. T is a braw game, minister, is 
 it no ? " 
 
 Mr. Monroe looked at the potato halm. The potatoes were 
 harvesting with a vengeance : the leaves were getting yellow 
 and curling up black at the edges. He clasped his hands 
 together and said, " Thy will be done, O Lord ! " 
 
 Mr. Monroe had been warned of this. He had hoped and 
 hoped, and even now he continued to hope. They dug their 
 potatoes up. One half of them were rotten, the rest rotted in 
 the places where they were stored ; " graves," as we call them 
 in England. At first they hoped that they might pull through 
 
 * Harvesting. This is the expression we use in Hampshire when the 
 halm of the potato turns yellow, and it is ripe. I do not know the Scotch 
 term ; certainly not the Gaelic. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 337 
 
 the winter, and have seed for next year. That hope soon left 
 them ; in the first week in November potatoes were cheaper 
 in Ronaldsay than any one could recollect. They were all in 
 their little market at once. But at the end of the month, when 
 the leading Protectionist was trying to deny the whole busi 
 ness, there were no potatoes whatever. The potato crop had 
 failed. 
 
 I should like to meet with a poet who would make that a 
 line in one of his poems. " The potato crop had failed." How 
 we should laugh at him ! A potato is ridiculous enough, but a 
 rotten potato, bah ! 
 
 All through November the south-wind poured steadily up 
 through the Kyle, and filled Ronaldsay with mist and gloom. 
 But in the first week in December, when the days were get 
 ting towards their shortest, the north-wind came down, drove 
 the mists away, and invested the island with a cold, cruel, 
 merciless beauty. Under an inexorable brazen sky, every 
 crag came out clear and sharp as crystal, every cataract was 
 turned into a glacier, every little spouting burn on the hillside 
 into a beautiful ice palace. The lochs were frozen three feet 
 thick ; but the curling-stones lay neglected under the bed- 
 place, and the faded ribands upon the handles only served to 
 remind the young men of the merry rinks last year, before the 
 potatoes rotted and left them all starving. 
 
 The old folks died first. That was as it should be. One 
 could not complain at that ; one might envy them, but one 
 could not complain. They had had sixty years of this sort of 
 thing, and it was hard if they were not to enter into their rest 
 before the misery grew to its full head. The loss of the dear 
 old faces at the fireside was very sad, and the hearts of those 
 who were left behind .starving ached sorely ; but God had 
 taken them from the misery, which grew more terrible as the 
 winter went on, and He knew best. 
 
 15 Y 
 
338 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 Then the children began to die, and this was very bitter, 
 very, very hard to bear. The bonny bare-legged little things, 
 who had done no wrong ; who paddled in the surf, that made 
 wreaths of those infernal potato-flowers, and called them the 
 lilies of heaven. This would not do to think of. To be locked 
 up here in an island in the Atlantic, without one chance of 
 making one s voice heard till it was too late, and to see one s 
 own bonny darlings dying before one s face ! Hush ! It was 
 well for the MacTavish that these men were Scotchmen, not 
 Irishmen ! It was well for the peace of the kingdom that these 
 things happened in Ronaldsay and Lewis, and not in Manches 
 ter and Birmingham. 
 
 T was a weary Halloween for the poor souls. The men 
 who dug the graves noticed that day by day the frost got 
 deeper into the earth. The fishing-lines froze like wires, the 
 blocks refused to run, the sails were stiff as boards, and the 
 women who wearily, with blue fingers, knocked the limpets off 
 the rocks, to save themselves from starvation, began to notice 
 that even the salt water in the little pools among the rocks 
 was beginning to freeze. And they came home and told the 
 men, and the men lost heart, and went no more a-fishing. 
 How could they ? Did you ever sit hour after hour fishing, 
 with fourteen degrees of frost, and in a state of starvation ? 
 The men stayed at home, and lay in the bed-places. 
 
 And then they began to die. Yes ! The oldest of the able- 
 bodied men began to lie down, and to fall asleep, in a strange, 
 quiet way. Perfectly happy, perfectly calm. They would lie 
 for a day or two, and at last give over speaking. In the 
 morning they would be found quietly dead, without the sign 
 of a spasm on their faces. This is no novelist s fancy ; the 
 author has seen what he is describing. 
 
