ATLANTIC TALES 
 
 // 
 A COLLECTION OF STORIES 
 
 From the Atlantic Monthly. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 TICKNOR AND FIELDS 
 1866. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1865, by 
 
 TICKNOR AND FIELDS, 
 in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 
 
 UNIVERSITY PRESS: WELCH, BIGELOW, & Co., 
 CAMBRIDGE. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 MY DOUBLE ; AND HOW HE UNDID 
 
 ME 
 
 THE DIAMOND LENS 
 
 LIFE IN THE IRON-MILLS . . . 
 
 THE PURSUIT OF KNOWLEDGE UN- 
 DER DIFFICULTIES .... 
 
 A RAFT THAT NO MAN MADE . . 
 WHY THOMAS WAS DISCHARGED . 
 VICTOR AND JACQUELINE . . . 
 
 ELKANAH BREWSTER'S TEMPTA- 
 TION 
 
 TIE QUEEN OF THE RED CHESS- 
 MEN 
 
 MlSS LUCINDA 
 
 THE DENSLOW PALACE .... 
 FR T END ELI'S DAUGHTER . . . 
 A HALF-LIFE AND HALF A LIFE . 
 THE MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY . 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Edward Everett Hale I 
 
 Fitz James O'Brien . 21 
 
 Miss R. B. Harding 50 
 
 Gail Hamilton . . 93 
 
 < 
 
 Robert T. S. Lowell . 147 
 
 George Arnold . . 162 
 
 Miss Caroline Chesebro 1 80 
 
 Charles Nordhoff 
 
 248 
 
 Miss Lucretia P. Hale 271 
 
 Miss Rose Terry . . 299 
 
 J. D. Whelpley . . 336 
 
 Bayard Taylor . . 367 
 
 Miss E. H. Appleton 398 
 
 Edward Everett Hale 448 
 
 M11967 
 
MY DOUBLE; 
 
 AND HOW HE UNDID ME 
 
 T is not often that I trouble you, my readers. I 
 should not trouble you now, but for the importu- 
 nities of my wife, who " feels to insist " that a duty 
 to society is unfulfilled, till I have told why I had to have a 
 double, and how he undid me. She is sure, she says, that 
 intelligent persons cannot understand that pressure upon 
 public servants which alone drives any man into the em- 
 ployment of a double. And while I fear she thinks, at the 
 bottom of her heart, that my fortunes will never be remade, 
 she has a faint hope, that, as another Rasselas, I may teach 
 a lesson to future publics, from which they may profit, 
 though we die. Owing to the behavior of my double, or, if 
 you please, to that public pressure which compelled me to 
 employ him, I have plenty of leisure to write this communi- 
 cation. 
 
 I am, or rather was, a minister, of the Sandemanian con- 
 nection. I was settled in the active, wide-awake town of 
 Naguadavick, on one of the finest water-powers in Maine. 
 We used used to call it a Western town in the heart of the 
 civilization of New England. A charming place it was and 
 is. A spirited, brave young parish had I ; and it seemed as 
 if we might have all "the joy of eventful living" to our 
 hearts' content. 
 
 Alas ! how little we knew on the day of my ordination, 
 
 I A 
 
2 ,->., My Double ; and how ke undid me. 
 
 and^ in those halcyon moments of our first housekeeping ! 
 {To -be. 1 the confidential friend in a hundred families in the 
 town, cutting the social trifle, as my friend Haliburton 
 says, " from the top of the whipped-syllabub to the bottom 
 of the sponge-cake, which is the foundation," to keep 
 abreast of the thought of the age in one's study, and to do 
 one's best on Sunday to interweave that thought with the 
 active life of an active town, and to inspirit both and make 
 both infinite by glimpses of the Eternal Glory, seemed such 
 an exquisite forelock into one's life ! Enough to do, and all 
 so real and so grand ! If this vision could only have lasted. 
 The truth is, that this vision was not in itself a delusion, 
 nor, indeed, half bright enough. If one could only have 
 been left to do his own business, the vision would have ac- 
 complished itself and brought out new paraheliacal visions, 
 each as bright as the original. The misery was and is, as 
 we found out, I and Polly, before long, that, besides the 
 vision, and besides the usual human and finite failures in 
 life, (such as breaking the old pitcher that came over in the 
 " Mayflower," and putting into the fire the Alpenstock with 
 which her father climbed Mont Blanc,) besides these, I 
 say, (imitating the style of Robinson Crusoe,) there were 
 pitchforked in on us a great rowen-heap of humbugs, 
 handed down from some unknown seed-time, in which we 
 were expected, and I chiefly, to fulfil certain public functions 
 before the community, of the character of those fulfilled by 
 the third row of supernumeraries who stand behind the 
 Sepoys in the spectacle of the " Cataract of the Ganges." 
 They were the duties, in a word, which one performs as 
 member of one or another social class or subdivision, wholly 
 distinct from what one does as A. by himself A. What in- 
 visible power put these functions on me, it would be very 
 hard to tell. But such power there was and is. And I had 
 not been at work a year before I found I was living two 
 lives, one real and one merely functional, for two sets of 
 people, one my parish, whom I loved, and the other a vague 
 public, for whom I did not care two straws. All this was in 
 
My Double ; and how he zmdid me. 3 
 
 a vague notion, which everybody had and has, that this sec- 
 ond life would eventually bring out some great results, un- 
 known at present, to somebody somewhere. 
 
 Crazed by this duality of life, I first read Dr. Wigan on 
 the " Duality of the Brain," hoping that I could train one 
 side of my head to do these outside jobs, and the other to 
 do my intimate and real duties. For Richard Greenough 
 once told me, that, in studying for the statue of Franklin, 
 he found that the left side of the great man's face was philo- 
 sophic and reflective, and the right side funny and smiling. 
 If you will go and look at the bronze statue, you will find he 
 has repeated this observation there for posterity. The east- 
 ern profile is the portrait of the statesman Franklin, the 
 western of Poor Richard. But Dr. Wigan does not go into 
 these niceties of this subject, and I failed. It was then, 
 that, on my wife's suggestion, I resolved to look out for a 
 Double. 
 
 I was, at first, singularly successful. We happened to be 
 recreating at Stafford Springs that summer. We rode out 
 one day, for one of the relaxations of that watering-place, to 
 the great Monson Poor-House. We were passing through 
 one of the large halls, when my destiny was fulfilled ! I 
 saw my man ! 
 
 He was not shaven. He had on no spectacles. He was 
 dressed in a green baize roundabout and faded blue over- 
 alls, worn sadly at the knee. But I saw at once that he was 
 of my height, five feet four and a half. He had black hair, 
 worn off by his hat. So have and have not I. He stooped 
 in walking. So do I. His hands were large, and mine. 
 And choicest gift of Fate in all he had, not " a straw- 
 berry-mark on his left arm," but a cut from a juvenile brick- 
 bat over his right eye, slightly affecting the play of that eye- 
 brow. Reader, so have I ! My fate was sealed ! 
 
 A word with Mr. Holley, one of the inspectors, settled the 
 whole thing. It proved that this Dennis Shea was a harm- 
 less, amiable fellow, of the class known as shiftless, who had 
 sealed his fate by marrying a dumb wife, who was at that 
 
4 My Double ; and how he undid me. 
 
 moment ironing in the laundry. Before I left Stafford, I 
 had hired both for five years. We had applied to Judge 
 Pynchon, then the probate judge at Springfield, to change 
 the name of Dennis Shea to Frederic Ingham. We had 
 explained to the Judge, what was the precise truth, that an 
 eccentric gentleman wished to adopt Dennis under this new 
 name into his family. It never occurred to him that Dennis 
 might be more than fourteen years old. And thus, to 
 shorten this preface, when we returned one night to my par- 
 sonage at Naguadavick, there entered Mrs. Ingham, her 
 new dumb laundress, myself, who am Mr. Frederic Ingham, 
 and my double, who was Mr. Frederic Ingham by as good 
 right as I. 
 
 Oh, the fun we had the next morning in shaving his beard 
 to my pattern, cutting his hair to match mine, and teaching 
 him how to wear and how to take off gold-bowed spectacles ! 
 Really, they were electro-plate and the glass was plain (for 
 the poor fellow's eyes were excellent). Then in four suc- 
 cessive afternoons I taught him four speeches. I had found 
 these would be quite enough for the supernumerary-Sepoy 
 line of life, and it was well for me they were. For though 
 he was good-natured, he was very shiftless, and it was, as 
 our national proverb says, " like pulling teeth " to teach him. 
 But at the end of the next week he could say, with quite my 
 easy and frisky air, 
 
 1. "Very well, thank you. And you ?" This for an an- 
 swer to casual salutations. 
 
 2. " I am very glad you liked it." 
 
 3. " There has been so much said, and, on the whole, so 
 well said, that I will not occupy the time." 
 
 4. " I agree, in general, with my friend the other side of 
 the room." 
 
 At first I had a feeling that I was going to be at great 
 cost for clothing him. But it proved, of course, at once, 
 that, whenever he was out, I should be at home. And I 
 went, during the bright period of his success, to so few of 
 those awful pageants which require a black dress-coat and 
 
My Double ; and how he undid me. 5 
 
 what the ungodly call, after Mr. Dickens, a white choker, 
 that in the happy retreat of my own dressing-gowns and 
 jackets my days went by as happily anfl cheaply as those of 
 another Thalaba. And Polly declares there was never a 
 year when the tailoring cost so little. He lived (Dennis, 
 not Thalaba) in his wife's room over the kitchen. He had 
 orders never to show himself at that window. When he 
 appeared in the front of the house, I retired to my sanctis- 
 simum and my dressing-gown. In short, the Dutchman 
 and his wife, in the old weather-box, had not less to do with 
 each other than he and I. He made the furnace-fire and 
 split the wood before daylight ; then he went to sleep again, 
 and slept late ; then came for orders, with a red silk ban- 
 danna tied round his head, with his overalls on, and his 
 dress-coat and spectacles off. If we happened to be inter- 
 rupted, no one guessed that he was Frederic Ingham as well 
 as I ; and, in the neighborhood, there grew up an impres- 
 sion that the minister's Irishman worked day-times in the 
 factory-village at New Coventry. After 1 had given him 
 his orders, I never saw him till the next day. 
 
 I launched him by sending him to a meeting of the En- 
 lightenment Board. The Enlightenment Board consists -of 
 seventy-four members, of whom sixty-seven are necessary 
 to form a quorum. One becomes a member under the reg- 
 ulations laid down in old Judge Dudley's will. I became 
 one by being ordained pastor of a church in Naguadavick. 
 You see you cannot help yourself, if you would. At this 
 particular time we had had four successive meetings, aver- 
 aging four hours each, wholly occupied in whipping in a 
 quorum. At the first only eleven men were present ; at the 
 next, by force of three circulars, twenty-seven ; at the third, 
 thanks to two days' canvassing by Auchmuty and myself, 
 begging men to come, we had sixty. Half the others were 
 in Europe. But without a quorum we could do nothing. 
 All the rest of us waited grimly for our four hours, and ad- 
 journed without any action. At the fourth meeting we had 
 flagged, and only got fifty-nine together. But on the first 
 
6 My Double ; and how he undid me. 
 
 appearance of my double, whom I sent on this fatal Mon- 
 day to the fifth meeting, he wa's the sixty-seventh man 
 who entered the roo^m. He was greeted with a storm of 
 applause ! The poor fellow had missed his way, read the 
 street signs ill through his spectacles, (very ill, in fact, with- 
 out them,) and had not dared to inquire. He entered 
 the room, finding the president and secretary holding to 
 their chairs two judges of the Supreme Court, who were 
 also members ex officio, and were begging leave to go away. 
 On his entrance all was changed. Presto, the by-laws were 
 amended, and the Western property was given away. No- 
 body stopped to converse with him. He voted, as I had 
 charged him to do, in every instance, with the minority. I 
 won new laurels as a man of sense, though a little unpunc- 
 tual, and Dennis, alias Ingham, returned to the parsonage, 
 astonished to see with how little wisdom the world is gov- 
 erned. He cut a few of my parishioners in the street ; but 
 he had his glasses off, and I am known to be near-sighted. 
 Eventually he recognized them more readily than I. 
 
 I "set him again" at the exhibition of the New Coventry 
 Academy ; and here he undertook a " speaking part," as, 
 in my boyish, worldly days, I remember the bills used to say 
 of Mile. Celeste. We are all trustees of the New Coventry 
 Academy ; and there has lately been " a good deal of feel- 
 ing" because the Sandemanian trustees did not regularly 
 attend the exhibitions. It has been intimated, indeed, that 
 the Sandemanians are leaning towards Free-Will, and that 
 we have, therefore, neglected these semiannual exhibitions, 
 while there is no doubt that Auchmuty last year went to 
 Commencement at Waterville. Now the head master at 
 New Coventry is a real good fellow, who knows a Sanskrit 
 root when he sees it, and often cracks etymologies with me, 
 so that, in strictness, I ought to go to their exhibitions. 
 But think, reader, of sitting through three long July days in 
 that Academy chapel, following the programme from 
 
 TUESDAY MORNING. English Composition. " SUNSHINE." 
 Miss Jones. 
 
My Double ; and how he undid me. 7 
 
 round to 
 
 Trio on Three Pianos. Duel from the Opera of " Midshipman 
 Easy.*' Marryatt. 
 
 coming in at nine, Thursday evening ! Think of this, reader, 
 for men who know the world is trying to go backward, and 
 who would give their lives if they could help it on ! Well ! 
 The double had succeeded so well at the Board, that I sent 
 him to the Academy. (Shade of Plato, pardon !) He ar- 
 rived early on Tuesday, when, indeed, few but mothers and 
 clergymen are generally expected, and returned in the even- 
 ing to us, covered with honors. He had dined at the right 
 hand of the chairman, and he spoke in high terms of the 
 repast. The chairman had expressed his interest in the 
 French conversation. " I am very glad you liked it," said 
 Dennis ; and the poor chairman, abashed, supposed the ac- 
 cent had been wrong. At the end of the day, the gentlemen 
 present had been called upon for speeches, the Rev. Fred- 
 eric Ingham first, as it happened ; upon which Dennis had 
 risen, and had said, " There has been so much said, and, 
 on the whole, so well said, that I will not occupy the time." 
 The girls were delighted, because Dr. Dabney, the year be- 
 fore, had given them at this occasion a scolding on impro- 
 priety of behavior at lyceum lectures. They all declared 
 Mr. Ingham was a love, and so handsome ! (Dennis is 
 good-looking.) Three of them, with arms behind the others' 
 waists, followed him up to the wagon he rode home in ; and 
 a little girl with a blue sash had been sent to give him a 
 rosebud. After this cttbut in speaking, he went to the ex- 
 hibition for two days more, to the mutual satisfaction of all 
 concerned. Indeed, Polly reported that he had pronounced 
 the trustees' dinners of a higher grade than those of the par- 
 sonage. When the next term began, I found six of the 
 Academy girls had obtained permission to come across the 
 river and attend our church. But this arrangement did not 
 long continue. 
 After this he went to several Commencements for me, and 
 
8 My Double ; and how he undid me. 
 
 ate the dinners provided ; he sat through three of our 
 Quarterly Conventions for me, always voting judiciously, 
 by the simple rule mentioned above, of siding with the mi- 
 nority. And I, meanwhile, who had before been losing 
 caste among my friends, as holding myself aloof from the 
 associations of " the Body," began to rise in everybody's 
 favor. "Ingham's a good fellow, always on hand"; 
 " never talks much, but does the right thing at the right 
 time " ; " is not as unpunctual as he used to be, he comes 
 early, and sits through to the end." " He has got over his 
 old talkative habit, too. I spoke to a friend of his about it 
 once ; and I think Ingham took it kindly," etc., etc. 
 
 This voting power of Dennis was particularly valuable at 
 the quarterly meetings of the Proprietors of the Naguadavick 
 Ferry. My wife inherited from her father some shares in 
 that enterprise, which is not yet fully developed, though it 
 doubtless will become a very valuable property. The law 
 of Maine then forbade stockholders to appear by proxy at 
 such meetings. Polly disliked to go, not being, in fact, a 
 " hens'-rights hen," and transferred her stock to me. I, 
 after going once, disliked it more than she. But Dennis 
 went to the next meeting, and liked it very much. He said 
 the arm-chairs were good, the collation good, and the free 
 rides to stockholders pleasant. He was a little frightened 
 when they first took him upon one of the ferry-boats, but 
 after two or three quarterly meetings he became quite 
 brave. 
 
 Thus far I never had any difficulty with him. Indeed, 
 being of that type which is called shiftless, he was only too 
 happy to be told daily what to do, and to be charged not to 
 be forthputting or in any way original in his discharge of 
 that duty. He learned, however, to discriminate between 
 the lines of his life, and very much preferred these stock- 
 holders' meetings and trustees' dinners and Commencement 
 collations to another set of occasions, from which he used to 
 beg off most piteously. Our excellent brother, Dr. Fillmore, 
 had taken a notion at this time that our Sandemanian 
 
My Double; and how he undid me. 9 
 
 churches needed more expression of mutual sympathy. He 
 insisted upon it that we were remiss. He said, that, if the 
 Bishop came to preach at Naguadavick, all the Episcopal 
 clergy of the neighborhood were present ; if Dr. Pond 
 came, all the Congregational clergymen turned out to hear 
 him ; if Dr. Nichols, all the Unitarians ; and he thought 
 we owed it to each other, that, whenever there was an occa- 
 sional service at a Sandemanian church, the other brethren 
 should all, if possible, attend. " It looked well," if nothing 
 more. Now this really meant that I had not been to hear 
 one of Dr. Fillmore's lectures on the Ethnology of Religion. 
 He forgot that he did not hear one of my course on the 
 " Sandemanianism of Anselm." But I felt badly when he 
 said it ; and afterwards I always made Dennis go to hear 
 all the brethren preach, when I was not preaching myself. 
 This was what he took exceptions to, the only thing, as I 
 said, which he ever did except to. Now came the advan- 
 tage of his long morning-nap, and of the green tea with 
 which Polly supplied the kitchen. But he would plead, so 
 humbly, to be let off, only from one or two ! I never ex- 
 cepted him, however. I knew the lectures were of value, 
 and I thought it best he should be able to keep the con- 
 nection. 
 
 Polly is more rash than I am, as the reader has observed 
 in the outset of this memoir. She risked Dennis one night 
 under the eyes of her own sex. Governor Gorges had al- 
 ways been very kind to us ; and when he gave his great 
 annual party to the town, asked us. I confess I hated to 
 go. I was deep in the new volume of Pfeiffer's " Mystics," 
 which Haliburton had just sent me from Boston. " But 
 how rude," said Polly, " not to return the Governor's civility 
 and Mrs. Gorges's, when they will be sure to ask why you 
 are away ! " Still I demurred, and at last she, with the wit 
 of Eve and of Semiramis conjoined, let me off by saying, 
 that, if I would go in with her, and sustain the initial con- 
 versations with the Governor and the ladies staying there, 
 she would risk Dennis for the rest of the evening. And 
 i* 
 
io My Double ; and how he undid me. 
 
 that was just what we did. She took Dennis in training all 
 that afternoon, instructed him in fashionable conversation, 
 cautioned him against the temptations of the supper-table, 
 
 and at nine in the evening he drove us all down in the 
 carryall. I made the grand star-<?/2/r<& with Polly and the 
 pretty Walton girls, who were staying with us. We had put 
 Dennis into a great rough top-coat, without his glasses, 
 and the girls never dreamed, in the darkness, of looking at 
 him. He sat in the carriage, at the door, while we entered. 
 I did the agreeable to Mrs. Gorges, was introduced to her 
 niece, Miss Fernanda, I complimented Judge Jeffries on 
 his decision in the great case of D'Aulnay vs. Laconia Min- 
 ing Co., I stepped into the dressing-room for a moment, 
 
 stepped out for another, walked home, after a nod with 
 Dennis, and tying the horse to a pump; and while I 
 walked home, Mr. Frederic Ingham, my double, stepped in 
 through the library into the Gorges' grand saloon. 
 
 Oh ! Polly died of laughing as she told me of it at mid- 
 night ! And even here, where I have to teach my hands to 
 hew the beech for stakes to fence our cave, she dies of laugh- 
 ing as she recalls it, and says that single occasion was 
 worth all we have paid for it. Gallant Eve that she is ! 
 She joined Dennis at the library-door, and in an instant 
 presented him to Dr. Ochterlony, from Baltimore, who was 
 on a visit in town, and was talking with her as Dennis came 
 in. " Mr. Ingham would like to hear what you were telling 
 us about your success among the German population." And 
 Dennis bowed and said, in spite of a scowl from Polly, " I 'm 
 very glad you liked it." But Dr. Ochterlony did not ob- 
 serve, and plunged into the tide of explanation, Dennis 
 listening like a prime-minister, and bowing like a mandarin, 
 
 which is, I suppose, the same thing. Polly declared it 
 was just like Haliburton's Latin conversation with the Hun- 
 garian minister, of which he is very fond of telling. " Qucene 
 sit historia Reformationis in Ungarid ? " quoth Haliburton, 
 after some thought. And his confrere replied gallantly,. 
 "In seculo decimo tertio? etc., etc., etc. ; and from decimo 
 
My Double ; and how he undid me. 1 1 
 
 tertio * to the nineteenth century and a half lasted till the 
 oysters came. So was it that before Dr. Ochterlony came 
 to the " success," or near it, Governor Gorges came to Den- 
 nis and asked him to hand Mrs. Jeffries down to supper, a 
 request which he heard with great joy. 
 
 Polly was skipping round the room, I guess, gay as a lark. 
 Auchmuty came to her " in pity for poor Ingham," who was 
 so bored by the stupid pundit, and Auchmuty could not 
 understand why I stood it so long. But when Dennis took 
 Mrs. Jeffries down, Polly could not resist standing near 
 them. He was a little flustered, till the sight of the eatables 
 and drinkables gave him the same Mercian courage which 
 it gave Diggory. A little excited then, he attempted one or 
 . two of his speeches to the Judge's lady. But little he knew 
 how hard it was to get in even a promptu there edgewise. 
 " Very well, I thank you," said he, after the eating elements 
 were adjusted ; " and you ? " And then did not he have to 
 hear about the mumps, and the measles, and arnica, and 
 belladonna, and chamomile-flower, and dodecatheon, till she 
 changed oysters for salad, and then about the old practice 
 and the new, and what her sister said, and what her sister's 
 friend said, and what the physician to her sister's friend said, 
 and then what was said by the brother of the sister of the 
 physician of the friend of her sister, exactly as if it had been 
 in Ollendorff ? There was a moment's pause, as she declined 
 Champagne. " I am very glad you liked it," said Dennis 
 again, which he never should have said, but to one who 
 complimented a sermon. " Oh ! you are so sharp, Mr. Ing- 
 ham ! No ! I never drink any wine at all, except some- 
 times in summer a little currant spirits, from our own 
 currants, you know. My own mother, that is, I call her 
 my own mother, because, you know, I do not remember," 
 etc., etc., etc. ; till they came to the candied orange at the 
 end of the feast, when Dennis, rather confused, thought 
 
 * Which means, " In the thirteenth century," my dear little bell-and-coral 
 reader. You have rightly guessed that the question means, "What is the his- 
 tory of the Reformation in Hungary? " 
 
12 My Double; and how he undid me. 
 
 he must say something, and tried No. 4, "I agree, in 
 general, with my friend the other side of the room," which 
 he never should have said but at a public meeting. But 
 Mrs. Jeffries, who never listens expecting to understand, 
 caught him up instantly with, " Well, I 'm sure my husband 
 returns the compliment ; he always agrees with you, 
 though we do worship with the Methodists ; but you 
 know, Mr. Ingham," etc., etc., etc., till the move was made 
 up-stairs ; and as Dennis led her through the hall, he was 
 scarcely understood by any but Polly, as he said, " There 
 has been so much said, and, on the whole, so well said, that 
 I will not occupy the time." 
 
 His great resource the rest of the evening was, standing 
 in the library, carrying on animated conversations with one 
 and another in much the same way. Polly had initiated 
 him in the mysteries of a discovery of mine, that it is not 
 necessary to finish your sentences in a crowd, but by a sort 
 of mumble, omitting sibilants and dentals. This, indeed, 
 if your words fail you, answers even in public extempore 
 speech, but better where other talking is going on. Thus, 
 "We missed you at the Natural-History Society, Ing- 
 ham." Ingham replies, "I am very gligloglum, that is, 
 that you were mmmmm." By gradually dropping the voice, 
 the interlocutor is compelled to supply the answer. " Mrs. 
 Ingham, I hope your friend Augusta is better." Augusta 
 has not been ill. Polly cannot think of explaining, however, 
 and answers, " Thank you, Ma'am ; she is very rearason 
 wewahwewoh," in lower and lower tones. And Mrs. Throck- 
 morton, who forgot the subject of which she spoke as soon 
 as she asked the question, is quite satisfied. Dennis could 
 see into the card-room, and came to Polly to ask if he might 
 not go and play all-fours. But, of course, she sternly re- 
 fused. At midnight they came home delighted. Polly, as 
 I said, wild to tell me the story of victory ; only both the 
 pretty Walton girls said, " Cousin Frederick, you did not 
 come near me all the evening." 
 
 We always called him Dennis at home, for convenience, 
 
My Double; and how he undid me. 1 3 
 
 though his real name was Frederic Ingham, as I have ex- 
 plained. When the election-day came round, however, I 
 found that by some accident there was only one Frederic 
 Ingham's name on the voting-list ; and, as I was quite 
 busy that day in writing some foreign letters to Halle, I 
 thought I would forego my privilege of suffrage,, and stay 
 quietly at home, telling Dennis that he might use the record 
 on the voting-list and vote. I gave him a ticket, which I 
 told him he might use, if he liked to. That was that very 
 sharp election in Maine which the readers of the " Atlantic " 
 so well remember, and it had been intimated in public that 
 the ministers would do well not to appear at the polls. Of 
 course, after that, we had to appear by self or proxy. Still, 
 Naguadavick was not then a city, and this standing in a 
 double queue at town-meeting several hours to vote was a 
 bore of the first water ; and so, when I found that there was 
 but one Frederic Ingham on the list, and that one of us must 
 give up, I stayed at home and finished the letters, (which, in- 
 deed, procured for Fothergill his coveted appointment of 
 Professor of Astronomy at Leavenworth,) and I gave Den- 
 nis, as we called him, the chance. Something in the matter 
 gave a good deal of popularity to the Frederic Ingham 
 name ; and at the adjourned election, next week, Frederic 
 Ingham was chosen to the legislature. Whether this was I 
 ' or Dennis, I never really knew. My friends seemed to think 
 it was I ; but I felt, that, as Dennis had done the popular 
 thing, he was entitled to the honor ; so I sent him to Au- 
 gusta when the time came, and he took the oaths. And a 
 very valuable member he made. They appointed him on 
 the Committee on Parishes ; but I wrote a letter for him, 
 resigning, on the ground that he took an interest in our 
 claim to the stumpage in the minister's sixteenths of Gore 
 A, next No. 7, in the loth Range. He never made any 
 speeches, and always voted with the minority, which was 
 what he was sent to do. He made me and himself a great 
 many good friends, some of whom I did not afterwards rec- 
 ognize as quickly as Dennis did my parishioners. On one 
 
14 My Double ; and how he undid me. 
 
 or two occasions, when there was wood to saw at home, I 
 kept him at home ; but I took those occasions to go to Au- 
 gusta myself. Finding myself often in his vacant seat at 
 these times, I watched the proceedings with a good deal of 
 care ; and once was so much excited that I delivered my 
 somewhat celebrated speech on the Central School-District 
 question, a speech of which the " State of Maine " printed 
 some extra copies. I believe there is no formal rule permit- 
 ting strangers to speak ; but no one objected. 
 
 Dennis himself, as I said, never spoke at all. But our 
 experience this session led me to think, that, if, by some 
 such " general understanding " as the reports speak of in 
 legislation daily, every member of Congress might leave a 
 double to sit through those deadly sessions, and to answer 
 to roll-calls and do the legitimate party-voting, which ap- 
 pears stereotyped in the regular list of Ashe, Bocock, Black, 
 etc., we should gain decidedly in working-power. As things 
 stand, the saddest state-prison I ever visit is that Repre- 
 sentatives' Chamber in Washington. If a man leaves for an 
 hour, twenty " correspondents " may be howling,- " Where 
 was Mr. Pendergrast when the Oregon bill passed ? " And 
 if poor Pendergrast stays there ! Certainly, the worst use 
 you can make of a man is to put him in prison ! 
 
 I know, indeed, that public men of the highest rank have 
 resorted to this expedient long ago. Dumas's novel of the 
 w Iron Mask" turns on the brutal imprisonment of Louis the 
 Fourteenth's double. There seems little -doubt, in our own 
 history, that it was the real General Pierce who shed tears 
 when the delegate from Lawrence explained to him the suf- 
 ferings of the people there, and only General Pierce's 
 double who had given the orders for the assault on that 
 town, which was invaded the next day. My charming 
 friend, George Withers, has, I am almost sure, a double, 
 who preaches his afternoon sermons for him. This is the 
 reason that the theology often varies so from that of the 
 forenoon. But that double is almost as charming as the 
 original. Some of the most well-defined men, who stand 
 
My Double ; and how he undid me. 15 
 
 out most prominently on the background of history, are in 
 this way stereoscopic men, who owe their distinct relief to 
 the slight differences between the doubles. All this I know. 
 My present suggestion is simply the great extension of the 
 system, so that all public machine-work may be done by it 
 But I see I loiter on my story, which is rushing to the 
 plunge. Let me stop an instant more, however, to recall, 
 were it only to myself, that charming year while all was yet 
 well. After the double had become a matter of course, for 
 nearly twelve months before he undid me, what a year it 
 was ! Full of active life, full of happy love, of the hardest 
 work, of the sweetest sleep, and the fulfilment of so many 
 of the fresh aspirations and dreams of boyhood ! Dennis 
 went to every school-committee meeting, and sat through 
 all those late wranglings which used to keep me up till mid- 
 night and awake till morning. He attended all the lectures 
 to which foreign exiles sent me tickets begging me to come 
 for the love of Heaven and of Bohemia. He accepted and 
 used all the tickets for charity concerts which were sent to 
 me. He appeared everywhere where it was specially desir- 
 able that "our denomination," or "our party," or "our class," 
 or "our family," or "our street," or "our town," or "our 
 county," or " our State," should be fully represented. And 
 I fell back to that charming life which in boyhood one 
 dreams of, when he supposes he shall do his own duty and 
 make his own sacrifices, without being tied up with those of 
 other people. My rusty Sanskrit, Arabic, Hebrew, Greek, 
 Latin, French, Italian, Spanish, German, and English began 
 to take polish. Heavens ! how little I had done with them 
 while I attended to my public duties ! My calls on my pa- 
 rishioners became the friendly, frequent, homelike sociabili- 
 ties they were meant to be, instead of the hard work of a 
 man goaded to desperation by the sight of his lists of arrears. 
 And preaching ! what a luxury, preaching was when I had 
 on Sunday the whole result of an individual, personal week, 
 from which to speak to a people whom all that week I had 
 been meeting as hand-to-hand friend ! I never tired on 
 
1 6 My Double ; and how he undid me. 
 
 Sunday, and I was in condition to leave the sermon at 
 home, if I chose, and preach it extempore, as all men should 
 do always. Indeed, I wonder, when I think that a sensible 
 people, like ours, really more attached to their clergy than 
 they were in the lost days, when the Mathers and Nortons 
 were noblemen, should choose to neutralize so much of 
 their ministers' lives, and destroy so much of their early 
 training, by this undefined passion for seeing them in public. 
 It springs from our balancing of sects. If a spirited Epis- 
 copalian takes an interest in the almshouse, and is put on 
 the Poor Board, every other denomination must have a 
 minister there, lest the poorhouse be changed into St. 
 Paul's Cathedral. If a Sandemanian is chosen president 
 of the Young Men's Library, there must be a Methodist vice- 
 president and a Baptist secretary. And if a Universalist 
 Sunday-School Convention collects five hundred delegates, 
 the next Congregationalist Sabbath-School Conference must 
 be as large, " lest ' they ' whoever they may be should 
 think * we ' whoever we may be are going down." 
 
 Freed from these necessities, that happy year, I began to 
 know my wife by sight. We saw each other sometimes. 
 In those long mornings, when Dennis was in the study ex- 
 plaining to map-pedlers that I had eleven maps of Jerusa- 
 lem already, and to school-book agents that I would see 
 them hanged before I would be bribed to introduce their 
 text-books into the schools, she and I were at work to- 
 gether, as in those old dreamy days, and in these of our 
 log-cabin again. But all this could not last, and at length 
 poor Dennis, my double, overtasked in turn, undid me. 
 
 It was thus it happened. There is an excellent fellow, 
 once a minister, I will call him Isaacs, who deserves 
 well of the world till he dies, and after, because he oncfe, 
 in a real exigency, did the right thing, in the right way, at 
 the right time, as no other man could do it. In the world's 
 great football match, the ball by chance found him loitering 
 on the outside of the field ; he closed with it, " camped " it, 
 charged it home, yes, right through the other side, not 
 
My Double; and how he undid me. 1 7 
 
 disturbed, not frightened by his own success, and breath- 
 less found himself a great man, as the Great Delta. rang 
 applause. But he did not find himself a rich man ; and the 
 football has never come in his way again. From that mo- 
 ment to this moment he has been of no use, that one can 
 see, at all. Still, for that great act we speak of Isaacs 
 gratefully and remember him kindly ; and he forges on, 
 hoping to meet the football somewhere again. In that 
 vague hope, he had arranged a " movement " for a general 
 organization of the human family into Debating-Clubs, 
 County Societies, State Unions, etc., etc., with a view of indu- 
 cing all children to take hold of the handles of their knives 
 and forks, instead of the metal. Children have bad habits 
 in that way. The movement, of course, was absurd ; but we 
 all did our best to forward, not it, but him. It came time 
 for the annual county-meeting on this subject to be held at 
 Naguadavick. Isaacs came round, good fellow ! to arrange 
 for it, got the town-hall, got the Governor to preside, (the 
 saint ! he ought to have triplet doubles provided him by 
 law,) and then came to get me to speak. . " No," I said, " I 
 would not speak, if ten Governors presided. I do not be- 
 lieve in the enterprise. If I spoke, it should be to say chil- 
 dren should take hold of the prongs of the forks and the 
 blades of the knives. I would subscribe ten dollars, but I 
 would not speak a mill." So poor Isaacs went his way, 
 sadly, to coax Auchmuty to speak, and Delafield. I went 
 out. Not long after, he came back, and told Polly that they 
 had promised to speak, the Governor would speak, and 
 he himself would close with the quarterly report, and some 
 interesting anecdotes regarding Miss Biffin's way of hand- 
 ling her knife and Mr. Nellis's way of footing his fork. 
 " Now if Mr. Ingham will only come and sit on the plat- 
 form, he need not say one word ; but it will show well in 
 the paper, it will show that the Sandemanians take as 
 much interest in the movement as the Armenians or the 
 Mesopotamians, and will be a great favor to me." Polly, 
 good soul ! was tempted, and she promised. She knew 
 
1 8 My Double ; and how he undid me. 
 
 Mrs. Isaacs was starving, and the babies, she knew Den- 
 nis was at home, and she promised ! Night came, and I 
 returned. I heard her story. I was sorry. I doubted. 
 But Polly had promised to beg me, and I dared all ! I told 
 Dennis to hold his peace, under all circumstances, and sent 
 him down. 
 
 It was not half an hour more before he returned, wild 
 with excitement, in a perfect Irish fury, which it was 
 long before I understood. But I knew at once that he had 
 undone me ! 
 
 What happened was this. .The audience got together, 
 attracted by Governor Gorges's name. There were a thou- 
 sand people. Poor Gorges was late from Augusta. They 
 became impatient. He came in direct from the train at 
 last, really ignorant of the object of the meeting. He 
 opened it in the fewest possible words, and said other gen- 
 tlemen were present who would entertain them better than 
 he. The audience were disappointed, but waited. The 
 Governor, prompted by Isaacs, said, " The Honorable Mr. 
 Delafield will address you. Delafield had forgotten the 
 knives and forks, and was playing the Ruy Lopez opening 
 at the chess-club. " The Rev. Mr. Auchmuty will address 
 you." Auchmuty had promised to speak late, and was at 
 the school-committee. " I see Dr. Stearns in the hall ; per- 
 haps he will say a word." Dr. Stearns said he had come to 
 listen and not to speak. The Governor and Isaacs whis- 
 pered. The Governor looked at Dennis, who was resplen- 
 dent on the platform ; but Isaacs, to give him his due, 
 shook his head. But the look was enough. A miserable 
 lad, ill-bred, who had once been in Boston, thought it would 
 sound well to call for me, and peeped out, " Ingham ! " A 
 few more wretches cried, " Ingham ! Ingham ! " Still 
 Isaacs was firm ; but the Governor, anxious, indeed, to 
 prevent a row, knew I would say something, and said, 
 " Our friend Mr. Ingham is always prepared, and though 
 we had not relied upon him, he will say a word, perhaps." 
 Applause followed, which turned Dennis's head. He rose, 
 
My Double ; and how he undid me. 19 
 
 fluttered, and tried No. 3 : " There has been so much said, 
 and, on the whole, so well said, that I will not longer occupy 
 the time ! " and sat down, looking for his hat ; for things 
 seemed squally. But the people cried, " Go on ! go on ! " 
 and some applauded. Dennis, still confused, but flattered 
 by the applause, to which neither he nor I are used, rose 
 again, and this time tried No. 2 : "I am very glad you 
 liked it ! " in a sonorous, clear delivery. My best friends 
 stared. All the people who did not know me personally 
 yelled with delight at the aspect of the evening ; the Gov- 
 ernor was beside himself, and poor Isaacs thought he was 
 undone ! Alas, it was I ! A boy in the gallery cried in a 
 loud tone, " It 's all an infernal humbug," just as Dennis, 
 waving his hand, commanded silence, and tried No. 4 : "I 
 agree, in general, with my friend the other side of the 
 room." The poor Governor doubted his senses, and crossed 
 to stop him, not in time, however. The .same gallery-boy 
 shouted, " How 's your mother ? " and Dennis, now com- 
 pletely lost, tried, as his last shot, No. i, vainly : " Very 
 well, thank you ; and you ? " 
 
 I think I must have been undone already. But Dennis, 
 like another Lockhard, chose " to make sicker." The au- 
 dience rose in a whirl of amazement, rage, and sorrow. 
 Some other impertinence, aimed at Dennis, broke all re- 
 straint, and, in pure Irish, he delivered himself of an ad- 
 dress to the gallery, inviting any person who wished to fight 
 to come down and do so, stating, that they were all dogs 
 and cowards and the sons of dogs and cowards, that he 
 would take any five of them single-handed. " Shure, I have 
 said all his Riverence and the Misthress bade me say," 
 cried he, in defiance ; and, seizing the Governor's cane from 
 his hand, brandished it, quarter-staff fashion, above his 
 head. He was, indeed, got from the hall only with the 
 greatest difficulty by the Governor, the City Marshal, who 
 had been called in, and the Superintendent of my Sunday- 
 School. 
 
 The universal impression, of course, was, that the Rev. 
 
2O My Double ; and how he undid me. 
 
 Frederic Ingham had lost all command of himself in some 
 of those haunts of intoxication which for fifteen years I 
 have been laboring to destroy. Till this moment, indeed, 
 that is the impression in Naguadavick. This number of 
 the "Atlantic" will relieve from it a hundred friends of 
 mine who have been sadly wounded by that notion now for 
 years ; but I shall not be likely ever to show my head 
 there again. 
 
 No ! My double has undone me. 
 
 We left town at seven the next morning. I came to No. 
 9, in the Third Range, and settled on the Minister's Lot. 
 In the new towns in Maine, the first settled minister has a 
 gift of a hundred acres of land. I am the first settled min- 
 ister in No. 9. My wife and little Paulina are my parish. 
 We raise corn enough to live on in summer. We kill bear's 
 meat enough to carbonize it in winter. I work on steadily 
 on my " Traces of, Sandemanianism in the Sixth and 
 Seventh Centuries," which I hope to publish next year. 
 We are very happy, but the world thinks we are undone. 
 
THE DIAMOND LENS. 
 
 THE BENDING OF T-HEJTWIG. 
 
 ROM a very early period of my life the entire bent 
 of my inclinations had been towards microscopic 
 investigations. When I was not more than ten 
 years old, a distant relative of our family, hoping to astonish 
 my inexperience, constructed a simple microscope for me, 
 by drilling in a disk of copper a small hole, in which a drop 
 of pure water was sustained by capillary attraction. This 
 very primitive apparatus, magnifying some fifty diameters, 
 presented, it is true, only indistinct and imperfect forms, but 
 still sufficiently wonderful to work up my imagination to a 
 preternatural state of excitement. 
 
 Seeing me so interested in this rude instrument, my 
 cousin explained to me all that he knew about the principles 
 of the microscope, related to me a few of the wonders which 
 had been accomplished through its agency, and ended by 
 promising to send me one regularly constructed, immedi- 
 ately on his return to the city. I counted the days, the 
 hours, the minutes, that intervened between that promise 
 and his departure. 
 
 Meantime I was not idle. Every transparent substance 
 that bore the remotest semblance to a lens I eagerly seized 
 upon and employed in vain attempts to realize that instru- 
 ment, the theory of whose construction I as yet only vaguely 
 
22 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 comprehended. All panes of glass containing those oblate 
 spheroidal knots familiarly known as " bulPs eyes" were 
 ruthlessly destroyed, in the hope of obtaining lenses of mar- 
 vellous power. I even went so far as to extract the crys- 
 talline humor from the eyes of fishes and animals, and 
 endeavored to press it into the microscopic service. I plead 
 guilty to having stolen the glasses from my Aunt Agatha's 
 spectacles, with a dim idea of grinding them into lenses of 
 wondrous magnifying properties, in which attempt it is 
 scarcely necessary to say that I totally failed. 
 
 At last the promised instrument came. It was of that 
 order known as Field's simple microscope, and had cost 
 perhaps about fifteen dollars. As far as educational pur- 
 poses went, a better apparatus could not have been selected. 
 Accompanying it was a small treatise on the microscope, 
 its history, uses, and discoveries. I comprehended then for 
 the first time the " Arabian Nights' Entertainments." The 
 dull veil of ordinary existence that hung across the world 
 seemed suddenly to roll away, and to lay bare a land of en- 
 chantments. I felt towards my companions as the seer 
 might feel towards the ordinary masses of men. I held con- 
 versations with Nature in a tongue which they could not 
 understand. I was in daily communication with living 
 wonders, such as they never imagined in their wildest vis- 
 ions. I penetrated beyond the external portal of things, 
 and roamed through the sanctuaries. Where they beheld 
 only a drop of rain slowly rolling down the window-glass, I 
 saw a universe of beings animated with all the passions 
 common to physical life, and convulsing their minute sphere 
 with struggles as fierce and protracted as those of men. In 
 the common spots of mould, which my mother, good house- 
 keeper that she was, fiercely scooped away from her jam 
 pots, there abode for me, under the name of mildew, en- 
 chanted gardens, filled with dells and avenues of the densest 
 foliage and most astonishing verdure, while from the fantas- 
 tic boughs of these microscopic forests hung strange fruits 
 glittering with green and silver and gold. 
 
The Diamond Leits. 23 
 
 It was no scientific thirst that at this time filled my mind. 
 It was the pure enjoyment of a poet to whom a world of won- 
 ders has been disclosed. I talked of my solitary pleasures 
 to none. Alone with my microscope, I dimmed my sight, 
 day after day and night after night poring over the marvels 
 wHich it unfolded to me. I was like one who, having dis- 
 covered the ancient Eden still existing in all its primitive 
 glory, should resolve to enjoy it in solitude, and never be- 
 tray to mortal the secret of its locality. The rod of my life 
 was bent at this moment. I destined myself to be a micro- 
 scopist. 
 
 Of course, like every novice, I fancied myself a discov- 
 erer. I was ignorant at the time of the thousands of acute 
 intellects engaged in the same pursuit as myself, and with 
 the advantages of instruments a thousand times more pow-. 
 erful than mine. The names of Leeuwenhoek, Williamson, 
 Spencer, Ehrenberg, Schultz, Dujardin, Schact, and Schlei- 
 den were then entirely unknown to me, or if known, I was 
 ignorant of their patient and wonderful researches. In 
 every fresh specimen of Cryptogamia which I placed be- 
 neath my instrument, I believed that I discovered wonders 
 of which the world was as yet ignorant. I remember well 
 the thrill of delight and admiration that shot through me the 
 first time that I discovered the common wheel animalcule 
 (Rotifera mtlgaris) expanding and contracting its flexible 
 spokes, and seemingly rotating through the water. Alas ! 
 as I grew older, and obtained some works treating of my 
 favorite study, I found that I was only on the threshold of 
 a science to the investigation of which some of the greatest 
 men of the age were devoting their lives and intellects. 
 
 As I grew up, my parents, who saw but little likelihood 
 of anything practical resulting- from the examination of bits 
 of moss and drops of water through a brass tube and a 
 piece of glass, were anxious that I should choose a profes- 
 sion. It was their desire that I should enter the counting- 
 house of my uncle, Ethan Blake, a prosperous merchant, 
 who carried on business in New York. This suggestion I, 
 
24 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 decisively combated. I had no taste for trade ; I should 
 only make a failure ; in short, I refused to become a mer- 
 chant. 
 
 But it was necessary for me to select some pursuit. My 
 parents were staid New England people, who insisted on 
 the necessity of labor ; and therefore, although, thanks" to 
 the bequest of my poor Aunt Agatha, I should, on coming 
 of age, inherit a small fortune sufficient to place me above 
 want, it was decided, that, instead of waiting for this, I 
 should act the nobler part, and employ the intervening years 
 in rendering myself independent. 
 
 After much cogitation I complied with the wishes of my 
 family, and selected a profession. I determined to study 
 medicine at the New York Academy. This disposition of 
 my future suited me. A removal from my relatives would 
 enable me to dispose of my time as I pleased, without fear 
 of detection. As long as I paid my Academy fees, I might 
 shirk attending the lectures, if I chose ; and as I never had 
 the remotest intention of standing an examination, there 
 was no danger of my being " plucked." Besides, a metrop- 
 olis was the place for me. There I could obtain excellent 
 instruments, the newest publications, intimacy with men of 
 pursuits kindred to my own, in short, all things necessary 
 to insure a profitable devotion of. my life to my beloved 
 science. I had an abundance of money, few desires that 
 were not bounded by my illuminating mirror on one side 
 and my object-glass on the other ; what, therefore, was to 
 prevent my becoming an illustrious investigator of the 
 veiled worlds ? It was with the most buoyant hopes that I 
 left my New England home and established myself in New 
 York. 
 
The Diamond Lens. 25 
 
 II. 
 
 THE LONGING OF A MAN OF SCIENCE. 
 
 MY first step, of course, was to find suitable apart- 
 ments. These I obtained, after a couple of days' 
 search, in Fourth Avenue ; a very pretty second-floor unfur- 
 nished, containing sitting-room, bedroom, and a smaller 
 apartment which I intended to fit up as a laboratory. I 
 furnished my lodgings simply, but rather elegantly, and 
 then devoted all my energies to the adornment of the temple 
 of my worship. I visited Pike, the celebrated optician, and 
 passed in review his splendid collection of microscopes, 
 Field's Compound, Higham's, Spencer's, Nachet's Binocu- 
 lar, (that founded on the principles of the stereoscope,) and 
 at length fixed upon that form known as Spencer's Trunnion 
 Microscope, as combining the greatest number of improve- 
 ments with an almost perfect freedom from tremor. Along 
 with this I purchased every possible accessory, draw- 
 tubes, micrometers, a camera-lucida, lever-stage, achromatic 
 condensers, white cloud illuminators, prisms, parabolic con- 
 densers, polarizing apparatus, forceps, aquatic boxes, fish- 
 ing-tubes, with a host of other articles, all of which would 
 have been useful in the hands of an experienced microscop- 
 ist, but, as I afterwards discovered, were not of the slightest 
 present value to me. It takes years of practice to know 
 how to use a complicated microscope. The optician looked 
 suspiciously at me as I made these wholesale purchases. 
 He evidently was uncertain whether to set me down as 
 some scientific celebrity or a madman. I think he inclined 
 to the latter belief. I suppose I was mad. Every great 
 genius is mad upon the subject in which he is greatest. 
 The unsuccessful madman is disgraced, and called a lu- 
 natic. 
 
 Mad or not, I set myself to work with a zeal which few 
 scientific students have ever equalled. I had everything to 
 
26 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 learn relative to the delicate study upon which I had em- 
 barked, a study involving the most earnest patience, the 
 most rigid analytic powers, the steadiest hand, the most un- 
 tiring eye, the most refined and subtile manipulation. 
 
 For a long time half my apparatus lay inactively on the 
 shelves of my laboratory, which was now most amply fur- 
 nished with every possible contrivance for facilitating my 
 investigations. The fact was that I did not know how to 
 use some of my scientific accessories, never having been 
 taught microscopies, and those whose use I understood 
 theoretically were of little avail, until by practice I could 
 attain the necessary delicacy of handling. Still, such was 
 the fury of my ambition, such the untiring perseverance of 
 my experiments, that, difficult of credit as it may be, in the 
 course of one year I became theoretically and practically an 
 accomplished microscopist. 
 
 During this period of my labors, in which I submitted 
 specimens of every substance that came under my observa- 
 tion to the action of my lenses, I became a discoverer, in 
 a small way, it is true, for I was very young, but still a dis- 
 coverer. It was I who destroyed Ehrenberg's theory that 
 the Volvox globator was an animal, and proved that his 
 " monads " with stomachs and eyes were merely phases of 
 the formation of a vegetable cell, and were, when they 
 reached their mature state, incapable of the act of conjuga- 
 tion, or any true generative act, without which no organism 
 rising to any stage of life higher than vegetable can be said 
 to be complete. It was I who resolved the singular prob- 
 lem of rotation in the cells and hairs of plants into ciliary 
 attraction, in spite of the assertions of Mr. Wenham and 
 others, that my explanation was the result of an optical 
 illusion. 
 
 But notwithstanding these discoveries, laboriously and 
 painfully made as they were, I felt horribly dissatisfied. At 
 every step I found myself stopped by the imperfections of 
 my instruments. Like all active microscopists, I gave my 
 imagination full play. Indeed, it is a common complaint 
 
The Diamond Lens. 27 
 
 against many such, that they supply the defects of their in- 
 struments with the creations of their brains. I imagined 
 depths beyond depths in Nature which the limited power 
 of my lenses prohibited me from exploring. I lay awake at 
 night constructing imaginary microscopes of immeasurable 
 power, with which I seemed to pierce through all the en- 
 velopes 'of matter down to its original atom. How I cursed 
 those imperfect mediums which necessity through ignorance 
 compelled me to use ! How I longed to discover the secret 
 of some perfect lens whose magnifying power should be 
 limited only by the resolvability of the object, and which at 
 the same time should be free from spherical and chromatic 
 aberrations, in short from all the obstacles over which the 
 poor microscopist finds himself continually stumbling ! I 
 felt convinced that the simple microscope, composed of a 
 single lens of such vast yet perfect power, was possible of 
 construction. To attempt to bring the compound micro- 
 scope up to such a pitch would have been commencing at 
 the wrong end ; this latter being simply a partially success- 
 ful endeavor to remedy those very defects of the simple in- 
 strument, which, if conquered, would leave nothing to be 
 desired. 
 
 It was in this mood of mind that I became a constructive 
 microscopist. After another year passed in this new pur- 
 suit, experimenting on every imaginable substance, glass, 
 gems, flints, crystals, artificial crystals formed of the alloy 
 of various vitreous materials, in short, having constructed 
 as many varieties of lenses as Argus had eyes, I found my- 
 self precisely where I started, with nothing gained save an 
 extensive knowledge of glass-making. I was almost dead 
 with despair. My parents were surprised at my apparent 
 want of progress in my medical studies, (I had not attended 
 one lecture since my arrival in the city,) and the expenses 
 of my mad pursuit had been so great as to embarrass me 
 very seriously. 
 
 I was in this frame of mind one day, experimenting in 
 my laboratory on a small diamond, that stone, from its 
 
28 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 great refracting power, having always occupied my attention 
 more than any other, when a young Frenchman, who 
 lived on the floor above me, and who was in the habit of oc- 
 casionally visiting me, entered the room. 
 
 I think that Jules Simon was a Jew. He had many traits 
 of the Hebrew character : a love of jewelry, of dress, and of 
 good living. There was something mysterious about him. 
 He always had something to sell, and yet went into excel- 
 lent society. When I say sell, I should perhaps have said 
 peddle ; for his operations were generally confined to the 
 disposal of single articles, a picture, for instance, or a 
 rare carving in ivory, or a pair of duelling-pistols, or the 
 dress of a Mexican caballero. When I was first furnishing 
 my rooms, he paid me a visit, which ended in my purchas- 
 ing an antique silver lamp, which he assured me was a Cel- 
 lini, it was handsome enough even for that, and some 
 other knickknacks for my sitting-room. Why Simon 
 should pursue this petty trade I never could imagine. He 
 apparently had plenty of money, and had the entrte of the 
 best houses in the city, taking care, however, I suppose, 
 to drive no bargains within the enchanted circle of the 
 Upper Ten. I came at length to the conclusion that this 
 peddling was but a mask to cover some greater object, and 
 even went so far as to believe my young acquaintance to be 
 implicated in the slave-trade. That, however, was none of 
 my affair. 
 
 On the present occasion, Simon entered my room in a 
 state of considerable excitement. 
 
 "Ah! mon ami!' 1 ' 1 he cried, before I could even offer 
 him the ordinary salutation, " it has occurred to me to be 
 the witness of the most astonishing things in the world. I 
 
 promenade myself to the house of Madame . How 
 
 does the little animal le renard name himself in the 
 Latin?" 
 
 " Vulpes," I answered. 
 
 " Ah ! yes, Vulpes. I promenade myself to the house 
 of Madame Vulpes." 
 
The Diamond Lens. 29 
 
 " The spirit medium ? " 
 
 " Yes, the great medium. Great Heavens ! what a wo- 
 man ! I write on a slip of paper many of questions con- 
 cerning affairs the most secret, affairs that conceal 
 themselves in the abysses of my heart the most profound ; 
 and behold ! by example ! what occurs ! This devil of a 
 woman makes me replies the most truthful to all of them. 
 She talks to me of things that I do not love to talk of to 
 myself. What am I to think ? I am fixed to the earth ! " 
 
 " Am I to understand you, M. Simon, that this Mrs. 
 Vulpes replied to questions secretly written by you, which 
 questions related to events known only to yourself ? " 
 
 " Ah ! more than that, more than that," he answered, 
 with an air of some alarm. " She related to me things 
 But," he added, after a pause, and suddenly changing his 
 manner, " why occupy ourselves with these follies ? It was 
 all the Biology, without doubt. It goes without saying that 
 it has not my credence. But why are we here, mon ami ? 
 It has occurred to me to discover the most beautiful thing 
 as you can imagine, a vase with green lizards on it, com- 
 posed by the great Bernard Palissy. It is in my apartment ; 
 let us mount. I go to show it to you." 
 
 I followed Simon mechanically ; but my thoughts were 
 far from Palissy and his enamelled ware, although I, like 
 him, was seeking in the dark after a great discovery. This 
 casual mention of the spiritualist, Madame Vulpes, set me 
 on a new track. What if this spiritualism should be really 
 a great fact ? What if, through communication with sub- 
 tiler organisms than my own, I could reach, at a single 
 bound, the goal which perhaps a life of agonizing mental 
 toil would never enable me to attain ? 
 
 While purchasing the Palissy vase from my friend Simon, 
 I was mentally arranging a visit to Madame Vulpes. 
 
30 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 IIL 
 
 * 
 
 THE SPIRIT OF LEEUWENHOEK. 
 
 TWO evenings after this, thanks to an arrangement by 
 letter and the promise of an ample fee, I found Mad- 
 ame Vulpes awaiting me at her residence alone. She was 
 a coarse-featur-ed woman, with a keen and rather cruel dark 
 eye, and an exceedingly sensual expression about her mouth 
 and under jaw. She received me in perfect silence, in an 
 apartment on the ground floor, very sparely furnished. In 
 the centre of the room, close to where Mrs. Vulpes sat, 
 there was a common round mahogany table. If I had 
 come for the purpose of sweeping her chimney, the woman 
 could not have looked more indifferent to my appearance. 
 There was no attempt to inspire the visitor with any awe. 
 Everything bore a simple and practical aspect. This inter- 
 course with the spiritual world was evidently as familiar an 
 occupation with Mrs. Vulpes as eating her dinner or riding 
 in an omnibus. 
 
 " You come for a communication, Mr. Linley ? " said the 
 medium, in a dry, business-like tone of voice. 
 
 " By appointment, yes." 
 
 " What sort of communication do you want ? a written 
 one?" 
 
 " Yes, I wish for a written one." 
 
 " From any particular spirit ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Have you ever known this spirit on this earth ? " 
 
 " Never. He died long before I was born. I wish 
 merely to obtain from him some information which he 
 ought to be able to give better than any other." 
 
 " Will you seat yourself at the table, Mr. Linley," said the 
 medium, "-and place your hands upon it ? " 
 
 I obeyed, Mrs. Vulpes being seated opposite me, with 
 her hands also on the table. We remained thus for about 
 
The Diamond Lens. 31 
 
 a minute and a half,, when a violent succession of raps came 
 on the table, on the back of my chair, on the floor immedi- 
 ately under my feet, and even on the window-panes. Mrs. 
 Vulpes smiled composedly. 
 
 " They are very strong to-night," she remarked. " You 
 are fortunate." She then continued, " Will the spirits com- 
 municate with this gentleman ? " 
 
 Vigorous affirmative. 
 
 " Will the particular spirit he desires to speak with com- 
 municate ? " 
 
 A very confused rapping followed this question. 
 
 " I know what they mean," said Mrs. Vulpes, addressing 
 herself to me ; " they wish you to write down the name of 
 the particular spirit that you desire to converse with. Is 
 that so ? " she added, speaking to her invisible guests. 
 
 That it was so was evident from the numerous affirmatory 
 responses. While this was going on, I tore a slip from my 
 pocket-book, and scribbled a name under the table. 
 
 " Will this spirit communicate in writing with this gentle- 
 man ? " asked the medium once more. 
 
 After a moment's pause her hand seemed to be seized 
 with a violent tremor, shaking so forcibly that the table 
 vibrated. She said that a spirit had seized her hand and 
 would write. I handed her some sheets of paper that were 
 on the table, and a pencil The latter she held loosely in 
 her hand, which presently began to move over the paper 
 with a singular and seemingly involuntary motion. After a 
 few moments had elapsed she handed me the paper, on 
 which I found written, in a large, uncultivated hand, the 
 words, " He is not here, but has been sent for." A pause 
 of a minute or so now ensued, during which Mrs. Vulpes 
 remained perfectly silent, but the raps continued at regular 
 intervals. When the short period I mention had elapsed, 
 the hand of the medium was again seized with its convulsive 
 tremor, and she wrote, under this strange influence, a few 
 words on the paper, which she handed to me. They were 
 as follows : 
 
32 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 " I .am here. Question me. 
 
 " LEEUWENHOEK." 
 
 I was astounded. The name was identical with that I 
 had written beneath the table, and carefully kept concealed. 
 Neither was it at all probable that an uncultivated woman 
 like Mrs. Vulpes should know even the name of the great 
 father of microscopies. It may have been Biology ; but this 
 theory was soon doomed to be destroyed. I wrote on my 
 slip still concealing it from Mrs. Vulpes a series of ques- 
 tions, which, to avoid tediousness, I shall place with the 
 responses in the order in which they occurred. 
 
 I. Can the microscope be brought to perfection ? 
 
 SPIRIT. Yes. 
 
 I. Am I destined to accomplish this great task ? 
 
 SPIRIT. You are. 
 
 I. I wish to know how to proceed to attain this end. 
 For the love which you bear to science, help me ! 
 
 SPIRIT. A diamond of one hundred and forty carats, 
 submitted to electro-magnetic currents for a long period, will 
 experience a rearrangement of its atoms inter se, and from 
 that stone you will form the universal lens. 
 
 I. Will great discoveries result from the use of such a 
 lens? 
 
 SPIRIT. So great, that all that has gone before is as 
 nothing. 
 
 I. But the refractive power of the diamond is so im- 
 mense, that the image will be formed within the lens. How 
 is that difficulty to be surmounted ? 
 
 SPIRIT. Pierce the lens through its axis, and the diffi- 
 culty is obviated. The image will be formed in the pierced 
 space, which will itself serve as a tube to look through. 
 Now I am called. Good night ! 
 
 I cannot at all describe the effect that these extraordinary 
 communications had upon me. I felt completely bewil- 
 dered. No biological theory could account for the discovery 
 of the lens. The medium might, by means of biological 
 rapport with my mind, have gone so far as to read my ques- 
 
The Diamond Lens. 33 
 
 tions, and reply to them coherently. But Bioiogy could not 
 enable her to discover that magnetic currents would so alter 
 the crystals of the diamond as to remedy its previous de- 
 fects, and admit of its being polished into a perfect lens. 
 Some such theory may have passed through my head, it is 
 true ; but if so, I had forgotten it. In my excited condition 
 of mind there was no course left but to become a convert, 
 and it was in a state of the most painful nervous exaltation 
 that I left the medium's house that evening. She accom- 
 panied me to the door, hoping that I was satisfied. The 
 raps followed us as we went through the hall, sounding on 
 the balusters, the flooring, and even the lintels of the door. 
 I hastily expressed my satisfaction, and escaped hurriedly 
 into the cool night air. I walked home with but one thought 
 possessing me, how to obtain a diamond of the immense 
 size required. My entire means multipled a hundred times 
 over would have been inadequate to its purchase. Besides, 
 such stones are rare, and become historical. I could find 
 such only in the regalia of Eastern or European monarchs. 
 
 IV. 
 THE EYE OF MORNING. 
 
 THERE was a light in Simon's room as I entered my 
 house. A vague impulse urged me to visit him. As 
 I opened the door of his sitting-room, unannounced, he was 
 bending, with his back toward me, over a carcel lamp, ap- 
 parently engaged in minutely examining some object which 
 he held in his hands. As I entered, he started suddenly, 
 thrust his hand into his breast pocket, and turned to me 
 with a face crimson with confusion. 
 
 " What ! " I cried, " poring over the miniature of some 
 fair lady ? Well, don't blush so much ; I won't ask to 
 see it." 
 
34 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 Simon laughed awkwardly enough, but made none of the 
 negative protestations usual on such occasions. He asked 
 me to take a seat. 
 
 " Simon," said I, " I have just come from Madame 
 Vulpes." 
 
 This time Simon turned as white as a sheet, and 
 seemed stupefied, as if a sudden electric shock had smit- 
 ten him. He babbled some incoherent words, and went 
 hastily to a small closet where he usually kept his liquors. 
 Although astonished at his emotion, I was too preoccupied 
 with my own idea to pay much attention to anything 
 else. 
 
 " You say truly when you call Madame Vulpes a devil of 
 a wom'an," I continued. " Simon, she told me wonderful 
 things to-night, or rather was the means of telling me won- 
 derful things. Ah ! if I could only get a diamond that 
 weighed one hundred and forty carats ! " 
 
 Scarcely had the sigh with which I uttered this desire 
 died upon my lips, when Simon, with the aspect of a wild 
 beast, glared at me savagely, and rushing to the mantel- 
 piece, where some foreign weapons hung on the wall, 
 caught up a Malay creese, and brandished it furiously be- 
 fore him. 
 
 " No ! " he cried in French, into which he always broke 
 when excited, " No ! you shall not have it ! You are per- 
 fidious ! You have consulted with that demon, and desire 
 my treasure ! But I will die first ! Me ! I am brave ! You 
 cannot make me fear ! " 
 
 All this, uttered in a loud voice trembling with excite- 
 ment, astounded me. I saw at a glance that I had acci- 
 dentally trodden upon the edges of Simon's secret, whatever 
 it was. It was necessary to reassure him. 
 
 " My dear Simon," I said, " I am entirely at a loss to 
 know what you mean. I went to Madame Vulpes to con- 
 sult with her on a scientific problem, to the solution of 
 which I discovered that a diamond of the size I just men- 
 tioned was necessary. You were never alluded to during 
 
The Diamond Lens. 35 
 
 the evening, nor, so far as I was concerned, even thought 
 of. What can be the meaning of this outburst ? If you hap- 
 pen to have a set of valuable diamonds in your possession, 
 you need fear nothing from me. The diamond which I re- 
 quire you could not possess ; or if you did possess it, you 
 would not be living here." 
 
 Something in my tone must have completely reassured 
 him ; for his expression immediately changed to a sort of 
 constrained merriment, combined, however, with a certain 
 suspicious attention to my movements. He laughed, and 
 said that I must bear with him ; that he was at certain mo- 
 ments subject to a species of vertigo, which betrayed itself 
 in incoherent speeches, and that the attacks passed off as 
 rapidly as they came. He put his weapon aside while mak- 
 ing this explanation, and endeavored, with some success, to 
 assume a more cheerful air. 
 
 All this did not impose on me in the least. I was too 
 much accustomed to analytical labors to be baffled by so 
 flimsy a veil. I determined to probe the mystery to the 
 bottom. 
 
 " Simon," I said, gayly, " let us forget all this over a bottle 
 of Burgundy. I have a case of Lausseure's Clos Vougeot 
 down-stairs, fragrant with the odors and ruddy with the sun- 
 light of the Cote d'Or. Let us have up a couple of bottles. 
 What say you ? " 
 
 " With all my heart," answered Simon, smilingly. 
 
 I produced the wine, and we seated ourselves to drink. It 
 was of a famous vintage, that of 1848, a year when war and 
 wine throve together, and its pure, but powerful juice 
 seemed to impart renewed vitality to the system. By the 
 time we had half finished the second bottle, Simon's head, 
 which I knew was a weak one, had begun to yield, while I 
 remained calm as ever, only that every draught seemed to 
 send a flush of vigor through my limbs. Simon's utterance 
 became more and more indistinct. He took to singing 
 French chansons of a not very moral tendency. I rose sud- 
 denly from the table just at the conclusion of one of those 
 
36 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 incoherent verses, and, fixing my eyes on him with a quiet 
 smile, said : 
 
 " Simon, I have deceived you. I learned your secret this 
 evening. You may as well be frank with me. Mrs. Vulpes, 
 or rather one of her spirits, told me all." 
 
 He started with horror. His intoxication seemed for the 
 moment to fade away, and he made a movement towards 
 the weapon that he had a short time before laid down. I 
 stopped him with my hand. 
 
 " Monster ! " he cried, passionately, " I am ruined ! What 
 shall I do ? You shall never have it ! I swear by my 
 mother ! " 
 
 " I don't want it," I said ; " rest secure, but be frank with 
 me. Tell me all about it." 
 
 The drunkenness began to return. He protested with 
 maudlin earnestness that I was entirely mistaken, that I 
 was intoxicated ; then asked me to swear eternal secrecy, 
 and promised to disclose the mystery to me. I pledged 
 myself, of course, to all. With an uneasy look in his 
 eyes, and hands unsteady with drink and nervousness, he 
 drew a small case from his breast and opened it. Heavens ! 
 How the mild lamp-light was shivered into a thousand pris- 
 matic arrows, as it fell upon a vast rose-diamond that glit- 
 tered in the case ! I was no judge of diamonds, but I saw 
 at a glance that this was a gem of rare size and purity. I 
 looked at Simon with wonder, and must I confess it ? 
 with envy. How could he have obtained this treasure ? In 
 reply to my questions, I could just gather from his drunken 
 statements (of which, I fancy, half the incoherence was af- 
 fected) that he had been superintending a gang of slaves 
 engaged in diamond-washing in Brazil ; that he had seen 
 one of them secrete a diamond, but, instead of informing 
 his employers, had quietly watched the negro until he saw 
 him bury his treasure ; that he had dug it up, and fled with 
 it, but that as yet he was afraid to attempt to dispose of it 
 publicly, so valuable a gem being almost certain to attract 
 too much attention to its owner's antecedents, and he had 
 
The Diamond Lens. 37 
 
 not been able to discover any of those obscure channels by 
 which such matters are conveyed away safely. He added, 
 that, in accordance with Oriental practice, he had named 
 his diamond by the fanciful title of " The Eye of Morning." 
 
 While Simon was relating this to me, I regarded the great 
 diamond attentively. Never had I beheld anything so 
 beautiful. All the glories of light, ever imagined or de- 
 scribed, seemed to pulsate in its crystalline chambers. Its 
 weight, as I learned from Simon, was exactly one hundred 
 and forty carats. Here was an amazing coincidence. The 
 hand of Destiny seemed in it. On the very evening when 
 the spirit of Leeuwenhoek communicates to me the great 
 secret of the microscope, the priceless means which he di- 
 rects me to employ start up within my easy reach ! I deter- 
 mined, with the most perfect deliberation, to possess myself 
 of Simon's diamond. 
 
 I sat opposite him while he nodded over his glass, and 
 calmly revolved the whole affair. I did not for an instant 
 contemplate so foolish an act as a common theft, which 
 would of course be discovered, or at least necessitate flight 
 and concealment, all of which must interfere with my scien- 
 tific plans. There was but one step to be taken, to kill 
 Simon. After all, what was the life of a little peddling Jew, 
 in comparison with the interests of science ? Human beings 
 are taken every day from the condemned prisons to be ex- 
 perimented on by surgeons. This man, Simon, was by his 
 own confession, a criminal, a robber, and I believed on my 
 soul a murderer. He deserved death quite as much as any 
 felon condemned by the laws ; why should I not, like gov- 
 ernment, contrive that his punishment should contribute to 
 the progress of human knowledge ? 
 
 The means for accomplishing everything I desired lay 
 within my reach. There stood upon the mantel-piece a 
 bottle half full of French laudanum. Simon was so occu- 
 pied with his diamond, which I had just restored to him, 
 that it .was an affair of no difficulty to drug .his glass. In a 
 quarter of an hour he was in a profound sleep. 
 
38 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 I now opened his waistcoat, took the diamond from the 
 inner pocket in which he had placed it, and removed him to 
 the bed, on which I laid him so that his feet hung down 
 over the edge. I had possessed myself of the Malay creese, 
 which I held in my right hand, while with the other I dis- 
 covered, as accurately as I could by pulsation, the exact lo- 
 cality of the heart. It was essential that all the aspects of 
 his death should lead to the surmise of self-murder. I cal- 
 culated the exact angle at which it was probable that the 
 weapon, if levelled by Simon's own hand, would enter his 
 breast ; then with one powerful blow I thrust it up to the 
 hilt in the very spot which I desired to penetrate. A con- 
 vulsive thrill ran through Simon's limbs. I heard a smoth- 
 ered sound issue from his throat, precisely like the bursting 
 of a large air-bubble, sent up by a diver, when it reaches 
 the surface of the water ; he turned half round on his side, 
 and, as if to assist my plans more effectually, his right hand, 
 moved by some mere spasmodic impulse, clasped the handle 
 of the creese, which it remained holding with extraordinary 
 muscular tenacity. Beyond this there was no apparent 
 struggle. The laudanum, I presume', paralyzed the usual 
 nervous action. He must have died instantaneously. 
 
 There was yet something to be done. To make it certain 
 that all suspicion of the act should be diverted from any in- 
 habitant of the house to Simon himself, it was necessary 
 that the door should be found in the morning locked on the 
 inside. How to do this, and afterwards escape myself? Not 
 by the window ; that was a physical impossibility. Besides, 
 I was determined that the windows also should be found 
 bolted. The solution was simple enough. I descended 
 softly to my own room for a peculiar instrument which I 
 had used for holding small slippery substances, such as 
 minute spheres of glass, etc. This instrument was nothing 
 more than a long, slender hand-vice, with a very powerful 
 grip, and a considerable leverage, which last was accident- 
 ally owing to the shape of the handle. Nothing was simpler 
 than, when the key was in the lock, to seize the end of its 
 
The Diamond Lens. 39 
 
 stem in this vice, through the keyhole, from the outside, and 
 so lock the door. Previously, however, to doing this, I 
 burned a number of papers on Simon's hearth. Suicides 
 almost always burn papers before they destroy themselves. 
 I also emptied some more laudanum into Simon's glass, 
 having first removed from it all traces of wine, cleaned 
 the other wine-glass, and brought the bottles away with me. 
 If traces of two persons drinking had been found in the 
 room, the question naturally would have arisen, Who was 
 the second ? Besides, the wine-bottles might have been 
 identified as belonging to me. The laudanum I poured out 
 to account for its presence in his stomach, in case of ^post- 
 mortem examination. The theory naturally would be, that 
 he first intended to poison himself, but, after swallowing a 
 little of the drug, was either disgusted with its taste, or 
 changed his mind from other motives, and chose the dag- 
 ger. These arrangements made, I walked out, leaving the 
 gas burning, locked the door with my vice, and went to 
 bed. 
 
 Simon's death was not discovered until nearly three in 
 the afternoon. The servant, astonished at seeing the gas 
 burning, the light streaming on the dark landing from 
 under the door, peeped through the keyhole and saw 
 Simon on the bed. She gave the alarm. The door was 
 burst open, and the neighborhood was in a fever of excite- 
 ment. 
 
 Every one in the house was arrested, myself included. 
 There was an inquest ; but no clew to his death, beyond 
 that of suicide, could be obtained. Curiously enough, he 
 had made several speeches to his friends, the preceding 
 week, that seemed to point to self-destruction. One gen- 
 tleman swore that Simon had sai'd in his presence that " he 
 was tired of life." His landlord affirmed that Simon, when 
 paying him his last month's rent, remarked that " he would 
 not pay him rent much longer." All the other evidence 
 corresponded, the door locked inside, the position of the 
 corpse, the burnt papers. As I anticipated, no one knew of 
 
40 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 the possession of the diamond by Simon, so that no motive 
 was suggested for his murder. The jury, after a prolonged 
 examination, brought in the usual verdict, and the neigh- 
 borhood once more settled down into its accustomed quiet. 
 
 V. 
 
 ANIMULA 
 
 THE three months succeeding Simon's catastrophe I 
 devoted night and day to my diamond lens. I had 
 constructed a vast galvanic battery, composed of nearly two 
 thousand pairs of plates, a higher power I dared not use, 
 lest the diamond should be calcined. By means of this 
 enormous engine I was enabled to send a powerful current 
 of electricity continually through my great diamond, which 
 it seemed to me gained in lustre every day. At the expira- 
 tion of a month I commenced the grinding and polishing 
 of the lens, a work of intense toil and exquisite delicacy. 
 The great density of the stone, and the care required to be 
 taken with the curvatures of the surfaces of the lens, ren- 
 dered the labor the severest and most harassing that I had 
 yet undergone. 
 
 At last the eventful moment came ; the lens was com- 
 pleted. I stood trembling on the threshold of new worlds. 
 I had the realization of Alexander's famous wish before me. 
 The lens lay on the table, ready to be placed upon its plat- 
 form* My hand fairly shook as I enveloped a drop of water 
 with a thin coating of oil of turpentine, preparatory to its 
 examination, a process necessary in order to prevent the 
 rapid evaporation of the water. I now placed the drop on 
 a thin slip of glass under the lens, and throwing upon it, by 
 the combined aid of a prism and a mirror, a powerful stream 
 of light, I approached my eye to the minute hole drilled 
 through the axis of the lens. For an instant I saw nothing 
 
The Diamond Lens. 41 
 
 save what seemed to be an illuminated chaos, a vast lumi- 
 nous abyss. A pure" white light, cloudless and serene, an'd 
 seemingly limitless as space itself, was my first impression. 
 Gently, and with the greatest care, I depressed the lens a 
 few hairs' breadths. The wondrous illumination still con- 
 tinued, but as the lens approached the object, a scene of 
 indescribable beauty was unfolded to my view. 
 
 I seemed to gaze upon a vast space, the limits of which 
 extended far beyond my vision. An atmosphere of magical 
 luminousness permeated the entire field of view. I was 
 amazed to see no trace of animalculous life. Not a living 
 thing, apparently, inhabited that dazzling expanse. I com- 
 prehended instantly, that, by the wondrous power of my 
 lens, I had penetrated beyond the grosser particles of aque- 
 ous matter, beyond the realms of Infusoria and Protozoa, 
 down to the original gaseous globule, into whose luminous 
 interior I was gazing, as into an almost boundless dome 
 filled with a supernatural radiance. 
 
 It was, however, no brilliant void into which I looked. 
 On every side I beheld beautiful inorganic forms, of un- 
 known texture, and colored with the most enchanting hues. 
 These forms presented the appearance of what might be 
 called, for want of a more specific definition, foliated clouds 
 of the highest rarity ; that is, they undulated and broke into 
 vegetable formations, and were tinged with splendors com- 
 pared with which the gilding of our autumn woodlands is as 
 dross compared with gold. Far away into the illimitable 
 distance stretched 'long avenues of these gaseous forests, 
 dimly transparent, and painted with prismatic hues of un- 
 imaginable brilliancy. The pendent branches waved along 
 the fluid glades until every vista seemed to break through 
 half-lucent ranks of many-colored drooping silken pennons. 
 What seemed to be either fruits or flowers, pied with a 
 thousand hues lustrous and ever varying, bubbled from the 
 crowns of this fairy foliage. No hills, no lakes, no rivers, 
 no forms animate or inanimate were to be seen, save those 
 vast auroral copses that floated serenely in the luminous 
 
42 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 stillness, with leaves and fruits and flowers gleaming with 
 unknown fires, unrealizable . by mere imagination. 
 
 How strange, I thought, that this sphere should be thus 
 condemned to solitude ! I had hoped, at least, to discover 
 some new form of animal life, perhaps of a lower class 
 than any with which we are at present acquainted, but 
 still, some living organism. I find my newly discovered 
 world, if I may so speak, a beautiful chromatic desert. 
 
 While I was speculating on the singular arrangements of 
 the internal economy of Nature, with which she so fre- 
 quently splinters into atoms our most compact theories, I 
 thought I beheld a form moving slowly through the glades 
 of one of the prismatic forests. I looked more attentively, 
 and found that I was not mistaken. Words cannot depict 
 the anxiety with which I awaited the nearer approach of this 
 mysterious object. Was it merely some inanimate sub- 
 stance, held in suspense in the attenuated atmosphere of the 
 globule ? or was it an animal endowed with vitality and mo- 
 tion ? It approached, flitting behind the gauzy, colored veils 
 of cloud-foliage, for seconds dimly revealed, then vanishing. 
 At last the violet pennons that trailed nearest to me vibrat- 
 ed ; they were gently pushed aside, and the Form floated 
 out into the broad light. 
 
 It was a female human shape. When I say " human," I 
 mean it possessed the outlines of humanity, but there 
 the analogy ends. Its adorable beauty lifted it illimitable 
 heights beyond the loveliest daughter of Adam. 
 
 I cannot, I dare not, attempt to inventory the charms of 
 this divine revelation of perfect beauty. Those eyes of 
 mystic violet, dewy and serene, evade my words. Her long 
 lustrous hair following her glorious head in a golden wake, 
 like the track sown in heaven by a falling star, seems to 
 quench my most burning phrases with its splendors. If all 
 the bees of Hybla nestled upon my lips, they would still 
 sing but hoarsely the wondrous harmonies of outline that 
 enclosed her form. 
 
 She swept out from between the rainbow-curtains of the 
 
The Diamond Lens. 43 
 
 cloud-trees into the broad sea of light that lay beyond. Her 
 motions were those of some graceful Naiad, cleaving, by a 
 mere effort of her will, the clear, unruffled waters that fill 
 the chambers of the sea. She floated forth with the serene 
 grace of a frail bubble ascending through the still atmos- 
 phere of a June day. .The perfect roundness of her limbs 
 formed suave and enchanting curves. It was like listening 
 to the most spiritual symphony of Beethoven the divine, to 
 watch the harmonious flow of lines. This, indeed, was a 
 pleasure cheaply purchased at any price. What cared I, if 
 I had waded to the portal of this wonder through another's 
 blood ? I would have given my own to enjoy one such mo- 
 ment of intoxication and delight. 
 
 Breathless with gazing on this lovely wonder, and forget- 
 ful for an instant of everything save her presence, I with- 
 drew my eye from the microscope eagerly, alas ! As my 
 gaze fell on the thin slide that lay beneath my instrument, 
 the bright light from mirror and from prism sparkled on a 
 colorless drop of water ! There, in that tiny bead of dew, 
 this beautiful being was forever imprisoned. The planet 
 Neptune was not more distant from me than she. I hastened 
 once more to apply my eye to the microscope. 
 
 Animula (let me now call her by that dear name which I 
 subsequently bestowed on her) had changed her position. 
 She had again approached the wondrous forest, and was 
 gazing earnestly upwards. Presently one of the trees as 
 I must call them unfolded a long ciliary process, with 
 which it seized one of the gleaming fruits that glittered on 
 its summit, and sweeping slowly down, held it within reach 
 of Animula. The sylph took it in her delicate hand, and 
 began to eat. My attention was so entirely absorbed by 
 her, that I could not apply myself to the task of determining 
 whether this singular plant was or was not instinct with 
 volition. 
 
 I watched her, as she made her repast, with the most pro- 
 found attention. The suppleness of her motions sent a thrill 
 of delight through my frame ; mv heart beat madly as she 
 
44 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 turned her beautiful eyes in the direction of the spot in 
 which I stood. What would I not have given to have had 
 the power to precipitate myself into that luminous ocean, 
 and float with her through those groves-of purple and gold ! 
 While I was thus breathlessly following her every move- 
 ment, she suddenly started, seemed to listen for a moment, 
 and then cleaving the brilliant ether in which she was float- 
 ing, like a flash of light, pierced through the opaline forest, 
 and disappeared. 
 
 Instantly a series of the most singular sensations attacked 
 me. It seemed as if I had suddenly gone blind. The 
 luminous sphere was still before me, but my daylight had 
 vanished. What caused this sudden disappearance ? - Had 
 she a lover, or a husband ? Yes, that was the solution ! 
 Some signal from a happy fellow-being had vibrated 
 through the avenues of the forest, and she had obeyed the 
 summons. 
 
 The agony of my sensations, as I arrived at this conclu- 
 sion, startled me. I tried to reject the conviction that my 
 reason forced upon me. I battled against the fatal conclu- 
 sion, but'in vain. It was so. I had no escape from it. 
 I loved an animalcule ! 
 
 It is tRie, that, thanks to the marvellous power of my mi- 
 croscope, she appeared of human proportions. Instead of 
 presenting. the revolting aspect of the coarser creatures, that 
 live and struggle and die, in the more easily resolvable por- 
 tions of the water-drop, she was fair and delicate and of 
 surpassing beauty. But of what account was all that ? 
 Every time that my eye was withdrawn from the instru- 
 ment, it fell on a miserable drop of water, within which, I 
 must be content to know, dwelt all that could make my life 
 lovely. 
 
 Cottld she but see me once ! Could I for one moment 
 pierce the mystical walls that so inexorably rose to separate 
 us, and whisper all that filled my soul, I might consent to 
 be satisfied for the rest of my life with the knowledge of her 
 remote sympathy. It would be something to have estab- 
 
The Diamond Lens. 45 
 
 lished even the faintest personal link to bind us together, 
 to know that at times, when roaming through those en- 
 chanted glades, she might think of the wonderful stranger, 
 who had broken the monotony of her life with his presence, 
 and left a gentle memory in her heart ! 
 