 All ;his time, the island lay in the bright brazen sunshine, 
 more beautiful than ever. The ducks and the snipes had fled 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 339 
 
 southward ; the curlew and the peewit had followed them, and 
 the moor was silent. But for the shadows of the cra^s and 
 
 O 
 
 corries, which sloped so long towards the north ; and for the 
 fantastic glaciers on the hillside, which in summer time were 
 wimpling burns ; one might have fancied, if one only used the 
 sense of sight, that it was spring-time ; the island had never 
 looked more beautiful. After Christmas, it got a new and 
 more awful beauty. The wind was still steady, and quiet 
 from the north ; but one day, Gil Macdonald pointed out to 
 Mr. Monroe and the MacTavish, a long low light-brown line of 
 cloud, which was backing the lower summits of the Argyleshire 
 hills, to the southeast. 
 
 For two days the dun vapor had grown and spread until it 
 had obscured the sun. When it had fairly disappeared, a 
 broad red orb, into the snow-cloud, Gil Macdonald said, " I m 
 wishing you good day, old friend, belike I ll never see ye 
 again." 
 
 In the morning the wind, which was in front of the dull 
 cloud, begun to blow. The thermometer rose to six degrees 
 of frost, and there stayed, and would come no higher in spite 
 of the southeast wind. Then the edge of the cloud reached 
 them, and the dust at the corner of the little street in the vil 
 lage begun to grow white ; and soon after the air was filled 
 with straying crystals of snow, which rose and fell, and whirled 
 about, and was driven into every cranny and corner. And 
 those who looked towards Ben More saw that the towering 
 peak was rapidly growing from brown to gray, and from gray 
 to silver. 
 
 For two days the snow came down, and then the north-wind 
 came down once more and laid his deadly icy hand on the 
 island. The sky was clear again, blue overhead, but a gleam 
 ing yellow towards the horizon. Ben More towered up over 
 the vast sheets of snow which covered the island, a tall 
 peak of ghastly white, barred with lines of purple crag. 
 
340 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 The moment the snow-cloud cleared, Mr. Monroe started 
 Gil Macdonald over the hill, through the snow, with provisions 
 to an outlying family at Loch na Craig, on the other side of the 
 mountain. The wind which had come up with the snow had 
 been strong, and the southeast side of the mountain was pretty 
 bare. Gil, the lion-hearted, made brave weather of it till he 
 came to the shoulder of the mountain which overlooks Loch 
 na Craig. But his feet went the swifter in consequence of an 
 anxiety which had taken possession of him. 
 
 He reached the shoulder of the hill and looked over into 
 the corrie of Loch na Craig. Then he sat down on a rock. 
 He saw the whole horrible disaster. 
 
 The snow which they, looking from the southeast from the 
 windward side of the mountain, had seen eddying and curling 
 and fuming before the wind which they had seen blown 
 from the steep side of the mountain nearest to them had 
 all settled down here in this corner of Loch na Craig. All 
 that Gil saw before him was a vast amphitheatre of smooth 
 white snow, and in the centre a patch of green ice about an 
 acre in extent. The sloping sides of snow represented the 
 noble corrie, and the acre of ice showing in the middle was all 
 that was to be seen of the five hundred acres of the beautiful 
 Loch na Craig. 
 
 He saw that a terrible disaster had befallen. One little 
 farm, near the head of a little glen, he thought he would force 
 his way to ; the chimney was yet showing above the snow. 
 Alone, fearless of the deadly snow sleep, bare-legged in the 
 freezing snow, he forced himself to the door of that little 
 farm-house, and, getting no answer, he broke it in. 
 
 They were all dead. The old folks and the children had 
 died before, and now the younger men and women had fol 
 lowed them. All dead. This same accident had happened 
 before. Corrie ria Craig had been filled with snow ; but then 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 341 
 
 the huts had been full with oatcake and whiskey, and the peo 
 ple had lived to make a joke of it. But now the peat was 
 still smouldering on the hearth, and Gil found six of them 
 dead. These people had died more from starvation than from 
 cold, and there were three other families down by the loch, 
 buried fifty feet deep. 
 
 Gil called out, " was any one alive ? " first in a low tone, 
 and afterwards, when not so scared at the sound of his own 
 voice, in a louder. He got no answer. He sped away to the 
 village, and told Mr. Monroe and the MacTavish, that there 
 were forty less souls on the island to starve. 
 
 Austin s fifty pounds had done good service at the begin 
 ning of the famine. It was as nothing among a population of 
 two thousand, in a state of absolute destitution, but still it was 
 a great godsend. Mr. Monroe hoped for all sorts of things, 
 for a mild winter, for Government assistance, - nay, " God 
 forgie him," for the death of the dowager, Mrs. MacTavish, 
 who had retired to Clapham, near London, and whose, death 
 would put another 800 a year at the MacTavish s disposal. 
 But it was no use hoping. Austin s fifty pounds was gone, 
 and things got worse and worse, and he wrote to the Mac 
 Tavish to come to him at once. 
 
 MacTavish came instantly. He looked round with Mr. 
 Monroe, and saw what a disaster was impending. He went 
 back to Argyleshire at once. He ordered his two sons home 
 from Cambridge, and told Mrs. MacTavish to do her duty, 
 and keep the creditors at bay, to scrimp, save, and borrow 
 every farthing she could, and send it to him in Ronaldsay. 
 He was horribly poor, and desperately in debt. He had 
 taken no rents from Ronaldsay for years ; but the Ronaldsay 
 people were flesh of his flesh, and bone of his bone ; and so 
 the great, coarse, bare-legged Highland giant came back to 
 them in their trouble, to live with them, and, if need were, 
 to die with them. 
 
342 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " Our own people, Monroe, our own flesh and blood, 
 Monroe." 
 
 As for Mr. Monroe, he well earned his crown of glory in 
 this terrible winter, even if, by long continuance in well doing, 
 he had not earned it before. I know that what I have just 
 written will be called by some people heretical, but it shall 
 stand and shall be repeated. He earned his crown : with his 
 hair growing grayer week by week ; with the people that he 
 had loved so well dying round him ; with the souls which he, 
 in his way of speaking, would have said that he had brought 
 to Christ, passing away from him too quickly for one word of 
 farewell, that noble man worked on. I feel that I am un 
 worthy to write about such a man. But there are such men. 
 If I did not know one or two of them, I would not have dared 
 to say so much about Mr. Monroe. 
 
 Let the glorious fellow be. Let his works speak for him. 
 He is no fictitious character, though I have altered his name, 
 and changed his locality. There was another hero developed 
 in this miserable winter, by name Gil Macdonald. 
 
 His restless soul, craving eagerly for work, of which there 
 was none to be got, settled down, concentrated itself, in the 
 work which Mr. Monroe and the MacTavish put before him. 
 By night and by day, through frost and through snow, he, the 
 best hill-walker in the island, sped swiftly on messages of help 
 and charity. But all the Gil Macdonalds, all the Mr. Mon 
 roes, all the MacTavishes, in the world, could not send the 
 thermometer up above freezing ; and so the people died on, 
 and despair began to settle down on all of them. 
 
 Then MacTavish s money failed. There had been little 
 enough of it at first, for he had contracted heavy debts to 
 send his sons to Cambridge. First, he heard that the bailiffs 
 were in his castle. Then his wife wrote to warn him that 
 writs were out against him, and that he might be taken. Gil 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 343 
 
 Macdonald heard this, and* merely mentioned it about among 
 the young men in conversation. They were dull, heartless, 
 and desperate enough, these young men ; but it would have 
 been a bad business for any bailiff who had tried to follow 
 T.lacTavish to Ronaldsay. 
 
 " Our own flesh and blood, Gil. Our own flesh and blood." 
 
 Things went on from bad to worse. Wearily each night 
 the MacTavish and Mr. Monroe met, only to tell each other 
 of some new disaster. One night MacTavish refused even 
 the miserable supper which he and Mr. Monroe allowed them- 
 selves, and walked sulkily up and down the room. At last he 
 broke out. He threw up his arms, and clutched his hair wildly 
 in his hands. 
 