 But it could not be. No invention, of which human in- 
 tellect was capable, could break down the barriers that Na- 
 ture had erected. I might feast my soul upon her wondrous 
 beauty, yet she must always remain ignorant of the adoring 
 eyes that day and night gazed upon her, and, even when 
 closed, beheld her in dreams. With a bitter cry of anguish 
 I fled from the room, and flinging myself on my bed, sobbed 
 myself to sleep like a child. 
 
 VI. 
 
 SPITT.Tiyi OF TTTF. PTTP 
 
 I AROSE the next morning almost at daybreak, and 
 rushed to my microscope. I trembled as I sought the 
 luminous world in miniature that contained my all. Ani- 
 mula was there. I had left the gas-lamp, surrounded by its 
 moderators, burning, when I went to bed the night before. 
 I found the sylph bathing, as it were, with an expression of 
 pleasure animating her features, in the brilliant light which 
 surrounded her. She tossed her lustrous golden hair over her 
 shoulders with innocent coquetry. She lay at full length in 
 the transparent medium, in which she supported herself 
 with ease, and gambolled with the enchanting grace that 
 the Nymph Salmacis might have exhibited when she sought 
 to conquer the modest Hermaphroditus. I tried an experi- 
 ment to satisfy myself if her powers of reflection were de- 
 veloped. I lessened the lamp-light considerably. By the 
 dim light that remained, I could see an expression of pain 
 flit across her face. She looked upward suddenly, and her 
 
46 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 brows contracted. I flooded the stage of the microscope 
 again with a full stream of light, and her whole expression 
 changed. She sprang forward like some substance deprived 
 of all weight. Her eyes sparkled, and her lips moved. Ah ! 
 if science had only the means of conducting and redupli- 
 cating sounds, as it does the rays of light, what carols of 
 happiness would then have entranced my ears ! what jubi- 
 lant hymns to Adonais would have thrilled the illumined 
 air! 
 
 I now comprehended how it was that the Count de Gaba- 
 lis peopled his mystic world with sylphs, beautiful beings 
 whose breath of life was lambent fire, and who sported for- 
 ever in regions of purest ether and purest light. The Ro- 
 sicrucian had anticipated the wonder that I had practically 
 realized. 
 
 How long this worship of my strange divinity went on 
 thus I scarcely know. I lost all note of time. All day from 
 early dawn, and far into the night, I was to be found peer- 
 ing through that wonderful lens. I saw no one, went no- 
 where, and scarce allowed myself sufficient time for my 
 meals. My whole life was absorbed in contemplation as 
 rapt as that of any of the Romish saints. Every hour that 
 I gazed upon^the divine form strengthened my passion, a 
 passion that was always overshadowed by the maddening 
 conviction, that, although I could gaze on her at will, she 
 never, never could behold me ! 
 
 At length I grew so pale and emaciated, from want of 
 rest, and continual brooding over my insane love and its 
 cruel conditions, that I determined to make some effort to 
 wean myself from it. " Come," I said, " this is at best but 
 a fantasy. Your imagination has bestowed on Animula 
 charms which in reality she does not possess. Seclusion 
 Jfrom female society has produced this morbid condition of 
 mind. Compare her with the beautiful women of your own 
 world, and this false enchantment will vanish." 
 
 I looked over the newspapers by chance. There I be- 
 held the advertisement of a celebrated danseuse who ap- 
 
The Diamond Lens. 47 
 
 peared nightly at Niblo's. The Signorina Caradolce had 
 the reputation of being the most beautiful as well as the 
 most graceful woman in the world. I instantly dressed and 
 went to the theatre. 
 
 The curtain drew up. The usual semicircle of fairies in 
 white muslin were standing on the right toe around the en- 
 amelled flower-bank, of green canvas, on which the belated 
 prince was sleeping. Suddenly a flute is heard. The fai- 
 ries start. The trees open, the fairies all stand on the left 
 toe, and the queen enters. It was the Signorina. She 
 bounded forward amid thunders of applause, and lighting 
 on one foot remained poised in air. Heavens !' was this 
 the great enchantress that had drawn monarchs at her 
 chariot-wheels ? Those heavy muscular limbs, those thick 
 ankles, those cavernous eyes, that stereotyped smile, those 
 crudely painted cheeks ! Where were the vermeil blooms, 
 the liquid expressive eyes, the harmonious limbs of Ani- 
 mula ? 
 
 The Signorina danced. What gross, discordant move- 
 ments ! The play of her limbs was all false and artificial. 
 Her bounds were painful athletic efforts ; her poses were 
 angular and distressed the eye. I could bear it no longer ; 
 with an exclamation of disgust that drew every eye upon 
 me, I rose from my seat in the very middle of the Signo- 
 rina's pas-de-fascination, and abruptly quitted the house. 
 
 I hastened home to feast my eyes- once more on the 
 lovely form of my sylph. I felt that henceforth to combat 
 this passion would be impossible. I applied my eye to the 
 lens. Animula was there, but what could have hap- 
 pened ? Some terrible change seemed to have taken place 
 during my absence. Some secret grief seemed to cloud the 
 lovely features of her I gazed upon. Her face had grown 
 thin and haggard ; her limbs trailed heavily ; the wondrous 
 lustre of her golden hair had faded. She was ill ! ill, and 
 I could not assist her ! I believe at that moment I would 
 have gladly forfeited all claims to my human birthright, if I 
 could only have been dwarfed to the size of an animalcule, 
 
48 The Diamond Lens. 
 
 and permitted to -console her from whom fate had forever 
 divided me. 
 
 I racked my brain for the solution of this mystery. What 
 was it that afflicted the sylph ? She seemed to suffer in- 
 tense pain. Her features contracted, and she even writhed, 
 as if with some internal agony. The wondrous forests ap- 
 peared also to have lost half their beauty. Their hues were 
 dim, and in some places faded away altogether. I watched 
 Animula for hours with a breaking heart, and she seemed 
 absolutely to wither away under my very eye. Suddenly I 
 remembered that I had not looked at the water-drop for 
 several days. In fact, I hated to see it ; for it reminded me 
 of the natural barrier between Animula and myself. I hur- 
 riedly looked down on the stage of the microscope. The 
 slide was still there, but, great heavens ! the water-drop 
 had vanished ! The awful truth burst upon me ; it had 
 evaporated, until it had become so minute as to be invisible 
 to the naked eye ; I had been gazing on its last atom, the 
 one that contained Animula, and she was dying ! 
 
 I rushed again to the front of the lens, and looked 
 through. Alas ! the last agony had seized her. The rain- 
 bow-hued forests had all melted away, and Animula lay 
 struggling feebly in what seemed to be a spot of dim light. 
 Ah ! the sight was horrible : the limbs once so round and 
 lovely shrivelling up into nothings ; the eyes those eyes 
 that shone like heaven being quenched into black dust ; 
 the lustrous golden hair now lank and discolored. The last 
 throe came. I beheld that final struggle of the blackening 
 form and I fainted. 
 
 When I awoke out of a trance of many hours, I found 
 myself lying amid the wreck of my instrument, myself as 
 shattered in mind and body as it. I crawled feebly to my 
 bed, from which I did not rise for months. 
 
 They say now that I am mad ; but they are mistaken. 
 I am poor, for I have neither the heart nor the will to work ; 
 all my money is spent, and I live on charity. Young men's 
 associations that love a joke invite me to lecture on Optics 
 
The Diamond Lens. 
 
 49 
 
 before them, for which they pay me, and laugh at me while 
 I lecture. " Linley, the mad microscopist," is the name I 
 go by. I suppose that I talk incoherently while I lecture. 
 Who could talk sense when his brain is haunted by such 
 ghastly memories, while ever and anon among the shapes 
 of death I behold the radiant form of my lost Animula ! 
 
LIFE IN THE IRON-MILLS. 
 
 Is this the end ? 
 
 O Life, as futile, then, as frail ! 
 
 What hope of answer or 'redress ? ' 
 
 CLOUDY day : do you know what that is in a 
 town of iron-works ? The sky sank down before 
 dawn, muddy, flat, immovable. The air is thick, 
 clammy with the breath of crowded human beings. It 
 stifles me. I open the window, and, looking out, can 
 scarcely see through the rain the grocer's shop opposite, 
 where a crowd of drunken Irishmen are purring Lynchburg 
 tobacco in their pipes. I can detect the scent through all 
 the foul smells ranging loose in the air. 
 
 The idiosyncrasy of this town is smoke. It rolls sullenly 
 in slow folds from the great chimneys of the iron-founderies, 
 and settles down in black, slimy pools on the muddy streets. 
 Smoke on the wharves, smoke on the dingy boats, on the 
 yellow river, clinging in a coating of greasy soot to the 
 house-front, the two faded poplars, the faces of the passers- 
 by. The long train of mules, dragging masses of pig-iron 
 through the narrow street, have a foul vapor hanging to 
 their reeking sides. Here, inside, is a little broken figure 
 of an angel pointing upward from the mantel-shelf; but 
 even its wings are covered with smoke, clotted and black. 
 Smoke everywhere ! A dirty canary chirps desolately in a 
 cage beside me. Its dream of green fields and sunshine is 
 a very old dream, almost worn out, I think. 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 51 
 
 From the back-window I can see a narrow brick-yard 
 sloping down to the river-side, strewed with rain-butts and 
 tubs. The river, dull and tawny-colored, (la belle riviere /) 
 drags itself sluggishly along, tired of the heavy weight of 
 boats and coal-barges. What wonder ? When I was a 
 child, I used to fancy a look of weary, dumb appeal upon 
 the face of the negro-like river slavishly bearing its burden 
 day after day. Something of the same idle notion comes to 
 me to-day, when from the street-window I look on the slow 
 stream of human life creeping past, night and morning, to 
 the great mills. Masses of men, with dull, besotted faces 
 bent to the ground, sharpened here and there by pain or 
 cunning ; skin and muscle and flesh begrimed with smoke 
 and ashes ; stooping all night over boiling caldrons of 
 metal, laired by day in dens of drunkenness and infamy ; 
 breathing from infancy to death an air saturated with fog 
 and grease and soot, vileness for soul and body. What do 
 you make of a case like that, amateur psychologist ? You 
 call it an altogether serious thing to be alive : to these men 
 it is a drunken jest, a joke, horrible to angels perhaps, to 
 them commonplace enough. My fancy about the river was 
 an idle one : it is no type of such 'a life. What if it be 
 stagnant and slimy here ? It knows that beyond there waits 
 for it odorous sunlight, quaint old gardens, dusky with 
 soft, green foliage of apple-trees, and flushing crimson with 
 roses, air, and fields, and mountains. The future of the 
 Welsh puddler passing just now is not so pleasant. To be 
 stowed away, after his grimy work is done, in a hole in the 
 muddy graveyard, and after that, not air, nor green fields, 
 nor curious roses. 
 
 Can you see how foggy the day is ? As I stand here, idly 
 tapping the window-pane, and looking out through the rain 
 at the dirty back-yard and the coal-boats below, fragments 
 of an old story float up before me, a story of this house 
 into which I happened to come to-day. You may think it a 
 tiresome story enough, as foggy as the day, sharpened by no 
 sudden flashes of pain or pleasure. I know : only the out- 
 
52 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 line of a dull life, that long since, with thousands of dull 
 lives like its own, was vainly lived and lost : thousands of 
 them, massed, vile, slimy lives, like those of the torpid 
 lizards in yonder stagnant water-butt. Lost ? There is a 
 curious point for you to settle, my friend, who study psy- 
 chology in a lazy, dilettante way. Stop a moment. I am 
 going to be honest. This is what I want you to do. I 
 want you to hide your disgust, take no heed to your clean 
 clothes, and come right down with me, here, into the 
 thickest of the fog and mud and foul effluvia. I want you 
 to hear this story. There is a secret down here, in this 
 nightmare fog, that has lain dumb for centuries : I want to 
 make it a real thing to you. You, Egoist, or Pantheist, or 
 Arminian, busy in making straight paths for your feet on 
 the hills, do not see it clearly, this terrible question which 
 men here have gone mad and died trying to answer. I dare 
 not put this secret into words. I told you it was dumb. 
 These men, going by with drunken faces, and brains full of 
 unawakened power, do not ask it of Society or of God. 
 Their lives ask it ; their deaths ask it. There is no reply. 
 I will tell you plainly that I have a great hope ; and I bring 
 it to you to be tested. It is this : that this terrible dumb 
 question is its own reply ; that it is not the sentence of 
 death we think it, but, from the very extremity of its dark- 
 ness, the most solemn prophecy which the world has known 
 of the Hope to come. I dare make my meaning no clearer, 
 but will only tell my story. It will, perhaps, seem to you as 
 foul and dark as this thick vapor about us, and as pregnant 
 with death ; but if your eyes are free as mine are to look 
 deeper, no perfume-tinted dawn will be so fair with promise 
 of the day that shall surely come. 
 
 My story is very simple, only what I remember of the 
 life of one of these men, a furnace-tender in one of Kirby 
 & John's rolling-mills, Hugh Wolfe. You know the 
 mills ? They took the great order for the lower Virginia 
 railroads there last winter ; run usually with about a thou- 
 sand men. I cannot tell why I choose the half-forgotten 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 53 
 
 story of this Wolfe more than that of myriads of these fur- 
 nace-hands. Perhaps because there is a secret, underlying 
 sympathy between that story and this day with its impure 
 fog and thwarted sunshine, or perhaps simply for the 
 reason that this house is the one where the Wolfes lived. 
 There were the father and son, both hands, as I said, in 
 one of Kirby & John's mills for making railroad-iron, and 
 Deborah, their cousin, a picker in some of the cotton-mills. 
 The house was rented then to half a dozen families. The 
 Wolfes had two of the cellar-rooms. The old man, like 
 many of the puddlers and feeders of the mills, was Welsh, 
 had spent half of his life in the Cornish tin-mines. You 
 may pick the Welsh emigrants, Cornish miners, out of the 
 throng passing the windows, any day. They are a trifle 
 more filthy ; their muscles are not so brawny ; they stoop 
 more. When they are drunk, they neither yell, nor shout, 
 nor stagger, but skulk along like beaten hounds. A pure, 
 unmixed blood, I fancy, shows itself in the slight angular 
 bodies and sharply-cut facial lines. It is nearly thirty years 
 since the Wolfes lived here. Their lives were like those of 
 their class : incessant labor, sleeping in kennel-like rooms, 
 eating rank pork and molasses, drinking God and the dis- 
 tillers only know what ; -with an occasional night in jail, to 
 atone for some drunken excess. Is that all of their lives ? 
 of the portion given to them and these their duplicates 
 swarming the streets to-day? nothing beneath? all? 
 So many a political reformer will tell you, and many a 
 private reformer, too, who has gone among them with a 
 heart tender with Christ's charity, and come out outraged, 
 hardened. 
 
 One rainy night, about eleven o'clock, a crowd of half- 
 clothed women stopped outside of the cellar-door. They 
 were going home from the cotton-mill. 
 
 " Good-night, Deb," said one, a mulatto, steadying her- 
 self against the gas-post. She needed the post to steady 
 her. So did more than one of them. 
 
 " Dah 's a ball to Miss Potts' to-night. Ye 'd best come." 
 
54 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 " Inteet, Deb, if hur '11 come, hur '11 hef fun," said a shrill 
 Welsh voice in the crowd. 
 
 Two or three dirty hands were thrust out to catch the 
 gown of the woman, who was groping for the latch of the 
 door. ^ 
 
 " No." 
 
 " No ? Where 's Kit Small, then ? " 
 
 " Begorra ! on the spools. Alleys behint, though we 
 helped her, we dud. An wid ye ! Let Deb alone ! It 's 
 ondacent frettin' a quite body. Be the powers, an' % we '11 
 have a night of it ! there '11 be lashin's o' drink, the Var- 
 gent be blessed and praised for 't ! " 
 
 They went on, the mulatto inclining for a moment to show 
 fight, and drag the woman Wolfe off with them ; but, being 
 pacified, she staggered away. 
 
 Deborah groped her way into the cellar, and, after con- 
 siderable stumbling, kindled a match, and lighted a tallow 
 dip, that sent a yellow glimmer over the room. It was low, 
 damp, the earthen floor covered with a green, slimy moss, 
 a fetid air smothering the breath. Old Wolfe lay asleep 
 on a heap of straw, wrapped in a torn horse-blanket. He 
 was a pale, meek little man, with a white face and red rab- 
 bit-eyes. ' The woman Deborah was like him ; only her 
 face was even more ghastly, her lips bluer, her eyes more 
 watery. She wore a faded cotton gown and a slouching 
 bonnet. When she walked, one could see that she was de- 
 formed, almost a hunchback. She trod softly, so as not to 
 waken him, and went through into the room beyond. There 
 she found by the half-extinguished fire an iron saucepan 
 filled with cold boiled potatoes, which she put upon a broken 
 chair with a pint-cup of ale. Placing the old candlestick 
 beside this dainty repast, she untied her bonnet, which hung 
 limp' and wet over her face, and prepared to eat her supper. 
 It was the first food that had touched her lips since morn- 
 ing. There was enough of it, however : there is not always. 
 She was hungry, one could see that easily enough, and 
 not drunk, as most of her companions would have been 
 
Life in the Iron- Mills. 55 
 
 found at this hour. She did not drink, this woman, her 
 face told that too, nothing stronger than ale. Perhaps 
 the weak, flaccid wretch had some stimulant in her pale life 
 to keep her up, some love or hope, it might be, or urgent 
 need. When that stimulant was gone, she would take to 
 whiskey. Man cannot live by work alone. While she was 
 skinning the potatoes, and munching them, a noise behind 
 her made her stop. 
 
 " Janey ! " she called, lifting the candle and peering into 
 the darkness. " Janey, are you there ? " 
 
 A heap of ragged coats was heaved up, and the face of a 
 young girl emerged, staring sleepily at the woman. 
 
 " Deborah," she said, at last, " I 'm here the night." 
 
 " Yes, child. Hur 's welcome," she said, quietly eating on. 
 
 The girl's face was haggard and sickly ; her eyes were 
 heavy with sleep and hunger : real Milesian eyes they were, 
 dark, delicate blue, glooming out from black shadows with 
 a pitiful fright. 
 
 " I was alone," she said, timidly. 
 
 " Where 's the father ? " asked Deborah, holding out a 
 potato, which the girl greedily seized. 
 
 " He 's bey ant, wid Haley, in the stone house." 
 (Did you ever hear the word/#z7 from an Irish mouth?) " I 
 came here. Hugh told me never to stay me-lone." 
 
 "Hugh?" 
 
 Yes." 
 
 A vexed frown crossed her face. The girl saw it, and 
 added quickly, 
 
 " I have not seen Hugh the day, Deb. The old man says 
 his watch lasts till the mornin'." 
 
 The woman sprang up, and hastily began to arrange some 
 bread and flitch in a tin pail, and to pour her own measure 
 of ale into a bottle. Tying on her bonnet, she blew out the 
 candle. 
 
 " Lay ye down, Janey dear," she said, gently, covering her 
 with the old rags. " Hur can eat the potatoes, if hur 's 
 hungry." 
 
56 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 " Where are ye goin', Deb ? The rain 's sharp." 
 
 " To the mill, with Hugh's supper." 
 
 " Let him bide till th' morn. Sit ye down." 
 
 " No, no," sharply pushing her off. " The boy '11 
 starve." 
 
 She hurried from the cellar, while the child wearily coiled 
 herself up for sleep. The rain was falling heavily, as the 
 woman, pail in hand, emerged from the mouth of the alley, 
 and turned down the narrow street, that stretched out, long 
 and black, miles before her. Here and there a flicker of 
 gas lighted an uncertain space of muddy footwalk and gut- 
 ter ; the long rows of houses, except an occasional lager-bier 
 shop, were closed ; now and then she met a band of mill- 
 hands skulking to or from their work. 
 
 Not many even of the inhabitants of a manufacturing 
 town know the vast machinery of system by which the 
 bodies of workmen are governed, that goes on unceasingly 
 from year to year. : The hands of each mill are divided into 
 watches that relieve each other as regularly as the sentinels 
 of an army. By night and day the work goes on, the un- 
 sleeping engines groan and shriek, the fiery pools of metal 
 boil and surge. Only for a day in the week, in half-courtesy 
 to public censure, the fires are partially veiled ; but as soon 
 as the clock strikes midnight, the great furnaces break forth 
 with renewed fury, the clamor begins with fresh, breathless 
 vigor, the engines sob and shriek like " gods in pain." 
 
 As Deborah hurried down through the heavy rain, the 
 noise of these thousand engines sounded through the sleep 
 and shadow of the city like far-off thunder. The mill to 
 which she was going lay on the river, a mile below the city- 
 limits. It was far, and she was weak, aching from standing 
 twelve hours at the spools. Yet it was her almost nightly 
 walk to take this man his supper, though at every square 
 she sat down to rest, and she knew she should receive small 
 word of thanks. 
 
 Perhaps, if she had possessed an artist's eye, the pic- 
 turesque oddity of the scene might have made her step stag- 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 57 
 
 ger less, and the path seem shorter ; but to her the mills 
 were only " summat deilish to look at by night." 
 
 The road leading to the mills had been quarried from the 
 solid rock, which rose abrupt and bare on one side of the 
 cinder-covered road, while the river, sluggish and black, 
 crept past on the other. The mills for rolling iron are sim- 
 ply immense tent-like roofs, covering acres of ground, open 
 on every side. Beneath these roofs Deborah looked in on 
 a city of fires, that burned hot and fiercely in the night. 
 Fire in every horrible form : pits of flame waving in the 
 wind ; liquid metal-flames writhing in tortuous streams 
 through the sand ; wide caldrons filled with boiling fire, 
 over which bent ghastly wretches stirring the strange brew- 
 ing ; and through all, crowds of half-clad men, looking like 
 revengeful ghosts in the red light, hurried, throwing masses 
 of glittering fire. It was like a street in Hell. Even 
 Deborah muttered, as she crept through, " 'T looks like 
 t' Devil's place ! " It did, in more ways than one. 
 
 She found the man she was looking for, at last, heaping 
 coal on a furnace. He had not time to eat his supper ; so 
 she went behind the furnace, and waited. Only a few men 
 were with him, and they noticed her only by a " Hyur comes 
 t' hunchback, Wolfe." 
 
 Deborah was stupid with sleep ; her back pained her 
 sharply ; and her teeth chattered with cold, with the rain 
 that soaked her clothes and dripped from her at every step. 
 She stood, however, patiently holding the pail, and waiting. 
 
 " Hout, woman ! ye look like a drowned cat. Come near 
 to the fire," said one of the men, approaehing to scrape 
 away the ashes. 
 
 She shook her head. Wolfe had forgotten her. He 
 turned, hearing the man, and came' closer. 
 
 " I did no' think ; g' me my supper, woman." 
 
 She watched him eat with a painful eagerness. With a 
 woman's quick instinct, she saw that he was not hungry, 
 was eating to please her. Her pale, watery eyes began to 
 gather a strange light. 
 3* 
 
58 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 " Is 't good, Hugh ? T ale was a bit sour, I feared." 
 
 " No, good enough." He hesitated a moment. " Ye 're 
 tired, poor lass ! Bide here till I go. Lay down there on 
 that heap of ash, and go to sleep." 
 
 He threw her an old coat for a pillow, and turned to his 
 work. The heap was the refuse of the burnt iron, and was 
 not a hard bed ; the half- smothered warmth, too, pene- 
 trated her limbs, dulling their pain and cold shiver. 
 
 Miserable enough she looked, lying there on the ashes 
 like a limp, dirty rag, yet not an unfitting figure to crown 
 the scene of hopeless discomfort and veiled crime : more 
 fitting, if one looked deeper into the heart of things, at 
 her thwarted woman's form, her colorless life, her waking 
 stupor that smothered pain and hunger, even more fit to 
 be a type of her class. Deeper yet if one could look ; was 
 there nothing worth reading in this wet, faded thing, half 
 covered with ashes ? no story of a soul filled with groping, 
 passionate love, heroic unselfishness, fierce jealousy? of 
 years of weary trying to please the one human being whom 
 she loved, to gain one look of real heart-kindness from him ? 
 If anything like this were hidden beneath the pale, bleared 
 eyes, and dull, washed-out-looking face, no one had ever 
 taken the trouble to read its faint signs : not the half- 
 clothed furnace-tender, Wolfe, certainly. Yet he was kind 
 to her : it was his nature to be kind, even to the very rats 
 that swarmed in the cellar : kind to her in just the same 
 way. She knew that. And it might be that very knowledge 
 had given to her face its apathy and vacancy more than 
 her low, torpid life. One sees that dead, vacant look steal 
 sometimes over the rarest, finest of women's faces, in the 
 very midst, it may be, of their warmest summer's day ; and 
 then one can guess at the secret of intolerable solitude that 
 lies hid beneath the delicate laces and brilliant smile. 
 There was no warmth, no brilliancy, no summer for this 
 woman ; so the stupor and vacancy had time to gnaw into 
 her face perpetually. She was young, too, though no one 
 guessed it ; so the gnawing was the fiercer. 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 59 
 
 She lay quiet in the dark corner, listening, through the 
 monotonous din and uncertain glare of the works, to the 
 dull plash of the rain in the far distance, shrinking back 
 whenever the man Wolfe happened to look towards her. 
 She knew, in spite of all his kindness, that there was that in 
 her face and form which made him loathe the sight of her. 
 She felt by instinct, although she could not comprehend it, 
 the finer nature of the man, which made him among his fel- 
 low-workmen something unique, set apart. She knew, that, 
 down under all the vileness and coarseness of his life, there 
 was a groping passion for whatever was beautiful and pure, 
 that his soul sickened with disgust at her deformity, even 
 when his words were kindest. Through this dull conscious- 
 ness, which never left her, came, like a sting, the recollection 
 of the dark blue eyes and lithe figure of the little Irish girl 
 she had left in the cellar. The recollection struck through 
 even her stupid intellect with a vivid glow of beauty and of 
 grace. Little Janey, timid, helpless, clinging to Hugh as 
 her only friend : that was the sharp thought, the bitter 
 thought, that drove into the glazed eyes a fierce light of pain. 
 You laugh at it ? Are pain and jealousy less savage realities 
 down here in this place I am taking you to than in your 
 own house or your own heart, your heart, which they 
 clutch at sometimes ? The note is the same, I fancy, be the 
 octave high or low. 
 
 If you could go into this mill where Deborah lay, and 
 drag out from the hearts of these men the terrible tragedy 
 of their lives, taking it as a symptom of the disease of their 
 class, no ghost Horror would terrify you more. A reality 
 of soul-starvation, of living death, that meets you every day 
 under the besotted faces on the street I can paint noth- 
 ing of this, only give you the outside outlines of a night, a 
 crisis in the life of one man : whatever muddy depth of soul- 
 history lies beneath you can read according to the eyes God 
 has given you. 
 
 Wolfe, while Deborah watched him as a spaniel its mas- 
 ter, bent over the furnace with his iron pole, unconscious of 
 
60 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 her scrutiny, only stopping to receive orders. Physically, 
 Nature had promised the man but little. He had already 
 lost the strength and instinct vigor of a man, his muscles 
 were thin, his nerves weak, his face (a meek, woman's face) 
 haggard, yellow with consumption. In the mill he was 
 known as one of the girl-men : " Molly Wolfe " was his so- 
 briquet. He was never seen in the cockpit, did not own a 
 terrier, drank but seldom ; when he did, desperately. He 
 fought sometimes, but was always thrashed, pommelled to a 
 jelly. The man was game enough, when his blood was up : 
 but he was no favorite in the mill ; he had the taint of 
 school-learning on him, not to a dangerous extent, only a 
 quarter or so in the free-school in fact, but enough to ruin 
 him as a good hand in a fight. 
 
 For other reasons, too, he was not popular. Not one of 
 themselves, they felt that, though outwardly as filthy and 
 ash-covered ; silent, with foreign thoughts and longings 
 breaking out through his quietness in innumerable curious 
 ways : this one, for instance. In the neighboring furnace- 
 buildings lay great heaps of the refuse from the ore after the 
 pig-metal is run. Korl we call it here : a light, porous 
 substance, of a delicate, waxen, flesh-colored tinge. Out of 
 the blocks of this korl, Wolfe, in his off-hours from the fur- 
 nace, had a habit of chipping and moulding figures, hide- 
 ous, fantastic enough, but sometimes strangely beautiful : 
 even the mill-men saw that, while they jeered at him. It 
 was a curious fancy in the man, almost a passion. The 
 few hours for rest he spent hewing and hacking with his 
 blunt knife, never speaking, until his watch came again, 
 working at one figure for months, and, when it was finished, 
 breaking it to pieces perhaps, in a fit of disappointment. A 
 morbid, gloomy man, untaught, unled, left to feed his soul 
 in grossness and crime, and hard, grinding labor. 
 
 I want you to come down and look at this Wolfe, stand- 
 ing there among the lowest of his kind, and see him just as 
 he is, that you may judge him justly when you hear the 
 -story of this night I want you to look back, as he does 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 6 1 
 
 every day, at his birth in vice, his starved infancy ; to re- 
 member the heavy years he has groped through as boy and 
 man, the slow, heavy years of constant, hot work. So 
 long ago he began, that he thinks sometimes he has worked 
 there for ages. There is no hope that it will ever end. 
 Think that God put into this man's soul a fierce thirst for 
 beauty, to know it, to create it ; to be something, he 
 knows not what, other than he is. There are moments 
 when a passing cloud, the sun glinting on the purple this- 
 tles, a kindly smile, a child's face, will rouse him to a passion 
 of pain, when his nature starts up with a mad cry of rage 
 against God, man, whoever it is that has forced this vile, 
 slimy life upon him. With all this groping, this mad desire, 
 a great blind intellect stumbling through wrong, a loving 
 poet's heart, the man was by habit only a coarse, vulgar la- 
 borer, familiar with sights and words you would blush to 
 name. Be just : when I tell you about this night, see him 
 as he is. Be just, not like man's law, which seizes on one 
 isolated fact, but like God's judging angel, whose clear, sad 
 eye saw all the countless cankering days of this man's life, 
 all the countless nights, when, sick with starving, his soul 
 fainted in him, before it judged him for this night, the saddest 
 of all. 
 
 I called this night the crisis of his life. If it was, it stole 
 on him unawares. These great turning-days of life cast no 
 shadow before, slip by unconsciously. Only a trifle, a little 
 turn of the rudder, and the ship goes to heaven or hell. 
 
 Wolfe, while Deborah watched him, dug into the furnace 
 of melting iron with his pole, dully thinking only how many 
 rails the lump would yield. It was late, nearly Sunday 
 morning ; another hour, and the heavy work would be done, 
 only the furnaces to replenish and cover for the next day. 
 The workmen were growing more noisy, shouting, as they 
 had to do, to be heard over the deep clamor of the mills. 
 Suddenly they grew less boisterous, at the far end, en- 
 tirely silent. Something unusual had happened. After a 
 moment, the silence came nearer ; the men stopped their 
 
62 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 jeers and drunken choruses. Deborah, stupidly lifting up 
 her head, saw the cause of the quiet. A group of five or 
 six men were slowly approaching, stopping to examine each 
 furnace as they came. Visitors often came to see the mills 
 after night : except by growing less noisy, the men took no 
 notice of them. The furnace where Wolfe worked was near 
 the bounds of the works ; they halted there hot and tired : 
 a walk over one of these great founderies is no trifling task. 
 The woman, drawing out of sight, turned over to sleep. 
 Wolfe, seeing them stop, suddenly roused from his indiffer- 
 ent stupor, and watched them keenly. He knew some of 
 them : the overseer, Clarke, a son of Kirby, one of the 
 mill-owners, and a Doctor May, one of the town-physi- 
 cians. The other two were strangers. Wolfe came closer. 
 He seized eagerly every chance that brought him into con- 
 tact with this mysterious class that shone down on him per- 
 petually with the glamour of another order of being. What 
 made the difference between them ? That was the mystery 
 of his life. He had a vague notion that perhaps to-night 
 he could find it out. One of the strangers sat down on a 
 pile of bricks, and beckoned young Kirby to his side. 
 
 " This is hot, with a vengeance. A match, please ? " 
 lighting his cigar. " But the walk is worth the trouble. If 
 it were not that you must have heard it so often, Kirby, I 
 would tell you that your works look like Dante's Inferno." 
 
 Kirby laughed. 
 
 " Yes. Yonder is Farinata himself in the burning tomb," 
 pointing to some figure in the shimmering shadows. 
 
 " Judging from some of the faces of your men," said the 
 other, "they bid fair to try the reality of Dante's vision, 
 some day." 
 
 Young Kirby looked curiously around, as if seeing the 
 faces of his hands for the first time. g 
 
 " They 're bad enough, that 's true. A desperate set, I 
 fancy. Eh, Clarke ? " 
 
 The overseer did not hear him. He was talking of net 
 profits just then, giving, in fact, a schedule of the annual 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 63 
 
 business of the firm to a sharp peering little Yankee, who 
 jotted down notes on a paper laid on the crown of his hat : 
 a reporter for one of the city papers, getting up a series of 
 reviews of the leading manufactories. The other gentlemen 
 had accompanied them merely for amusement. They were 
 silent until the notes were finished, drying their feet at the 
 furnaces, and sheltering their faces from the intolerable heat. 
 At last the overseer concluded with 
 
 " I believe that is a pretty fair estimate, Captain." 
 
 " Here, some of you men ! " said Kirby, " bring up those 
 boards. We may as well sit down, gentlemen, until the 
 rain is over. It cannot last much longer at this rate." 
 
 " Pig-metal," mumbled the reporter, " um ! coal fa- 
 cilities, um ! hands employed, twelve hundred, bitu- 
 men, um ! all right, I believe, Mr. Clarke ; sinking- 
 fund, what did you say was your sinking-fund ? " 
 
 " Twelve hundred hands ? " said the stranger, the young 
 man who had first spoken. " Do you control their votes, 
 Kirby?" 
 
 " Control ? No." The young man smiled complacently. 
 " But my father brought seven hundred votes to the polls 
 for his candidate last November. No force-work, you un- 
 derstand, only a speech or two, a hint to form themselves 
 into a society, and a bit of red and blue bunting to make 
 them a flag. The Invincible Roughs, I believe that is 
 their name. I forget the motto : ' Our country's hope,' I 
 think." 
 
 There was a laugh. The young man talking to Kirby 
 sat with an amused light in his cool gray eye, surveying 
 critically the half-clothed figures of the puddlers, and the 
 slow swing of their brawny muscles. He was a stranger in 
 the city, spending a couple of months in the borders of a 
 Slave State, to study the institutions of the South, a 
 brother-in-law of Kirby's, Mitchell. He was an amateur 
 gymnast, hence his anatomical eye ; a patron, in a blast 
 way, of the prize-ring ; a man who sucked the essence out 
 of a science or philosophy in an indifferent, gentlemanly 
 
64 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 way ; who took Kant, Novalis, Humboldt, for what they 
 were worth in his own scales ; accepting all, despising noth- 
 ing, in heaven, earth, or hell, but one-idead men ; with a 
 temper yielding and brilliant as summer water, until his 
 Self was touched, when it was ice, though brilliant still. 
 Such men are not rare in the States. 
 
 As he knocked the ashes from his cigar, Wolfe caught 
 with a quick pleasure the contour of the white hand, the 
 blood-glow of a red ring he wore. His voice, too, and that 
 of Kirby's, touched him like music, low, even, with chord- 
 ing cadences. About this man Mitchell hung the impalpa- 
 ble atmosphere belonging to the thoroughbred gentleman. 
 Wolfe, scraping away the ashes beside him, was conscious 
 of it, did obeisance to it with his artist sense, unconscious 
 that he did so. 
 
 The rain did not cease. Clarke and the reporter left the 
 mills ; the others, comfortably seated near the furnace, lin- 
 gered, smoking and talking in a desultory way. Greek 
 would not have been more unintelligible to the furnace- 
 tenders, whose presence they soon forgot entirely. Kirby 
 drew out a newspaper from his pocket and read aloud some 
 article, which they discussed eagerly. At every sentence, 
 Wolfe listened more and more like a dumb, hopeless ani- 
 mal, with a duller, more stolid look creeping over his face, 
 glancing now and then at Mitchell, marking acutely every 
 smallest sign of refinement, then back to himself, seeing as 
 in a mirror his filthy body, his more stained soul. 
 
 Never ! He had no words for such a thought, but he 
 knew now, in all the sharpness of the bitter certainty, that 
 between them there was a great gulf never to be passed. 
 Never ! 
 
 The bell of the mills rang for midnight. Sunday morn- 
 ing had dawned. Whatever hidden message lay in the 
 tolling bells floated past these men unknown. Yet it was 
 there. Veiled in the solemn music ushering the risen Sav- 
 iour was a key-note to solve the darkest secrets of a world 
 gone wrong, even this social riddle which the brain of the 
 grimy puddler grappled with madly to-night. 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 65 
 
 The men began to withdraw the metal from the caldrons. 
 The mills were deserted on Sundays, except by the hands 
 who fed the fires, and those who had no lodgings and slept 
 usually on the ash-heaps. The three strangers sat still 
 during the next hour, watching the men cover the furnaces, 
 laughing now and then at some jest of Kirby's. 
 
 "Do you know," said Mitchell, " I like this view of the 
 works better than when the glare was fiercest ? These heavy 
 shadows and the amphitheatre of smothered fires are ghostly, 
 - unreal. One .could fancy these red smouldering lights to be 
 the half-shut eyes of wild beasts, and the spectral figures 
 their victims in the den." 
 
 Kirby laughed. " You are fanciful. Come, let us get 
 out of the den. The spectral figures, as you call them, are 
 a little too real for me to fancy a close proximity in the 
 darkness, unarmed, too." 
 
 The others rose, buttoning their overcoats, and lighting 
 cigars. 
 
 " Raining still," said Doctor May, " and hard. Where 
 did we leave the coach, Mitchell ? " 
 
 " At the other side of the works. Kirby, what 's that ? " 
 
 Mitchell started back, half-frightened, as, suddenly turn- 
 ing a corner, the white figure of a woman faced him in the 
 darkness, a woman, white, of giant proportions, crouching 
 on the ground, her arms flung out in some wild gesture of 
 warning. 
 
 " Stop ! Make that fire burn there ! " cried Kirby, stop- 
 ping short 
 
 The flame burst out, flashing the gaunt figure into bold 
 relief. 
 
 Mitchell drew a long breath. 
 
 " I thought it was alive," he said, going up curiously. 
 
 The others followed. 
 
 " Not marble, eh ? " asked Kirby, touching it 
 
 One of the lower overseers stopped. 
 
 " Korl, Sir." 
 
 "Who did it?" 
 
 E 
 
66 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 " Can't say. Some of the hands ; chipped it out in off- 
 hours." 
 
 " Chipped to some purpose, I should say. What a flesh- 
 tint the stuff has ! Do you see, Mitchell ? " 
 
 " I see." 
 
 He had stepped aside where the light fell boldest on the 
 figure, looking at it in silence. There was not one line of 
 beauty or grace in it : a nude woman's form, muscular, 
 grown coarse with labor, the powerful limbs instinct with 
 some one poignant longing. One idea : therje it was in the 
 tense, rigid muscles, the clutching hands, the wild, eager 
 face, like that of a starving wolf's. Kirby and Dr. May 
 walked around it, critical, curious. Mitchell stood aloof, 
 silent. The figure touched him strangely. 
 
 "Not badly done," said Doctor May. "Where did the 
 fellow learn that sweep of the muscles in the arm and hand ? 
 Look at them ! They are groping, do you see ? clutch- 
 ing : the peculiar action of a man dying of thirst." 
 
 "They have ample facilities for studying anatomy," 
 sneered Kirby, glancing at the half-naked figures. 
 
 " Look," continued the Doctor, " at this bony wrist, and 
 the strained sinews of the instep ! A working- woman, the 
 very type of her class." 
 
 " God forbid ! " muttered Mitchell. 
 
 " Why ? " demanded May. " What does the fellow intend 
 by the figure ? I cannot catch the meaning." 
 
 " Ask him," said the other, dryly. " There he stands," 
 pointing to Wolfe, who stood with a group of men, leaning 
 on his ash-rake. 
 
 The Doctor beckoned him with the affable smile which 
 kind-hearted men put on, when talking to these people. 
 
 " Mr. Mitchell has picked you out as the man who did 
 this, I 'm sure I don't know why. But what did you mean 
 by it ? " 
 
 " She be hungry." 
 
 Wolfe's eyes answered Mitchell, not the Doctor. 
 
 " Oh-h ! But what a mistake you have made, my fine 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 67 
 
 fellow ! You have given no sign of starvation to the body. 
 It is strong, terribly strong. It has the mad, half-despair- 
 ing gesture of drowning." 
 
 Wolfe stammered, glanced appealingly at Mitchell, who 
 saw the soul of the thing, he knew. But the cool, probing 
 eyes were turned on himself now, mocking, cruel, relent- 
 less. 
 
 " Not hungry for meat," the furnace-tender said at last. 
 
 " What then ? Whiskey ? " jeered Kirby, with a coarse 
 laugh. 
 
 Wolfe was silent a moment, thinking. 
 
 " I dunno," he said, with a bewildered look. " It mebbe. 
 Summat to make her live, I think, like you. Whiskey ull 
 do it, in a way." 
 
 The young man laughed again. Mitchell flashed a look 
 of disgust somewhere, not at Wolfe. 
 
 " May," he broke out impatiently, " are you blind ? Look 
 at that woman's face ! It asks questions of God, and says, 
 * I have a right to know.' Good God, how hungry it is ! " 
 
 They looked a moment ; then May turned to the mill- 
 owner : 
 
 " Have you many such hands as this ? What are you go- 
 ing to do with them ? Keep them at puddling iron ? " 
 
 Kirby shrugged his shoulders. Mitchell's look had irri- 
 tated him. 
 
 " Ce rfest pas mon affaire. I have no fancy for nursing 
 infant geniuses. I suppose there are some stray gleams of 
 mind and soul among these wretches. The Lord will take 
 care of his own ; or else they can work out their own salva- 
 tion. I have heard you call our American system a ladder 
 which any man can scale. Do you doubt it ? Or perhaps 
 you want to banish all social ladders, and put us all on a flat 
 table-land, eh, May?" 
 
 The Doctor looked vexed, puzzled. Some terrible prob- 
 lem lay hid in this woman's face, and troubled these men. 
 Kirby waited for an answer, and, receiving none, went on, 
 warming with his subject. 
 
68 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 " I tell you, there 's something wrong that no talk of 
 'Libertt* or ' Egalite* will do away. If I had the making 
 of men, these men who do the lowest part of the world's 
 work should be machines, nothing more, hands. It 
 would be kindness. God help them ! What are taste, 
 reason, to creatures who must live such lives as that ? " He 
 pointed to Deborah, sleeping on the ash-heap. "So many 
 nerves to sting them to pain. What if God had put your 
 brain, with all its agony of touch, into your fingers, and bid 
 you work and strike with that ? " 
 
 " You think you could govern the world better ? " laughed 
 the Doctor. 
 
 " I do not think at all." 
 
 " That is true philosophy. Drift with the stream, because 
 you cannot dive deep enough to find bottom, eh ? " 
 
 " Exactly," rejoined Kirby. " I do not think. I wash my 
 hands of all social problems, slavery, caste, white or black. 
 My duty to my operatives has a narrow limit, the pay- 
 hour on Saturday night. Outside of that, if. they cut korl, or 
 cut each other's throats, (the more popular amusement of 
 the two,) I am not responsible." 
 
 The Doctor sighed, a good honest sigh, from the depths 
 , of his stomach. 
 
 " God help us ! Who is responsible ? " 
 
 " Not I, I tell you," said Kirby, testily. " What has the 
 man who pays them money to do with their souls' concerns, 
 more than the grocer or butcher who takes it ? " 
 
 " And yet," said Mitchell's cynical voice, " look at her ! 
 How hungry she is ! " 
 
 Kirby tapped his boot with his cane. No one spoke. 
 Only the dumb face of the rough image looking into their 
 faces with the awful question, " What shall we do to be 
 saved ? " Only Wolfe's face, with its heavy weight of brain, 
 its weak, uncertain mouth, its desperate eyes, out of which 
 looked the soul of his class, only Wolfe's face turned to- 
 wards Kirb/s. Mitchell laughed, a cool, musical laugh. 
 
 " Money has spoken ! " he said, seating himself lightly on 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 69 
 
 a stone with the air of an amused spectator at a play. "Are 
 you answered?" turning to Wolfe his clear, magnetic 
 face. 
 
 Bright and deep and cold as Arctic air, the soul of the 
 man lay tranquil beneath. He looked at the furnace-tender 
 as he had looked at a rare mosaic in the morning ; only the 
 man was the more amusing study of the two. 
 
 " Are you answered ? Why, May, look at him ! ' De pro- 
 fundis clamavi? Or, to quote in English, * Hungry and 
 thirsty, his soul faints in him.' And so Money sends back 
 its answer into the depths through you, Kirby ! Very clear 
 the answer, too ! I think I remember reading the same 
 words somewhere : washing your hands in Eau de Co- 
 logne, and saying, ' I am innocent of the blood of this man. 
 See ye to it ! ' " 
 
 Kirby flushed angrily. 
 
 " You quote Scripture freely." 
 
 " Do I not quote correctly ? I think I remember another 
 line, which may amend my meaning : ' Inasmuch as ye did 
 it unto one of the least of these, ye did it unto me.' Deist ? 
 Bless you, man, I was raised on the milk of the Word. 
 Now, Doctor, the pocket of the world having uttered its 
 voice, what has the heart to say ? You are a philanthropist, 
 in a small way, rfest ce pas f Here, boy, this gentleman 
 can show you how to cut korl better, or your destiny. Go 
 on, May ! " 
 
 " I think a mocking devil possesses you to-night," rejoined 
 the Doctor, seriously. 
 
 He went to Wolfe and put his hand kindly on his arm. 
 Something of a vague idea possessed the Doctor's brain that 
 much good was to be done here by a friendly word or two : 
 a latent genius to be warmed into life by a waited-for sun- 
 beam. Here it was : he had brought it. So he went on 
 complacently : 
 
 "Do you know, boy, you have it in you to be a great 
 sculptor, a great man? do you understand?" (talking 
 down to the capacity of his hearer : it is a way people have 
 
JO Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 with children, and men like Wolfe,) " to live a better, 
 stronger life than I, or Mr. Kirby here ? A man may make 
 himself anything he chooses. God has given you stronger 
 powers than many men, me, for instance." 
 
 May stopped, heated, glowing with his own magnanimity. 
 And it was magnanimous. The puddler had drunk in every 
 word, looking through the Doctor's flurry, and generous 
 heat, and self-approval, into his will, with those slow, ab- 
 sorbing eyes of his. 
 ^ " Make yourself what you will. It is your right." 
 
 " I know," quietly. " Will you help me ? " 
 
 Mitchell laughed again. The Doctor turned now, in a 
 passion, 
 
 * You know, Mitchell, I have not the means. You know, 
 if I had, it is in my heart to take this boy and educate him 
 for " 
 
 " The glory of God, and the glory of John May." 
 
 May did not speak for a moment ; then, controlled, he 
 said, 
 
 " Why should one be raised, when myriads are left ? I 
 have not the money, boy," to Wolfe, shortly. 
 
 " Money ? " He said it over slowly, as one repeats the 
 guessed answer to a riddle, doubtfully. '"That is it ? 
 Money ? " 
 
 " Yes, money, that is it," said Mitchell, rising, and 
 drawing his furred coat about him. "You've found the 
 cure for all the world's diseases. Come, May, find your 
 good-humor, and come home. This damp wind chills my 
 very bones. Come and preach your Saint-Simonian doc- 
 trines to-morrow to Kirby's hands. Let them have a clear 
 idea of the rights of the soul, and I '11 venture next week 
 they '11 strike for higher wages. That will be the end of it." 
 
 " Will you send the coach-driver to this side of the 
 mills ? " asked Kirby, turning to Wolfe. 
 
 He spoke kindly : it was his habit to do so. Deborah, 
 seeing the puddler go, crept after him. The three men 
 waited outside. Doctor May walked up and down, chafed. 
 Suddenly he stopped. 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 71 
 
 " Go back, Mitchell ! You say the pocket and the heart 
 of the world speak without meaning to these people. What 
 has its head to say ? Taste, culture, refinement ? Go ! " 
 
 Mitchell was leaning against a brick wall. He turned his 
 head indolently, and looked into the mills. There hung 
 about the place a thick, unclean odor. The slightest mo- 
 tion of his hand marked that he perceived it, and his insuf- 
 ferable disgust. That was all. May said nothing, only 
 quickened his angry tramp. 
 
 " Besides," added Mitchell, giving a corollary to his an- 
 swer, " it would be of no use. I am not one of them." 
 
 " You do not mean" said May, facing him. 
 
 " Yes, I mean just that. Reform is born of need, not 
 pity. No vital movement of the people's has worked down, 
 for good or evil ; fermented, instead, carried up the heav- 
 ing, cloggy mass. Think back through history, and you 
 will know it. What will this lowest deep thieves, Mag- 
 dalens, negroes do with the light filtered through pon- 
 derous Church creeds, Baconian theories, Goethe schemes ? 
 Some day, out of their bitter need will be thrown up their 
 own light-bringer, their Jean Paul, their Cromwell, their 
 Messiah." 
 
 " Bah ! " was the Doctor's inward criticism. However, 
 in practice, he adopted the theory ; for, when, night and 
 morning, afterwards, he prayed that power might be given 
 these degraded souls to rise, he glowed at heart, recognizing 
 an accomplished duty. 
 
 Wolfe and the woman had stood in the shadow of the 
 works as the coach drove off. The Doctor had held out his 
 hand in a frank, generous way, telling him to " take care of 
 himself, and to remember it was his right to rise." Mitchell 
 had simply touched his hat, as to an equal, with a quiet 
 look of thorough recognition. Kirby had thrown Deborah 
 some money, which she found, and clutched eagerly enough. 
 They were gone now, all of them. The man sat down on 
 the cinder-road, looking up into the murky sky 
 
 " 'T be late, Hugh. Wunnot hur come ? " 
 
72 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 He shook his head doggedly, and the woman crouched 
 out of his sight against the wall. Do you remember rare 
 moments when a sudden light flashed over yourself, your 
 world, God ? when you stood on a mountain-peak, seeing 
 your life as it might have been, as it is ? one quick instant, 
 when custom lost its force and every-day usage ? when your 
 friend, wife, brother, stood in a new light ? your soul was 
 bared, and the grave, a foretaste of the nakedness of the 
 Judgment-Day ? So it came before him, his life, that night 
 The slow tides of pain he had borne gathered themselves up 
 and surged against his soul. His squalid daily life, the 
 brutal coarseness eating into his brain, as the ashes into his 
 skin : before, these things had been a dull aching into his 
 consciousness ; to-night, they were reality. He griped the 
 filthy red shirt that clung, stiif with soot, about him, and 
 tore it savagely from his arm. The flesh beneath was 
 muddy with grease and ashes, and the heart beneath that f 
 And the soul ? God knows. 
 
 Then flashed before his vivid poetic sense the man who 
 had left him, the pure face, the delicate, sinewy limbs, in 
 harmony with all he knew of beauty or truth. In his cloudy 
 fancy he had pictured a Something like this. He had 
 found it in this Mitchell, even when he idly scoffed at his 
 pain : a Man all-knowing, all-seeing, crowned by Nature, 
 reigning, the keen glance of his eye falling like a sceptre 
 on other men. And yet his instinct taught him that he too 
 He ! He looked at himself with sudden loathing, sick, 
 wrung his hands with a cry, and then was silent. With all 
 the phantoms of his heated, ignorant fancy, Wolfe had not 
 been vague in his ambitions. They were practical, slowly 
 built up before him out of his knowledge of what he could 
 do. Through years he had day by day made this hope a 
 real thing to himself, a clear, projected figure of himself, 
 as he might become. 
 
 Able to speak, to know what was best, to raise these men 
 and women working at his side up with him : sometimes he 
 forgot this defined hope in the frantic anguish to escape, 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 73 
 
 only to escape, out of the wet:, the pain, the 'ashes, some- 
 where, anywhere, only for one moment of free air on a hill- 
 side, to lie down and let his sick soul throb itself out in the 
 sunshine. But to-night he panted for life. The savage 
 strength of his nature was roused ; his cry was fierce to 
 God for justice. 
 
 " Look at me ! " he said to Deborah, with a low, bitter 
 laugh, striking his puny chest savagely. " What am I worth, 
 Deb ? Is it my fault that I am no better ? My fault ? My 
 fault?" 
 
 He stopped, stung with a sudden remorse, seeing her 
 hunchback shape writhing with sobs. For Deborah was 
 crying thankless tears, according to the fashion of women. 
 
 " God forgi' me, woman ! Things go harder wi' you nor 
 me. It 's a worse share." 
 
 He got up and helped her to rise ; and they went dog- 
 gedly down the muddy street, side by side. 
 
 " It 's all wrong," he muttered, slowly, " all wrong ! I 
 dunnot understan'. But it '11 end some day." 
 
 " Come home, Hugh ! " she said, coaxingly ; for he had 
 stopped, looking around bewildered. 
 
 " Home, and back to the mill ! " He went on saying 
 this over to himself, as if he would mutter down every pain 
 in this dull despair. 
 
 She followed him through the fog, her blue lips chattering 
 with cold. They reached the cellar at last. Old Wolfe had 
 been drinking since she went out, and had crept nearer the 
 door. The girl Janey slept heavily in the corner. He went 
 up to her, touching softly the worn white arm with his fin- 
 gers. Some bitterer thought; stung him, as he stood there. 
 He wiped the drops from his forehead, and went into the 
 room beyond, livid, trembling. A hope, trifling, perhaps, 
 but very dear, had died just then out of the poor puddler's 
 life, as he looked at the sleeping, innocent girl, some plan 
 for the future, in which she had borne a part. He gave it 
 up that moment, then and forever. Only a trifle, perhaps, 
 to us : his face grew a shade paler, that was all. But, 
 4 
 
74 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 somehow, the man's soul, as God and the angels looked 
 down on it, never was the same afterwards. 
 
 Deborah followed him into the inner room. She carried 
 a candle, which she placed on the floor, closing the door 
 after her. She had seen the look on his face, as he turned 
 away ; her own grew deadly. Yet, as she came up to him, 
 her eyes glowed. He was seated on an old chest, quiet, 
 holding his face in his hands. 
 
 " Hugh ! " she said, softly. 
 
 He did not speak. 
 
 " Hugh, did hur hear what the man said, him with the 
 clear voice ? Did hur hear ? Money, money, that it wud 
 do all?" 
 
 He pushed her away, gently, but he was worn out ; her 
 rasping tone fretted him. 
 
 " Hugh ! " 
 
 The candle flared a pale yellow light over the cobwebbed 
 brick walls, and the woman standing there. He looked at 
 her. She was young, in deadly earnest ; her faded eyes, 
 and wet, ragged figure caught from their frantic eagerness a 
 power akin to beauty. 
 
 " Hugh, it is true ! Money ull do it ! Oh, Hugh, boy, 
 listen till me ! He said it true ! It is money ! " 
 
 " I know. Go back ! I do not want you here." 
 
 " Hugh, it is t' last time. I '11 never worrit hur again." 
 
 There were tears in her voice now, but she choked them 
 back. 
 
 " Hear till me only to-night ! .If one of t' witch people 
 wud come, them we heard of t' home, and gif hur all hur 
 wants, what then ? Say, Hugh ! " 
 
 " What do you mean ? " 
 
 " I mean money." 
 
 Her whisper shrilled through his brain. 
 
 "If one of t' witch dwarfs wud come from t' lane moors 
 to-night, and gif hur money, to go out, out, I say, out, 
 lad, where t' sun shines, and t' heath grows, and t' ladies 
 walk in silken gownds, and God stays all t' time, where t' 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 75 
 
 man lives that talked to us to-night, Hugh knows, 
 Hugh could walk there like a king ! " 
 
 He thought the woman mad, tried to check her, but she 
 went on, fierce in her eager haste. 
 
 " If / were t' witch dwarf, if I had t' money, wud hur 
 thank me ? Wud hur take me out o' this place wid hur and 
 Janey ? I wud not come into the gran' house hur wud build, 
 to vex hur wid t' hunch, only at night, when t' shadows 
 were dark, stand far off to see hur." 
 
 " Pocfr Deb ! poor Deb ! " he said, soothingly. 
 
 " It is here," she said, suddenly jerking into his hand a 
 small roll. " I took it ! I did it ! I shall be hanged ! I 
 shall be burnt in hell, if anybody knows I took it ! Me, me ! 
 not hur ! Out of his pocket, as he leaned against t' bricks. 
 Hur knows ? " 
 
 She thrust it into his hand, and then, her errand done, 
 began to gather chips together to make a fire, choking down 
 hysteric sobs. 
 
 " Has it come to this ? " 
 
 That was all he said. The Welsh Wolfe blood was 
 honest. The roll was a small green pocket-book containing 
 one or two gold pieces, and a check for an incredible 
 amount, as it seemed to the poor puddler. He laid it down, 
 hiding his face again in his hands. 
 
 " Hugh, don't be angry wud me ! It 's only poor Deb, 
 hur knows ? " 
 
 He took the long skinny fingers kindly in his. 
 
 " Angry ? God help me, no ! Let me sleep. I am 
 tired." 
 
 He threw himself heavily down on the wooden bench, 
 stunned with pain and weariness. She brought some old 
 rags to cover him. 
 
 It was late on Sunday evening before he awoke. I tell 
 God's truth, when I say he had then no thought of keeping 
 this money. Deborah had hid it in his pocket. He found 
 it there. She watched him eagerly, as he took it out. 
 
 " I must gif it to him," he said, reading her face. 
 
76 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 " Hur knows," she said with a bitter sigh of disappoint- 
 ment. " But it is hur right to keep it." 
 
 His right ! The word struck him. Doctor May had used 
 the same. He washed himself, and went out to find this 
 man Mitchell. His right ! Why did this chance word 
 cling to him so obstinately ? Do you hear the fierce devils 
 whisper in his ear, as he went slowly down the darkening 
 street ? 
 
 The evening came on, slow and calm. He seated him- 
 self at the end of an alley leading into one of the larger 
 streets. His brain was clear to-night, keen, intent, master- 
 ing. It would not start back, cowardly, from any hellish 
 temptation, but meet it face to face. Therefore the great 
 temptation of his life came to him veiled by no sophistry, 
 but bold, defiant, owning its own vile name, trusting to one 
 bold blow for victory. 
 
 He did not deceive himself. Theft ! That was it. At 
 first the word sickened him ; then he grappled with it. 
 Sitting there on a broken cart-wheel, the fading day, the 
 noisy groups, the church-bells' tolling passed before him 
 like a panorama, while the sharp struggle went on within. 
 This money ! He took it out, and looked at it. If he gave 
 it back, what then ? He was going to be cool about it. 
 
 People going by to church saw only a sickly mill-boy 
 watching them quietly at the alley's mouth. They did not 
 know that he was mad, or they would not have gone by so 
 quietly : jnad with hunger ; stretching out his hands to the 
 world, that had given so much to them, for leave to live 
 the life God meant him to live. His soul within him was 
 smothering to death ; he wanted so much, thought so much, 
 and knew nothing. There was nothing of which he was 
 certain, except the mill and things there. Of God and 
 heaven he had heard so little, that they were to him what 
 fairy-land is to a child : something real, but not here ; very 
 far off. His brain, greedy, dwarfed, full of thwarted energy 
 and unused powers, questioned these men and women going 
 by, coldly, bitterly, that night. Was it not his right to live 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 77 
 
 asjthey, a pure life, a good, true-hearted life, full of beauty 
 ancTkind words ? He only wanted to know how to use the 
 strength within him. His heart warmed, as he thought of 
 it. He suffered himself to think of it longer. If he took 
 the money ? 
 
 Then he saw himself as he might be, strong, helpful, 
 kindly. The night crept on, as this one image slowly 
 evolved itself from the crowd of other thoughts and stood 
 triumphant. He looked at it. As he might be ! What 
 wonder, if it blinded him to delirium, the madness that 
 underlies all revolution, all progress, and all fall ? 
 
 You laugh at the shallow temptation ? You see the error 
 underlying its argument so clearly, that to him a true life 
 was one of full development rather than self-restraint ? that 
 he was deaf to the higher tone in a cry of voluntary suffer- 
 ing for truth's sake than in the fullest flow of spontaneous 
 harmony ? I do not plead his cause. I only want to show 
 you the mote in my brother's eye : then you can see clearly 
 to take it out. 
 
 The money, there it lay on his knee, a little blotted slip 
 of paper, nothing in itself ; used to raise him out of the pit ; 
 something straight from God's hand. A thief ! Well, what 
 was it to be a thief ? He met the question at last face to 
 face, wiping the clammy drops of sweat from his forehead. 
 God made this money the fresh air, too for his chil- 
 dren's use. He never made the difference between poor and 
 rich. The Something who looked down on him that mo- 
 ment through the cool gray sky had a kindly face, he knew, 
 loved his children alike. Oh, he knew that ! 
 
 There were times when the soft floods of color in the crim- 
 son and purple flames, or the clear depth of amber in the 
 water below the bridge, had somehow given him a glimpse 
 of another world than this, of an infinite depth of beauty 
 and of quiet somewhere, somewhere, a depth of quiet 
 and rest and love. Looking up now, it became strangely 
 real. The sun had sunk quite below the hills, but his last 
 rays struck upward, touching the zenith. The fog had risen, 
 
78 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 and the town and river were steeped in its thick, gray 
 damp ; but overhead, the sun-touched smoke-clouds opened 
 like a cleft ocean, shifting, rolling seas of crimson mist, 
 waves of billowy silver veined with blood-scarlet, inner 
 depths unfathomable of glancing light. Wolfe's artist-eye 
 grew drunk with color. The gates of that other world ! 
 Fading, flashing before him now ! What, in that world of 
 Beauty, Content, and Right, were the petty laws, the mine 
 and thine, of mill-owners and mill-hands ? 
 
 A consciousness of power stirred within him. He stood 
 up. A man, he thought, stretching out his hands, free 
 to work, to live, to love ! Free ! His right ! He folded the 
 scrap of paper in his hand. As his nervous fingers took it 
 in, limp and blotted, so his soul took in the mean tempta- 
 tion, lapped it in fancied rights, in dreams of improved ex- 
 istences, drifting and endless as the cloud-seas of color. 
 Clutching it, as if the tightness of his hold would strengthen 
 his sense of possession, he went aimlessly down the street. 
 It was his watch at the mill. He need not go, need never go 
 again, thank God ! shaking off the thought with unspeak- 
 able loathing. 
 
 Shall I go over the history of the hours of that night ? 
 how the man wandered from one to another of his old 
 haunts, with a half-consciousness of bidding them farewell, 
 lanes and alleys and back-yards where the mill-hands 
 lodged, noting, with a new eagerness, the filth and drunk- 
 enness, the pig-pens, the ash-heaps covered with potato- 
 skins, the bloated, pimpled women at the doors, with a 
 new disgust, a new sense of sudden triumph, and, under all, 
 a new, vague dread, unknown before, smothered down, kept 
 under, but still there ? It left him but once during the 
 night, when, for the second time in his life, he entered a 
 church. It was a sombre Gothic pile, where the stained 
 light lost itself in far-retreating arches ; built to meet the 
 requirements and sympathies of a far other class than 
 Wolfe's. Yet it touched, moved him uncontrollably. The 
 distances, the shadows, the still, marble figures, the mass of 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 79 
 
 silent, kneeling worshippers, the mysterious music, thrilled, 
 lifted his soul with a wonderful pain. Wolfe forgot himself, 
 forgot the new life he was going to live, the mean terror 
 gnawing underneath. The voice of the speaker strength- 
 ened the charm ; it was clear, feeling, full, strong. An old 
 man, who had lived much, suffered much ; whose brain was 
 keenly alive, dominant ; whose heart was summer-warm 
 with charity. He taught it to-night. He held up Humanity 
 in its grand total ; showed the great world-cancer to his 
 people. Who could show it better ? He was a Christian 
 reformer ; he had studied the age thoroughly ; his outlook 
 at man had been free, world-wide, over all time. His faith 
 stood sublime upon the Rock of Ages ; his fiery zeal guided 
 vast schemes by which the Gospel was to be preached to all 
 nations. How did he preach it to-night ? In burning, 
 light-laden words he painted Jesus, the incarnate Life, Love, 
 the universal Man : words that became reality in the lives 
 of these people, that lived again in beautiful words and 
 actions, trifling, but heroic. Sin, as he defined it, was a 
 real foe to them ; their trials, temptations, were his. His 
 words passed far over the furnace-tender's grasp, toned to 
 suit another class of culture ; they sounded in his ears a 
 very pleasant song in an unknown tongue. He meant to 
 cure this world-cancer with a steady eye that had never 
 glared with hunger, and a hand that neither poverty nor 
 strychnine- whiskey had taught to shake. In this morbid, 
 distorted heart of the Welsh puddler he had failed. 
 
 Eighteen centuries ago, the Master of this man tried re- 
 form in the streets of a city as crowded and vile as this, and 
 did not fail. His disciple, showing Him to-night to cultured 
 hearers, showing the clearness of the* God-power acting 
 through Him,<shrank back from one coarse fact; that in 
 birth and habit the man Christ was thrown up from the 
 lowest of the people : his flesh, their flesh ; their blood, his 
 blood ; tempted like them, to brutalize day by day ; to lie, 
 to steal : the actual slime and want of their hourly life, and 
 the wine-press he trod alone. 
 
8o Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 Yet, is there no meaning in this perpetually covered 
 truth ? If the son of the carpenter had stood in the church 
 that night, as he stood with the fishermen and harlots by 
 the sea of Galilee, before His Father and their Father, de- 
 spised and rejected of men, without a place to lay His head, 
 wounded for their iniquities, bruised for their transgressions, 
 would not that hungry mill-boy at least, in the back seat, 
 have " known the man " ? That Jesus did not stand there. 
 
 Wolfe rose at last, and turned from the church down the 
 'street. He looked up ; the night had come on foggy, damp ; 
 the golden mists had vanished, and the sky lay dull and 
 ash-colored. He wandered again aimlessly down the street, 
 idly wondering what had become of the cloud-sea of crim- 
 son and scarlet. The irial-day of this man's life was over, 
 and he had lost the victory. What followed was mere drift- 
 ing circumstance, a quicker walking over the path, that 
 was all. Do you want to hear the end of it ? You wish me 
 to make a tragic story out of it ? Why. in the police-reports 
 of the morning paper you can find a dozen such tragedies ; 
 hints of shipwrecks unlike any that ever befell on the high 
 seas ; hints that here a power was lost to heaven, that 
 there a soul went down where no tide can ebb or flow. 
 Commonplace enough the hints are, jocose sometimes, 
 done up in rhyme. 
 
 Doctor May, a month after the night I have told you of, 
 was reading to his wife at breakfast from this fourth column 
 of the morning-paper : an unusual thing, these police-re- 
 ports not being, in general, choice reading for ladies ; but it 
 was only one item he read. 
 
 " Oh, my dear ! You remember that man I told you of, 
 that we saw at Kirby's mill ? that was arrested for robbing 
 Mitchell ? Here he is ; just listen : ' Circuit Court. Judge 
 Day. Hugh Wolfe, operative in. Kirby & John's Loudon 
 Mills. Charge, grand larceny. Sentence, nineteen years 
 hard labor in penitentiary.' Scoundrel ! Serves him 
 right ! After all our kindness that night ! Picking Mitchell's 
 pocket at the very time ! " 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 8 1 
 
 His wife said something about the ingratitude of that 
 kind of people, and then they began to talk of something 
 else. 
 
 Nineteen years ! How easy that was to read ! What a 
 simple word for Judge Day to utter ! Nineteen years ! 
 Half a lifetime ! 
 
 Hugh Wolfe sat on the window-ledge of his cell, looking 
 out. His ankles were ironed. Not usual in such cases; 
 but he had made two desperate efforts to escape. " Well," 
 as Haley, the jailer, said, " small blame to him ! Nineteen 
 years' imprisonment was not a pleasant thing to look forward 
 to." Haley was very good-natured about it, though Wolfe 
 had fought him savagely. 
 
 " When he was first caught," the jailer said afterwards, in 
 telling the story, " before the trial, the fellow was cut down 
 at once, laid there on that pallet like a dead man, with his 
 hands over his eyes. Never saw a man so cut down in my life. 
 Time of the trial, too, came the queerest dodge of any custom- 
 er I ever had. Would choose no lawyer. Judge gave him 
 one, of course. Gibson it was. He tried to prove the fellow 
 crazy ; but it would n't go. Thing was plain as daylight : 
 check found on him. 'T was a hard sentence, all the 
 law allows ; but it was for 'xample's sake. These mill- 
 hands are gettin' onbearable. When the sentence was read, 
 he just looked up, and said the money was his by rights, 
 and that all the world had gone wrong. That night, after 
 the trial, a gentleman came to see him here, name of 
 Mitchell, him as he stole* from. Talked to him for an 
 hour. Thought he came for curiosity, like. After he was 
 gone, thought Wolfe was remarkable quiet, and went into 
 his cell. Found him very low ; bed all bloody. Doctor 
 said he had been bleeding at the lungs. He was as weak 
 as a cat ; yet, if ye '11 b'lieve me, he tried to get a-past me 
 and get out. I just carried him like a baby, and threw him 
 on the pallet. Three days after, he tried it again : that 
 time reached the wall. Lord help you ! he fought like a 
 tiger, giv' some terrible blows. Fightin' for life, you see ; 
 4 * F 
 
82 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 for he can't live long, shut up in the stone crib down yon- 
 der. Qot a death-cough now. 'T took two of us to bring 
 him down that day ; so I just put the irons on his feet. 
 There he sits, in there. Coin' to-morrow, with a batch 
 more of 'em. That woman, hunchback, tried with him, 
 you remember ? she 's only got three years. 'Complice. 
 But she^s a woman, you know. He 's been quiet ever since 
 I put on irons : giv' up, I suppose. Looks white, sick- 
 lookin'. It acts different on 'em, bein' sentenced. Most of 
 'em gets reckless, devilish-like. Some prays awful, and 
 sings them vile songs of the mills, all in a breath. That 
 woman, now, she 's desperY. Been beggin' to see Hugh, 
 as she calls him, for three days. I 'm a-goin' to let her in. 
 She don't go with him. Here she is in this next cell. I 'm 
 a-goin' now to let her in." 
 
 He let her in. Wolfe did not see her. She crept into a 
 corner of the cell, and stood watching him. He was scratch- 
 ing the iron bars of the window with a piece of tin which he 
 had picked up, with an idle, uncertain, vacant stare, just as 
 a child or idiot would do. 
 
 " Tryin' to get out, old boy ? " laughed Haley. " Them 
 irons will need a crowbar beside your tin, before you can 
 open 'em." 
 
 Wolfe laughed, too, in a senseless way. 
 
 " I think I '11 get out," he said. 
 
 " I believe his brain 's touched," said Haley, when he 
 came out. 
 
 The puddler scraped away with the tin for half an hour. 
 Still Deborah did not speak. At last she ventured nearer, 
 and touched his arm. 
 
 " Blood ? " she said, looking at some spots on his coat 
 with a shudder. 
 
 He looked up at her. " Why, Deb ! " he said, smiling, 
 such a bright, boyish smile, that it went to poor Deborah's 
 heart directly, and she sobbed and cried out loud. 
 
 " Oh, Hugh, lad ! Hugh ! dunnot look at me, when it wur 
 my fault ! To think I brought hur to it ! And I loved hur 
 so! Oh, lad, I dud!" 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 83 
 
 The confession, even in this wretch, came with the wo- 
 man's blush through the sharp cry. 
 
 He did not seem to hear her, scraping away diligently 
 at the bars with the bit of tin. 
 
 Was he going mad ? She peered closely into his face. 
 Something she saw there made her draw suddenly back, 
 something which Haley had not seen, that lay beneath the 
 pinched, vacant look it had caught since the trial, or the 
 curious gray shadow that rested on it. That gray shadow, 
 yes, she knew what that meant. She had often seen it 
 creeping over women's faces for months, who died at last of 
 slow hunger or consumption. That meant deatn, distant, 
 lingering : but this Whatever it was the woman saw, 
 or thought she saw, used as she was to crime and misery, 
 seemed to make her sick with a new horror. Forgetting 
 her fear of him, she caught his shoulders, and looked keenly, 
 steadily, into his eyes. 
 
 " Hugh ! " she cried, in a desperate whisper, " oh, boy, 
 not that ! for God's sake, not that!" 
 
 The vacant laugh went off his face, and he answered her 
 in a muttered word or two that drove her away. Yet the 
 words were kindly enough. Sitting there on his pallet, she 
 cried silently a hopeless sort of tears, but did not speak 
 again. The man looked up furtively at her now and then. 
 Whatever his own trouble was, her distress vexed him with 
 a momentary sting. 
 
 It was market-day. The narrow window of the jail 
 looked down directly on the carts and wagons drawn up in 
 a long line, where they had unloaded. He could see, too, 
 and hear distinctly the clink of money as it changed hands, 
 the busy crowd of whites and blacks shoving, pushing one 
 another, and the chaffering and swearing at the stalls. 
 Somehow, the sound, more than anything else had done, 
 wakened him up, made the whole real to him. He was 
 done with the world and the business of it. He let the tin 
 fall, and looked out, pressing his face close to the rusty bars. 
 How thev crowded and pushed ! And he, he should. 
 
84 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 never walk that pavement again ! There came Neff San- 
 ders, one of the feeders at the mill, with a basket on his 
 arm. Sure enough, Neff was married the other week. He 
 whistled, hoping he would look up ; but he did not. He 
 wondered if Neff remembered he was there, if any of the 
 boys thought of him up there, and thought that he never 
 was to go down that old cinder-road again. Never again ! 
 He had not quite understood it before ; but now he did. 
 Not for days or years, but never ! that was it. 
 
 How clear the light fell on that stall in front of the mar- 
 ket ! and how like a picture it was, the dark-green heaps of 
 corn, and the crimson beets, and golden melons ! There 
 was another with game : how the light flickered on that 
 pheasant's breast, with the purplish blood dripping over the 
 brown feathers ! He could see the red shining of the drops, 
 it was so near. In one minute he could be down there. It 
 was just a step. So easy, as it seemed, so natural to go ! 
 Yet it could never be not in all the thousands of years to 
 come that he should put his foot on that street again ! 
 He thought of himself with a sorrowful pity, as of some one 
 else. There was a dog down in the market, walking after 
 his master with such a stately, grave look ! only a dog, 
 yet he could go backwards and forwards just as he pleased : 
 he had good luck ! Why, the very vilest cur, yelping there 
 in the gutter, had not lived his life, had been free to act out 
 whatever thought God had put into his brain ; while he 
 No, he would not think of that ! He tried to put the thought 
 away, and to listen to a dispute between a countryman and 
 a woman about some meat ; but it would come back. He, 
 what had he done to bear this ? 
 
 Then came the sudden picture of what might have been, 
 and now. He knew what it was to be in the penitentiary, 
 how it went with men there. He knew how in these long 
 years he should slowly die, but not until soul and body had 
 become corrupt and rotten, how, when he came out, if he 
 lived to come, even the lowest of the mill-hands would jeer 
 him, how his hands would be weak, and his bjain sense- 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 85 
 
 less and stupid. He believed he was almost that now. 
 He put his hand to his head, with a puzzled, weary look. 
 It ached, his head, with thinking. He tried to quiet him- 
 self. It was only right, perhaps ; he had done wrong. But 
 was there right_or wrong for such as he ? What was right ? 
 And who had ever taught him ? He thrust the whole mat- 
 ter away. A dark, cold quiet crept through his brain. It 
 was all wrong ; but let it be ! It was nothing to him more 
 than the others. Let it be ! 
 
 The door grated, as Haley opened it. 
 
 " Come, my woman ! Must lock up for t' night. Come, 
 stir yerself ! " 
 
 She went up and took Hugh's hand. 
 
 " Good-night, Deb," he said, carelessly. 
 
 She had not hoped he would say more ; but the tired pain 
 on her mouth just then was bitterer than death. She took 
 his passive hand and kissed it 
 
 " Hur '11 never see Deb again ! " she ventured, her lips 
 growing colder and more bloodless. 
 
 What did she say that for ? Did he not know it ? Yet 
 he would not be impatient with poor old Deb. She had 
 trouble of her own, as well as he. 
 
 " No, never again," he said, trying to be cheerful. 
 
 She stood just a moment, looking at him. Do you laugh 
 at her, standing there, with her hunchback, her rags, her 
 bleared, withered face, and the great despised love tugging 
 at her heart ? 
 
 " Come you ! " called Haley, impatiently. 
 
 She did not move. 
 
 " Hugh ! " she whispered. 
 
 It was to be her last word. What was it ? 
 
 " Hugh, boy, not THAT ! " 
 
 He did not answer. She wrung her hands, trying to be 
 silent, looking in his face in an agony of entreaty. He 
 smiled again, kindly. 
 
 " It is best, Deb. I cannot bear to be hurted any more." 
 
 " Hur knows," she said, humbly. 
 
86 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 " Tell my father good-by ; and and kiss little Janey." ' 
 
 She nodded, saying nothing, looked in his face again, and 
 went out of the door. As she went, she staggered. 
 
 " Drinkin' to-day ? " broke out Haley, pushing her before 
 him. "Where the Devil did you get it? Here, in with 
 ye ! " and he shoved her into her cell, next to Wolfe's, and 
 shut the door. 
 
 Along the wall of her cell there was a crack low down by 
 the floor, through which she could see the light from 
 Wolfe's. She had discovered it days before. She hurried 
 in now, and, kneeling down by it, listened, hoping to hear 
 some sound. Nothing but the rasping of the tin on the 
 bars. He was at his old amusement again. Something in 
 the noise jarred on her ear, for she shivered as she heard it 
 Hugh rasped away at the bars. A dull old bit of tin, not 
 fit to cut korl with. 
 
 He looked out of the window again. People were leaving 
 the market now. A tall mulatto girl, following her mistress, 
 her basket on her head, crossed the street just below, and 
 looked up. She was laughing ; but, when she caught sight 
 of the haggard face peering out through the bars, suddenly 
 grew grave, and hurried by. A free, firm step, a clear-cut 
 olive face, with a scarlet turban tied on one side, dark, 
 shining eyes, and on the head the basket poised, filled with 
 fruit and flowers, under which the scarlet turban and bright 
 eyes looked out half-shadowed. The picture caught his eye. 
 It was good to see a face like that. He would try to-mor- 
 row, and cut one like it. To-morrow ! He threw down the 
 tin, trembling, and covered his face with his hands. When 
 he looked up again, the daylight was gone. 
 
 Deborah, crouching near by on the other side of the 
 wall, heard no noise. He sat on the side of the low pallet, 
 thinking. Whatever was the mystery which the woman had 
 seen on his face, it came out now slowly, in the dark there, 
 and became fixed, a something never seen on his face be- 
 fore. The evening was darkening fast. The market had 
 been over for an hour ; the rumbling of the carts over the 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 87 
 
 pavement grew more infrequent : he listened to each, as it 
 passed, because he thought it was to be for the last time. 
 For the same reason, it was, I suppose, that he strained his 
 eyes to catch a glimpse of each passer-by, wondering who 
 they were, what kind of homes they were going to, if they 
 had children, listening eagerly to every chance word in 
 the street, as if (God be merciful to the man ! what 
 strange fancy was this ?) as if he never should hear hu- 
 man voices again. 
 
 It was quite dark at last. The street was a lonely one. 
 The last passenger, he thought, was gone. Nq, there 
 was a quick step : Joe Hill, lighting the lamps. Joe was a 
 good old chap ; never passed a fellow without some joke 
 or other. He remembered once seeing the place where he 
 lived with his wife. " Granny Hill" the boys called her. 
 Bedridden she was ; but so kind as Joe was to her 1 kept 
 the room so clean ! and the old woman, when he was 
 there, was laughing at " some of t' lad's foolishness." The 
 step was far down the street ; but he could see him place 
 the ladder, run up, and light the gae. A longing seized him 
 to be spoken to once more. 
 
 " Joe ! " he called out of the grating. " Good-by, 
 Joe I 
 
 The old man stopped a moment, listening uncertainly ; 
 then hurried on. The prisoner thrust his hand out of the 
 window, and called again, louder ; but Joe was too far down 
 the street. It was a little thing ; but it hurt him, this dis- 
 appointment. 
 
 " Good-by, Joe ! " he called, sorrowfully enough. 
 
 " Be quiet ! " said one of the jailers, passing the door, 
 striking on it with his club. 
 
 Oh, that was the last, was it ? 
 
 There was an inexpressible bitterness on his face, as he 
 lay down on the bed, taking the bit of tin, which he had 
 rasped to a tolerable degree of sharpness, in his hand, to 
 play with, it may be. He bared his arms, looking intently at 
 their corded veins and sinews. Deborah, listening in the 
 
88 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 next cell, heard a slight clicking sound, often repeated. She 
 shut her lips tightly, that she might not scream ; the cold 
 drops of sweat broke over her, in her dumb agony. 
 
 " Hur knows best," she muttered at last, fiercely clutching 
 the boards where she lay. 
 
 If she could have seen Wolfe, there was nothing about 
 him to frighten her. He lay quite still, his arms out- 
 stretched, looking at the pearly stream of moonlight coming 
 into the window. I think in that one hour that came then 
 he lived back over all the years that had gone before. 
 I think that all the low, vile life, all his wrongs, all his 
 starved hopes, came then, and stung him with a farewell 
 poison that made him sick unto death. He made neither 
 moan nor cry, only turned his worn face now and then to 
 the pure light, that seemed so far off, as one that said, 
 " How long, O Lord ? how long ? " 
 
 The hour was over at last. The .moon, passing over her 
 nightly path, slowly came nearer, and threw the light across 
 his bed on his feet. He watched it steadily, as it crept up, 
 inch by inch, slowly. Ittseemed to him to carry with it a 
 great silence. He had been so hot and tired there always 
 in the mills ! The years had been so fierce and cruel ! 
 There was coming now quiet and coolness and sleep. His 
 tense limbs relaxed, and settled in a calm languor. The 
 blood ran fainter and slow from his heart. He did not 
 think now with a savage anger of what might be and was 
 not ; he was conscious only of deep stillness creeping over 
 him. At first he saw a sea of faces : tne mill-men, women 
 he had known, drunken and bloated, Janey's timid and 
 pitiful, poor old Debs : then they floated together like a 
 mist, and faded away, leaving only the clear, pearly moon- 
 light. 
 
 Whether, as the pure light crept up the stretched-out 
 figure, it brought with it calm and peace, who shall say ? 
 His dumb soul was alone with God in judgment. A Voice 
 may have spoken for it from far-off Calvary, " Father, for- 
 give them, for they know not what they do ! " Who dare 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 89 
 
 say ? Fainter and fainter the heart rose and fell, slower and 
 slower the moon floated from behind a cloud, until, when at 
 last its full tide of white splendor swept over the cell, it 
 seemed to wrap and fold into a deeper stillness the dead 
 figure that never should move again. Silence deeper than 
 the Night ! Nothing that moved, save the black, nauseous 
 stream of blood dripping slowly from the pallet to the floor ! 
 
 There was outcry and crowd' enough in the cell the next 
 day. The coroner and his jury, the local editors, Kirby 
 himself, and boys with their hands thrust knowingly into 
 their pockets anfl heads on one side, jammed into the cor- 
 ners. Coming and going all day. Only one woman. She 
 came late, and outstayed them all. A Quaker, or Friend, 
 as they call themselves. I think this woman was known 
 by that name in heaven. A homely body, coarsely dressed 
 in gray and white. Deborah (for Haley had let her in) 
 took notice of her. She watched them all sitting on the 
 end of the pallet, holding his head in her arms with the 
 ferocity of a watch-dog, if any of them touched the body. 
 There was no meekness, no sorrow, in her face ; the stuff 
 out of which murderers are made, instead. All the time 
 Haley and the woman were laying straight the limbs and 
 cleaning the cell, Deborah sat still, keenly watching the 
 Quaker's face. Of all the crowd there that day, this woman 
 alone had not spoken to her, only once or twice had put 
 some cordial to her lips. After they all were gone, the 
 woman, in the same stjj, gentle way, brought a vase of 
 wood-leaves and berries, and placed it by the pallet, then 
 opened the narrow window. The fresh air blew in, and 
 swept the woolly -fragrance over the dead face. Deborah 
 looked up with a quick wonder. 
 
 " Did hur know my bby wud like it ? Did hur know 
 Hugh?" 
 
 " I know Hugh now." 
 
 The white fingers passed in a slow, pitiful way over the 
 dead, worn face. There was a heavy shadow in the quiet 
 eyes. 
 
go Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 " Did hur know where they '11 bury Hugh ? " said Debo- 
 rah in a shrill tone, catching her arm. 
 
 This had been the question hanging on her lips all day. 
 
 " In t' town-yard ? Under t' mud and ash ? T lad 'll 
 smother, woman ! He wur born on t' lane moor, where t j 
 air is frick and strong. Take hur out, for God's sake, take 
 hur out where t' air blows ! " 
 
 The Quaker hesitated, but only for a moment She put 
 her strong arm around Deborah and led her to the window. 
 
 " Thee sees the hills, friend, over the river ? Thee sees 
 how the light lies warm there, and the wiftds of God blow 
 all the day ? I live there, where the blue smoke is, by 
 the trees. Look at me." She turned Deborah's face to her 
 own, clear and earnest. " Thee will believe me ? I will 
 take Hugh and bury him there to-morrow." 
 
 Deborah did not doubt her. As the evening wore on, 
 she leaned against the iron bars, looking at the hills that 
 rose far off, through the thick sodden clouds, like a bright, 
 unattainable calm. As she looked, a shadow of their sol- 
 emn repose fell on her face : its fierce discontent faded into 
 a pitiful, humble quiet. Slow, solemn tears gathered in her 
 eyes : the poor weak eyes turned so hopelessly to the place 
 where Hugh was to rest, the grave heights looking higher 
 and brighter and more solemn than ever before. The 
 Quaker watched her keenly. She came to her at last, and 
 touched her arm. 
 
 " When thee comes back," sh%said, in a low, sorrowful 
 tone, like one who speaks from a strong heart deeply moved 
 with remorse or pity, " thee shall begin thy life again, 
 there on the hills. I came too late ; but not for thee, by 
 God's help, it may be." 
 
 Not too late. Three years after, the Quaker began her 
 work. I end my story here. At evening-time it was light. 
 There is no need to tire you with the long years of sun- 
 shine, and fresh air, and slow, patient Christ-love, needed to 
 make healthy and hopeful this impure body and soul. 
 There is a homely pine house, on one of these hills, whose 
 
Life in the Iron-Mills. 91 
 
 i 
 
 windows overlook broad, wooded slopes and clover-crim- 
 soned meadows, niched into the very place where the 
 light is warmest, the air freest. It is the Friends' meeting- 
 house. Once a week they sit there, in their grave, earnest 
 way, waiting for the Spirit of Love to speak, opening their 
 simple hearts to receive His words. There is a woman, 
 old, deformed, who takes a humble place among them : 
 waiting like them : in her gray dress, her worn face, pure 
 and meek, turned now and then to the sky. A woman 
 much loved by these silent, restful people ; more silent 
 than they, more humble, more loving. Waiting : with her 
 eyes turned to hills higher and purer than these on which 
 she lives, dim and far off now, but to be reached some 
 day. There may be in her heart some latent hope to meet 
 there the love denied her here, that she shall find him 
 whom she lost, and that then she will not be all-unworthy. 
 Who blames her? Something is lost in the passage of 
 every soul from one eternity to the other, something pure 
 and beautiful, which might have been and was not : a hope, 
 a talent, a love, over which the soul mourns, like Esau de- 
 prived of his birthright. What blame to the meek Quaker, 
 if she took her lost hope to make, the hills of heaven more 
 fair? 
 
 Nothing remains to tell that the poor Welsh puddler once 
 lived, but this figure of the mill- woman cut in korl. I have 
 it here in a corner of my library. I keep it hid behind a 
 curtain, it is such a rough, ungainly thing. Yet there are 
 about it touches, grand sweeps of outline, that show a mas- 
 ter's hand. Sometimes, to-night, for instance, the cur- 
 tain is accidentally drawn back, and I see a bare arm 
 stretched out imploringly in the darkness, and an eager, 
 wolfish face watching mine : a wan, woful face, through 
 which the spirit of the dead korl-cutter looks out, with its 
 thwarted life, its mighty hunger, its unfinished work. Its 
 pale, 'vague lips seem to tremble with a terrible question. 
 "Is this the End ? " they say, " nothing beyond ? no 
 more ? " Why, you tell me you have seen that look in the 
 

 92 Life in the Iron-Mills. 
 
 f 
 
 eyes of dumb brutes, horses dying under the lash. I 
 know. 
 
 The deep of the night is passing while I write. The 
 gas-light wakens from the shadows here and there the ob- 
 jects which lie scattered through the room : only faintly, 
 though ; for they belong to the open sunlight. As I glance 
 at them, they each recall some task or pleasure of the com- 
 ing day. *A half-moulded child's head ; Aphrodite ; a 
 bough of forest-leaves ; music ; work ; homely fragments, 
 in which lie the secrets of all eternal truth and beauty. 
 Prophetic all ! Only this dumb, woful face seems to belong 
 to and end with the night. I turn to look at it. Has the 
 power of its desperate need commanded the darkness away ? 
 While the room is yet steeped in heavy shadow, a cool, 
 gray light suddenly touches its head like a blessing hand, 
 and its groping arm points through the broken cloud to the 
 far East, where, in the flickering, nebulous crimson, God 
 has set the promise of the Dawn. 
 
 
THE PURSUIT OF KNOWLEDGE UNDER 
 DIFFICULTIES ; 
 
 AND WHAT CAME OF IT. 
 
 R. GEER!" 
 
 Mr. Geer was unquestionably asleep. 
 
 This certainly did not indicate a sufficiently 
 warm appreciation of Mrs. Geer's social charms ; but the 
 enormity of the offence will be greatly modified by a brief 
 review of the attending circumstances. If you will but con- 
 sider that the crackling of burning wood in a huge Frank- 
 lin stove is strongly soporific in its tendencies, that the 
 cushion of a capacious arm-chair, constructed and adjusted 
 as if with a single eye to a delicious doze, nay, to a long 
 succession of dozes, is a powerful temptation to a sleepy 
 soul, that the regular, and, it must be confessed, some- 
 what monotonous click, click, click of Mrs. Geer's knitting- 
 needles only served to measure, without disturbing the 
 silence, and, lastly, that they had been husband and wife 
 for thirty years, you will not cease to wonder that Mr. 
 Geer 
 
 " was glorious, 
 O'er all the ills of life victorious." 
 
 To most men, an interruption at such a time would have 
 been particularly annoying ; but when Mrs. Geer spoke in 
 that way, Mr. Geer, asleep or awake, always made a point 
 of hearing ; so he roused himself, and turned his round, 
 
94 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 honest face and placid blue eyes on the partner of his 
 bosom, who went on, 
 
 " Mr. Geer, our Ivy will be seventeen, come fall." 
 
 " Possible ? " replied Mr. Geer. " Who 'd 'a' thunk it ? " 
 
 Mr. Geer, as you may infer, was eminently a free-thinker, 
 or rather, a free-actor, in respect of irregular verbs. In fact, 
 he tyrannized over all parts of speech : wrested nouns and 
 verbs from their original shape, till you could hardly recog- 
 nize their distorted faces ; and committed that next worst 
 sin to murdering one's mother, namely, murdering one's 
 mother-tongue, with an abandon that was absolutely fasci- 
 nating. Having delivered his opinion thus sententiously, he 
 at once subsided, closed his placid eyes, and retired into his 
 inner world of thought, perhaps. 
 
 "Mr. Geer!" 
 
 This time he fairly jumped from his seat, and cast about 
 him scared, blinking eyes. 
 
 " Mr. Geer, how can you sleep away your precious time 
 so?" 
 
 " Sleep ? I I am sure, I was never wider awake in 
 my life." 
 
 "Well, then, tell me what I said." 
 
 " Said ? Eh, eh, something about Ivy, was n't it ? " 
 
 And Mr. Geer nervously twitched up the skirts of his 
 coat, and replaced his awry cushion, and began to think 
 that perhaps, after all, he had been asleep. But Mrs. Geer 
 was too much interested in the subject of her own cogita- 
 tions to pursue her victory further ; so she answered, 
 
 " Yes, and what is a-going to become of her ? " 
 
 "Lud, lud! What's the matter?" asked Mr. Geer, 
 wildly. 
 
 " Matter ? Why, she '11 be seventeen, come fall, and 
 doesn't know a thing." 
 
 " O Lud ! that all ? That a'n't nothin'." 
 
 And Mr. Geer settled comfortably down into his arm- 
 chair once more. He felt decidedly relieved. Visions of 
 small-pox, cholera, and throat-distemper, the worst evils 
 
^mder Difficulties. 95 
 
 that he could think of and dread for his darling, had been 
 conjured up by his wife's words ; and when he found the 
 real state of the case, a great burden, which had suddenly 
 fallen on his heart, was as suddenly lifted. 
 
 " But I tell you it is something," continued Mrs. Geer, 
 energetically. " Ivy is 'most a woman, and has never been 
 ten miles from home in her life, and to no school but our 
 little district" 
 
 " And she 's as pairk a gal," interrupted Mr. Geer, " as 
 any you '11 find in all the ten miles round, be the other who 
 she will." 
 
 " She 's well enough in her way," replied Mrs. Geer, in 
 all the humility of motherly pride ; " and so much the more 
 reason why she should n't be let go so. There 's Mr. Ding- 
 ham sending his great logy girls to Miss Porter's seminary. 
 (I wonder if he expects they '11 ever turn out anything ?) 
 And here 's our Ivy, bright as a button, and you full well 
 able to maintain her like a lady 7 , and have done nothing but 
 turn her out to grass all her life, till she 's fairly run wild. I 
 declare it 's a shame. She ought to be sent to school to- 
 morrow." 
 
 " Nonsense, Sally ! nonsense ! I a'n't a-goin' to have 
 no such doin's. Sha'n't go off to school. What 's the use 
 havin' her, if she can't stay at home with us? Let Mr. 
 Dingham send his gals to Chiny, if he wants to. All the 
 book-larnin' in the world won't make 'em equal to our Ivy 
 with only her own head. I don't want her to go to gettin' 
 up high-falutin' notions. She 's all gold now. She don't 
 need no improvin'. Sha'n't budge an inch. Sha'n't stir a 
 step." 
 
 " But do consider, Mr. Geer, the child has got to leave us 
 some time. We can't have her always." 
 
 " Why can't we ? " exclaimed Mr. Geer, almost fiercely. 
 
 " Sure enough ! Why can't we ? There a'n't nobody be- 
 sides you and me, I suppose, that thinks she's pairk. 
 What's John Herricks and Dan Norris hangin' round for 
 all the time ? " 
 
96 .' The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 " And they may hang round till the cows come home I 
 Nary hair of Ivy's head shall they touch, nary one of 
 'em ! " 
 
 Just at this juncture of affairs, the damsel in question 
 bounded into the room. 
 
 " Come here, lyy," said the old man ; " your mother 's 
 been a-slanderin' you ; says you don't know nothin'." 
 
 Ivy knelt before him, rested her arms on his knees, and 
 turned upon him a pair of palpably roguish eyes. 
 
 " Father, it is an awful slander. I do know a sight." 
 
 " Lud, child, yes ! I knew you did. No more you don't 
 want to marry John Herricks, do you ? " 
 
 "O Daddy Geer! O h h!" 
 
 " Nor Dan N orris ? nor none of 'em ? " 
 
 " Never a one, father." 
 
 " Nor don't you ever think of gettin' married and slavin* 
 yourself out for nobody. I 'm plenty well able to take care 
 of you, as long as I live. You '11 never live so happy as you 
 do at home ; and you '11 break my heart to go away, Ivy." 
 
 " I '11 never go, papa." (She pronounced it with the ac- 
 cent on the first syllable.) "Indeed, I never will. I'll 
 never be married, as long as I live." 
 
 " No more you sha'n't, good child, good child ! " 
 
 And again Farmer Geer betook himself to the depths of 
 his arm-chair, with the complacent consciousness of having 
 faithfully discharged his parental duties. " She should not 
 go to school. She would not be married. She had said 
 she would not, and of course she would not." 
 
 " Of course I shall not," mused Ivy, as she lay in her 
 white bed. " What could put it into poor papa's head ? 
 Marry John Herricks, with his everlasting smirk, and his 
 diddling walk, and take care of all the Herricks' sisters and 
 mothers and aunts, and the Herricks' cows and horses and 
 pigs and hens and and " 
 
 But Ivy had kept her thoughts on her marriage longer 
 than ever before in her life ; and ere she had finished the 
 inventory of John Herricks's personal property and real 
 
imder Difficulties. 97 
 
 estate, the blue eyes were closed in the sweet, sound sleep 
 of youth and health. 
 
 Mrs. Geer, in her estimate of her daughter's attainments, 
 was partly right and partly wrong. Ivy had never been 
 " finished " at Mrs. Porter's seminary, and was consequently 
 in a highly unfinished condition. " Small Latin and less 
 Greek" jostled each other in her head. German and 
 French, Italian and Spanish, were strange tongues to Ivy. 
 She could not dance, nor play, nor draw, nor paint, nor 
 work little dogs on footstools. 
 
 What, then, could she do ? 
 
 Imprimis, she could climb a tree like a squirrel. Secundo, 
 she could walk across the great beam in the barn like a 
 year-old kitten. In the pursuit of hens' eggs she knew no 
 obstacles ; from scaffold to scaffold, from haymow to hay- 
 mow, she leaped defiant. She pulled out the hay from 
 under the very noses of the astonished cows, to see if, per- 
 chance, some inexperienced pullet might there have depos- 
 ited her golden treasure. With all four-footed beasts she 
 was on the best of terms. The matronly and lazy old sheep 
 she unceremoniously hustled aside, to administer consola- 
 tion and caresses to the timid, quaking lamb in the corner 
 behind. Without saddle or bridle she could 
 
 " Ride a black horse 
 To Banbury Cross." 
 
 (N. B. I don't say she actually did. I only say she could ; 
 and under sufficiently strong provocation, I have no doubt 
 she would.) She knew where the purple violets and the 
 white innocence first flecked the spring turf, and where the 
 ground-sparrows hid their mottled eggs. All the little wad- 
 dling, downy goslings, the feeble chickens, and faint-hearted, 
 desponding turkeys, that broke the shell too soon, and shiv- 
 ered miserably because the spring sun was not high enough 
 in the morning to warm them, she fed with pap, and cher- 
 ished in cotton-wool, and nursed and watched with eager, 
 happy eyes. O blessed Ivy Geer ! True Sister of Charity ! 
 5 G 
 
98 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 Thrice blessed stepmother of a brood whose name was 
 Legion ! 
 
 From the conjugal and filial conversation which I have 
 faithfully reported, a casual observer, particularly if young 
 and inexperienced, might infer that the question of Miss 
 Ivy's education was definitively settled, and that she was 
 henceforth to remain under the paternal roof. I should, my- 
 self, have fallen into the same .error, had not a long and inti- 
 mate acquaintance with the . female sex generated and cher- 
 ished a profound and mournful conviction of the truth of 
 the maxim, that appearances are deceitful. E. g., a woman 
 has set her heart on something, and is refused. She pouts 
 and sulks : that is clouds, and will soon blow over. She 
 scolds, storms, and raves (I speak in a figure ; I mean she 
 does something as much like that as a tender, delicate, an- 
 gelic woman can) : that is thunder, and only clears the air. 
 She betakes herself to tears, sobs, and embroidered cam- 
 bric : that is a shower, and everything will be greener and 
 fresher after it. You may go your ways, one to his farm, 
 another to his merchandise ; the world -will not wind up its 
 affairs just yet. But, put the case, she goes on the even 
 tenor of her way unmoved : 
 
 " Beware 1 beware I 
 Trust her not ; she is fooling thee." 
 
 Thus Mrs. Geer, who was a thorough tactician. Like 
 Napoleon, she was never more elated than after a defeat. 
 Before consulting her husband at all, she had contemplated 
 the subject in all its bearings, and had deliberately decided 
 that Ivy was to go to school. The consent of the senior 
 partner qf the firm was a secondary matter, which time 
 and judicious management would infallibly secure. Conse- 
 quently, notwithstanding the unpropitious result of their 
 first colloquy, she the next day commenced preparations for 
 Ivy's departure, as unhesitatingly, as calmly, as assiduously, 
 as if the day of that departure had been fixed. 
 
 Mrs. Geer was right. She knew she was, all the time. 
 
under Difficulties. 99 
 
 She had a sublime faith in herself. She felt in her soul the 
 divine afflatus, and pressed forward gloriously to her goal. 
 Mr. Geer had as much firmness, not to say obstinacy, as 
 falls to the lot of most men ; but Mrs. Geer had more ; and 
 as Launce Outram, hard beset, so pathetically moaned, " A 
 woman in the very house has such deused opportunities ! " 
 so Farmer Geer grumbled, and squirmed, and remonstrated, 
 and yielded. 
 
 Mrs. Geer was not right. She had reckoned without her 
 host. Her affairs were gliding down the very Appian Way 
 of prosperity in a chariot-and-four, with footmen and out- 
 riders, when, presto ! they turned a sharp and unexpected 
 corner, and over went the whole establishment into a mirier 
 mire than ever bespattered Dr. Slop. 
 
 To speak without a parable. When her expected Hegira 
 was announced to Miss Mary Ives Geer, that young lady, 
 to the ill-concealed vexation of her mother, and the 'not-at- 
 tempted-to-be-concealed exultation of her father, expressed 
 decided disapprobation of the whole scheme. As she was 
 the chief dramatis. persona, the very Hamlet of the play, 
 this unlooked-for decision somewhat interfered with Mrs. 
 Geer's plans. All the eloquence of that estimable woman 
 was brought to bear on this one point ; but this one point 
 was invincible. Expostulation and entreaty were alike vain. 
 Neither ambition nor pleasure could hold out any allure- 
 ments to Ivy. Maternal authority was at length hinted at, 
 only hinted at, and the spoiled child declared that she had 
 not had her own will and way for sixteen years to give up 
 quietly in her seventeenth. One last resort, one forlorn 
 hope, one expedient, which had never failed to overcome 
 her childish stubbornness : " Would she grieve her parents 
 so much as to oppose this their darling wish ? " And Ivy 
 burst into tears, and begged to know if she should show her 
 i love to her father and mother by going away from them. 
 j This drove the nail into her old father's heart, and then the 
 little vixen clenched it by throwing herself into his arms, 
 and sobbing, " O, papa ! would you turn your Ivy out of 
 doors and break her heart ? " 
 
ioo The Purstiit. of Knowledge 
 
 Flimsiest of fallacies ! Shallowest of sophists ! But she 
 was the only and beloved child of his old age ; so the fal- 
 lacy passed unchallenged ; the strong arms closed around 
 the naughty girl ; and the soothing voice murmured, 
 " There, there, Ivy ! don't cry, child ! Lud ! lud ! you 
 sha'n't be bothered ; no more you sha'n't, lovey ! " and the 
 status quo was restored. 
 
 w It is not in the sea nor in the strife 
 
 We feel benumbed and wish to be no more, 
 But in the after silence on the shore, 
 When all is lost, except a little life," 
 
 said one who had breasted the stormiest sea and plunged 
 into the fiercest strife. Ivy, who had never read Byron, and 
 therefore could not be suspected of any Byronical affecta- 
 tions, felt it, when, having gained her point, she sat down 
 alone in her own room. When her single self had been 
 pitted against superior numbers, age, experience, and pa- 
 rental authority, all her heroism was roused, and she was 
 adequate to the emergency ; but her end gained, the excite- 
 ment gone, the sense of disobedience alone remaining, and 
 she was thoroughly uncomfortable, nay, miserable. 
 
 " Mamma is right ; I know I am a little goose," sobbed 
 she. (The words were mental, intangible, unspoken ; the 
 sobs physical, palpable, decided.) " I never did know any- 
 thing, and I never shall, and I don't care if I don't. I 
 don't see any good in knowing so much. We don't have a 
 great while to stay in the world any way, and I don't see 
 why we can't be let alone and have a good time while we 
 are here, and when we get to heaven we can take a fresh 
 start. O, dear ! I never shall go to heaven, if I am so bad 
 and vex mamma. But then papa did n't care. But then 
 he would have liked me to go to school. But there, I won't ! 
 I won't ! I will not ! I '11 study at home. O, dear ! I 
 wish papa was a great man, and knew everything, and could 
 teach me. Well, he is just as happy, and just as rich, and 
 everybody likes him just as well, as if he knew the whole 
 world full ; and why can't I do so, too ? Rebecca Dingham, 
 
under Difficulties. IOI 
 
 indeed ! Mercy ! I hope I never shall be like her ; I 
 would rather not know my ABC! What shall I do ? 
 There 's Mr. Brownslow might teach me ; he knows enough. 
 But, dear me ! he is as busy as he can be, all day long ; 
 and Squire Merrill goes out of town every day ; and there 's 
 Dr. Mix, to be sure, but he smells so strong of paregoric, 
 and I don't believe he knows much, either ; and there 's no- 
 body else in town that knows any more than anybody else ; 
 and there 's nothing for it but I must go to school, if I am 
 ever to know anything." (A renewal of sobs, uninterrupted 
 for several minutes.) " There 's Mr. Clerron ! " (A sudden 
 cessation.) " I suppose he knows more than the whole 
 
 town tumbled into one ; and writes books, and mercy ! 
 
 there 's no end to his knowledge ; and he 's rich, and does 
 everything he likes, all day long. O, if I only did know 
 him ! I would ask him straight off to teach me. I should 
 be scared to death. I Ve a great mind to ask him, as it is. 
 I can tell him who I am. He never will know any other 
 way, for he is n't acquainted with anybody. They say he is 
 as proud as Lucifer. If he were ten times prouder, I would 
 rather ask him than go to school. He might just as well 
 do something as not. I am sure, if God had made me him, 
 and him me, I should be glad to help him. I '11 go straight 
 to him the first thing to-morrow morning." 
 
 Once seeing a possible way out of her difficulties, her sor- 
 row vanished. Not quite so gayly as usual, it is true, did 
 she sing about the house that night ; for she was summon- 
 ing all her powers to prepare an introductory speech to 
 Felix Clerron, Esq., a gentleman and a scholar. Her elo- 
 cutionary attempts were not quite satisfactory to herself, but 
 she was not to be daunted ; and when morning came, she 
 took heart of grace, slung her broad-brimmed hat over her 
 arm, and began her march " over the hills and far away," in 
 search of her fate. 
 
 " And did her mother really let her roam away, alone, on 
 such an errand, to a perfect stranger ? " 
 
 " Humanly speaking," nothing was more unlikely than 
 
102 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 that Mrs. Geer, a prudent, modest, arid sensible woman, 
 should give her consent to such an to use the mildest 
 term unusual undertaking. Nor did she. The fact is, 
 her consent was not asked. She knew nothing whatever of 
 the plan. 
 
 " Worse and worse ! Did the wilful girl go off without 
 leave ? without even informing her parents ? " . 
 
 I am sorry to say she did. In writing a story of real life, 
 one cannot take that liberty with facts' which is quite proper, 
 not to say indispensable, in history, science, and belles-lettres 
 generally. Duty compels me to adhere closely to the truth ; 
 and for whatever of obloquy may be heaped upon me, or 
 upon my Ivy, I shall find consolation in the words of the 
 illustrious Harrison ; or perhaps it was the illustrious Tay- 
 lor ; I am not quite sure, however, that it was not the illus- 
 trious Washington : " Do right, and let the consequences 
 take care of themselves." I am therefore obliged to say, 
 that Ivy's departure in pursuit of knowledge was entirely 
 unknown to her respected and beloved parents. But you 
 must remember that she was an only child, and a spoiled 
 child, spoiled as only stern New England Puritan parents, 
 somewhat advanced in years, can spoil their children. I do 
 not defend Ivy. On the contrary, notwithstanding my 
 regard for her, I hand her over to the reprobation of an 
 enlightened community ; and I hereby entreat all young 
 persons into whose hands this memoir may fall to take 
 warning by the fate of poor Ivy, and never enter upon any 
 important undertaking, until they have, to say the least, 
 consulted those who are their natural guides, their warmest 
 friends, and their most experienced counsellors. 
 
 While I have been writing this, Ivy Geer, light of heart, 
 fleet of foot, and firm of will, has passed over hillside, 
 through wood-path, and across meadow-land, and drawn 
 near the domains of Felix Clerron, Esq. Light of heart 
 perhaps I scarcely ought to say. Certainly, that enterpris- 
 ing organ had never before beat so furious a tattoo in Ivy's 
 breast, as when she stood, hat in hand, on the steps of the 
 
under Difficulties. 103 
 
 somewhat stately dwelling. To do her justice, she had in- 
 tended to do the penance of wearing her hat when she 
 should have reached her destination ; but in her excitement 
 she quite forgot it. So, as I said, she stood on the door- 
 step, as a royal maiden stood three hundred years before 
 (not in the same place), with the " wind blowing her fair 
 hair about her beautiful cheeks." 
 
 There had come to Ivy from the great, gay world a vague 
 rumor, that, instead of knocking at a door, like a Christian, 
 with your own good knuckles, for such case made and pro- 
 vided, modern fashion had introduced " the ringing and the 
 dinging of the bells." This vague rumor found a local hab- 
 itation, when Mr. Clerron came down upon the village and 
 established himself, his men and women and horses and 
 cattle ; but as Ivy stood on his doorstep, looking upward, 
 downward, sidewise, with earnest, peering gaze, no bell, and 
 no sign of bell, was visible ; nothing unusual, save a little 
 door-knob at the right hand side of the door, a thing 
 which could not be accounted for. After long and serious 
 deliberation, she came to the conclusion that the bell must 
 be inside, and that the knob was a screw attached to it. So 
 she tried to twist it, first one way, then the other ; but twist 
 it would not. In despair she betook herself to her fingers 
 and knocked. Nobody came. Twist again. No use. 
 Knock again. Ditto. Then she went down to the grav-- 
 elled path, selected one of the largest pebbles, took up her 
 station before the door, and began to pound away. In a 
 moment, a gentleman in dressing-gown and smoking-cap, 
 with a cigar between his fingers, came round the corner. 
 Seeing her, he threw away his cigar, lifted his velvet cap, 
 bowed, and, with a gentle " allow me," stepped to the door, 
 pulled the bell, and again passed out of sight. Ivy was not 
 so confused at being detected in her assault and battery on 
 the door of a respectable, peaceable, private gentleman, as 
 not to make the silent reflection, " Pulled the knob, instead 
 of twisting it. How easy it is to do a thing, if you only 
 know how ! " 
 
IO4 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 The summons was soon answered by a black gnome, and 
 Ivy was ushered into a large room, which, to her dazzled, 
 sun- weary eyes, seemed delightfully fresh and green-looking. 
 Two minutes more of waiting, then a step in the hall, a 
 gently opening door, and Ivy felt rather than saw herself in 
 the presence of the formidable Mr. Clerron. A single 
 glance showed her that he was the person who had rung 
 the bell for her, though the gay dressing-gown had been 
 exchanged for a soberer suit Mr. Clerron bowed. Ivy, 
 hardly knowing what sh*e did, faltered forth, " I am Ivy 
 Geer." A half-curious, half-sarcastic smile glimmered 
 behind the heavy beard, and gleamed beneath the heavy 
 eyebrows, as he answered, " I am happy to make your ac- 
 quaintance " ; but another glance at the trembling form, the 
 frightened, pale face, and quivering lips, changed the smile 
 into one that was very good-natured, and even kind ; and 
 he added, playfully, 
 
 " I am Felix Clerron, very much at your service." 
 
 " You write books and are a very learned man," pursued 
 Ivy, hurriedly, never lifting her eyes from the floor, and 
 never ceasing to twirl her hat-strings. 
 
 There was no possibility of supposing her guilty of com- 
 mitting a little diplomatic flattery in conveying this succinct 
 bit of information. She made the assertion with the air of 
 one who has a disagreeable piece of business on hand, and 
 is determined to go through with it as soon as possible. 
 He bowed and smiled again ; quite unnecessarily, since, 
 as I have before remarked, Ivy's eyes were steadfastly fixed 
 on the carpet. A slight pause for breath and she pitched 
 ahead again. 
 
 " I am very ignorant, and I am growing old. I am almost 
 seventeen. I don't know anything to speak of. Mamma 
 wishes me to go to school. Papa did not, but now he does. 
 I won't go. I would rather be stupid all my life long than 
 leave home. But mamma is vexed, and I want to please 
 her, and I thought, Mr. Brownslow is so busy, and you, 
 if you have nothing to do, and know so much, I 
 thought " 
 
under Difficulties. 105 
 
 She stopped short, utterly unable to proceed. Wonder- 
 fully different did this affair seem from the one she had 
 planned the preceding evening. It is so much easier to 
 fight the battle of life in our own chimney-corner, by the 
 ruddy and genial firelight, than in broad day on the world's 
 great battle-field ! . 
 
 Mr. Clerron, seeing Ivy's confusion, kindly came to her 
 aid. " And you thought my superfluous time and wisdom 
 might be transferred to you, thus making a more equal 
 division of property ? " 
 
 " If you would be so good, I, yes, Sir." 
 
 " May I inquire how you propose to effect such an ex- 
 change?" 
 
 He really did not intend to be anything but kind, but the 
 whole matter presented itself to him in a very ludicrous 
 light ; and in endeavoring to preserve proper gravity, he 
 became severe. Ivy, all-unused to the world, still had a se- 
 cret feeling that he was laughing at her. Tears, that would 
 not be repressed, glistened in her downcast eyes, gathered 
 on the long lashes, dropped silently to the floor. He saw 
 that she was entirely a child, ignorant, artless, and sincere. 
 His better feelings were roused, and he exclaimed, with real 
 earnestness, 
 
 " My dear young lady, I should rejoice to serve you in 
 any way, I beg you to believe." 
 
 His words only hastened the catastrophe which seems to 
 be always impending over the weaker sex. Ivy sobbed out- 
 right, a perfect tempest. Felix Clerron looked on with a 
 bachelor's dismay. " What in thunder ? Confound the 
 girl ! " were his first reflections ; but her utter abandonment 
 to sorrow melted his heart again, not a very susceptible 
 heart either ; but men, especially bachelors, are so. green ! 
 (the word is found in Cowper.) 
 
 He sat down by her side, stroked the hair from her 
 burning forehead, as if she had been six instead of six- 
 teen, and again and again assured her of his willingness 
 to assist her. 
 
io6 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 " I must go home," whispered Ivy, as soon as she could 
 command, or rather coax her voice. 
 
 His hospitality was shocked. 
 
 " Indeed you must not, till we have at least had a con- 
 sultation. Tell me how much you know. What have you 
 studied ? " 
 
 " O, nothing, Sir. I am very stupid." 
 
 " Ah ! we must begin with the Alphabet, then. Blocks 
 or a primer ? " 
 
 Ivy smiled through her tears. 
 
 " Not quite so bad as that, Sir. 
 
 " You do know your letters ? Perhaps you can even 
 count, and spell your name ; maybe write it. Pray, en- 
 lighten me." 
 
 Ivy grew calm as he became playful. 
 
 " I can cipher pretty well. I have been through Green- 
 leaf's Large." 
 
 " House or meadow ? And the exact dimensions, if you 
 please." 
 
 "Sir?" 
 
 " I understood you to say you had traversed Green- 
 leaf's large. You did not designate what." 
 
 He was laughing at her now, indeed, but it was open and 
 genial, and she joined. 
 
 " My Arithmetic, of course. I supposed everybody knew 
 that. Everybody calls it so." 
 
 " Time is shoVt. Yes. Do you like Arithmetic ? " 
 
 " Pretty well, some parts of it. Fractions and Partial 
 Payments. But I can't bear Duodecimals, Position, and 
 such things." 
 
 " Positions are occasionally embarrassing. And Gram- 
 mar?" 
 
 " I think it's horrid. It's all 'indicative mood, common 
 noun, third person, singular number, and agrees with John.' " 
 
 " Bravissima ! A comprehensive sketch ! A bird's-eye 
 view, as one may say, and not entertaining, certainly. 
 What other branches have you pursued ? Drawing, for in- 
 stance ? " 
 
under Difficulties. 107 
 
 O, no, Sir ! " 
 
 " Nor Music ? " 
 
 " No, Sir." 
 
 " Good ! excellent ! An overruling Providence has saved 
 you and your friends from many a pitfall. Shall we pro- 
 ceed to History ? Be so good as to inform me who discov- 
 ered America." 
 
 " I believe Columbus has the credit of it," replied Ivy, 
 demurely. 
 
 " Non-committal, I see. Case goes strongly in his favor, 
 but you reserve your judgment till further evidence." 
 
 " I think he was a wise and good and enterprising man." 
 
 " But are rather sceptical about that San Salvador story. 
 A wise course. Never decide till both sides have been 
 fairly presented. ' He that judgeth a matter before he 
 heareth it, it is folly and shame unto him,' said the wise 
 man. Occasionally his after-judgment is equally discredit- 
 able. That is a thousand times worse. Exit Clio. Enter 
 well ! Geographia. My young friend, what celebrated 
 city has the honor of concentrating the laws, learning, and 
 literature of Massachusetts, to wit, namely, is its capital?" 
 
 " Boston, Sir." 
 
 " Your Geography has evidently been attended to. You 
 have learned the basis fact. You have discovered the pivot 
 on which the world turns. You have dug down to the 
 antediluvian, ante-pyrean granite, the primitive, unfused 
 stratum of society. The force of learning can no farther 
 go. Armed with that fact, you may march fearlessly forth 
 to do battle with the world, the flesh, and the ahem 
 the King of Beasts ! Do you think you should like me for 
 a teacher ? " 
 
 " I can't tell, Sir. I did not like you as anything awhile 
 ago." 
 
 " But you like me better now ? You think I improve on 
 acquaintance ? You detect signs of a moral reformation?" 
 
 " No, Sir, I don't like you now. I only don't dislike you 
 so much as I did." 
 
loS The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 " Spoken like a major-general, or, better still, like a brave 
 little Yankee girl, as you are. I am an enthusiastic admirer 
 of truth. I foresee we shall get on famously. I was rather 
 premature in sounding the state of your affections, it must 
 be confessed, but we shall be rare friends by and by. 
 On the whole, you are not particularly fond of books ? " 
 
 " I like some books well enough, but not studying-books," 
 said Ivy, with a sigh, " and I don't see any good in them. 
 If it was n't for mamma, I never would open one, never ! 
 I would just as soon be a dunce as not ; I don't see any- 
 thing very horrid in it." 
 
 " How should you, to be sure ? There is a distinction, 
 however, which you must immediately learn to make. The 
 dunce subjective is a very inoffensive animal, contented, 
 happy, and harmless ; and, as you justly remark, inspires 
 no horror, but rather an amiable and genial self-compla- 
 cency. The dunce objective, on the contrary, is of an en- 
 tirely different species. He is a bore of the first magnitude, 
 a poisoned arrow, that not only pierces, but inflames, 
 a dull knife, that not only cuts, but tears, a cowardly little 
 cur, that snaps occasionally, but snarls unceasingly ; whom, 
 which, and that, it becomes the duty of all good citizens to 
 sweep from the face of the earth." 
 
 " What is the difference between them ? How shall one 
 know which is which ? " 
 
 "The dunce subjective is the dunce from his own point 
 of view, the dunce with his eyes turned inward, . confin- 
 ing his duncehood to the bosom of his family. The dunce 
 objective is the dunce butting against his neighbor's study- 
 door, intruding, obtruding, protruding his insipid folly 
 and still more insipid wisdom at all times and seasons. He 
 is a creature utterly devoid of shame. He is like Milton's 
 angels, in one respect at least : you may thrust him through 
 and through with the two-edged sword of your satire, and 
 at the end he shall be as intact and integral as at the be- 
 ginning. Am I sufficiently obvious ? " He was talking, 
 however, quite as much to himself as to Ivy, and with a 
 bitterness evidently born of suffering. 
 
under Difficulties. 109 
 
 " It is very obvious that I am both, according to your 
 definition." 
 
 " It is very obvious that you are neither, but a sensible 
 young girl, with no great quantity of the manufactured ar- 
 ticle, perhaps, but plenty of raw material, capable of being 
 wrought into fabric of the finest quality." 
 
 " Do you really think I can learn ? " asked Ivy, with a 
 bright blush of pleasure. 
 
 " Can learn ? " 
 
 " As much as if I went to school ? " 
 
 " My dear miss, as the forest oak, ' cabined, cribbed, con- 
 fined ' with multitudes of its fellows, grows stunted, scrubby, 
 and dwarfed, but brought into the open fields alone, stretches 
 out its arms to the blue heavens and its roots to the kindly 
 earth, so, in a word, shall you, under my fostering care, 
 flourish like a green bay-tree, only not quite so high and 
 mightily as I am flourishing now ; that is, if I am to 
 have the honor." 
 
 " Yes, Sir, I mean I meant I was thinking as if you 
 were teaching me I mean were going to teach me." 
 
 " Which I also mean, if your parents continue to wish it;" 
 
 " O, they won't care ! " 
 
 " Won't care ? " 
 
 " No, Sir, they will be glad, I think. Papa, at least, will 
 be glad to have me stay at home." 
 
 " Did not they direct you to come to me to-day ? " 
 
 Ivy blushed deeply, and replied, in a low voice, " No, Sir ; 
 I knew mamma would not let me come, if I asked her." 
 
 " And to prevent any sudden temptation to disobedience, 
 and a consequent forfeiture of your peace of mind, you 
 took time by the forelock and came on your own responsi- 
 bility?" 
 
 " Yes, Sir." 
 
 " Very ingenious, upon my word ! But, my dear Miss 
 Geer, I must confess I have not this happy feminine knack 
 of keeping out of the way of temptation. I should prefer 
 to consult your friends, even at the risk of losing the pleas- 
 ure of your society." 
 
no The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 " O, yes, Sir ! I don't care, now it is all settled." 
 And so, over hillside, along wood-path, and through 
 meadow-land, with light heart and smiling eyes, tripped Ivy 
 back again. To Mrs. Geer shelling peas in the shady 
 porch, and to Mr. Geer fanning himself with his straw hat 
 on the steps beside her, Ivy recounted the story of her ad- 
 ventures. Mrs. Geer was thunderstruck at Ivy's temerity ; 
 Mr. Geer was lost in admiration of her pluck. Mrs. Geer 
 termed it a wild-goose chase ; Mr. Geer declared Ivy to be 
 as smart as a steel trap. Mrs. Geer vetoed the whole plan ; 
 Mr. Geer did n't know. But when at sunset Mr. Clerron 
 rode over, and admired Mr. Geer's orchard, and praised the 
 points of his Durhams, and begged a root of Mrs. Geer's 
 scarlet; verbena, and assured them he should be very glad to 
 refresh his own earl* studies, and also to form an acquaint- 
 ance with the family, he knew very few in the village, 
 and if Mrs. Geer would drive over when Ivy came to recite, 
 or perhaps they would rather he should come to their 
 house. O, no ! Mrs. Geer could not think of that. Just 
 as they pleased. Mrs. Simm, the housekeeper, would be 
 very glad to meet Mrs. Geer. By the way, Mrs. Simm was 
 a thrifty and sensible woman, and he was sure they would 
 be pleased with each other. When, in short, all this and 
 much more had been said, it was decided that Ivy should be 
 regularly installed pupil of Mr. Felix Clerron. 
 
 " Eureka ! " cries the professional novel-reader, that far- 
 sighted and keen-scented hound that snuffs a denouement 
 afar off ; and anon there rises before his eyes the vision of 
 poor little Stella drinking in love and learning, especially 
 love, from the divine eyes of the anything but divine Swift, 
 of Shirley, the lioness, the pantheress, the leopardess, the 
 beautiful, fierce creature, sitting, tamed, quiet, meek, by the 
 side of Louis Moore, her tutor and master, and of all the 
 legends of all the ages wherein Beauty has sat at the feet of 
 Wisdom, and Love has crept in unawares, and spoiled the 
 lesson while as yet half-unlearnt ; so he cries, " She is 
 going the way of all heroines. The man and the girl, 
 
under Difficulties. 1 1 1 
 
 they will fall in love, marry, and live happily all the rest of 
 their days." 
 
 Of course they will. Is there any reason why they should 
 not ? If any man can show just cause why they may not 
 lawfully be joined together, let him now speak, or else here- 
 after forever hold his peace. 
 
 I repeat it, of course they will. You surely cannot sup- 
 pose I should, in cold blood, sit down to write a story in 
 which nobody was to fall in love or be in love ! Scoff as 
 you may, love is the one vital principle in all romance. Not 
 only does your cheek flush and your eye sparkle, till heart, 
 brain, and soul are all on fire, over the burning words of 
 some Brontean Pythoness, but when you open 'the last 
 thrilling work of Maggie Marigold, and are immediately 
 submerged " in a weak, washy, everlasting flood " of insip- 
 idity, and heart-rending sorrow, you do not shut the book 
 with a jerk. Why not ? Because in the dismal distance 
 you dimly descry two figures swimming, floating, struggling 
 towards each other, and a languid curiosity detains you till 
 you have ascertained, that, after infinite distress, Adolphus 
 and Miranda have made 
 
 " One of the very best matches, 
 
 Both well mated for life : 
 She 's got a fool for a husband, 
 He 's got a fool for his wife." 
 
 Sir, scoff as you may, love is the one sunbeam of poetry 
 that gilds with a softened splendor the hard, bare outline of 
 many a prosaic life. " Work, work, work, from weary chime 
 to chime " ; tramp behind the plough, hammer on the lap- 
 stone, beat the anvil, drive the plane, from morn till dewy 
 eve ; but when the dewy eve comes, ah ! Hesperus gleams 
 soft and golden over the far-off pine-trees, but 
 
 "The star that lightens your bosom most, 
 And gives to your weary feet their speed, 
 Abides in a cottage beyond the mead." 
 
 It is useless to assert that the subject is worn threadbare. 
 
112 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 Threadbare it may be to you, enervated and blast man of 
 pleasure, worn and hardened man of the world ; but it is 
 not for you I write. The fountain which leaps up fresh and 
 living in every new life can never be exhausted till the 
 springs of all life are dry. Tell me, O lover, gazing into 
 those tender eyes uplifted to yours, twining the silken rings 
 around your bronzed finger, does it abate one jot or tittle 
 of your happiness to know that eyes just as tender, curls 
 just as silken, have stirred the hearts of men for a thousand 
 years ? 
 
 Love, then, is a sine qua non in stories ; and if love, why 
 not marriage ? What pleasure can a humane and benevo- 
 lent man find in separating two individuals whose chief, 
 perhaps whose sole happiness, consists in being together ? 
 For certain inscrutable reasons, Divine Benevolence per- 
 mits evil to exist in the world. All who have a taste for 
 misery can find it there in exhaustless quantities. Johns 
 are every day falling in love with Katys, but marrying Isa- 
 bels, and Isabels the same, mutatis mutandis. We submit 
 to it because there is no alternative ; and we believe that 
 good shall finally be wrought and wrested from evil. But 
 let us not in mere wantonness introduce into our novel- 
 world the work of our own hand, an abridged edition, a da- 
 guerrotype copy of the world without, of which we know so 
 little and so much. I always do and always shall read the 
 last page of a novel first ; and if I perceive there any indi- 
 cations that matters are not coming out " shipshape," my 
 reading invariably terminates with the last page. 
 
 For the rest, please to remember that I am not writing 
 about a princess of the blood, nor of the days of the bold 
 barons, but only the life of a quiet little girl in a quiet little 
 town in the eastern part of Massachusetts ; and so far as 
 my experience and observation go. men and women in the 
 eastern part of Massachusetts are not given to thrilling ad- 
 ventures, hairbreadth escapes, wonderful concatenations of 
 circumstances, and blood and thunder generally, but pur- 
 sue the even tenor of their way, and of their love, with a 
 
under Difficulties. 113 
 
 sober and delightful equanimity. If you want a plot, go to 
 the " Children of the Abbey," " Consuelo," and myriads of 
 that kin, and help yourself. As for me, I must confess I 
 hate plots. I see no pleasure in stumbling blindfolded 
 through a story, unable to see a yard ahead, fancying every 
 turn to be the last, and the road to go straight on to a glo- 
 rious goal, and, lo ! we are in a more hopeless labyrinth 
 than ever. I have a sense of restraint. I want to breathe 
 freely, and cannot. I want to have leisure to observe the 
 style, the development of character, the author's tone of 
 thought, and not be galloped through on the back of a 
 breathless desire to know " how they are coming out." 
 
 But, my dear plot-loving friend, be easy. I will not leave 
 you in the lurch. I am not going to marry my man and 
 woman out of hand. An obstacle, of which I suppose you 
 have never heard, an obstacle entirely new, fresh, and 
 unhackneyed, will arise ; so, I pray you, let patience have 
 her perfect work. 
 
 Wonderful was the new world opened to Ivy Geer. It 
 was as if a corse, cold, inert, lifeless, had suddenly sprung 
 up, warm, invigorated, informed with a spirit which led her 
 own spell-bound. Grammar, Grammar, which had been 
 a synonyme for all that was dry, irksome, useless, a beat- 
 ing of the wind, the crackling of thorns under a pot, 
 Grammar even assumed for her a charm, a wonder, a glory. 
 She saw how the great and wise had shrined in fitting words 
 their purity, and wisdom, and sorrow, and suffering, and 
 penitence ; and how, as this generation passed away, and 
 another came forth which knew not God, the golden casket 
 became dim, and the memory of its priceless gem faded 
 away ; but how, at the touch of a mighty wand, the obedi- 
 ent lid flew back, and the long-hidden thought " sprang full- 
 statured in an hour." She saw how love and beauty and 
 freedom lay floating vaguely and aimlessly in a million 
 minds till the poet came and crystallized them into clear-cut, 
 prismatic words, tinged for each with the color of his own 
 fancy, and wrought into a perfect mosaic, not for an age, 
 
 H 
 
114 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 but for all time. Led by a strong hand, she trod with awe 
 down the dim aisles of the Past, and saw how the soul of 
 man, bound in its prison-house, had ever struggled to voice 
 itself in words. Roaming in the dense forest with the stern 
 and bloody Druid, bounding over the waves with the 
 fierce pirates who supplanted them, and in whose blue eyes 
 and beneath whose fair locks gleamed indeed the ferocity 
 of the savage, but lurked also, though unseen and unknown, 
 the tender chivalry of the English gentleman, gazing ad- 
 miringly on the barbaric splendor of the cloth-of-gold, 
 whereon trod regally, to the sound of harp and viol, the 
 beauty and bravery of the old Norman nobility, she de- 
 lighted to see how the mother-tongue, our dear mother- 
 tongue, had laid all the nations under contribution to enrich 
 her treasury, gathering from one its strength, from an- 
 other its stateliness, from a third its harmony, till the harsh, 
 crude, rugged dialect of a barbarous horde became worthy 
 to embody, as it does, the love, the wisdom, and the faith 
 of half a world. 
 
 So Grammar taught Ivy to reverence language. 
 
 History, in the light of a guiding mind, ceased to be a 
 bare record of slaughter and crime. Before her eyes filed, 
 in a statelier pageant than they knew, the long procession 
 of " simple great ones gone forever and ever by," and the 
 countless lesser ones whose names are quenched in the 
 darkness of a night that shall know no dawn. She saw the 
 "great world spin forever down the ringing grooves of 
 change " ; but amid all the change, the confusion, the chaos, 
 she saw the finger of God ever pointing, and heard the sub- 
 lime monotone of the Divine voice ever saying to the chil- 
 dren of men, " This is the way, walk ye in it." And Ivy 
 thought she saw, and rejoiced in the thought, that, even 
 when this warning was unheeded, when on the brow of 
 the mournful Earth " Ichabod, Ichabod," was forever en- 
 graven, when the First Man with his own hand put from 
 him the cup of innocence, and went forth from the happy 
 garden, sin-stained and fallen, the whole head sick, and the 
 
under Difficulties. 115 
 
 whole heart faint, even then she saw within him the Di- 
 vine spark, the leaven of life, which had power to vitalize 
 and vivify what Crime had smitten with death. Though 
 sea and land teemed with strange perils, though night and 
 day pursued him with mysterious terrors, though the now 
 unfriendly elements combined to check his career, still, with 
 unswerving purpose, undaunted courage, she saw him march 
 constantly forward. Spirits of evil could not drive from his 
 heart the prescience of greatness ; and his soul dwelt calmly 
 under the foreshadow of a mighty future. 
 
 And as Ivy looked, she saw how the children of men be- 
 came a great nation, and possessed the land far and wide. 
 They delved into the bosom of the pleased earth, and brought 
 forth the piled-up treasures of uncounted cycles. They un- 
 folded the book of the skies, and sought to read the records 
 thereon. They plunged into the unknown and terrible 
 ocean, and decked their own brows with the gems they 
 plucked from hers. And when conquered Nature had laid 
 her hoards at their feet, their restless longings would not be 
 satisfied. Brave young spirits, with the dew of their youth 
 fresh upon them, set out in quest of a land beyond their ken. 
 Over the mountains, across the seas, through the forests, 
 there came to the ear of the dreaming girl the measured 
 tramp of marching men, the softer footfalls of loving women, 
 the pattering of the feet of little children. Many a day and 
 many a night she saw them wander on towards the setting 
 sun, till the Unseen Hand led them to a fair and fruitful 
 country that opened its bounteous arms in welcome. Broad 
 rivers, green fields, laughing valleys wooed them to plant 
 their household gods, and the foundations of Europe were 
 laid. Here were sown the seeds of those heroic virtues 
 which have since leaped into luxuriant life, seeds of that 
 irresistible power which fastened its grasp on Nature, and 
 forced her to unfold the secret of her creation, seeds of 
 that far-reaching wisdom which in the light of the unveiled 
 past has read the story of the unseen future. 
 
 And still under Ivy's eye they grouped themselves. 
 
n6 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 Some gathered on the pleasant hills of the sunny South, 
 and the beauty of earth and sea and sky passed into their 
 souls forever. They caught the evanescent gleam, the 
 passing shadow, and on unseemly canvas limned it for all 
 time In forms of unuttered and unutterable loveliness. 
 They shaped into glowing life the phantoms of grace that 
 were always flitting before their enchanted eyes, and poured 
 into inanimate marble their rapt and passionate souls. 
 They struck the lyre to wild and stirring songs whose trem- 
 ulous echoes still linger along the corridors of Time. Some 
 sought the ice-bound North, and grappled with dangers by 
 field and flood. They hunted the wild dragon to his moun- 
 tain-fastnesses, and fought him at bay, and never quailed. 
 Death, in its most fearful forms, they met with grim delight, 
 and chanted the glories of the Valhalla waiting for heroes 
 who should forever quaff the " foaming, pure, and shining 
 mead " from skulls of foes in battle slain. Some crossed 
 the sea, and on 
 
 " that pale, that white-faced shore, 
 Whose foot spurns back the ocean's swelling tide," 
 
 they reared a sinewy and stalwart race, " whose morning 
 drum-beat encircles the world." 
 
 And History taught Ivy to reverence man. 
 
 But there was one respect in which Ivy was both pupil 
 and teacher. Never a word of Botany had fallen upon her 
 ears ; but through all the unconscious bliss of infancy, child- 
 hood, and girlhood, for sixteen happy years, she had lived 
 among the flowers, and she knew their dear faces and their 
 wild-wood names. She loved them with an almost human 
 love. They were to her companions and friends. She knew 
 their likings and dislikings, their joys and sorrows, who 
 among them chose the darkest nooks of the old woods, and 
 who bloomed only to the brightest sunlight, who sent 
 their roots deep down among the mosses by the brook, and 
 who smiled only on the southern hillside. Around each she 
 wove a web of beautiful individuality, and more than one 
 
under Difficulties. 1 1 7 
 
 had received from her a new christening. It is true, that, 
 when she came to study from a book, she made wry faces 
 over the long, barbarous, Latin names which completely 
 disguised her favorites, and in her heart deemed a great 
 many of the definitions quite superfluous ; but she had 
 strong faith in her teacher, and when the technical was laid 
 aside for the real, then, indeed, " her foot was on her native 
 heath, and her name was MacGregor." A wild and merry 
 chase she led her grave instructor. Morning, noon, or 
 night, she was always ready. Under the blue sky, breathing 
 the pure air, treading the green turf familiar from her in- 
 fancy, she could not be otherwise than happy ; but when 
 was superadded to this the companionship of a mind vigor- 
 ous, cultivated, and refined, she enjoyed it with a keen and 
 intense delight. Nowhere else did her soul so entirely un- 
 fold to the genial light of this new sun which had suddenly 
 mounted above her horizon. Nowhere else did the freshness 
 and fulness and splendor of life dilate her whole being with 
 a fine ecstasy. 
 
 And what was the end of all this ? Just what you would 
 have supposed. She had led a life of simple, unbounded 
 love and trust, a buoyant, elastic gladness, a dream of 
 sunshine. No gray cloud had ever lowered in her sky, no 
 thunderbolt smitten her joys, no winter rain chilled her 
 warmth. Only the white fleeciness of morning mist had 
 flitted sometimes over her summer-sky, deepening the blue. 
 Little cooling drops had .fluttered down through the leafi- 
 ness, only to span her with a rainbow in the glory of the set- 
 ting sun. But the time had come. From the deep foun- 
 tains of her heart the stone was to be rolled away. The 
 secret chord was to be smitten by a master-hand, a chord 
 which, once stirred, may never cease to quiver. 
 
 At first Ivy worshipped very far off. Her friend was to 
 her the embodiment of all knowledge and goodness and 
 greatness. She marvelled to see him so at home in what 
 was to her so strange. Every word that fell from his lips 
 was an oracle. She secretly contrasted him with all the men 
 
1 1 8 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 she had ever met, to the utter discomfiture of the latter. 
 Washington, the Apostle Paul, and Peter Parley were the 
 only men of the past or present whom she considered at all 
 worthy to be compared with him ; and in fact, if these three 
 men and Felix Clerron had all stood before her, and offered 
 each a different opinion on any given subject, I have 
 scarcely a doubt as to whose would have commended itself 
 to her as combining the soundest practical wisdom and the 
 highest Christian benevolence. 
 
 So the summer passed on, and her shyness wore off, 
 and their intimacy became less and less that of teacher and 
 pupil, and more and more that of friend and friend. With 
 the sudden awakening of her intellectual nature, there woke 
 also another power, of whose existence she had never 
 dreamed. It was natural, that, in ranging the fields of 
 thought so lately opened to her, she should often revert to 
 him whose hand had unbarred the gates ; she was therefore 
 not startled that the image of Felix Clerron was with her 
 when she sat down and when she rose up, when she went 
 out and when she came in. She ceased, indeed, to think 
 0/"him. She thought him. She lived him. Her soul fed 
 on his life. And so and so by a pleasant and flowery 
 path, there came into Ivy's heSirt the old, old pain. 
 
 Now the thing was on this wise : 
 
 One morning, when she went to recite, she did not find 
 Mr. Clerron in the library, where he usually awaited her. 
 After spending a few moments in looking over her lessons, 
 she rose and was about to pass to the door to ring, when 
 Mrs. Simm looked in, and, seeing Ivy, informed her that 
 Mr. Clerron was in the garden, and desired her to come 
 out. Ivy immediately followed Mrs. Simm into the garden. 
 On the south side of the house was a piazza two stories high. 
 Along the pillars which supported it a trellis-work had been 
 constructed, reaching several feet above the roof of the 
 piazza. About this climbed a vigorous grape-vine, which 
 not only completely screened nearly the whole front of the 
 piazza, but, reaching the top of the trellis, shot across, by 
 
under Difficulties. 119 
 
 the aid of a few pieces of fine wire, and overran a part of 
 the roof of the house. Thus the roof of the piazza was the 
 floor of a beautiful apartment, whose walls and ceiling were 
 broad, rustling, green leaves, among which drooped now 
 innumerable heavy clusters of rich purple grapes. 
 
 From behind this leafy wall a well-known voice cried, 
 " All hail, my twining vine ! " Ivy turned and looked up, 
 with the uncertain, inquiring smile we often wear when con- 
 scious that, though unseeing, we are not unseen ; and pres- 
 ently two hands parted the leaves far enough for a very 
 sunshiny smile to gleam down on the upturned face. 
 
 " O, I wish I could come up there ! " cried Ivy, clasping 
 her hands with childish eagerness. 
 
 " The wish is father to the deed." 
 
 " May I ? " 
 
 " Be sure you may." 
 
 " But how shall I get in ? " 
 
 " Are you afraid to come up the ladder ? " 
 
 "No, I don't mean that ; but how shall I get in where 
 you are, after I am up ? " 
 
 " O, never fear ! I '11 draw you in safely enough." 
 
 " Lorful heart ! Miss Ivy, what are you "going to do ?" 
 cried Mrs. Simm, in terror. 
 
 Ivy was already on the third round of the ladder, but she 
 stopped and answered, hesitatingly, 
 
 " He said I might." 
 
 " He said you might, yes," continued Mrs. Simm, talk- 
 ing to Ivy, but at Mr. Clerron, with whom she hardly dared 
 to remonstrate in a more direct way. " And if he said you 
 might throw yourself down Vineyard Cliff, it don't follow 
 that you are bound to do it. He goes into all sorts of hap- 
 hazard scrapes himself, but you can't follow him." 
 
 " But it looks so nice up there," pleaded Ivy, " and I have 
 been twice as high at home. I don't mind it at all." 
 
 "If your father chooses to let you run the risk of your 
 life, it 's none of my lookout, but I a'n't going to have you 
 breaking your neck right under my nose. If ^ou want to 
 
I2O The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 get up there, I '11 show you the way in the house, and you 
 can step right out of the window. Just wait till I Ve told 
 Ellen about the dinner." 
 
 As Mrs. Simm disappeared, Mr. Clerron said softly to 
 Ivy, " Come ! " and in a moment Ivy bounded up the 
 ladder and through an opening in the vine, and stood by 
 his side. 
 
 " I 'm ready now, Miss Ivy," said Mrs. Simm, reappear- 
 ing. " Miss Ivy ! Where is the child ? " 
 
 A merry laugh greeted her. 
 
 " O, you good-for-nothing ! " cried the good-natured old 
 housekeeper, " you '11 never die in your bed." 
 
 " Not for a good while, I hope," answered Mr. Clerron. 
 
 Then he made Ivy sit down by him, and took from the 
 great basket the finest cluster of grapes. 
 
 "Is that reward enough for coming ? " 
 
 " Coming into so beautiful a place as this is like what you 
 read yesterday about poetry to Coleridge, ' its own exceed- 
 ing great reward.' " 
 
 " And you don't want the grapes ? " 
 
 " I don't know that I have any intrinsic objection to them 
 as a free gift, it was only the principle that I opposed." 
 
 " Very well, we will go shares, then. You may have half 
 for the free gift, and I will have half for the principle. Little 
 tendril, you look as fresh as the morning." 
 
 "Don't I always?" 
 
 " I should say there was a little more dew than usual. 
 Stand up and let me survey you, if perchance I may discover 
 the cause." 
 
 Ivy rose, made a profound courtesy, and then turned 
 slowly around, after the manner of the revolving fashion- 
 figures in a milliner's window. 
 
 " I don't know," continued Mr. Clerron, when Ivy, after a 
 couple of revolutions, resumed her seat. " You seem to be 
 the same. I think it must be the frock." 
 
 " I don't wear a frock. I don't think it would improve 
 my style ofrbeauty if I did. Papa wears one sometimes." 
 
under Difficulties. 121 
 
 " And what kind of a frock, pray, does ' papa ' wear ? " 
 
 " O, a horrid blue thing. Comes about down to his 
 knees. Made of some kind of woollen stuff. Horrid ! " 
 
 " And what name do you give to that white thing with 
 blue sprays in it ? " 
 
 "This?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " This is a dress." 
 
 " No. This, and your collar, and hat, and shoes, and sash 
 are your dress. This is a frock." 
 
 Ivy shook her head doubtfully. 
 
 " You know a great deal, I know." 
 
 " So you informed me once before." 
 
 " O, don't mention that ! " said Ivy, blushing, and quickly 
 added, " Do you know I have discovered the reason why 
 you like me this morning ? " 
 
 " And every morning." 
 
 " Sir ? " 
 
 " Go on. What is the reason ? " 
 
 " It is because I clear-starched and ironed it myself with 
 my owny-dony hands ; and that, you know, is the reason it 
 looks nicer than usual." 
 
 " Ah me ! I wish I wore dresses." 
 
 " You can, if you choose, I suppose. There is no one to 
 hinder you." 
 
 " Simpleton ! that is not what you were intended to say. 
 You should have asked the cause of so singular a wish, and 
 then I had a pretty little speech all ready for you, a verit- 
 able compliment." 
 
 " It is well I did not ask, then. Mamma does not approve 
 of compliments, and perhaps it would have made me vain." 
 
 " Incorrigible ! Why did you not ask me what the speech 
 was, and thus give me an opportunity to relieve myself. 
 Why, a body might die of a plethora of flattery, if he had 
 nobody but you to discharge it against." 
 
 "He must take care, then, that the supply does not ex- 
 ceed the demand." 
 6 
 
122 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 " Political economy, upon my word ! What shall we have 
 next?" 
 
 " Domestic, I suppose you would like. Men generally, 
 indeed, prefer it to the other, I am told." 
 
 " Ah, Ivy, Ivy ! little you know about men, my child ! " 
 
 He leaned back in his seat and was silent for some min- 
 utes. Ivy did not care to interrupt his thinking. Presently 
 he said, 
 
 " Ivy, how old are you?" 
 
 " I shall be seventeen the last day of this month." 
 
 A short pause. 
 
 "And then eighteen." 
 
 " And then nineteen." 
 
 " And then twenty. In three years you will be twenty." 
 
 "Horrid old, is n't it?" 
 
 He turned his head, and looked down upon her with what 
 Ivy thought a curious kind of smile, but only said, 
 
 " You must not say ' horrid ' so much." 
 
 By and by Ivy grew rather tired of sitting silent and 
 watching the rustle of the leaves, which hid every other 
 prospect ; she turned a little so that she could look at him. 
 He sat with folded arms, looking straight ahead ; and she 
 thought his face wore a troubled expression. She felt as if 
 she would like very much to smooth out the wrinkles in his 
 forehead and run her fingers through his hair, as she some- 
 times did for her father. She had a great mind to ask him 
 if she should ; then she reflected that it might make him 
 nervous. Then she wondered if he had forgotten her les- 
 sons, and how long they were to sit there. Determined, at 
 length, to have a change of some kind, she said, softly, 
 
 " Mr. Clerron ! " 
 
 He roused himself suddenly, and stood up. 
 
 " I thought, perhaps, you had a headache." 
 
 " No, Ivy. But this is not climbing the hill of science, is 
 it?" 
 
 " Not so much as it is climbing the piazza." 
 
 " Suppose we take a vacation to-day, and investigate the 
 state of the atmosphere ? " 
 
under Difficulties. 123 
 
 " Yes, sir, I am ready." 
 
 Ivy did not fully understand the nature of his proposi- 
 tion ; but if he had proposed to " put a girdle round the 
 earth in forty minutes," she would have said and acted, 
 " Yes, sir, I am ready," just the same. 
 
 He took up the basket of grapes which he had gathered, 
 and led the way through the window, down-stairs. Ivy 
 waited for him at the hall-door, while he carried the grapes 
 to Mrs. Simm ; then he joined her again and proposed to 
 walk through the woods a little while, before Ivy went 
 home. 
 
 " You must know, my docile pupil, that I am going to the 
 city to-morrow, on business, to be gone a week or two. So, 
 as you must perforce take a vacation then, why, we may as 
 well begin to vacate to-day, and enjoy it." 
 
 " I am sorry you are going away." 
 
 " You are ? That is almost enough to pay me for going. 
 Why are you sorry ? " 
 
 " Because I shall not see you for a week ; and I have be- 
 come so used to you, that somehow I don't seem to know 
 what to do with a day without you ; and then the cars may 
 run off the track and kill you or hurt you, or you may get 
 the small-pox, or a great many things may happen." 
 
 " And suppose some of these terrible things should hap- 
 pen, the last, for instance, what would you do ? " 
 
 " I ? I should advise you to send for the doctor at once." 
 
 Mr. Clerron laughed. 
 
 " So you would not come and nurse me, and take care of 
 me, and get me well again ? " 
 
 " No, because I should then be in danger of taking it 
 myself and giving it to papa and mamma ; besides, they 
 would not let me, I am quite sure." 
 
 " So you love your papa and mamma better than " 
 
 He stopped abruptly. Ivy finished for him. 
 
 " Better than words can tell. Papa particularly. Mam- 
 ma, somehow, seems strong of herself, and does n't depend 
 upon me ; but papa, O, you don't know how he is to me ! 
 
124- The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 I think, if I should die, he would die of grief. I have, I 
 cannot help having, a kind of pity /or him, he loves me so." 
 
 "Do you always pity people, when they love you very 
 much ? " 
 
 " O no ! of course not. Besides, nobody loves me enough 
 to be pitied, except -papa; Isn't it pleasant here ? How 
 very green it is ! It looks just like summer. O Mr. Cler- 
 ron, did you see the clouds this morning ? " 
 
 " There were none, when I arose." 
 
 " Why, yes, sir, there was a great heap of them at sun- 
 rise." 
 
 " I am not prepared to contradict you." 
 
 " Perhaps you were not up at sunrise." 
 
 " I have an impression to that effect." 
 
 He smiled so comically, that Ivy could not help saying, 
 though she was half afraid he might not be pleased, ' 
 
 " I wonder whether you are an early riser." 
 
 " Yes, my dear, I consider myself tolerably early. I be- 
 lieve I have been up every morning but one, this week, by 
 nine o'clock." 
 
 Ivy was horror-struck. Her country ideas of " early to 
 bed and early to rise " received a great shock, as her looks 
 plainly showed. He laughed gayly at her amazed face. 
 
 " You don't seem to appreciate me, Miss Geer." 
 
 " ' Nine o'clock ' ! " repeated Ivy, slowly, " f every morn- 
 ing but one ' ! and it is Tuesday to-day." 
 
 " Yes, but you know yesterday was a dark, cloudy day, 
 and excellent for sleeping." 
 
 " But, Mr. Clerron, then you are not more than fairly up 
 when I come. And when do you write ? " 
 
 " Always in the evening." 
 
 " But the evenings are so short, or have been." 
 
 " Mine are not particularly so. From six to three is 
 about long enough for one sitting." 
 
 " I should think so. And you must be so tired ! " 
 
 " Not so tired as you think. You, now, rising at five or 
 six, and running round all day, become so tired that you 
 
under Difficulties. 125 
 
 have to go to bed by nine ; of course you have no time for 
 reflection and meditation. I, on the contrary, take life easi- 
 ly, write in the night, when everything is still and quiet, 
 take my sleep when all the noise of the world's waking- 
 up is going on, and after creation is fairly settled for the 
 day, I rise leisurely, breakfast leisurely, take a smoke lei- 
 surely, and leisurely wait the coming of my little pupil." 
 
 " Mr. Clerron ! " 
 
 " Well ! " 
 
 " May I tell you another thing I don't like, in you ? a bad 
 habit ? " 
 
 " As many as you please, provided you won't require me 
 to reform." 
 
 " What is the use of telling it, then ? " 
 
 " But it may be a relief to you. You will have the satis- 
 faction arising from doing your duty. We shall exchange 
 opinions, and perhaps come to a better understanding; Go 
 on." 
 
 " Well, sir, I wish you did not smoke so much." 
 
 " I don't smoke very much, little Ivy." 
 
 " I wish you would not at all. Mamma thinks it is very 
 injurious, and wrong, even. And papa says cigars are bad 
 things." 
 
 " Some of them are outrageous. But, my dear, granting 
 your father and mother and yourself to be right, don't you 
 see I am doing more to extirpate the evil than you, with all 
 your principle ? I exterminate, destroy, and ruin them at 
 the rate of three a day ; while you, I venture to say, never 
 lifted a finger or lighted a spark against them." 
 
 " Now, sir, that is only a way of slipping round the ques- 
 tion. And I really wish you did not. Before I knew you, 
 I thought it was almost as bad to smoke as it was to steal, 
 I know, however, now, that it cannot be ; still " 
 
 " Feminine logic." 
 
 " I have not studied Logic yet ; still, as I was going to 
 say, sir, I don't like to think of you as being in a kind of 
 subjection to anything." 
 
126 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 " Ivy, seriously, I am not in subjection to a cigar. I often 
 don't smoke for months together. To prove it, I promise 
 you I won't smoke for the next two months." 
 
 " O, I am so glad ! O, I am so much obliged to you ! 
 And you are not in the least vexed that I spoke to you about 
 it?" 
 
 " Not in the least." 
 
 " I was afraid you would be. And one thing more, sir, I 
 have been afraid of, the last few days. You know when I 
 first knew you, or before I knew you, I supposed you did 
 nothing but walk round and enjoy yourself all day. But 
 now I know you do work very hard ; and I have feared that 
 you could not well spare two hours every day for me, par- 
 ticularly in the morning, which are almost always consid- 
 ered the best. But if you like to write in the evening, you 
 would just as soon I would come in the morning ? " 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 " But if two hours are too much, I hope you won't, at any 
 time, hesitate to tell me. I have no claim on a moment, 
 only" 
 
 " My dear Ivy Geer, pupil and friend, be so good as to 
 understand, henceforth, that you cannot possibly come into 
 my house at any time when you are not wanted ; nor stay 
 any longer than I want you ; nor say anything that will not 
 please me ; well, I am not quite sure about that ; but, 
 at least, remember that I am always glad to see you, and 
 teach you, and have you with me ; and that I can never 
 hope to do you as much good as you do me every day of 
 your blessed life." 
 
 " O Mr. Clerron ! " exclaimed Ivy, with a great gush of 
 gratitude and happiness ; ." do I, can I, &v you any good ?" 
 
 " You do and can, my tendril ! You supply an element 
 that was wanting in my life. You make every day beautiful 
 to me. The flutter of your robes among these trees brings 
 sunshine into my heart. Every morning I walk in my gar- 
 den as soon as I am, as you say, fairly up, till I see you 
 turn into the lane ; and every day I watch you till you dis- 
 
under Difficulties. 127 
 
 appear. You are fresh and truthful and natural, and you 
 give me new life. And now, my dear little trembling bene- 
 factor, because we are nearly through the woods, I can go 
 no farther with you ; and because I am going away to- 
 morrow, not to see you again for a week, and because I hope 
 you will be a little lonesome while I am gone, why, I think 
 I must let you kiss me ! " 
 
 Ivy had been looking intently into his face, with an ex- 
 pression, at -first, of the most beaming, tearful delight, then 
 gradually changing into waiting wonder ; but when his sen- 
 tence finally closed, she stood still, scarcely able to compre- 
 hend. He placed his hands on her temples, and, smiling 
 involuntarily at her blushes and embarrassment, half in 
 sport and half in tenderness, bent her head a little back, 
 touched brow, cheeks, and lips, whispered softly, " Go now ! 
 God bless you for ever andf ever, my darling ! " and, turning 
 walked hastily down the winding path. As for Ivy, she went 
 home in a dream, blind and stunned with a great joy. 
 
 The week of Mr. Clerron's absence passed away more 
 quickly than Ivy had supposed it would. The reason for 
 this may be found in the fact that her thoughts were very 
 busily occupied. She was more silent than usual, so much 
 so that her father one day said to her, "Ivy, I haven't 
 heard you sing this long while, and seems to me you don't 
 talk either. What 's the matter ? " 
 
 " Do I look as if anything was the matter ? " and the face 
 she turned upon him was so radiant, that even the father's 
 heart was satisfied. 
 
 Very quietly happy was Ivy to think she was of service 
 to Mr. Clerron, that she could give him pleasure, though 
 she could in no wise understand how it was. She went 
 over every event since her acquaintance with him ; she felt 
 how much he had done for her, and how much he had been 
 to her ; but she sought in vain to discover how she had 
 been of any use to him. She only knew that she was the 
 most ignorant and insignificant girl in the whole world, and 
 that he was the best and greatest man. As this was very 
 
128 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 nearly the same conclusion at which she had arrived at an 
 early period of their acquaintance, it cannot be said that 
 her week of reflection was productive of any very valuable 
 results. 
 
 The day before Mr. Clerron's expected return, Ivy sat 
 down to prepare her lessons, and for the first time remem- 
 bered that she had left her books in Mr. Clerron's library. 
 She was not sorry to have so good an excuse for visiting 
 the familiar room, though its usual occupant was not there 
 to welcome her. Very quietly and joyfully happy, she trod 
 slowly along the path through the woods where she last 
 walked with Mr. Clerron. She was, indeed, at a loss to 
 know why she was so calm. Always before, a sudden in- 
 flux of joy testified itself by very active demonstrations. 
 She was quite sure that she had never in her life been so 
 happy as now ; yet she never had felt less disposed to leap 
 and dance and sing. The non-solution of the problem, 
 however, did not ruffle her serenity. She was content to 
 accept the facts, and await patiently the theory. 
 
 Arriving at the house, she went, as usual, into the library 
 without ringing, but, not finding the books, proceeded in 
 search of Mrs. Simm. That notable lady was sitting be- 
 hind a huge pile of clean clothes, sorting and mending to 
 her heart's content. She looked up over her spectacles at 
 Ivy's bright " good morning," and invited her to come in. 
 Ivy declined, and begged to know if Mrs. Simm had seen 
 her books. To be sure she had, like the good housekeeper 
 that she was. " You '11 find them in the book-case, second 
 shelf; but, Miss Ivy, I wish you would come in, for I've 
 had something on my mind that I Ve felt to tell you this 
 long while." 
 
 Ivy came in, took the seat opposite Mrs. Simm, and 
 waited for her to speak ; but Mrs. Simm seemed to be in 
 no hurry to speak. She dropped her glasses ; Ivy picked 
 them up and handed them to her. She muttered something 
 about the destructive habits of men, especially in regard to 
 buttons ; and presently, as if determined to come to the 
 subject at once, abruptly exclaimed, 
 
under Difficulties. 129 
 
 " Miss Ivy, you 're a real good girl, I know, and as in- 
 nocent as a lamb. That 's why I 'm going to talk to you as 
 I do. I know, if you were my child, I should want some- 
 body to do the same by you." 
 
 Ivy could only stare in blank astonishment. After a 
 moment's pause, Mrs. Simm continued, 
 
 " I 've seen how things have been going on for some time ; 
 but my mouth was shut, though my eyes were open. I 
 did n't know but maybe I 'd better speak to your mother 
 about it ; but then, thinks I to myself, she '11 think it is a 
 great deal worse than it is, and then, like enough, there '11 be 
 a rumpus. So I concluded, on the whole, I 'd just tell you 
 what I thought ; and I know you are a sensible girl and 
 will take it all right. Now you must promise me not to get 
 mad." 
 
 " No," gasped Ivy. 
 
 " I like you a sight. It's no flattery, but the truth, to say 
 I think you 're as pretty-behaved a girl as you '11 find in a 
 thousand. And all the time you Ve been here, I never have 
 known you to do a thing you had n't ought to. And Mr. 
 Clerron thinks so too, and there's the trouble. -You see, 
 dear, he's a man, and men go on their ways and like 
 women, and talk to them, and sort of bewitch them, not 
 meaning to do them any hurt, and enjoy their company 
 of an evening, and go about their own business in the 
 morning, and never think of it again ; but women stay at 
 home, and brood over it, and think there's something in 
 it, and build a fine air-castle, and when they find it 's all 
 smoke, they mope and pine and take on. Now that 's what 
 I don 't want you to do. Perhaps you 'd think I 'd better 
 have spoken with Mr. Clerron ; but it would n't signify the 
 head of a pin. He 'd either put on the Clerron look and 
 scare you to death and not say a word, or else he 'd hold 
 it up in such a ridiculous way as to make you think it was 
 ridiculous yourself. And I thought I 'd put you on your 
 guard a little, so as you need n't fall in love with him. 
 You '11 like him, of course. He likes you ; but a young 
 6* . i 
 
130 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 girl like you might make a mistake, if she was ever so 
 modest and sweet, and nobody could be modester or 
 sweeter than you, and think a man loved you to marry 
 you, when he only pets and plays with you. Not that Mr. 
 Clerron means to do anything wrong. He'd be perfectly 
 miserable himself, if he thought he 'd led you on. There 
 ain't a more honorable man every way in the whole coun- 
 try. Now, Miss Ivy, it 's all for your good I say this. I 
 don 't find fault with you, not a bit. It 's only to save you 
 trouble in store that I warn you to look where you stand, 
 and see that you don't lose your heart before you know it. 
 It 's an awful thing for a woman, Miss Ivy, to get a notion 
 after a man who hasn't got a notion after her. Men go 
 out and work and delve and drive, and forget; but there 
 ain't much in darning stockings and making pillow-cases 
 to take a woman's thought off her troubles, and sometimes 
 they get sp'iled for life." 
 
 Ivy had remained speechless from amazement ; but when 
 Mrs. Simm had finished, she said, with a sudden accession 
 of womanly dignity that surprised the good housekeeper, 
 
 " Mrs. Simm, I cannot conceive why you should speak 
 in this way to me. If you suppose I am not quite able to 
 take care of myself, I assure you you are very much mis- 
 taken." 
 
 " Lorful heart ! Now, Miss Ivy, you promised you 
 wouldn't be mad." 
 
 " And I have kept my promise. I am not mad." 
 
 " No, but you answer up short like, and that is n't what I 
 thought of you, Ivy Geer." 
 
 Mrs. Simm looked so disappointed that Ivy took a lower 
 tone, and at any rate she would have had to do it soon ; for 
 her fortitude gave way, and she burst into a flood of tears. 
 She was not, by any means, a heroine, and could not put on 
 the impenetrable mask of a woman of the world. 
 
 " Now, dear, don't be so distressful, dear, don't ! " said 
 Mrs. Simm, soothingly. " I can't bear to see you." 
 
 " I am sure I never thought of such a thing as falling in 
 
under Difficulties. 131 
 
 love with Mr. Clerron or anybody else," sobbed Ivy, " and 
 I don't know what should make you think so." 
 
 " Dear heart, I don't think so. I only told you, so you 
 need n't." 
 
 "Why, I should as soon think of marrying the angel 
 Gabriel ! " 
 
 " O, don't talk so, dear ; he 's no more than man, after 
 all ; but still, you know, he 's no fit match for you. To say 
 nothing of his being older, and all that, I don't think it 's 
 the right place for you. Your father and mother are very 
 nice folks ; I am sure nobody could ask for better neigh- 
 bors, and their good word is in everybody's mouth; and 
 they Ve brought you up well, I am sure ; but, my dear, you 
 know it's nothing against you nor them that you ain't 
 used to splendor, and you would n't take to it natural like. 
 You 'd get tired of that way of life, and want to go back 
 to the old fashions, and you'd most likely have to leave 
 your father and mother ; for it 's noways probable Mr. 
 Clerron will stay here always ; and when he goes back to 
 the city, think what a dreary life you'd have betwixt his 
 two proud sisters, on the one hand, to be sure, there 's 
 no reason why they should be ; their gran'ther was a tailor, 
 and their grandma was his apprentice, and he got rich, 
 and gave all his children learning ; and Mr. Felix's father, 
 he was a lawyer, and he got rich by speculation, and so the 
 two girls always had on their high-heeled boots ; but Mr. 
 Clerron, he always laughs at them, and brings up "the 
 grand-paternal shop," as he calls it, and provokes them 
 terribly, I know. Well, that 's neither here nor there ; but, 
 as I was saying, here you '11 have them on the one side, 
 and all the fine ladies on the other, and a great house and 
 servants, and parties to see to, and, lorful heart ! Miss Ivy, 
 you'd die in three years; and if you know when you're 
 well off, you'll stay at home, and marry and settle down 
 near the old folks. Believe me, my dear, it 's a bad thing 
 both for the man and the woman, when she marries above 
 her." 
 
132 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 "Mrs. Simm," said Ivy, rising, "will you promise me 
 one thing ? " 
 
 " Certainly, child, if I can." 
 
 "Will you promise me never again to mention this thing 
 to me, or allude to it in the most distant manner ? " 
 
 " Miss Ivy, now," began Mrs. Simm, deprecatingly. 
 
 " Because," interrupted Ivy, speaking very thick and fast, 
 "you cannot imagine how disagreeable it is to me. It 
 makes me feel ashamed to think of what you have said, 
 and that you could have thought it even. I suppose 
 indeed, I know that you did it because you thought you 
 ought ; but you may be certain that I am in no danger 
 from Mr. Clerron, nor is there the slightest probability that 
 his fortune, or honor, or reputation, or sisters will ever be 
 disturbed by me. I am very much obliged to you for your 
 good intentions, and I wish you good morning." 
 
 " Don't, now, Miss Ivy, go so 
 
 But Miss Ivy was gone, and Mrs. Simm could only with- 
 draw to her pile of clothes, and console herself by stitching 
 and darning with renewed vigor. She felt rather uneasy 
 about the result of her morning's work, though she had 
 really done it from a conscientious sense of duty. 
 
 " Welladay," she sighed, at last, " she 'd better be a little 
 cut up and huffy now, than to walk into a ditch blind- 
 folded ; and I wash my hands of whatever may happen 
 after this. I Ve had my say and done my part." 
 
 Alas, Ivy Geer ! The Indian summer day was just as 
 calm and beautiful, the far-off mountains wore their veil 
 of mist just as aerially, the brook rippled over the stones 
 with just as soft a melody ; but what " discord on the 
 music " had fallen ! what " darkness on the glory " ! A miser- 
 able, dull, dead weight was the heart which throbbed so 
 lightly but an hour before. Wearily, drearily, she dragged 
 herself home. It was nearly sunset when she arrived, and 
 she told her mother she was tired and had the headache, 
 which was true, though, if she had said heartache, it 
 would have been truer. Her mother immediately did what 
 
tinder Difficulties. 133 
 
 ninety-nine mothers out of a hundred would do in similar 
 circumstances, made her swallow a cup of strong tea, 
 and sent her to bed. Alas, alas that there are sorrows 
 which the strongest tea cannot assuage ! 
 