 " I will not bear it, Monroe ; I will not bear it." 
 
 " Be quiet, MacTavish ; dinna rebel." 
 
 " I tell you that I will rebel," he answered, furiously, doing 
 exactly as Austin did on one occasion. " I tell you that I 
 will not bear it. I tell you that God is unrighteous, unjust, 
 vindictive. I have done enough to deserve his anger, but 
 these poor sheep, what have they done ? " 
 
 " Colin, Colin ! " said the old man, throwing himself down 
 before him and clasping his bare knees, " dinna blaspheme in 
 your wrath. Trust God, and think that every wild word 
 uttered now will be a worm to eat your heart till you meet 
 him." 
 
 " I will not ! There is no mercy in heaven ! My own 
 people dying like dogs, and no help. I tell you that I will 
 curse God and die ! " 
 
 " Ye may curse God, but ye 11 not die, my ain boy. He 
 will punish you for this. He will let you live, MacTavish, till 
 every wild word you have uttered just now will be a scorn 
 and a loathing to you, till you see your folly and wickedness, 
 and beg for forgiveness." 
 
344 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " Words ! words ! What is the use of cramming one s ear 
 with them ? I am hopeless and desperate, I tell you. What 
 are words to me ? Feed my people." 
 
 " Perhaps, Colin, by a little patience and humiliation they 
 might be fed. Will you listen to me ? " 
 
 The MacTavish sat down and listened, and, as he did so, his 
 face grew calmer. At last he said, " Say no more, Monroe. 
 I were worse than a dog if I did not." 
 
 He wrote the following curious letter : 
 
 " Grandmother, I am humbled. I am humbled by 
 famine. My people are dying here like sheep. I ask for 
 nothing for myself, I only beg for them. 
 
 " I ask your forgiveness, certainly. I was in the wrong, let 
 us say. My pride is so broken that I will allow anything. 
 You will gain your suit about the farms at Inverhadden. I m 
 a ruined man, and have no more money to spend on law. 
 
 " Send me a thousand pounds worth of food here instantly. 
 If you don t, we are all undone, for it is useless asking my 
 mother. Forgive me or not, grandmother, but, in God s name, 
 save the Ronaldsay folk ! 
 
 " MACTAVISH. 
 
 " To the dowager Lady Tullygoram,^ Barrock Lodge, Argyle- 
 shire" 
 
 To which Lady Tullygoram replied : 
 
 " Ablins, my ain Colin, we may both have been too tena 
 cious of our rights. A body does na like to see herself 
 wronged out of her own dower rights. The three Inverhad 
 den farms have gone with the dower lands of Tullygoram, for 
 sax centuries, and I was no justified, in the interest of future 
 dowagers, in giving up my rights. God kens, my bonny boy, 
 I bear ye no ill will. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 345 
 
 " I send you twa hundred pounds. With the help of God, 
 I will keep the Ronaldsay folk for you till better times. I 
 have cleared the execution out of your castle, and sent the 
 two lads back to their studies. Though what the deil garred 
 ye send them to a cockney university, I dinna ken. 
 
 " ELSPETH TULLYGORAM." 
 
 So poor MacTavish was humbled, and prayed to be for 
 given for the wild words he had used in his madness. Let us 
 hope he was forgiven. Better times- began to dawn on them 
 after this ; but things are not mended all at once. When the 
 tide is receding, and shipwrecked men, who have clung all 
 night to the rock, begin to hope that the worst is over, and 
 that their way to the shore is safe, often there comes some 
 angry receding wave, and once more washes high above their 
 heads, and makes them despair again. 
 
 So it was with the Ronaldsay famine. The MacTavish de 
 parted at the end of January, leaving things in a much better 
 state. In February the frost broke, and then the new enemy 
 appeared, typhus, bred by starvation and hardship. At 
 first the people began dying nearly as fast as in the famine ; 
 then it got better and then it got worse. Lady Tullygoram 
 and the MacTavish did all they could, tried to keep a popu 
 lation of two thousand for a year, with indifferent success, as 
 you may imagine. When the men got to their fishing again, 
 the island got more cheerful. But there were no seed-pota 
 toes. The last money that Lady Tullygoram could scrape 
 together was spent in buying seed-potatoes. She paid, noble 
 old body ! two hundred and seventy pounds for them in Glas 
 gow, and sent them off as fast as they could be bought. The 
 Ronaldsay folk got them all into the ground by the first week 
 in April. 
 