 When the last echo of her mother's footstep died on the 
 stairs, and Ivy was alone in the darkness, the tide of bit- 
 terness and desolation swept unchecked over her soul, and 
 she wept tears more passionate and desponding than her 
 life had ever before known, tears of shame and indigna- 
 tion and grief. It was true that the thought which. Mrs. 
 Simm had suggested had never crossed her mind before ; 
 yet it is no less true, that, ail-unconsciously, she had been 
 weaving a golden web, whose threads, though too fine and 
 delicate tven for herself to perceive, were yet strong enough 
 to entangle her life in their meshes. A secret chamber, far 
 removed from the noise and din of the world, a chamber 
 whose soft and rose-tinted light threw its radiance over her 
 whole future, and within whose quiet recesses she loved 
 to sit alone and dream away the hours, had been rudely 
 entered, and thrown violently open to the light of day, and 
 Ivy saw with dismay how its pictures had become ghastly 
 and its sacredness was defiled. With bitter, though need- 
 less and useless self-reproach, she saw how she had suffered 
 herself to be fascinated. Sorrowfully, she felt that Mrs. 
 Simm's words were true, and a great gulf lay between her 
 and him. She pictured him moving easily arid gracefully 
 and naturally among scenes which to her inexperienced eye 
 were grand and stately ; and then, with a sharp pain, she 
 felt how constrained and awkward and entirely unfit for 
 such a life was she. Then her thoughts reverted to her 
 parents, their unchanging love, their happiness, depend- 
 ing on her, their solicitude and watchfulness, and she 
 felt as if ingratitude were added to her other sins, that 
 she could have so attached herself to any other. And 
 again came back the bitter, burning agony of shame that 
 she had done the very thing that Mrs. Simm too late had 
 warned her not to do ; she had been carried away by the 
 
134 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 kindness and tenderness of her friend, and, unasked, had 
 laid the wealth of her heart at his feet. So the night 
 flushed -into morning ; and the sun rose upon a pale face 
 and a trembling form, but not upon a faint heart ; for 
 Ivy, kneeling by the couch where her morning and evening 
 prayer had gone up since lisping infancy, kneeling no 
 longer a child, but a woman, matured through love, ma- 
 tured, alas ! through suffering, prayed for strength and 
 comfort ; prayed that her parents' love might be rendered 
 back into their own bosoms a hundred-fold ; prayed that 
 her friend's kindness to her might not be an occasion of 
 sin against God, and that she might be enabled to walk 
 with a steady step in the path that lay before her. And 
 she arose strengthened and comforted. 
 
 All the morning she lay quiet and silent on the lounge 
 in the little sitting-room. Her mother, busied with house- 
 hold matters, only looked in upon her occasionally, and, 
 as the eyes were always closed, did not speak, thinking her 
 asleep. Ivy was not asleep. Ten thousand little sprites 
 flitted swiftly through the chambers of her brain, humming, 
 singing, weeping, but always busy, busy. Then softly came 
 another tread, and she knew her dear old father had drawn 
 a chair close to her, and was looking into her face. Tears 
 came into her eyes, her lip involuntarily quivered, and then 
 she felt the pressure of his his ! surely that was not 
 her father's kiss ! She started up. No, no ! that was not 
 her father's face bending over her, not her father's eyes 
 smiling into hers ; but, woe for Ivy ! her soul thrilled with 
 a deeper bliss, her heart leaped with a swifter bound, and 
 for a moment all the experience and suffering and resolu- 
 tions of the last night were as if they had never been. 
 Only for a moment, and then with a strong effort she re- 
 membered the impassable gulf. 
 
 " A pretty welcome home you have given me ! " said Mr. 
 Clerron, lightly. 
 
 He saw that something was weighing on her spirits, but 
 did not wish to distress her by seeming to notice it. 
 
under Difficulties. 135 
 
 " I wait in my library, I walk in my garden, expecting 
 every moment will bring you, and lo ! here you are lying, 
 doing nothing but look pale and pretty as hard as you can." 
 
 Ivy smiled, but did not consider it prudent to speak. 
 
 " I found your books, however, and have brought them 
 to you. You thought you would escape a lesson finely, did 
 you not ? But you see I have outwitted you." 
 
 "Yes, I went for the books yesterday," said Ivy, "but 
 I got talking with Mrs. Simm and forgot them." 
 
 " Ah ! " he replied, looking somewhat surprised. " I did 
 not know Mrs. Simm could be so entertaining. She must 
 have exerted herself. Pray, now, if it would not be im- 
 pertinent, what subject was it that drove everything else 
 from your mind ? The best way of preserving apples, I 
 dare swear, or the superiority of pickled grapes to pickled 
 cucumbers." 
 
 "No," said Ivy, with the ghost of another smile, "we 
 talked upon various subjects ; but not those. How do you 
 do, Mr. Clerron ? Have you had a pleasant visit to the 
 city?" 
 
 "Very well, I thank you, Miss Geer; and I have not 
 had a remarkably pleasant visit, I am obliged to you. 
 Have I the pleasure of seeing you quite well, Miss Geer, 
 quite fresh and buoyant?" 
 
 The lightness of tone which he had assumed had pre- 
 cisely the opposite effect intended. 
 
 " Ye banks and braes o' bonny Doon, 
 
 How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair ? 
 How can ye chant, ye little birds, 
 And I sae weary fu' o' care ? " 
 
 is the wail of stricken humanity everywhere. And Ivy 
 thought of Mr. Clerron, rich, learned, elegant, happy, on 
 the current of whose life she only floated a pleasant ripple, 
 and of herself, poor, plain, ignorant, to whom he was 
 the life of life, the all in all. I would not have you suppose 
 this passed through her mind precisely as I have written 
 
136 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 it. By no means. The ideas rather trooped through in a 
 pellmell sort of way ; but they got through just as effectu- 
 ally. Now, if Ivy had been content to let her muscles 
 remain perfectly still, her face might have given no sign 
 of the confusion within ; but, with a foolish presumption, 
 she undertook to smile, and so quite lost control of the 
 little rebels, who immediately twisted themselves into a sob. 
 Her whole frame convulsed with weeping and trying not 
 to weep, he forced her gently back on the pillow, and, bend- 
 ing low, whispered softly, 
 
 "Ivy what is it?" 
 
 " O, don't ask me ! please, don't ! Please, go away ! " 
 murmured the poor child. 
 
 " I will, my dear, in a minute ; but you must think I 
 should be a little anxious. I leave you as gay as a bird, 
 and healthy and rosy, and when I come back, I find you 
 white and sad and ill. I am sure something weighs on 
 your mind. I assure you, my little Ivy, and you must 
 believe, that I am your true friend, and if you would 
 confide in me, perhaps I could bring you comfort. It would 
 at least relieve you to let me help you bear the burden." 
 
 The burden being of such a nature, it is not at all proba- 
 ble that Ivy would have assented to his proposition ; but 
 the welcome entrance of her mother prevented the ne- 
 cessity of replying. 
 
 " O, you 're awake ! Well, I told Mr. Clerron he might 
 come in, though I thought you wouldn't be. Slept well 
 this morning, did n't you, deary, to make up for last night ? " 
 
 " No, mamma, I have n't been asleep." 
 
 " Crying, my dear ? Well, now, that 's a pretty good one ! 
 Nervous she is, Mr. Clerron, always nervous, when the least 
 thing ails her ; and she did n't sleep a wink last night, 
 which is a bad thing for the nerves, and Ivy generally 
 sleeps like a top. She walked over to your house yester- 
 day, and when she got home she was entirely beat out, 
 looked as if she had been sick a week. I don't know why 
 it was, for the walk could n't have hurt her. She 's always 
 
under Difficulties. 137 
 
 dancing round at home. I don't think she 's been exactly 
 well for four or five days. Her father and I both thought 
 she 'd been more quiet like than usual." 
 
 The sudden pang that shot across Ivy's face was not 
 unobserved by Mr. Clerron. A thought came into his 
 mind. He had risen at Mrs. Geer's entrance, and he now 
 expressed his regret for Ivy's illness, and hoped that she 
 would soon be well, and able to resume her studies ; and, 
 with a few words of interest and inquiry to Mrs. Geer, took 
 his leave. 
 
 " I wonder if Mrs. Simm has been making mischief ! " 
 thought he, as he stalked home rather more energetically 
 than was his custom. 
 
 That unfortunate lady was in her sitting-room, starching 
 muslins, when Mr. Clerron entered. She had surmised 
 that he was gone to the farm, and had looked for his re- 
 turn with a shadow of dread. She saw by his face thai? 
 something was wrong. 
 
 "Mrs. Simm," he began, somewhat abruptly, but not 
 disrespectfully, "may I beg your pardon for inquiring what 
 Ivy Geer talked to you about, yesterday ? " 
 
 " O, good Lord ! she ha' n't told you, has she ? " cried 
 Mrs. Simm, her fear of God, for once, yielding to her 
 greater fear of man. The embroidered collar, which she 
 had been vigorously beating, dropped to the floor, and she 
 gazed at him with such terror and dismay in every linea- 
 ment, that he could not help being amused. He picked up 
 the collar, which, in her perturbation, she had not noticed, 
 and said, 
 
 "No, she has told me nothing; but I find her excited 
 and ill, and I have reason to believe it is connected with 
 her visit here yesterday. If it is anything relating to me, 
 and which I have a right to know, you would do me a 
 great favor by enlightening me on the subject." 
 
 Mrs. Simm had not a particle of that knowledge in 
 which Young America is so great a proficient, namely, the 
 " knowing how to get out of a scrape." She was, besides, 
 
138 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 alarmed at the effect of her words on Ivy, supposing noth- 
 ing less than that the girl was in the last stages of a swift 
 consumption ; so she sat down, and, rubbing her starchy 
 hands together, with many a deprecatory " you know," and 
 apologetic " I am sure I thought I was acting for the best," 
 gave, considering her agitation, a tolerably accurate ac- 
 count of the whole interview. Her interlocutor saw plainly 
 that she had .acted from a sincere conscientiousness, and 
 not from a meddlesome, mischievous interference ; so he 
 only thanked her for her kind interest, and suggested that 
 he had now arrived at an age when it would, perhaps, be 
 well for him to conduct matters, particularly of so delicate 
 a nature, solely according to his own judgment. He was 
 sorry to have given her any trouble. 
 
 "Scissors cuts only what comes between 'em," solilo- 
 quized Mrs. Simm, when the door closed behind him. "If 
 ever I meddle with a courting-business again, my name 
 ain't Martha Simm. No, they may go to Halifax, whoever 
 they be, 'fore ever I '11 lift a finger." 
 
 It is a great pity that the world generally has not been 
 brought to make the same wise resolution. 
 
 One, two, three, four days passed away, and still Ivy pon- 
 dered the question so often wrung from man in his bewil- 
 dered gropings, " What shall I do ? " Every day brought 
 her teacher and friend to comfort, amuse, and strengthen. 
 Every morning she resolved to be on her guard, to re- 
 member the impassable gulf. Every evening she felt the 
 silken cords drawing tighter and tighter around her soul, 
 and binding her closer and closer to him. She thought 
 she might die, and the thought gave her a sudden joy. 
 Death would solve the problem at once. If only a few 
 weeks or months lay before her, she could quietly rest on 
 him, and give herself up to him and wait in heaven for all 
 rough places to be made plain. But Ivy did not die. 
 Youth and nursing and herb-tea were too strong for her, 
 and the color came back to her cheek and the languor went 
 out from her blue eyes. She saw nothing to be done but 
 
under Difficulties. 139 
 
 to resume her old routine. It would be difficult to say 
 whether she was more glad or sorry at seeming to see this 
 necessity. She knew her danger, and it was very fascinat- 
 ing. She did not look into the far-off future ; she only 
 prayed to be kept from day to day. Perhaps her course 
 was wise ; perhaps not. But she had to rely on her own 
 judgment alone : and her judgment was founded on in- 
 experience, which is not a trustworthy basis. 
 
 A new difficulty arose. Ivy found that she could not 
 resume her old habits. To be sure, she learned her lessons 
 just as perfectly at home as she had ever done. Just as 
 punctual to the appointed hour, she went to recite them ; 
 but no sooner had her foot crossed Mr. Clerron's threshold 
 than her spirit seemed to die within her. She remembered 
 neither words nor ideas. Day after day, she attempted to 
 go through her recitation as usual, and, day after day, she 
 hesitated, stammered, and utterly failed. His gentle assist- 
 ance only increased her embarrassment. This she was too 
 proud to endure ; and, one day, after an unsuccessful effort, 
 she closed the book with a quick, impatient gesture, and 
 exclaimed, 
 
 " Mr. Clerron, I shall not recite any more ! " 
 
 The agitated flush which had suffused her face gave way 
 to paleness. He saw that she was under strong excite- 
 ment, and quietly replied, 
 
 " Very well, you need not, if you are tired. You are not 
 quite well yet, and must not try to do too much. We will 
 commence here to-morrow." 
 
 " No, sir, I shall not recite any more at all." 
 
 "Till to-morrow." 
 
 " Never any more ! " 
 
 There was a moment's pause. 
 
 " You must not lose patience, my dear. In a few days 
 you will recite as well as ever. A fine notion, forsooth, 
 because you have been ill, and forgotten a little, to give up 
 studying ! And what is to become of my laurels, pray, 
 all the glory I am to get by your proficiency ? " 
 
140 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 "I shall study at home just the same, but I shall not 
 recite." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 His look became serious. 
 
 " Because I cannot. I do not think it best, and and 
 I will not." 
 
 Another pause. 
 
 " Ivy, do you not like your teacher ? " 
 
 "No, sir. I hate 'you!" 
 
 The words seemed to flash from her lips. She sprang 
 up and stood erect before him, her eyes on fire, and every 
 nerve quivering with intense excitement. He was shocked 
 and startled. It was a new phase of her character, a 
 new revelation. He, too, arose, and walked to the window. 
 If Ivy could have seen the workings of his face, there 
 would have been a revelation to her also. But she was too 
 highly excited to notice anything. He came back to her 
 and spoke in a low voice, 
 
 " Ivy, this is too much. This I did not expect." 
 
 He laid his Jiand upon her head as he had often done 
 before. She shook it off passionately. 
 
 " Yes, I hate you. I hate you, because " 
 
 " Because I wanted you to love me ? " 
 
 " No, sir ; because I do love you, and you bring me only 
 wretchedness. I have never been happy since the misera- 
 ble day I first saw you." 
 
 " Then, Ivy, I have utterly failed in what it has been my 
 constant endeavor to do." 
 
 " No, sir, you have succeeded in what you endeavored 
 to do. You have taught me. You have given me knowl- 
 edge and thought, and showed me the source of knowledge. 
 But I had better have been the ignorant girl you found me. 
 You have taken from me what I can never find again. I 
 have made a bitter exchange. I was ignorant and stupid, 
 I know, but I was happy and contented ; and now I am 
 wretched and miserable and wicked. You have come be- 
 tween me and my home and my father and mother, be- 
 
under Difficulties. . 141 
 
 tween me and all the bliss of my past and all my hope for 
 the future." 
 
 " And thus, Ivy, have you come between me and my past 
 and my future ; yet not thus. You shut out from my 
 heart all the sorrow and vexation and strife that have 
 clouded my life, and fill it with your own dear presence. 
 You come between me and my future, because, in looking 
 forward, I see only you. I should have known better. 
 There is a gulf between us ; but if I could make you ' 
 happy " 
 
 " I don't want you to make me happy. I know there is 
 a gulf between us. I saw it while you were gone. I 
 measured it and fathomed it. I shall not leap across. 
 Stay you on your side quietly ; I shall stay as quietly on 
 mine." 
 
 "It is too late for that, Ivy, too late now. But you 
 are not to blame, my child. Little sunbeam that you are, 
 I will not cloud you. Go shine upon other lives as you have 
 shone upon mine ! light up other hearths as you have mine ! 
 and I will bless you forever, though mine " 
 
 He turned away with an expression on his face that Ivy 
 could not read. Her passion was gone. She hesitated a 
 moment, then went to his side and laid her hand softly on 
 his arm. There was a strange moistened gleam in his eyes 
 as he turned them upon her. 
 
 " Mr. Clerron, I do not understand you." 
 
 " My dear, you never can understand me." 
 
 " I know it," said Ivy, with her old humility ; " but, at 
 least, I might understand whether I have vexed you." 
 
 "You have not vexed me." 
 
 " I spoke proudly and rudely to you. I was angry, and 
 so unhappy. I shall always be so ; I shall never be happy 
 again ; but I want you to be, and you do not look as if 
 you were." 
 
 If Ivy had not been a little fool, she would not have 
 spoken so ; but she was, so she did. . 
 
 " I beg your pardon, little tendril. I was so occupied 
 
142 The Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 with my own preconceived ideas that I forgot to sympa- 
 thize with you. Tell me why or how I have made you 
 unhappy. But I know ; you need not. I assure you, how- 
 ever, that you are entirely wrong. It was a prudish and 
 whimsical notion of my good old housekeeper's. You are 
 never to think of it again. / never attributed such a 
 thought or feeling to you." 
 
 u Did you suppose that was all that made me unhappy ? " 
 
 " Can there be anything else ? " 
 
 " I am glad you think so. Perhaps I should not have 
 been unhappy but for that, at least not so soon ; but that 
 alone could never have made me so." 
 
 Little fool again ! She was like a chicken thrusting its 
 head into a corner and thinking itself out of danger be- 
 cause it cannot see the danger. She had no notion that 
 she was giving him the least clew to the truth, but con- 
 sidered herself speaking with more than Delphic prudence. 
 She rather liked to coast along the shores of her trouble 
 and see how near she could approach without running 
 aground ; but she struck before she knew it. 
 
 Mr. Clerron's face suddenly changed. He took both her 
 hands, and drew her towards him. 
 
 "Ivy, perhaps I have been misunderstanding you. I 
 will at least find out the truth. Ivy, do you know that I 
 love you, that I have loved you almost from the first, that 
 I would gladly here and now take you to my heart and 
 keep you here forever?" 
 
 " I do not know it," faltered Ivy, half beside herself. 
 
 " Know it now, then ! I am older than you, and I seem 
 to myself so far removed from you that I have feared to 
 ask you to trust your happiness to my keeping, lest I should 
 lose you entirely ; but sometimes you say or do something 
 which gives me hope. My experience has been very dif- 
 ferent from yours. I am not worthy to clasp your purity 
 and loveliness. Still I would do it if Tell me, Ivy, 
 does it give you pain or pleasure ? " 
 
 Ivy took his hands, as he had before held hers, gazed 
 steadily into his eyes, and said, 
 
under Difficulties. 143 
 
 " Mr. Clerron, are you in earnest ? Do you love me ? " 
 
 "I am, Ivy. I do love you." 
 
 " How do you love me ? " 
 
 " I love you with all the strength and power that God has 
 given me." 
 
 " You do not simply pity me ? You have not, because 
 you heard from Mrs. Simm, or suspected, yourself, that I 
 was weak enough to mistake your kindness and nobleness, 
 you have not in pity resolved to sacrifice your happiness 
 to mine?" 
 
 "No, Ivy, nothing of the kind. I pity only myself. 
 I reverence you. I think I have hoped that you loved 
 me as a teacher and friend. I dared not believe you could 
 ever do more; now something within tells me that you 
 can. Can you, Ivy ? If the love and tenderness and de- 
 votion of my whole life can make you happy, happiness 
 shall not fail to be yours." 
 
 Ivy's gaze never for a moment drooped under his, earnest 
 and piercing though it was. 
 
 "Now I am happy," she said, slowly and distinctly. 
 " Now I am blessed. I can never ask anything more." 
 
 " But I ask something more," he replied, bending forward 
 eagerly. " I ask much more. I want your love. Shall I 
 have it? And I want you." 
 
 "My love?" She blushed slightly, but spoke without 
 hesitation. " Have I not given it, long, long before you 
 asked it, before you even cared for my friendship ? Not 
 love only, but life, my very whole being, centred in you, 
 does now, and will always. Is it right to say this ? But 
 I am not ashamed. I shall always be proud to have loved 
 you, though only to lose you, and to be loved by you is 
 glory enough for all my future." 
 
 One moment Ivy rested in the arms that clasped her; 
 but as he whispered, " Thus you answer the second ques- 
 tion ? You give me yourself too ? " she hastily freed herself. 
 
 " Never ! " 
 
 " Ivy ! " 
 
144 2^* Pursuit of Knowledge 
 
 " Never ! " more firmly than before. 
 
 " What does this mean ? " he said, sternly. " Are you 
 trifling?" 
 
 There was such a frown on his brow as Ivy had never 
 seen. She quailed before it. 
 
 " Do not be angry ! Alas ! I am not trifling. Life itself 
 is not worth so much as your love. But the impassable 
 gulf is between us just the same." 
 
 " What is it ? Who put it there ? 
 
 " God put it there. Mrs. Simm showed it to me." 
 
 " Mrs. Simm be ! A prating gossip ! Ivy, I told you 
 you were never to mention that again, never to think of 
 it; and you must obey me." 
 
 " I will try to obey you in that." 
 
 "And very soon you shall promise to obey me in all 
 things. But I will not be hard with you. The yoke shall 
 rest very lightly, so lightly you shall not feel it. You 
 will not do as much, I dare say. You will make me ac- 
 knowledge your power every day, dear little vixen ! Ivy, 
 why do you draw back ? Why do you not come to me ? " 
 
 " I cannot come to you, Mr. Clerron, any more. I must 
 go home now, and stay at home." 
 
 " When your home is here, Ivy, stay at home.- For the 
 present, don't go. Wait a little." 
 
 " You do not understand me. You will not understand 
 me," said Ivy, bursting into tears. " I must leave you. 
 Don't make the way so difficult." 
 
 " I will make it so difficult that you cannot walk in it. 
 Why do you wish to leave me ? Have you not said that 
 you loved me ? " 
 
 "It is because I love you that I go. I am not fit for 
 you. I was not made for you. I can never make you 
 happy. I cannot go among your friends, your sisters. I 
 am ignorant. You would be ashamed of me, and then 
 you would not love me ; you could not ; and I should lose 
 the thing I most value. No, Mr. Clerron, I would rather 
 keep your love in my own heart and my own home." 
 
iinder Difficulties. 145 
 
 " Ivy, can you be happy without me ? " 
 
 " I shall not be without you. My heart is full of lifelong 
 joyful memories. You need not regret me. Yes, I shall 
 be happy. I shall work with mind and hands. I shall 
 not pine away in a mean and feeble life. I shall be strong, 
 and cheerful, and active, and helpful ; and I think I shall 
 not cease to love you in heaven." 
 
 " But there is, maybe, a long road for us to travel before 
 we reach heaven, and I want you to help me along. Ivy, 
 I am not so spiritual as you. I cannot .live on memory, 
 I want you before me all the time. I want to see you and 
 talk with you every day. Why do you speak of such 
 things ? Is it the soul or its surroundings that you value? 
 Do you respect or care for wealth and station? Do you 
 consider a woman your superior because she wears a finer 
 dress than you ? " 
 
 " I ? No, sir ! No, indeed ! you very well know. But 
 the world does, and you move in the world ; and I do not 
 want the world to pity you because you have an uncouth, 
 ignorant wife. / don't want to be despised by those who 
 are above me only in station." 
 
 "Little aristocrat, you are prouder than I. Will you 
 sacrifice your happiness and mine to your pride ? " 
 
 " Proud perhaps I am, but it is not all pride. I think 
 you are noble, but I think also you could not help losing 
 patience when you found that I could not accommodate 
 myself to the station to which you had raised me. Then 
 you would not respect me. I am, indeed, too proud to 
 wish to lose that ; and losing your respect, as I said before, 
 I should not long keep your love." 
 
 " But you will accommodate yourself to any station. 
 My dear, you are young, and know so little about this 
 world, which is such a bugbear to you. Why, there is very 
 little that will be greatly unlike this. At first you might 
 be a little bewildered, but I shall be by you all the time, 
 and you shall feel and fear nothing, and gradually you will 
 learn what little you need to know ; and most of all, you 
 
 J 
 
146 The Pursuit of Knowledge under Difficulties. 
 
 will be yourself the best and the loveliest of women. Dear 
 Ivy, I would not part with your sweet, unconscious sim- 
 plicity for all the accomplishments and acquired elegancies 
 of the finest lady in the world." (What men always say.) 
 " You are not ignorant of anything you ought to know, and 
 your ignorance of the world is an additional charm to one 
 who knows so much of its wickedness as I. But we will 
 not talk of it. There is no need. This shall be our home, 
 and here the world will not trouble us." 
 
 "And I cannot give up my dear father and mother. 
 You and your friends " 
 
 " They are my friends, valued and dear to me, and dearer 
 still they shall be as the parents of my dear little wife " 
 
 "I was going to say " 
 
 " But you shall not say it. I utterly forbid you ever to 
 mention it again. You are mine, all my own. Your friends 
 are my friends, your honor my honor, your happiness my 
 'happiness henceforth ; and what God joins together let not 
 man or woman put asunder." 
 
 "Ah !" whispered Ivy, faintly; for she was yielding, and 
 just beginning to receive the sense of great and unexpected 
 bliss, "but if you should be wrong, if you should ever 
 repent of this, it is not your happiness alone, but mine, too, 
 that will be destroyed." 
 
 " Ivy, am I a mere school-boy to swear eternal fidelity 
 for a week ? Have I not been tossing hither and thither 
 on the world's tide ever since you lay in your cradle, and 
 do I not know my position and 'my power and my habits 
 and my love ? And knowing all this, do I not know that 
 this dear head " etc., etc., etc., etc. 
 
 But I said I was not going to marry my man and woman, 
 did I not ? Nor have I. To be sure, you may have, de- 
 tected premonitory symptoms, but I said nothing about 
 that. I only promised not to marry them, and I have not 
 married them. 
 
 And that is the end of my story. 
 
A RAFT THAT NO MAN MADE. 
 
 AM a soldier : but my tale, this time, is not of 
 
 war. 
 
 The man of whom the Muse talked to the blind 
 bard of old had grown wise in wayfaring. He had seen 
 such men and cities as the sun shines on, and the great 
 wonders of land and sea ; and he had visited the farther 
 countries, whose indwellers, having been once at home in 
 the green fields and under the sky and roofs of the cheery 
 earth, were now gone forth and forward into a dim and 
 shadowed land, from which they found no backward path 
 to these old haunts, and their old loves : , 
 
 "He'pt Kal veifreXy Ke/caAu/AjaeVot ovSe TTOT* avrous 
 'He'Aio? $ae'&ot> KaTaSepxeTat anTlvevaw. 
 
 Od. xi. 
 
 At the Charter-House I learned the story of the King 
 of Ithaca, and read it for something better than a task ; 
 and since, though I have never seen so many cities as the 
 much-wandering man, nor grown so wise, yet have heard 
 and seen and remembered, for myself, words and thing^ 
 from crowded streets and fairs and shows and wave-washed 
 quays and murmurous market-places, in many lands ; and 
 for his Ki/j,p.piuv dvSp&v SfJ/zoy, his people wrapt in cloud 
 and vapor, whom "no glad sun finds with his beams," 
 have been borne along a perilous path through thick mists, 
 among the crashing ice of the Upper Atlantic, as well as 
 sweltered upon a Southern sea, and have learned something 
 of men and something of God. 
 
148 A Raft that no Man made. 
 
 I was in Newfoundland, a lieutenant of Royal Engineers, 
 in Major Gore's time, and went about a good deal among 
 the people, in surveying for Government. One of my old 
 friends there was Skipper Benjie Westham of Brigus, a 
 shortish, stout, bald man, with a cheerful, honest face and 
 a kind voice ; and he, mending a caplin-seine one day, told 
 me this story, which I will try to tell after him. 
 
 We were upon the high ground, beyond where the church 
 stands now, and Prudence, the fisherman's daughter, and 
 Ralph Barrows, her husband, were with Skipper Benjie 
 when he began ; and I had an hour by the watch to spend. 
 The neighborhood, all about, was still ; the only men who 
 were in sight were so far off that we heard nothing from 
 them ; no wind was stirring near us, and a slow sail could 
 be seen outside. Everything was right for listening and 
 telling. 
 
 " I can tell 'ee what I sid * myself, sir," said Skipper 
 Benjie. " It is n' like a story that 's put down in books : 
 it 's on'y like what we planters f tells of a winter's night or 
 sech ; but it 's feeinn, mubbe, an' 'ee won't expect much off 
 a man as could n' never read, not so much as Bible or 
 Prayer-Book, even." 
 
 Skipper Benjie looked just like what he was thought : a 
 true-hearted, healthy man, a good fisherman, and .a good 
 seaman. There was no need of any one's saying it. So 
 I only waited till he went on speaking. 
 
 "'Twas one time I goed to th' Ice, sir. I never goed 
 but once, an' 't was a'most the first v'yage ever was, ef 
 't^was n' the very first ; an' 't was the last for me, an' worse 
 agen for the rest-part o' that crew, that never goed no 
 more ! 'T was tarrible sad douns wi' they ! " 
 
 This preface was accompanied by some preliminary 
 handling of the caplin-seine, also, to find out the broken 
 places and get them about him. Ralph and Prudence 
 deftly helped him. Then, making his story wait, after this 
 opening, he took one hole to begin at in mending, chose 
 
 * Saw. t Fishermen. 
 
A Raft that no Man made. 149 
 
 his seat, and drew the seine up to his knee. At the same 
 time I got nearer to the fellowship of the family by per- 
 suading the planter (who yielded with a pleasant smile) to 
 let me try my hand at the netting. Prudence quietly took 
 to herself a share of the work, and Ralph alone was un- 
 busied. 
 
 " They calls th' Ice a wicked place, Sundays an' weekin 
 days all alike ; an' to my seemun it 's a cruel, bloody place, 
 jes' so well, but not all thinks alike, surely. Rafe, lad, 
 mubbe 'ee 'd ruther go down cove-ways, an' overhaul the 
 punt a bit." , 
 
 Ralph, who perhaps had stood waiting for the very dis- 
 missal that he now got, assented and left us three. Pru- 
 dence, to be sure, looked after him as if she would a good 
 deal rather go with him than stay ; but she stayed, never- 
 theless, and worked at the seine. I interpreted to myself 
 Skipper Benjie's sending away of one of his hearers by 
 supposing that his son-in-law had often heard his tales ; 
 but the planter explained himself : 
 
 " 'Ee sees, sir, I knocked off goun to th' Ice becase 
 't was sech a tarrible cruel place, to my seemun. They 
 swiles * be so knowun like, as knowun as a dog, iri a 
 manner, an' lovun to their own, like Christens, a'most, more 
 than bastes ; an' they 'm got red blood, for all they lives 
 most-partly in water ; an' then I found 'em so friendly, 
 when I was wantun friends badly. But I s'pose the swile- 
 fishery 's needful ; an' I knows, in course, that even Chris- 
 tens' blood 's got to be taken sometimes, when it's bad 
 blood, an' I would n' be childish about they things ; on'y, 
 ef it 's me, when I can live by fishun, I don' want to go 
 an' club an' shoot an' cut an' slash among poor harmless 
 things that 'ould never harm man or 'oman, an' 'ould cry 
 great tears down for pity- sake, an got a sound like a Chris- 
 ten ; I 'ould n' like to go a-swilun for gain, not after beun 
 among 'em, way I was, anyways." 
 
 This apology made it plain that Skipper Benjie was large- 
 
 * Seals. 
 
150 A Raft that no Man made. ' 
 
 hearted enough, or indulgent enough, not to seek to strain 
 others, even his own family, up to his own way in every- 
 thing ; and it might easily be thought that the young 
 fisherman had different feelings about sealing from those 
 that the planter's story was meant to bring out. All being 
 ready, he began his tale again : 
 
 " I shipped wi' Skipper Isra'l Gooden, from Carbonear : 
 the schooner was the Baccaloue, wi' forty men, all told. 
 'Twas of a Sunday morn'n 'e 'ould sail, twel'th day o' 
 March, wi' another schooner in company, the Sparrow. 
 There was a many of us was n' too good, but we thowt 
 wrong of 'e's takun the Lord's Day to 'e'sself. Wull, sir, 
 afore I corned 'ome, I was in a great desert country, an' 
 floated on sea wi' a monstrous great raft that no man never 
 made, creakun an' crashun an' groanun an' tumblun an' 
 wastun an' goun to pieces, an' no man on her but me, an' 
 full o' livun things, dreadful ! 
 
 " About a five hours out, 't was, we first sid the blink,* 
 an' corned up wi' th' Ice about off Cape Bonavis'. We fell 
 in wi, it south, an worked up nothe along : but we did n' 
 see swiles for two or three days yet ; on'y we was workun 
 along ; pokun the cakes of ice away, an' haulun through 
 wi' main strength sometimes, holdun on wi' bights o' ropes 
 out o' the bow ; an' more times, agen, in clear water : some- 
 times mist all round us, 'ee could n' see the ship's len'th, 
 sca'ce ; an' more times snow, jes' so thick ; an' then a gale 
 o' wind, mubbe, would a'most blow all the spars out of her, 
 seemunly. 
 
 " We kep' sight o' th' other schooner, most-partly ; an' 
 when we did n' keep it, we'd get it agen. So one night 
 't was a beautiful moonlight night : I think I never sid a 
 moon so bright as that moon was ; an' such lovely sights 
 a body 'ould n' think could be ! Little islands, an' bigger, 
 agen, there was, on every hand, shinun so bright, wi' great, 
 awful-lookun shadows ! an' then the sea all black, between ! 
 They did look so beautiful as ef a body could go an' bide 
 
 * A dull glare on the horizon, from the immense masses of ice. 
 
A Raft that no Man made. 151 
 
 on em, in a manner ; an' the sky was jes' so blue, an' the 
 stars all shinun out, an' the moon all so bright ! I never 
 looked upon the like. An' so I stood in the bows ; an' I 
 don't know ef I thowt o' God first, but I was thinkun o' my 
 girl that I was troth-plight wi' then, an' a many things, 
 when all of a sudden we corned upon the hardest ice we 'd 
 a-had ; an' into it ; an' then, wi' pokun an' haulun, workun 
 along. An' there was a cry goed up, like the cry of a 
 babby, 'twas, an' I thowt mubbe 'twas a somethun had 
 got upon one o' they islands ; but I said, agen, ' How could 
 it ? ' an' one John Harris said 'e thowt 't was a bird. Then 
 another man (Moms 'e's name was) started off wi' what 
 they calls a gaff, ('tis somethun like a short boat-hook,) 
 over the bows, an' run ; an' we sid un strike, an' strike, 
 an' we hard it go wump ! wump ! an' the cry goun up 
 so tarrible feelun, seemed as ef 'e was murderun some poor 
 wild Inden child 'e 'd a-found, (on'y mubbe 'e would n' do 
 so bad as that : but there 've a-been tarrible bloody, cruel 
 work wi' Indens in my time,) an' then 'e corned back wi' 
 a .white-coat * over 'e's shoulder ; an' the poor thing was n' 
 dead, but cried an' soughed like any poor little babby." 
 
 The young wife was very restless at this point, and, though 
 she did not look up, I saw her tears. The stout fisherman 
 smoothed out the net a little upon his knee, and drew it 
 in closer, and heaved a great sigh : he did not look at his 
 hearers. 
 
 "When 'e throwed it down, it walloped, an' cried, an' 
 soughed, an' its poor eyes blinded wi' blood ! ('Ee sees, 
 sir," said the planter, by way of excusing his tenderness, 
 " they swiles were friends to I, after.) Dear, O dear ! I 
 could n' stand it ; for 'e might ha' killed un ; an' so 'e goes 
 for a quart o' rum, for fetchun first swile, an' I went an' 
 put the poor thing out o' pain. I did n' want to look at 
 they beautiful islands no more, somehow. Bumby it corned 
 on thick, an' then snow. 
 
 " Nex' day swiles bawlun t every way, poor things ! (I 
 
 * A young seal. \ Technical word for the crying of the seals. 
 
152 A Raft that no Man made. 
 
 knowed their voice, now,) but 't was blowun a gale o' wind, 
 an' we under bare poles, an' snow comun agen, so fast as 
 ever it could come : but out the men 'ould go, all mad like, 
 an' my watch goed, an' so I mus' go. (I did n' think what 
 I was goun to !) The skipper never said no ; but to keep 
 near the schooner, an' fetch in first we could, close by ; an' 
 keep near the schooner. 
 
 " So we got abroad, an' the men that was wi' me jes 
 began to knock right an' left : 't was heartless to see an' 
 hear it. They laved two old uns an' a young whelp to me, 
 as they runned by. The mother did cry like a Christen, 
 in a manner, an' the big tears 'ould run down, an' they 'ould 
 both be so brave for the poor whelp that 'ould cuddle up 
 an' cry ; an' the mother looked this way an' that way, wi' 
 big, pooty, black eyes, to see what was the manun of it, 
 when they 'd never doned any harm in God's world" that 'E 
 made, an' would n', even ef you killed 'em : on'y the poor 
 mother baste ketched my gaff, that ! was goun to strike 
 wi', betwixt her teeth, an' I could n' get it away. 'T was n' 
 like fishun ! (I was weak hearted like : I s'pose 't was wi' 
 what was comun that I did n' know.) Then corned a hail, 
 all of a sudden, from the schooner ; (we had n' been gone 
 mor n' a five minutes, ef 't was so much, no, not mor 'n 
 a three :) but I was glad to hear it come then, however : 
 an' so every man ran, one afore t' other. There the schoon- 
 er was, tearun through all, an' we runnun for dear life. I 
 failed among the slob,* and got out agen. 'T was another 
 man pushun agen me doned it. I could n' 'elp myself from 
 goun in, an' when I got out I was astarn of all, an' there 
 was the schooner carryun on, right through to clear water ! 
 So, hold of a bight o' line, or anything ! an' they swung 
 up in over bows an' sides ! an' swash ! she struck the 
 water, an' was out o' sight in a minute an' the snow drivun 
 as ef 't would bury her, an' a man laved behind on a pan 
 of ice, an' the great black say two fathom ahead, an' the 
 storm-wind blowun 'im into it ! " 
 
 * Broken ice, between large cakes, or against the shore. 
 
A Raft that no Man made. 153 
 
 The planter stopped speaking. We had all gone along 
 so with the story, that the stout seafarer, as he wrought 
 the whole scene up about us, seemed instinctively to lean 
 back and brace his feet against the ground, and clutch his 
 net. The young woman looked up, this time ; and the 
 cold snow-blast seemed to howl through that still summer's 
 noon, and the terrific ice-fields and hills to be crashing 
 against the solid earth that we sat upon, and all things 
 round changed to the far-off stormy ocean and boundless 
 frozen wastes. 
 
 The planter began to speak again : 
 
 " So I failed right down upon th' ice, sayun, ' Lard, help 
 me ! Lard, help me ! ' an' crawlun away, wi' the snow in 
 my face, (I was afeard, a'most, to stand,) ' Lard, help me ! 
 Lard, help me ! ' 
 
 " 'T was n' all hard ice, but many places lolly ; * an' once 
 I goed right down wi' my hand-wristes an' my armes in 
 cold water, part-ways to the bottom o' th' ocean ; and 
 a'most head-first into un, as I 'd a-been in wi' my legs 
 afore : but, thanks be to God ! 'E helped me out of un, 
 but colder an' wetter agen. 
 
 "In course I wanted to folly the schooner ; so I runned 
 up along, a little ways from the edge, an' then I runned 
 down along ; but 't was all great black ocean outside, an' 
 she gone miles an' miles away; an' by two hours' time, 
 even ef she 'd come to, itself, an' all clear weather, I could n' 
 never see her ; an' ef she could come back, she could n' 
 never find me, more 'n I could find any one o' the flakes o' 
 snow. The schooner was gone, an' I was laved out o' 
 the world ! 
 
 " Bumby, when I got on the big field agen, I stood up 
 on my feet, an' I sid that was my ship ! She had n' e'er a 
 sail, an' she had n' e'er a spar, an' she had n' e'er a compass, 
 an' she had n' e'er a helm, an' she had n' no hold, an' she 
 hadn' no cabin. I could n' sail her, nor I could n' steer 
 her, nor I could n' anchor her, nor bring her to, but she 
 
 * Snow In water, not yet frozen, but looking like the white ice. 
 
154 A Raft that no Man made. 
 
 would go, wind or calm, an' she 'd never come to port, but 
 out in th' ocean she'd go to pieces ! I sid 'twas so, an' I 
 must take it, an' do my best wi' it. 'T was jest a great, 
 white, frozen raft, driftun bodily away, wi' storm blowun 
 over, an' current runnun under, an' snow comun down so 
 thick, an' a poor Christen laved all alone wi' it. 'T would 
 drift as long as anything was of it, an' 't was n' likely there 'd 
 be any life in the poor man by time th' ice goed to naw- 
 thun ; an' the s wiles 'ould swim back agen up to the Nothe ! 
 
 " I was th' only one, seemunly, to be cast out alive, an' 
 wi' the dearest maid in the world (so I thought) waitun for 
 me. I s'pose 'ee might ha' knowed somethun better, sir ; 
 but I wasn' lamed, an' I ran so fast as ever I could up 
 the way I thowt home was, an' I groaned, an' groaned, an' 
 shook my handes, an' then I thowt, ' Mubbe I may be goun 
 wrong way.' So I groaned to the Lard to stop the snow. 
 Then I on'y ran this way an' that way, an' groaned for 
 snow to knock off.* I knowed we was driftun mubbe a 
 twenty leagues a day, and anyways I wanted to be doun 
 what I could, keepun up" over th' Ice so well as I could, 
 Noofoundland-ways, an' I might come to somethun, to a 
 schooner or somethun ; anyways I 'd get up so near as I 
 could. So I looked for a lee. I s'pose 'ee'd ha' knowed 
 better what to do, sir," said the planter, here again appeal- 
 ing to me, and showing by his question that he understood 
 me, in spite of my pea-jacket. 
 
 I had been so carried along with his story that I had felt 
 as if I were the man on the Ice myself, and assured him 
 that, though I could get along pretty well on land, and 
 could even do something at netting, I should have been 
 very awkward in his place. 
 
 " Wull, sir, I looked for a lee. ('T would n' ha' been so 
 cold, to say cold, ef it had n' a-blowed so tarrible hard.) 
 First step, I stumbled upon somethun in the snow, seemed 
 soft, like a body ! Then I corned all together, hopun an' 
 fearun an' all together. Down I goed upon my knees to 
 * To stop. 
 
A Raft that no Man made. 155 
 
 un, an' I smoothed away the snow, all tremblun, an' there 
 was a moan, as ef 't was a-livun. \ 
 
 "<O Lard!' I said, 'who's this? Be this one of our 
 men?' 
 
 " But how could it ? Sol scraped the snow away, but 
 't was easy to see 't was smaller than a man. There was n' 
 no man on that dreadful place but me! Wull, sir, 'twas 
 a poor swile, wi' blood runnun all under ; an' I got my 
 cuffs * an' sleeves all red wi' it. It looked like a fellow- 
 creatur's blood, a'most, an' I was a lost man, left to die 
 away out there in th' Ice, an' I said, ' Poor thing ! poor thing ! ' 
 an' I did n' mind about the wind, or th' ice, or the schooner 
 goun away from me afore a gale (I 'wo^ildn' mind about 'em), 
 an' a poor lost Christen may show a good turn to a hurt 
 thing, ef 't was on'y a baste. So I smoothed away the snow 
 wi' my cuffs, an' I sid 't was a poor thing wi' her whelp close 
 by her, an' her tongue out, as ef she 'd a-died fondlun an' 
 lickun it ; an' a great puddle o' blood, it looked tarrible 
 heartless, when I was so nigh to death, an' was n' hungry. 
 An' then I feeled a stick, an' I thowt, ' It may be a help to 
 me,' an' so I pulled un, an' it would n' come, an' I found she 
 was lyun on it so I hauled agen, an', when it corned, 't was 
 my gaff the poor baste had got away from me, an' got it 
 under her, an' she was a-lyun on it. Some o' the men, when 
 they was runnun for dear life, must ha' struck 'em, out o' 
 madness like, an' laved 'em to die where they was. 'T was 
 the whelp was n' quite dead. 'Ee '11 think 't was foolish, sir, 
 but it seemed as though they was somethun to me, an' I 'd 
 a-lost the last friendly thing there was. 
 
 " I found a big hummock an' sheltered under it, standun 
 on my feet, wi' nawthun to do but think, an' think, an' pray 
 to God ; an' so I doned. I could n' help feelun to God 
 then, surely. Nawthun to do, an' no place to go, tull snow 
 cleared away ; but jes' drift wi' the great Ice down from 
 the Nothe, away down over the say, a sbcty mile a day, 
 mubbe. I was n' a good Christen, an' I could n' help 
 
 * Mittens. 
 
156 A Raft that no Man made. 
 
 a-thinkun o' home an' she I was troth-plight wi', an' I 
 doubled over myself an' groaned, I could n' help it : but 
 bumby it corned into me to say my prayers, an' it seemed 
 as thof she was askun me to pray, (an' she was good, sir, 
 al'ays,) an'. I seemed all opened, somehow, an' I knowed 
 how to pray." 
 
 While the words were coming tenderly from, the weather- 
 beaten fisherman, I could not help being moved, and 
 glanced over toward the daughter's seat ; but she was 
 gone, and, turning round, I saw her going quietly, almost 
 stealthily, and very quickly, toward the cove. 
 
 The father gave no heed to her leaving, but went on with 
 his tale : 
 
 " Then the wind began to fall down, an' the snow knocked 
 off altogether, an' the sun corned out ; an' I sid th' Ice, 
 field-ice an' icebargs, an' every one of 'em flashun up as ef 
 they 'd kendled up a bonfire, but no sign of a schooner ! 
 no sign of a schooner ! nor no sign o' man's douns, but 
 on'y ice, every way, high an' low, an' some places black 
 water, in-among ; an' on'y the poor swiles bawlun all over, 
 an' I standun amongst 'em. 
 
 "While I was lookun out, I sid a great icebarg (they 
 calls 'em) a quarter of a mile away, or thereabouts, standun 
 up, one end a twenty fathom out o' water, an' about a 
 forty fathom across, wi' hills like, an' houses, an' then, 
 jest as ef 'e was alive an' had tooked a notion in 'e'sself, 
 seemunly, all of a sudden 'e rared up, an' turned over an' 
 over, wi' a tarrible thunderun noise, an' corned right on, 
 breakun everything an' throwun up great seas : 't was fright- 
 some for a lone body away out among 'em ! I stood an' 
 looked at un, but then agen I thowt I may jes' so well be 
 goun to thick ice an' over Noofoundland-ways a piece, so 
 well as I could. So I said my bit of a prayer, an' told Un 
 I could n' help myself; an' I made my confession how bad 
 I 'd been, an' I was sorry, an' ef 'E 'd be so pitiful an' for- 
 give me ; an' ef I mus' loss my life, ef 'E 'd be so good as 
 make me a good Christen first, an' make they happy, in 
 course. 
 
A Raft that no Man made. 157 
 
 " So then I started ; an' first I goed to where my gaff 
 was, by the mother-swile an' her whelp. There was swiles 
 every two or three yards a'most, old uns an' young uns, all 
 round, everywhere ; an' I feeled shamed in a manner : but 
 I got my gaff, an' cleaned un, an' then, in God's name, I 
 took the big swile, that was dead by its dead whelp, an' 
 hauled it away, where the t' other poor things could n' si' 
 me, an' I sculped * it, an' took the pelt ; for I thowt I 'd 
 wear un, now the poor dead thing did n' want to make oose 
 of un no more, an' partly because 'twas sech a lovun 
 thing. An' so I set out, walkun this way, for a spurt, an' 
 then t' other way, keepun up mostly a Nor-norwest, so well 
 as I could : sometimes away round th' open, an' more times 
 round a lump of ice, an' more times, agen, off from one an* 
 on to another, every minute. I didn' feel hungry, for I 
 drinked fresh water off th' ice. No schooner ! no schooner ! 
 
 " Bumby the sun was goun down : 't was slow work 
 feelun my way along, an' I did n' want to look about : but 
 then agen I thowt God 'ad made it to be sid ; an' so I 
 come to, an' turned all round, an' looked ; an' surely it 
 seemed like another world, some way, 't was so beautiful, 
 yellow, an', different sorts o' red, like the sky itself in a 
 manner, an' flashun like glass. So then it corned night : 
 an' I thowt I should n' go to bed, an' I may forget my 
 prayers, an' so I 'd, mubbe, best say 'em right away ; an' 
 so I doned : ' Lighten our darkness,' and others we was 
 oosed to say : an' it corned into my mind the Lard said to 
 Saint Peter, ' Why did n' 'ee have faith ? ' when there was 
 nawthun on the water for un to go on ; an' I had ice under 
 foot, 't was but frozen water, but 't was frozen, an' I 
 thanked Un. 
 
 " I could n' help thinkun o'* Brigus an' them I 'd laved 
 in it, an' then I prayed for 'em ; an' I could n' help cryun, 
 a'most : but then I give over agen, an' would n' think, ef I 
 could help it ; on'y tryun to say an odd psalm, all through 
 singun-psalms an' other, for I knowed a many of 'em by 
 
 * Skinned. 
 
158 A Raft that no Man made. 
 
 singun wi' Patience, on'y now I cared more about 'em : I 
 said that one, 
 
 ' Sech as in ships an' brickie barks 
 
 Into the seas descend, 
 Their merchantun, through fearful floods, 
 
 To compass an' to end : 
 They men are force-put to behold 
 
 The Lard's works, what they be ; 
 An' in the dreadful deep the same 
 
 Most marvellous they see.' 
 
 An' I said a many more, (I can't be accountable how many 
 I said,) an' same uns many times over : for I would keep 
 on ;. an' 'ould sometimes sing 'em very loud in my poor 
 way. 
 
 " A poor baste (a silver fox 'e was) corned an 1 looked at 
 me ; an' when I turned round, he walked away a piece, an' 
 then 'e corned back, an' looked. 
 
 " So I found a high piece, wi' a wall of ice atop for 
 shelter, ef it corned on to blow ; an' so I stood, an' said, 
 an' sung. I knowed well I was on'y driftun away. 
 
 " It was tarrible lonely in the night, when night corned : 
 it 's no use ! 'T was tarrible lonely : but I 'ould n' think, 
 ef I could help it ; an' I prayed a bit, an' kep' up my 
 psalms, an' varses out o' the Bible, I 'd a-larned. I had n' 
 a-prayed for sleep, but for wakun all night, an' there I was 
 standun. 
 
 " The moon was out agen, s<5 bright ; an' all the hills of 
 ice shinun up to her ; an' stars twinklun, so busy, all over ; 
 an' No'ther' Lights goun up wi' a faint blaze, seemunly, 
 from th' ice, an' meetun up aloft ; an' sometimes a great 
 groanun, an' more times tarrible loud shriekun ! There 
 was great white fields, an' great white hills, like countries, 
 comun down to be destroyed ; an' some great bargs a-goun 
 faster, an' tearun through, breakun, others to pieces ; an' 
 the groanun an' scre'echun, ef all the dead that ever was, 
 wi' their white clothes But no ! " said the stout fisherman, 
 recalling himself from gazing, as he seemed to be, on the 
 far-off ghastly scene, in memory. 
 
A Raft that no Man made. 159 
 
 No ! an' thank 'E's marcy, I 'm sittun by my own 
 room. 'E took me off : but \ was a dreadful sight, it 's 
 no use, ef a body M let 'e'sself think ! I sid a great 
 black bear, an' hard un growl ; an' 't was feelun, like, to 
 hear un so bold an' so stout, among all they dreadful things, 
 an' bumby the time 'ould come when 'e could n' save 
 'e'sself, do what 'e woul'. 
 
 " An' more times 't was all still : on'y swiles bawlun, all 
 over. Ef it had n' a-been for they poor swiles, how could 
 I stan' it ? Many 's the one I 'd a-ketched, day-time, an' 
 talked to un, an' patted un on the head, as ef they 'd a-been 
 dogs by the door, like ; an' they 'd oose to shut their eyes, 
 an' draw their poor foolish faces together. It seemed 
 neighbor-like to have some live thing. 
 
 " So I kep' awake, sayun an' singun, an' it was n' very 
 cold ; an' so first thing I knowed, I started, an there I 
 was lyun in a heap ; an' I must have been asleep, an' did n' 
 know how 't was, nor how long I 'd a-been so : an' some 
 sort o' baste started away, an' 'e must have waked me up ; 
 I could n' rightly see what 't was, wi' sleepiness : an' then 
 I hard a sound, sounded like breakers ; an' that waked me 
 fairly. 'T was like a lee-shore ; an' 't was a comfort to 
 think o' land, ef 't was on'y to be wrecked on itself ; but I 
 did n' go, an' I stood an' listened to un ; an' now an' agen 
 I 'd walk a piece, back an' forth, an' back an' forth ; an' so 
 I passed a many, many longsome hours, seemunly, tull 
 night goed down tarrible slowly, an' it corned up day o' 
 t' other side : an' there was n' no land ; nawthun but great 
 mountains meltun an' breakun up, an' fields wastun away. 
 I sid 'twas a rollun barg made the noise like breakers, 
 throwun up great seas o' both sides of un.; no sight nor 
 sign o' shore, nor ship, but dazun white, enough to blind 
 a body, an' I knowed 't was all floatun away, over the 
 say. Then I said my prayers, an' tooked a drink o' water, 
 an' set out agen for Nor-norwest : 'twas all I could do. 
 Sometimes snow, an' more times fair agen ; but no sign 
 o' man's things, an' no sign o' land, on'y white ice an' black 
 
160 A Raft that no Man made. 
 
 water ; an 'ef a schooner was n' into un a'ready, 't was n' 
 likely they woul', for we was gettun furder an' furder away. 
 Tired I was wi' goun, though I had n' walked more n' a 
 twenty or thirty mile, mubbe, an' it all comun down so fast 
 as I could go up, an' faster, an' never stoppun ! 'T was a 
 tarrible long journey up over the driftun ice, at sea ! So, 
 then I went on a high bit to wait tull all was done : I thowt 
 't would be last to melt, an' mubbe, I thowt, 'e may capsize 
 wi' me, when I did n' know (for I don't say I was stout- 
 hearted) : an' I prayed Un to take care o' them I loved ; 
 an' the tears corned. Then I felt somethun tryun to turn 
 me round like, an' it seemed as ef she was doun it, some- 
 how, an' she seemed to be very nigh, somehow, an' I did n' 
 look. 
 
 " After a bit, I got up to look out where most swiles was, 
 for company, while I was livun : an' the first look struck 
 me a'most like a bullet! There I sid a sail! 'Twas a 
 sail, an' 't was like heaven openun, an' God settun her down 
 there. About three mile away she was, to nothe'ard, in th' 
 Ice. 
 
 " I could ha' sid, at first look, what schooner 't was ; but 
 I did n' want to look hard at her. I kep' my peace, a spurt, 
 an' then I runned an' bawled out. ' Glory be to God ! ' an' 
 then I stopped an' made proper thanks to Un. An' there 
 she was, same as ef I 'd a-walked off from her an hour 
 ago ! It felt so long as ef I 'd been livun years, an' they 
 would n' know me, sca'ce. Somehow I did n' think I could 
 come up wi' her. 
 
 " I started, in the name o' God, wi' all my might, an' 
 went, an' went, 't was a five mile, wi' goun round, an' 
 got her, thank God ! 'T was n' the Baccaloue, (I sid that 
 long before,) 't was t' other schooner, the Sparrow, repairun 
 damages they'd got day before. So that kep' !em there, 
 an' I 'd a-been took from one an' brought to t' other. 
 
 " I could n' do a hand's turn tull we got into the Bay 
 agen, I was so clear beat out. The Sparrow kep' her 
 men, an' fotch home about thirty-eight hundred swiles, an' 
 
A Raft that no Man made. 161 
 
 a poor man off th' Ice : but they, poor fellows, that I went 
 out wi' never corned no more ; an' I never went agen. 
 
 " I kep' the skin o' the poor baste, sir : that 's 'e on my 
 cap." 
 
 When the planter had fairly finished his tale, it was a 
 little while before I could teach my eyes to see the things 
 about me in their places. The slow-going sail, outside, I 
 at first saw as the schooner that brought away the lost man 
 from the Ice ; the green of the earth would not, at first, 
 show itself through the white with which the fancy covered 
 it ; and at first I could not quite feel that the ground was 
 fast under my feet I even mistook one of my own men 
 (the sight of whom was to warn me that I was wanted 
 elsewhere) for one of the crew of the schooner Sparrow of 
 a generation ago. 
 
 I got the tale and its scene gathered away, presently, 
 inside my mind, and shook myself into a present associa- 
 tion with surrounding things, and took my leave. I went 
 away the more gratified that I had a chance of lifting my 
 cap to a- matron, dark-haired and comely, (who, I was sure, 
 at a glance, had once been the maiden of Benjie West- 
 ham's " troth-plight,") and receiving a handsome courtesy 
 in return. 
 
 K 
 
WHY THOMAS WAS DISCHARGED. 
 
 RANT Beach is a long promontory of rock and 
 sand, jutting out at an acute angle from a barren 
 portion of the coast. Its farthest extremity is 
 marked by a pile of many-colored, wave-washed bowlders ; 
 its junction with the mainland is the site of the Brant 
 House, a watering-place of excellent repute. 
 
 The attractions of this spot are not numerous. There is 
 surf-bathing all along the outer side of the beach, and good 
 swimming on the inner. The fishing is fair ; and in still 
 weather, yachting is rather a favorite amusement. Further 
 than this, there is little to be said, save that the hotel is 
 conducted upon liberal principles, and the society generally 
 select. 
 
 But to the lover of Nature, and who has the courage 
 to avow himself aught else ? the sea-shore can never be 
 monotonous. The swirl and sweep of ever-shifting waters, 
 the flying mist of foam breaking away into a gray and 
 ghostly distance down the beach, the eternal drone of 
 ocean, mingling itself with one's talk by day and with the 
 light dance-music in the parlors by night, all these are 
 active sources of a passive pleasure. And to lie at length 
 upon the tawny sand, watching, through half-closed eyes, 
 the heaving waves, that mount against a dark-blue sky 
 wherein great silvery masses of cloud float idly on, whiter 
 than the sunlit sails that fade and grow and fade along the 
 horizon, while some fair damsel sits close by, reading an- 
 cient ballads of a simple metre, or older legends of love 
 
Why Thomas was Discharged. 163 
 
 and romance, tell me, my eater of the fashionable lotbs, 
 is not this a diversion well worth your having ? 
 
 There is an air of easy sociality among the guests at the 
 Brant House, a disposition on the part of all to contribute 
 to the general amusement, that makes a summer sojourn 
 on the beach far more agreeable than in certain larger, 
 more frequented watering-places, where one is always in 
 danger of discovering that the gentlemanly person with 
 whom he has been fraternizing is a faro-dealer, or that the 
 lady who has half fascinated him is Anonyma herself. 
 Still, some consider the Brant rather slow, and many good 
 folk were a trifle surprised when Mr. Edwin Salisbury and 
 Mr. Charles Burnham arrived by the late stage from Wika- 
 hasset Station, with trunks enough for two first-class belles, 
 and a most unexceptional man-servant in gray livery, in 
 charge of two beautiful setter-dogs. 
 
 These gentlemen seemed to have imagined that they were- 
 about visiting some backwoods wilderness, some savage 
 tract of country, " remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow " ; 
 for they brought almost everything with them that men of 
 elegant leisure could require, as if the hotel were but four 
 walls and a roof, which they must furnish with their own 
 chattels. I am sure it took Thomas, the man-servant, a 
 whole day to unpack the awnings, the bootjacks, the game- 
 bags, the cigar-boxes, the guns, the camp-stools, the liquor- 
 cases, the bathing-suits, and other paraphernalia that these 
 pleasure-seekers brought. It must be owned, however, that 
 their room, a large one in the Bachelor's Quarter, facing 
 the sea, wore a very comfortable, sportsmanlike look, when 
 all was arranged. 
 
 Thus surrounded, the young men betook themselves to 
 the deliberate pursuit of idle pleasures. They arose at 
 nine and went down to the shore, invariably returning at 
 ten with one unfortunate snipe, which was preserved on ice, 
 with much ceremony, till wanted. At this rate, it took 
 them a week to shoot a breakfast; but to see them sally' 
 forth, splendid in velveteen and corduroy, with top-boots and 
 
164 Why Thomas was Discharged. 
 
 a complete harness of green cord and patent-leather straps, 
 you would have imagined that all game-birds were about to 
 become extinct in that region. Their dogs, even, recog- 
 nized this great-cry-and-little-wool condition of things, and 
 bounded off joyously at the start, but came home crest- 
 fallen, with an air of canine humiliation that would have 
 aroused Mr. Mayhew's tenderest sympathies. 
 
 After breakfasting, usually in their room, the friends en- 
 joyed a long and contemplative smoke upon the wide 
 piazza in front of their windows, listlessly regarding the 
 ever-varied marine view that lay before them in flash- 
 ing breadth and beauty. Their next labor was to array 
 themselves in wonderful morning-costumes of very shaggy 
 English cloth, shiny flasks and field-glasses about their 
 shoulders, and loiter down the beach, to the point and back, 
 making much unnecessary effort over the walk, a brief 
 mile, which they spoke of with importance, as their "con- 
 stitutional." This killed time till bathing-hour, and then 
 came another smoke on the piazza, and another toilet, for 
 dinner. After dinner, a siesta: in the room, when the 
 weather was fresh ; when otherwise, in hammocks, hung 
 from the rafters of the piazza. When they had been domi- 
 ciled a few days, they found it expedient to send home for 
 what they were pleased to term their " crabs " and " traps," 
 and excited the envy of less fortunate guests by driving up 
 and down the beach at a racing gait to dissipate the lan- 
 guor of the after-dinner sleep. 
 
 This was their regular routine for the day, varied, oc- 
 casionally, when the tide served, by a fishing-trip down the 
 narrow bay inside the point. For such emergencies, they 
 provided themselves with a sail-boat and .skipper, hired for 
 the whole season, and arrayed themselves in a highly 
 nautical rig. The results were, large quantities of sardines 
 and pale sherry consumed by the young men, and a reason- 
 able number of sea-bass and black-fish caught by their 
 skipper. 
 
 There were no regular "hops" at the Brant House, but 
 
Why Thomas was Discharged. 165 
 
 dancing in a quiet way every evening, to a flute, violin, 
 and violoncello, played by some of the waiters. For a 
 time, Burnham and Salisbury did not mingle much in these 
 festivities, but loitered about the halls and piazzas, very 
 elegantly dressed and barbered, (Thomas was an unrivalled 
 coiffeur}) and apparently somewhat ennuye. 
 
 That two well-made, full-grown, intelligent, and healthy 
 young men should lead such a life as this for an entire 
 summer might surprise one of a more active temperament. 
 The aimlessness and vacancy of an existence devoted to 
 no earthly purpose save one's own comfort must soon weary 
 any man who knows what is the meaning of real, earnest 
 life, life with a battle to be fought and a victory to be 
 won. But these elegant young gentlemen comprehended 
 nothing of all that: they had been born with golden 
 spoons in their mouths, and educated only to swallow the 
 delicately insipid lotos-honey that flows inexhaustibly from 
 such shining spoons. Clothes, complexions, polish of man- 
 ner, and the avoidance of any sort of shock, were the 
 simple objects of their solicitude. 
 
 I do not know that I have any serious quarrel with such 
 fellows, after all. They have some strong virtues. They 
 are always clean ; and your rough diamond, though manly 
 and courageous as Cceur-de-Lion, is not apt to be scrupu- 
 lously nice in his habits. Affability is another virtue. The 
 Salisbury and Burnham kind of man bears malice toward 
 no one, and is disagreeable only when assailed by some ham- 
 mer-and-tongs utilitarian. All he asks is to be permitted 
 to idle away his pleasant life unmolested. Lastly, he is 
 extremely ornamental. We all like to see pretty things ; 
 and I am sure that Charley Burnham, in his fresh white 
 duck suit, with his fine, thoroughbred face gentle as a 
 girl's shaded by a snowy Panama, his blonde moustache 
 carefully pointed, his golden hair clustering in the most 
 picturesque possible waves, his little red neck-ribbon the 
 only bit of color in his dress tied in a studiously careless 
 knot, and his pure, untainted gloves of pearl-gray or 
 
1 66 Why Thomas was Discharged. 
 
 lavender, was, if I may be allowed the expression, just as 
 pretty as a picture. And Ned Salisbury was not less " a 
 joy forever," according to the dictum of the late Mr. Keats. 
 He was darker than Burnham, with very black hair, and 
 a moustache worn in the manner the French call triste, 
 which became him, and increased the air of pensive melan- 
 choly that distinguished his dark eyes, thoughtful attitudes, 
 and slender figure. Not that he was in the least degree 
 pensive or melancholy, or that he had cause to be ; quite 
 the contrary ; but it was his style, and he did it well. 
 
 These two butterflies sat, one afternoon, upon the piazza, 
 smoking very large cigars, lost, apparently, in profoundest 
 meditation. Burnham, with his graceful head resting upon 
 one delicate hand, his clear blue eyes full of a pleasant light, 
 and his face warmed by a calm unconscious smile, might 
 have been revolving some splended scheme of universal 
 philanthropy. The only utterance, however, forced from 
 him by the sublime thoughts that permeated his soul, was 
 the emission of a white rolling volume of fragrant smoke, 
 accompanied by two words : 
 
 "Dooced hot!" 
 
 Salisbury did not reply. He sat, leaning back, with his 
 fingers interlaced behind his head, and his shadowy eyes 
 downcast, as in sad remembrance of some long-lost love. 
 So might a poet have looked, while steeped in mournfully 
 rapturous day-dreams of remembered passion and sever- 
 ance. So might Tennyson's hero have mused, when he 
 sang, 
 
 " O, that 'twere possible, 
 
 After long grief and pain, 
 To find the arms of my true love 
 Round me once again ! " 
 
 But the poetic lips opened not to such numbers. Salisbury 
 gazed, long and earnestly, and finally gave vent to his emo- 
 tions, indicating, with the amber tip of his cigar-tube, the 
 setter that slept in the sunshine at his feet. 
 
 " Shocking place, this, for dogs ! " I regret to say he 
 
Why Thomas was Discharged. 167 
 
 pronounced it " dawgs." " Why, Carlo is as fat as fat 
 as as a " 
 
 His mind was unequal to a simile, even, and he termi- 
 nated the sentence in a murmur. 
 
 More silence ; more smoke ; more profound meditation. 
 Directly, Charley Burnham looked around with some show 
 of vitality. 
 
 " There comes the stage," said he. 
 
 The driver's bugle rang merrily among the drifted sand- 
 hills that lay warm and glowing in the orange light of the 
 setting sun. The young men leaned forward over the 
 piazza-rail, and scrutinized the occupants of the vehicle, as 
 it appeared. 
 
 " Old gentleman and lady, aw, and two children," said 
 Ned Salisbury ; " I hoped there would be some nice girls." 
 
 This, in a voice of ineffable tenderness and poetry, but 
 with that odd, tired little drawl, so epidemic in some of our 
 universities. 
 
 " Look there, by Jove ! " cried Charley, with a real inter- 
 est at last ; " now that 's what I call the regular thing ! " 
 
 The " regular thing " was a low, four-wheeled pony-chaise 
 of basket-work, drawn by two jolly little fat ponies, black 
 and shiny as vulcanite, which jogged rapidly in, just far 
 enough behind the stage to avoid its dust. 
 
 This vehicle was driven by a young lady of decided 
 beauty, with a spice of Amazonian spirit. She was rather 
 slender and very straight, with a jaunty little hat and 
 feather perched coquettishly above her dark-brown hair, 
 which was arranged in one heavy mass and confined in a 
 silken net. Her complexion was clear, without brilliancy ; 
 her eyes blue as the ocean horizon, and spanned by sharp, 
 characteristic brows ; her mouth small and decisive ; and 
 her whole cast of features indicative of quick talent and 
 independence. 
 
 Upon the seat beside her s%t another damsel, leaning 
 indolently back in the corner of the carriage. This one 
 was a little fairer than the first, having one of those beauti- 
 
1 68 Why Thomas was Discharged. 
 
 ful English complexions of mingled rose and snow, and a 
 dash of gold-dust in her hair, where the sun touched it. 
 Her eyes, however, were dark hazel, and full of fire, shaded 
 and intensified by their long, sweeping lashes. Her mouth 
 was a rose-bud, and her chin and throat faultless in the 
 delicious curve of their lines. In a word, she was some- 
 what of the Venus-di-Milo type : her companion was more 
 of a Diana. Both were neatly habited in plain travelling- 
 dresses and cloaks of black and white plaid, and both 
 seemed utterly unconscious of the battery of eyes and eye- 
 glasses that enfiladed them from the whole length of the 
 piazza, as they passed. 
 
 " Who are they ? " asked Salisbury ; " I don't know 
 them." 
 
 " Nor I," said Burnham ; " but they look like -people to 
 know. They must be somebody." 
 
 Half an hour later, the hotel-office was besieged by a 
 score of young men, all anxious for a peep at the last 
 names upon the register. It is needless to say that our 
 friends were not in the crowd. Ned Salisbury was no more 
 the man to exhibit curiosity than Charley Burnham was 
 the man to join in a scramble for anything under the sun. 
 They had educated their emotions clear down, out of sight, 
 and piled upon them a mountain of well-bred inertia. 
 
 But, somehow or other, these fellows who take no trouble 
 are always the first to gain the end. A special Providence 
 seems to aid the poor, helpless creatures. So, while the 
 crowd still pressed at the office-desk, Jerry Swayne, the 
 head clerk, happened to pass directly by the piazza where 
 the inert ones sat, and, raising a comical eye, saluted them. 
 
 " Heavy arrivals to-night. See the turn-out ? " 
 
 " Y-e-s," murmured Ned. 
 
 " Old Chapman and family. His daughter drove the 
 pony-phaeton, with her friend, a Miss Thurston. Regular 
 nobby ones. Chapman 's the steamship-man, you know. 
 Worth thousands of millions ! I 'd like to be. connected 
 with his family 'by marriage, say ! " and Jerry went off, 
 
Why Thomas was Discharged. 169 
 
 rubbing his cropped head, and smiling all over, as was his 
 wont. 
 
 "I know who they are now," said Charley. "Met a 
 cousin of theirs, Joe Faulkner, abroad, two years ago. 
 Dooced fine fellow. Army." 
 
 The manly art of wagoning is not pursued very vigor- 
 ously at Brant Beach. The roads are too heavy back from 
 the water, and the drive is confined to a narrow strip 
 of wet sand along the shore; so carriages are few, and 
 the pony-chaise became a distinguished element at once. 
 Salisbury and Burnham whirled past it in their light trot- 
 ting-wagons at a furious pace, and looked hard at the two 
 young ladies in passing, but withaut eliciting even the 
 smallest glance from them in return. 
 
 u Confounded tifc/**ttg"tt^-looking girls, and all that," owned 
 Ned ; " but, aw, fearfully unconscious of a fellow ! " 
 
 This condition of matters continued until the young men 
 were actually driven to acknowledge to each other that 
 they should not mind knowing the occupants of the pony- 
 carriage. It was a great concession, and was rewarded 
 duly. A bright, handsome boy of seventeen, Miss Thurs- 
 ton's brother, came to pass a few days at the seaside, and 
 fraternized 'with everybody, but was especially delighted 
 with Ned Salisbury, who took him out sailing and shooting, 
 and, I am afraid, gave him cigars stealthily, when out of 
 range of Miss Thurston's fine eyes. The result was, that 
 the first time the lad walked on the beach with the two 
 girls, and met the young men, introductions of an enthusi- 
 astic nature were instantly sprung upon them. An attempt 
 at conversation followed. 
 
 " How do you like Brant Beach ? " asked Ned. 
 
 " O, it is a pretty place," said Miss Chapman, " but not 
 lively enough." 
 
 "Well, Burnham and I find it pleasant; aw, we have 
 lots of fun." 
 
 " Indeed ! Why, what do you do ? " 
 
 " O, I don't know. Everything." 
 
170 Why Thomas was Discharged. 
 
 "Is the shooting good ? I saw you with your guns, 
 yesterday." 
 
 "Well, there is n't a great deal of game. There is some 
 fishing, but we have n't caught much." 
 
 "How do you kill time, then?" 
 
 Salisbury looked puzzled. 
 
 " Aw it is a first-rate air, you know. The table is good, 
 and you can sleep like a top. And then, you see, I like to 
 smoke around, and do nothing, on the sea-shore. It is 
 real jolly to lie on the sand, aw, with all sorts of little bugs 
 running over you, and listen to the water swashing about ! " 
 
 " Let 's try it ! " cried vivacious Miss Chapman ; and 
 down she sat on the *sand. The others followed her ex- 
 ample, and in five minutes they were picking up pretty 
 pebbles and chatting away as sociably as could be. The 
 rumble of the warning gong surprised them. 
 
 At dinner, Burnham and Salisbury took seats opposite 
 the ladies, and were honored with an introduction to papa 
 and mamma, a very dignified, heavy, rosy, old-school couple, 
 who ate a good deal, and said very little. That evening, 
 when flute and viol wooed the lotos-eaters to agitate the 
 light fantastic toe, these young gentlemen found themselves 
 in dancing humor, and revolved themselves into a grievous 
 condition of glow and wilt, in various mystic and intoxicat- 
 ing measures with their new-made friends. 
 
 On retiring, somewhat after midnight, Miss Thurston 
 paused, while " doing her hair," and addressed Miss Chap- 
 man. 
 
 " Did you observe, Hattie, how very handsome those 
 gentlemen are ? Mr. Burnham looks like a prince of the 
 sang azur, and Mr. Salisbury like his poet-laureate." t 
 . " Yes, dear," responded Hattie ; " I have been consider- 
 ing those flowers of the field and lilies of the valley." 
 
 "Ned," said Charley, at about the same time, "we won't 
 find anything nicer here, this season, I think." 
 
 "They're pretty well worth while," replied Ned; "and 
 I 'm rather pleased with them." 
 
Why Thomas was Discharged. 171 
 
 "Which do you like best?" 
 
 " O, bother ! I have n't thought of that yet." 
 
 The next day the young men delayed their "constitu- 
 tional " until the ladies were ready to walk, and the four 
 strolled off together, mamma and the children following 
 in the pony-chaise. At the rocks on the end of the point, 
 Ned got his feet very wet, fishing up specimens of sea- 
 weed for the damsels ; and Charley exerted himself super- 
 humanly in assisting them to a ledge which they considered 
 favorable for sketching purposes. 
 
 In the afternoon a sail was arranged, and they took din- 
 ner on board the boat, with any amount of hilarity and a 
 good deal of discomfort. In the evening, more dancing, 
 and vigorous attentions to both the young ladies, but with- 
 out a shadow of partiality being -shown by either of the 
 four. 
 
 This was very nearly the history of many days. It does 
 not take long to get acquainted with people who are willing, 
 especially at a watering-place ; and in the course of a few 
 weeks, these young folks were, to all intents and purposes, 
 old friends, calling each other by their given names, and 
 conducting themselves with an easy familiarity quite charm- 
 ing to behold. Their amusements were mostly in common 
 now. The light wagons were made to hold two each, in- 
 stead of one, and the matinal snipe escaped death, and 
 was happy over his early worm. 
 
 One day, however, Laura Thurston had a headache, and 
 Hattie Chapman stayed at home to take care of her ; so 
 Burnham and Salisbury had to amuse themselves alone. 
 They took their boat, and idled about the water, inside 
 the point, dozing under an awning, smoking, gaping, and 
 wishing that headaches were out of fashion, while the 
 taciturn and tarry skipper instructed the dignified and 
 urbane Thomas in the science of trolling for blue-fish. 
 
 At length Ned tossed his cigar-end overboard, and braced 
 himself for an effort. 
 
 " I say, Charley," said he, " this sort of thing can't go on 
 forever, you know. I Ve been thinking, lately." 
 
1/2 Why Thomas was Discharged. 
 
 " Phenomenon ! " replied Charley ; " and what have you 
 been thinking about?" 
 
 " Those girls. We Ve got to choose." 
 
 " Why ? Is n't it well enough as it is ? " 
 
 " Yes, so far. But I think, aw, that we don't quite do 
 them justice. They 're grands partis, you see. I hate to 
 see clever girls wasting themselves on society, waiting and 
 waiting, and we fellows swimming about just like fish 
 round a hook that is n't baited properly." 
 
 Charley raised himself upon his elbow. 
 
 " You don't mean to tell me, Ned, that you have matri- 
 monial intentions ? " 
 
 " O, no ! Still, why not ? We Ve all got to come to it, 
 some day, I suppose." 
 
 " Not yet, though. It is a sacrifice we can escape for 
 some years yet." 
 
 " Yes, of course, some years ; but we may begin to 
 look about us a bit. I 'm, aw, I 'm six-and-twenty, you 
 know." 
 
 " And I 'm very near that. I suppose a fellow can't put 
 off the yoke too long. After thirty, chances are n't so good. 
 I don't know, by Jove ! but what we ought to begin think- 
 ing of it." 
 
 " But it is a sacrifice. Society must lose a fellow, though, 
 one time or another. And I don't believe we will ever do 
 better than we can now." 
 
 "Hardly, I suspect." 
 
 " And we 're keeping other fellows away, maybe. It is a 
 shame ! " 
 
 Thomas ran his line in rapidly, with nothing on the hook. 
 
 " Capt'n Hull," he said, gravely, " I had the biggest kind 
 of a fish then, I 'm sure ; but d'rectly I went to pull him in, 
 sir, he took and let go." 
 
 " Yaas," muttered the taciturn skipper, " the biggest fish 
 allers falls back inter the waiter." 
 
 " I Ve been thinking a little about this matter, too," said 
 Charley, after a pause, "and I had about concluded. we 
 
Why Thomas was Discharged. 173 
 
 ought to pair off. But 1 11 be confounded, if I know which 
 I like best ! They 're both nice girls." 
 
 "There is n't much choice," Ned replied. " If they were 
 as different, now, as you and me, I 'd take the blonde, of 
 course ; aw, and you 'd take the brunette. But Hattie 
 Chapman's eyes are blue, and her hair isn't black, you 
 know ; so you can't call her dark, exactly." 
 
 " No more than Laura is exactly light. Her hair is 
 brown, more than golden, and her eyes are hazel. Has ift 
 she a lovely complexion, though ? By Jove ! " 
 
 "Better than Hattie's. Yet I don't know but Hattie's 
 features are a little the best." 
 
 "They are. Now, honest, Ned, which do you prefer? 
 Say either ; I '11 take the one you don't want. I have n't 
 any choice." 
 
 " Neither have I." 
 
 "How will we settle?" 
 
 "Aw throw for it?" 
 
 " Yes. Is n't there a backgammon-board forward, in that 
 locker, Thomas?" 
 
 The board was found, and the dice produced. 
 
 " The highest takes which ? " 
 
 "Say, Laura Thurston." 
 
 "Very good; throw." 
 
 "You first." 
 
 " No. Go on." 
 
 Charley threw, with about the same amount of excite- 
 ment he might have exhibited in a turkey-raffle. 
 
 u Five-three," said he. " Now for your luck." 
 
 " Six-four ! Laura 's mine. Satisfied ? " 
 
 " Perfectly, if you are. If not, I don't mind exchang- 
 ing." 
 
 " O, no. I 'm satisfied." 
 
 Both reclined upon the deck once more, with a sigh of 
 relief, and a long silence followed. 
 
 " I say," began Charley, after a time, " it is a comfort to 
 have these little matters arranged without any trouble, eh ? " 
 
Why Thomas was Discharged. 
 
 Y-e-s." 
 
 " Do you know, I think I '11 marry mine ? " 
 
 " I will, if you will." 
 
 "Done! it is a bargain." 
 
 This " little matter " being arranged, a change gradually 
 took place in the relations of the four. Ned Salisbury 
 began to invite Laura Thurston out driving and in bathing 
 somewhat oftener than before, and Hattie Chapman some- 
 what less often ; while Charley Burnham followed suit with 
 the last-named young lady. As the line of demarcation 
 became fixed, the damsels recognized it, and accepted with 
 gracious readiness the cavaliers that Fate, through the 
 agency of a chance-falling pair of dice, had allotted to 
 them. 
 
 The other guests of the house remarked the new position 
 of affairs, and passed whispers about, to the effect that 
 the girls had at last succeeded in getting their fish on hooks 
 instead of in a net. No suitors could have been more 
 devoted than our friends. It seemed as if each now be- 
 stowed upon the chosen one all the attentions he had 
 hitherto given to both ; and whether they went boating, 
 sketching, or strolling upon the sands, they were the very 
 picture of a partie carrte of lovers. 
 
 Naturally enough, as the young men became more in 
 earnest, with the reticence common to my sex, they spoke 
 less freely and frequently on the subject. Once, however, 
 after an unusually pleasant afternoon, Salisbury ventured a 
 few words. 
 
 " I say, we 're a couple of lucky dogs ! Who 'd have 
 thought, now, aw, that our summer was going to turn out 
 so well ? I 'm sure I did n't. How do you get along, 
 Charley, boy ? " 
 
 " Deliciously. Smooth sailing enough ! Was n't it a 
 good idea, though, to pair off? I'm just as happy as a 
 bee in clover. You seem to prosper, too, heh ? " 
 
 " Could n't ask anything different. Nothing but devo- 
 tion, and all that. I 'm delighted. I say, when are you 
 going to pop?" 
 
Why Thomas was Discharged. 175 
 
 " O, I don't know. It is only a matter of form. Sooner 
 the better, I suppose, and have it over." 
 
 " I was thinking of next week. What do you say to a 
 quiet picnic down on the rocks, and a walk afterward? 
 We can separate, you know, and do the thing up systemati- 
 cally." 
 
 " All right. I will, if you will." 
 
 " That 's another bargain. I notice there is n't much 
 doubt about the result, though." 
 
 " Hardly ! " 
 
 A close observer might have seen that the gentlemen 
 increased their attentions a little from that time. The ob- 
 jects of their devotion perceived it, and smiled more and 
 more graciously upon them. 
 
 The day set for the picnic arrived duly, and was radiant. 
 It pains me to confess that my heroes were a trifle nervous. 
 Their apparel was more gorgeous and wonderful than ever, 
 and Thomas, who was anxious to be off, courting Miss 
 Chapman's lady's-maid, found his masters dreadfully exact- 
 ing in the matter of hair-dressing. At length, however, 
 the toilet was over, and " Solomon in all his glory " would 
 have been vastly astonished at finding himself " arrayed as 
 one of these." 
 
 The bqat lay at the pier, receiving large quantities of 
 supplies for the trip, stowed by Thomas, under the super- 
 vision of the grim and tarry skipper. When all was ready, 
 the young men gingerly escorted their fair companions 
 aboard, the lines were cast off, and the boat glided gently 
 down the bay, leaving Thomas free to fly to the smart 
 presence of Susan Jane, and to draw glowing pictures for 
 her of a neat little porter-house in the city, wherein they 
 should hold supreme sway, be happy with each other, and 
 let rooms up-stairs for single gentlemen. 
 
 The brisk land-breeze, the swelling sail, the fluttering of 
 the gay little flag at the gaff, the musical rippling of water 
 under the counter, and the spirited motion of the boat, 
 combined with the bland air and pleasant sunshine to 
 
176 Why Thomas was Discharged. 
 
 inspire the party with much vivacity. They had not been 
 many minutes afloat before the guitar-case was opened, 
 and the girls' voices Laura's soprano and Hattie's con- 
 tralto rang melodiously over the waves, mingled with 
 feeble attempts at bass accompaniment from their gorgeous 
 guardians. 
 
 Before these vocal exercises wearied, the skipper hauled 
 down his jib, let go his anchor, and brought the craft to, 
 just off the rocks ; and bringing the yawl along-side, un- 
 ceremoniously plumped the girls down into it, without 
 giving their cavaliers a chance for the least display of agile 
 courtliness. Rowing ashore, this same tarry person left 
 them huddled upon the beach with their hopes, their ham- 
 pers, their emotions, and their baskets, and returned to the 
 vessel to do a little private fishing on his own account till 
 wanted. 
 
 The maidens gave vent to their high spirits by chasing 
 each other among the rocks, gathering shells and sea-weed 
 for the construction of those ephemeral little ornaments 
 fair, but frail in which the sex delights, singing, laughing, 
 quoting poetry, attitudinizing upon the peaks and ledges 
 of the fine old bowlders, mossy and weedy and green 
 with the wash of a thousand storms, worn into strange 
 shapes, and stained with the multitudinous dyes of mineral 
 oxidization, and, in brief, behaved themselves with all 
 the charming abandon that so well becomes young girls, 
 set free, by the entourage of a holiday ramble, from the 
 buckram and clear-starch of social etiquette. 
 
 Meanwhile Ned and Charley smoked the pensive cigar 
 of preparation in a sheltered corner, and gazed out seaward, 
 dreaming and seeing nothing. 
 
 Erelong the breeze and the romp gave the young ladies 
 not only a splendid color and sparkling eyes, but excellent 
 appetites also. The baskets and hampers were speedily 
 unpacked, the table-cloth laid on a broad, flat stone, so used 
 by generations of Brant-House picnickers, and the party 
 fell to. Laura's beautiful hair, a little disordered, swept her 
 
Why Thomas was Discharged. 177 
 
 blooming cheek, and cast a pearly shadow upon her neck. 
 Her bright eyes glanced archly out from under her half- 
 raised veil, and there was something inexpressibly naive in 
 the freedom with which she ate, taking a bird's wing in her 
 little fingers, and boldly attacking it with teeth as white 
 and even as can be imagined. Notwithstanding all the 
 mawkish nonsense that has been put forth by sentimental- 
 ists concerning feminine eating, I hold that it is one of the 
 nicest things in the world to see a pretty woman enjoying 
 the creature comforts ; and Byron himself, had he been 
 one of this picnic party, would have been unable to resist 
 the admiration that filled the souls of Burnham and Salis- 
 bury. Hattie Chapman stormed a fortress of boned turkey 
 with a gusto equal to that of Laura, and made highly suc- 
 cessful raids upon certain outlying salads and jellies. The 
 young men were not in a very ravenous condition; they 
 were, as I have said, a little nervous, and bent their ener- 
 gies principally to admiring the ladies and coquetting with 
 pickled oysters. 
 
 When the repast was over, with much accompanying 
 chat and laughter, Ned glanced significantly at Charley, 
 and proposed to Laura that they should walk up the beach 
 to a place where, he said, there were "some pretty rocks 
 and things, you know." She consented, and they marched 
 off. Hattie. also arose, and took her parasol, as if to follow, 
 but Charley remained seated, tracing mysterious diagrams 
 upon the table-cloth with his fork, and looking sublimely 
 unconscious. 
 
 " Sha'n't we walk, too ?" Hattie asked. 
 
 " O, why, the fact is," said he, hesitantly, " I I sprained 
 my ankle, getting out of that confounded boat ; so I don't 
 feel much like exercise just now." 
 
 The young girl's face expressed concern. 
 
 " That is too bad ! Why did n't you tell us of it before ? 
 Is it painful ? I 'm so sorry ! " 
 
 " N-no, it does n't hurt much. I dare say it will be 
 8* L 
 
I /S Why Thomas was Discharged. 
 
 all right in a minute. And then I 'd just as soon stay 
 here with you as to walk anywhere." 
 This, very tenderly, with a little sigh. 
 
 Hattie sat down again, and began to talk to this facti- 
 tious cripple, in the pleasant, purring way some damsels 
 have, about the joys of the sea-shore, the happy summer 
 that was, alas ! drawing to a close, her own enjoyment 
 of life, and kindred topics, till Charley saw an excel- 
 lent opportunity to interrupt with some aspirations of his 
 own, which, he averred, must be realized before his life 
 could be considered a satisfactory success. 
 
 If you have ever been placed in analogous circumstances, 
 you know, of course, just about the sort of thing that was 
 being said by the two gentlemen at nearly the same mo- 
 ment : Ned, loitering slowly along the sands with Laura 
 on his arm, and Charley, stretched in indolent pictu- 
 resqueness upon the rocks, with Hattie sitting beside him. 
 If you do not know from experience, ask any candid friend 
 who has been through the form and ceremony of an ortho- 
 dox proposal. 
 
 When the pedestrians returned, the two couples looked 
 very hard at each other. All were smiling and complacent, 
 but devoid of any strange or unusual expression. Indeed, 
 the countenance is subject to such severe education in 
 good society, that one almost always looks smiling and 
 complacent. Demonstration is not fashionable ; and a man 
 must preserve the same demeanor over the loss of a wife 
 or a glove-button, over the gift of a heart's whole devotion 
 or a bundle of cigars. Under all these visitations, the 
 complacent smile is in. favor, as the neatest, most service- 
 able, and convenient form of non-committalism. 
 
 The sun was approaching the blue range of misty hills 
 that bounded the mainland swamps by this time ; so the 
 skipper was signalled, the dinner paraphernalia gathered 
 up, and the party were soon en route for home once more. 
 When the young ladies were safely in, Ned and Charley 
 
Why Thomas was Discharged. 179 
 
 met in their room, and each caught the other looking at 
 him stealthily. Both smiled.' 
 
 " Did I give you time, Charley ? " asked Ned ; " we came 
 back rather soon." 
 
 " O, yes, plenty of time." 
 
 "Did you aw, did you pop?" 
 
 " Y-es. Did you ? " 
 
 "Well yes." 
 
 " And you were " 
 
 " Rejected, by Jove ! " 
 
 " So was I ! " 
 
 The day following this disastrous picnic, the baggage of 
 Mr. Edwin Salisbury and Mr. Charles Burnham was sent 
 to the depot at Wikahasset Station, and they presented 
 themselves at the hotel-office with a request for their bill. 
 As Jerry Swayne deposited their key upon its hook, he 
 drew forth a small tri-cornered billet from the pigeon-hole 
 beneath, and presented it. 
 
 " Left for you, this morning, gentlemen." 
 
 It was directed to both, and Charley read it over Ned's 
 shoulder. It ran thus : 
 
 " DEAR BOYS, The next time you divert yourselves by 
 throwing dice for two young ladies, we pray you not to do 
 so in the presence of a valet who is upon terms of inti- 
 macy with the maid of one of them. 
 
 " With many sincere thanks for the amusement you have 
 given us, often when you least suspected it, we bid 
 you a 'lasting adieu, and remain, with the best wishes, 
 
 HATTIE CHAPMAN. 
 
 "Brant House, Wedtiesday. LAURA THURSTON." 
 
 " It is all the fault of that, aw, that confounded Thomas ! " 
 said Ned. 
 
 So Thomas was discharged. 
 
VICTOR AND JACQUELINE. 
 
 ACQUELINE GABRIE and Elsie Mdril could 
 not occupy one room, and remain, either of them, 
 indifferent to so much as might be manifested of 
 the other's inmost life. They could not emigrate together, 
 peasants from Domre"my, Jacqueline so strong, Elsie so 
 fair ; could not labor in the same harvest-fields, children 
 of old neighbors, without each being concerned in the wel- 
 fare and affected by the circumstances of the other. 
 
 It was near ten o'clock, one evening, when Elsie Me*ril 
 ran up the common stairway, and entered the room in the 
 fourth story where she and Jacqueline lodged. 
 
 Victor Le Roy, student from Picardy, occupied the room 
 next theirs, and was startled from his slumber by the voices 
 of the girls. Elsie was fresh from the theatre, from the 
 first play she had ever witnessed ; she came home excited 
 and delighted, ready to repeat and recite, as long as Jacque- 
 line would listen. 
 
 And here was Jacqueline. 
 
 Early in the evening Elsie had sought -her friend with a 
 good deal of anxiety. A fellow-lodger and field-laborer 
 had invited her to see the play, and Jacqueline was far 
 down the street, nursing old Antonine Dupre. To seek 
 her, thus occupied, on such an errand, Elsie had the good 
 taste and the selfishness to refrain from doing. 
 
 Therefore, after a little deliberation, she had gone to 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 181 
 
 the theatre, and there forgot her hard day-labor in the 
 wonders of the stage, forgot Jacqueline, and Antonine, 
 and every care and duty. It was hard for her, when all 
 was ended, to come back to compunction and explanation, 
 yet to this she had come back. 
 
 Neither of the girls was thinking of the student, their 
 neighbor ; but he was not only wakened by their voices, 
 he amused himself by comparing them and their utterances 
 with his preconceived notions of the girls. They might 
 not have recognized him in the street, though they had 
 often passed him on the stairs ; but he certainly could have 
 distinguished the pretty face of Elsie, or the strange face 
 of Jacqueline, wherever he might meet them. 
 
 Elsie ran on with her story, not careful to inquire into 
 the mood of Jacqueline, suspicious of that mood, no 
 doubt, but at last, made breathless by her haste and 
 agitation, she paused, looked anxiously at Jacqueline, and 
 finally said, 
 
 " You think I ought not to have gone ? " 
 
 " O, no, it gave you pleasure." 
 
 A pause followed. It was broken at length by Elsie, 
 exclaiming, in a voice changed from its former speaking, 
 
 " Jacqueline Gabrie, you are homesick ! horribly home- 
 sick, Jacqueline ! " 
 
 " You do not ask for Antonine : yet you know I went to 
 spend the day with her," said Jacqueline, very gravely. 
 
 " How is Antonine Dupr& ? " asked Elsie. 
 
 " She is dead. I have told you a good many times that 
 she must die. Now she is dead." 
 
 " Dead ? " repeated Elsie. 
 
 " You care as much as if a candle had gone out," said 
 Jacqueline. 
 
 " She was as much to me as I to her," was the quick 
 answer. " She never liked me. She did not like my 
 mother before me. When you told her my name, the day 
 we saw her first, I knew what she thought. So let that go. 
 If I could have done her good, though, I would, Jacque- 
 line." 
 
1 82 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 " She has everything she needs, a great deal more than 
 we have. She is very happy, Elsie." 
 
 " Am not I ? Are not you, in spite of your dreadful 
 look ? Your look is more terrible than the lady's in the 
 play, just before she killed herself. Is that because Anto- 
 nine is so well off?" 
 
 " I wish that I could be where she is," sighed Jacqueline. 
 
 " You ? You are tired, Jacqueline. You look ill. You 
 will not be fit for to-morrow. Come to bed. It is late'." 
 
 As Jacqueline made no reply to this suggestion, Elsie 
 began to reflect upon her words, and to consider wherefore 
 and to whom she had spoken. Not quite satisfied with 
 herself could she have been, for at length she said in quite 
 another manner, 
 
 " You always said, till now, you wished that you might 
 live a hundred years. But it was not because you were 
 afraid to die, you said so, Jacqueline." 
 
 " I don't know," was the answer, sadly spoken. " Don't 
 remind me of things I have said. I seem to have lost 
 myself." 
 
 The voice and the words were effectual, if they were 
 intended as an appeal to Elsie. Fain would she now ex- 
 clude the stage and the play from her thoughts, fain 
 think and feel with Jacqueline, as it had long been her 
 habit to do. 
 
 Jacqueline, however, was not eager to speak. And Elsie 
 must draw yet nearer to her, and make her nearness felt, 
 ere she could hope to receive the thought of her friend. 
 By and by these words were uttered, solemn, slow, and 
 dirge-like : 
 
 " Antonine died just after sundown. I was alone with 
 her. She did not think that she would die so soon. I did 
 not. In the morning, John Leclerc came in to inquire how 
 she spent the night. He prayed with her. And a hymn, 
 he read a hymn that she seemed to know, for all day she 
 was humming it over. I can say some of the lines." 
 
 " Say them, Jacqueline," said the softened voice of Elsie. 
 
Victor arid Jacqueline. 183 
 
 Slowly, and as one recalls that of which he is uncertain, 
 Jacqueline repeated what I copy more entire : 
 
 " In the midst of life, behold, 
 Death hath girt us round ! 
 Whom for help, then, shall we pray ? 
 Where shall graoe be found ? 
 
 In thee, O Lord, alone I 
 We rue the evil we have done, 
 That thy wrath on us hath drawn. 
 Holy Lord and God ! 
 Strong and holy God 1 
 Merciful and holy Saviour 1 
 
 Eternal God ! 
 Sink us not beneath 
 Bitter pains of endless death 1 
 Kyrie, eleison 1 " 
 
 " Then he went away," she continued. " But he did not 
 think it was the last time he should speak to Antonine. In 
 the afternoon I thought I saw a change, and I wanted to 
 go for somebody. But she said, ' Stay with me. I want 
 nothing.' So I sat by her bed. At last she said, * Come, 
 Lord Jesus ! come quickly ! ' and she started up in her bed, 
 as if she saw him coming. And as if he were coming 
 nearer, she smiled. That was the last, without a strug- 
 gle, or as much as a groan." 
 
 "No priest there?" asked Elsie. ^ 
 
 " No. When I spoke to her about it, she said her priest 
 was Jesus Christ the Righteous, and there was no other, 
 the High-Priest. She gave me her Bible. See how it 
 has been used ! ' Search the Scriptures,' she said. She 
 told me I was able to learn the truth. ' I loved your 
 mother,' she said ; ' that is the reason I am so anxious you 
 should know. It is by my spirit, said the Lord. Ask for 
 that spirit,' she said. 'He is more willing to give than 
 earthly parents are to give good gifts to their children.' 
 She said these things, Elsie. If they are true, they must 
 be better worth believing than all the riches of the world 
 are worth the having." 
 
 The interest manifested by the student in this conversa- 
 
184 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 tion had been on the increase since Jacqueline began to 
 speak of Antonine Dupre. It was not, at this point of the 
 conversation, waning. 
 
 "Your mother would not have agreed with Antonine," 
 said Elsie, as if there were weight in the argument; for 
 such a girl as Jacqueline could not speak earnestly in the 
 hearing of a girl like Elsie without result, and the result 
 was at this time resistance. 
 
 " She believed what she was taught in Domre'my," an- 
 swered Jacqueline. " She believed in Absolution, Extreme 
 Unction, in the need of another priest than Jesus Christ, 
 a representative they call it." She spoke slowly, as if inter- 
 rogating each point of her speech. 
 
 " I believe as they believed before us," answered Elsie, 
 coldly. 
 
 " We have learned many things since we came to Meaux," 
 answered Jacqueline, with a patient gentleness, that indi- 
 cated the perplexity and doubt with which the generous 
 spirit was departing from the old dominion. She was 
 indeed departing, with that reverence for the past which 
 is not incompatible with the highest hope for the future. 
 " Our Joan came from Domre'my, where she must crown 
 the king," she continued. " We have much to learn." 
 
 " She lost her life," said Elsie, with vehemence. 
 
 " Yes, she did lose her life," Jacquelin quietly acquiesced. 
 
 " If she had known what must happen, would she have 
 come ? " 
 
 " Yes, she would have come." 
 
 " How late it is ! " said Elsie, as if in sleep were certain 
 rest from these vexatious thoughts. 
 
 Victor Le Roy was by this time lost in his own reflec- 
 tions. These girls had supplied an all-sufficient theme; 
 whether they slept or wakened was no affair of his> He 
 had somewhat to argue for himself about extreme unction, 
 priestly intervention, confession, absolution, something to 
 say to himself about Leclerc, and the departed Antonine. 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 185 
 
 Late into the night he sat thinking of the marvel of 
 Domre'my and of Antonine Dupre, of Picardy and of 
 Meaux, of priests and of the High-Priest. Brave and 
 aspiring, Victor Le Roy could not think of these things, 
 involved in the names of things above specified, as more 
 calculating, prudent spirits might have done. It was his 
 business, as a student, to ascertain what powers were work- 
 ing in the world. All true characters, of past time or 
 present, must be weighed and measured by him. Result 
 was what he aimed at. 
 
 Jacqueline's words had not given him new thoughts, but 
 unawares they did summon him to his appointed labor. 
 He looked to find the truth. He must stand to do his 
 work. He must haste to make his choice. Enthusiastic, 
 chivalrous, and strong, he was seeking the divine Tight, 
 night and day ; and to ascertain that, as it seemed, he 
 had come from Picardy to Meaux. 
 
 Elsie Me*ril went to bed, as she had invited Jacqueline 
 to do ; to sleep, to dream, she went, and to smile, in her 
 dreaming, on the world that smiled on her. 
 
 Jacqueline sat by the window ; leaned from the window, 
 and prayed ; her own prayer she prayed, as Antonine had 
 said she must, if she would discover what she needed, and 
 obtain an answer. 
 
 She thought of the dead, her own. She pondered on 
 the future. She recalled some lines of the hymn Antonine 
 had repeated, and she wished oh, how she wished ! 
 that, while the woman lived, and could reason and speak, 
 she had told her about the letter she had received from 
 the priest of Domre'my. Many a time it had been on her 
 lips to tell, but she failed in courage to bring her poor 
 affairs into that chamber and disturb that dying hour. 
 Now she wished that she had done it. Now she felt that, 
 speech had been the merest act of justice to herself. 
 
 But there was Leclerc, the wool-comber, and his mother ; 
 she might rely on them for the instruction she needed. 
 
 Old Antonine's faith had made a deep impression on the 
 
1 86 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 strong-hearted and deep-thinking girl ; as also had the 
 prayers of John Leclerc, especially that last prayer offered 
 for Antonine. It seemed to authenticate, by its strong, un- 
 faltering utterance, the poor old woman's evidence. "Jesus 
 Christ, the same yesterday, to-day, and forever," were strong 
 words that seemed about to take possession of the heart of 
 Jacqueline. 
 
 Therefore, while Elsie slept, she prayed, looking far- 
 ther than the city-streets and darkness, looking farther 
 than the shining stars. What she sought, poor girl, stood 
 in her silent chamber, stood in her waiting heart. But she 
 knew Him not, and her ear was heavy ; she did not hear 
 the voice, that she should answer Him, " Rabboni ! " 
 
 II. 
 
 A FORTNIGHT from this night, after the harvesters 
 had left the fields of M. Flaval, Jacqueline was lin- 
 gering in the twilight. 
 
 The instant the day's work was done, the laborers set 
 out for Meaux. Their haste suggested some unusual cause, 
 
 John Leclerc, wool-comber, had received that day his 
 sentence. Report of the sentence had spread among the 
 reapers in the field and all along the vineyards of the hill- 
 sides. Not a little stir was occasioned by this sentence : 
 three days of whipping through the public streets, to con- 
 clude with branding on .the forehead. For this Leclerc, it 
 seemed, had profanely and audaciously declared that a 
 man might in his own behalf deal with the invisible God, 
 by the mediation of Christ, the sole Mediator beween God 
 and man. Viewed in the light of his offence, his punish- 
 ment certainly was of the mildest. Tidings of his sentence 
 were received with various emotion ; by some as though 
 they were maddened with new wine ; others wept openly ; 
 many more were pained at heart ; some brutally rejoiced ; 
 some were incredulous. 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 187 
 
 But now they were all on their way to Meaux ; the fields 
 were quite deserted. Urged by one desire, to ascertain the 
 facts of the trial, and the time when the sentence would be 
 executed, the laborers were returning to the town. 
 
 Without demonstration of any emotion, Jacqueline Ga- 
 brie, quiet, silent, walked along the river-bank, until she 
 came to the clump of chestnut-trees, whose shadow fell 
 across the stream. Many a time, through the hot, dreadful 
 day, her eyes turned wistfully to this place. In the morn- 
 ing Elsie Me'ril had promised Jacqueline that at twilight 
 they would read together here the leaves the poor old 
 mother of Leclerc gave Jacqueline last night : when they 
 had read them, they would walk home by starlight together. 
 But now the time had come, and Jacqueline was alone. 
 Elsie had returned to town with other young harvesters. 
 
 " Very well," said Jacqueline, when Elsie told her she 
 must go. It was not, indeed, inexplicable that she should 
 prefer the many voices to the one, excitement and com- 
 pany, rather than quiet, dangerous thinking. 
 
 But, thus left alone, the face of Jacqueline expressed 
 both sorrow and indignation. She would exact nothing 
 of Elsie ; but latterly how often had she expected of her 
 companion more than she gave or could give ! 
 
 Of course the young girl was equal to others in pity and 
 surprise ; but there were people in the world beside the 
 wool-comber and his mother. Nothing of vast import was 
 suggested by his sentence to her mind. She did not see 
 that spiritual freedom was threatened with destruction. If 
 she heard the danger questioned, she could not apprehend 
 it. Though she had listened to the preaching of Leclerc 
 and had been moved by it, her sense of truth and of justice 
 was not so acute as to lead her willingly to incur a risk in 
 the maintaining of the same. 
 
 She would not look into Antonine's Bible, which Jacque- 
 line had read so much during the last fortnight. She was 
 not the girl to torment herself about her soul, when the 
 
1 88 Victor and Jacqueline, 
 
 Church would save it for her by mere compliance with a 
 few easy regulations. 
 
 More and more was Elsie disappointing Jacqueline. Day 
 by day these girls were developing in ways which bade fair 
 to separate them in the end. When now they had most, 
 need of each other, their estrangement was becoming more 
 apparent and decided. The peasant-dress of Elsie would 
 not content her always, Jacqueline said sadly to herself. 
 
 Jacqueline's tracts, indeed, promised poorly as entertain- 
 ment for an hour of rest, -rest gained by hours of toil. 
 The confusion of tongues and the excitement of the city 
 pleased Elsie better. So she went along the road to Meaux, 
 and was not talking, neither thinking, all the way, of the 
 wrongs of John Leclerc, and the sorrows of his mother, 
 neither meditating constantly, and with deep-seated pur- 
 pose, " I will not let thee go, except thou bless me ! " 
 neither on this problem, agitated then in so many earnest 
 minds, " What shall a man give in exchange for his soul ? " 
 
 Thus Jacqueline sat alone and thought that she would 
 read by herself the tracts Leclerc had found it good to 
 study. But unopened she held the little printed scroll, 
 while she watched the home-returning birds, whose nests 
 were in the mighty branches of the chestnut-trees. 
 
 She needed the repose more than the teaching even ; 
 for all day the sun had fallen heavily on the harvesters, 
 and toiling with a troubled heart, under a burning sun, will 
 leave the laborer not in the best condition for such work as 
 Jacqueline believed she had to do. 
 
 But she had promised the old woman she would read 
 these tracts, and this was her only time, for they must be 
 returned that night : others were waiting for them with an 
 eagerness and longing of which, haply, tract-dispensers see 
 little now. Still she delayed in opening them. The news 
 of Leclerc's sentence had filled her with dismay. 
 
 Did she dread to read the truth, " the truth of Jesus 
 Christ," as his mother styled it? The frightful image of 
 the bleeding, lacerated wool-comber would come between 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 189 
 
 her and the book in which that faith was written, for main- 
 taining which this man must suffer. Strange contrast 
 between the heavy gloom and terror of her thoughts and 
 the peaceful " river flowing on " ! How tranquil were the 
 fields that spread beyond her sight ! But there is no rest 
 or joy in Nature to the agitated and foreboding spirit. Must 
 we not have conquered the world, if we serenely enter into 
 Nature's rest ? 
 
 Fain would Jacqueline have turned her face and steps in 
 another direction that night than toward the road that led 
 to Meaux : to the village on the border of the Vosges, 
 to the ancient Domre'my. Once her home was there; but 
 Jacqueline had parsed forth from the old, humble, true de- 
 fences : for herself must live and die. 
 
 Domre'my had a home for her no more. The priest, on 
 whom she had relied when all failed her, was still there, 
 it is true ; and once she had thought, that, while he lived, 
 she was not fatherless, not homeless : but his authority had 
 ceased to be paternal, and she trusted him no longer. 
 1 She had two graves in the old village, and among the 
 living a few faces she never could forget. But on this earth 
 she had no home. 
 
 Musing on these dreary facts, and on the bleeding, 
 branded image of Leclerc, as her imagination rendered him 
 back to his friends, his fearful trial over, a vision more 
 familiar to her childhood than her youth opened to Jacque- 
 line. 
 
 There was one who used to wander through the woods 
 that bordered the mountains in whose shadow stood 
 Domre'my, one whose works had glorified her name in 
 the England and the France that made a martyr of her. 
 Jeanne d'Arc had ventured all things for the truth's sake : 
 was she, who also came forth from that village, by any 
 power commissioned ? 
 
 Jacqueline laid the tracts on the grass. Over them she 
 placed a stone. She bowed her head. She hid her face. 
 She saw no more the river, trees, or home-returning birds ; 
 
Victor and Jacqtieline. 
 
 heard not the rush of water or of wind, = nor, even now, 
 the hurry and the shout that possibly to-morrow would 
 follow the poor wool-comber through the streets of Meaux, 
 and on the third day they would brand him ! 
 
 She remembered an old cottage in the shadow of the 
 forest-covered mountains. She remembered one who died 
 there suddenly, and without remedy, her father, unab- 
 solved and unanointed, dying in fear and torment, in a 
 moment when none anticipated death. She remembered 
 a strong-hearted woman who seemed to die with him, 
 who died to all the interests of this life, and was buried by 
 her husband ere a twelvemonth had passed, her mother, 
 who was buried by her father's side. 
 
 Burdened with a solemn care they left their child. The 
 priest of Domre'my, and none beside him, knew the weight 
 of this burden. How had he helped her bear it ? since it 
 is the business of the shepherd to look after the younglings 
 of the flock. Her hard earnings paid him for the prayers 
 he offered for the deliverance of her father from his purga- 
 torial woes. Burdened with a dire debt of filial love, the 
 priest had let her depart from Domre'my ; his influence 
 followed her as an oppression and a care, a degradation 
 also. 
 
 Her life of labor was a slavish life. All she did, and all 
 she left undone, she looked at with sad-hearted reference 
 to the great object of her life. Far away she put all allure- 
 ment to tempting, youthful joy. What had she to do with 
 merriment and jollity, while a sin remained unexpiated, or 
 a. moment of her father's suffering and sorrow could be 
 anticipated ? 
 
 How, probably, would these new doctrines, held fast by 
 some through persecution and danger, these doctrines 
 which brought liberty to light, be received by one so fast 
 a prisoner of Hope as she ? She had pledged herself, with 
 solemn vows had promised, to complete the work her moth- 
 er left unfinished when she died. 
 
 .Some of the laborers in the field, Elsie among them, had 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 191 
 
 hoped, they said, that the wool-comber would retract from 
 his dangerous position. Recalling their words, Jacqueline 
 asked herself would she choose to have him retract ? She 
 reminded herself of the only martyr whose memory she 
 loved, the glorious girl from Domre'my ; and a lofty and 
 stern spirit seemed to rouse within her as she answered 
 that question. She believed that John had found and 
 taught the truth ; and was Truth to be sacrificed to Power 
 that hated it ? Not by a suicidal act, at least. 
 
 She took the tracts, so judging, from underneath the 
 stone, wistfully looked them over, and, as she did so, re- 
 called these words : " You cannot buy your pardon of a 
 priest ; he has no power to sell it ; he cannot even give it. 
 Ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally, upbraiding 
 not. ' If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts to 
 your children, how much more shall your Heavenly Father 
 give his Holy Spirit to them that ask him ! ' " 
 
 She could never forget these words. She could never 
 forget the preacher's look when he used them ; nor the 
 solemnity of the assenting faith, as attested by the counte- 
 nances of those around her in that " upper room." 
 
 But her father ! What would this faith do for the de- 
 parted ? 
 
 Yet again she dared to pray, here in this solitude, to 
 ask for that Holy Spirit, the Enlightener. And it was truly 
 with trembling, in the face of all presentiments of what 
 the gift might possibly, must certainly, import to her. But 
 what was she, that she could withstand God, or His gift, 
 for any fear of the result that might attend the giving of 
 the gift? 
 
 Divinely she seemed to be inspired with that courageous 
 thought. She rose up, as if to follow the laborers who had 
 already gone to Meaux. But she had not passed out from 
 the shadow of the great trees when another shadow fell 
 along her path. 
 
1 92 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 III. 
 
 IT was Victor Le Roy who was so close at hand. He 
 recognized Jacqueline ; for, as he came down the road, 
 now and then he caught a glimpse of her red peasant-dress. 
 And he accepted his persuasion as it had been an assur- 
 ance ; for he believed that on such a night no other girl 
 would linger alone near the place of her day's labor. More- 
 over, while passing the group of harvesters, he had observed 
 that she was not among them. 
 
 The acquaintance of these young persons was but slight ; 
 yet it was of such a character as must needs increase. 
 Within the last fortnight they had met repeatedly in the 
 room of Leclerc's mother. On the last night of her son's 
 preaching they had together listened to his words. The 
 young student with manly aspirations, ambitious, courage- 
 ous, inquiring, and the peasant girl who toiled in fields and 
 vineyards, were on the same day hearkening to the call, 
 " Ho, > every one that thirsteth ! " with the consciousness 
 that the call was meant for them! 
 
 When Victor Le Roy saw that Jacqueline perceived and 
 recognized him, he also observed the tracts in her hand 
 and the trouble in her countenance, and he wondered in 
 his heart whether she could be ignorant of what had passed 
 that day at Meaux, and if it could be possible that her 
 manifest disturbance arose from any perplexity or dis- 
 quietude independent of the sentence that had been passed 
 on John Leclerc. His first words brought an answer that 
 satisfied his doubt. 
 
 " She has chosen that good part which shall not be taken 
 from her," said he, as he came near. " The country is so 
 fair, could no one of them all except Jacqueline see that ? 
 Were they all drawn away by the bloody fascination of 
 Meaux? even Elsie?" 
 
 "It was the news that hurried her home with the rest," 
 answered she, almost pleased at this disturbance of the 
 solitude. 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 193 
 
 "Did that keep you here, Jacqueline ?" he asked. "It 
 sent me out of the city. The dust choked me. Every 
 face looked like a devil's. To-morrow night, to-morrow 
 night, the harvesters will hurry all the faster. Terrible 
 curiosity ! And if they find traces of his blood along the 
 streets, there will be enough to talk about through the rest 
 of the harvesting. Jacqueline, if the river could be poured 
 through those streets, the sacred blood could never be 
 washed out. 'T is not the indignity, nor the cruelty, I think 
 of most, but the barbarous, wild sin. Shall a man's truest 
 liberty be taken from him, as though, indeed, he were not 
 a man of God, but the spiritual subject of his fellows ? If 
 that is their plan, they may light the fires, there are 
 many who will not shrink from sealing their faith with their 
 blood." 
 
 These words, spoken with vehemence, were the first free 
 utterance Victor Le Roy had given to his feelings all day. 
 All day they had been concentrating, and now came from 
 him fiery and fast. 
 
 It was time for him to know in whom and in what he 
 believed. 
 
 Greatly moved by his words, Jacqueline said, giving him 
 the tracts, 
 
 " I came from Domrdmy. I am free. No one can be 
 hurt by what befalls me. I want to know the truth. I am 
 not afraid. Did John Leclerc never give way for a mo- 
 ment ? Is he really to be whipped through the streets, 
 and on the third day to be branded? Will he not re- 
 tract?" 
 
 " Never ! " was the answer, spoken not without a shud- 
 der. " He did not flinch through all the trial, Jacqueline. 
 And his old mother says, * Blessed be Jesus Christ and his 
 witnesses ! ' " 
 
 " I came from Domrdmy," seemed to be in the girl's 
 thought again ; for her eyes flashed when she looked at 
 Victor Le Roy, as though she could believe the heavens 
 would open for the enlightening of such believers. 
 9 M 
 
194 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 " She gave me those to read," said she, pointing to the 
 tracts she had given him. 
 
 " And have you been reading them here by yourself ? " 
 
 "No. Elsie and I were to have read them together; 
 but I fell to thinking." 
 
 " You mean to wait for her, then ? " 
 
 " I was afraid I should not make the right sense . of 
 them." 
 
 " Sit down, Jacqueline, and let me read aloud. I have 
 read them before. And I understand them better than 
 Elsie does, or ever will." 
 
 " I am afraid that is true, sir. If you read, I will listen." 
 
 But he did not, with this permission, begin instantly. 
 
 "You came from Domre'my, Jacqueline," said he. " I 
 came from Picardy. My home was within a stone's throw 
 of the castle where Jeanne d'Arc was a prisoner before 
 they carried her to Rouen. I have often walked about that 
 castle and tried to think how it must have been with her 
 when they left her there a prisoner. God knows, perhaps 
 we shall all have an opportunity of knowing, how she felt 
 when a prisoner of Truth. Like a fly in a spider's net she 
 was, poor girl ! Only nineteen ! She had lived a life that 
 was worth the living, Jacqueline. She knew she was about 
 to meet the fate her heart must have foretold. Girls do not 
 run such a course and then die quietly in their beds. They 
 are attended to their rest by grim sentinels, and they light 
 fagots for them. I have read the story many a time, when 
 I could look at the window of the very room where she 
 was a prisoner. It was strange to think of her witnessing 
 the crowning of the King, with the conviction that her 
 work ended there and then, of the women who brought 
 their children to touch her garments or her hands, to let 
 her smile on them, or speak to them, or maybe kiss them. 
 And the soldiers deemed their swords were stronger when 
 they had but touched hers. And they knelt down to kiss 
 her standard, that white standard, so often victorious ! I 
 have read many 3 time of that glorious day at Rheims." 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 195 
 
 " And she said, that day, ' O, why can I not die here ? ' " 
 said Jacqueline, with a low voice. 
 
 "And when the Archbishop asked her," continued Victor, 
 " ' Where do you, then, expect to die ? ' she answered, ' I 
 know not. I shall die where God pleases. I have done 
 what the Lord my God commanded me ; and I wish that 
 He would now send me to keep my sheep with my mother 
 and sister.'" 
 
 " Because she loved Domre'my, and her work was done," 
 said Jacqueline, sadly. " And so many hated her ! But 
 her mother would be sure to love. Jeanne would never see 
 an evil eye in Domre'my, and no one would lie in wait to 
 kill her in the Vosges woods." 
 
 "It was such as you, Jacqueline, who believed in her, 
 and comforted her. And to every one that consoled her 
 Christ will surely say, * Ye blessed of my Father, ye did it 
 unto me ! ' Yes, to be sure, there were too many who stood 
 ready to kill her in all France, besides those who were 
 afraid of her, and fought against our armies. Even when 
 they were taking her to see the Dauphin, the guard would 
 have drowned her, and lied about it, but they were re- 
 strained. It is something to have been born in Domre'my, 
 to have grown up in the very place where she used to 
 play, a happy little girl. You have seen that fountain, and 
 heard the bells she loved so much. It was good for you, I 
 know." 
 
 " Her prayers were everywhere," Jacqueline replied. 
 " Everywhere she heard the voices that called her to come 
 and deliver France. But her father did not believe in her. 
 He persecuted Jeanne." 
 
 "A man's foes are of his own household," said Victor. 
 "You see the same thing now. It is the very family of 
 Christ yes ! so they dare call it who are going to tear 
 and rend Leclerc to-morrow for believing the words of 
 Christ. A hundred judges settled that Jeanne should be 
 burned ; and for believing such words as are in these 
 books " 
 
196 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 " Read me those words," said Jacqueline. 
 
 So they turned from speaking of Joan and her work, to 
 contemplate another style of heroism, and to question their 
 own hearts. 
 
 Jacqueline Gabrie had lived through eighteen years of . 
 hardship and exposure. She was strong, contented, reso- 
 lute. Left v to herself, she would probably have suffered no 
 disturbance of her creed, would have lived and died 
 conforming to the letter of its law. But thrown under the 
 influence of those who did agitate the subject, she was 
 brave and clear-headed. She listened now, while, accord- 
 ing to her wish, her neighbor read, listened with clear 
 intelligence, intent on the truth. That, or any truth, ac- 
 cepted, she would hardly shrink from whatever it involved. 
 This was the reason why she had re'ally feared to ask the 
 Holy Ghost's enlightenment ! So well she understood her- 
 self ! Truth was truth, and, if received, to be abided by. 
 She could not hold it loosely. She could not trifle with it. 
 She was born in Domre'my. She had played under the 
 Fairy Oak. She knew the woods where Joan wandered 
 when she sought her saintly solitude. The fact was acting 
 on her as an inspiration, when Domre'my became a memory, 
 when she labored far away from the wooded Vosges and 
 the meadows of Lorraine. 
 
 She listened to the reading, as girls do not always listen 
 when they sit in the presence of a reader such as young 
 Le Roy. 
 
 And let it here be understood that the conclusion 
 bring no sorrow, and no sense of wrong to those who turn 
 these pages, thinking to find the climax dear to half- 
 fledged imagination, incapable from inexperience of any 
 deeper truth, (I render them all homage !) this story is 
 not told for any sake but truth's. 
 
 This Jacqueline did listen to this Victor, thinking actually 
 of the words he read. She looked at him really to ascer- 
 tain whether her apprehension of these things was all the 
 same as his. She questioned him, with the simple desire 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 197 
 
 to learn what he could tell her. Her hands were very hard, 
 so constant had been her dealing with the rough facts of 
 this life ; but the hard hand was firm in its clasp, and ready 
 with its helpfulness. Her eyes were open, and very clear 
 of dreams. There was room in them for tenderness as 
 well as truth. Her voice was not the sweetest of all voices 
 in this world ; but it had the quality that would make it 
 prized by others when heart and flesh were failing ; for it 
 would be strong to speak then with cheerful faith and an 
 unfaltering courage. 
 
 Jacqueline sat there under the chestnut-trees, upon the 
 river-bank, strong-hearted, high-hearted, a brave, generous 
 woman. What if her days were toilsome ? What if her 
 peasant-dress was not the finest woven in the looms of 
 Paris or of Meaux ? Her prayers were brief, her toil was 
 long, her sleep was sound, her virtue firm as the ever- 
 lasting mountains. Jacqueline, I have singled you from 
 among hordes and tribes and legions upon legions of 
 women, one among ten thousand, altogether lovely, not 
 for dalliance, not for idleness, not for dancing, which is 
 well ; not for song, which is better ; not for beauty, which, 
 perhaps, is best ; not for grace, or power, or passion. There 
 is an attribute of God which is more to His universe than 
 all evidence of power. It is His truth. Jacqueline, it is 
 for this your name shall shine upon my page. 
 
 And, manifestly, it is by virtue of this quality that her 
 reader is moved and attracted at this hour of twilight on 
 the river-bank. 
 
 Her intelligence is so quick ! her apprehension so direct ! 
 her conclusions so true ! He intended to aid her ; but 
 Mazurier himself had never uttered comments so entirely 
 to the purpose as did this young girl, speaking from heart 
 and brain. Better fortune, apparently, could not have be- 
 fallen him than was his in this reading ; for with every sen- 
 tence almost came her comment, clear, earnest, to the point. 
 
 He had need of such a friend as Jacqueline seemed able 
 to prove herself. His nearest living relative was an uncle, 
 
198 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 who had sent the ambitious and capable young student to 
 Meaux ; for he gave great promise, and was worth an ex- 
 periment, the old man thought, and was strong to be 
 thrown out into the world, where he might ascertain the 
 power of self-reliance. He had need of friends, and, of all 
 friends, one like Jacqueline. 
 
 From the silence and retirement of his home in Picardy 
 he had come to Meaux, the town that was so astir, busy, 
 thoroughly alive ! Inexperienced in worldly ways he came. 
 His face was beautiful with its refinement and power of 
 expression. His eyes were full of eloquence ; so also was 
 his voice. When he came from Picardy to Meaux, his old 
 neighbors prophesied for him. He knew their prophecies, 
 and purposed to fulfil them. He ceased from dreaming, 
 when he came to Meaux. He was not dreaming, when he 
 looked on Jacqueline. He was aware of what he read, and 
 how she listened, under those chestnut-trees. 
 
 The burden of the tracts he read to Jacqueline was sal- 
 vation by faith, not of works, an iconoclastic doctrine, 
 that was to sweep away the great mass of Romish super- 
 stition, invalidating Papal power. Image-worship, shrine- 
 frequenting sacrifices, indulgences, were esteemed and 
 proved less than nothing worth in the work of salvation. 
 
 " Did you understand John, when he said that the priests 
 deceived us and were full of robberies, and talked about 
 the masses for the dead, and said the only good of them 
 was to put money into the Church ? " asked Jacqueline. 
 
 " I believe it," he replied, with spirit. 
 
 " That the masses are worth nothing ? " she asked, far 
 from concealing that the thought disturbed her. 
 
 " What can they be worth, if a man has lived a bad life ? " 
 
 " That my father did not ! " she exclaimed. 
 
 " If a man is a bad man, why, then he is. He has gone 
 where he must be judged. The Scripture says, As a tree 
 falls, it must lie." 
 
 " My father was a good man, Victor. But he died of a 
 sudden, and there was no time." 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 199 
 
 "No time for what, Jacqueline? No time for him to 
 turn about, and be a bad man in the end ? " 
 
 " No time for confession and absolution. He died pray- 
 ing God to forgive him all his sins. I heard him. I won- 
 dered, Victor, for I never thought of his committing sins. 
 And my mother mourned for him as a good wife should 
 not mourn for a bad husband." 
 
 " Then what is your trouble, Jacqueline ? " 
 
 " Do you know why I came here to Meaux ? I came to 
 get money, to earn it. I should be paid more money 
 here than I got for any work nt home, they said : that was 
 the reason. When I had earned so much, it was a large 
 sum, but I knew I should get it, and the priest encouraged 
 me to think I should, he said that my heart's desire 
 would be accomplished. And I could earn the money 
 before winter is over, I think. But now if " 
 
 " Throw it into the Seine, when you get it, rather than 
 pay it to the liar for selling your father out of a place he 
 was never in ! He is safe, believe me, if he was the good 
 man you say. Do not disturb yourself. Jacqueline." 
 
 "He never harmed a soul. And we loved him that way 
 a bad man could not be loved." 
 
 As Jacqueline said this, a smile more sad than joyful 
 passed over her face, and disappeared. 
 
 " He rests in peace/' said Victor Le Roy. 
 
 " It is what I must believe. But what if there should be 
 a mistake about it ? It was all I was working for." 
 
 " Think for yourself, Jacqueline. No matter what Leclerc 
 thinks or I think. Can you suppose that Jesus Christ re- 
 quires any such thing as this of you, that you should make 
 a slave of yourself for the expiation of your father? It is 
 a monstrous thought. Doubt not it was love that took 
 him away so quickly. And love can care for him. Long 
 before this, doubtless,- he has heard the words, * Come, ye 
 blessed of my father ! ' And what is required of you, do 
 you ask ? You shall be merciful to them that live ; and 
 trust Him that He will care for those who have gone be- 
 
2OO Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 yond your reach. Is it so? Do I understand you ? You 
 have been thinking to buy this good gift of God, eternal 
 life for your father, when of course you could have nothing 
 to do with it. You have been imposed upon, and robbed 
 all this while, and this is the amount of it." 
 
 "Well, do not speak so. If what you say is true, and 
 I think it may be, what is past is past." 
 
 " But won't you see what an infernal lie has been prac- 
 tised on you, and all the rest of us who had any conscience 
 or heart in us, all this while ? There is no purgatory ; and 
 it is nonsense to think, that, if there were, money could 
 buy a man out of it. Jesus Christ is the one sole atone- 
 ment for sin. And by faith in Him shall a man save his 
 soul alive. That is the only way. If I lose my soul, and 
 am gone, the rest is between me and God. Do you see it 
 should be so, and must be so, Jacqueline ? " 
 
 " He was a good man," said Jacqueline. 
 
 She did not find it quite easy to make nothing of all this 
 matter, which had been the main-spring of her effort since 
 her father died. She could not in one instant drop from 
 her calculations that on which she had heretofore based all 
 her activity. She had labored so long, so hard, to buy the 
 rest and peace and heavenly blessedness of the father she 
 loved, it was hardly to be expected that at once she would 
 choose to see that in that rest and peace and blessedness, 
 she, as a producing power, had no part whatever. 
 
 As she more than hinted, the purpose of her life seemed 
 to be taken from her. She could not perceive that fact 
 without some consternation ; could not instantly connect 
 it with another, which should enable her to look around 
 her with the deliberation of a liberated spirit, choosing her 
 new work. And in this she was acted upon by more than 
 the fear arising from the influences of her old belief. Of 
 course she should have been, and yet she was not, able to 
 drop instantly and forever from recollection the constant 
 sacrifices she had made, the deprivation she had endured, 
 with heroic persistence, the putting far away every per- 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 201 
 
 sonal indulgence whose price had a market value. Her 
 father was not the only person concerned in this work ; the 
 priest ; herself. She had believed in the pastor of Dom- 
 re'my. Yet he had deceived her. Else he was self-deceived ; 
 and what if the blind should strive to lead the blind ? 
 Could she accept the new faith, the great freedom, with 
 perfect rejoicing ? 
 
 Victor Le Roy seemed to have some suspicion of what 
 was passing in her thoughts. He did not need to watch 
 her changeful face in order to understand them. 
 
 " I advise you to still think of this," said he. " Recall 
 your father's life, and then ask yourself if it is likely that 
 He who is Love requires the sacrifice of your youth and 
 your strength before your father shall receive from Him 
 what He has promised to give to all who trust in Him. 
 Take God at his word, and you will be obliged to give up 
 all this priest-trash." 
 
 IV. 
 
 VICTOR LE ROY spoke these words quietly, as if 
 aware that he might safely leave them, as well as 
 any other true words, to the just sense of Jacqueline. 
 
 She was none the happier for them when she returned 
 that night to the little city room, the poor lodging whose 
 high window overlooked both town and country, city streets 
 and harvest-fields, and the river flowing on beyond the 
 borders of the town, no happier through many a moment 
 of thinking, until, as it were by an instant illumination, she 
 began to see the truth of the matter, as some might wonder 
 she did not instantly perceive it, if they could omit from 
 observation this leading fact, that the orphan girl was 
 Jacqueline Gabrie, child of the Church, and not a. wise and 
 generous person, who had never been in bondage to super- 
 stitions. 
 
 . For a long time after her return to her lodging she was 
 alone. Elsie was in the street with the rest of the town> 
 9* 
 
2O2 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 talking, as all were talking, of the sight that Meaux should 
 see to-morrow. 
 
 Besides Jacqueline, there was hardly another person in 
 this great building, six stories high, every room of which 
 had usually a tenant at this hour. She sat by her window, 
 and looked at the dusky town, over which the moon was 
 rising. But her thoughts were far away ; over many a 
 league they wandered. 
 
 Once more she stood on the play-ground of her toilsome 
 childhood. She recalled many a year of sacrificing drudg- 
 ery, which now she could not name such, for another 
 reason than that which had heretofore prevented her from 
 calling it a sacrifice. She remembered these years of 
 wrong and of extortion, they received their proper name 
 now, years whose mirth and leisure she had quietly fore- 
 gone, but during which she had borne a burden that sad- 
 dened youth, while it also dignified it, a burden which 
 had made her heart's natural cheerfulness the subject of 
 self-reproach, and her maiden dreams and wishes matter 
 for tears, for shame, for confession, for prayer. 
 
 Now Victor Le Roy's words came to her very strangely ; 
 powerfully they moved her. She believed them in this 
 solitude, where at leisure she could meditate upon them. 
 A vision more fair and blessed than she had ever imagined 
 rose before her. . There was no suffering in it, and no sor- 
 row ; it was full of peace. Already, in the heaven to which 
 she had hoped her toil would give him at length admission, 
 her father had found his home. There was a glory in his 
 rest not reflected from her filial love, but from the all-avail- 
 ing love of Christ. 
 
 Then delay the rigor of your judgment ! she began, 
 yes, she, this Jacqueline, began to count the cost of what 
 she had done. She was not a sordid soul, she had not a 
 miserly nature. Before she had gone far in that strange 
 computation, she paused abruptly, with a crimsoned face, 
 and not with tearless eyes. Counting the cost ! Estimat- 
 ing the sacrifice ! Had, then, her purpose been less holy 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 203 
 
 because excited by falsehood and sustained through delu- 
 sion ? Was she less loving and less true, because deceived ? 
 And was she to lament that Christ, the one and only Priest, 
 rather than another instrumentality, was the deliverer of 
 her beloved from the power of death ? 
 
 No ritual was remembered, and no formula consulted, 
 when she cried out, " It is so ! and I thank Th'ee ! Only 
 give me now, my Jesus, a purpose as holy as that Thou 
 hast taken away ! " 
 
 But she had not come into her chamber to spend a 
 solitary evening there. Turning away from the window, 
 she bestowed a little care upon her person, smoothed away 
 the traces of her day's labor, and after all was done she 
 lingered yet longer. She was going out, evidently. Whith- 
 er ? To visit the mother of John Leclerc. She must carry 
 back the tracts the good woman had lent her. Their con- 
 tents had firm lodgment in her memory. 
 
 Others might run to and fro in the streets, and talk about 
 the corners, and prognosticate with passion, and defy, in 
 the way of cowardice, where safety rather than the truth is 
 well assured. If one woman could console another, Jacque- 
 line wished that she might console Leclerc's mother. And 
 if any words of wisdom could drop from the poor old 
 woman's lips while her soul was in this strait, Jacqueline 
 desired to hear those words. 
 
 Down the many flights of stairs she went across the court, 
 and then along the street, to the house where the wool- 
 comber lived. 
 
 A brief pause followed her knock for admittance. She 
 repeated it. Then was heard a sound from within, a 
 step crossing the floor. The door opened, and there stood 
 the mother of Leclerc, ready to face any danger, the very 
 Fiend himself. 
 
 But when she saw that it was Jacqueline, only Jacqueline, 
 an angel, as one might say, and not a devil, the terri- 
 ble look passed from her face ; she opened the door wide. 
 
 " Come in, child ! come in ! " 
 
2O4 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 So Jacqueline went into the room where John had worked 
 and thought, reasoned, argued, prayed. 
 
 This is the home of the man because of whom many 
 are this night offended in the city of Meaux. This is the 
 place whence issued the power that has set the tongues to 
 talking, and the minds to thinking, and the hearts to hop- 
 ing, and the authorities to avenging. 
 
 A grain of mustard-seed is the kingdom of heaven in a 
 figure ; the wandering winds a symbol of the Pentecostal 
 power : a dove did signify the descent of God to man. 
 This poor chamber, so pent in, and so lowly, so obscure, 
 has its significance. Here has a life been lived ; and not 
 the least does it import, that walls are rough and the ceil- 
 ing low. 
 
 But the life of John Leclerc was not to be limited. A 
 power has stood here which by its freedom has set at de- 
 fiance the customary calculation of the worldly-wise. In 
 high places and in low the people are this night disturbed 
 because of him who has dared to lift his voice in the free- 
 dom of the speech of God. In drawing-rooms odorous 
 with luxury the man's name has mention, and the vulgarity 
 of his liberated speech and courageous faith is a theme to 
 move the wonder and excite the reprobation of hearts whose 
 languid beating keeps up their show of life, to what 
 sufficient purpose expect me not to tell. His voice is loud 
 and harsh to echo through these music-loving halls ; it 
 rends and tears, with almost savage strength, the dainty 
 silences. 
 
 But busier tongues are elsewhere more vehement in 
 speech ; larger hearts beat faster indignation ; grief and 
 vulgarest curiosity are all manifesting themselves after their 
 several necessity. In solitary places heroes pray through- 
 out the night, wrestling like Jacob, agonizing like Saul, and 
 with some of them the angel left his blessing ; for some 
 the golden harp was struck that soothed their souls to peace. 
 Angels of heaven had work to do that night. Angels of 
 heaven and hell did prove themselves that night in Meaux ; 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 205 
 
 night of unrest and sleeplessness, or of cruel dreaming; 
 night of bloody visions, tortured by the apprehension of a 
 lacerated body driven through the city streets, and of the 
 hooting shouts of Devildom ; night-haunted by a gory im-. 
 age, the denied temple of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 Did the prospect of torture keep him wakeful ? Could 
 the man bear the disgrace, the derision, shouting, agony ? 
 Was there nothing in this thought, that as a witness of 
 Jesus Christ he was to appear next day, that should soothe 
 him even unto slumber ? Upon the silence of his guarded 
 chamber let none but ministering angels break. Sacred to 
 him, and to Him who watched the hours of the night, let 
 the night go ! 
 
 But here his mother, Jacqueline with her we may 
 linger with these. 
 
 V. 
 
 WHEN the old woman saw that it was Jacqueline 
 Gabrie who stood waiting admittance, she opened 
 the door wider, as I said ; and the dark solemnity of her 
 countenance seemed to be, by so much as a single ray, 
 enlivened for an instant. 
 
 She at once perceived the tracts which Jacqueline had 
 brought. Aware of this, the girl said, 
 
 " I stayed to hear them read, after I heard that for the 
 sake of the truth in them" she hesitated "this city 
 will invite God's wrath to-morrow." 
 
 And she gave the papers to the old woman, who took 
 them in silence. 
 
 By and by she asked, 
 
 " Are you just home, Jacqueline ? " 
 
 " Since sunset, though it was nearly dark when I came 
 in," she answered. "Victor Le Roy was down by the 
 river-bank, and he read them for me." 
 
 "He wanted to get out of town, may be. You would 
 surely have thought it was a holiday, Jacqueline, if you 
 
206 Victor and Jacqtieline. 
 
 could have seen the people. Anything for a show ; but 
 some of them might well lament. Did you want to know 
 the truth he pays so dear for teaching? But you have 
 heard it, my child." 
 
 " We all heard what he must pay for it, in the fields at 
 noon. Yes, mother, I wanted to know." 
 
 " But if you shall believe it, Jacqueline, it may lead you 
 into danger, into sad straits," said the old woman, looking 
 at the young girl with earnest pity in her eyes. 
 
 She loved this girl, and shuddered at the thought of 
 exposing her to danger. 
 
 Jacqueline had nursed her neighbor, Antonine, and more 
 than once, after a hard day's labor, which must be followed 
 by another, she had sat with her through the night; and 
 she could pay this service only with love, and the best gift 
 of her love was to instruct her in the truth. John and she 
 had proved their grateful interest in her fortunes by giving 
 her that which might expose her to danger, persecution, 
 and they could not foresee to what extremity of evil. 
 
 And now the old woman felt constrained to say this to 
 her, even for her love's sake, "It may lead you into 
 danger." 
 
 "But if truth is dangerous, shall I choose to be safe?" 
 answered Jacqueline, with stately courage. 
 
 " It is truth. It will support him. Blessed be Jesirs 
 Christ and His witnesses ! To-night, and to-morrow, and 
 the third day, our Jesus will sustain him. They think John 
 will retract. They do not know my son. They do not 
 know how he has waited, prayed, and studied to learn the 
 truth, and how dear it is to him. No, Jacqueline, they do 
 not. But when they prove him, they will know. And if 
 he is willing to witness, shall I not be glad ? The people 
 will understand him better afterward, and the priests, 
 maybe. ' I can do all things,' said he, ' Christ strengthen- 
 ing me'; and that was said long ago by one who was 
 proved. Where shall you be, Jacqueline ? " 
 
 " O," groaned Jacqueline, " I shall be in the fields at work, 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 207 
 
 away from these cruel people, and the noise and the sight. 
 But, mother, where shall you be?" 
 
 "With the people, child. With him, if I live. Yes, he 
 is my son ; and I have never been ashamed of the brave 
 boy. I will not be ashamed to-morrow. I will follow John ; 
 and when they bind him, I will let him see his mother's eyes 
 are on him, blessing him, my child ! Hark ! how they 
 talk through the streets ! Jacqueline, he was never a 
 coward. He is strong, too. They will not kill him, and 
 they cannot make him dumb. He will hold the truth the 
 faster for all they do to him. Jesus Christ on his side, do 
 you think he will fear the city, or all Paris, or all France ? 
 He does not know what it is to be afraid. And when God 
 opened his eyes to the truth of his Gospel, which the priests 
 had hid, he meant that John should work for it ; for he is 
 a working-man, whatever he sets about." 
 
 So this old woman tried, and not without success, to 
 comfort herself, and sustain her tender, proud, maternal 
 heart. The dire extremity into which she and her son had 
 fallen did not crush her ; few were the tears that fell from 
 her eyes as she recalled for Jacqueline the years of her 
 son's boyhood, told her of his courage, as in various 
 ways it had made itself manifest : how he had always been 
 fearless in danger, a conqueror of pain, seemingly re- 
 gardless of comfort, fond of contemplation, contented 
 with his humble state, kindly, affectionate, generous, but 
 easily stirred to wrath by injustice, when manifested by the 
 strong toward the weak, or by cruelty, or by falsehood. 
 
 Many an anecdote of his career might she relate; for 
 his character, under the pressure of this trial, which was 
 as searching and severe a test of her faith as of his, seemed 
 to illustrate itself in manifold heroic ways, all now of the 
 highest significance. With more majesty and grandeur his 
 character arose before her ; for now in all the past, as she 
 surveyed it, she beheld a living power, a capability, and a 
 necessity of new and grand significance, and her heart 
 reverenced the spirit she had nursed into being. 
 
208 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 Removed to the distance of a prison from her sight, 
 separated from her love by bolts and bars, and the wrath 
 of tyranny and close-banded bigotry, he became a power, 
 a hero, who moved her, as she recalled his sentence, and 
 prophesied the morrow, to a feeling tears could not ex- 
 plain. 
 
 They passed the night together, the young woman and 
 the old. In the morning, Jacqueline must go into the field 
 again. She was in haste to go. Leaving a kiss on the old 
 woman's cheek, she was about to steal away in silence ; 
 but as she laid her hand upon the latch, a thought arrested 
 her, and she did not open the door, but went back and sat 
 beside the window, and watched the mother of Leclerc 
 through the sleep that must be brief. It was not in her 
 heart to go away and leave those eyes to waken upon soli- 
 tude. She must see a helpful hand and hopeful face, and, 
 if it might be, hear a cheerful human voice, in the dawning 
 of that day. 
 
 She had not long to wait ; and the time she may have lost 
 in waiting Jacqueline did not count or reckon, when she 
 heard her name spoken, and could answer, "What wilt 
 thou ? here am I." 
 
 Not in vain had she lingered. What were wages, more 
 or less, that they should be mentioned, thought of, when 
 she might give and receive here what the world gives not, 
 and never has to give, and what a mortal cannot buy, 
 the treasure being priceless ? Through the quiet of that 
 morning hour, soothing words, and strong, she felt and 
 knew to speak ; and when at last she hurried away from 
 the city to the fields, she was stronger than of nature, able 
 to bear witness to the faith that speaks from the bewilder- 
 ment of its distresses, "Though He slay me, yet will I 
 trust in Him." 
 
 Not alone had her young, frank, loving eyes enlivened 
 the dreary morning to the heart of Leclerc's mother. Grace 
 for grace had she received. And words of the hymn that 
 were always on John's lips had found echo from his mother's 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 209 
 
 memory this morning : they lodged in the heart of Jacque- 
 line. She went away repeating, 
 
 " In the midst of death, the jaws 
 
 Of hell against us gape. 
 Who from peril dire as this 
 Openeth us escape ? 
 
 'T is thou, O Lord, alone 1 
 Our bitter suffering and our sin 
 Pity from thy mercy win, 
 Holy Lord and God I 
 Strong and holy God f 
 Merciful and holy Saviour ! 
 
 Eternal God 1 
 Let us not despair 
 For the fire that burneth there I 
 Kyrie, eleison 1 " 
 
 Jacqueline met Elsie on her way to the fields. But the 
 girls had not much to say to each other that morning in 
 their walk. Elsie was manifestly conscious of some great 
 constraint ; she might have reported to her friend what she 
 had heard in the streets last night, but she felt herself 
 prevented from such communication, seemed to be in- 
 tent principally on one thing : she would not commit her- 
 self in any direction. She was looking with suspicion 
 upon Jacqueline. Whatever became of her soul, her body 
 she would save alive. ' She was waking to this world's 
 enjoyment with vision alert, senses keen. Martyrdom in 
 any degree was without attraction to her, and in Truth she 
 saw no beauty that she should desire it. It was a root out 
 of dry ground indeed, that gave no promise of spreading 
 into goodly shelter and entrancing beauty. 
 
 As to Jacqueline, she was absorbed in her heroic and 
 exalted thoughts. Her heart had almost failed her when 
 she said farewell to John's mother ; tearfully she had hur- 
 ried on her way. One vast cloud hung between her and 
 heaven ; darkly rolled the river ; every face seemed to bear 
 witness to the tragedy that day should witness. 
 
 Not the least of her affliction was the consciousness of 
 the distance increasing between herself and Elsie Me'ril. 
 
 N 
 
2IO Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 She knew that Elsie was rejoicing that she had in no way 
 endangered herself yet ; and sure was she that in no way 
 would Elsie invite the fury of avenging tyranny and reck- 
 less superstition. 
 
 Jacqueline asked her no questions, spoke few words to 
 her, was absorbed in her own thoughts. But she was 
 kindly in her manner, and in such words as she spoke. 
 So Elsie perceived two things, that she should not lose 
 her friend, neither was in danger of being seized by the 
 heretical mania. It was her way of drawing inferences. 
 Certain that she had not lost her friend, because Jacqueline 
 did not look away, and refuse to recognize her ; congratulat- 
 ing herself that she was not the object of suspicion, either 
 justly or unjustly, among the dreadful priests. 
 
 But that friend whose steady eye had balanced Elsie 
 was already sick at heart, for she knew that never more 
 must she rely upon this girl who came with her from 
 Domre'my. 
 
 As they crossed the bridge, lingering thereon a moment, 
 the river seemed to moan in its flowing toward Meaux. 
 The day's light was sombre ; the birds' songs had no 
 joyous sound, plaintive was their chirping ; it saddened 
 the heart to hear the wind, it was a wind that seemed to 
 take the buoyancy and freshness out of every living thing, 
 an ugly southeast wind. They went on together, to the 
 wheat-fields together. It was to be day of minutes to 
 poor Jacqueline. 
 
 To be away from Meaux bodily was, it appeared, only 
 that the imagination might have freer exercise. Yes, 
 now the people must be moving through the streets ; shop- 
 men were not so intent on profits this day as they were on 
 Other days. The priests were thinking with vengeful hate 
 of the wrong to themselves which should be met and con- 
 quered that day. The people should be swiftly brought 
 into order again ! John in his prison was preparing, as all 
 without the prison were. 
 
 The crowd was gathering fast. He would soon be led 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 211 
 
 forth. The shameful march was forming. Now the brutal 
 hand of Power was lifted with scourges. The bravest man 
 in Meaux was driven through the streets, she saw with 
 what a visage, she knew with what a heart. Her heart 
 was awed with thinking thereupon. A bloody mist seemed 
 to fall upon the environs of Meaux ; through that red 
 horror she could not penetrate ; it shrouded and it held 
 poor Jacqueline. 
 
 , Of the faith that would sustain him she began once more 
 to inquire. It is not by a bound that mortals ever clear the 
 heights of God". Step by step they scale the eminences, 
 toiling through the heavenly atmosphere. Only around the 
 summit shines the eternal sun. 
 
 So she must now recall the words that Victor Le Roy 
 read for her last night ^ and the words he spoke from out 
 his heart, these also. And she did not fear now, as 
 yesterday, to ask for light. Let the light dawn, oh, let it 
 shine on her ! 
 
 The mother of Leclerc had uttered mysterious words 
 which Jacqueline took for truth ; the light was joyful and 
 blessed, and of all things to be desired, though it smote the 
 life from one like lightning. She waited alone with faith, 
 watching till it should come, left alone with this beam 
 glimmering like a moth through darkness ! for thus was 
 a believer, or one who resolved on believing, left in that 
 day, when he turned from the machinery of the Church, 
 and stood alone, searching for God without the aid of 
 priestly intervention. 
 
 VI. 
 
 THERE was something awful in such loneliness. 
 Jacqueline knew little of it until now, as she walked 
 toward the fields, by the side of Elsie Me'ril. 
 
 She saw how she had depended on the priest of Dom- 
 re"my, as he had been the lawgiver and the leader of her 
 life. A spiritual life, to be sustained only by the invisible 
 
212 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 spirit, to be lived by faith, not in man, but in God, without 
 intervention of saint or angel or Blessed Virgin, was the 
 world's life liberated by such freedom ? 
 
 By faith, and not by sight, the just must live. Would 
 He bow his heavens and come down to dwell with the 
 contrite and the humble? 
 
 Wondrous strange it seemed, incomprehensible, more 
 than she could manage or control. There are prisoners 
 whose pardon proves the world too large for them: they 
 find no rest until their prison-door is opened for them again. 
 
 Of this- class was Elsie, not Jacqueline. Elsie was 
 afraid of freedom, not equal to it, unable to deal with 
 it ; satisfied with being a child, with being a slave, when it 
 came to be a question whether she should accept and use 
 her highest privilege and dignity. At this hour, and among 
 all persuasions, you will find that Elsie does not stand 
 alone. Little children there are, long as the world shall 
 stand, though not precisely such as we think of when we 
 remember, " Of such is the kingdom of heaven." 
 
 It was enough for Elsie it is enough for multitudes 
 through all the reformations that she had an earthly 
 defence, even such as she relied on without trouble. She 
 lived in the hour. She had never toiled to deliver her 
 darling from the lions, to redeem a soul from purgatory. 
 She eased her conscience, when it was troubled, by such 
 shallow discovery of herself as she deemed confession. 
 She loved dancing, and all other amusements, hated soli- 
 tude, knew not the meaning of self-abnegation. And let 
 her dance and enjoy herself ! some service to the body is 
 rendered thereby. She might do greatly worse, and is in- 
 capable of doing greatly better. Will you stint the idiots 
 of comfort, or rather build them decent habitations, and 
 even vex yourself to feed and clothe them, in reverent con- 
 fidence that the Future shall surely take them up and bless 
 them, unstop their ears, open their eyes, give speech to 
 them and absolute deliverance? 
 
 There are others beside Elsie who congratulate them- 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 213 
 
 selves on non-committal, they covet not the advanced 
 and dangerous positions. Honorable, but dangerous posi- 
 tions ! The head might be taken off, do you not see ? 
 And could all eternity compensate for the loss of time ? 
 Ah, the body might be mutilated, the liberty restrained : 
 as if, indeed, a man's freedom were not eternally established, 
 when his enemies, howling around, must at least crucify 
 him ! as if a divine voice were not ever heard through the 
 raging of the people, saying, " Come up higher ! " 
 
 But a fern-leaf cannot grow into a mighty hemlock-tree. 
 From the ashes of a sparrow the phcenix shall not rise. 
 You will not to all eternity, by any artificial means, nor by 
 a miracle, bring forth an eagle from a mollusk. 
 
 There was not a sadder heart in all those fields of Meaux 
 than the heart of Jacqueline Gabrie. There was not a 
 stronger heart. Not a hand labored more diligently. Under 
 the broad-brimmed peasant-hat was a sad countenance, 
 under the peasant-dress a heavily burdened spirit. Silent, 
 all day, she labored. She was alone at noon under the 
 river-bordered trees, eating her coarse fare without zest, but 
 with a conscience, to sustain the body that was born to 
 toil. But in the maelstrom of doubt and anxiety was she 
 tossed and whirled, and she cared not for her life. To be 
 rid of it, now for the first time, she felt might be a blessing. 
 What purpose, indeed, had she? She turned her thought 
 from this question, but it would not let her alone. Again 
 and yet again she turned to meet it, and thus would surely 
 have at length its satisfying answer. 
 
 John Leclerc might pass through this ordeal, as from 
 the first she had expected of him. But she listened to the 
 speech of many of her fellow-laborers. Some prophecies 
 which had a sound incredible escaped them. She did not 
 credit them, but they tormented her. They contended with 
 one another. John, some foretold, would certainly retract. 
 One day of public whipping would suffice. When the 
 blood began to flow, he would see his duty clearer ! The 
 men were prophesying from the depths and the abundance 
 
214 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 of their self-consciousness. Others speculated on the final 
 result of the executed sentence. They believed that the 
 "obstinacy" and courage of the man would provoke his 
 judges, and the executors of his sentence ; that with rigor 
 they would execute it; and that, led on by passion, and 
 provoked by such as would side with the victim, the sen- 
 tence would terminate in his destruction. Sooner or later, 
 nothing but his life would be found ultimately to satisfy his 
 enemies. 
 
 It might be so, thought Jacqueline Gabrie. What tKen ? 
 what then ? she thought. There was inspiration to the 
 girl in that cruel prophecy. Her life-work was not ended. 
 If Christ was the One Ransom, and it did truly fall on 
 Him, and not on her, to care for those beloved, departed 
 from this life, her work was still for love. 
 
 John Leclerc disabled or dead, who should care then for 
 his aged mother? Who should minister to him? Who, 
 indeed, but Jacqueline ? 
 
 Living or dying, she said to herself, with grand enthusi- 
 asm, living or dying, let him do the Master's pleasure ! 
 She also was here to serve that Master; and while in 
 spiritual things he fed the hungry, clothed the naked, gave 
 the cup of living water, visited the imprisoned, and the 
 sick of sin, she would bind herself to minister to him and 
 his old mother in temporal things ; so should he live above 
 all cares save those of heavenly love. She could support 
 them all by her diligence, and in this there would be joy. 
 
 She thought this through her toil ; and the thought was 
 its own reward. It strengthened her like an angel, 
 strengthened heart and faith. She labored as no other 
 peasant- woman did that day, like a beast of burden, 
 unresisting, patient, like a holy saint, so peaceful and 
 assured, so conscious of the present very God ! 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 21$ 
 
 VII. 
 
 THE three days passed away. And every hour's pro- 
 gress was marked as it passed over the citizens of 
 Meaux. Leclerc, and the doctrines for which he suffered, 
 filled the people's thought ; he was their theme of speech. 
 Wonder softened into pity; unbelief was goaded by his 
 stripes to cruelty ; faith became transfigured, while he, 
 followed by the hooting crowd, endured the penalty of faith. 
 Some men looked on with awe that would become adoring ; 
 some with surprise that would take refuge in study and 
 conviction. There were tears as well as exultation, solemn 
 joy as well as execration, in his train. The mother of 
 Leclerc followed him with her undaunted testimony, " Bless- 
 ed be Jesus Christ and His Witnesses ! " 
 
 By day, in the field, Jacqueline Gabrie thought over the 
 reports she heard, through the harvesters, of the city's feel- 
 ing, of its purpose, of its judgment ; by night she prayed 
 and hoped, with the mother of Leclerc ; and wondrous was 
 the growth her faith had in those days. 
 
 On the evening of the third day, Jacqueline and Elsie 
 walked into Meaux together. This was not invariably their 
 habit. Elsie had avoided too frequent conversation with 
 her friend . of late. She knew their paths were separate, 
 and was never so persuaded of the fact as this night, when, 
 of her own will, she sought to walk with Jacqueline. The 
 sad face of her friend troubled her; it moved her con- 
 science that she did not deeply share in her anxiety. When 
 they came from Domre'my, she had relied on Jacqueline : 
 there was safety in her counsel, there was wisdom in it : 
 but now, either ? 
 
 " It made me scream outright, when I saw the play," said 
 she ; " but it is worse to see your face now-a-days, it is 
 more terrible, Jacqueline." 
 
 Jacqueline made no reply to this; and Elsie regarded 
 the silence as sufficient provocation. 
 
216 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 " You seem to think I have no feeling," said she. " I am 
 as sorry about the poor fellows as you can be. But I can- 
 not look as if I thought the day of judgment close at hand, 
 when I don't, Jacqueline." 
 
 " Very well, Elsie. I am not complaining of your looks." 
 
 " But you are, or you might as well." 
 
 " Let not that trouble you, Elsie. Your face is smooth, 
 at least ; and your voice does not sound like the voice of 
 one who is in grief. Rejoice, for, as you say, you have a 
 right to yourself, with which I am not to interfere. We are 
 old friends, we came away from Lorraine together. Do 
 not forget that. I never will forget it." 
 . " But you are done with me. You say nothing to me. I 
 might as well be dead, for all you care." 
 
 " Let us not talk of such things in this manner," said 
 Jacqueline, mildly. But the dignity of her rebuke was felt, 
 for Elsie said, 
 
 " But I seem to have lost you, and now we are alone 
 together, I may say it. Yes, I have lost you, Jacqueline ! " 
 
 " This is not the first time we have been alone together 
 in these dreadful three days." . 
 
 " But now I cannot help speaking." 
 
 " You could help it before. Why, Elsie ? You had not 
 made up your mind. But now you have, or you would not 
 speak, and insist on speaking. What have you to say, 
 then?" ' 
 
 " Jacqueline ! Are you Jacqueline ? " 
 
 "Am I not?" 
 
 "You seem not to be." 
 
 " How is it, Elsie ? " 
 
 "You are silent and stern, and I think you are very 
 unhappy, Jacqueline." 
 
 " I do not know, not unhappy, I think. Perhaps I 
 am silent, I have been so busy. But for all it is so 
 dreadful no ! not unhappy, Elsie." 
 
 " Thinking of Leclerc all' the while ? " 
 
 " Of him ? O, no ! I have not been thinking of him, 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 217 
 
 not constantly. Jesus Christ will take care of him. His 
 mother is quiet, thinking that. I, at least, can be as strong 
 as she. I 'in not thinking of the shame and cruelty, but 
 of what that can be worth which is so much to him, that he 
 counts this punishment, as they call it, as nothing, as hardly 
 pain, certainly not disgrace. The Truth, Elsie ! if I have 
 not as much to say, it is because I have been trying to find 
 the Trufh." 
 
 "But if you have found it, then I hope I never' shall, 
 if it is the Truth that makes you so gloomy. I thought it 
 was this business in Meaux." 
 
 " Gloomy ? when it may be I have found, or shall find " 
 
 Here Jacqueline hesitated, looked at Elsie. Grave 
 enough was that look to expel every frivolous feeling from 
 the heart of Elsie, at least, so Ibng as she remained 
 under its influence. It was something to trust another as 
 Jacqueline intended .now to trust her friend. It was a 
 touching sight to see her seeking her old confidence, and 
 appearing to rely on it, while she knew how frail the reed 
 was. But this girl, frivolous as was her spirit, this girl had 
 come with her from the distant native village ; their child- 
 hood's recollections were the same. And Jacqueline deter- 
 mined now to trust her. For in times of blasting heat the 
 shadow even of the gourd is not to be despised. 
 
 " You know what I have looked for so long, Elsie," she 
 said ; " you ought to rejoice with me. I need work for that 
 no longer." 
 
 "What is that, Jacqueline?" 
 
 Even this question, betraying no such apprehension as 
 Jacqueline's word's seemed to intimate, did not disturb the 
 girl. She was in the mood wKen, notwithstanding her show 
 of dependence, she was really in no such necessity, Never 
 was she stronger than now when she put off all show of 
 strength. Elsie stood before her in place of the opposing 
 world. To Elsie's question she replied as readily as though 
 she -anticipated the word, and had no expectation of better 
 recollection, not to speak of better apprehension. 
 10 
 
218 Victor and Jacqtieline. 
 
 " To bring him out of suffering he has never been made 
 to endure, as surely as God lives. As if the Almighty 
 judged men so ! I shall send back no more money to 
 Father La Croi'x. It is not his prayer, nor my earnings, 
 that will have to do with the eternity of John Gabrie. Do 
 you hear me, Elsie?" 
 
 " I seem to, Jacqueline." 
 
 " Have I any cause for wretched looks, then ? . \ am in 
 sight of better fortune than I ever hoped for in this world." 
 
 " Then don't look so fearful. It is enough to scare one. 
 You are not a girl to choose to be a fright, unless this 
 dreadful city has changed you altogether from what you 
 were. You would frighten the Domre'my children with 
 such a face as that ; they used not to fear Jacqueline." 
 
 " I shall soon be sailing on a smoother sea. As it is, do 
 not speak of my looks. That is too foolish." 
 
 ' " But, O, I feel as if I must hold you, hold you ! 
 you are leaving me ! " 
 
 " Come on, Elsie ! " exclaimed Jacqueline, as though she 
 almost hoped this of her dear companion. 
 
 " But where ? " asked Elsie, not so tenderly. 
 
 "Where God leads. I cannot tell." 
 
 " I do not understand." 
 
 "You would not think the Truth worth buying at the 
 price of your life ? " 
 
 " My life ? " 
 
 " Or such a price as he pays who has been branded 
 to-day ? " 
 
 "It was not the truth to your mother, or to mine. It 
 was not the truth to any one we ever knew, till we came 
 here to Meaux." 
 
 "It is true to my heart, Elsie. It is true to my con- 
 science. I know that I can live for it. And it may 
 be " 
 
 " Hush ! do not ! O, I wish that I could get you back 
 to Domre'my ! What is going to come of this ? Jacque- 
 line, let us go home. Come, let us start to-night. We shall 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 219 
 
 have the moon all night to walk by. There is nothing in 
 Meaux for us. O, if we had never come- away ! It would 
 have been better for you to work there for what you wanted, 
 for what you came here to do." 
 
 " No, let God's Truth triumph ! What am I ? Less 
 than that rush ! But if His breath is upon me, I will be 
 moved by it, I am not a stone." 
 
 Then they walked on in silence. Elsie had used her 
 utmost of persuasion, but Jacqueline not her utmost of 
 resistance. Her companion knew this, felt her weakness in 
 such a contest, and was silent. 
 
 On to town they went together. They walked together 
 through the streets, passing constantly knots of people who 
 stood about the corners and among the shops, discussing, 
 what had taken place that day. They crossed the square 
 where the noonday sun had shone on crowds of people, 
 men and women, gathered from the four quarters of the 
 town arid the neighboring country, assembled to witness 
 the branding of a heretic. They entered their court-yard 
 together, ascended the stairway leading to their lodging. 
 But they were two, not one. 
 
 Elsie's chief desire had been to get Jacqueline safely into 
 the house ere she could find opportunity for expression of 
 what was passing in her mind. Her fear was even greater* 
 than her curiosity. She had no desire to learn, under these 
 present circumstances, the arguments and incidents which 
 the knots 'of men and women were discussing with so much 
 vehemence as they passed by. She could guess enough to 
 satisfy her. So she had hurried along, betraying more 
 eagerness than was common with her to get out of the 
 street. Not often was she so overcome of weariness, 
 not often so annoyed by heat and dust! Jacqueline, with- 
 out remonstrance, followed her. But they were two, - 
 not one. 
 
 Once safe in their upper room, Elsie appeared to be, after 
 all, not so devoid of interest in what was passing in the 
 street as her hurried walk would seem to betoken. She 
 
22O Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 had not quite yet lost her taste for excitement and display. 
 For immediately she seated herself by the window, and 
 was all eye and ear to what went on outside. 
 
 Jacqueline's demonstrations also were quite other than 
 might have been anticipated. Each step she took in her 
 chamber gave an indication that she had a purpose, and 
 that she would perform it. 
 
 She removed from her dress the dust and stain of toil, 
 arranged her hair, made herself clean and decent, to meet 
 the sober gaze of others. Then she placed upon the table 
 the remains of their breakfast ; but she ate nothing. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 IT was nearly dark when Jacqueline said to Elsie, 
 " I am now going to see John and his mother. I must 
 see with my own eyes, and hear with my own ears. I may 
 be able to help them, and I know they will be able to 
 help me. John's word will be worth hearing, and I want 
 to hear it. He must have learned in these days more than 
 we shall ever be able to learn for ourselves. Will you go 
 with me ? " 
 
 " No," cried Elsie, as though she feared she might 
 against her will be taken into such company. Then, not 
 for her own sake, but for Jacqueline's, she added, almost as 
 if she hoped that she might prove successful in persuasion, 
 " I remember my father and mother. What they taught 
 me I believe. And that I shall live by. I shall never be 
 wiser than they were. And I know I never can be happier. 
 They were good and honest. Jacqueline, we shall never 
 be as happy again as we were in Domre'my, when the 
 pastor blessed us, and we hunted flowers for the altar, 
 never ! never ! " And Elsie Me'ril, overcome by her recol- 
 lections and her presentiments, burst into tears. 
 
 "It was the happiness of ignorance," said Jacqueline, 
 after a solemn silence, full of hurried thought. " No, I, 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 221 
 
 for one, shall never be as happy as I was then. But my 
 joy will be full of peace and bliss. It will be full of satis- 
 faction, very different, but such as belongs to me, such 
 as I must not do without. God led us from Domre'my, and 
 with me shall He do as seemeth good to Him. We were 
 children then, Elsie ; but now may we be children no 
 longer ! " 
 
 "I will be faithful to my mother. Go, Jacqueline, let 
 me alone." 
 
 Elsie said this with so much spirit that Jacqueline an- 
 swered quickly, and yet very kindly, 
 
 " I did not mean to trouble you, dear, but no matter 
 now." 
 
 No sooner had Jacqueline left the house than Elsie went 
 down to a church near by, where she confessed herself to 
 the priest, and received such goodly counsel as was calcu- 
 lated to fortify her against Jacqueline in the future. 
 
 Jacqueline went to the house of the wool-comber, as of 
 late had been her nightly custom, but not, as heretofore, 
 to lighten the loneliness and anxiety of the mother of 
 Leclerc. Already she had said to the old woman, 
 
 " I need not work now for my father's redemption. Then 
 I will work for you, if your son is disabled. Let us believe 
 tliat God brought me here for this. I am strong. You can 
 lean on me. Try it." 
 
 Now she went to make repetition of the promise to 
 Leclerc, if, perchance, he had come back to his mother sick 
 and sore and helpless. For this reason, when she entered 
 the humble home of the martyr, his eyes fell 'on her, and 
 he saw her as she had been an angel ; how serene was her 
 countenance ; and her courage was manifestly such as no 
 mortal fear, no human affliction, could dismay. 
 
 Already in that room faithful friends had gathered to 
 congratulate the living man, and to refresh their strength 
 from the abounding richness of his. 
 
 Martial Mazurier, the noted preacher, was there, and 
 
222 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 Victor Le Roy; besides these, others, unknown by name 
 or presence to Jacqueline. 
 
 Among them was the wool-comber, wounded with 
 many stripes, branded, a heretic ! But a man still, it ap- 
 peared, a living man, brave as any hero, determined 
 as a saint, ready to proclaim now the love of God, and 
 from the couch where he was lying to testify to Jesus and 
 his Truth. 
 
 It was a goodly sight to see the tenderness of these men 
 here gathered ; how they were forgetful of .all inequalities 
 of station, such as worldlings live by, meeting on a new 
 ground, and greeting one another in a new spirit. 
 
 They had come to learn of John. A halo surrounded 
 him ; he was transfigured ; and through that cloud of 
 glory they would fain penetrate. Perchance his eyes, as 
 Stephen's, had seen heaven open, when men had tried 
 their torments. At least, they had witnessed, when they fol- 
 lowed the crowd, that his face, in contrast with theirs who 
 tormented, shone, as it had been the face of an angel. 
 They had witnessed his testimony given in the heroic en- 
 durance of physical pain. There was more to be learned 
 than the crowd were fit to hear or could hear. Broken 
 strains of the Lord's song they heard him singing through 
 the torture. Now they had come longing for the full 
 burden of that divinest melody. 
 
 Jacqueline entered the room quietly, scarcely observed. 
 She sat down by the door, and it chanced to be near the 
 mother of Leclerc, near Victor Le Roy. 
 
 To their conversation she listened as one who listens for 
 his life, td the reading of the Scripture, to the singing 
 of the psalm, that grand old version, 
 
 " Out of the depths I cry to thee, 
 
 Lord God ! O, hear my prayer ! 
 Incline a gracious ear to me, 
 
 And bid me not despair. 
 If thou rememberest each misdeed, \ 
 If each should have its rightful meed, 
 
 Lord, who shall stand before thee ? 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 223 
 
 " Lord, through thy love alone we gain 
 
 The pardon of our sin : 
 The strictest life is but in vain, 
 
 Our works can nothing win, 
 That man should boast himself of aught, 
 But own in fear thy grace hath wrought 
 
 What in him seemeth righteous. 
 
 "Wherefore my hope is in the Lord, 
 
 My works I count but dust ; 
 I build not there, but on his word, 
 
 And in his goodness trust. 
 Up to his care myself I yield ; 
 He is my tower, my rock, my shield ; 
 
 And for his help I tarry." 
 
 To the praying of the broken voice of John Leclerc she 
 listened. In his prayer she joined. To the eloquence of 
 Mazurier, whose utterances she laid up in her heart, to 
 the fervor of Le Roy, which left her eyes not dry, her soul 
 not calm, but strong in its commotion, grasping fast the 
 eternal truths which he, too, would proclaim, she listened. 
 