 Gil Macdonald waited and saw the potatoes put in. He 
 15* 
 
3-16 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 saw them come up, they looked bravely. He waited still 
 longer, everything seemed mending. Then he started 
 away, and came south to London, to find Austin. 
 
 They began to dig in September, they were all rotten 
 again, worse than last year. The sun began to south 
 towards another winter worse than the last. Lady Tully- 
 goram had spent every farthing she had. The MacTavish 
 was as good as ruined ; there was nothing but blank despair 
 before them. 
 
 A Highland Society agent came over, and talked to them 
 of fair lands sixteen thousand miles away. Some prepared to 
 go, but for those who stayed (for only a few could go) what a 
 prospect ! MacTavish had applied for the Government loan, 
 but, as he said, there was not the wildest probability of his 
 being able to set one man to work on the money before next 
 spring. Things looked blacker than ever. 
 
 Mr. Monroe preached patience. On a Sabbath day in 
 November, he preached earnestly and almost fiercely to them. 
 " I tell you," he said, " not to rebel. I tell myself not to de 
 spair. I tell (say you) the surf not to moan on the reef, 
 the wind not to whistle through the heather, the burn not 
 to roar in the linn. Still I tell you to be patient, you, 
 whose children have died before your eyes. I tell you to 
 trust in God. You and I will meet at his throne, and then 
 let none of you look me in the face, and say that I did not 
 tell you this, that you must trust in God, for he cannot be 
 unjust. 
 
 " Unjust ! Is there one man or woman in this church to-day 
 who does not envy those who have gone before us, and are 
 waiting to welcome us, when we have dreed our weird, 
 when we have done our day s work, when this tyranny is 
 overpast ? My ain people, for whom I have wrestled night 
 and day in prayer, do not rebel. The riddle may whiles be 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 347 
 
 hard to read, but trust God. Do I pray for rest ? No. I 
 only pray that I may be spared to see the end. The wild 
 winter is coming down on us once more. Let us pray that 
 we may win through it, or, if not, that we may die trusting 
 in God." 
 
 So he pleaded to them on the November Sabbath ; and in 
 the evening, in solitude, he prayed for them, prayed as he 
 had done the year before, that the cup might pass away. 
 
 On the Monday morning the answer to his prayer came. 
 Over the morning sea, across the Kyle, from the mainland, a 
 boat came plunging and leaping across the short, chopping, 
 swell, caused by the meeting of the tide and the south-wind. 
 The boat came over with a mail-bag, and in that mail-bag 
 there was only one letter, and that letter was from the Mao 
 Tavish to Mr. Monroe. 
 
 "DEAR OLD FRIEND, 
 
 " May God forgive me, if I have done wrong. What could 
 I do ? It is like tearing my heart out by the roots. It is a 
 bitter, bitter dispensation. 
 
 " I have sold the island of Ronaldsay to an Englishman. It 
 was the only chance of saving my own people my own no 
 longer from starvation. 
 
 " They say he is noble and generous. He is, I know, very 
 wealthy. He will, with his wealth, if he keeps half his prom 
 ises, make the island a prosperous and a happy one. I have 
 no heart left to say more. 
 
 " Yet I must go on. You must be gentle with him. You 
 must tell the people to be gentle and polite to him. You 
 know how proud and captious these English are. Give way 
 to his every whim. If he is properly nattered, he may be in 
 duced to settle and build a house on the island, to do by the 
 island what I, God forgive me ! have never been able to do. 
 
348 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 " He will be with you directly, Monroe. Be prepared. Get 
 him to settle there. The pampered Cockney has got some 
 whim about the island. Flatter it. O God, Monroe, that it 
 should have come to this ! " 
 
 Mr. Monroe turned to the few old peasants who were stand 
 ing round him, and said, 
 
 " Here is bitter news. The MacTavish has sold the island." 
 