 She was not only now among them, she was of them, 
 of them forevermore. Though she should never again look 
 on those faces, nor listen to those voices, of them, of all 
 they represented, was she forevermore. Their God was 
 hers, their faith was hers ; their danger would she share, 
 their work would aid. 
 
 Their talk was of the Truth, and of the future of the 
 Truth. Well .they understood that the spirit roused among 
 the people would not be quieted again, that what of 
 ferocity in the nature of the bigot and the powerful had 
 been appeased had but for the moment been satisfied. 
 There would be unremitting watch for victims ; everywhere 
 the net for the unwary and the fearless would be laid. 
 Blood-thirstiness and lust and covetousness would make 
 grand their disguises, broad would their phylacteries be 
 made, shining with sacred gems, their breastplates. 
 
 Of course it was of the great God's honor these men 
 would be jealous. This heresy must needs be uprooted, or 
 
224 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 no knowing where would be the end of the wild growth. 
 And, indeed, there was no disputing the fact that there was 
 danger in open acceptance of such doctrines as . defy the 
 authority of priestcraft, ay, danger to falsehood, and 
 death to falsehood ! 
 
 Fanaticism, cowardice, cruelty, the spirit of persecution, 
 the spirit of authority aroused, ignorance and vanity and 
 foolishness would make themselves companions, no doubt. 
 Should Truth succumb to these? Should Love retreat 
 before the fierce onset of Hate ? These brave men said 
 not so. And they looked above them and all human aid 
 for succor, Jacqueline with them. 
 
 When Mazurier and Victor Le Roy went away, they left 
 Jacqueline with the wool-comber's mother, but they did not 
 pass by her without notice. Martial lingered for a moment, 
 looking down on the young girl. 
 
 " She is one of us," said the old woman. 
 - Then the preacher laid his hand upon her head, and 
 blessed her. 
 
 " Continue in prayer, and listen to the testimony of the 
 Holy Ghost," said he. " Then shall you surely come deep 
 into the blessed knowledge and the dear love of Jesus 
 Christ." 
 
 When he had passed on, Victor paused in turn. 
 
 " It is good to be here, Jacqueline," said he. " This is 
 the house of God ; this is the gate of heaven." 
 
 And he also went forth, whither Mazurier had gone. 
 
 Then beside the bed of the poor wool-comber, women, 
 like angels ministered, binding up his wounds, and sooth- 
 ing him with voices soft as ever spoke to man. And from 
 the peasant whose toil was in harvest-fields and vineyards 
 came offers of assistance which the poor can best give the 
 poor. 
 
 But the wool-comber did not need the hard-earned pence 
 of Jacqueline. When she said, " Let me serve you now, as 
 a daughter and a sister, you two," he made no mistake in 
 regard to her words and offer. But he had no need of just 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 225 
 
 such service as she stood prepared to render. In his toil 
 he had looked forward to the seasons of adversity, had 
 provided for a dark day's disablement ; and he was able 
 now to smile upon his mother and on Jacqueline, and to 
 say, 
 
 " I will, indeed, be a brother to you, and my mother will 
 love you as if you were her child. But we shall not take 
 the bread from your mouth to prove it. Our daughter and 
 our sister in the Lord, we thank you and love you, Jacque- 
 line. I know what you have been doing since I went away. 
 The Lord love you, Jacqueline ! You will no longer be a 
 stranger and friendless in Meaux, while John Leclerc and 
 his mother are alive, nay, as long as a true man or 
 woman lives in Meaux. Fear not." 
 
 " I will not fear," said Jacqueline. 
 
 And she sat by the side of the mother of Leclerc, and 
 thought of her own mother in the heavens, and was tran- 
 quil, and prepared, she said to herself, to walk, if indeed 
 she must, through the valley of the shadow of death, and 
 would still fear no evil. 
 
 IX. 
 
 STRENGTHENED and inspired by the scenes of the 
 last three days, Martial Mazurier began to preach 
 with an enthusiasm, bravery, and eloquence unknown be- 
 fore to his hearers. He threw himself into the work of 
 preaching the new revelation of the ancient eternal Truth, 
 with an ardor that defied authority, that scorned danger, 
 and with a recklessness that had its own reward. 
 
 Victor Le Roy was his ardent admirer, his constant 
 follower, his loving friend, his servant. Day by day this 
 youth was studying with indefatigable zeal the truths and 
 doctrines adopted by his teacher. Enchanted by the wise 
 man's eloquence, ahfcady a convert to the faith he magnified, 
 he was prepared to follow wherever the preacher led. The 
 10* o 
 
226 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 fascination of danger he felt, and was allured by. Frown- 
 ing faces had for him no terrors. He could defy evil. 
 
 Jacqueline and he might be called most friendly students. 
 Often in the cool of the day the young man walked out 
 from Meaux along the 'country-roads, and his face was 
 always toward the setting sun, whence towards the east 
 Jacqueline at that hour would be coming. The girls were 
 living in the region of the vineyards now, and among the 
 vines they worked. 
 
 It began to be remarked by some of their companions 
 how much Jacqueline Gabrie and the young student from 
 the city walked together. But the subject of their dis- 
 course, as they rested under the trees that fringed the river, 
 was not within the range of common speculation ; far 
 enough removed from the ordinary use to which the peas- 
 ants put their thought was the thinking of Le Roy and 
 Jacqueline. 
 
 Often Victor went, carefully and with a student's pre- 
 cision, over the grounds of Martial's arguments, for the 
 satisfaction of Jacqueline. Much pride as well as joy had 
 he in the service ; for he reverenced his teacher, and feared 
 nothing so much, in these repetitions, as that this listener, 
 this animated, thinking, feeling Jacqueline, should lose any- 
 thing by his transmission of the preacher's arguments and 
 eloquence. 
 
 And sometimes, on those special occasions which were 
 now constantly occurring, she walked with him to the town, 
 and hearkened for herself in the assemblages of those who 
 were now one in the faith. 
 
 Elsie looked on and wondered, but did not jest with 
 Jacqueline, as girls are wont to jest with one another on 
 such points as seemed involved in this friendship between 
 youth and youth, between man and woman. 
 
 Towards the conclusion of the girl's appointed labor in 
 the vineyard, a week passed in which Victor Le Roy had 
 not once come out from Meaux in fee direction of the 
 setting sun. He knew the time when the peasants' labor in 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 227 
 
 the vineyard would be done ; Jacqueline had told him ; 
 and with wonder, and with trouble, she lived through the 
 days that brought no word from him. 
 
 At work early and late, Jacqueline had no opportunity of 
 discovering what was going on in Meaux. But it chanced, 
 on the last day of the last week in the vineyard, tidings 
 reached her : Martial Mazurier had been arrested, and 
 would be tried, the rumor said, as John Leclerc had been 
 tried; and sentence would be pronounced, doubtless, said 
 conjecture, severe in proportion to the influence the man 
 had acquired, to the position he held. 
 
 Hearing this, oppressed, troubled, yet not doubting, Jac- 
 queline determined that she would go to Meaux that even- 
 ing, and so ascertain the truth. She said nothing to Elsie 
 of her purpose. She was careful in all things to aveid that 
 which might involve her companion in peril in an unknown 
 future ; but at nightfall she had made herself ready to set 
 out for Meaux, when her purpose was changed in the first 
 steps by the appearance of Victor Le Roy. 
 . He had come to Jacqueline, had but one purpose in 
 his coming ; yet it was she who must say, 
 
 " Is it true, Victor, that Martial Mazurier is in prison ?" 
 
 His answer surprised her. 
 
 "No, it is not true." 
 
 But his countenance did not answer the glad expression 
 of her face with an equal smile. His gravity almost com- 
 municated itself to her. Yet this rebound from her recent 
 dismay surely might demand an opportunity. 
 
 " I believe you," said she. " But I was coming to see if 
 it could be true. It was hard to believe, and yet it has 
 cost me a great deal to persuade myself against belief, 
 Victor." 
 
 " It will cost you still more, Jacqueline. Martial Mazurier 
 has recanted." 
 1 "He has been in prison, then?" 
 
 " He has retracted, and is free again, has denied him- 
 self. No more glorious words from him, Jacqueline, such 
 
228 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 as we have heard ! He has sold himself to the Devil, you 
 see." 
 
 "^Mazurier?" 
 
 " Mazurier has thought raiment better than life. He has 
 believed a man's life to consist in the abundance of the 
 things he possesseth," said the youth, bitterly. He con- 
 tinued, looking steadfastly at Jacqueline, " Probably I must 
 give up the Truth also. My uncle is dead: 'must I not 
 secure my possessions ? for I am no longer a poor man ; 
 I cannot afford to let my life fall into the hands of those 
 wolves." 
 
 " Mazurier retracted ? I cannot believe it, Victor Le 
 Roy!" 
 
 " Believe, then, that yesterday the man was in prison, and 
 to-day he is at large. Yes, he says that he can serve Jesus 
 Christ more favorably, more successfully, by complying 
 with the will of the bishop and the priests. You see the 
 force of his argument. If he should be silenced, or im- 
 prisoned long, or his life should be cut off, he would then 
 be able to preach no more at all in any way. He only does 
 not believe that whosoever will save his life, in opposition 
 to the law of the everlasting Gospel, must lose it." 
 
 " O, do you remember what he said to John, what he 
 prayed in that room ? O, Victor, what does it mean ? " 
 
 " It means what cannot be spoken, what I dare not say 
 or think." 
 
 " Not that we are wrong, mistaken, Victor ? " 
 
 " No, Jacqueline, never ! it can never mean that ! What- 
 ever we may do with the Truth, we cannot make it false. 
 We may act like cowards, unworthy, ungrateful, ignorant ; 
 but the truth will remain, Jacqueline." 
 
 "Victor, you could not desert it." 
 
 " How can I tell, Jacqueline ? The last time I saw 
 Martial Mazurier, he would have said nobler and more 
 loving words than I can command. But with my own eyes 
 I saw him walking at liberty in streets where liberty for 
 him to walk could be bought only at an infamous price." 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 229 
 
 " Is there such danger for all men .who believe with John 
 Leclerc, and with with you, Victor?" 
 
 "Yes, there is danger, such danger." 
 
 " Then you must go away. You must not stay in Meaux," 
 she said, quickly, in a low, determined voice. 
 
 " Jacqueline, I must remain in Meaux," he answered, as 
 quickly, with flushed face and flashing eyes. The dignity 
 of conscious integrity, and the "fear of fear," a beholder 
 who could discern the tokens might have perceived in him. 
 
 " O, then, who can tell ? Did he not pray that he might 
 not be led into temptation ? " 
 
 " Yes," Victor replied, more troubled than scornful, 
 " yes, and allowed himself to be led at last." 
 
 " But if you should go away " 
 
 "Would not that be flying from danger?" he asked, 
 proudly. 
 
 " Nay, might it not be doing with your might what you 
 found to do, that you might not be led into temptation ?" 
 
 " And you are afraid, that, if I stay here, I shall yield to 
 them." 
 
 " You say you are not certain, Victor. You repeat Ma- 
 zurier's words." 
 
 " Yet shall I remain. No, I will never run away." 
 
 The pride of the young fellow, and the consternation 
 occasioned by the recreancy of his superior, his belief in 
 the doctrines he had confessed with Mazurier, and the 
 timeserving of the latter, had evidently thrown asunder 
 the guards of his peace, and produced a sad state of con- 
 fusion. 
 
 " It were better to run away," said Jacqueline, not paus- 
 ing to choose the word, " far better than to stay and defy 
 the Devil, and then find that you could not resist him, 
 Victor. O, if we could go, as Elsie said, back to Domre'my, 
 anywhere away from this cruel Meaux ! " 
 
 " Have you, then, gained nothing, Jacqueline ? " 
 
 " Everything. But to lose it, oh, I cannot afford that ! " 
 
 " Let us stand together, then. Promise me, Jacqueline," 
 
230 Victor and Jacqiteline. 
 
 he exclaimed, eagerly, as though he felt himself among 
 defences here, with her. 
 
 "What shall I promise, Victor?" she asked, with the 
 voice and the look of one who is ready for any deed of 
 daring, for any work of love. 
 
 " I, too, have preached this word." 
 
 Her only comment was, " I know you preached it well." 
 
 " What has befallen others may befall me." 
 
 " Well." 
 
 So strong f ?o confidently did she speak this word, that 
 the young man went on, manifestly influenced by it, hesitat- 
 ing no more in his speech. 
 
 " May befall me," he repeated. 
 
 " ' Whosoever believeth in me, though he were dead, yet 
 shall he live,' " she answered, with lofty voice, repeating the 
 divine word. " What is our life, that we should hold it at 
 the expense of his Truth ? Mazurier was wrong. He can 
 never atone for the wrong he has done." 
 
 " I believe it ! " exclaimed Victor, with a brightening 
 countenance. The clouds of doubt rose from his face and 
 floated away, as we see the mists ascending from the 
 heights, when we are so happy as to live in the wild hill- 
 country. " You prize Truth m< re than life. Stand with me 
 in this, Jacqueline. Speak of this Truth as it has come to 
 me. You are all that I have left. I have lost Mazurier. 
 Jacqueline, you are a woman, but you never, yes ! yes ! 
 though I dare not say as much of myself, I dare say it of 
 you, ^ you never could have bought your liberty at such a 
 price as. Martial has paid. I know not how, even with the 
 or ^rtunity, he will ever gain the courage to speak of these 
 things again, those great mysteries which are hidden 
 from the eyes of the covetous and worldly and unbelieving. 
 Promise, stand with me, Jacqueline, and I will rely on you. 
 Forsake me not." 
 
 " Victor, has He not said, who can best say it, ' I will 
 never leave you nor forsake you ' ? " 
 
 " But, Jacqueline, I love you." 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 231 
 
 Having said these words, the face of the young man 
 emerged wholly from the eclipse of the former shadow. 
 
 " What is this ? " said the brave peasant from Domremy, 
 manifestly doubting whether she had heard aright ; and her 
 clear pure eyes were gazing full on Victor Le Roy, actually 
 looking for an explanation of his words. 
 
 " I love you, Jacqueline," he repeated. " And I do not 
 involve you in danger, oh, my friend ! Only let me have it 
 to believe that my life is dear to Jacqueline, and I shall not 
 be afraid then to lose it, if that testimoi V required of 
 me. Shall we not stand side by side, soldiers of Christ, 
 stronger in each other than in all the world beside ? Shall 
 it not be so, Jacqueline ? True heart, answer me ! And 
 if you will not love me, at least say, say you are my friend, 
 you trust me. I will hold your safety sacred." 
 
 " I am your friend, Victor." 
 
 " Say my wife, Jacqueline. I honored you, that you came 
 from Domrdmy. You are my very dream of Joan, as 
 brave and as true, as beautiful. Jacqueline, it is not all for 
 the Truth's sake, but for my love's sake. Is not our work 
 one, moreover ? Are we not one in heart and purpose, Jac- 
 queline ? You are alone ; let me protect you." 
 
 He needed no other answer than he had while his eyes 
 constantly sought hers. Her calm look, the dignity and 
 strength of her composure, assured him of all he longed to 
 learn, assured him that their hearts, even as their pur- 
 poses and faith, were one." 
 
 " But speak one word," he urged. 
 
 The word she spoke was, " I can be true to you, Victor." 
 
 Won hardly by a word: too easily, you think ru She 
 loved the youth, my friends, and she loved the Truth for 
 which he dared not say that he could sacrifice himself. 
 
 " We are one, then," said Victor Le Roy. "It concerned 
 me above all things to prove that, Jacqueline. So you 
 shall have no more to do with these harvest-fields and vine- 
 yards henceforth, except to eat of the fruits, if God will. 
 You have borne all the burden and heat of labor you shall 
 
232 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 ever bear. I can say that, with God's blessing. We shall 
 sit under our own vine. Death in one direction has pre- 
 pared for life in another. I inherit what my uncle can 
 make use of no longer. We shall look out on our own 
 fields, our harvests ; for I think this city will keep us no 
 longer than may be needful. We will go away into Picardy, 
 and I will show you where our Joan was a prisoner ; and 
 we will go back to Domre'my, and walk in the places she 
 loved, and pray God to bless us by that fountain, and in 
 the graveyard where your father and mother sleep. O, Jac- 
 queline, is it not all blessed and all fair ?" 
 
 She could hardly comprehend all the brightness of this 
 vision which Victor Le Roy would fain bring before her. 
 The paths he pointed out to her were new and strange ; 
 but she could trust him, could believe that together they 
 might walk without stumbling. 
 
 She had nothing to say of her unfitness, her unworthi- 
 ness, to occupy the place to which he pointed. Not a 
 doubt, not a fear, had she to express. He loved her, and 
 that she knew ; and she had no thought of depreciating his 
 choice, its excellency, or its wisdom. Whatever excess of 
 wonder she may have felt was not communicated. How 
 know I that she marvelled at her lover's choice, though all 
 the world might marvel? 
 
 Then remembering Mazurier, and thinking of her strength 
 of faith, and her high-heartedness, he was eager that Jac- 
 queline should appoint their marriage-day. And more 
 than he, perhaps, supposed was betrayed by this haste. 
 He made his words profoundly good. Strong woman that 
 she was, he wanted her strength joined to his. He was 
 secretly disquieted, secretly afraid to trust himself, since 
 this defection of Martial Mazurier. 
 
 What did hinder them? They might be married on 
 Sunday, if she would : they might go down together to the 
 estate, which he must immediately visit. 
 
 Through the hurry of thought, and the agitation of heart, 
 and the rush of seeming impossibilities, he brought out at 
 length in triumph her consent. 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 233 
 
 She did consent. It should all be as he wished. And 
 so they parted outside that town of Meaux on the fair 
 summer evening, plighted lovers, hopeful man and wo- 
 man. For them the evening sky was lovely with the day's 
 last light ; for them the serene stars of night arose. 
 
 So they parted under the open sky : he going forward 
 to the city, strengthened and refreshed in faith and holy 
 courage ; she, adorned with holy hopes which never until 
 now had found place among her visions. Neither was she 
 prepared for them, until he brought them to a heart which, 
 indeed, could never be dismayed by the approach and claim 
 of love. 
 
 Love was no strange guest. Fresh and fair as Zephyrus, 
 he came from the forest depths, and she welcomed him ; 
 no stranger, though the breath that bore him was all heav- 
 enly, and his aspiration was remote from earthly sources. 
 Yes, she so imagined. 
 
 She went back to the cottage where she and Elsie lodged 
 now, to tell Elsie what had happened, to thankfulness, 
 to gazing forward into a new world, to aspiration, ex- 
 pectation, joy, humility, to wonder, and to praise, to 
 all that my best reader will perceive must be true of Jac- 
 queline on this great evening of her life. 
 
 X. 
 
 THAT same night Victor Le Roy was arrested on charge 
 of heresy, arrested and imprisoned. Watchmen 
 were on the look-out when the lover walked forward with 
 triumphant steps to Meaux. 
 
 " This fellow also was among the wool-comber's disci- 
 ples," said they ; and their successful dealing with Mazurier 
 encouraged the authorities to hope that soon all this evil 
 would be overcome, trampled in the dust. This impudent 
 insurrection of thought should certainly be stifled ; youth 
 and age, high station, low, should be taught alike of Rome. 
 
234 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 Tidings reached Martial Mazurier next da/ of what had 
 befallen Victor Le Roy, and he went instantly to visit him 
 in prison. It was an interview which the tender-hearted 
 officials would have invited, had he not forestalled them by 
 inviting himself to the duty. Mazurier had something to 
 do in the matter of reconciling his conscience to the part 
 he had taken, in his recent opportunity to prove himself 
 equally a hero with Leclerc. He had recanted, done evil, 
 in short, that good might come ; and was not content with 
 having done this thing : how should he be ? Now that his 
 follower was in the same position, he had but one wish, 
 that he should follow his example. He did not, perhaps, 
 entirely ascertain his motive in this ; but it is hardly to be 
 supposed that Mazurier was so persuaded of the justice of 
 his course that he desired to have it imitated by another 
 under the same circumstances. 
 
 No ! he was forever disgraced in his own eyes, when he 
 remembered the valiant John Leclerc ; and it was not to be 
 permitted that Victor Le Roy should follow the example of 
 the wool-comber in preference to that he had given, that 
 politic, wise, blood-sparing, flesh-loving, truth-depreciating, 
 God-defrauding example. 
 
 Accordingly he lost no time in seeking Victor in his cell. 
 It was the very cell in which he himself had lately been 
 imprisoned. Within those narrow walls he had meditated, 
 prayed, and made his choice. There he had stood face to 
 face with fate, with God, with Jesus, and had decided 
 not in favor of the flogging, and the branding, and the 
 glorious infamy. There, in spite of eloquence and fervor 
 and devotion, in spite of all his past vows and his hopes, 
 he had decided to take the place and part of a timeserver ; 
 for he feared disgrace and pain, and the hissing and scoff 
 and persecution, more than he feared the blasting anger 
 of insulted and forsaken Truth. 
 
 He found Victor within his cell, his Bright face not over- 
 cast with gloom, his eyes not betraying doubts, neither 
 disappointed, astonished, nor in deep dejection. The mood 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 235 
 
 he deemed unfavorable for his special word, poor, de- 
 ceived, self-deceiving Mazurier ! 
 
 He was not merely surprised at these indications, he 
 was at a loss. A little trepidation, doubt, suspicion would 
 have better suited him. Alas ! and was his hour the ex- 
 tremity of another's weakness, not in the elevation of 
 another's spiritual strength ? Once when he preached the 
 Truth as moved by the Holy Ghost, it was not to the pru- 
 dence or the worldly wisdom of his hearers he appealed, 
 but to the higher feelings and the noblest powers of men. 
 Then he called on them to praise God by their faith in all 
 that added to His glory and dominion. But now his elo- 
 quence was otherwise directed ; not full of the old fire and 
 enthusiasm ; not trustful in God, but dependent on pru- 
 dence, as though all help were in man. He had to draw 
 from his own experience now, things new and old, and 
 was not, by confession of the result of such experience, 
 humiliated ! 
 
 " You are under a mistake," was his argument. " You 
 have not gone deep into these matters ; you have made 
 acquaintance only with the agitated surface of them." And 
 he proceeded to make good -all this assertion, it was 
 so readily proven ! He also had been beguiled ; ah, had 
 he not ? He had been beguiled by the rude eloquence, the 
 insensibility to pain, the pride of opposition, the pride of 
 poverty, the pride of a rude nature, exhibited by John 
 Leclerc. 
 
 He acknowledged freely, with a fatal candor, that, until 
 he came to consider these things in their true light, when 
 shut away from all outward influences, until compelled to 
 quiet meditation beyond the reach and influence of mere 
 enthusiasm, he had believed with Leclerc, even as Victor 
 was believing now. He could have gone on, who might 
 tell to what fanatica-1 length ? had it not been for that fortu- 
 nate arrest which made a sane man of him ! 
 
 Leclerc was not quite in the wrong ; not absolutely, 
 but neither was he, as Mazurier had once believed, glo- 
 
236 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 riously in the right. It was clearly apparent to him, that 
 Victor Le Roy, having now also like opportunity for calm 
 reflection, would come to like conclusions. 
 
 With such confident prophecy, Mazurier left the young 
 man. His visit was brief and hurried, no duty that could 
 be waved should call him away from his friend at such 
 a time ; but he would return ; they would speak of this 
 again ; and he kissed Victor, and blessed him, and went 
 out to bid the authorities delay yet before the lad was 
 brought to trial, for he was confident, that, if left to reflec- 
 tion, he would come to his senses, and choose wisely 
 between God and Mammon? Mazurier expressed it in 
 another way. 
 
 In the street, Elsie MeVil heard of Victor's arrest, and 
 she brought the news to Jacqueline. They had returned 
 to Meaux, to their old lodging, and a day had passed, dur- 
 ing which, moment by moment, his arrival was anticipated. 
 Elsie went out to buy a gift for Jacqueline, a bit of fine 
 apparelling which she had coveted from the moment she 
 knew Jacqueline should be a bride. She stole away on her 
 errand without remark, and came back with the gift ; but 
 also with that which made it valueless, unmentionable, 
 though it was a costly offering, purchased with the wages 
 of more than a week's labor in the fields. 
 
 It was almost dark when she returned to Jacqueline. 
 Her friend was sitting by the window, waiting, not for 
 her ; and when she went in to her, it was silently, with no 
 mention of her errand or her love-gift. Quietly she sat 
 down, thankful that the night was falling, waiting for its 
 darkness before she should speak words which would make 
 the darkness to be felt. 
 
 " He does not come," said Jacqueline, at length. 
 
 " Did you think it was he, when I came up tKe stairs ? " 
 inquired Elsie, tenderly. 
 
 ** O, no ! I can tell your step from all the rest." 
 
 "His, too, I think." 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 237 
 
 "Yes, and his, too. My best friends. Strange, if I 
 could not ! " 
 
 " O, I 'm glad you said that, Jacqueline ! " 
 
 " My best friends," repeated Jacqueline ; not merely to 
 please Elsie. Love had opened wide her heart ; and Elsie, 
 weak and foolish though she might be, Elsie, her old 
 companion, her playmate, her fellow-laborer, Elsie, who 
 should be to her a sister always, and share in her good- 
 fortune, Elsie had honorable place there. 
 
 " Could anything have happened, Jacqueline ?" said Elsie, 
 trembling : her tremulous voice betrayed it. 
 
 " O, I think not," was the answer. 
 
 " But he is so fearless ; he might have fallen into 
 into trouble." 
 
 " What have you heard, Elsie ? " 
 
 This question was quietly asked, but it struck to the 
 heart of the questioned girl. Jacqueline suspected ! and 
 yet Jacqueline asked so calmly ! Jacqueline could hear it ; 
 and yet how could this be declared ? 
 
 Her hesitation quickened what was hardly suspicion into 
 a conviction. 
 
 " What have you heard ? " Jacqueline again questioned, 
 not so calmly as before ; and yet it was quite calm, even to 
 the alarmed ear of Elsie MeVil. 
 
 " They have arrested Victor, Jacqueline." 
 
 "For heresy?" 
 
 " I heard it in the street." 
 
 Jacqueline arose, she crossed the chamber, her hand 
 was on the latch. Instantly Elsie stood beside her. 
 
 " What will you do ? I must go with you, Jacqueline." 
 
 " Where will you go ? " said Jacqueline. 
 
 " With you. Wait, what is it you will do ? Or, no 
 matter, go on, I will follow you, and take the danger 
 with you." 
 
 " Is there danger ? For him there is ! and there might 
 be for you, but none for me. Stay, Elsie. Where shall 
 I go, in truth?" 
 
238 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 Yet she opened the door, and began to descend the stairs 
 even while she spoke ; and Elsie followed her. 
 
 First to the house of the wool-comber. John was not at 
 home ; and his mother could tell them nothing, had heard 
 nothing of the arrest of Victor. Then to the place which 
 Victor had pointed out to her as the home of Mazurier. 
 Mazurier likewise they failed to find. Where, then, was 
 the prison of Le Roy's captivity ? That no man could tell 
 them ; so they came home to their lodging at length in the 
 dark night, there to wait through endless-seeming hours for 
 morning. 
 
 On the Sunday they had chosen for their wedding-day 
 Mazurier brought word of Victor to Jacqueline, was really 
 a messenger, as he announced himself, when she opened 
 for him the door of her room in the fourth story of the 
 great lodging-house. He had come on that day with a 
 message ; but it was not in all things in little beside the 
 love it was meant to prove the message Victor had de- 
 sired to convey. In want of more faithful, more trust- 
 worthy messenger, Le Roy sent word by this man of his 
 arrest, and bade Jacqueline pray for him, and come to 
 him, if that were possible. He desired, he said, to serve 
 his Master, and, of all things, sought the Truth. 
 
 To go to the prisoner, Mazurier assured Jacqueline, was 
 impossible, but she might send a message ; indeed, he was 
 here to serve his dear friends. Ah, poor girl, did she trust 
 the man by whom she sent into a prison words like these ? 
 
 " Hold fast to the faith that is in you, Victor. Let 
 nothing persuade you that you have been mistaken. We 
 asked for light, it was given us, let us walk in it ; and 
 no matter where it leads, since the light is from heaven. 
 Do not think of me, nor of yourself, but only of Jesus 
 Christ, who said, ' Whosoever would save his life shall 
 lose it.' " 
 
 Mazurier took this message. What did he do with it ? 
 He tossed it to the winds. 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 239 
 
 A week after, Le Roy was brought to trial, and re- 
 canted ; and so recanting, was acquitted and set at liberty. 
 
 Mazurier supposed that he meant all kindly in the exer- 
 tion he made to save his friend. He would never have 
 ceased from self-reproach, had he conveyed the words of 
 Jacqueline to Victor ; for the effect of those words he 
 could clearly foresee. And so far from attempting to bring 
 about an interview between the pair, he would have striven 
 to prevent it, had he seen a probability that it would be 
 allowed. He set little value on such words as Jacqueline 
 spoke, when her conscience and her love rose up against 
 each other. The words she had committed to him he could 
 account for by no supposition acceptable and reasonable 
 to him. There was something about the girl he did not 
 understand ; she was no fit guide for a man who had need 
 of clear judgment, when such a decision was to be made as 
 the court demanded of Le Roy. 
 
 Elsie Mdril, between hope and fear, was dumb in these 
 days ; but her presence and her tenderness, though not he- 
 roic in action nor wise in utterance, had a value of which 
 neither she nor Jacqueline was fully aware. 
 
 When Jacqueline learned the issue of the trial, and that 
 Victor had falsified his faith, her first impulse was to fly, 
 that she might never see his face again. For, the instant 
 she heard his choice, her heart told her what she had been 
 hoping during these days of suspense. She had tried to 
 see Martial Mazurier, but without success, since he con- 
 veyed, or promised to convey, her message to the prisoner. 
 Of purpose he had avoided her. He guessed what strength 
 she would by this time have attained ; and he was deter- 
 mined to save both to each other, though it might be 
 against their will. 
 
240 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 XL 
 
 VICTOR LE ROY'S first endeavor, on being liberated, 
 was of course to find Jacqueline ? Not so. That 
 was far from his first design. His impulse was to avoid 
 the girl he had dared to love. Mazurier had, indeed, con- 
 veyed to his mind an impression that would have satisfied 
 him, if anything of this character could do so. But this 
 was impossible. The secret of his disquiet was far too 
 profound for such easy removal. 
 
 He had not in himself the witness that he had fulfilled 
 the will of God. He was disquieted, humiliated, wretched. 
 He could not think of Leclerc, nor upon his protestations, 
 except with shame and remorse, remorse, already. In 
 his heart, in spite of the impression Mazurier had contrived 
 to convey, he believed not that Jacqueline would bless him 
 to such work as he could henceforth perform, no longer a 
 free man, no longer possessed of liberty of speech and 
 thought. 
 
 He had no sooner renounced his liberty than he became 
 persuaded, by an overwhelming reasoning, as he had never 
 been convinced before, of the pricelessness of that he had 
 sacrificed. When he" went from the court-room, from the 
 presence of his judges, he was not a free man, though the 
 dignitaries called him so. Martial Mazurier walked arm 
 in arm with him ; but the world was a den of horrors, a 
 blackened and accursed world, to the young man who came 
 from prison, free to use his freedom as the priests di- 
 rected ! 
 
 He went home from the prison with Mazurier. The 
 world had conquered. Love had conquered, Love, that 
 in the conquest felt itself disgraced. He had sold the 
 divine, he had received the human : it was the old pottage 
 speculation over again. This privilege of liberty from his 
 dungeon had looked so fair ! but now it seemed so worth- 
 less ! This prospect of life so priceless in contemplation 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 241 
 
 of its loss, O, the beggar who crept past him was an 
 enviable man compared with young Victor Le Roy, the 
 heir of love and riches, the heir of liberty and life ! 
 
 Yes, he went home with Mazurier. Where else should 
 he go ? Congratulations attended him. He was compelled 
 to receive them with a countenance not too sombre, and a 
 grace not all thankless, or or they would say it was of 
 cowardice he had saved his precious body from the sen- 
 tence of the judges, and given his precious LIFE up to the 
 sentence of the JUDGE. 
 
 Yes, Martial took him home. There they might talk 
 at leisure of those things, and ask a blessing on the 
 testimony of Jesus, made and kept by them ! 
 
 Victor Le Roy was too proud to complain now. He as- 
 sented to all the preacher's sophistry. He allowed himself 
 to be cheered. But this was no such evening as had been 
 spent in the room of the wool-comber, when Leclerc's voice, 
 strong, even through his weakness, called on God, and 
 blessed and praised Him, and the spirit conquered the flesh 
 gloriously, the old mother of Leclerc sharing his joy, as 
 she had also shared his anguish. Here was no Jacqueline 
 to say to Victor, " Thou hast done well ! ' Glory be to 
 Jesus Christ and His witnesses ! '" 
 
 Mazurier thanked God for the deliverance of His servant ! 
 He dedicated himself and Victor anew to the service of 
 Truth, which they had shrunk from defending ! And his 
 eloquence and fervor seemed to stamp the words with 
 sincerity. He seemed not in the least to suspect or fear 
 himself. 
 
 With Victor Le Roy such self-deception, such sophistry, 
 was simply impossible. 
 
 Not of purpose did he meet Jacqueline that night She 
 had heard that Le Roy was at liberty, and alone now she 
 applied at the door of Martial Mazurier for admittance, 
 but in vain. The master had signified that his evening 
 was not to be interrupted. Therefore she returned, from 
 ii P 
 
242 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 waiting near his door, to the street where she and Elsie 
 lived. 
 
 Should her woman's pride have led her to her lofty lodg- 
 ing, and kept her there without a sign, till Victor himself 
 came seeking her ? She knew nothing of such pride, 
 but much of love ; and her love took her back to the post 
 where she had waited many an hour since that disastrous 
 arrest ; she would wait there till morning if she must, at 
 least, till one should enter, or come forth, who might tell 
 her of Victor Le Roy. 
 
 The light in the preacher's study she could see from the 
 door-step in a court-yard where she waited. Should Mazu- 
 rier come with Victor, she would let them pass; but if 
 Victor came alone, she had a right to speak. 
 
 It was after midnight when the student came down from 
 the preacher's study. She heard his voice when the door 
 opened, by the street-lamp saw his face. And she recog- 
 nized also the voice of Mazurier, who, till the last moment 
 of separation, seemed endeavoring to dissuade his friend 
 from leaving him that night. 
 
 He heard footsteps following him, as he passed along the 
 pavement, observed that they gained on him. And could 
 it be any other than Jacqueline who touched his arm, and 
 whispered, "Victor"? 
 
 His fast-beating heart told him it was she. He took her 
 hand, and drew it within his arm, and looked upon her 
 face, 'the face of his Jacqueline. 
 
 " Now where ? " said he. "It is late. It is after mid- 
 night. Why are you alone in the street ? " 
 
 " Waiting for you, Victor. I heard you were at liberty, 
 and I supposed you were with him. I was safe." 
 
 "Yes, for you fear nothing. That is the only reason. 
 You knew I was with the preacher, Jacqueline. Why? 
 Because because I am with him, of course." 
 
 " Yes," she said. " I heard it was so, Victor." 
 
 " Strange ! strange ! is it not ? A prison is a better 
 place to learn the truth than the pure air of liberty, it 
 seems," said he, bitterly. 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 243 
 
 " What is that ? " she asked. She seemed not to under- 
 stand his meaning. 
 
 " Nothing. I am acquitted of heresy, you know. It 
 seems, what we talked so bravely meant nothing. O, I 
 am safe now ! " 
 
 "It was to preach none the less, to hold the truth none 
 the less. But if he lost his life, there was an end of all ; 
 or if he lost his liberty, it was as bad. But he would keep 
 both, and serve God so," said Jacqueline. 
 
 " Yes," cried Victor, " precisely what he said. I have 
 said the same, you think ? " 
 
 " If you are quite clear that Leclerc and the rest of us 
 are all wrong, Victor." 
 
 "Jacqueline!" 
 
 "What is it, Victor?" 
 
 " ' The rest of us,' you say. What would you have done 
 in my place ? " 
 
 " God knows. I pretend not to know anything more." 
 
 " Bui ' the rest of us,' you said. You think that you at 
 least are with Leclerc?" 
 
 "That was the truth you taught me, Victor. But I 
 have not yet been tried." 
 
 "That is safe to say. What makes you speak so pru- 
 dently, Jacqueline ? Why do you not declare, * Though all 
 men deny Thee, yet will I never deny Thee'? Ah, you 
 have not been tried ! You are not yet in danger of the 
 judgment, Jacqueline ! " 
 
 "Do not speak so ; you frighten me ; it is not like you. 
 How can I tell? I do not know but in this retirement, 
 in this thought you have been compelled to, you have 
 obtained more light than any one can have until he comes 
 to just such a place." 
 
 "Ah, Jacqueline, why not say to me what you are think- 
 ing ? Have you lost your courage ? Say, * Thou hast not 
 lied unto men, but unto God.'" 
 
 "No, oh, no ! How could I say it, my poor Victor? 
 How do you know?" 
 
244 Victor and Jacqueline. 
 
 " Surely you cannot know, as you say. But from where 
 you stand, that is what you are thinking. Jacqueline, con- 
 fess ! If you should speak your mind, it would be, * Thou 
 hast not lied unto men, but unto God, poor coward ! ' O, 
 Jacqueline, Mazurier may deceive himself! I speak not 
 for him ; but what will you do with your poor Victor, my 
 poor Jacqueline?" 
 
 She did not linger in the answer, she did not sob or 
 tremble, he was by her side. 
 
 "Love him to the end. As He, when He loved His 
 own." 
 
 " Your own, poor girl ? No, no ! " 
 
 " You gave yourself to me," she answered straightway, 
 with resolute firmness clinging to the all she had. 
 
 " I was a man then," he answered. " But I will never 
 give a liar and a coward to Jacqueline Gabrie. Everything 
 but myself, Jacqueline ! Take the old words and the old 
 memory. But for this outcast, him you shall forget. My 
 God ! thou hast not brought this brave girl from Domre'my, 
 and lighted her heart with a coal from Thine altar, that she 
 should turn from Thee to me ! If you love a liar and a 
 coward, Jacqueline, you cannot help yourself, he will 
 make you one, too. And what I loved you for was your 
 truth and purity and courage. I have given you a treasure 
 which was greater than I could keep. Where is it that you 
 live now, Jacqueline ? I am not yet such a poltroon that I 
 am afrard to conduct you. I think that I should have the 
 courage to protect you to-night, if you were in any im- 
 mediate danger. Come, lead the way." 
 
 " No," said Jacqueline. " I am not going home. I could 
 not sleep ; and a roof over my head any save God's 
 heaven would suffocate me, I believe." 
 
 " Go, then, as you will. But where ? " 
 
 Jacqueline did not answer, but walked quietly on ; and 
 so they passed beyond the city-borders to the river-bank, 
 far away into the country, through the fields, under the 
 light of stars and of the waning moon. 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 245 
 
 "If I had been true!" said Victor, "if I had not 
 listened to him ! But him I will not blame. For why 
 should I blame him ? Am I an idiot ? And his influence 
 could not have prevailed, had I not so chosen, when I stood 
 before my judges and they questioned me. No, I acquit 
 Mazurier. Perhaps what I have denied never appeared to 
 him so glorious as it did once to me ; and so he was guilt- 
 less at least of knowing what it was I did. But I knew. 
 And I could not have been deceived for a moment. No, 
 I think it impossible that for a moment I should have been 
 deceived. They would have made a notable example of 
 me, Jacqueline. I am rich, I am a student. O, yes ! 
 Jesus Christ may die for me, and I accept the benefit ; but 
 when it comes to suffering for His sake, you could not 
 have expected that of such a poltroon, Jacqueline ! We 
 may look for it in brave men like Leclerc, whose very living 
 depends on their ability to earn their bread, to earn it by 
 daily sweat ; but men who need not toil, who have leisure 
 and education, of course you would not expect such testi- 
 mony to the truth of Jesus from them ! Bishop Briconnet 
 recants, and Martial Mazurier ; and Victor Le Roy is no 
 braver man, no truer man than these ! " 
 
 With bitter shame and self-scorning he spoke. Poor 
 Jacqueline had not a word to say. She sat beside him. 
 She would help him bear his cross. Heavy-laden as he, 
 she awaited the future, saying, in the silence of her spirit's 
 dismal solitude, " O, teach us ! O, help us ! " But she 
 called not on any name ; her prayer went out in search of 
 a God whom in that hour she knew not. The dark cloud 
 and shadow of Satan that overshadowed him was also 
 upon her. 
 
 " Mazurier is coming in the morning to take me with 
 him, Jacqueline," said Victor. "We are to make a journey." 
 
 " What is it, Victor ? " she asked, quietly. 
 
 There was nothing left for her but patience, that she 
 clearly saw, nothing but patience, and quiet enduring of 
 the will of God. 
 
246 Victor and Jacqtieline. 
 
 " He is afraid of me, or of himself, or of both, I 
 believe. He thinks a change of scene would be good for 
 both of us, poor lepers that we are." 
 
 " I must go with you, Victor Le Roy," said the resolute 
 Jacqueline. 
 
 "Wherefore?" asked he. 
 
 "Because, when you were strong and happy, that was 
 your desire, Victor ; and now that you are sick and sorrow- 
 ing, I will not give you to another : no ! not to Mazurier, 
 nor to any one that breathes, except myself, to whom you 
 belong." 
 
 " I must stay here in Meaux, then ? " 
 
 " That depends upon yourself, Victor." 
 
 "We were to have been married. We were going to 
 look after our estate, now that the hard summer and the 
 hard years of work are ended." 
 
 "Yes, Victor, it was so." 
 
 " But I will not wrong you. You were to be the wife of 
 Victor Le Roy. You are his widow, Jacqueline. For you 
 do not think that he lives any longer ? " 
 
 " He lives, and he is free ! If he has sinned, like Peter 
 even, he weeps bitterly." 
 
 " Like Peter ? Peter denied his Lord. But he did weep, 
 as you say, bitterly. Peter confessed again." 
 
 " And none served the Master with truer heart or greater 
 courage afterward. Victor, you remember." 
 
 " Even so, O, Jacqueline ! " 
 
 " Victor ! Victor ! it was only Judas who hanged himself." 
 
 " Come, Jacqueline ! " 
 
 She arose and went with him. At dawn they were 
 married. Love did lead and save them. 
 
 I see two youthful students studying one page. I see 
 two loving spirits walking through thick darkness. Along 
 the horizon flicker the promises of day. They say, "O 
 Holy Ghost, hast thou forsaken thine own temples ? " Aloud 
 they cry to God. 
 
Victor and Jacqueline. 247 
 
 I see them Wandering among Domr&ny woods and mead- 
 ows, around the castle of Picardy, talking of Joan. I 
 see them resting by the graves they find in two ancient 
 villages. I see them walk in sunny places ; they are not 
 called to toil : they may gather all the blossoms that delight 
 their eyes. Their love grows beyond childhood, does 
 not die before it comes to love's best estate. Happy bride 
 and bridegroom ! But I see them as through a cloud whose 
 fair hues are transient. 
 
 From the meadow-lands and the vineyards and the dark 
 forests of the mountains, from study and from rest, I see 
 them move with solemn faces and calm steps. Brave lights 
 are in their eyes, and flowers that are immortal they carry 
 in their hands. No distillation can exhaust the fragrance 
 of those blooms. 
 
 What dost thou here, Victor? What dost thou here, 
 Jacqueline ? 
 
 This is the place of prisons. Here they light again, as 
 they have often lighted, torch and fagot ; life must pay 
 the cost ! Angry crowds and hooting multitudes love this 
 dreary square. O, Jacqueline and Victor, what is this I 
 behold? 
 
 They come together from their prison, hand in hand. 
 " The testimony of Jesus ! " Stand back, Mazurier ! Retire, 
 Briconnet ! Here is not your place, this is not your hour ! 
 Yet here incendiaries fire the temples of the Holy Ghost ! 
 
 The judges do not now congratulate. Jacqueline waits 
 not now at midnight for the coming of Le Roy. Bride and 
 bridegroom, there they stand ; they face the world to give 
 their testimony. 
 
 And a woman's voice, almost I deem the voice of Elsie 
 Meril, echoes the mother's cry that followed John Leclerc 
 when he fought the beasts at Meaux, 
 
 " Blessed be Jesus Christ, and His witnesses." 
 
 So of the Truth were they borne up that day in a blazing 
 chariot to meet their Lord in the air, to be forever with 
 their Lord. 
 
ELKANAH BREWSTER'S TEMPTATION. 
 
 WAS always of opinion that the fruit forbidden 
 to our grandmother Eve was an unripe apple. 
 Eaten, it afflicted Adam with the first colic known 
 to this planet. He, the weaker vessel, sorrowed over his trans- 
 gression ; but I doubt if Eve's repentance was thorough ; 
 for the plucking of unripe fruit has been, ever since, a 
 favorite hobby of her sons and daughters, until now our 
 mankind has got itself into such a chronic state of colic, 
 that even Dr. Carlyle declare* himself unable to prescribe 
 any Morrison's Pill or other remedial measure to allay the 
 irritation. 
 
 Part of this irritation finds vent in a great cry about 
 " legitimate ambition." Somehow, because any American 
 may be President of the United States, almost every Ameri- 
 can feels himself bound to run for the office. A man thinks 
 small things of himself, and his neighbors think less, if he 
 does not find his heart filled with an insane desire, in some 
 way, to attain to fame or notoriety, riches or bankruptcy. 
 Nevertheless, we are not purse-proud, nor, indeed, proud 
 at all, more 's the pity, and receive a man just as readily 
 whose sands of life have been doled out to suffering hu- 
 manity in the shape of patent pills, as one who has entered 
 Fifth Avenue by the legitimate way of pork and cotton 
 speculations, if only he have been successful, which I 
 call a very noble trait in the American character. 
 
 Now this is all very well, and, granted that Providence 
 has placed us here to do what is best pleasing to ourselves, 
 
Elkanah Brewster s Temptation. 249 
 
 it is surely very noble and grand in us to please to serve 
 nothing less than our country or our age. But let us not 
 forget that the English language has such a little word as 
 duty. A man's talents, and, perhaps, once in a great while, 
 his wishes, would make him a great man (if wishes ever 
 did such things, which I doubt), while duty imperatively 
 demands that he shall remain a little man. What then ? 
 Let us see. 
 
 Elkanah Brewster was going to New York to-morrow. 
 
 "What for, boy?" asked ol.d Uncle Shubael, meeting 
 whom on the fish-wharf, he had bid him a cheery good-bye. 
 
 " To make my fortune," was the bold reply. 
 
 " Make yer fortin ? You 're a goose, boy ! Stick to yer 
 work here, fishin' summers an' shoemakin' winters. Why, 
 there is n't a young feller on the hull Cape makes as much 
 as you. What 's up ? Gal gin ye the mitten ? Or what ? " 
 
 " I don't want to make shoes, nor fish neither, Uncle 
 Shub," said Elkanah, soberly, looking the old fellow in the 
 face, " goin' down to the Banks year arter year in cold 
 an' fish-gurry, an' peggin' away all winter, like mad. I 
 want to be rich, like Captain Crowell ; I want to be a 
 gentleman, like that painter-chap that give me drawin'- 
 lessons, last summer, when I stayed to home." 
 
 " Phew ! Want to be rich an' a gentleman, eh ? Gittin' 
 tu big for yer boots, youngster ? What 's yer old man du 
 but go down t' the Banks reg'lar every spring ? You 're 
 no better 'n he, I guess ! Keep yer trade, an' yer trade '11 
 keep you. A rollin' stun gethers no moss. Dry bread tu 
 home 's better 'n roast meat an' gravy abroad." 
 
 "All feet don't tread in one shoe, Uncle Shub," said 
 young Brewster, capping the old fellow's proverbs with 
 another. " Don't see why I should n't make money as 
 well 's other fellers. It 's a free country, an' if a feller wants 
 to try suthin' else 'sides fishin' uv it, what d'yer all want to 
 be down on him fur ? I don't want to slave all my days, 
 when other folks ken live in big houses an' ride in 'ker- 
 riges, an' all that." 
 n* 
 
250 Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 
 
 " A'n't yer got bread enough to eat, an' a place to sleep ? 
 an' what more's any on 'em. got ? You stay here ; make 
 yer money on the old Cape, where yer father an' grand'ther 
 made it afore you. Use yer means, an' God '11 give the 
 blessin'. Yer can't honestly git rich anywheres all tu once. 
 Good an' quickly don't often meet. One nail drives out 
 another. Slow an' easy goes fur in a day. Honor an' ease 
 a'n't often bedfellows. Don't yer be a goose, I tell ye. 
 What 's to become of Hepsy Ann ? " 
 
 Having delivered himself of which last and hardest shot, 
 Uncle Shubael shouldered his cod-craft, and, without await- 
 ing an answer, tugged across the sand-beach for home. 
 
 Elkanah Brewster was a Cape-Cod boy, with a pedigree, 
 if he had ever thought of it, as long as any on the Cape, 
 and they are the longest in the land. His forefathers had 
 caught fish to the remotest generation known. The Cape 
 boys take to the water like young ducks ; and are born 
 with a hook and line in their fists, so to speak, as the 
 Newfoundland codfish and Bay Chaleur mackerel know, 
 to their cost. " Down on old Chatham " there is little 
 question of a boy's calling, if he only comes into the world 
 with the proper number of fingers and toes ; he swims as 
 soon as he walks, knows how to drive a bargain as soon 
 as he can talk, goes cook of a coaster at the mature age 
 of eight years, and thinks himself robbed of his birthright, 
 if he has not made a voyage to the Banks before his 
 eleventh birthday comes round. There is good stuff in 
 the Cape boys, as the South-Street ship-owners know, who 
 don't sleep easier than when they have put a " Cape man " 
 in charge of their best clipper. Quick of apprehension, 
 fertile in resource, shrewd, enterprising, brave, prudent, and 
 above all, lucky, no better seamen sail the sea. Long 
 may they keep their prestige and their sand ! 
 
 They are not rich on the Cape, in the Wall-Street 
 sense of the word, that is to say. I doubt if Uncle Lew 
 Baker, who was high line out of Dennis last year, and who, 
 by the same token, had to work himself right smartly to 
 
Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 251 
 
 achieve that honor, I doubt if this smart and thoroughly 
 wide-awake fellow took home more than three hundred 
 dollars to his wife and children when old Obed settled the 
 voyage. But then the good wife saves while he earns, and, 
 what with a cow, and a house and garden-spot of his own, 
 and a healthy lot of boys and girls, who, if too young to 
 help, are not suffered to hinder, this man is more fore- 
 handed and independent, gives more to the poor about him 
 and to the heathen at the other end of the world, than 
 many a city man who makes, and spends, his tens of 
 thousands. 
 
 Uncle Abijah Brewster, the father of this Elkanah, was 
 an old Banker, which signifies here, not a Wall-Street 
 broker-man, but a Grand-Bank fisherman. He had brought 
 up a goodly family of boys and girls by his hook and line, 
 and, though now a man of some fifty winters, still made 
 his two yearly fares to the Banks, in his own trim little 
 pinky, and prided himself on being the smartest and jol- 
 liest man aboard. His boys had sailed with him till they 
 got vessels of their own, had learned from his stout heart 
 and strong arm their seamanship, their fisherman's acute- 
 ness, their honest daring, and childlike trust in God's 
 Providence. These poor fishermen are not rich, as I have 
 said ; a dollar looks to them as big as a dinner-plate to us, 
 and a moderately flush Wall-Street man might buy out the 
 whole Cape, and not overdraw his bank-account. Also, 
 they have but little book-learning among them, reading 
 chiefly their Bible, Bowditch, and Nautical Almanac, and 
 leaving theology mostly to the parson, on shore, who is 
 paid for it. But they have a conscience, and, knowing a 
 thing to be right, do it bravely, and against all odds. I 
 have seen these men on Sunday, in a fleet of busy " Sun- 
 day fishers," fish biting all around them, sitting faithfully, 
 ay, and contentedly, with book in hand, sturdily re- 
 fraining from what the mere human instinct of destruction 
 would strongly impel them to, without counting the tempta- 
 tion of dollars, and this only because they had been 
 
252 Elkanah Brews ters Temptation. 
 
 taught that Sunday was a day of rest and worship, wherein 
 no man should catch fish, and knew no theological quibble 
 or mercantile close-sailing by which to weather on God's 
 command. It sounds little to us who have not been 
 tempted, or, if tempted, have gracefully succumbed, on the 
 plea that other people do so too; but how many stock- 
 speculators would see their fellows buying bargains and 
 making easy fortunes on Sunday morning, and not forget 
 the ring of Trinity chimes and go in for dollars ? Or which 
 of us denies himself his Monday morning's paper ? 
 
 Elkanah had always been what his mother called a 
 strange boy. He was, indeed, an odd sheep in her flock. 
 Restless, ambitious, dreamy, from his earliest youth, he 
 possessed, besides, a natural gift for drawing and sketching, 
 imitating and constructing, that bade fair, unless properly 
 directed, to make of him that saddest and most useless of 
 human lumber, a jack-at-all-trades. He profited more by 
 his limited winter's schooling than his brothers and fellows, 
 and was always respected by the old man as " a boy that 
 took naterally to book-larnin', and would be suthin' some 
 day." Of course he went to the Banks, and acquitted him- 
 self there with honor, no man fishing more zealously or 
 having better luck. But all the time he was dreaming of 
 his future, counting this present as nothing, and ready, as 
 soon as Fortune should make him an opening, to cast away 
 this life, and grasp he had not settled what. 
 
 " / dun know what ails him," said his father ; " but he 
 don't take kindly to the Banks. Seems to me he kinder 
 despises the work, though he does it well enough. And 
 then he makes the best shoes on the Cape ; but he a'n't 
 content, somehow." 
 
 And that was just it. He was not contented. He had 
 seen men " no better than I," thought he, poor fool ! 
 in Boston, living in big houses, wearing fine clothes, putting 
 fair, soft hands into smooth-fitting kid-gloves; "and why 
 not I ? " he cried to himself continually. Year by year, 
 from his seventeenth to his twenty-first, he was pursued by 
 
Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 253 
 
 this demon of " ambition," which so took possession of his 
 heart as to crowd out nearly everything else, father, 
 mother, work, even pretty Hepzibah Nickerson, almost, 
 who loved him, and whom he also loved truly. They had 
 almost grown-up together, had long loved each other, and 
 had been now two years betrothed. When Elkanah was 
 out of his time and able to buy a share in a vessel, and 
 had made a voyage to the Banks as captain, they were to be 
 married. 
 
 The summer before this spring in which our story opens, 
 Elkanah had stayed at home for two months, because of a 
 rheumatism contracted by unusual exposure on the Banks 
 in early spring ; and at this time he made the acquaintance 
 of Mr. James Graves, N. A., from New York, spending 
 part of his summer on the Cape in search of the pictu- 
 resque, which I hope he found. Elkanah had, as I have 
 said, a natural talent for drawing, and some of his sketches 
 had that in them which elicited the approval of Graves, 
 who saw in the young fellow an untutored genius, or, at 
 least, very considerable promise of future excellence. To 
 him there could be but one choice between shoemaking 
 and " Art " ; and finding that young Brewster made rapid 
 advances under his desultory tuition, he told him his 
 thoughts, that he should not waste himself making sea- 
 boots for fishermen, but enter a studio in Boston or New 
 York, and make his career as a painter. It scarcely needed 
 this, however ; for Elkanah took such delight in his new 
 proficiency, and got from Graves's stories of artist life such 
 exalted ideas of the unalloyed felicity of the gentleman of 
 the brush, that, even had the painter said no word, he 
 would have worked out that way himself. 
 
 " Only wait till next year, when I 'm out of my time," 
 said he to Graves ; and to himself, " This is the opening 
 for which I have been waiting." 
 
 That winter "my last at shoemaking " he worked 
 more diligently than ever before, and more good-naturedly. 
 Uncle Abijah was delighted at the change in his boy, and 
 
254 Elkanah Brews ters Temptation. 
 
 promised him great things in the way of a lift next year, 
 to help him to a speedy wedding. Elkanah kept his own 
 counsel, read much in certain books which Graves had left 
 him, and looked impatiently ahead to the day when, twenty- 
 one years of age, he should be a free man, able to go 
 whither he listed and do what he would, with no man 
 authoritatively to say him nay. 
 
 And now the day had come ; and with I don't know how 
 few dollars in his pocket, his scant earnings, he had de- 
 clared to his astounded parents his determination to fish 
 and shoemake no longer, but to learn to be a painter. 
 
 " A great painter," that was what he said. 
 
 " I don't see the use o' paintin' picters, for my part," said 
 the old man, despairingly ; " can't you learn that, an' 
 fish tu ? " 
 
 " Famous and rich too," said Elkanah half to himself, 
 looking through the vista of years at the result he hoped 
 for, and congratulating himself in advance upon it. And 
 a proud, hard look settled in his eye, which froze the op- 
 position of father and mother, and was hardly dimmed 
 by encountering the grieved glance of poor Hepsy Ann 
 Nickerson. 
 
 Poor Hepsy Ann ! They had talked it all over, time and 
 again. At first she was in despair ; but when he laid be- 
 fore her all his darling hopes, and painted for her in such 
 glowing colors the final reward which should come to him 
 and her in return for his struggles, when she saw him, 
 her love and pride, before her already transfigured, as it 
 were, by this rare triumph, clothed in honors, his name in 
 all mouths, dear, loving soul, her heart consented, " ay, 
 if it should break meantime," thought she, as she looked 
 proudly on him through her tears, and said, " Go, in 
 God's name, and God be with you ! " 
 
 Perhaps we might properly here consider a little whether 
 this young man did well thus to leave father, mother, home, 
 his promised bride, sufficient bread-and-butter, healthy oc- 
 cupation, all, to attempt life in a new direction. Of course, 
 
Elkdnah Brewster's Temptation. 255 
 
 your man who lives by bread alone will " pooh ! pooh ! w 
 all such folly, and tell the young man to let well enough 
 alone. But consider candidly, and decide : Should Elkanah 
 have gone to New York ? 
 
 On the whole, 7 think, yes. For, 
 
 He had a certain talent, and gave good promise of excel- 
 lence in his chosen profession. 
 
 He liked it, felt strongly impelled towards it. Let us not 
 yet scrutinize too closely the main impelling forces. Few 
 human actions originate solely in what we try to think the 
 most exalted motives. 
 
 He would have been discontented for life, had he not had 
 his way. And this should count for something, for much, 
 indeed. Give our boys liberty to try that to which their 
 nature or fancy strongly drives them, to burn their fingers, 
 if that seem best. 
 
 Let him go, then ; and God be with him ! as surely He 
 will be, if the simple, faithful prayers of fair, sad Hepsy 
 Ann are heard. Thus will he, thus only can any, solve that 
 sphinx-riddle of life which is propounded to each passer 
 to-day, as of old in fable-lands, failing to read which, he 
 dies the death of rusting discontent, solving whose mys- 
 teries, he has revealed to him the deep secret of his life, 
 and sees and knows what best he may do here for himself 
 and the world. 
 
 But what, where, who, is Elkanah Brewster's world? 
 
 While we stand reasoning, he has gone. In New York, 
 his friend Graves assisted him to a place in the studio of 
 an artist, whose own works have proved, no less than those 
 of many who have gathered their most precious lessons 
 from him, that he is truly a master of his art. But what 
 are masters, teachers, to a scholar? It's very fine board- 
 ing at the Spread-Eagle Hotel ; but even after you have 
 feed the waiter, you have to chew your own dinner, and are 
 benefited, not by the amount you pay for it, but only by so 
 much of all that with which the bounteous mahogany is 
 covered as you can thoroughly masticate, easily contain, 
 
256 Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 
 
 and healthily digest. Elkanah began with the soup, so to 
 speak. He brought all his Cape- Cod acuteness of observa- 
 tion to bear on his profession ; lived closely, as well he 
 might ; studied attentively and intelligently ; lost no hints, 
 no precious morsels dropping from the master's board; 
 improved slowly, but surely. Day by day he gained in that 
 facility of hand, quickness of observation, accuracy of 
 memory, correctness of judgment, patience of detail, felicity 
 of touch, which, united and perfected and honestly directed, 
 we call genius. He was above no drudgery, shirked no 
 difficulties, and labored at the insignificant sketch in hand 
 to-day as though it were indeed his masterpiece, to be hung 
 up beside Raphael's and Titian's ; meantime, keeping up 
 poor Hepsy Ann's heart by letters full of a hope bred of 
 his own brave spirit, rather than of any favoring circum- 
 stances in his life, and gaining his scant bread-and-butter 
 by various honest drudgeries which I will not here recount. 
 
 So passed away three years ; for the growth of a poor 
 young artist in public favor, and that thing called fame, is 
 fearfully slow. Oftenest he has achieved his best when the 
 first critic speaks kindly or savagely of him. What, indeed, 
 at best, do those blind leaders, but zealously echo a senti- 
 ment already in the public heart, which they vainly 
 endeavor to create (out of nothing) by any awe-inspiring 
 formula of big words ? 
 
 Men grow so slowly ! But then so do oaks. And little 
 matter, so the growth be straight. 
 
 Meantime Elkanah was getting, slowly and by hardest 
 labor, to have some true conception of his art and his aims. 
 He became less and less satisfied with his own perform- 
 ances ; and, having with much pains and anxious prayers 
 finished his first picture for the Academy, carefully hid it 
 under the bed, and for that year played the part of inde- 
 pendent critic at the Exhibition. Wherefrom resulted some 
 increase of knowledge, though chiefly negative. 
 
 For what positive lesson is taught to any by that yearly 
 show of what we flatter ourselves by calling Art? Eight 
 
Elkanah Brews ters Temptation. 257 
 
 hundred and fifteen new paintings this year, shown by no 
 less than two hundred and eighty-one painters. When you 
 have gone patiently through and looked at every picture, 
 see if you don't wish the critics had eyes, and a little 
 common sense, too. How many of these two hundred and 
 eighty-one, if they live to be a hundred, will ever solve their 
 great riddle ? and once solved, how many would honestly 
 go back to shoemaking? 
 
 Why should they not paint ? Because, unless some of 
 them are poorer men than I think, that is not the thing 
 they are like to do best ; and a man is put into this world, 
 not to do what he may think or hope will most speedily or 
 effectually place him in the list of this world's illustrious 
 benefactors, but honestly and against all devilish tempta- 
 tions to stick to that thing by which he can best serve and 
 bless 
 
 Whom ? A city ? A state ? A republic ? A king ? 
 
 No, but that person who is nearest to, and most de- 
 pendent upon him. Look at Charles Lamb, and then at 
 Byron and Shelly. 
 
 The growth of a poor young artist into public favor is 
 slow enough. But even poor young artists have their 
 temptations. When Elkanah hung his first picture in the 
 Academy rooms, he thought the world must feel the acqui- 
 sition. Now the world is a notoriously stupid world, and 
 never does its duty ; but kind woman not seldom supplies its 
 omissions. So it happened, that, though the world ignored 
 the picture, Elkanah became at once the centre of admira- 
 tion to a coterie of young ladies, who thought they were 
 appreciating Art when they flattered an artist, and who, 
 when they read in the papers the gratifying intelligence 
 (invented by some sanguine critic, over a small bottle of 
 Champagne cider) that the American people are rapidly 
 growing in true love for the fine arts, blushingly owned to 
 themselves that their virtuous labors in this direction were 
 not going unrewarded. 
 
 Have you never seen them in the Academy, these dear 
 
 Q 
 
258 Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 
 
 young ladies, who are so constantly foreseeing new Ra- 
 phaels, Claudes, and Rembrandts ? Positively, in this year's 
 Exhibition they are better worth study than the paintings. 
 There they run, up and down, critical or enthusiastical, as 
 the humor strikes: Laura, with big blue eyes and a loud 
 voice, pitying Isidora because she "has never met" that 
 dear Mr. Herkimer, who paints such delicious, dreamy 
 landscapes ; and Emily dragging everybody off to see Mr. 
 Smith's great work, " The Boy and the Windmill," which 
 so surprising is his facility he actually painted in less 
 than twelve days, and which " promises so much for his 
 success and the future of American Art," says this sage 
 young critic, out of whose gray eyes look the garnered 
 experiences of almost eighteen summers. 
 
 Whoever desiderates cheap praise, let him cultivate a 
 beard and a sleepy look, and hang a picture in the Academy 
 rooms. Elkanah received it, you may be sure. It was 
 thought so romantic, that he, a fisherman, the young 
 ladies sunk the shoemaker, I believe, should be so de- 
 voted to Art. How splendidly it spoke for our civilization, 
 when even sailors left their vessels, and abjuring codfish, 
 took to canvas and brushes ! What admirable courage in 
 him, to come here and endeavor to work his way up from 
 the very bottom ! What praiseworthy self-denial', " No ! ! 
 is it really so ? " cried Miss Jennie, when he had left 
 behind him a fair young bride ! 
 
 It was as though it had been written, " Blessed is he who 
 forsaketh father, mother, and wife to paint pictures." But 
 it is not so written. 
 
 It was as if the true aim and glory of every man in a 
 civilized community should be to paint pictures. Which 
 has this grain of truth in it, that, in the highest form of 
 human development, I believe every man will be at heart 
 an artist. But then we shall be past picture-painting and 
 exhibitions. Don't you see, that, if the fruit be thoroughly 
 ripe, it needs no violent plucking ? or that, if a man is 
 really a painter, he will paint, ay, though he were ten 
 
Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 259 
 
 times a shoemaker, and could never, never hope to hang 
 his pictures on the Academy walls, to win cheap wonder 
 from boarding-school misses, or just regard from judicious 
 critics ? 
 
 Elkanah Brewster came to New York to make his career, 
 to win nothing less than fame and fortune. When he 
 had struggled through five years of Art-study, and was 
 now just beginning to earn a little money, he began also to 
 think that he had somehow counted his chickens before they 
 were hatched, perhaps, indeed, before the eggs were laid. 
 " Good and quickly come seldom together," said old Uncle 
 Shubael. But then a man who has courage commonly has 
 also endurance ; and Elkanah, ardently pursuing from love 
 now what he had first been prompted to by ambition, did 
 not murmur nor despair. For, indeed, I must own that 
 this young fellow had worked himself up to the highest and 
 truest conception of his art, and felt, that, though the 
 laborer is worthy of his hire, unhappy is the man who 
 lowers his art to the level of a trade. In olden times, the 
 priests did, indeed, eat of the sacrificial meats ; but we live 
 under a new and higher dispensation. 
 
 II. 
 
 MEANTIME, what of Hepsy Ann Nickerson? She 
 had bravely sent her hero out, with her blessing on 
 his aspirations. Did she regret her love and trust ? I am 
 ashamed to say that these five long, weary years had passed 
 happily to this young woman. She had her hands full of 
 work at home, where she reigned over a family of brothers 
 and sisters, vice\er mother, promoted. Hands busied with 
 useful toils, head and heart filled with love and trust of 
 Elkanah, there was no room for unhappiness. To serve 
 and to be loved ; this seems, indeed, to be the bliss of the 
 happiest women I have known, and of the happiest men, 
 too, for that matter. It does not sound logical, and I know 
 
260 Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 
 
 of no theory of woman's rights which will satisfactorily 
 account for the phenomenon. But then there are the 
 facts. 
 
 A Cape household is a simpler affair than you will meet 
 with in the city. If any young marrying man waits for a 
 wife who shall be an adept in the mysteries of the kitchen 
 and the sewing-basket, let him go down to the Cape. 
 Captain Elijah Nickerson, Hepsy Ann's father, was master 
 and owner of the good schooner " Miranda," in which ex- 
 cellent, but rather strongly scented vessel, he generally made 
 yearly two trips to the Newfoundland Banks, to draw thence 
 his regular income ; and it is to be remarked, that his drafts, 
 presented in person, were never dishonored in that foggy 
 region. Uncle Elijah (they are all uncles, on the Cape, 
 when they marry and have children, and boys until then), 
 Uncle Elijah, I say, was not uncomfortably off, as things 
 go in those parts. The year before Elkanah went to New 
 York, the old fellow had built himself a bran-new house, 
 and Hepsy Ann was looked up to by her acquaintance as 
 the daughter of a man who was not only brave and honest, 
 but also lucky. " Elijah Nickerson's new house " as it is 
 still called, and will be, I suppose, until it ceases to be a 
 house was fitted up inside in a way which put you much 
 in mind of a ship's cabin, and would have delighted the 
 simple heart of good Captain Cuttle. 
 
 There was no spare space anywhere thrown away, nor 
 anything suffered to lie loose. Beckets and cleats, fixed 
 into the walls of the sitting-room, held and secure^ against 
 any possible damage the pipes, fish-lines, dolphin-grains, 
 and sou'westers of the worthy Captain ; and here he and 
 his sat, when he was at home, through the long winter 
 evenings, in simple and not often idle content. The kitch- 
 en, flanked by the compendious outhouses which make our 
 New England kitchens almost luxurious in the comfort and 
 handiness of every arrangement, was the centre of Hepsy 
 Ann's kingdom, where she reigned supreme, and waged 
 sternest warfare against dirt and disorder. Hence her 
 
Elkanah Brewster's Temptation. 261 
 
 despotic sway extended over the pantry, an awful, and fra- 
 grant sanctuary, whither she fled when household troubles, 
 or a letter from Elkanah, demanded her entire seclusion 
 from the outer world, and of whose interior the children 
 got faint glimpses and sniffs only on special and long- 
 remembered occasions; the west room, where her father 
 slept when he was at home, and where the curious searcher 
 might find store of old compasses, worn-out cod-hooks, 
 condemned gurry-knives, and last year's fishing-mittens, 
 all "stowed away against time-o'-need " ; the spare room, 
 sacred to the rites of hospitality ; the " up-stairs," occupied 
 by the children and Hepsy Ann's self; and finally, but 
 most important of all, the parlor, a mysterious and her- 
 metically sealed apartment, which almost seemed to me an 
 unconsecrated spot in this little temple of the homely 
 virtues and affections, a room furnished in a style some- 
 what ostentatious and decidedly uncomfortable, swept and 
 .dusted on Saturday afternoons by Hepsy Ann's own careful 
 hands, sat in by the Captain and her for an hour or two on 
 Sundays in awkward state, then darkened and locked for 
 the rest of the week. 
 
 As for the queen and mistress of so much neatness and 
 comfort, I must say, that, like most queens whose likeness 
 I have seen, she was rather plain than strictly beautiful, 
 though, no doubt, her loyal subjects, as in such cases com- 
 monly occurs, pictured her to themselves as a very Helen 
 of Troy. If her cheeks had something of the rosy hue of 
 health, cheeks, and arms, too, were well tanned by frequent 
 exposure to the sun. Neither tall nor short, but with a 
 lithe figure, a natural grace and sweet dignity of carriage, 
 the result of sufficient healthy exercise, and a pure, un- 
 troubled spirit ; hands and feet, mouth and nose, not such 
 as a gentleman would particularly notice ; and straight 
 brown hair, which shaded the only really beautiful part 
 of Hepsy Ann's face, her clear, honest, brave blue eyes : 
 eyes from which spoke a soul at peace with itself and with 
 the outward world, a soul yet full of love and trust, fear- 
 
262 Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 
 
 ing nothing, doubting nothing, believing much good, and 
 inclined to patient endurance of the human weaknesses it 
 met with in daily life, as not perhaps altogether strange to 
 itself. The Cape men are a brave, hardy race ; and the 
 Cape women, grave and somewhat silent, not demonstrative 
 in joy or grief, reticent mostly of anxieties and sorrows, born 
 to endure, in separation from fathers, brothers, lovers, hus- 
 bands, in dangers not oftener fancied than real, griefs which 
 more fortunate women find it difficult to imagine, these 
 Cape women are worthy mothers of brave men. Of such 
 our Hepsy Ann was a fair example, weaving her rather 
 prosaic life into golden dreams in the quiet light of her 
 pantry refuge, happy chiefly because she thought much and 
 carefully for others and had little time for self-brooding ; 
 like most genuine heroines (except those of France), living 
 an heroic life without in the least suspecting it. 
 
 And did she believe in Elkanah? 
 
 Utterly. 
 
 And did Elkanah believe in himself? 
 
 Yes, but with certain grave doubts. Here is the differ- 
 ence : the woman's faith is intuition ; the man must have a 
 reason for the faith that is in him. 
 
 Yet Elkanah was growing. I think a man grows like the 
 walls of a house, by distinct stagea : so far the scaffolding 
 reaches, and then a general stoppage while the outer shell 
 is raised, the ladders lengthened, and the work squared 
 off. Now I don't know, unhappily, the common process of 
 growth of the artistic mind, and how far the light of to-day 
 helps the neophyte to look into the indefinite twilight of 
 to-morrow ; but step by step was the slow rule of Elkanah's 
 mind, and he had been now five years an artist, and was 
 held in no despicable repute by those few who could rightly 
 judge of a man's future by his past, when first it became 
 very clear to him that he had yet to find his specialty in 
 Art, that truth which he might better represent than any 
 other man. Don't think five years long to determine so 
 trivial a point. The right man in the right place is still 
 
Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 263 
 
 a rare phenomenon in the world ; and some men spend a 
 lifetime in the consideration of this very point, doubtless 
 looking to take their chance of real work in the next world. 
 I mean to say it took Elkanah just five years to discover, 
 that, though he painted many things well, he did yet put 
 his very soul into none, and that, unless he could now 
 presently find this, his right place, he had, perhaps, better 
 stop altogether. 
 
 Elkanah considered; but he also worked unceasingly, 
 feeling that the best way to break through a difficulty is to 
 pepper away at its outer walls. 
 
 Now while he was firing away wearily at this fortress, 
 which held, he thought, the deepest secret of his life, Hepsy 
 Ann sat in her pantry, her serene soul troubled by unwonted 
 fears. Captain Elijah Nickerson had sailed out in his 
 stanch schooner in earliest spring, for the Banks. The 
 old -man had been all winter meditating a surprise; and 
 his crew were in unusual excitement, peering out at the 
 weather, consulting almanacs, prophesying (to outsiders) a 
 late season, and winking to each other a cheerful disbelief 
 of their own auguries. The fact is, they were intending to 
 slip off before the rest, and perhaps have half their fare of 
 fish caught before the fleet got along. No plan could have 
 succeeded better up to a certain point. Captain Elijah 
 got off to sea full twelve days earlier than anybody else, 
 and was bowling merrily down towards the eternal fog- 
 banks when his neighbors were yet scarce thinking of gath- 
 ering up their mittens and sea-boots. By the time the last 
 comers arrived on the fishing-ground, one who had spoken 
 the -"Miranda" some days before, anchored and fishing 
 away, reported that they had, indeed, nearly wet her salt, 
 by which is meant that she was nearly filled with good, 
 sound codfish. The men were singing as they dressed their 
 fish, and Captain Elijah, sitting high up on the schooner's 
 quarter, took his pipe out of his mouth, and asked, as the 
 vessel rose on the sea, if they had any news to send home, 
 for three days more like that would fill him up. 
 
264 Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 
 
 That was the last word of Captain Elijah Nickerson's 
 ever heard by men now living. Whether the " Miranda " 
 was sunk by an iceberg ; whether run down in the dark 
 and silent watches of the night by some monster packet 
 or swift hurling steamer, little recking the pale fisher's light 
 feebly glimmering up from the surface of the deep ; or 
 whether they went down at their anchors, in the great gale 
 which set in on the third night, as many brave men have 
 done before, looking their fate steadfastly in the face for 
 long hours, and taking time to bid each other farewell ere 
 the great sea swallowed them ; the particulars of their 
 hapless fate no man may know, till the dread day when the 
 sea shall give up its dead. 
 
 Vainly poor Hepsy Ann waited for the well-known signal 
 in the offing, daily walking to the shore, where kind old 
 Uncle Shubael, now long superannuated, and idly busying 
 himself about the fish-house, strove to cheer her fainting 
 soul by store of well-chosen proverbs, and yarns of how, 
 aforetimes, schooners not larger and not so stout as the 
 " Miranda," starting early for the Banks, had been blown 
 southward to the West Indies, and, when the second-fare 
 men came in with their fish, had made their appearance 
 laden with rich cargoes of tropical molasses and bananas. 
 Poor Hepsy Ann ! what need to describe the long-drawn 
 agony which grew with the summer flowers, but did not 
 wane with the summer sun? Hour after hour, day after 
 day, she sat by her pantry-window, looking with wistful 
 eyes out upon the sand, to that spot where the ill-fated 
 " Miranda " had last been seen, but never should appear 
 again, another 
 
 "poor lone Hannah, 
 Sitting by the window, binding shoes," 
 
 cheeks paling, eyes dimming, with that hope deferred which 
 maketh the heart sick. Pray God you never may be so 
 tried, fair reader ! If, in these days, she had not had the 
 children to keep and comfort, she has since told me, she 
 could scarce have borne it. To calm their fears, to soothe 
 
Elkanah Brewster's Temptation. 265 
 
 their little sorrows, to look anxiously morq anxiously 
 than ever before after each one of her precious little 
 brood, became now her chief solace. 
 
 Thus the long, weary days rolled away, each setting sun 
 crushing another hope, until at last the autumn storms 
 approached, the last Banker was safe home ; and by this 
 time it was plain, even to poor Hepsy Ann's faithful heart 
 that her dead would not come back to her. 
 
 " If only Elkanah were here ! " she had sometimes sighed 
 to herself ; but in all these days she wrote him no word. 
 And he guessing nothing of her long, silent agony, him- 
 self sufficiently bemired in his slough of despond, working 
 away with sad, unsatisfied heart in his little studio, hoping 
 yet for light to come to his night was, in truth, so full of 
 himself, that Hepsy Ann had little of his thoughts. Shall 
 I go farther, and admit that sometimes this poor fellow 
 dimly regretted his pledged heart, and faintly murmured, 
 "If only I were free, then I might do something?" If 
 only the ship were rid of her helmsman, then indeed would 
 she go somewhere. 
 
 At last, it was already near Thanksgiving, the news 
 reached Elkanah. " I thought you' d ha' been down afore 
 this to see Hepsy Ann Nickerson in her trouble," said an 
 old coasting-skipper to him, with mild reproach, handing 
 him a letter from his mother, of all persons in the world ! 
 Whereupon, seeing ignorance in Elkanah's inquiring glance, 
 he told the story. 
 
 Elkanah was as one in a maze. Going to his little room, 
 he opened his mother's letter, half-dreading to find here a 
 detailed repetition of what his heart had just taken in. 
 But the letter was short. 
 
 " MY SON ELKANAH, ' 
 
 " Do you not know that Captain Elijah Nickerson will 
 never come home from the Banks, and that Hepsy Ann is 
 left alone in the world ? 
 
 " ' For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, 
 
 12 
 
266 Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 
 
 and be joined to his wife, and they two shall be one 
 flesh.'" 
 
 That was all. 
 
 Elkanah sat on his stool, before his easel, looking vacantly 
 at the unfinished picture, as one stunned and breathless. 
 For the purport of this message was not to be mistaken. 
 Nor did his conscience leave him in doubt as to his duty. 
 O God ! was this, indeed, the end ? Had he toiled, and hoped 
 and prayed, and lived the life of an anchorite these five years 
 only for this ? Was such faith, such devotion, so rewarded ? 
 
 But had any one the right to demand this sacrifice of 
 him ? Was it not a devilish temptation to take him from 
 his calling, from that work in which God had evidently 
 intended him to work for the world ? Had he a right to 
 spoil his life, to belittle his soul, for any consideration ? If 
 Hepsy Ann Nickerson had claims, had not he also, and 
 his Art? If he were willing, in this dire extremity, to sacri- 
 fice his love, his prospects of married bliss, might he not 
 justly require the same of her ? Was not Art his mistress ? 
 Thus whispered the insidious devil of Selfishness to this 
 poor, tempted, anguished soul. 
 
 " Yea," whispered another still, small voice ; " but is not 
 Hepsy Ann your promised wife ? " And those fatal words 
 sounded in his heart : " For this cause shall a man leave 
 his father and mother, and be joined to his wife." 
 
 " Lord, inspire me to do what is right ! " prayed poor 
 amazed Elkanah, sinking on his knees at his cot-side. 
 
 But presently, through his blinding tears, " Lord, give 
 me strength to do the right ! " 
 
 And then, when he awoke next morning, the world seemed 
 another world to him. The foundations of his life seemed 
 broken loose. Tears were no longer, nor prayers. But he 
 went about slowly, and with loving hands, packing up his 
 brushes, pallets, paints, easel, all the few familiar objects 
 of a life which was his no longer, and on which he seemed 
 to himself already looking as across some vast gulf of 
 
Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 267 
 
 years. At last all was done. A last look about the dis- 
 mantled garret, so long his workshop, his home, where he 
 had grown out of one life into another, and a better, as he 
 thought, out of a narrow circle into a broader. And 
 then, away for the Cape. No farewells, no explanations to 
 friends, nothing that should hold out to his sad soul any 
 faintest hope of a return to this garret, this toil, which 
 now seemed to him more heaven than ever before. Thus 
 this Adam left his paradise, clinging to his Eve. 
 
 It was the day before Thanksgiving when Elkanah ar- 
 rived at home. Will any one blame him, if he felt little 
 thankful ? if the thought of the Thanksgiving turkey was 
 like to choke him, and the very idea of giving thanks 
 seemed to him a bitter satire ? Poor fellow ! he forgot 
 that there were other hearts to whom Thanksgiving turkey 
 seemed little tempting. 
 
 The Cape folk are not demonstrative. They have warm 
 hearts, but the old Puritan ice has never quite melted away 
 from the outer shell. 
 
 " Well, Elkanah, glad to see you, boy ! " said his father, 
 looking up from his corner by the stove ; " how 's things in 
 New York ?" Father and son had not met for three years. 
 But, going out into the kitchen, he received a warm grasp 
 of the hand, and his mother said, in her low, sweet voice, 
 " I knew you'd come." That was all. But it was enough. 
 
 How to take his sad face over to Elijah Nickerson's new 
 house ? But that must be done, too. Looking through the 
 little sitting-room window, as he passed, he saw pale-faced 
 Hepsy Ann sitting quietly by the table, sewing. The chil- 
 dren had gone to bed. He did not knock ; why should 
 he ? but, walking in, stood silent on the floor. A glad, 
 surprised smile lit up the sad, wan face, as she recognized 
 him, and, stepping to his side, said, " O, Elkanah ! I knew 
 you 'd come. How good of you ! " Then, abashed to have 
 so committed herself and him, she shrank to her chair 
 again. 
 
 Let us not intrude further on these two. Surely Elkanah 
 
268 Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 
 
 Brewster had been less than man, had he not found his 
 hard heart to soften, and his cold love to warm, as he drew 
 from her the story of her long agony, and saw this weary 
 heart ready to rest upon him, longing to be comforted in 
 his strong arms. 
 
 The next day a small sign was put up at Abijah Brewster's 
 door : 
 
 BOOTS AND SHOES 
 
 MADE AND MENDED 
 
 BY 
 
 ELKANAH BREWSTER. 
 
 It was arranged that he should work at his trade all 
 winter. In the spring, he was to have his father's vessel, 
 and the wedding would be before he started for the Banks. 
 
 So the old life was put on again. I will not say that 
 Elkanah was thoroughly content, that there were no bit- 
 ter longings, no dim regrets, no faint questionings of Provi- 
 dence. But hard work is a good salve for a sore heart ; 
 and in his honest toils, in his care for Hepsy Ann and her 
 little brood, in her kind heart, which acknowledged with 
 such humility of love all he did for her and all he had cast 
 away for her, he found his reward. 
 