 " And us with it," said the eldest of them. " Aweel, things 
 could be no waur. But hech, sirs ! For a MacTavish to sell 
 his ain flesh and blude to the Duke of Argyle ! " 
 
 " It is not the Duke of Argyle. It is an Englishman." 
 
 " It does na much matter," said the old man, " that we, who 
 beat the dust out of their coats so brawly at Dunbar, should be 
 bought up by them, body and banes, like kye." 
 
 " Which battle of Dunbar do you mean ? " said Mr. Mon 
 roe, sharply. " You seem to have forgotten either the first 
 one, or the one which we call Preston Pans. There were twa 
 battles by Dunbar, old man. Don t be a fool. Come home 
 with me ; I see hope in this." 
 
 So he did. This Englishman had money. Englishmen 
 were noble and generous, in spite of their airs and graces. 
 So Mr. Monroe, after laying his head on the table and weep 
 ing, because the MacTavish was no longer master of the island, 
 raised his head and smiled, because the island had been sold 
 to an Englishman, who was very likely an insolent and ex 
 acting person, but who, at all events, would take care that his 
 tenantry did not starve during the next winter. 
 
 Scotch pride is harder to humble than even English pride ; 
 but such a winter as 1845 - 46 will humble even a Scotchman s 
 pride. 
 
 God forgive Mr. Monroe ! The dear man went as near 
 well fiction, as any man should. He did not know even 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 349 
 
 the name of this abominable Englishman, but he represented 
 him as a model of high-hearted generosity. As for his wealth, 
 there, Mr. Monroe felt justified by representing it as 
 enormous, but unluckily he launched into figures, which he 
 should not have done ; and these figures grew under his hand, 
 and got beyond his control in the most terrible way. Some 
 times he " harked back," and tried to make them smaller by 
 ten thousand a year or so ; but the Ronaldsay people did not 
 like that ; and so at last he expressed the income of the Lon 
 don shopkeeper by waving his two hands abroad ; as much as 
 to say that your figures failed to express the immense amount 
 of income of this Cockney shopkeeper. 
 
 At this same time Mr. Monroe committed himself to the 
 statement, that the new owner of Ronaldsay was a cheese 
 monger, and what was more awful still, a cheesemonger in 
 Piccadilly. Mr. Monroe denies having ever said such a 
 thing ; but one morning he was taxed with it, and, instead of 
 boldly denying the matter on the spot, he weakly gave in to 
 it, and prevaricated. From this time it was an accepted fact, 
 that the island had been bought by a cheesemonger in Picca 
 dilly, which was a street in London. Mr. Monroe never 
 knew how this happened, but the folks were in a state of ex 
 citement, and he did not dare to contradict them. He went 
 about like a guilty man, hoping, for his soul s sake, that 
 some one might have told him, that it was a cheesemonger in 
 Piccadilly, and that he might have forgotten it. He knew 
 nothing of the new owner of Ronaldsay, not even his name ; 
 nothing, save that he might be expected any day ; therefore 
 this astounding canard about the cheesemonger was annoying. 
 His object was to prepossess the people in favor of the new 
 owner, and to get that new owner to stay on the island. At 
 this time the good man was overheard to wish that that feck 
 less billie, Gil Macdonald, had stayed at hame, and not gone 
 daundering down South. 
 
350 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 But at last the cheesemonger from Piccadilly came, and 
 took possession of his property after this manner : 
 
 One morning, in the end of November, five or six days 
 after the receipt of the MacTavish s letter, it was reported to 
 him that a steamer had rounded the south point of Donaldsay, 
 and was bearing up for Ronaldsay. She carried no pennant. 
 It was not the Shoals and Quicksands Lords coming their 
 rounds. This was your cheesemonger coming to take pos 
 session. 
 
 So it was. A small screw steamer came up, and eased off 
 the pier of Ronaldsay. Mr. Monroe tumbled into a boat, 
 went on board, and clambered into the waist. 
 
 Some one came forward to receive him, Gil Macdonald. 
 No other. Mr. Monroe started back ; but the cheesemonger 
 fiction had been so burnt into his brain by repetition, that he 
 said, 
 
 " Why, Gil ! ye telled me in your letter that ye were in 
 the gun-making trade ! guns and cheeses ? Is your master 
 a general dealer, then ? " 
 
 He passed on towards the cheesemonger and his wife, who 
 stood on the quarter-deck. But there was no cheesemonger 
 there : Austin Elliot and his wife Eleanor stood before him ! 
 Austin said, " Dear Mr. Monroe, I am your new landlord, and 
 I am come to live and to die with you." And the minister 
 cast his hat on the deck, and said, " God has been very good 
 to us, Mr. Elliot, God has been very good to us." 
 
 And so just when a story gets to be worth telling it has 
 come to an end. I have told you how Austin Elliot, generous 
 and ambitious, got fed on wind, would have gone Lord 
 knows where, if it had not been for his dog. Now that he 
 has developed into a useful man, we must leave him. The 
 story of the work which he and Eleanor did in Ronaldsay 
 would be but dull reading. 
 
AUSTIN ELLIOT. 351 
 
 Once more the morning sun rises behind the hills of Argyle- 
 shire ; once more the summer s morning raises the peat-smoke 
 from a thousand cottages in ten thousand purple valleys ; once 
 more the dawn smites the peak of Ben More of Ronaldsay, 
 and creeps down, until the island awakens and the men of 
 Ronaldsay come abroad to their labor. 
 
 But it shines on a new Ronaldsay now. On vast tracts 
 of young larch plantations, emerald green, among the dark 
 heather ; on broad yellow patches of soil turned up on the 
 lower hillsides, where they are trenching the land for agricul 
 ture; better still, on sheets of rye and clover, giving good 
 promise of a noble harvest. No more famine, no more dull, 
 heart-gnawing sorrow in Ronaldsay now. " He may do any 
 thing with Eleanor s money," said old Mr. Hilton, on his 
 death -bed, little dreaming what he would do with it, little 
 dreaming that his ill-earned money would be spent in making 
 the desert of Ronaldsay to blossom like a rose. 
 
 See the morning comes lower yet and lower, until it shines 
 strong and full on a new castle, built on the rise behind the 
 village ; on a broad stone terrace ; on a little dark lady who 
 walks abroad in the dew to look at her flowers, and leads a 
 brave little lad of three years old by the hand. 
 
 A peaceful, calm little lady, dressed all in gray. She says 
 to the toddling boy, " Come on, Charles ; let us be ready to 
 meet father as he comes from the hill ! " And presently Aus 
 tin comes brushing through the heather towards her, and takes 
 his boy in his arms; so he and Eleanor walk slowly home 
 along the terrace. 
 
 Who are these aloft here on the windy mountain in the 
 morning air? A strange pair. One is a gigantic man, a 
 kilted Highlander, with a square, thoughtful face, who is lean 
 ing in repose against a rock ; the other is also a tall man, but 
 
352 AUSTIN ELLIOT. 
 
 stone blind, who turns and feels in the dark for his companion, 
 though the level sun is blazing on his face. 
 
 " And so ye re no going to leave us, my Lord," says the 
 Highlander. " Dinna leave us, my Lord ; you have made 
 yourself a necesssity to us. I never flattered any man born 
 of woman ; but I must say this much, you would be sair 
 missed in Ronaldsay. Why the bairns would greet and the 
 dogs would howl if they missed your kind dark face at the 
 quay end when the boats come hame. Dinna gang South, my 
 Lord, into that weary hurly-burly, with a its Whiggeries and 
 Toryisms and Papistries. Stay with them that love you, and 
 play on your bonny new harp." 
 
 " I think I will live and die in Ronaldsay, Gil," said the blind 
 man. " It is kind of you to lead me up here. I am looking 
 towards the sun, now, for there is something in my eyes, 
 which I think must be light. I must be looking towards 
 those purple mountains on the mainland you tell me of. I 
 love to look towards the east, Gil ; for the light which will 
 open my eyes, and show me the faces of those I have loved so 
 well, will come from thence, on the morning of the Resurrec 
 tion." 
 
 So Lord Edward Barty and Gil Macdonald stood on the 
 shoulder of Ben More, and looked eastward ; while Robin, the 
 dog, sat like a statue among the heather at their feet, and 
 looked eastward also. And so the whole story comes to an 
 end. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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