 The wedding was over, a quiet affair enough, and 
 Elkanah was anchored on the Banks, with a brave, skilful 
 crew, and plenty of fish. His old luck had not deserted 
 him ; wherever he dropped anchor, there the cod seemed 
 to gather; and, in the excitement of catching fish and 
 guarding against the dangers of the Banks, the old New 
 York life seemed presently forgotten ; and, once more, 
 Elkanah's face wore the old, hopeful calm which belonged 
 there. Art, that had been so long his tyrant mistress, was 
 at last cast off. 
 
 Was she ? 
 
Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 269 
 
 As he sat, one evening, high on the quarter, smoking his, 
 pipe, in that calm, contemplative mood which is the smoker's 
 reward for a day of toil, the little vessel pitching bows 
 under in the long, tremendous swell of the Atlantic, the 
 low drifting fog lurid in the light of the setting sun, but 
 bright stars twinkling out, one by one, overhead, in a sky 
 of Italian clearness and softness, it all came to him, 
 that which he had so long, so vainly sought, toiled for, 
 prayed for in New York, his destiny. 
 
 Why should he paint heads, figures, landscapes, objects 
 with which his heart had never been really filled ? 
 
 But now, as in one flash of divinest intelligence, it was 
 revealed to him ! This sea, this fog, this sky, these stars, 
 this old, old life, which he had been almost born into. O, 
 blind bat indeed, not to have seen, long, long ago, that this 
 was your birthright in Art ! not to have felt in your inner- 
 most heart, that this was indeed that thing, if anything, 
 which God had called you to paint ! 
 
 For this Elkanah had drunk in from his earliest youth, 
 this he understood to its very core ; but the poor secret of 
 that other life, which is so draped about with the artistic 
 mannerisms and fashionable Art of New York, or any other 
 civilized life, he had never rightly appreciated, 
 
 In that sunset-hour was born a. painter J 
 
 III. 
 
 IT chanced, that, a few months ago, I paid my accus- 
 tomed summer visit to an old friend, living near Boston, 
 a retired merchant he calls himself. He began life as a 
 cabin-boy, became, in time, master of an Indiaman, 
 then, partner in a China house, and after many years' 
 residence in Canton, returned some years ago, heart and 
 liver whole, to spend his remaining days among olden 
 scenes. A man of truest culture, generous heart, and rarely 
 erring taste. I never go there without finding something 
 new and admirable. 
 
2/o Elkanah Brewsters Temptation. 
 
 , " What am I to see, this time ? " I asked, after dinner, 
 looking about the drawing-room. 
 
 " Come. I '11 show you." 
 
 He led me up to a painting, a sea-piece : A schooner, 
 riding at her anchor, at sunset, far out at sea, no land in 
 sight, sails down, all but a little patch of storm-sail flutter- 
 ing wildly in the gale, and heavily pitching in a great, grand, 
 rolling sea ; around, but not closely enveloping her, a driv- 
 ing fog-bank, lurid in the yellow sheen of the setting sun ; 
 above her, a few stars dimly twinkling through a clear blue 
 sky ; on the quarter-deck, men sitting, wrapped in all the 
 paraphernalia of storm-clothing, smoking and watching the 
 roll of the sea. 
 
 " What do you think ? " asked Captain Eastwick, inter- 
 rupting my rapt contemplation. 
 
 " I never in my life saw so fine a sea-view. Whose can 
 it be?" 
 
 "A Cape-Cod fisherman's." 
 
 " But he is a genius ! " cried I, enthusiastically. 
 
 " A great, a splendid genius ! " said my friend, quietly. 
 
 "And a fisherman?" 
 
 "Yes, and shoemaker." 
 
 " What a magnificent career he might make ! W T hy 
 don't you help him ! What a pity to bury such a man in 
 fish-boots and cod-livers ! " 
 
 "My dear ," said Captain Eastwick, "you are a goose. 
 The highest genius lives above the littleness of making a 
 career. This man needs no Academy prizes or praises. 
 To my mind, his is the noblest, happiest life of all." 
 
 Whereupon he told me the story which I have endeavored 
 to relate. 
 
THE QUEEN OF THE RED CHESSMEN. 
 
 HE box of chessmen had been left open all night. 
 That was a great oversight ! For everybody 
 knows that the contending chessmen are but too 
 eager to fight their battles over again by midnight, if a 
 chance is only allowed them. 
 
 It was at the Willows, so called, not because the house 
 is surrounded by willows, but because a little clump of 
 them hangs over the pond close by. It is a pretty place, 
 with its broad lawn in front of the door-way, its winding 
 avenue hidden from the road by high trees. It is a quiet 
 place, too ; the sun rests gently on the green lawn, and 
 the drooping leaves of the willows hang heavily over the 
 water. 
 
 No one would imagine what violent contests were going 
 on under the still roof, this very night. It was the night of 
 the first of May. The moon came silently out from the 
 shadows ; the trees were scarcely stirring. The box of 
 chessmen had been left on the balcony steps by the draw- 
 ing-room window, and the window, too, that warm night, 
 had been left open. So, one by one, all the chessmen came 
 out to fight over again their evening's battles. 
 
 It was a famously carved set of chessmen. The bishops 
 wore their mitres, the knights pranced on spirited steeds, 
 the castles rested on the backs of elephants, even the 
 pawns mimicked the private soldiers of an army. The 
 skilful carver had given to each piece, and each pawn, too, 
 a certain individuality. That night there had been a close 
 
272 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 contest. Two well-matched players had guided the game, 
 and it had ended with leaving a deep irritation on the con- 
 quered side. 
 
 It was Isabella the Queen of the Red Chessmen, who 
 had been obliged to yield. She was young and proud, and 
 it was she, indeed, who held the rule ; for her father, the 
 old Red King, had grown too imbecile to direct affairs ; he 
 merely bore the name of sovereignty. And Isabella was 
 loved by knights, pawns, and all ; the bishops were willing 
 to die in her cause, the castles would have crumbled to 
 earth for her. Opposed to her, stood the detested White 
 Queen. All the Whites, of course, were despised by her ; 
 but the haughty, self-sufficient queen angered her most. 
 
 The White Queen was reigning during the minority of 
 her only son. The White Prince had reached the age of 
 nineteen, but the strong mind of his mother had kept him 
 always under restraint. A simple youth, he had always 
 yielded to her control. He was pure-hearted and gentle, 
 but never ventured to make a move of his own. He sought 
 shelter under cover of his castles, while his more energetic 
 mother went forth at the head of his army. She was 
 dreaded by her subjects, never loved by them. Her own 
 pawn, it is true, had ventured much for her sake, had often 
 with his own life redeemed her from captivity ; but it was 
 loyalty that bound even him, no warmer feeling of devo- 
 tion or love. 
 
 The Queen Isabella was the first to come out from her 
 prison. 
 
 " I will stay here no longer," she cried ; " the blood of 
 the Reds grows pale in this inactivity." 
 
 She stood upon the marble steps ; the May moon shone 
 down upon her. She listened a moment to a slight mur- 
 muring within the drawing-room window. The Spanish 
 lady, the Murillo-painted Spanish lady, had come down 
 from her frame that bound her against the wall. Just .for 
 this one night in the year, she stepped out from the canvas 
 to walk up and down the rooms majestically. She would 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 273 
 
 not exchange a word with anybody ; nobody understood 
 her language. She could remember when Murillo looked 
 at her, watched over her, created her with his pencil. She 
 could have nothing to say to little paltry shepherdesses, 
 and other articles of virtti, that came into grace and mo- 
 tion just at this moment. 
 
 The Queen of the Red Chessmen turned away, down 
 into the avenue. The May moon shone upon her. Her 
 feet trod upon unaccustomed ground ; no black or white 
 square hemmed her in ; she felt a new liberty. 
 
 " My poor old father ! " she exclaimed, " I will leave him 
 behind ; better let him slumber in an ignoble repose than 
 wander over the board, a laughing-stock for his enemies. 
 We have been conquered, the foolish White Prince rules ! " 
 
 A strange inspiration stole upon her ; the breath of the 
 May night hovered over her ; the May moon shone upon 
 her. She could move without waiting for the will of 
 another ; she was free. She passed down the avenue ; 
 she had left her old prison behind. 
 
 Early in the morning, it was just after sunrise, the 
 kind Doctor Lester was driving home, after watching half 
 the night out with a patient. He passed the avenue to the 
 Willows, but drew up his horse just as he was leaving the 
 entrance. He saw a young girl sitting under the hedge. 
 She was without any bonnet, in a red dress, fitting closely 
 and hanging heavily about her. She was so very beautiful, 
 she looked so strangely lost and out of place here at this 
 early hour, that the Doctor could not resist speaking 
 to her. 
 
 " My child, how came you here ? " 
 
 The young girl rose up, and looked round with uncer- 
 tainty. 
 
 " Where am I ? " she asked. 
 
 She was very tall and graceful, with an air of command, 
 but with a strange, wild look in her eyes. 
 
 " The young woman must be slightly insane," thought 
 the Doctor ; "but she cannot have wandered far." 
 12* R 
 
274 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 " Let me take you home," he said aloud. " Perhaps you 
 come from the Willows ? " 
 
 "O, don't take me back there!" cried Isabella, "they 
 will imprison me again ! I had rather be a slave than a 
 conquered queen ! " 
 
 " Decidedly insane ! " thought the Doctor. ' I must take 
 her back to the Willows." 
 
 He persuaded the young girl to let him lift her into his 
 chaise. She did not resist him ; but when he turned up 
 the avenue, she leaned back in despair. He was fortunate 
 enough to find one of the servants up at the house, just 
 sweeping the steps of the hall-door. Getting out of his 
 chaise, he said confidentially to the servant, 
 
 " I have brought back your young lady." 
 
 " Our young lady ! " exclaimed the man, as the Doctor 
 pointed out Isabella. 
 
 " Yes, she is a little insane, is she not ? " 
 
 " She is not our young lady," answered the servant ; "we 
 have nobody in the house just now, but Mr. and Mrs. 
 Fogerty, and Mrs. Fogerty's brother, the old geologist." 
 
 " Where did she come from ? " inquired the Doctor. 
 
 "I never saw her before," said the servant, "and I cer- 
 tainly should remember. There's some foreign folks live 
 down in the cottage, by the railroad ; but they are not the 
 like of her ! " 
 
 The Doctor got into his chaise again, bewildered. 
 
 " My child," he said, " you must tell me where you came 
 from." 
 
 " O, don't let me go back again ! " said Isabella, clasping 
 her hands imploringly. " Think how hard it must be never 
 to take a move of one's own ! to know how the game might 
 be won, then see it lost through folly ! O, that last game, 
 lost through utter weakness ! There was that one move ! 
 Why did he not push me down to the king's row ? I might 
 have checkmated the White Prince, shut in by his own 
 castles and pawns, it would have been a direct check- 
 mate ! Think of his folly ! he stopped to take the queen's 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 275 
 
 pawn with his bishop, and within one move of a check- 
 mate ! " 
 
 "Quite insane!" repeated the Doctor. "But I must 
 have my breakfast. She seems quiet ; I think I can keep 
 her till after breakfast, and then I must try and find where 
 the poor child's friends live. I don't know what Mrs. 
 Lester will think of her." 
 
 They rode on. Isabella looked timidly round. 
 
 " You don't quite believe me," she said, at last. " It 
 seems strange to you." 
 
 " It does," answered the Doctor, " seem very strange." 
 
 "Not stranger than to me," said Isabella, "it is so 
 very grand to me ! All this motion ! Look down at that 
 great field there, not cut up into squares ! If I only had 
 my knights and squires there ! I would be willing to give 
 her as good a field, too ; but I would show her where the 
 true bravery lies. What a place for the castles, just to 
 defend that pass ! " 
 
 The Doctor whipped up his horse. 
 
 Mrs. Lester was a little surprised at the companion her 
 husband had brought home to breakfast with him. 
 
 " Who is it ? " she whispered. 
 
 "That I don't know, I shall have to find out," he 
 answered, a little nervously. 
 
 "Where is her bonnet?" asked Mrs. Lester; this was 
 the first absence of conventionality she had noticed. 
 
 " You had better ask her," answered the Doctor. 
 
 But Mrs. Lester preferred leaving her guest in the parlor 
 while she questioned her husband. She was somewhat 
 disturbed when she found he had nothing more satisfactory 
 to tell her. 
 
 " An insane girl ! and what shall we do with her ? " she 
 asked. 
 
 " After breakfast I will make some inquiries about her," 
 answered the Doctor. 
 
 " And leave her alone with us ? that will never do ! You 
 must take, her away directly, at least to the Insane 
 
276 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 Asylum, somewhere ! What if she should grow wild 
 while you were gone ? She might kill us all ! I will go 
 in and tell her that she cannot stay here." 
 
 On returning to the parlor, she found Isabella looking 
 dreamily out of the window. As Mrs. Lester approached, 
 she turned. 
 
 "You will let me stay with you a little while, will you 
 not?" 
 
 She spoke in a quiet tone, with an air somewhat com- 
 manding. It imposed upon nervous little Mrs. Lester. 
 But she made a faint struggle. 
 
 " Perhaps you would rather go home," she said. 
 "I have no home now," said Isabella; "some time I 
 may recover it ; but my throne has been usurped." 
 
 Mrs. Lester looked round in alarm, to see if the Doctor 
 were near. 
 
 " Perhaps you had better come in to breakfast," she 
 suggested. 
 
 She was glad to place the Doctor between herself and 
 their new guest. 
 
 Celia Lester, the only daughter, came down stairs. She 
 had heard that her father had picked up a lost girl in the 
 road. As she came down in her clean morning dress, she 
 expected to have to hold her skirts away from some little 
 squalid object of charity. She started when she saw the 
 elegant-looking young girl who sat at the table. There 
 was something in her air and manner that seemed to make 
 the breakfast equipage, and the furniture of the room about 
 her, look a little mean and poor. Yet the Doctor was very 
 well off, and Mrs. Lester fancied she had everything quite 
 in style. Celia stole into her place, feeling small in the 
 presence of the stranger. 
 
 After breakfast, when the Doctor had somewhat refreshed 
 himself by its good cheer from his last night's fatigue, 
 Isabella requested to speak with him. 
 
 " Let me stay with you a little while," she asked, beseech- 
 ingly ; " I will do everything for you that you desire. You 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 277 
 
 shall teach me anything ; I know I can learn all that you 
 will show me, all that Mrs. Lester will tell me." 
 
 " Perhaps so, perhaps that will be best," answered the 
 Doctor, " until your friends inquire for you ; then I must 
 send you back to them." 
 
 " Very well, very well," said Isabella, relieved. " But I 
 must tell you they will not inquire for me. I see you will 
 not believe my story. If you only would listen to me, I 
 could tell it all to you." 
 
 " That is the only condition I can make with you," an- 
 swered the Doctor, "that you will not tell your story, 
 that you will never even think of it yourself. I am a 
 physician. I know that it is not good for you to dwell 
 upon such things. Do not talk of them to me, nor to my 
 wife or daughter. Never speak of your story to any one 
 who comes here. It will be better for you." 
 
 "Better for me," said Isabella, dreamily, "that no one 
 should know ! Perhaps so. I am, in truth, captive to the 
 White Prince ; and if he should come and demand me, 
 I should be half afraid to try the risks of another game." 
 
 " Stop, stop ! " exclaimed the doctor, " you are already 
 forgetting the condition. I shall be obliged to take you 
 away to some retreat, unless you promise me 
 
 " O, I will promise you anything," interrupted Isabella ; 
 " and you will see that I can keep my promise." 
 
 Meanwhile Mrs. Lester and Celia had been holding a 
 consultation. 
 
 " I think she must be some one in disguise," suggested 
 Celia. 
 
 Celia was one of the most unromantic of persons. Both 
 she and her mother had passed their lives in an unvarying 
 routine of duties. Neither of them had ever found time 
 from their sewing even to read. Celia had her books of 
 history laid out, that she meant to take up when she should 
 get through her work; but it seemed hopeless that this 
 time would ever come. It had never come to Mrs. Lester, 
 and she was now fifty years old. Celia had never read any 
 
278 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 novels. She had tried to read them, but never was inter- 
 ested in them. So she had a vague idea of what romance 
 was, conceiving of it only as something quite different 
 from her every-day life. For this reason the unnatural 
 event that was taking place this very day was gradually 
 appearing to her something possible and natural. Because 
 she knew there was such a thing as romance, and that it 
 was something quite beyond her comprehension, she was 
 the more willing to receive this event quietly from finding 
 it incomprehensible. 
 
 "We can let her stay here to-day, at least," said Mrs. 
 Lester. "We will keep John at work in the front door- 
 yard, in case we should want him. And I will set Mrs. 
 Anderson's boy to weeding in the border ; we can call him, 
 if we should want to send for help." 
 
 She was quite ashamed of herself, when she had uttered 
 these words, and Isabella walked into the room, so com- 
 posed, so refined in her manners. 
 
 " The Doctor says I may stay here a little while, if you 
 will let me," said Isabella, as she took Mrs. Lester's hands. 
 
 "We will try to make you comfortable," replied Mrs. 
 Lester. 
 
 " He says you will teach me many things, I think he 
 said, how to sew." 
 
 " How to sew ! Was it possible she did not know how 
 to sew ? " Celia thought to herself, " How many servants 
 she must have had, never to have learned how to sew, 
 herself!" 
 
 And this occupation was directly provided, while the 
 Doctor set forth on his day's duties, and at the same time 
 to inquire about the strange apparition of the young girl. 
 He was so convinced that there was a vein of insanity 
 about her, that he was very sure that questioning her only 
 excited her the more. Just as he had parted from her, 
 some compunction seized her, and she followed him to the 
 door. 
 
 "There is my father," said she. 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 279 
 
 "Your father! where shall I find him?" asked the 
 Doctor. 
 
 " O, he could not help me," she replied ; " it is a long 
 time since he has been able to direct affairs. He has 
 scarcely been conscious of my presence, and will hardly 
 feel my absence, his mind is so weak." 
 
 " But where can I find him ? " persisted the Doctor. 
 
 "He did not come out," said Isabella; "the White 
 Queen would not allow it, indeed." 
 
 " Stop, stop ! " exclaimed the Doctor, " we are on forbid- 
 den ground." 
 
 He drove away. 
 
 " So there is insanity in the family," he thought to him- 
 self. " I am quite interested in this case. A new form of 
 monomania ! I should be quite sorry to lose sight of it. 
 I shall be loath to give her up to her friends." 
 
 But he was not yet put to that test. No one could give 
 him any light with regard to the strange girl. He went 
 first to the Willows, and found 'there so much confusion 
 that he could hardly persuade any one to listen to his 
 questions. Mrs. Fogerty's brother, the geologist, had been 
 riding that morning, and had fallen from his horse and 
 broken his leg. The Doctor arrived just in time to be of 
 service in setting it. Then he must linger some time to 
 see that the old gentleman was comfortable, so that he was 
 obliged to stay nearly the whole morning. He was much 
 amused at the state of disturbance in which he left the 
 family. The whole house was in confusion, looking after 
 some lost chessmen. 
 
 " There was nothing," said Mrs. Fogerty, apologetically, 
 "that would soothe her brother so much as a game of 
 chess. That, perhaps, might keep him quiet. He would 
 be willing to play chess with Mr. Fogerty by the day to- 
 gether. It was so strange ! they had a game the night 
 before, and now some of the pieces could not be found. 
 Her brother had lost the game, and to-day he was so eager 
 to take his revenge ! 
 
280 TJie Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 " How absurd ! " thought the Doctor ; " what trifling 
 things people interest themselves in ! Here is this old man 
 more disturbed at losing his game of chess than he is at 
 breaking his leg. It is different in my profession, where 
 one deals with life and death. Here is this young girl's 
 fate in my hands, and they talk to me of the loss of a few 
 paltry chessmen ! " 
 
 The " foreign people " at the cottage knew nothing of 
 Isabella. No one had seen her the night before, or at any 
 time. Dr. Lester even drove ten miles to Dr. Giles's 
 Retreat for the Insane, to see if it were possible that a 
 patient could have wandered away from there. Dr. Giles 
 was deeply interested in the account Dr. Lester gave. He 
 would very gladly take such a person under his care. 
 
 " No," said Dr. Lester, " I will wait awhile. I am inter- 
 ested in the young girl. It is not possible but that I shall 
 in time find out from her, by chance, perhaps, who her 
 friends are, and where she came from. She must have 
 wandered away in some delirium of fever, but it is very 
 strange, for she -appears perfectly calm now. Yet I hardly 
 know in what state I shall find her." 
 
 He returned to find her very quiet and calm, learning 
 from his wife and daughter how to sew. She seemed 
 deeply interested in this new occupation, and had g^ven 
 all her time and thought to it. Celia and her mother 
 privately confided to the Doctor their admiration of their 
 strange guest. Her ways were so graceful and beautiful ! 
 all that she said seemed so new and singular ! The Doc- 
 tor, before he went away, had -exhorted Mrs. Lester and 
 Celia to ask her no questions about her former life, and 
 everything had gone on very smoothly. And everything 
 went on as smoothly for some weeks. Isabella seemed 
 willing to be as silent as the Doctor upon all exciting sub- 
 jects. She appeared to be quite taken up with her sewing, 
 much to Mrs. Lester's delight. 
 
 " She will turn out quite as good a seamstress as Celia," 
 said she to the Doctor. " She sews steadily all the time, 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 281 
 
 and nothing seems to please her so much as to finish a 
 piece of work. She will be able to do much more than her 
 own sewing, and may prove quite a help to us." 
 
 " I shall be very glad," said the Doctor, " if anything 
 can be a help, to prevent you and Celia from working your- 
 selves to death. I shall be glad if you can ever have done 
 with that eternal sewing. It is time that Celia should do 
 something about cultivating her mind." 
 
 " Celia's mind is so well regulated," interrupted Mrs. 
 Lester. 
 
 "We won't discuss that," continued the Doctor, "we 
 never come to an agreement there. I was going on to say 
 theft I am becoming so interested in Isabella, that I feel 
 towards her as if she were my own. If she is' of help to 
 the family, that is very well, it is the best thing for her 
 to be' able to make herself of use. But I don't care to 
 make any profit to ourselves out of her help. Somehow I 
 begin to think of her as belonging to us. Certainly she 
 belongs to nobody else. Let us treat her as our own child. 
 We have but one, yet God has given us means enough to 
 care for many more. I confess I should find it hard to 
 give Isabella up to any one else. I like to find her when I 
 come home, it is pleasant to look at her." 
 
 "And I,. too, love her," said Mrs. Lester. " I like to see 
 her as she sits quietly at her work." 
 
 So Isabella went on learning what it was to be one of 
 the family, and becoming, as Mrs. Lester remarked, a very 
 experienced seamstress. She seldom said anything as she 
 sat at her work, but seemed quite occupied with her sew- 
 ing ; while Mrs. Lester and Celia kept up a stream of 
 conversation, seldom addressing Isabella, as, indeed, they 
 had few topics in common. 
 
 One day, Celia and Isabella were sitting together. 
 
 " Have you always sewed ? " asked Isabella. 
 
 " O, yes," answered Celia, " since I was quite a child." 
 
 " And do you remember when you were a child ? " asked 
 Isabella, laying down her work. 
 
282 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 " O, yes, indeed," said Celia ; " I used to make all my 
 doll's dresses myself." 
 
 " Your doll's dresses ! " repeated Isabella. 
 
 " O, yes," replied Celia, " I was not ashamed to play 
 with dolls in that way." 
 
 " I should like to see some dolls," said Isabella. 
 
 " I will show you my large doll," said Celia ; " I have 
 always kept it, because I fitted it out with such a nice set 
 of clothes. And I keep it for children to play with." 
 
 She brought her doll, and Isabella handled it and looked 
 at it with curiosity. 
 
 " So you dressed this, and played with it," said Isabella, 
 inquiringly, "and moved it about as one would move a 
 piece at chess ? " 
 
 Celia started at this word " chess." It was one of the 
 forbidden words. But Isabella went on : 
 
 " Suppose this doll should suddenly have begun to speak, 
 to move, and walk round, would not you have liked it ? " 
 
 " O, no ! " exclaimed Celia. " What ! a wooden thing 
 speak and move ! It would have frightened me very 
 much." 
 
 " Why should it not speak, if it has a mouth, and walk, 
 if it has feet ? " asked Isabella. 
 
 " What foolish questions you ask ! " exclaimed Celia, " of 
 course it has not life." 
 
 " O, life, that is it ! " said Isabella. " Well what is 
 life ? " 
 
 " Life ! why it is what makes us live," answered Celia. 
 * Of course you know what life is." 
 
 "No, I don't know," said Isabella, " But I have been 
 thinking about it lately, while I have been sewing, what 
 it is." 
 
 " But you should not think, you should talk more, Isa- 
 bella, said Celia, ." Mamma and I talk while we are at 
 work, but you are always very silent." 
 
 " But you think sometimes ? " asked Isabella. 
 
 " Not about such things," replied Celia. " I have to 
 think about my work." 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 283 
 
 " But your father thinks, I suppose, when he comes home 
 and sits in his study alone ? " 
 
 " O, he reads when he goes into his study, he reads 
 books and studies them," said Celia. 
 
 " Do you know how to read ? " asked Isabella. 
 
 " Do I know how to read ! " cried Celia, angrily. 
 
 " Forgive me," said Isabella, quickly, " but I never saw 
 you reading. I thought perhaps women are so different 
 here ! " 
 
 She did not finish her sentence, for she saw Celia was 
 really angry. Yet she had no idea of hurting her feelings. 
 She had tried to accommodate herself to her new circum- 
 stances. She had observed a great deal, and had never 
 been in the habit of asking questions. Celia was disturbed 
 at having it supposed that she did not know how to read ; 
 therefore it must be a very important thing to know how to 
 read, and she determined she must learn. She applied to 
 the Doctor. He was astonished at her entire ignorance, 
 but he was very glad to help her. Isabella gave herself 
 up to her reading, as she had done before to her sewing. 
 The Doctor was now the gainer. All the time he was 
 away, Isabella sat in his study, poring over her books ; 
 when he returned*, she had a famous lesson to recite to him. 
 Then he began to tell her of books that he was interested 
 in. He made Celia come in, for a history class. It was 
 such a pleasure to him to find Isabella interested in what 
 he could tell her of history ! 
 
 "All this really happened," said Isabella to Celia once, 
 " these people really lived ! " 
 
 " Yes, but they died," responded Celia, in an indifferent 
 tone, " and ever so long ago, too ! " 
 
 "But did they die," asked Isabella, "if we can talk 
 about them, and imagine how they looked ? They live for 
 us as much as they did then." 
 
 " That I can't understand," said Celia. " My uncle saw 
 Napoleon when he was in Europe, long ago. But I never 
 saw Napoleon. He is dead and gone to me, just as much 
 as Alexander the Great." 
 
284 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 " Well, who does live, if Alexander the Great, if Napoleon, 
 and Columbus do not live ? " asked Isabella, impatiently. 
 
 "Why, papa and mamma live," answered Celia, "and 
 you " 
 
 "And the butcher," interrupted Isabella, "because he 
 brings you meat to eat ; and Mr. Spool, because he keeps 
 the thread store. Thank you for putting me in, too ! 
 Once " 
 
 " Once ! " answered Celia, in a dignified tone, " I suppose 
 once you lived in a grander circle, and it appears to you we 
 have nobody better than Mr. Spool and the butcher." 
 
 Isabella was silent, and thought of her "circle," her 
 former circle. The circle here was large enough, the cir- 
 cumference not very great, but there were as many points 
 in it as in a larger one. There were pleasant, motherly 
 Mrs. Gibbs, and her agreeable daughters, the Gresham 
 boys, just in college, the Misses Tarletan, fresh from a 
 New York boarding-school, Mr. Lovell, the young minis- 
 ter, and the old Misses Pendleton, that made raspberry- 
 jam, together with Celia's particular friends, Anna and 
 Selina Mountfort, who had a great deal of talking with 
 Celia in private, but not a word to say to anybody in the 
 parlor. All these, with many others in the background, 
 had been speculating upon the riddle that Isabella pre- 
 sented, " Who was she ? and where did she come from ? " 
 
 Nobody found any satisfactory answer. Neither Celia 
 nor her mother would disclose anything. It is a great 
 convenience in keeping a secret, not to know what it is. 
 One can't easily tell what one does not know. 
 
 " The Doctor really has a treasure in his wife and daugh- 
 ter," said Mrs. Gibbs, " they keep his secrets so well ! 
 Neither of them will lisp a word about this handsome 
 Isabella." 
 
 " I have no doubt she is the daughter of an Italian refu- 
 gee," said one of the Misses Tarletan. " We saw a number 
 of Italian refugees in New York." 
 
 This opinion became prevalent in the neighborhood. 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 285 
 
 That Dr. Lester should be willing to take charge of an 
 unknown girl did not astonish those who knew of his many 
 charitable deeds. It was not more than he had done for 
 his cousin's child, who had no especial claim upon him. 
 He had adopted Lawrence Egerton, educated him, sent 
 him to college, and was giving him every advantage in his 
 study of the law. In the end Lawrence would probably 
 marry Celia and the pretty property that the Doctor would 
 leave behind for his daughter. 
 
 " She is one of my patients," the Doctor would say, to 
 any one who asked him about her. 
 
 The tale that she was the daughter of an Italian refugee 
 became more rife after Isabella had begun to study Italian. 
 She liked to have the musical Italian words linger on her 
 tongue. She quoted Italian poetry, read Italian history. 
 In conversation, she generally talked of the present, rarely 
 pf the past or of the future. She listened with wonder to 
 those who had a talent for reminiscence. How rich their 
 past must be, that they should be willing to dwell in it ! 
 Her own she thought very meagre. If she wanted to live in 
 the past, it must be in the past of great men, not in that of 
 her own little self. So she read of great painters and great 
 artists, and because she read of them she talked of them. 
 Other people, in referring to by-gone events, would say, 
 "When I was in Trenton last summer," "In Cuba the 
 spring that we were there " ; but Isabella would say, " When 
 Raphael died, or when Dante lived." Everybody liked to 
 talk with her, laughed with her at her enthusiasm. There 
 was something inspiring, too, in this enthusiasm ; it com- 
 pelled attention, as her air and manner always attracted 
 notice. By her side, the style and elegance of the Misses 
 Tarletan faded out ; here was a moon that quite extin- 
 guished the light of their little tapers. She became the 
 centre of admiration ; the young girls admired her, as they 
 are prone to admire some one particular star. She never 
 courted attention, but it was always given. 
 
 " Isabella attracts everybody," said Celia to her mother. 
 
286 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 " Even the old Mr. Spencers, who have never been touched 
 by woman before, follow her, and act just as she wills." 
 
 Little Celia, who had been quite a belle hitherto, sunk 
 into the shade by the side of the brilliant Isabella. Yet 
 she followed willingly in the sunny wake that Isabella left 
 behind. She expanded somewhat, herself, for she was 
 quite ashamed to know nothing of all that Isabella talked 
 about so earnestly. The sewing gave place to a little read- 
 ing, to Mrs. Lester's horror. The Mountforts and the 
 Gibbses met with Isabella and Celia to read and study, and 
 went into town with them to lectures and to concerts. - 
 
 A winter passed away and another summer came. Still 
 Isabella was at Dr. Lester's ; and with the lapse of time 
 the harder did it become for the Doctor to question her 
 of her past history, the more, too, was she herself weaned 
 from it. 
 
 The young people had been walking in the garden one 
 evening. 
 
 " Let me sit by you here in the porch," said Lawrence 
 Egerton to Celia, "I want rest, for body and spirit. I 
 am always in a battle-field when I am talking with Isabella. 
 I must either fight with her or against her. She insists on 
 my fighting all the time. I have to keep my weapons 
 bright, ready for use, every moment. She will lead me, 
 too, in conversation, sends me here, orders me there. I 
 feel like a poor knight in chess, under the sway of a 
 queen " 
 
 " I don't know anything about chess," said Celia, curtly. 
 
 " It is a comfort to have you a little ignorant," said Law- 
 rence. " Please stay in 'bliss awhile. It is repose, it is 
 refreshment. Isabella drags one into the company of her 
 heroes, and then one feels completely ashamed not to be 
 on more familiar terms with them all. Her Mazzinis, her 
 Tancreds, heroes false and true, it makes no difference 
 to her, put one into a whirl between history and story. 
 What a row she would make in Italy, if she went back 
 there 1 " 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 287 
 
 " What could we do without her ? " said Celia ; " it was 
 so quiet and commonplace before she came ! " 
 
 " That is the trouble," replied Lawrence, " Isabella won't 
 let anything remain commonplace. She pulls everything 
 out of its place, makes a hero or heroine out of a piece 
 of clay. I don't want to be in heroics all the time. Even 
 Homer's heroes ate their suppers comfortably. I think it 
 was a mistake in your father, bringing her here. Let her 
 stay in her sphere queening it, and leave us poor mortals 
 to our bread and butter." 
 
 "You know you don't think so," expostulated Celia; 
 " you worship her shoe-tie, the hem of her garment." 
 
 " But I don't want to," said Lawrence, " it is a com- 
 pulsory worship. I had rather be quiet." 
 
 " Lazy Lawrence ! " cried Celia, " it is better for you. 
 You would be the first to miss Isabella. You would find 
 us quite flat without her brilliancy, and would be hunting 
 after some other excitement." 
 
 " Perhaps so," said Lawrence. " But here she comes to 
 goad us on again. Queen Isabella, when do the bull-fights 
 begin?" 
 
 " I wish I were Queen Isabella ! " she exclaimed. " Have 
 you read the last accounts from Spain ? I was reading 
 them to the Doctor to-day. Nobody knows what to do 
 there. Only think what an opportunity for the Queen to 
 show herself a queen ! Why will not she make of herself 
 such a queen as the great Isabella of Castile was ? " 
 
 " I can't say," answered Lawrence. 
 
 " Queens rule in chess," said Horace Gresham. " I 
 always wondered that the king was made such a poor 
 character there. He is not only ruled by his cabinet, 
 bishops, and knights, but his queen is by far the more 
 warlike character." 
 
 " Whoever plays the game rules, you or Mr. Egerton," 
 said Isabella, bitterly; "it is not the poor queen. She 
 must yield to the power of the moving hand. I suppose 
 it is so with us women. We see a great aim before us, but 
 have not the power." 
 
288 The Qiieen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 " Nonsense ! " exclaimed Lawrence, " it is just the reverse. 
 With some women, for I won't be personal, the aim, 
 as you call it, is very small, a poor amusement, another 
 dress, a larger house 
 
 " You may stop," interrupted Isabella, " for you don't 
 believe this. At least, keep some of your flings for the 
 women that deserve them ; Celia and I don't accept them." 
 
 " Then we '11 talk of the last aim we were discussing, 
 the ride to-morrow." 
 
 The next winter was passed by Mrs. Lester, her daughter, 
 and Isabella in Cuba. Lawrence Egerton accompanied 
 them thither, and the Doctor hoped to go for them in the 
 spring. They went on Mrs. Lester's account. She had 
 worn herself out with her household labors, very use- 
 lessly, the Doctor thought, so he determined to send her 
 away from them. Isabella and Celia were very happy all 
 this winter and spring.' With Isabella, Spanish took the 
 place of Italian studies. She liked talking in Spanish. 
 They made some friends among the residents, as well as 
 among the strangers, particularly the Americans. Of these 
 last, they enjoyed most the society of Mrs. Blanchard and 
 her son, Otho, who were at the same hotel with them. 
 
 The opera, too, was a new delight to Isabella, and even 
 Celia was excited by it. 
 
 " It is a little too absurd, to see the dying scene of Romeo 
 and Juliet sung out in an opera ! " remarked Lawrence 
 Egerton, one morning ; " all the music of the spheres could 
 not have made that scene, last night, otherwise than su- 
 premely ridiculous." 
 
 " I am glad you did not sit by us, then," replied Celia ; 
 " Isabella and I were crying." 
 
 " I dare say," said Lawrence. " I should be afraid to 
 take you to see a tragedy well acted. You would both be 
 in hysterics before the killing was over." 
 
 " I should be really afraid," said Celia, " to see Romeo 
 and Juliet finely performed. It would be too sad." 
 
 " It would be much better to end it -up comfortably," 
 
4 The Queen, of the Red Chessmen. 289 
 
 said Lawrence. " Why should not Juliet marry her Romeo 
 in peace ? " 
 
 "It would be impossible!" exclaimed Isabella, "im- 
 possible to bring together two such hostile families ! Of 
 course the result must be a tragedy." 
 
 "In romances," answered Lawrence, " that may be neces- 
 sary ; but not in real life." 
 
 " Why not in real life ? " asked Isabella. " When two 
 thunder-clouds meet, there must be an explosion." 
 
 " But we don't have such hostile families arrayed against 
 each other now-a-days," said Lawrence. " The Bianchi 
 and the Neri have died out ; unless the feud lives between 
 the whites and the blacks of the present day." 
 
 " Are you sure that it has died out everywhere ? " asked 
 Isabella. 
 
 " Certainly not," said Otho Blanchard ; " my mother, 
 Bianca Bianco, inherits her name from a long line of ances- 
 try, and with it come its hatreds as well as its loves." 
 
 " You speak like an Italian or Spaniard," said Lawrence. 
 " We are cold-blooded Yankees, and in our slow veins such 
 passions do die out. I should have taken you for an 
 American from your name." 
 
 " It is our name Americanized ; we have made Americans 
 of ourselves, and the Bianchi have become the Blanch- 
 ards." 
 
 " The romance of the family, then," persisted Lawrence, 
 "must needs become Americanized too. If you were to 
 meet with a lovely young lady of the enemy's race, I think 
 you would be willing to bury your sword in the sheath for 
 her sake." 
 
 " I hope I should not forget the honor of my family," 
 said Otho. " I certainly never could, as long as my mother 
 lives ; her feelings on the subject are stronger even than 
 mine." 
 
 " I cannot imagine the possibility of such feelings dying 
 out," said Isabella. " I cannot imagine such different ele- 
 ments amalgamating. It would be like fire and water 
 13 s 
 
290 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. > 
 
 uniting. Then there would be no longer any contest ; the 
 game of life would be over." 
 
 "Why will you make out life to be a battle always?" 
 exclaimed Lawrence ; " won't you allow us any peace ? I 
 do not find such contests all the time, never, except when 
 I am fighting with you." 
 
 " I had' rather fight with you than against you," said 
 Isabella, laughing. " But when one is not striving, one is 
 sleeping." 
 
 " That reminds me that it is time for our siesta," said 
 Lawrence ; " so we need not fight any longer." 
 
 Afterwards Isabella and Celia were talking of their new 
 friend Otho. 
 
 " He does not seem to me like a Spaniard," said Celia, 
 " his complexion is so light ; then, too, his name sounds 
 German." 
 
 " But his passions are quick," replied Isabella. " How 
 he colored up when he spoke of the honor of his family ! " 
 
 " I wonder that you like him," said Celia ; " when he is 
 with his mother, he hardly ventures to say his soul is his 
 own." 
 
 " I don't like his mother," said Isabella ; " her manner 
 is too imperious and unrefined, it appears to me. No 
 wonder that Otho is ill at ease in her presence. It is evi- 
 dent that her way of talking is not agreeable to him. He 
 is afraid that she will commit herself in some way." 
 
 " But he never stands up for himself," answered Celia ; 
 "he always yields to her. Now I should not think you 
 would like that." 
 
 " He yields because she is his mother," said Isabella ; 
 " and it would not be becoming to contradict her." 
 
 " He yields to you, too," said Celia ; " how happens 
 that?" 
 
 " I hope he does not yield to me more than is becoming," 
 answered Isabella, laughing; "perhaps that is why I like 
 him. After all, I don't care to be always sparring, as I am 
 with Lawrence Egerton. With Otho I find that I agree 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 291 
 
 wonderfully in many things. Neither of us yields to the 
 other, neither of us is obliged to convince the other." 
 
 "Now I should think. you would find that stupid," said 
 Celia. " What becomes of this desire of yours never to 
 rest, always to be struggling after something ? " 
 
 " We might strive together, we might struggle together," 
 responded Isabella. 
 
 She said this musingly, not in answer to Celia, but to her 
 own thoughts, as she looked away, out from everything 
 that surrounded her. The passion for ruling had always 
 been uppermost in her mind ; suddenly there dawned upon 
 her the pleasure of being ruled. She became conscious of 
 the pleasure of conquering all things for the sake of giving 
 all to another. A new sense of peace stole upon her mind. 
 Before, she had felt herself alone, even in the midst of the 
 kindness of the home that had been given her. She had 
 never dared to think or to speak of the past, and as little 
 of the future. She had gladly flung herself into the details 
 of every-day life. She had given her mind to the study 
 of all that it required. She loved the Doctor, because he 
 was always leading her on to fresh fields, always exciting 
 her to a new knowledge. She loved him, too, for himself, 
 for his tenderness and kindness to her. With Mrs. Lester 
 and Celia she felt herself on a different footing. They 
 admired her, but they never came near her. She led them, 
 and they were always behind her. 
 
 With Otho she experienced a new feeling. He seemed, 
 very much as she did herself, out of place in the world just 
 around him. He was a foreigner, was not yet acclimated 
 to the society about him. He was willing to talk of other 
 things than every-day events. He did not talk of " things," 
 indeed, but he speculated, as though he lived a separate 
 life from that of mere eating and drinking. He was not 
 content with what seemed to every-day people possible, but 
 was willing to believe that there were things not dreamed 
 of in their philosophy. 
 
 " It is a satisfaction," said Lawrence once to Celia, " that 
 
292 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 Isabella has found somebody who will go high enough into 
 the clouds to suit her. Besides, it gives me a little repose." 
 " And a secret jealousy at the same time ; is it not so ? " 
 asked Celia. "He takes up too much of Isabella's time to 
 please you." 
 
 " The reason he pleases her," said Lawrence, " is because 
 he is more womanly than manly, and she thinks women 
 ought to rule the world. Now if the world were made up 
 of such as he, it would be very easily ruled. Isabella loves 
 power too well to like to see it in others. Look at her when 
 she is with Mrs. Blanchard ! It is a splendid sight to see 
 them together!" 
 
 " How can you say so ? I am always afraid of some 
 outbreak." 
 
 These families were, however, so much drawn together, 
 that, when the Doctor came to summon his wife and 
 daughter and Isabella home, Mrs. Blanchard was anxious 
 to accompany them to New England. She wondered if it 
 were not possible to find a country-seat somewhere near 
 the Lesters, that she could occupy for a time. The Doctor 
 knew that the Willows was to be vacant this spring. The 
 Fogertys were all going to Europe, and would be very 
 willing to let their place. 
 
 So it was arranged after their return. The Fogertys left 
 for Europe, and Mrs. Blanchard took possession of the 
 Willows. It was a pleasant walking distance from the 
 Lesters, but it was several weeks before Isabella made her 
 first visit there. She was averse to going into the house, 
 but, in company with Celia, Lawrence, and Otho, walked 
 about the grounds. Presently they stopped near a pretty 
 fountain that was playing in the midst of the garden. 
 
 " That is a pretty place for an Undine," said Otho. 
 
 " The idea of an Undine makes me shiver," said Law- 
 rence. " Think what a cold-blooded, unearthly being she 
 would be!" 
 
 " Not after she had a soul ! " exclaimed Isabella. 
 
 " An Undine with a soul ! " cried Lawrence. " I con- 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 293 
 
 ceive of them as malicious spirits, who live and die as the 
 bubbles of water rise and fall." 
 
 " You talk as if there were such things as Undines," said 
 Celia. " I remember once trying to read the story of Un- 
 dine, but I never could finish it." 
 
 " It ends tragically," remarked Otho. 
 
 " Of course all such stories must," responded Lawrence ; 
 " of course it is impossible to bring the natural and the 
 unnatural together." 
 
 "That depends upon what you call the natural," said 
 Otho. 
 
 " We should differ, I suppose," said Lawrence, " if we 
 tried to explain what we each call the natural I fancy 
 your 'real life' is different from mine." 
 
 "Pictures of real life," said Isabella, "are sometimes 
 pictures of horses and dogs, sometimes of children playing, 
 sometimes of fruits of different seasons heaped upon one 
 dish, sometimes of watermelons cut open." 
 
 " That is hardly your picture of real life," said Lawrence, 
 laughing, "a watermelon cut open ! I think you would 
 rather choose the picture of the Water Fairies from the 
 Dusseldorf Gallery." 
 
 "Why not?" said Isabella. "The life we see must be 
 very far from being the only life that is." 
 
 " That is very true," answered Lawrence ; " but let the 
 fairies live their life by themselves, while we live our life in 
 our own way. Why should they come to disturb our peace, 
 since we cannot comprehend them, and they certainly can- 
 not comprehend us ? " 
 
 " You do not think it well, then," said Isabella, stopping 
 in their walk, and looking down, " you do not think it 
 well that beings of different natures should mingle ? " 
 
 " I do not see how they can," replied Lawrence. " I am 
 limited by my senses ; I can perceive only what they show 
 me. Even my imagination can picture to me only what 
 my senses can paint." 
 
 " Your senses ! " cried Otho, contemptuously, " it is 
 
294 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 very true, as you confess, you are limited by your senses. 
 Is all this beauty around you created merely for you, and 
 the other insects about us? I have no doubt it is filled 
 with invisible life." 
 
 " Do let us go in ! " said Celia. " This talk, just at twi- 
 light, under the shade of this shrubbery, makes me shudder. 
 I am not afraid of the fairies. I never could read fairy 
 stories when I was a child ; they were tiresome to me. 
 But talking in this way makes one timid. There might be 
 strollers or thieves under all these hedges." 
 
 They went into the house, through the hall, and different 
 apartments, till they reached the drawing-room. Isabella 
 stood transfixed upon the threshold. It was all so familiar 
 to her ! everything as she had known it before ! Over 
 the mantel-piece hung the picture of the scornful Spanish 
 lady ; a heavy bookcase stood in one corner ; comfortable 
 chairs and couches were scattered round the room ; beauti- 
 ful landscapes against the wall seemed like windows cut 
 into foreign scenery. There was an air of ease in the room, 
 an old-fashioned sort of ease, such as the Fogertys must 
 have loved. 
 
 " It is a pretty room, is it not ? " said Lawrence. " You 
 look at it as if it pleased you. How much more comfort 
 there is about it than in the fashionable parlors of the day ? 
 It is solid, substantial comfort." 
 
 " You look at it as if you had seen it before," said Otho 
 to Isabella. "Do you know the room impressed me in 
 that way, too ? " 
 
 "It is singular," said Lawrence, "the feeling, that 'all 
 this has been before,' that comes over one at times. I have 
 heard it expressed by a great many people." 
 
 "Have yo.u, indeed, ever had this feeling?" asked Isa- 
 bella. 
 
 " Certainly," replied Lawrence ; " I say to myself some- 
 times, ' I have been through all this before ! ' and I can 
 almost go on to tell what is to come next, it seems so 
 much a part of my past experience." 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 295 
 
 " It is strange it should be so with you, and with you 
 too," she said, turning to Otho. 
 
 " Perhaps we are all more alike than we have thought," 
 said Otho. 
 
 Otho's mother appeared, and the conversation took an- 
 other turn. 
 
 Isabella did not go to the Willows again, until all the 
 Lester family were summoned there to a large party that 
 Mrs. Blanchard gave. She called it a house-warming, 
 although she had been in the house some time. It was a 
 beautiful evening. A clear moonlight made it as brilliant 
 outside on the lawn as the lights made the house within. 
 There was a band of music stationed under the shrubbery, 
 and those who chose could dance. Those who were more 
 romantic wandered away down the shaded walks, and 
 listened to the dripping of the fountain. 
 
 Lawrence and Isabella returned from a walk through the 
 grounds, and stopped a moment on the terrace in front of 
 the house. Just then a dark cloud appeared in the sky, 
 threatening the moon. The wind, too, was rising, and 
 made a motion among the leaves of the trees. 
 
 " Do you remember," asked Lawrence, " that child's story 
 of the Fisherman and his Wife ? how the fisherman went 
 down to the sea-shore, and cried out, 
 
 " ' O man of the sea, 
 Come listen to me 1 
 For Alice, my wife, 
 The plague of my life, 
 Has sent me to beg a boon of thee ! ' 
 
 The sea muttered and roared ; do you remember ? There 
 was always something impressive to me in the descriptions, 
 in the old story, of the changes in the sea, and of the 
 tempest that rose up, more and more fearful, as the fisher- 
 man's wife grew more ambitious and more and more grasp- 
 ing in her desires, each time that the fisherman went down 
 to the sea-shore. I believe my first impression of the sea 
 came from that. The coming on of a storm is always as- 
 
296 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 sociated with it. I always fancy that it is bringing with it 
 something beside the tempest, that there is something 
 ruinous behind it." 
 
 "That is more fanciful than you usually are," said Isa- 
 bella ; " but, alas ! I cannot remember your story, for I 
 never read it." 
 
 " That is where your education and Celia's was fearfully 
 neglected," said Lawrence ; " you were not brought up on 
 fairy stories and Mother Goose. You have not needed 
 the first, as Celia has ; but Mother Goose would have 
 given a tone to your way of thinking, that is certainly 
 wanting." 
 
 A little while afterwards, Isabella stood upon the balcony 
 steps leading from the drawing-room. Otho was with her. 
 The threatening clouds had driven almost every one into 
 the house. There was distant thunder and lightning ; 
 but through the cloud-rifts, now and then, the moonlight 
 streamed down. Isabella and Otho had been talking 
 earnestly, so earnestly, that they were quite unobservant 
 of the coming storm, of the strange lurid light that hung 
 around. 
 
 " It is strange that this should take place here ! " said 
 Isabella, "that just here I should learn that you love 
 me ! Strange that my destiny should be completed in this 
 spot ! " 
 
 "And this spot has its strange associations with me," 
 said Otho, "of which I must some time speak to you. 
 But now I can think only of the present. Now, for the 
 first time, do I feel what life is, now that you have 
 promised to be mine ! " 
 
 Otho was interrupted by a sudden .cry. He turned to 
 find his mother standing behind him. 
 
 " You are here with Isabella ! she has promised herself 
 to you ! " she exclaimed. " It is a fatality, a terrible fatality ! 
 Listen, Isabella ! You are the Queen of the Red Chess- 
 men ; and he, Otho, is the King of the White Chessmen, 
 and I, their Queen. Can there be two queens ? Can there 
 
The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 297 
 
 be a marriage between two hostile families ? Do you not 
 see, if there were a marriage between the Reds and the 
 Whites, there were no game ? Look ! I have found our 
 old prison ! The pieces would all be here, but we, we 
 are missing ! Would you return to the imprisonment of 
 this poor box, to your old mimic life ? No, my children, 
 go back ! Isabella, marry this Lawrence Egerton, who 
 loves you. You will find what life is, then. Leave Otho, 
 that he may find this same life also." 
 
 Isabella stood motionless. 
 
 " Otho, the White Prince ! Alas ! where is my hatred ? 
 But life without him ! Even stagnation were better ! I 
 must needs be captive to the White Prince ! " 
 
 She stretched out her hand to Otho. He seized it pas- 
 sionately. At this moment there was a grand crash of 
 thunder. A gust of wind extinguished at once all the lights 
 in the drawing-room. The terrified guests hurried into the 
 hall, into the other rooms. 
 
 " The lightning must have struck the house ! " they ex- 
 claimed. 
 
 A heavy rain followed ; then all was still. Everybody 
 began to recover his spirits. The servants relighted the 
 candles. The drawing-room was found untenanted. It 
 was time to go ; yet there was a constraint upon all the 
 party, who were eager to find their hostess and bid her 
 good-bye. 
 
 But the hostess could not be found ! Isabella and Otho, 
 too, were missing ! The Doctor and Lawrence went every- 
 where, calling for them, seeking them in the house, in the 
 grounds. They were nowhere to be found, neither that 
 night, nor the next day, nor ever afterwards ! 
 
 The Doctor found in the balcony a box of chessmen 
 fallen down. It was nearly filled ; but the red queen, and 
 the white king and queen, were lying at a little distance. 
 In the box was the red king, his crown fallen from his head, 
 himself broken in pieces. The Doctor took up the red 
 queen, and carried it home. 
 
298 The Queen of the Red Chessmen. 
 
 " Are you crazy ? " asked his wife. " What are you going 
 to do with that red queen?" 
 
 But the Doctor placed the figure on his study-table, and 
 often gazed at it wistfully. 
 
 Whenever, afterwards, as was often the case, any one 
 suggested a new theory to account for the mysterious disap- 
 pearance of Isabella and the Blanchards, the Doctor looked 
 at the carved image on his table and was silent. 
 
MISS LUCINDA. 
 
 UT that Solomon is out of fashion I should quote 
 him, here and now, to the effect that there is a 
 time for all things ; but Solomon is obsolete, and 
 never, no, never, will I dare to quote a dead language, 
 "for raisons I have," as the exiles of Erin say. Yet, in 
 spite of Solomon and Horace, I may express my own less 
 concise opinion, that even in hard times, and dull times, 
 and war times, there is yet a little time to laugh, a brief 
 hour to smile and love and pity, just as through this dreary 
 easterly storm, bringing clouds and rain, sobbing against 
 casement and door with the inarticulate wail of tempests, 
 there comes now and then the soft shine of a sun behind it 
 all, a fleeting glitter, an evanescent aspect of what has 
 been. 
 
 But if I apologize for a story that is nowise tragic, nor 
 fitted to " the fashion of these times," possibly somebody 
 will say at its end that I should also have apologized for its 
 subject, since it is as easy for an author to treat his readers 
 to high themes as vulgar ones, and velvet can be thrown 
 into a portrait as cheaply as calico ; but of this apology I 
 wash my hands. I believe nothing in place or circum- 
 stance makes romance. I have the same quick sympathy 
 for Biddy's sorrows with Patrick that I have for the Em- 
 press of France and her august, but rather grim lord and 
 master. I think words are often no harder to bear than 
 " a blue bating," and I have a reverence for poor old maids 
 as great as for the nine Muses. Commonplace people are 
 
3OO Miss Lucinda. 
 
 only commonplace from character, and no position affects 
 ' that. So forgive me once more, patient reader, if I offer 
 to you no tragedy in high life, no sentimental history of 
 fashion and wealth, but only a little story about a woman 
 who could not be a heroine. 
 
 Miss Lucinda Jane Ann Manners was a lady of unknown 
 age, who lived in a place I call Dalton, in a State of these 
 Disuniting States, which I do not mention for good cause. 
 I have already had so many unconscious personalities visited 
 on my devoted head, that but for lucidity I should never 
 mention persons or places, inconvenient as it would be. 
 However, Miss Lucinda did live, and lived by the aid of 
 "means," which, in the vernacular, is money. Not a great 
 deal, it is true, five thousand dollars at lawful interest, 
 and a little wooden house, do not imply many luxuries even 
 to a single-woman; and it is also true that a little fine 
 sewing taken in helped Miss Manners to provide herself 
 with a few small indulgences otherwise beyond her reach. 
 She had one or two idiosyncrasies, as they are politely 
 called, that were her delight. Plenty of dish-towels were 
 necessary to her peace of mind ; without five pair of 
 scissors she could not be happy ; and Tricopherous was 
 essential to her well-being : indeed, she often said she 
 would rather give up coffee than Tricopherous, for her hair 
 was black and wiry and curly, and caps she abhorred, so 
 that of a winter's day her head presented the most irrele- 
 vant and volatile aspect, each particular hair taking a twist 
 on its own responsibility, and improvising a wild halo about 
 her unsaintly face, unless subdued into propriety by the 
 aforesaid fluid. 
 
 I said Miss Lucinda's face was unsaintly, I mean un 
 like ancient saints as depicted by contemporary artists : 
 modern and private saints are after another fashion. I met 
 one yesterday, whose green eyes, great nose, thick lips, and 
 sallow wrinkles, under a bonnet of fifteen years' standing, 
 further clothed upon by a scant merino cloak and cat-skin 
 tippet, would have cut a sorry figure in the gallery of the 
 
Miss Lucinda. 301 
 
 Vatican or the Louvre, and put the tranquil Madonna of 
 San Sisto into a state of stunning antithesis ; but if Saint 
 Agnes or Saint Catharine was half as good as my saint, I 
 am glad of it ! 
 
 No, there was nothing sublime and dolorous about Miss 
 Manners ; her face was round, cheery, and slightly puckered, 
 with two little black eyes sparking and shining under dark 
 brows, a nose she unblushingly called pug, and a big mouth 
 with eminently white and regular teeth, which she said 
 were such a comfort, for they never ached, and never would 
 to the end of time. Add to this physiognomy a small and 
 rather spare figure, dressed in the cleanest of calicoes, 
 always made in one style, and rigidly scorning hoops, 
 without a symptom of a collar, in whose place (or it may 
 be over which) she wore a white cambric handkerchief, 
 knotted about her throat, and the two ends brought into 
 subjection by means of a little angular-headed gold pin, 
 her sole ornament, and a relic of her old father's days 
 of widowhood, when buttons were precarious tenures. So 
 much for her aspect. Her character was even more quaint. 
 
 She was the daughter of a clergyman, one of the old 
 school, the last whose breeches and knee-buckles adorned 
 the profession, who never " outlived his usefulness," nor lost 
 his godly simplicity. Parson Manners held rule over an 
 obscure and quiet village in the wilds of Vermont, where 
 hard-handed farmers wrestled with rocks and forests for 
 their daily bread, and looked forward to heaven as a land 
 of green pastures and still waters, where agriculture should 
 be a pastime, and winter impossible. Heavy freshets from 
 the mountains that swelled their rushing brooks into annual 
 torrents, and snow-drifts that covered five-rail fences a foot 
 above the posts and blocked up the turnpike-road for weeks, 
 caused this congregation fully to appreciate Parson Man- 
 ners's favorite hymns, 
 
 "There is a land of pure delight," 
 
 and 
 
 " On Jordan's stormy banks I stand." 
 
302 Miss Luanda. 
 
 Indeed, one irreverent, but " pretty smart feller," who lived 
 on the top of a hill known as Drift Hill, where certain 
 adventurous farmers dwelt for the sake of its smooth sheep- 
 pastures, was heard to say, after a mighty sermon by Parson 
 Manners about the seven-times heated furnaces of judg- 
 ment reserved for the wicked, that " Parson had n't better 
 try to skeer Drift-Hillers with a hot place ; 't would n't more 
 'n jest warm 'em through down there, arter a real snappin' 
 winter." 
 
 In this out-of-the-way nook was Lucinda Jane Ann born 
 and bred. Her mother was like her in many things, just 
 such a cheery, round-faced little body, but with no more 
 mind than found ample scope for itself in superintending 
 the affairs of house and farm, and vigorously " seeing to " 
 her husband and child. So, while Mrs. Manners baked, 
 and washed, and ironed, and sewed, and knit, and set the 
 sweetest example of quiet goodness and industry to all her 
 flock, without knowing she could set an example,- or be 
 followed as one, the Parson amused himself, between ser- 
 mons of powerful doctrine and parochial duties of a more 
 human interest, with educating Lucinda, whose intellect 
 was more like his own than her mother's. A strange train- 
 ing it was for a young girl, mathematics, metaphysics, 
 Latin, theology of the driest sort ; and after an utter failure 
 at Greek and Hebrew, though she had toiled patiently 
 through seven books of the "yneid," Parson Manners 
 mildly sniffed at the inferiority of the female mind, and 
 betook himself to teaching her French, which she learned 
 rapidly, and spoke with a pure American accent, perhaps 
 as pleasing to a Parisian ear as the hiss of Piedmont or 
 the gutturals of Switzerland. Moreover, the minister had 
 been brought up, himself, in the most scrupulous refinement 
 of manner ; his mother was a widow, the last of an " old 
 family," and her dainty, delicate observances were inbred, 
 as it were, in her only son. This sort of elegance is per- 
 haps the most delicate test of training and descent, and all 
 these things Lucinda was taught from the grateful recollec- 
 
Miss Lucinda. 303 
 
 tion of a son who never forgot his mother, through all the 
 solitary labors and studies of a long life. So it came to 
 pass, that, after her mother died, Lucinda grew more and 
 more like her father, and, as she became a woman, these 
 rare refinements separated her more and more from those 
 about her, and made her necessarily solitary. As for mar- 
 riage, the possibility of such a thing never crossed her 
 mind ; there was not a man in the parish who did not 
 offend her sense of propriety and shock her taste, whenever 
 she met one ; and though her warm, kind heart made her 
 a blessing to the poor and sick, her mother was yet bitterly 
 regretted at quiltings and tea-drinkings, where she had 
 been so "sociable-like." 
 
 It is rather unfortunate for such a position as Luanda's, 
 that, as Deacon Stowell one day remarked to her father, 
 " Natur' will be Natur' as much on Drift Hill as down to 
 Bosting " ; and when she began to feel that " strong neces- 
 sity of loving " that sooner or later assails every woman's 
 heart, there was nothing for it to overflow on, when her 
 father had taken his share. Now Lucinda loved the Par- 
 son most devoutly. Ever since the time when she could 
 just remember watching through the dusk his white stock- 
 ings, as they glimmered across the road to evening-meeting, 
 and looked like a supernatural pair of legs taking a walk 
 on their own responsibility, twilight concealing the black 
 breeches and coat from mortal view, Lucinda had regarded 
 her father with a certain pleasing awe. His long abstrac- 
 tions, his profound knowledge, his grave, benign manners, 
 and the thousand daily refinements of speech and act that 
 seemed to put him far above the sphere of his pastorate, 
 all these things inspired as much reverence as affection ; 
 and when she wished with all her heart and soul she had 
 a sister or a brother to tend and kiss and pet, it never once 
 occurred to her that any of those tender familiarities could 
 be expended on her father : she would as soon have thought 
 of caressing any of the goodly angels whose stout legs, 
 flowing curls, and impossible draperies sprawled among the 
 
304 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 pictures in the big Bible, and who excited her wonder as 
 much by their garments as their turkey-wings and bran- 
 dishing arms. So she betook herself to pets, and growing 
 up to the old-maidenhood of thirty-five before her father 
 fell asleep, was by that time the centre of a little world of 
 her own, hens, chickens, squirrels, cats, dogs, lambs, and 
 sundry transient guests of stranger kind ; so that, when 
 she left her old home, and removed to the little house in 
 Dalton that had been left her by her mother's aunt, and 
 had found her small property safely invested by means of 
 an old friend of her father's, Miss Manners made one more 
 journey to Vermont to bring in safety to their future dwell- 
 ing a cat and three kittens, an old blind crow, a yellow 
 dog of the true cur breed, and a rooster with three hens, 
 "real creepers," as she often said, "none of your long- 
 legged, screaming creatures." 
 
 Lucinda missed her father, and mourned him as con- 
 stantly and faithfully as ever a daughter could; but her 
 temperament was more cheerful and buoyant than his, and 
 when once she was quietly settled in her little house, her 
 garden and her pets gave her such full occupation that she 
 sometimes blamed herself for not feeling more lonely and 
 unhappy. A little longer life or a little more experience 
 would have taught her better: power to be happy is the 
 last thing to regret. Besides, it would have been hard to 
 be cheerless in that sunny little house, with its queer old 
 furniture of three-legged tables, high-backed chairs, and 
 chintz curtains where red mandarins winked, at blue pa- 
 godas on a deep-yellow ground, and birds of insane orni- 
 thology pecked at insects that never could have been 
 hatched, or perched themselves on blossoms totally unknown 
 to any mortal flora. Old engravings of Bartolozzi, from 
 the stiff elegances of Angelica Kaufman and the mytholo- 
 gies of Reynolds, adorned the shelf ; and the carpet in the 
 parlor was of veritable English make, older than Lucinda 
 herself, but as bright in its fading and as firm in its useful- 
 ness as she. Up stairs the tiny chambers were decked with 
 
Miss Lucinda. 305 
 
 spotless white dimity, and rush-bottomed chairs stood in 
 each window, with a strip of the same old carpet by either 
 bedside ; and in the kitchen the blue settle that had stood 
 by the Vermont fireside now defended this lesser hearth 
 from the draught of the door, and held under the seat 
 thereof sundry ironing-sheets, the blanket belonging to 
 them, and good store of ticking and worsted holders. A 
 half-gone set of egg-shell china stood in the parlor-close*t, 
 cups, and teapot, and sugar-bowl, rimmed with brown 
 and gold in a square pattern, and a shield without blazon 
 on the side; the quaint tea-caddy with its stopper stood 
 over against the pursy little cream-pot, and held up in its 
 lumps of sparkling sugar the oddest sugar-tongs, also a 
 family relic ; beside this, six small spoons, three large 
 ones, and a little silver porringer comprised all the "plate" 
 belonging to Miss Manners, so that no fear of burglars 
 haunted her, and but for her pets she would have lived a life 
 of profound and monotonous tranquillity. But this was a 
 vast exception'; in her life her pets were the great item 
 now ; her cat had its own chair in the parlor and kitchen ; 
 her dog, a rug and a basket never to be meddled with by 
 man or beast ; her old crow, its special nest of flannel and 
 cotton, where it feebly croaked as soon as Miss Lucinda 
 began to spread the little table' for her meals ; and the 
 three kittens had their own playthings and their own saucer 
 as punctiliously as if they had been children. In fact, 
 Miss Manners had a greater share of kindness for beasts 
 than for mankind. A strange compound of learning and 
 unworldliness, of queer simplicity, native penetration, and 
 common sense, she had read enough books to despise 
 human nature as it develops itself in history and theology, 
 and she had not known enough people to love it in its 
 personal development. She had a general idea that all 
 men were liars, and that she must be on her guard against 
 their propensity to cheat and annoy a lonely and helpless 
 woman ; for, to tell the truth, in her good father's over- 
 anxiety to defend her from the snares of evil men after his 
 
 T 
 
306 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 death, his teachings had given her opinion this bias, and 
 he had forgotten to tell her how kindly and how true he 
 had found many of his own parishioners, how few inclined to 
 harm or pain him. So Miss Lucinda made her entrance 
 into life at Dalton, distrustful, but not suspicious ; and 
 after a few attempts on the part of the women who were 
 her neighbors to be friendly or intimate, they gave her up 
 as impracticable : not because she was impolite or unkind : 
 they did not themselves know why they failed, though she 
 could have told them ; for, old maid as she was, poor and 
 plain and queer, she could not bring herself to associate 
 familiarly with people who put their teaspoons into the 
 sugar-bowl, helped themselves with their own knives and 
 forks, gathered up bits of uneaten butter and returned them 
 to the plate for next time, or replaced on the dish pieces of 
 cake half eaten or cut with the knives they had just intro- 
 duced into their mouths. Miss Lucinda's code of minor 
 morals would have forbidden her to drink from the -same 
 cup with a queen, and have considered a pitchfork as suita- 
 ble as a knife to eat with, nor would she have offered to a 
 servant the least thing she had touched with her own lips 
 or her own implements of eating ; and she was too deli- 
 cately bred to look on in comfort where such things were 
 practised. Of course these women were not ladies ; and 
 though many of them had kind hearts and warm impulses 
 of goodness, yet that did not make up to her for their social 
 misdemeanors, and she drew herself more into her own 
 little shell, and cared more for her garden and her chickens, 
 her cats and her dog, than for all the humanity of Dalton 
 put together. 
 
 Miss Manners held her flowers next dearest to her pets, 
 and treated them accordingly. Her garden was the- most 
 brilliant bit of ground possible. It was big enough to hold 
 one flourishing peach-tree, one Siberian crab, and a solitary 
 egg-plum ; while under these fruitful boughs bloomed moss- 
 roses in profusion, of the dear old-fashioned kind, every 
 deep pink bud with its clinging garment of green breathing 
 
Miss Lucinda. 307 
 
 out the richest odor ; close by, the real white rose, which 
 fashion has banished to country towns, unfolded its cups 
 of pearl flushed with yellow sunrise to the heart ; and by 
 its side its damask sister waved long sprays of bloom and 
 perfume. Tulips, dark-purple and cream-color, burning 
 scarlet and deep-maroon, held their gay chalices up to 
 catch the dew; hyacinths, blue, white, and pink, hung 
 heavy bells beneath them ; spiced carnations of rose and 
 garnet crowded their bed in July and August, heart's-ease 
 fringed the walks, May honeysuckles clambered over the 
 board-fence, and monthly honeysuckles overgrew the porch 
 at the back-door, making perpetual fragrance from their 
 moth-like horns of crimson and ivory. Nothing inhabited 
 those beds that was not sweet and fair and old-fashioned. 
 Gray-lavender-bushes sent up purple spikes in the middle 
 of the garden and were duly housed in winter, but these 
 were the sole tender plants admitted, and they pleaded 
 their own cause in the breath of the linen-press and the 
 bureau-drawers that held Miss Luanda's clothes. Beyond 
 the flowers, utility blossomed in a row of bean-poles, a 
 hedge of currant-bushes against the farther fence, carefully 
 tended cauliflowers, and onions enough to tell of their use 
 as sparing as their number; a few deep-red beets and 
 golden carrots were all the vegetables beside : Miss Lucinda 
 never ate potatoes or pork. 
 
 Her housekeeping, but for her pets, would have been 
 the proper housewifery for a fairy. Out of her fruit she 
 annually conserved miracles of flavor and transparence, 
 great plums like those in Aladdin's garden, of shining topaz, 
 peaches tinged with the odorous bitter of their pits, and 
 clear as amber, crimson crabs floating in their own ruby 
 sirup, or transmuted into jelly crystal clear, yet breaking 
 with a grain, and jelly from the acid currants to garnish 
 her dinner-table or refresh the fevered lips of a sick neigh- 
 bor. It was a study to visit her tiny pantry, where all these 
 "lucent sirops" stood in tempting array, where , spices, 
 and sugar, and tea, in their small jars, flanked the sweet- 
 
308 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 meats, and a jar of glass showed its store of whitest honey, 
 and another stood filled with crisp cakes. Here always a 
 loaf or two of home-made bread lay rolled in a snowy 
 cloth, and another was spread over a dish of butter ; pies 
 were not in favor here, nor milk, save for the cats ; salt 
 fish Miss Manners never could abide, her savory taste 
 allowed only a bit of rich old cheese, or thin scraps of 
 hung beef, with her bread and butter; sauces and spices 
 were few in her repertory, but she cooked as only a lady 
 can cook, and might have asked Soyer himself to dinner. 
 For, verily, after much meditation and experience, I have 
 divined that it takes as much sense and refinement and 
 talent to cook a dinner, wash and wipe a dish, make a bed 
 as it should be made, and dust a room as it should be 
 dusted, as goes to the writing of a novel or shining in high 
 society. 
 
 But because Miss Lucinda Manners was reserved and 
 " unsociable," as the neighbors pronounced her, I did not, 
 therefore, mean to imply that she was inhuman. No neigh- 
 bor of hers,, local or Scriptural, fell ill, without an immedi- 
 ate offer of aid from her : she made the best gruel known 
 to Dalton invalids, sent the ripest fruit and the sweetest 
 flowers : and if she could not watch with the sick, because 
 it interfered with her duties at home in an unpleasant and 
 inconvenient way, she would sit with them hour after hour 
 in the day-time, and wait on all their caprices with the 
 patient tenderness of a mother. Children she always eyed 
 with strange wistfulness, as if she longed to kiss them, 
 but did n't know how ; yet no child was ever invited across 
 her threshold, for the yellow cur hated to be played with, 
 and children always torment kittens. 
 
 So Miss Lucinda wore on happily toward the farther side 
 of the middle ages. One after another of her pets passed 
 away and was replaced, the yellow cur barked his last 
 currish signal, the cat died and her kittens came to various 
 ends of time or casualty, the crow fell away to dust and 
 was too old to stuff, and the garden bloomed and faded ten 
 
Miss Lucinda. 309 
 
 .times over, before Miss Manners found herself to be forty- 
 six years old, which she heroically acknowledged one fine 
 day to the census-taker. But it was not this consciousness, 
 nor its confession, that drew the dark brows so low over 
 Miss Lucinda's eyes that day ; it was quite another trouble, 
 and one that wore heavily on her mind, as we shall proceed 
 to explain. For Miss Manners, being, like all the rest of 
 her sex, quite unable to do without some masculine help, 
 had employed, for some seven years, an old man by the 
 name of Israel Slater, to do her " chores," as the vernacular 
 hath it. It is a mortifying thing, and one that strikes at 
 the roots of Women's Rights terribly sharp blows, but I 
 must even own it, that one might as well try to live without 
 one's bread-and-butter as without the aid of the dominant 
 sex. When I see women split wood, unload coal-carts, move 
 wash-tubs, and roll barrels of flour and apples handily down 
 cellar-ways or up into carts, then I shall believe in the 
 sublime theories of the strong-minded sisters ; but as long 
 as I see before me my own forlorn little hands, and sit 
 down on the top stair to recover breath, and try in vain to 
 lift the water-pitcher at table, just so long I shall be glad 
 and thankful that there are men in the world, and that 
 half a dozen of them are my kindest and best friends. It 
 was rather an- affliction to Miss Lucinda to feel this innate 
 dependence, and at first she resolved to employ only small 
 boys, and never any one of them more than a week or two. 
 She had an unshaped theory that an old maid was a match 
 for a small boy, but that a man would cheat and domineer 
 over her. Experience sadly put to flight these notions ; 
 for a succession of boys in this cabinet-ministry for the 
 first three years of her stay in Dalton would have driven 
 her into a Presbyterian convent, had there been one at 
 hand. Boy Number One caught the yellow cur out of 
 bounds one day, and shaved his plumy tail to a bare stick, 
 and Miss Lucinda fairly shed tears of grief and rage when 
 Pink appeared at the door with the denuded appendage 
 tucked between his little legs, and his funny yellow eyes 
 
3io Miss Lucinda. 
 
 casting sidelong looks of apprehension at his mistress. 
 Boy Number One was despatched directly. Number Two 
 did pretty well for a month, but his integrity and his appe- 
 tite conflicted, and Miss Lucinda found him one moonlight 
 night perched in her plum-tree devouring the half-ripe fruit. 
 She shook him down with as little ceremony as if he had 
 been an apple ; and though he lay at Death's door for a 
 week with resulting cholera-morbus, she relented not. So 
 the experiment went on, till a list of casualties that num- 
 bered in it fatal accidents to three kittens, two hens and a 
 rooster, and at last Pink himself, who was sent into a 
 decline by repeated drenchings from the watering-pot, put 
 an end to her forbearance, and she instituted in her vizier- 
 ship the old man who had now kept his office so long, 
 a queer, withered, slow, humorous old creature, who did 
 " chores " for some six or seven other households, and got 
 a living- by sundry "jobs" of wood-sawing, hoeing corn, 
 and other like works of labor, if not of skill. Israel was 
 a great comfort to Miss Lucinda : he was efficient counsel 
 in the maladies of all her pets, had a sovereign cure for 
 the gapes in chickens, and could stop a cat's fit with the 
 greatest ease; he kept the tiny garden in perfect order, 
 and was very honest, and Miss Manners favored him ac- 
 cordingly. She compounded liniment for his rheumatism, 
 herb-sirup for his colds, presented him with a set of flannel 
 shirts, and knit him a comforter ; so that Israel expressed 
 himself strongly in favor of " Miss Lucindy," and she said 
 to herself he really was " quite good for a man." 
 
 But just now, in her forty-seventh year, Miss Lucinda had 
 come to grief, and all on account of Israel and his attempts 
 to please her. About six months before this census-taking 
 era, the old man had stepped into Miss Manners's kitchen 
 with an unusual radiance on his wrinkles and in his eyes, 
 and began without his usual morning greeting, 
 
 " I 've got so'thin' for you naow, Miss Lucindy. You 're 
 a master-hand for pets, but I '11 bet a red cent you ha'n't an 
 idee what I Ve got for ye naow ! " 
 
Miss Lucinda. 311 
 
 " I 'm sure I can't tell, Israel," said she ; "you '11 have to 
 let me see it." 
 
 " Well," said he, lifting up his coat and looking carefully 
 behind him as he sat down on the settle, lest a stray kitten 
 or chicken should preoccupy the bench, " you see I was 
 down to Orrin's abaout a week back, and he hed a litter o' 
 pigs, eleven on 'em. Well, he could n't raise the hull on 
 'em, 't a'n't good to raise more 'n nine, an' so he said, 
 ef I 'd 'a' had a place o' my own, I could 'a' had one on 'em, 
 but, as 't was, he guessed he 'd hev to send one to market 
 for a roaster. I went daown to the barn to see 'em, an' 
 there was one, the cutest little critter I ever sot eyes on, 
 and I Ve seen more 'n four pigs in my day, 't was a little 
 black-spotted one, as spry as an ant, and the dreffullest 
 knowin' look out of its eyes ! I fellowshipped it right off, 
 and I said, says I, 'Orrin, ef you'll let me hev that 'ere 
 little spotted feller, I '11 git a place for him, for I do take 
 to him consarnedly.' -So he said I could, and I fetched 
 him hum, and Miss Slater and me we kinder fed him up 
 for a few days back, till he got sorter wonted, and I 'm 
 a-goin' to fetch him to you." 
 
 " But, Israel, I have n't any place to put him in." 
 
 " Well, that a'n't nothin' to hender. I '11 jest fetch out 
 them old boards out of the wood-shed, and knock up a little 
 sty right off, daown by the end o' the shed, and you ken 
 keep your swill that I 've hed before, and it '11 come handy." 
 
 " But pigs are so dirty ! " 
 
 " I don't know as they be ; they ha'n't no great conven- 
 iences for washin' ginerally ; but I never heerd as they was 
 dirtier 'n other critters, where they run wild. An' beside, 
 that a'n't goin' to hender, nuther; I calculate to make it 
 one o' the chores to take keer of him ; 't won't cost no more 
 to you ; and I ha'n't no great opportunities to do things for 
 folks that 's allers a-doin' for me ; so 't you need n't be 
 afeard, Miss Lucindy : I love to." 
 
 Miss Lucinda's heart got the better of her judgment. A 
 nature that could feel so tenderly for its inferiors in the 
 
312 Miss Lncinda. 
 
 scale could not be deaf to the tiny voices of humanity, 
 when they reached her solitude ; and she thanked Israel 
 for the pig so heartily that the old man's face brightened 
 still more, and his voice softened from its cracked harsh- 
 ness, as he said, clicking up and down the latch of the 
 back-door, 
 
 " Well, I 'm sure you 're as welcome as you are obleeged, 
 and I '11 knock up that 'ere pen right off; he sha'n't pester 
 ye any, that's a fact." 
 
 Strange to say, yet perhaps it might have been expected 
 from her proclivities, Miss Lucinda to(3k an astonishing 
 fancy to the pig. Very few people know how intelligent an 
 animal a pig is ; but when one is regarded merely as pork 
 and hams, one's intellect is apt to fall into neglect : a moral 
 sentiment which applies out of Pigdom. This 'creature 
 would not have passed muster at a county fair ; no Suffolk 
 blood compacted and rounded him.; he belonged to the 
 " racers," and skipped about his pen with the alacrity of a 
 large flea, wiggling his curly tail as expressively as a dog's, 
 and "all but speakin'," as Israel said. He was always glad 
 to see Miss Lucinda, and established a firm friendship with 
 her dog Fun, a pretty, sentimental, German spaniel. Be- 
 sides, he kept tolerably clean by dint of Israel's care, and 
 thrust his long nose between the rails of his pen for grass, 
 or fruit, or carrot- and beet-tops, with a knowing look out 
 of his deep-set eyes that was never to be resisted by the 
 soft-hearted spinster. Indeed, Miss Lucinda enjoyed the 
 possession of one pet who could not tyrannize over her. 
 Pink's place was more than filled by Fun, who was so 
 oppressively affectionate that he never could leave his mis- 
 tress alone. If she lay down on her bed, he leaped up and 
 unlatched the door, and stretched himself on the white 
 counterpane beside her with a grunt of satisfaction ; if she 
 sat down to knit or sew, he laid his head and shoulders 
 across her lap, or curled himself up on her knees ; if she 
 was cooking, he whined and coaxed round her till she 
 hardly knew whether she fried or broiled her steak; and 
 
Miss Lucinda. 313 
 
 if she turned him out .and buttoned the door, his cries were 
 so pitiful she could never -be resolute enough to keep him 
 in exile five minutes, for it was a prominent article in her 
 creed, that animals have feelings that are easily wounded, 
 and are of "like passions" with men, only incapable of 
 expression. Indeed, Miss Lucinda considered it the duty 
 of human beings to atone to animals for the Lord's injustice 
 in making them dumb and four-legged. She would have 
 been rather startled at such an enunciation of her practice, 
 but she was devoted to it as a practice : she would give 
 her own chair tothe cat and sit on the settle herself; get 
 up at midnight, if a mew or a bark called her, though the 
 thermometer was below zero ; the tenderloin of her steak 
 or the liver of her chicken was saved for a pining kitten or 
 an ancient and toothless cat ; and no disease or wound 
 daunted her faithful nursing, or disgusted her devoted ten- 
 derness. It was rather, hard on humanity, and rather re- 
 versive of Providence, that all this care and pains should 
 be lavished on cats and dogs, while little morsels of flesh 
 and blood, ragged, hungry, and immortal, wandered up and 
 down the streets. Perhaps that they were immortal was 
 their defence from Miss Lucinda; one might have hoped 
 that her " other-worldliness " accepted that fact as enough 
 to outweigh present pangs, if she had not openly declared, 
 to Israel Slater's immense amusement and astonishment, 
 that she believed creatures had souls, little ones perhaps, 
 but souls after all, and she did expect to see Pink again 
 some time or other. 
 
 " Well, I hope he 's got his tail feathered out ag'in," said 
 Israel, dryly. "I do'no' but what hair'd grow as well as 
 feathers in a speretooal state,* and I never see a pictur* of 
 an angel but what hed consider'ble many feathers." 
 
 Miss Lucinda looked rather confounded. But humanity 
 had one little revenge on her in the shape of her cat, a 
 beautiful Maltese, with great yellow eyes, fur as soft as 
 velvet, and silvery paws as lovely to look at as they were 
 thistly to touch. Toby certainly pleaded hard for Miss 
 
3H Miss Lucinda. 
 
 Luanda's theory of a soul ; but his was no good one : some 
 tricksy and malign little spirit had lent him his share of 
 intellect, and he used it to the entire subjugation of Miss 
 Lucinda. When he was hungry, he was as well-mannered 
 and as amiable as a good child, he would coax, and purr, 
 and lick her fingers with his pretty red tongue, like a " per- 
 fect love " ; but when he had his fill, and needed no more, 
 then came Miss Lucinda's time of torment. If she at- 
 tempted to caress him, he bit and scratched like a young 
 tiger, he sprang at her from the floor and fastened on her 
 arm with real fury ; if he cried at the window and was not 
 directly let in, as soon as he had achieved entrance his first 
 manoeuvre was to dash at her ankles and bite them, if he 
 could, as punishment for her tardiness. This skirmishing 
 was his favorite mode of attack ; if he was turned out of 
 the closet, or off the pillow up stairs, he retreated under 
 the bed and made frantic sallies at her feet, till the poor 
 woman got actually nervous, and if he was in the room 
 made a flying leap as far as she could to her bed, to escape 
 those keen claws. Indeed, old Israel found her more than 
 once sitting in the middle of the kitchen-floor with Toby 
 crouched for a spring under the table, his poor mistress 
 afraid to move, for fear of her unlucky ankles. And this 
 literally cat-ridden woman was hazed about and ruled over 
 by her feline tyrant to that extent that he occupied the 
 easiest chair, the softest cushion, the middle of the bed, 
 and the front of the fire, not only undisturbed, but caressed. 
 This is a veritable history, beloved reader, and I offer it as 
 a warning and an example : if you will be an old maid, 
 or if you can't help it, take to petting children, or donkeys, 
 or even a respectable cow, but beware of domestic tyranny 
 in any shape but man's ! 
 
 No wonder Miss Lucinda took kindly to the pig, who 
 had a house of his own, and a servant, as it were, to the 
 avoidance of all trouble on her part, the pig who capered 
 for joy when she or Fun approached, and had so much 
 expression in his physiognomy that one almost expected 
 
Miss Lucinda. 315 
 
 to see him smile. Many a sympathizing conference Miss 
 Lucinda held with Israel over the perfections of Piggy, as 
 he leaned against the sty and looked over at his favorite 
 after this last chore was accomplished. 
 
 " I say for 't," exclaimed the old man, one day, " I b'lieve 
 that cre'tur' knows enough to be professor in a college. 
 Why, he talks ! he re'lly doos : a leetle through his nose, 
 maybe, but no more 'n Dr. Colton allers doos, V I de- 
 clare he appears to have abaout as much sense. I never 
 see the equal of him. , I thought he 'd 'a' larfed right out 
 yesterday, when I gin him that mess o' corn : he got up. 
 onto his forelegs on the trough, an' he winked them knowin' 
 eyes o' his'n, an' waggled his tail, an' then he set off an' 
 capered round till he come bunt up ag'inst the boards. I 
 tellyou, that sorter sobered him ; he gin a growlin' grunt, 
 an' shook his ears, an' looked sideways at me, and then he 
 put to and eet up that corn as sober as a judge. I swan ! 
 he does beat the Dutch ! " 
 
 But there was one calculation forgotten both by Miss 
 Lucinda and Israel: the pig would grow, and in conse- 
 quence, as I said before, Miss Lucinda came to grief; for 
 when the census-taker tinkled her sharp little door-bell, it 
 called her from a laborious occupation at the sty, no 
 more and no less than trying to nail up a board that Piggy 
 had torn down in struggling to get out of his durance. He 
 had grown so large that Miss Lucinda was afraid of him ; 
 his long legs and their vivacious motion added to the 
 shrewd intelligence of his eyes, and his nose seemed as 
 formidable to this poor little woman as the tusk of a rhi- 
 noceros : but what should she do with him ? One might 
 as well have proposed to her to kill and cut up Israel as to 
 consign Piggy to the " fate of race." She could not turn 
 him into the street to starve, for she loved him ; and the 
 old maid suffered from a constancy that might have made 
 some good man happy, but only embarrassed her with the 
 pig. She could not keep him forever, that was evident j 
 she knew enough to be aware that time would increase his 
 
316 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 disabilities as a pet, and he was an expensive one now, 
 for the corn-swallowing capacities of a pig, one of the 
 "racer" breed, are almost incredible, and nothing about 
 Miss Lucinda wanted for food even to fatness. Besides, he 
 was getting too big for his pen, and so " cute " an animal 
 could not be debarred from all out-door pleasures, and 
 tantalized by the sight of a green and growing garden 
 before his eyes continually, without making an effort to 
 partake of its delights. So, when Miss Lucinda indued 
 herself with her brown linen sack and sun-bonnet to go 
 and weed her carrot-patch, she was arrested on the way by 
 a loud grunting and scrambling in Piggy's quarter, and 
 found to her distress that he had contrived to knock off the 
 upper board from his pen. She had no hammer at hand ; 
 so she " seized a large stone that lay near by and pounded 
 at the board till the twice-tinkling bell recalled her to the 
 house, and as soon as she had made confession to the 
 census-taker she went back, alas, too late ! Piggy had 
 redoubled his efforts, another board had yielded, and he 
 was free ! What a thing freedom is ! how objectionable in 
 practice, how splendid in theory ! More people than Miss 
 Lucinda have been put to their wits' end when " Hoggie " 
 burst his bonds and became rampant instead of couchant. 
 But he enjoyed it ; he made the tour of the garden on a 
 delightful canter, brandishing his tail with an air of de- 
 fiance that daunted his mistress at once, and regarding her 
 with his small .bright eyes as if he would before long taste 
 her and see if she was as crisp as she looked. She retreated 
 forthwith to the shed and caught up a broom with which 
 she courageously charged upon Piggy, and was routed en- 
 tirely ; for, being no way alarmed by her demonstration, 
 the creature capered directly at her, knocked her down, 
 knocked the broom out of her hand, and capered away 
 again to the young carrot-patch. 
 
 " O dear ! " said Miss Manners, gathering herself up 
 from the ground, " if there only was a man here ! " 
 
 Suddenly she betook herself to her heels, for the ani- 
 
Miss Lucinda. 317 
 
 mal looked at her, and stopped eating : that was enough 
 to drive Miss Lucinda off the field. And now, quite des- 
 perate, she rushed through the house and out of the front- 
 door, actually in search of a man ! Just down the street 
 she saw one. Had she been composed, she might have 
 noticed the threadbare cleanliness of his dress, the odd 
 cap that crowned his iron-gray locks, and the peculiar 
 manner of his walk ; for our little old maid had stumbled 
 upon no less a person than Monsieur Jean Leclerc, the 
 dancing-master of Dalton. Not that this accomplishment 
 was much in vogue in the embryo city ; but still there were 
 a few who liked to fit themselves for firemen's balls and 
 sleighing-party frolics, and quite a large class of children 
 were learning betimes such graces as children in New 
 England, receive more easily than their elders. Monsieur 
 Leclerc had just enough scholars to keep his coat thread- 
 bare and restrict him to necessities ; but he lived, and was 
 independent. All this Miss Lucinda was ignorant of ; she 
 only saw a man, and, with the instinct of the sex in trouble 
 or danger, she appealed to him at once. 
 
 " O, sir ! won't you step in and help me ? My pig has 
 got out, and I can't catch him, and he is ruining my gar- 
 den ! " 
 
 " Madame, I shall ! " replied the Frenchman, bowing low, 
 and assuming the first position. 
 
 So Monsieur Leclerc followed Miss Manners, and sup- 
 plied himself with a mop that was hanging in the shed as 
 his best weapon. Dire was the battle between the pig and 
 the Frenchman. They skipped past each other and back 
 again as if they were practising for a cotillon. Piggy had 
 four legs, which gave him a certain advantage ; but the 
 Frenchman had most brain, and in the long run brain gets 
 the better of legs. A weary dance they led each other, but 
 after a while the pet was hemmed in a corner, and Miss 
 Lucinda had run for a rope to tie him, when, just as she 
 returned, the beast made a desperate charge, upset his 
 opponent, and, giving a leap in the wrong direction, to his 
 
318 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 manifest astonishment., landed in his own sty ! Miss Lu- 
 cinda's courage rose ; she forgot her prostrate friend in 
 need, and, running to the pen, caught up hammer and nail- 
 box on her way, and, with unusual energy, nailed up the 
 bars stronger than ever, and then bethought herself to 
 thank the stranger. But there he lay quite still and pale. 
 
 " Dear me ! " said Miss Manners, " I hope you have n't 
 hurt yourself, sir ? " 
 
 " I have fear that I am hurt, Madame," said he, trying to 
 smile. " I cannot to move but it pains me." 
 
 "Where is it? Is it your leg or your arm? Try and 
 move one at a time," said Miss Lucinda, promptly. 
 
 The left leg was helpless, it could not answer to the effort, 
 and the stranger lay back on the ground pale with the pain. 
 Miss Lucinda took her lavender-bottle out of her pocket 
 and softly bathed his head and face ; then she took off her 
 sack and folded it up under his head, and put the lavender 
 beside him. She was good at an emergency, and she 
 showed it. 
 
 " You must lie quite still," said she ; " you must not try 
 to move till I come back with help, or your leg will be hurt 
 more." 
 
 With that she went away, and presently returned with 
 two strong men and the long shutter of a shop-window. 
 To this extempore litter she carefully moved the French- 
 man, and then her neighbors lifted him and carried him into 
 the parlor, where Miss Lucinda?s chintz lounge was already 
 spread with a tight-pinned sheet to receive the poor man, 
 and while her helpers put him to bed she put on her bonnet 
 and ran for the doctor. 
 
 Doctor Colton did his best for his patient, but pronounced 
 it an impossibility to remove him till the bone should be 
 joined firmly, as a thorough cure was all-essential to his 
 professional prospects. And now, indeed, Miss Lucinda 
 had her hands full. A nurse could not be afforded, but 
 Monsieur Leclerc was added to the list of old Israel's 
 " chores," and what other nursing he needed Miss Lucinda 
 
Miss Lucinda. 319 
 
 was glad to do ; for her kind heart was full of self-re- 
 proaches to think it was her pig that had knocked down 
 the poor man, and her mop-handle that had twisted itself 
 across and under his leg, and aided, if not caused, its 
 breakage. So Israel came in Jour or five times a day to do 
 what he could, and Miss Lucinda played nurse at other 
 times to the best of her ability. Such flavorous gruels and 
 porridges as she concocted ! such tisanes after her guest's 
 instructions ! such dainty soups, and sweetbreads, and cut- 
 lets, served with such neatness ! After his experience of 
 a second-rate boarding-house, Monsieur Leclerc thought 
 himself in a gastronomic paradise. Moreover, these tiny 
 meals were garnished with flowers, which his French taste 
 for color and decoration appreciated : two or three stems 
 of lilies-of-the-valley in their folded green leaves, cool and 
 fragrant ; a moss-rosebud and a spire of purple-gray laven- 
 der bound together with ribbon-grass ; or three carnations 
 set in glittering myrtle-sprays, the last acquisition of the 
 garden. 
 
 Miss Lucinda enjoyed nursing thoroughly, and a kindlier 
 patient no woman ever had. Her bright needle flew faster 
 than ever through the cold linen and flaccid cambric of the 
 shirts and cravats she fashioned, while he told her, in his 
 odd idioms, stories of his life in France, and the curious 
 customs both of society and cuisinerie, with which last he 
 showed a surprising acquaintance. Truth to tell, when 
 Monsieur Leclerc said he had been a member of the Due 
 de Montmorenci's household, he withheld the other half 
 of this truth, that he had been his valet-de-chambre : but 
 it was an hereditary service, and seemed to him as different 
 a thing from common servitude as a peer's office in the 
 bedchamber differs from a lackey's. Indeed, Monsieur 
 Leclerc was a gentleman in his own way, not of blood, 
 but of breeding; and while he had faithfully served the 
 " aristocrats," as his father had done before him, he did 
 not limit that service to their prosperity, but in their great- 
 est need descended to menial offices, and forgot that he 
 
320 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 could dance and ride and fence almost as well as his young 
 master. But a bullet from a barricade put an end to his 
 duty there, and he hated utterly the democratic rule that 
 had overturned for him both past and future, so he escaped, 
 and came to America, the gjrand resort of refugees, where 
 he had labored, as he best knew how, for his own support, 
 and kept to himself his disgust at the manners and customs 
 of the barbarians. Now, for the first time, he was at 
 home and happy. Miss Lucinda's delicate fashions suited 
 him exactly ; he adored her taste for the beautiful, which 
 she was unconscious of; he enjoyed her cookery, and 
 though he groaned within himself at the amount of debt 
 he was incurring, yet he took courage from her kindness 
 to believe she would not be a hard creditor, and, being 
 naturally cheerful, put aside his anxieties and amused him- 
 self as well as her with his stories, his quavering songs, his 
 recipes for pot-au-feu, tisane, and p&th, at once economi- 
 cal and savoiy. Never had a leg of lamb or a piece of 
 roast beef gone so far in her domestic experience, a: chicken 
 seemed almost to outlive its usefulness in its various forms 
 of reappearance, and the salads he devised were as wonder- 
 ful as the omelets he superintended, or the gay dances he 
 played on his beloved violin, as soon as he could sit up 
 enough to manage it. Moreover, I should say most- 
 over^ if the word were admissible, Monsieur Leclerc 
 lifted a great weight before long from Miss Lucinda's mind. 
 He began by subduing Fun to his proper place by a mild 
 determination that completely won the dog's heart. " Wo- 
 men and spaniels," the world knows, " like kicking " ; and 
 though kicks were no part of the good man's Rareyfaction 
 of Fun, he certainly used a certain amount of coercion, 
 and the dog's lawful owner admired the skill of the teacher 
 and enjoyed the better manners of the pupil thoroughly ; 
 she could do twice as much sewing now, and never were 
 her nights disturbed by a bark, for the dog crouched by 
 his new friend's bed in the parlor and lay quiet there. 
 Toby was next undertaken, and proved less amenable to 
 
Miss Lucinda. 321 
 
 discipline ; he stood in some slight awe of the man who 
 tried to teach him, but still continued to sally out at Miss 
 Lucinda's feet, to spring at her caressing hand when he felt 
 ill-humored, and to claw Fun's patient nose and his ap- 
 proaching paws when his misplaced sentimentality led him 
 to caress the cat ; but after a while a few well-timed slaps 
 administered with vigor cured Toby of his worst tricks, 
 though every blow made Miss Lucinda wince, and almost 
 shook her good opinion of Monsieur Leclerc : for in these 
 long weeks he had wrought out a good opinion of himself 
 in her mind, much to her own surprise ; she could not have 
 believed a man could be so polite, so gentle, so patient, and 
 above all so capable of ruling without tyranny. Miss LjU- 
 cinda was puzzled. 
 
 One day, as Monsieur Leclerc was getting better, just 
 able to go about on crutches, Israel came into the kitchen, 
 and Miss Manners went out to see him. She left the door 
 open, and along with the odor of a pot of raspberry-jam 
 scalding over the fire, sending its steams of leaf-and-insect 
 fragrance through the little house, there came in also the 
 following conversation. 
 
 " Israel," said Miss Lucinda, in a hesitating and rather 
 forlorn tone, " I have been thinking, I don't know what 
 to do with Piggy. He is quite too big for me to keep. 
 I 'm afraid of him, if he gets out ; and he eats up the 
 garden." 
 
 " Well, that is a consider'ble swaller for a pig, Miss Lu- 
 cindy ; but I b'lieve you ? re abaout right abaout keepin' on 
 him. He is too big, that's a fact; but he's so like a 
 human cre'tur', I 'd jest abaout as lieves slarter Orrin. I 
 declare, I don't know no more'n a taown-haouse goose 
 what to do with- him ! " 
 
 " If I gave him away, I suppose he would be fatted and 
 killed, of course ? " 
 
 " I guess he 'd be killed, likely ; but as for fattenin' on 
 him, I 'd jest as soon undertake to fatten a salt codfish. 
 He 's one o' the racers, an' they 're as holler as hogsheads : 
 14* u 
 
322 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 you can fill 'em up to their noses, ef you 're a mind to 
 spend your corn, and they '11 caper it all off their bones in 
 twenty-four haours. I b'lieve, ef they was tied neck an' 
 heels an' stuffed, they'd wiggle thin betwixt feedin'-times. 
 Why, Orrin, he raised nine on 'em, and every darned 
 critter 's as poor as Job's turkey, to-day : they a'n't no good. 
 I 'd as lieves ha' had nine chestnut rails, an' a little 
 lieveser, 'cause they don't eat nothin'." 
 
 " You don't know of any poor person who 'd like to have 
 a pig, do you ? " said Miss Lucinda, wistfully. 
 
 " Well, the poorer they was, the quicker they 'd eat him 
 up, I guess, ef they could eat such a razor-back." 
 
 ." O, I don't like to think of his being eaten ! I wish he 
 could be got rid of some other way. Don't you think he 
 might be killed in his sleep, Israel?" 
 
 This was a little too much for Israel. An irresistible 
 flicker of laughter twitched his wrinkles and bubbled in 
 his throat. 
 
 " I think it 's likely 't would wake him up," said he, de- 
 murely. " Killin' 's killin', and a cre'tur 5 can't sleep over 
 it 's though 't was the stomach-ache. I guess he 'd kick 
 some, ef he was asleep, and screech some, too ! " 
 
 " Dear me ! " said Miss Lucinda, horrified at the idea. 
 '* I wish he could be sent out to run in the woods. Are 
 there any good woods near here, Israel ? " 
 
 "I don't know but what he'd as lieves be slartered to 
 once as to starve, an' be hunted down out in the lots. 
 Besides, there a'n't nobody as I knows of would like a hog 
 to be a-rootin' round amongst their turnips and young 
 wheat." 
 
 " Well, what I shall do with him I don't know ! " despair- 
 ingly exclaimed Miss Lucinda. " He was such a dear little 
 thing when you brought him, Israel ! Do you remember 
 how pink his pretty little nose was, just like a rose-bud, 
 and how bright his eyes looked, and his cunning legs? 
 And now he 's grown so big and fierce ! But I can't help 
 liking him, either." 
 
Miss Lucinda. 323 
 
 " He 's a cute critter, that 's sartain ; but he does too 
 much rootin' to have a pink nose now, I expect ; there 's 
 consider'ble on 't, so I guess it looks as well to have it gray. 
 But I don't know no more 'n you do what to do abaout it." 
 
 " If I could only get rid of him without knowing what 
 became of him ! " exclaimed Miss Lucinda, squeezing her 
 fore-finger with great earnestness, and looking both puzzled 
 and pained. 
 
 "If Mees Lucinda would pairmit?" said a voice behind 
 her. 
 
 She turned round to see Monsieur Leclerc on his crutches, 
 just in the parlor-door. 
 
 " I shall, Mees, myself dispose of Piggee, if it please. I 
 can. I shall have no sound ; he shall to go away like a. 
 silent snow, to trouble you no more, never ! " 
 
 " O, sir ! if you could ! But I don't see how ! " 
 
 "If Mees was to see, it would not be to save her pain. 
 I shall have him to go by magique to fiery land." 
 
 Fairy-land, probably ! But Miss Lucinda did not per- 
 ceive the Equivoque. 
 
 " Nor yet shall I trouble Meester Israyel. I shall have 
 the aid of myself and one good friend that I have ; and 
 some night when you rise of the morning, he shall not be 
 there." 
 
 Miss Lucinda breathed a deep sigh of relief. 
 
 " I am greatly obliged, I shall be, I mean," said she. 
 
 " Well, I 'm glad enough to wash my hands on 't," said 
 Israel. "I shall hanker arter the critter some, but he's 
 a-gettin' too big to be handy ; 'n' it 's one comfort abaout 
 critters, you ken get rid on' em somehaow when they 're 
 more plague than profit. But folks has got to be let alone, 
 excep' the Lord takes 'em ; an' He don't allers.see fit." 
 
 What added point and weight to these final remarks of 
 old Israel was the well-known fact that he suffered at home 
 from the most pecking and worrying of wives, and had 
 been heard to say in some moment of unusual frankness 
 that he "didn't see how 't could be sinful to wish Miss ; 
 
324 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 Slater was in heaven, for she 'd be lots better off, and other 
 folks too ! " 
 
 Miss Lucinda never knew what befell her pig one fine 
 September night ; she did not even guess that a visit paid 
 to Monsieur by one of his pupils, a farmer's daughter just 
 out of Dalton, had anything to do with this enlevement; 
 she was sound asleep in her bed up stairs, when her guest 
 shod his crutches with old gloves, and limped out to the 
 garden-gate by dawn, where he and the farmer tolled the 
 animal out of his sty and far down the street by tempting 
 red apples, and then Farmer Steele took possession of him, 
 and he was seen no more. No, the first thing Miss Lu- 
 cinda knew of her riddance was when Israel put his head 
 into the back-door that same morning, some four hours 
 afterward, and said, with a significant nod, 
 
 "He's gone!" 
 
 After all his other chores were done, Israel had a con- 
 ference with Monsieur Leclerc, and the two sallied into the 
 garden, and in an hour had dismantled the low dwelling, 
 cleared away the wreck, levelled and smoothed its site, 
 and Monsieur, having previously provided himself with an 
 Isabella-grape-vine, planted it on this forsaken spot, and 
 trained it carefully against the end of the shed : strange 
 to say, though it was against all precedent to transplant a 
 grape in September, it lived and flourished. Miss Lu- 
 cinda's gratitude to Monsieur Leclerc was altogether dis- 
 proportioned, as he thought, to his slight service. He could 
 not understand fully her devotion to her pets, but he re- 
 spected it, and aided it whenever he could, though he never 
 surmised the motive that adorned Miss Lucinda's table 
 with such delicate superabundance after the late departure, 
 and laid bundles of lavender-flowers in his tiny portmanteau 
 till the very leather seemed to gather fragrance. 
 
 Before long, Monsieur Leclerc was well enough to resume 
 his classes, and return to his boarding-house ; but the 
 latter was filled, and only offered a prospect of vacancy 
 in some three weeks after his application ; so he returned 
 
Miss Lucinda. 325 
 
 home somewhat dejected, and as he sat by the little parlor- 
 fire after tea, he said to his hostess, in a reluctant tone, 
 
 " Mees Lucinda, you have been of the kindest to the 
 poor alien. I have it in my mind to relieve you of this 
 care very rapidly, but it is not in the Fates that I do. I 
 have gone to my house of lodgings, and they cannot to give 
 me a chamber as yet. I have fear that I must yet rely me 
 on your goodness for some time more, if you can to enter- 
 tain me so much more of time ? " 
 
 "Why, I shall like to, sir," replied the kindly, simple- 
 hearted old maid. " I 'm sure you are not a mite of trouble, 
 and I never can forget what you did for my pig." 
 
 A smile flitted across the Frenchman's thin, dark face, 
 and he watched her glittering needles a few minutes in 
 silence before he spoke again. 
 
 " But I have other things to say of the most unpleasant 
 to me, Mees Lucinda. I have a great debt for the goodness 
 and care you to me have lavished. To the angels of the 
 good God we must submit to be debtors, but there are also 
 of mortal obligations. I have lodged in your mansion for 
 more 'of ten weeks, and to you I pay yet no silver, but it is 
 that I have it not at present. I must ask of your goodness 
 to wait." 
 
 The old maid's* shining black eyes grew soft as she looked 
 at him. 
 
 " Why ! " said she, " I don't think you owe me much of 
 anything, Mr. Leclerc. I never knew things last as they 
 have since you came. I really think you brought a blessing. 
 I wish you would please to think you don't owe me any- 
 thing." 
 
 The Frenchman's great brown eyes shone with suspicious 
 dew. 
 
 " I cannot to forget that I owe to you far more than any 
 silver of man repays ; but I should not think to forget that 
 I also owe to you silver, or I should not be worthy of a 
 man's name. No, Mees ! I have two hands and legs. I 
 will not let a woman most solitary spend for me her good 
 self." 
 
326 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 "Well," said Miss Lucinda," if you will be uneasy till 
 you pay me, I would rather have another kind of pay than 
 money. I should like to know how to dance. I never did 
 learn, when I was a girl, and I think it would be good 
 exercise." 
 
 Miss Lucinda supported this pious fiction through with 
 a simplicity that quite deceived the Frenchman. He did 
 not think it so incongruous as it was. He had seen women 
 of sixty, rouged, and jewelled, and furbelowed, foot it deftly 
 in the halls of the Faubourg St. Germain in his earliest 
 youth ; and this cheery, healthy woman, with lingering 
 blooms on either cheek, and uncapped head of curly black 
 hair but slightly strewn with silver, seemed quite as fit a 
 subject for the accomplishment. Besides, he was poor, 
 and this offered so easy a way of paying the debt he had so 
 dreaded ! Well said Solomon, " The destruction of the 
 poor is their poverty ! " For whose moral sense, delicate 
 sensitiveness, generous longings, will not sometimes give 
 way to the stringent need of food and clothing, the gall of 
 indebtedness, and the sinking consciousness of an empty 
 purse and threatening possibilities ? 
 
 Monsieur Leclerc's face brightened. 
 
 "Ah ! with what grand pleasure shall I teach you the 
 dance ! " 
 
 But it fell dark again as he proceeded, 
 
 " Though not one, nor two, nor three, nor four quarters 
 shall be of value sufficienVto achieve my payment." 
 
 "Then, if that troubles you, why, I should like to take 
 some French lessons in the evening, when you don't have 
 classes. I learned French when I was quite a girl, but not 
 to speak it very easily ; and if I could get some practice 
 and the right way to speak, I should be glad." 
 
 "And I shall give you the real Parisien tone, Mees 
 Lucinda ! " said he proudly. " I shall be as if it were no 
 more an exile when I repeat my tongue to you ! " 
 
 And so it was settled. Why Miss Lucinda should learn 
 French any more than dancing was not a question in Mon- 
 
Miss Liidnda. 327 
 
 sieur Leclerc's mind. It is true, that Chaldaic would, in all 
 probability, be as useful to our friend as French ; and the 
 flying over poles and hanging by toes and fingers, so elo- 
 quently described by the Apostle of the Body in these 
 "Atlantic" pages, would have been as well adapted to 
 her style and capacity as dancing ; but his own language, 
 and his own profession ! what man would not have re- 
 garded these as indispensable to improvement, particularly 
 when they paid his board? 
 
 During the latter three weeks of Monsieur Leclerc's stay 
 with Miss Lucinda he made himself surprisingly 'useful. 
 He listed the doors against approaching winter breezes, 
 he weeded in the garden, trimmed, tied, trained, wherever 
 either good office was needed, mended china with an 
 infallible cement, and rickety chairs with the skill of a 
 cabinet-maker ; and whatever hard or dirty work he did, 
 he always presented himself at table in a state of scrupu- 
 lous neatness : his long brown hands showed no trace of 
 labor ; his iron-gray hair was reduced to smoothest order ; 
 his coat speckless, if threadbare ; and he ate like a gentle- 
 man, an accomplishment not always to be found in the 
 " best society," as the phrase goes, whether the best in 
 fact ever lacks it is another thing. Miss Lucinda appreci- 
 ated these traits, they set her at ease ; and a pleasanter 
 home-life could scarce be painted than now enlivened the 
 little wooden house. But three weeks pass away rapidly ; 
 and when the rusty portmanteau, was gone from her spare 
 chamber, and the well-worn boots from the kitchen-corner, 
 and the hat from its nail, Miss Lucinda began to find her- 
 self wonderfully lonely. She missed the armfuls of wood 
 in her wood-box, that she had to fill laboriously, two sticks 
 at a time; she missed the other plate at her tiny round 
 table, the other chair beside her fire ; she missed that dark, 
 thin, sensitive face, with its rare and sweet smile; she 
 wanted her story-teller, her yarn-winder, her protector, back 
 again. Good gracious ! to think of an old lady of forty- 
 seven entertaining such sentiments for a man ! 
 
328 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 Presently the dancing-lessons commenced. It was thought 
 advisable that Miss Manners should enter a class, and, in 
 the fervency of her good intentions, she did not demur. 
 But gratitude and respect had to strangle with persistent 
 hands the little serpents of the ridiculous in Monsieur Le- 
 clerc's soul, when he beheld his pupil's first appearance. 
 What reason was it, O rose of seventeen, adorning thyself 
 with cloudy films of lace and sparks of jewelry before the 
 mirror that reflects youth and beauty, that made Miss Lu- 
 cinda array herself in a brand-new dress of yellow muslin- 
 de-laine strewed with round green spots, and displace her 
 customary handkerchief for a huge tamboured collar, on 
 this eventful occasion ? Why, O why did she tie up the 
 roots of her black hair with an unconcealable scarlet string ? 
 And most of all, why was her dress so short, her slipper- 
 strings so big and broad, her thick slippers so shapeless by 
 reason of the corns and bunions that pertained to the feet 
 within ? The " instantaneous rush of several guardian 
 angels " that once stood dear old Hepzibah Pynchon in 
 good stead was wanting here, or perhaps they stood by 
 all-invisible, their calm eyes softened with love deeper than 
 tears, at this spectacle so ludicrous to man, beholding in 
 the grotesque dress and adornments only the budding of 
 life's divinest blossom, and in the strange skips and hops 
 of her first attempts at dancing only the buoyancy of those 
 inner wings that goodness and generosity and pure self- 
 devotion were shaping for. a future strong and stately flight 
 upward. However, men, women, and children do not see 
 with angelic eyes, and the titterings of her fellow-pupils 
 were irrepressible : one bouncing girl nearly choked herself 
 with her handkerchief trying not to laugh, and two or three 
 did not even try. Monsieur Leclerc could not blame them, 
 at first he could scarce control his own facial muscles ; 
 but a sense of remorse smote him, as he saw how uncon- 
 scious and earnest the little woman was, and remembered 
 how often those knotty hands and knobbed feet had waited 
 on his need or his comfort. Presently he tapped on his 
 
Miss L ucindd. 3 29 
 
 violin for a few moments' respite, and approached Miss 
 Lucinda as respectfully as if she had been a queen. 
 
 " You are ver 5 tired, Mees Lucinda ? " said he. 
 
 "I am a little, sir," said she, out of breath. " I am not 
 used to dancing ; it 's quite an exertion." 
 
 " It is that truly. If you are too much tired, is it better 
 to wait? I shall finish for you the lesson till I come to- 
 night for a French conversation ? " 
 
 " I guess I will go home," said the simple little lady. " I 
 am some afraid of getting rheumatism ; but use makes 
 perfect, and I shall stay through next time, no doubt." 
 
 " So I believe," said Monsieur, with his best bow, as 
 Miss Lucinda departed and went home, pondering all the 
 way what special delicacy she should provide for tea. 
 
 " My dear young friends," said Monsieur Leclerc, pausing 
 with the uplifted bow in his hand, before he recommenced 
 his lesson, " I have observe that my new pupil does make 
 you much to laugh. I am not so surprise, for you do not 
 know all, and the good God does not robe all angels in one 
 manner ; but she have taken me to her mansion with a leg 
 broken, and have nursed me like a saint of the blesse*d, 
 nor with any pay of silver except that I teach her the dance 
 and the French. They are pay for the meat and the drink, 
 but she will have no more for her good patience and care. 
 I like to teach you the dance, but she could teach you the 
 saints' ways which are better. I think you will no more to 
 laugh." 
 
 "No ! I guess we i worft! n said the bouncing girl with 
 great emphasis, and the color rose over more than one 
 young face. 
 
 After that day Miss Lucinda received many a kind smile 
 and hearty welcome, and never did anybody venture even a 
 grimace at her expense. But it must be acknowledged 
 that her dancing was at least peculiar. With a sanitary 
 view of the matter, she meant to make it exercise, and fear- 
 ful was the skipping that ensued. She chasse'd on tiptoe, 
 and balanced with an indescribable hopping twirl, that 
 
33O Miss Lucinda. 
 
 made one think of a chickadee pursuing its quest of food 
 on new-ploughed ground ; and some late-awakened femi- 
 nine instinct of dress, restrained, too, by due economy, 
 indued her with the oddest decorations that woman ever 
 devised. The French lessons went on more smoothly. If 
 Monsieur Leclerc's Parisian ear was tortured by the bar- 
 barous accent of Vermont, at least he bore it with heroism, 
 since there was nobody else to hear ; and very pleasant, 
 both to our little lady and her master, were these long 
 winter evenings, when they diligently waded through Ra- 
 cine, and even got as far as the golden periods of Chateau- 
 briand. The pets fared badly for petting in these days ; 
 they were fed and waited on, but not with the old devotion ; 
 it began to dawn on Miss Lucinda's mind that something 
 to talk to was preferable, as a companion, even to Fun, and 
 that there might be a stranger sweetness in receiving care 
 and protection than in giving it. 
 
 Spring came at last. Its softer skies were as blue over 
 Dalton as in the wide fields without, and its footsteps as 
 bloom-bringing in Miss Lucinda's garden as in mead or 
 forest. Now Monsieur Leclerc came to her aid again at 
 odd minutes, and set her flower-beds with mignonette bor- 
 ders, and her vegetable-garden with salad herbs of new and 
 flourishing kinds. Yet not even the sweet season seemed 
 to hurry the catastrophe that we hope, dearest reader, thy 
 tender eyes have long seen impending. No, for this quaint 
 alliance a quainter Cupid waited, the chubby little fellow 
 with a big head and a little arrow, who waits on youth and 
 loveliness, was not wanted here. Lucinda's God of Love 
 wore a lank, hard-featured, grizzly shape, no less than that 
 of Israel Slater, who marched into the garden one fine June 
 morning, earlier than usual, to find Monsieur in his blouse, 
 hard at work weeding the cauliflower-bed. 
 
 " Good mornin', sir ! good mornin' ! " said Israel, in an- 
 swer to the Frenchman's greeting. "This is a real slick 
 little garden-spot as ever I see, and a pooty house, and a 
 real clever woman too. I '11 be skwitched, ef it a'n't a 
 
Miss Lucinda. 331 
 
 fust-rate consarn, the hull on 't. Be you ever a-goin' back 
 to France, Mister?" 
 
 " No, my goot friend. I have nobody there. I stay 
 here ; I have friend here : but there, oh, non ! je ne re- 
 uiendrai pas ! ah, jamais ! jamais ! " . 
 
 " Pa's dead, eh ? or shamming ? Well, I don't under- 
 stand your lingo ; but ef you 're a-goin' to stay here, I don't 
 see why you don't hitch bosses with Miss Lucindy." 
 
 Monsieur Leclerc looked up astonished. 
 
 " Horses, my friend ? I have no horse ! " 
 
 " Thunder 'n' dry trees ! I did n't say you bed, did I ? 
 But that comes o' usin' what Parson Hyde calls figgurs, I 
 s'pose. I wish't he'd use one kind o' figgurin' a leetle 
 more ; he 'd pay me for that wood-sawin'. I did n't mean 
 nothin' about horses. I sot out fur to say, Why don't ye 
 marry Miss Lucindy?" 
 
 ft I ? " gasped Monsieur, " I, the foreign, the poor ? I 
 could not to presume so ! " 
 
 " Well, I don't see 's it 's sech drefful presumption. Ef 
 you 're poor, she 's a woman, and real lonesome too ; she 
 ha'n't got nuther chick nor child belongin' to her, and 
 you 're the only man she ever took any kind of a notion to. 
 I guess 't would be jest as much for her good as yourn." 
 
 " Hush, good Is-ray-el ! it is good to stop there. She 
 would not to marry after such years of goodness : she is a 
 saint of the blessed." 
 
 " Well, I guess saints sometimes fellerships with sinners ; 
 I Ve heerd tell they did ; and ef I was you, I 'd make trial 
 for't. Nothin' ventur', nothin' have." 
 
 Whereupon Israel walked off, whistling. 
 
 Monsieur Leclerc's soul was perturbed within him by 
 these suggestions ; he pulled up two young cauliflowers 
 and reset their places with pigweeds ; he hoed the nicely- 
 sloped border of the bed flat to the path, and then flung 
 the hoe across the walk, and went off to his daily occupa- 
 tion with a new idea in his head. Nor was it an unpleas- 
 ant one. The idea of a transition from his squalid and 
 
33 2 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 pinching boarding-house to the delicate comfort of Miss 
 Lucinda's menage, the prospect of so kind and good a wife 
 to care for his hitherto dreaded future, all this was pleas- 
 ant. I cannot honestly say he was in love with our friend ; 
 I must even confess . that whatever element of that nature 
 existed between the two was now all on Miss Lucinda's side, 
 little as she knew it. Certain it is, that, when she appeared 
 that day at the dancing-class in a new green calico flowered 
 with purple, and bows on her slippers big enough for a 
 bonnet, it occurred to Monsieur Leclerc, that, if they were 
 married, she would take no more lessons ! However, let 
 us not blame him ; he was a man, and a poor one ; one 
 must not expect too much from men, or from poverty ; if 
 they are tolerably good, let us canonize them even, it is so 
 hard for the poor creatures ! And to do Monsieur Leclerc 
 justice, he had a very thorough respect and admiration for 
 Miss Lucinda. Years ago, in his stormy youth-time, there 
 had been a pair of soft-fringed eyes that looked into his as 
 none would ever look again, and they murdered her, those 
 mad wild beasts of Paris, in the chapel where she knelt at 
 her pure prayers, murdered her because she knelt beside 
 an aristocrat, her best friend, the Duchess of Montmorenci, 
 who had taken the pretty peasant from her own estate to 
 bring her up for her maid. Jean Leclerc had lifted that 
 pale shape from the pavement and buried it himself ; what 
 else he buried with it was invisible ; but now he recalled 
 the hour with a long, shuddering sigh, and, hiding his face 
 in his hands, said softly, " The violet is dead, there is 
 no spring for her. I will have now an amaranth, it is 
 good for the tomb." 
 
 Whether Miss Lucinda's winter dress suggested this floral 
 metaphor let us not inquire. Sacred be sentiment, when 
 there is even a shadow of reality about it ! when it be- 
 comes a profession, and confounds itself with millinery and 
 shades of mourning, it is " bosh," as the Turkeys say. 
 
 So that very evening Monsieur Leclerc arrayed himself 
 in his best, to give another lesson to Miss Lucinda. But, 
 
Miss Lucinda. 333 
 
 somehow or other, the lesson was long in beginning ; the 
 little parlor looked so home-like and so pleasant, with its 
 bright lamp and gay bunch of roses on the table, that it 
 was irresistible temptation to lounge and linger. Miss 
 Lucinda had the volume of Florian in her hands, and was 
 wondering why he did not begin, when the book was drawn 
 away, and a hand laid on both of hers. 
 
 " Lucinda ! " he began, " I give you no lesson to-night. 
 I have to ask. Dear Mees, will you to marry your poor 
 slave ? " 
 
 "O dear!" said Miss Lucinda. 
 
 Don't laugh at her, Miss Tender-eyes ! You will feel 
 just so yourself some day, when Alexander Augustus says, 
 " Will you be mine, loveliest of your sex ? " only you won't 
 feel it half so strongly, for you are young, and love is 
 Nature to youth, but it is a heavenly surprise to age. 
 
 Monsieur Leclerc said nothing. He had a heart after all, 
 and it was touched now by the deep emotion that flushed 
 Miss Lucinda's face, and made her tremble so violently, 
 but presently he spoke. 
 
 "Do not ! " said he. " I am wrong. I presume. For- 
 give the stranger ! " 
 
 " O dear ! " said poor Lucinda again, " O, you know 
 it is n't that ! but how can you like me ? " 
 
 There, Mademoiselle ! there 's humility for you ! you will 
 never say that to Alexander Augustus ! 
 
 Monsieur Leclerc soothed this frightened, happy, incredu- 
 lous little woman into quiet before very long ; and if he 
 really began to feel a true affection for her from the moment 
 he perceived her humble and entire devotion to him, who 
 shall blame him ? Not I. If we were all heroes, who 
 would be valet-de-chambre ? if we were all women, who 
 would be men ? He was very good as far as he went ; and 
 if you expect the chivalries of grace out of Nature, you 
 "may expect," as old Fuller saith. So it was peacefully 
 settled that they should be married, with a due amount of 
 tears and smiles on Lucinda's part, and a great deal of 
 
334 Miss Lucinda. 
 
 tender sincerity on Monsieur's. She missed her dancing- 
 lesson next day, and when Monsieur Leclerc came in the 
 evening he found a shade on her happy face. 
 
 " O dear ! " said she, as he entered. 
 
 " O dear ! * was Lu'cinda's favorite aspiration. Had she 
 thought of it as an Anglicizing of " O Dieu ! " perhaps she 
 would have dropped it ; but this time she went on head- 
 long, with a valorous despair, = 
 
 " I have thought of something ! I 'm afraid I can't ! 
 Monsieur, are n't you a Romanist ? " 
 
 " What is that ? " said he, surprised. 
 
 "A Papist, a Catholic!" 
 
 " Ah ! " he returned, sighing, " once I was bon Catholique, 
 once in my gone youth ; after then I was nothing but the 
 poor man who bats for his life ; now I am of the religion 
 that shelters the stranger and binds up the broken poor." 
 
 Monsieur was a diplomatist. This melted Miss Lucinda's 
 orthodoxy right down ; she only said, 
 
 " Then you will go to church with me ? " 
 
 " And to the skies above, I pray," said Monsieur, kissing 
 her knotty hand like a lover. 
 
 So in the earliest autumn they were married, Monsieur 
 having previously presented Miss Lucinda with a delicate 
 plaided gray silk for her wedding attire, in which she looked 
 almost young ; and old Israel was present at the ceremony, 
 which was briefly performed by Parson Hyde in Miss 
 Manners's parlor. They did not go to Niagara, nor to 
 Newport ; but that afternoon Monsieur Leclerc brought a 
 hired rockaway to the door, and took his bride a drive into 
 the country. They stopped beside a pair of bars, where 
 Monsieur hitched his horse, and, taking Lucinda by the 
 hand, led her into Farmer Steele's orchard, to the foot of 
 his biggest apple-tree. There she beheld a little mound, at 
 the head and foot of which stood a daily rose-bush shed- 
 ding its latest wreaths of bloom, and upon the mound itself 
 was laid a board on which she read, " Here lie the bones 
 of poor Piggy." 
 
Miss Lucinda. 335 
 
 Mrs. Lucinda burst into tears, and Monsieur, picking a 
 bud from the bush, placed it in her hand, and led her 
 tenderly back to the rockaway. 
 
 That evening Mrs. Lucinda was telling the affair to old 
 Israel with so much feeling that she did not perceive at all 
 the odd commotion in his face, till, as she repeated the 
 epitaph to him, he burst out with, " He did n't say what 
 became o' the flesh, did he ? " and therewith fled through 
 the kitchen-door. For years afterward Israel would enter- 
 tain a few favored auditors with his opinion of the matter, 
 screaming till the tears rolled down his cheeks, 
 
 " That was the beateree of all the weddin'-towers I ever 
 heerd tell on. Goodness ! it 's enough to make the Wander- 
 in' Jew die o' larfin' ! " 
 
THE DENSLOW PALACE. 
 
 T is the privilege of authors and artists to see and 
 to describe ; to "see clearly and describe vividly " 
 gives the pass on all state occasions. It is the 
 " cap of darkness " and the talaria, and wafts them whither 
 they will. The doors of boudoirs and senate-chambers 
 open quickly, and close after them, excluding the talent- 
 less and staring rabble. I, who am one of the humblest 
 of the seers, a universal admirer of all things beautiful 
 and great, from the commonwealths of Plato and Solon, 
 severally, expulsed, as poet without music or politic, and 
 a follower of the great, I, from my dormitory, or nest, 
 of twelve feet square, can, at an hour's notice, or less, enter 
 palaces, and bear away, unchecked and unquestioned, those 
 imagines of Des Cartes which emanate or are thrown off 
 from all forms, and this, not in imagination, but in the 
 flesh. 
 
 Whether it was the "tone of society" which pervaded 
 my " Florentine letters," or my noted description of the 
 boudoir of Egeria Mentale, I could not just now determine ; 
 but these, and other humble efforts of mine, made me 
 known in palaces as a painter of beauty and magnificence ; 
 and I have been in demand, to do for wealth what wealth 
 cannot do for itself, namely, make it live a little, or, at 
 least, spread as far, in fame, as the rings of a stone-plash 
 on a great pond. 
 
 I enjoy friendships and regards which would satisfy the 
 most fastidious. Are not the Denslows enormously rich ? 
 
The Denslow Palace. 337 
 
 Is not Dalton a sovereign of elegance ? It was I who gave 
 the fame of these qualities to the world, in true colors, not 
 flattered. And they know it, and love me. Honoria Dens- 
 low is the most beautiful and truly charming woman of 
 society. It was I who first said it ; and she is my friend, 
 and loves me. I defy poverty ; the wealth of all the senses 
 is mine, without effort. I desire not to be one of those 
 who mingle as principals and sufferers ; for they are less 
 causes than effects. As the Florentine in the Inferno saw 
 the souls of unfortunate lovers borne upon a whirlwind, so 
 have I seen all things fair and precious, outpourings of 
 wealth, all the talents, all the offerings of duty and 
 devotion, angelic graces of person and of soul, borne 
 and swept violently around on the circular gale. Wealth 
 is only an enlargement of the material boundary, and leaves 
 the spirit free to dash to and fro, and exhaust itself in vain 
 efforts. But I am philosophizing, oddly enough, when 
 I should describe. 
 
 An exquisite little note from Honoria, sent at the last 
 moment, asking me to be present that evening at a " select " 
 party, which was to open the "new house," the little 
 palace of the Denslows, lay beside me on the table. It 
 was within thirty minutes of nine o'clock, the hour I had 
 fixed for going. A howling winter out of doors, a clear fire 
 glowing in my little grate. My arm-chair, a magnificent 
 present from Honoria, shaming the wooden fixtures of the 
 poor room, invited to meditation, and perhaps the composi- 
 tion of some delicate periods. They formed slowly. Time, 
 it is said, devours all things ; but imagination, in turn, de- 
 vours time, an'd, indeed, swallowed my half-hour at a 
 gulp. The neighboring church-clock tolled nine. I was 
 belated, and hurried away. 
 
 It was a reunion of only three hundred invitations, se- 
 lected by my friend Dalton, the intimate and adviser of 
 Honoria. So happy were their combinations, scarce a 
 dozen we're absent or declined. 
 
 At eleven, the guests began to assemble. Introductions 
 15 v 
 
338 The Dens low Palace. 
 
 were almost needless. Each person was a recognized mem- 
 ber of " society." One half of the number were women, 
 many of them young, beautiful, accomplished, heiresses, 
 ."charming widows," poetesses of real celebrity, and, rarer 
 still, of good repute, wives of millionnaires, flashing in 
 satin and diamonds. The men, on their side, were of all 
 professions and arts, and of every grade of celebrity, from 
 senator to merchant, each distinguished by some personal 
 attribute or talent ; and in all was the gift, so rare, of man- 
 ners and conversation. It was a company of undoubted 
 gentlemen, as truly entitled to respect and admiration as 
 if they stood about a throne. They were the untitled 
 nobility of Nature, wealth, and genius. 
 
 As I stood looking, with placid admiration, from a recess, 
 upon a brilliant tableau of beautiful women and celebrated 
 men that had accidentally arranged itself before me, Dalton 
 touched my arm. 
 
 " I have seen," said he, " aristocratic and republican r/- 
 unions of the purest mode in Paris, the court and the 
 banker's circle of London, conversazioni at Rome and Flor- 
 ence. Every face in this room is intelligent, and nearly 
 all either beautiful, remarkable, or commanding. Observe 
 those five women standing with Denslow and Adonais, 
 grandeur, sweetness, grace, form, purity ; each has an at- 
 tribute. It is a rare assemblage of superior human beings, 
 The world cannot surpass it. And, by the by, the rooms 
 are superb." 
 
 They were indeed magnificent : two grand suites, on 
 either side a central hall of Gothic structure, in white 
 marble, with light, aerial staircases and gilded balconies. 
 Each suit was a separate miracle : the height, the breath, 
 the columnal divisions ; the wonderful delicacy of the arches, 
 upon which rested ceilings frescoed with incomparable art. 
 In one compartment the arches and caryatides were of 
 black marble ; in another, of snowy Parian ; in a third, of 
 wood, exquisitely carved, and joined like one piece, as if 
 it were a natural growth ; vines rising at the bases of the 
 
The Dens low Palace. 339 
 
 walls, and spreading under the roof. There was no forced 
 consistency. Forms suitable only for the support of heavy 
 masses of masonry, or for the solemn effects of church 
 interiors, were not here introduced. From straight window- 
 cornices of dark wood, slenderly gilt, but richly carved, fell 
 cataracts of gleaming satin, softened in effect with laces of 
 rare appreciation. 
 
 The frescoes and panel-work were a study by themselves, 
 1 uniting the classic and modern styles in allegorical subjects. 
 The paintings, selected by the taste of Dalton, to over- 
 power the darkness of the rooms by intensity of color, 
 were incorporated with the walls. There were but few 
 mirrors. At the end of each suite, one, of fabulous size, 
 without frame, made to appear, by a cunning arrangement 
 of dark draperies, like a transparent portion of the wall 
 itself, extended the magnificence of the apartments. 
 
 Not a flame nor a jet was anywhere visible. Tinted 
 vases, pendent, or resting upon pedestals, distributed har- 
 monies and thoughts of light rather than light itself; and 
 yet all was visible, effulgent. The columns which separated 
 the apartments seemed to be composed of masses of richly- 
 colored flames, compelled, by some ingenious alchemy, to 
 assume the form and office of columns. 
 
 In New York, par excellence the city of private gorgeous- 
 ness and petite magnificence, nothing had yet been seen 
 equal to the rooms of the glorious Denslow Palace. Even 
 Dalton, the most capricious and critical of men, whose nice 
 vision had absorbed the elegancies of European taste, pro- 
 nounced them superb. The upholstery and ornamentation 
 were composed under the direction of celebrated artists. 
 Palmer was consulted on the marbles. Page (at Rome) 
 advised the cartoons for the frescoes, and gave laws for the 
 colors and disposition of the draperies. The paintings, 
 panelled in the walls, were modern, triumphs of the art 
 and genius of the New World. 
 
 Until the hour for dancing, prolonged melodies of themes 
 modulated in the happiest moments of the great composers. 
 
34O The Dens low Palace. 
 
 floated in the perfumed air from a company of unseen 
 musicians, while the guests moved through the vast apart- 
 ments, charmed or exalted by their splendor, or conversed 
 in groups, every voice subdued and intelligent. 
 
 At midnight began the modish music of the dance, and 
 groups of beautiful girls moved like the atoms of Chladni 
 on the vibrating crystal, with their partners, to the sound 
 of harps and violins, in pleasing figures or inebriating 
 spirals. 
 
 When supper was served, the ivory fronts of a cabinet 
 of gems divided itself in the centre, the two halves re- 
 volving upon silver hinges, and discovered a hall of 
 great height and dimensions, walled with crimson damask, 
 supporting pictures of all the masters of modern art. The 
 dome-like roof of this hall was of marble variously colored, 
 and the floor tessellated and mosaicked in grotesque and 
 graceful figures of Vesuvian lavas and painted porcelain. 
 
 The tables, couches, chairs, and vis-a-vis in this hall 
 were of plain pattern and neutral dead colors, not to over- 
 power or fade the pictures on the walls, or the gold and 
 Parian service of the cedar tables. 
 
 But the chief beauty of this unequalled supper-room was 
 an immense bronze candelabrum, which rose in the centre 
 from a column of black marble. It was the figure of an 
 Italian elm, slender and of thin foliage, embraced, almost 
 enveloped, in a vine, which reached out and supported itself 
 in hanging from all the branches ; the twigs bearing fruit, 
 not of grapes, but of a hundred little spheres of crimson, 
 violet, and golden light, whose combination produced a soft 
 atmosphere of no certain color. 
 
 Neither Honoria, Dalton, nor myself remained long in 
 the gallery. We retired with a select few, and were served 
 in an antechamber, separated from the grand reception- 
 room by an arch, through which, by putting aside a silk 
 curtain, Honoria could see, at a distance, any that entered, 
 as they passed in from the hall. 
 
 My own position was such that I could look over her 
 
The Dens low Palace. 341 
 
 shoulder and see as she saw. Vis-a-vis with her, and con- 
 sequently with myself, was Adonais, a celebrated author, 
 and person of the beau monde. On his left, Dalton, always 
 mysteriously elegant and dangerously witty. Denslow and 
 Jeffrey Lethal, the critic, completed our circle. The con- 
 versation was easy, animated, personal. 
 
 "You are fortunate in having a woman of taste to 
 manage your entertainments," said Lethal, in answer to a 
 remark of Denslow's, "but in bringing these people to- 
 gether she has made a sad blunder." 
 
 " And what may that be ? " inquired Dalton, mildly. 
 
 " Your guests are too well behaved, too fine, and on their 
 guard ; there are no butts, no palpable fools or vulgarians , 
 and, worse, there are many distinguished, but no one great 
 man, no social or intellectual sovereign of the occasion." 
 
 Honoria looked inquiringly at Lethal. " Pray, Mr. Lethal, 
 tell me who he is ? I thought there was no such person in 
 America," she added, with a look of reproachful inquiry at 
 Dalton and myself, as if we should have found this sover- 
 eign and suggested him. 
 
 "You are right, my dear queen; Lethal is joking," re- 
 sponded Dalton; "we are a democracy, and have only a 
 queen of " 
 
 "Water ices," interrupted Lethal; "but, as for the king 
 you seek, as democracies finally come to that " 
 
 " Good Heavens ! " exclaimed Honoria, raising the cur- 
 tain, " it must be he that is coming in." 
 
 Honoria frowned slightly, rose, and advanced to meet a 
 new-comer, who had entered unannounced, and was advanc- 
 ing alone. Dalton followed to support her. I observed 
 their movements, Lethal and Adonais using my face as a 
 mirror of what was passing beyond the curtain. 
 
 The masses of level light from the columns on the left 
 seemed to envelop the stranger, who came toward us from 
 the entrance, as if he had divined the presence of Honoria 
 in the alcove. 
 
 He was about the middle height, Napoleonic in form and 
 
342 The Denslow Palace. 
 
 bearing, with features of marble paleness, firm, and sharply 
 defined. His hair and magnificent Asiatic beard were jetty 
 black, curling, and naturally disposed. Under his dark and 
 solid brows gleamed large eyes of abysmal blackness and 
 intensity. 
 
 "Is it Lord N ? " whispered Lethal, moved from his 
 
 habitual coldness by the astonishment which he read in my 
 face. 
 
 "Senator D , perhaps," suggested Denslow, whose 
 
 ideas, like his person, aspired to the senatorial. 
 
 " Dumas," hinted Adonais, an admirer of French litera- 
 ture. " I heard he was expected." 
 
 "No," I answered, "but certainly in appearance the most 
 noticeable man living. Let us go out and be introduced." 
 
 " Perhaps," said Lethal, " it is the d ." 
 
 All rose instantly at the idea, and we went forward, urged 
 by irresistible curiosity. 
 
 As we drew near the stranger, who was conversing with 
 Honoria and Dalton, a shudder went through me. It was 
 a thrill of the universal Boswell ; I seemed to feel the 
 presence of "the most aristocratic man of the age." 
 
 Honoria introduced me. " My Lord Duke, allow me to 
 present my friend, Mr. De Vere ; Mr. De Vere, the Duke 
 of Rosecouleur." 
 
 Was I, then, face to face with, nay, touching the hand of 
 a highness, and that highness the monarch of the ton ? 
 And is this a ducal hand, white as the albescent down of 
 the eider-duck, which presses mine with a tender touch, so 
 haughty and so delicately graduated to my standing as 
 " friend " of the exquisite Honoria? It was too much; I 
 could have wept ; my senses rather failed. 
 
 Dalton fell short of himself ; for, though his head stooped 
 to none, unless conventionally, the sudden and unaccount- 
 able presence of the Duke of Rosecouleur annoyed and 
 perplexed him. His own sovereignty was threatened. 
 
 Lethal stiffened himself to the ordeal of an introduction ; 
 the affair seemed to exasperate him. Denslow alone, of 
 
The Dens low Palace. 343 
 
 the men, was in his element. Pompous and soft, he " cot- 
 toned " to the grandeur with the instinct of a born satellite, 
 and his eyes grew brighter, his body more shining and 
 rotund, his back more concave. His bon-vivant tones, jolly 
 and conventional, sounded a pure barytone to the clear 
 soprano of Honoria, in the harmony of an obsequious wel- 
 come. 
 
 The Duke of Rosecouleur glanced around him approv- 
 ingly upon the apartments. I believed that he had never 
 seen anything more beautiful than the petite palace of 
 Honoria, or more ravishing than herself. He said little, 
 in a low voice, and always to one person at a time. His 
 answers and remarks were simple and well-turned. 
 
 Dalton allowed the others to move on, and by a slight 
 sign drew me to him. 
 
 " It is unexpected," he said, in a thoughtful manner, look- 
 ing me full in the eyes. 
 
 "You knew the Duke of Rosecouleur in Europe ? " 
 
 "At Paris, yes, and in Italy he was a travel friend; 
 but we heard lately that he had retired upon his estates in 
 England ; and certainly, he is the last person we looked for 
 here." 
 
 " Unannounced." 
 
 " That is a part of the singularity." 
 
 " His name was not in the published list of arrivals ; but 
 he may have left England incognito. Is a mistake possi- 
 ble?" 
 
 "No! there is but 'one such man in Europe; a hand- 
 somer or a richer does not live." 
 
 "An eye of wonderful depth." 
 
 " Hands exquisite." 
 
 "Feet, ditto." 
 
 "And his dress and manner." 
 
 " Unapproachable ! " 
 
 " Not a shadow of pretence ; the essence of good- 
 breeding founded upon extensive knowledge, and a thorough 
 sense of position and its advantages ; in fact, the Napo- 
 leon of the parlor." 
 
344 The Denslow Palace. 
 
 "But, Dalton," said I, nervously, "no one attends him." 
 " No, I thought so at first ; but do you see that Me- 
 phistophelean figure, in black, who follows the Duke a few 
 paces behind, and is introduced to no one ? " 
 
 " Yes. A singular creature, truly ! how thin he is ! " 
 " That shadow that follows his Highness is, in fact, the 
 famous valet, Reve de Noir, the prince of servants. The 
 Duke goes nowhere without this man as a shadow. He 
 asserts that Reve de Noir has no soul ; and I believe him. 
 The face is that of a demon. It is a separate creation, 
 equally wonderful with the master, but not 'human. He 
 was condensed out of the atmosphere of the great world." 
 
 As we were speaking, we observed a crowd of distin- 
 guished persons gathered about and following his Highness, 
 as he moved. He spoke now to one, now to another. 
 Honoria, fascinated, her beauty every instant becoming 
 more radiant, just leaned, with the lightest pressure, upon 
 the Duke's arm. They were promenading through the 
 rooms. The music, soft and low, continued, but the groups 
 of dancers broke up, the loiterers in the gallery came in, 
 and as the sun draws his fifty, perhaps his hundreds of 
 planets, circling around and near him, this noble luminary 
 centred in himself the attention of all. If they could not 
 speak with him, they could at least speak of him. If they 
 could not touch his hand, the'y could pass before him and 
 give one glance at his eyes. The less aristocratic were 
 even satisfied for the moment with watching the singular 
 being, Reve de Noir, who caught no one's eye, seemed 
 to see no one but his master, and yet was not here nor 
 there, nor in any place, never in the way, a thing of air, 
 and not tangible, but only black. 
 
 At a signal, he would advance and present to his master 
 a perfume, a laced handkerchief, a rose of rubies, a diamond 
 clasp; of many with whom he spoke the liberal Duke 
 begged the acceptance of some little token, as an earnest 
 of his esteem. After interchanging a few words with Jeffrey 
 Lethal, -^- who dared not utter a sarcasm, though he chafed 
 
The Denslow Palace. 345 
 
 visibly under the restraint, the Duke's tasteful generosity 
 suggested a seal ring, with an intaglio head of Swift cut 
 in opal, the mineral emblem of wit, which dulls in the sun- 
 light of fortune, and recovers its fiery points in the shade 
 of adversity ; Reve de Noir, with a movement so slight, 
 't was like the flitting of a bat, placed the seal in the hand 
 of the Duke, who, with a charming and irresistible grace, 
 compelled Lethal to receive it. 
 
 To Denslow, Honoria, Dalton, and myself he offered 
 nothing. Strange? Not at all. Was he not the guest, 
 and had not I been presented to him by Honoria as her 
 "friend?" a word of pregnant meaning to a Duke of 
 Rosecouleur ! 
 
 To Adonais he gave a lock of hair of the great novelist, 
 Dumas, in a locket of yellow tourmaline, a stone usually 
 black. Lethal smiled at this. He felt relieved. "The 
 Duke," thought he, "must be a humorist." 
 
 From my coarse way of describing this, you would sup- 
 pose that it was a farcical exhibition of vulgar extravagance, 
 and the Duke a madman or an impostor ; but the effect was 
 different. It was done with grace, and, in the midst of so 
 much else, it attracted only that side regard, at intervals, 
 which is sure to surprise and excite awe. 
 
 Honoria had almost ceased to converse with us. It was 
 painful to her to talk with any person. She followed the 
 Duke with her eyes. When, by some delicate allusion or 
 attention, he let her perceive that she was in his thoughts, a 
 mantling color overspread her features, and then gave way 
 to paleness, and a manner which attracted universal remark. 
 It was then Honoria abdicated that throne of conventional 
 purity which hitherto she had held undisputed. Women 
 who were plain in her presence outshone Honoria, by meet- 
 ing this ducal apparition, that called itself Rosecouleur, 
 and which might have been, for aught they knew, a fume 
 of the Infernal, shaped to deceive us all, with calm and 
 haughty propriety. 
 
 The sensation did not subside. The music of the waltz 
 15* 
 
The Denslow Palace. 
 
 invited a renewal of that intoxicating whirl which isolates 
 friends and lovers, in whispering and sighing pairs, in the 
 midst of a great assemblage. All the world looked on, when 
 Honoria Denslow placed her hand upon the shoulder of the 
 Duke of Rosecouleur, and the noble and beautiful forms 
 began silently and smoothly turning, with a dream-like mo- 
 tion. Soon she lifted her lovely eyes and steadied their 
 rays upon his. She leaned wholly upon his arm, and the 
 gloved hands completed the magnetic circle. At the close 
 of the first waltz, she rested a moment, leaning upon his 
 shoulder, and his hand still held hers, a liberty often as- 
 sumed and permitted, but not to the nobles and the mon- 
 archs of society. She fell farther, and her ideal beauty 
 faded into a sensuous. 
 
 Honoria was lost. Dalton saw it. We retired together 
 to a room apart. He was dispirited ; called for and drank 
 rapidly a bottle of Champagne ; it was insufficient. 
 
 " De Vere," said he, affairs go badly." 
 
 " Explain." 
 
 "This cursed thing that people call a duke it kills 
 me." 
 
 " I saw." 
 
 " Of course you did ; the world saw ; the servants 
 saw. Honoria has fallen to-night. I shall transfer my 
 allegiance." 
 
 " And Denslow ? " 
 
 " A born sycophant ; he thinks it natural that his wife 
 should love a duke, and a duke love his wife." 
 
 " So would you, if you were any other than you are." 
 
 " Faugh ! it is human nature." 
 
 " Not so ; would you not as soon strangle this Rosecou- 
 leur for making love to your wife in public, as you would 
 another man ? " 
 
 " Rather." 
 
 " Pooh ! I give you up. If you had simply said, * Yes,' 
 it would have satisfied me." 
 
 Dalton seemed perplexed. He called a servant and sent 
 
The Denslow Palace. 347 
 
 him with an order for Nalson, the usher, to come instantly 
 to him. 
 
 Nalson appeared with his white gloves and mahogany 
 face. 
 
 " Nalson, you were a servant of the Duke in Eng- 
 land?" / 
 
 " Yes, sir." 
 
 " Is the person now in the rooms the Duke of Rosecou- 
 leur ? " 
 
 " I have not seen him, sir." 
 
 " Go immediately, study the man well, do you hear ? 
 and come to me. Let no one know your purpose." 
 
 Nalson disappeared. 
 
 I was alarmed. If "the Duke" should prove to be an 
 impostor, we were indeed ruined. 
 
 In five minutes, an hour, it seemed, Nalson stood 
 before us. 
 
 " Is it he ? " said Dalton, looking fixedly upon the face of 
 the usher. 
 
 No reply. 
 
 " Speak the truth ; you need not be afraid." 
 
 " I cannot tell, sir." 
 
 " Nonsense ! go and look again." 
 
 "It is of no use, Mr. Dalton ; you, who are as well ac- 
 quainted with the personal appearance of his Highness as 
 I am, you have been deceived, if I have." 
 
 " Nalson, do you believe that this person is an impostor ?" 
 said Dalton pointing at myself. 
 
 "Who? Mr. De Vere, sir?" 
 
 " If, then, you know at sight that this gentleman is my 
 friend Mr. De Vere, why do you hesitate about the other ? " 
 
 " But the imitation is perfect And there is Reve de 
 Noir." 
 
 " Yes, did Reve de Noir recognize you ? " 
 
 "I have not caught his eye. You know, sir, that this 
 Reve is not, and never was like other men ; he is a devil. 
 One knows, and one does not know him." 
 
348 The Denslow Palace. 
 
 " Were you at the door when the Duke entered ? " 
 
 "I think not; at least I cannot tell. When I first 
 saw him, he was in the room, speaking with Madam Dens- 
 low." 
 
 " Nalson, you have done wrong ; no one should have en- 
 tered unannounced. Send the doorkeeper to me." 
 
 The doorkeeper came ; a gigantic negro, magnificently 
 attired. 
 
 "Jupiter, you were at the door when the Duke of Rose- 
 couleur entered ? " 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 " Did the Duke and his man come in a carriage ? " 
 
 "Yes, sir, a hack." 
 
 " You may go. They are not devils," said Dalton mus- 
 ingly, " or they would not have come in a carriage." 
 
 " You seem to have studied the spiritual mode of loco- 
 motion," said I. 
 
 Dalton frowned. " This is serious, De Vere." 
 
 "What mean you?" 
 
 " I mean that Denslow is a bankrupt." 
 
 " Explain yourself." 
 
 "You know what an influence he carries in political 
 
 circles. The-G rs, the S es, and their kind, have 
 
 more talent, but Denslow enjoys the secret of popular- 
 ity." 
 
 "Well, I know it." 
 
 " In the middle counties, where he owns vast estates, and 
 has been liberal to debtors and tenants, he carries great fa- 
 vor ; both parties respect him for his ignorance and pompos- 
 ity, which they mistake for simplicity and power, as usual. 
 The estates are mortgaged three deep, and wjll not hold out 
 a year. The shares of the Millionnaire's Hotel and the Poor 
 Man's Bank in the B y are worthless. Denslow's rail- 
 road schemes have absorbed the capital of those concerns." 
 
 " But he had three millions." 
 
 "Nominally. This palace has actually sunk his in- 
 come." 
 
The Denslow Palace. 349 
 
 Madness ! " 
 
 u Wisdom, if you will listen.' 
 
 " I am all attention." 
 
 " The use of money is to create and hold power. Dens- 
 low was certain of the popular and county votes ; he 
 
 needed only the aristocratic support, and the A people 
 
 would have made him Senator." 
 
 " Fool, why was he not satisfied with his money ? " 
 
 " Do you call the farmer fool, because he is not satisfied 
 with the soil, but wishes to grow wheat thereon ? Money 
 is the soil of power. For much less than a million one may 
 gratify the senses ; great fortunes are not for sensual luxu- 
 ries, but for those of the soul. To the facts, then. The 
 advent of this mysterious duke, whom I doubt, hailed 
 by Denslow and Honoria as a piece of wonderful good-for- 
 tune, has already shaken him and ruined the prestige of his 
 wife. They are mad and blind," 
 
 " Tell me, in plain prose, the how and the why" 
 
 " De Vere, you are dull. There are three hundred peo- 
 ple, in the rooms of the Denslow Palace ; these people 
 are the ' aristocracy.' They control the sentiments of the 
 ' better class.' Opinion, like dress, descends from them. 
 They no longer respect Denslow, and their women have 
 seen the weakness of Honoria." 
 
 " Yes, but Denslow still has * the people.' " 
 
 " That is not enough. I have calculated the chances, and 
 mustered all our available force. We shall have no support 
 among the ' better class ' since we are disgraced with the 
 ' millionriaires.' " 
 
 At this moment Denslow came in. 
 
 " Ah ! Dalton, like you ! I have been looking for you 
 to show the pictures. Devil a thing I know about them. 
 The Duke wondered at your absence." 
 
 "Where is Honoria?" 
 
 "Ill, ill, fainted. The house is new; smell of new 
 wood and mortar ; deused disagreeable in Honoria. If it 
 had not been for the Duke, she would have fallen. That 's 
 
3 SO The Dens low Palace. 
 
 a monstrous clever fellow, that Rosecouleur. Admires Ho- 
 noria vastly. Come, the pictures." 
 
 " Mr. John Vanbrugen Denslow, you are an ass ! " 
 
 The large, smooth, florid millionnaire, dreaming only of 
 senatorial honors, the shouts of the multitude, and the 
 adoration of a party press, cowered like a dog under the 
 lash of the " man of society." 
 
 " Rather rough, ha, De Vere ? What have / done ? 
 Am I an ass because I know nothing of pictures ? Come. 
 Dalton, you are harsh with your old friend." 
 
 " Denslow, I have told you a thousand times never to 
 concede position." 
 
 " Yes, but this is a duke, man, a prince ! " 
 
 " This from you ? By Jove, De Vere, I wish you and I 
 could live a hundred years, to see a republican aristocrat. 
 We are still mere provincials," added Dalton, with a sigh. 
 
 Denslow perspired with mortification. 
 
 " You use me badly, I tell you, Dalton, this Rosecou- 
 leur is a devil. Condescend to him ! be haughty and what 
 do you call it ? urbane to him ! I defy you to do it, with 
 all your impudence. Why, his valet, that shadow that glides 
 after him, is too much for me. Try him yourself, man." 
 
 "Who, the valet?" 
 
 " No, the master, though I might have said the valet." 
 
 " Did I yield in Paris ? " 
 
 " No, but you were of the embassy, and and no one 
 really knew us, you know." 
 
 Dalton pressed his lips hard together. 
 
 "Come," said he, " De Vere, let us try a fall with this 
 Titan of the carpet." 
 
 Denslow hastened back to the Duke. I followed Dalton ; 
 but as for me, bah ! I am a cipher. 
 
 The room in which we were adjoined Honoria's boudoir, 
 from which a secret passage led down by a spiral to a panel 
 behind hangings ; raising these, one could enter the draw- 
 ing-room unobserved. Dalton paused midway in the secret 
 passage, and through a loop or narrow window, concealed 
 
The Dens low Palace. 351 
 
 by architectural ornaments, and which overlooked the great 
 drawing-rooms, made a reconnaissance of the field. 
 
 Nights of Venice ! what a scene was there ! The vine- 
 branch chandeliers, crystal-fruited, which depended from the 
 slender ribs of the ceiling, cast a rosy dawn of light, deepen- 
 ing the green and crimson of draperies and carpets, making 
 an air like sunrise in the bowers of a forest. Form and or- 
 der were everywhere visible, though unobtrusive. Arch 
 beyond arch, to fourth apartments, lessening in dimension, 
 with increase of wealth; groups of beautiful women, on 
 either hand, seated or half reclined ; the pure or rich hues 
 of their robes blending imperceptibly, or in gorgeous con- 
 trasts, with the soft outlines and colors of their supports ; a 
 banquet for the eyes and the mind ; the perfect work of art 
 and culture; gliding about and among these, or, with 
 others, springing and revolving in that monarch of all meas- 
 ures, which blends luxury and purity, until it is either the 
 one or the other, moved the men. 
 
 " That is my work," exclaimed Dalton, unconsciously. 
 
 " Not all, I think." 
 
 " I mean the combinations, the effect. But see ! Ho- 
 noria will again accept the Duke's invitation. He is coming 
 to her. Let us prevent it." 
 
 He slipped away ; and I, remaining at my post of obser- 
 vation, saw him, an instant later, passing quickly across the 
 floor among the dancers, toward Honoria. - The Duke of 
 Rosecouleur arrived at the same instant before her. She 
 smiled sorrowfully upon Dalton, and held out her hand in a 
 languid manner toward the Duke, and again they floated 
 away upon the eddies of the music. I followed them with 
 eyes fixed in admiration. It was a vision of the orgies of 
 Olympus, Zeus and Aphrodite circling to a theme of 
 Chronos. 
 
 Had Honoria tasted of the Indian drug, the weed of para- 
 dise ? Her eyes, fixed upon the Duke's, shone like molten 
 sapphires. A tress of chestnut hair, escaping from the dia- 
 mond coronet, sprang lovingly forward and twined itself 
 
352 The Dens low Palace. 
 
 over her white shoulder and still fairer bosom. Tints like 
 flitting clouds, Titianic, the mystery and despair of art, dis- 
 closed to the intelligent eye the feeling that mastered her 
 spirit and her sense. Admirable beauty ! Unrivalled, un- 
 happy ! The Phidian idol of gold and ivory, into which 
 a demon had entered, overthrown, and the worshippers 
 gazing on it with a scorn unmixed with pity ! 
 
 The sullen animal rage of battle is nothing to the livor, 
 the burning hatred of the drawing-room. Dalton, defeated, 
 cast a glance of deadly hostility on the Duke. Nor was it 
 lost. While the waltz continued, for ten minutes, he stood 
 motionless. Fearing some untoward event, I came down 
 and took my place near him. 
 
 The Duke led Honoria to a sofa. But for his arm she 
 would again have fallen. Dalton had recovered his courage 
 and natural haughtiness. The tone of his voice, rich, ten- 
 der, and delicately expressive, did not change. 
 
 " Honoria, you sent for me; and the Duke wishes to see 
 the pictures. The air of the gallery will relieve your faint- 
 ness." 
 
 He offered his arm, which she, rising mechanically, ac- 
 cepted. A deep blush crimsoned her features, at the allu- 
 sion to her weakness. Several of the guests moved after 
 us, as we passed into the gallery. The Duke's shadow, 
 Reve de Noir, following last, closed the ivory doors. We 
 passed through the gallery, where pyramids of sunny 
 fruits, in baskets of fine porcelain, stood relieved by gold 
 and silver services for wine and coffee, disposed on the 
 tables, and thence entered another and smaller room, 
 devoid of ornament, but the crimson tapestried walls were 
 covered with works or copies of the great masters of Italy. 
 
 Opposite the entrance there was a picture -of a woman 
 seated on a throne, behind which stood a demon whispering 
 in her ear, and pointing to a handsome youth in the circle 
 of the courtiers. The design and color were in the style 
 of Correggio. Denslow stood close behind me. In ad- 
 vance were Honoria, Dalton, and the Duke, whose conver- 
 
The Dens low Palace. 353 
 
 sation was adressed alternately to her an^ Dalton. The 
 lights of the gallery burst forth in their full refulgence as we 
 approached the picture. 
 
 The glorious harmony of its colors, the force of the 
 shadows, which seemed to be converging in the rays of a 
 single unseen source of light, the unity of sentiment, 
 which drew all the groups together, in the idea ; I had 
 seen all this before, but with the eyes of supercilious criti- 
 cism. Now the picture smote us with awe. 
 
 a I have the original of this excellent work," said the 
 
 Duke, " in my house at A , but your copy is nearly as 
 
 good." 
 
 The remark, intended for Honoria, reached the pride of 
 her companion, who blandly replied, 
 
 "Your Highness's exquisite judgment is for -once at 
 fault. The piece is original. It was purchased from a well- 
 known collection in Italy, where there are none others of 
 the school." 
 
 Honoria was gazing upon the picture, as I was, in silent 
 astonishment. 
 
 " If this," said she, "is a copy, what must have been the 
 genuine work ? Did you never before notice the likeness 
 between the queen, in that picture, and myself? " she asked, 
 addressing Dalton. 
 
 The remark excited general attention. Every one mur- 
 v mured, " The likeness is perfect." 
 
 " And the demon behind the queen," said Denslow, in- 
 sipidly, " resembles your Highness's valet." 
 
 There was another exclamation. No sooner was it ob- 
 served, than the likeness to Reve de Noir seemed to be 
 even more perfect. 
 
 The Duke made a sign. 
 
 Reve de Noir placed himself near the canvas. His pro- 
 file was the counterpart of that in the painting. He seemed 
 to have stepped out of it. 
 
 " It was I," said the Duke, in a gentle voice, and with a 
 smile which just disclosed the ivory line under the black 
 
 w 
 
354 The Dens low Palace. 
 
 moustache, "wfco caused this picture to be copied and 
 altered. The beauty of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow, whom it 
 was my highest pleasure to know, seemed to me to surpass 
 that of the queen of my original. I first, with great secrecy, 
 unknown to your wife," continued the Duke, turning to 
 Denslow, "procured a portrait from the life by memory, 
 which was afterwards transferred to this canvas. The re- 
 semblance to my attendant is, I confess, remarkable and 
 inexplicable." 
 
 " But will you tell us by what accident this copy happened 
 to be in Italy ? " asked Dalton. 
 
 " You will remember," replied the Duke, coldly, " that at 
 Paris, noticing your expressions of admiration for the pic- 
 ture, which you had seen in my English gallery, I gave you 
 a history of its purchase at Bologna by myself. I sent my 
 artist to Bologna, with orders to place the copy in the 
 gallery and to introduce the portrait of the lady ; it was a 
 freak of fancy; I meant it -for a surprise; as I felt sure, 
 that, if you saw the picture, you would secure it." 
 
 "It seems to me," replied Dalton, "that the onus of 
 proof rests with your Highness." 
 
 The Duke made a signal to Reve de Noir, who again 
 stepped up to the canvas, and, with a short knife or stiletto, 
 removed a small portion of the outer layer of paint, dis- 
 closing a very ancient ground of some other and inferior 
 work, over which the copy seemed to have been painted.* 
 The proof was unanswerable. 
 
 "Good copies," remarked the Duke, "are often better 
 than originals." 
 
 He offered his arm to Honoria, and they walked through 
 the gallery, he entertaining her, and those near him, with 
 comments upon other works. The crowd followed them, 
 as they moved on or returned, as a cloud of gnats follow 
 up and down, and to and fro, a branch tossing in the wind. 
 
 " Beaten at every point," I said, mentally, looking on the 
 pale features of the defeated Dalton. 
 
 "Yes," he replied, seeing the remark in my face; "but 
 
The Deiislow Palace. 355 
 
 there is yet time. I am satisfied this is the man with whom 
 we travelled ; none other could have devised such a plan, 
 or carried it out. He must have fallen in love with Honoria 
 at that time ; and simply to see her is the object of his visit 
 to America. He is a connoisseur in pictures as in women ; 
 but he must not be allowed to ruin us by his arrogant as- 
 sumptions." . 
 
 "Excepting his manner and extraordinary personal ad- 
 vantages, I find nothing in him to awe or astonish." 
 
 " His wealth is incalculable ; he is used to victories ; and 
 that manner which you affect to slight, that is everything. 
 'Tis power, success, victory. This man of millions, this 
 prince, does not talk ; he has. but little use for words. It is 
 manner, and not words, that achieves social and amatory 
 conquests." 
 
 " Bah ! You are like the politicians, who mistake acci- 
 dents for principles. But even you are talking, while this 
 pernicious foreigner is acting. See ! they have left the 
 gallery, and the crowd of fools is following them. You 
 cannot stem such a tide of folly." 
 
 " I deny that they are fools. Why does that sallow 
 wretch, Lethal, follow them ? or that enamelled person, 
 Adonais ? They are at a serpent-charming, and Honoria is 
 the bird-of-paradise. They watch with delight, and sketch 
 as they observe, the struggles of the poor bird. The others 
 are indifferent or curious, envious or amused. It is only 
 Denslow who is capped and antlered, and the shafts aimed 
 at his foolish brow glance and wound us. 
 
 We were left alone in the gallery. Dalton paced back 
 and forth, in his slow, erect, and graceful manner ; there 
 was no hurry or agitation. 
 
 "How quickly," said he, as his moist eyes met mine, 
 " how like a dream, this glorious vision, this beautiful work, 
 will fade and be forgotten ! Nevertheless, I made it," he 
 added, musingly. " It was I who moulded and expanded 
 the sluggish millions." 
 
 "You will still be what you are, Dalton, an artist, more 
 
356 The Dens low Palace. 
 
 than a man of society. You work with a soft and perish- 
 able material." 
 
 "A distinction without a difference. Every man is a 
 politician, but only every artist is a gentleman." 
 
 " Densldw, then, is ruined." 
 
 " Yes and no ; there is nothing in him to ruin. It is I 
 who am the sufferer." 
 
 "And Honoria?" 
 
 "It was I who formed her manners, and guided her per- 
 ceptions of the beautiful. It was I who married her to a 
 mass of money, De Vere." 
 
 " Did you never love Honoria ? ' 
 
 He laughed. 
 
 " Loved ? Yes ; as Praxiteles may have loved the clay 
 he moulded, for its smoothness and ductility under the 
 hand." 
 
 " The day has not come for such men as you, Dalton.' 
 
 " Come, and gone, and coming. It has come in dream- 
 land. Let us follow your fools." 
 
 The larger gallery was crowded. The pyramids of glow- 
 ing fruit had disappeared ; there was a confused murmur of 
 pairs and parties, chatting and taking wine. The master 
 of the house, his wife, and guest were nowhere to be seen. 
 Lethal and Adonais stood apart, conversing. As we ap- 
 proached them unobserved, Dalton checked me. " Hear 
 what these people are saying," said he. 
 
 " My opinion is," said Lethal, holding out his crooked 
 forefinger like a claw, " that this soi-disant duke what 
 the deuse is his name ? " 
 
 " Rosecouleur," interposed Adonais, in a tone of society. 
 
 " Right, Couleur de Rose is an impostor, an impos- 
 tor, a sharper. Everything tends that way. What an utter 
 sell it would be ! " 
 
 " You were with us at the picture scene ? " murmured 
 Adonais. 
 
 " Yes. Dalton looked wretchedly cut up, when that devil 
 of a valet, who must be an accomplice, scraped the new paint 
 
The Dens low Palace. 357 
 
 off. The picture must have been got up in New York by 
 Dalton and the Denslows." 
 
 " Perhaps the Duke, too, was got up in New York, on 
 the same principle," suggested Adonai's. " Such things are 
 possible. Society is intrinsically rotten, you know, and 
 Dalton " 
 
 " Is a fellow of considerable talent," sneered Lethal, 
 "but has enemies, who may have planned a duke." 
 
 Adonai's coughed in his cravat, and hinted, " How 
 would it do to call him ' Barnum Dalton ' ? " 
 
 Adonai's appeared shocked at himself, and swallowed a 
 minim of wine to cleanse his vocal apparatus from the stain 
 of so coarse an illustration. 
 
 " Do you hear those creatures ? " whispered Dalton. 
 " They are arranging scandalous paragraphs for the ' Illus- 
 tration.' " 
 
 A moment after, he was gone. I spoke to Lethal and 
 Adonai's. 
 
 " Gentlemen, you are in error about the picture and the 
 Duke ; they are as they now appear : the one, an excellent 
 copy, purchased as an original, no uncommon mistake ; 
 the other, a genuine highness. How does he strike you ? " 
 
 Lethal cast his eyes around to see who listened. 
 
 " The person," said he, " who is announced here to-night 
 as an English duke seemed to me, of all men I could select, 
 least like one." 
 
 " Pray, what is your ideal or* an English duke, Mr. 
 Lethal ? " asked Adonai's, with the air of a connoisseur, 
 sure of himself, but hating to offend. 
 
 " A plain, solid person, well dressed, but simple ; mutton- 
 chop whiskers ; and the manners of a a " 
 
 " Bear ! " said a soft female voice. 
 
 " Precisely, the manners of a bear ; a kind of gentle- 
 manly bear, perhaps, but still, ursine and heavy; while 
 
 this person, who seems to have walked out of or a 
 
 novel, affects me, by his ways and appearance, like a a 
 h'm " 
 
358 The Dens low Palace. 
 
 " Gambler ! " said the same female voice, in a conclusive 
 tone. 
 
 There was a general soft laugh. Everybody was pleased. 
 All admired, hated, and envied the Duke. It was settled 
 beyond a doubt that he was an impostor, and that the 
 Denslows were either grossly taken in, or were " selling " 
 their friends. In either case, it was shocking and de- 
 lightful. 
 
 "The fun of the thing," continued Lethal, raising his 
 voice a little, "is, that the painter who got up the old pic- 
 ture must have been as much an admirer of the Hon. Mrs. 
 Denslow as his Highness ; for, in touching in the 
 queen, he has unconsciously made it a portrait." 
 
 The blow was final. I moved away, grieved and morti- 
 fied to the soul, cursing the intrusion of the mysterious 
 personage whose insolent superiority had overthrown the 
 hopes of my friends. 
 
 At the door of the gallery I met G , the painter, just 
 
 returned from London. I drew him with me into the inner 
 gallery, to make a thorough examination of the picture. I 
 called his attention to the wonderful resemblance of the 
 queen to Honoria. He did not see it ; we looked together, 
 and I began to think that it might have been a delusion. I 
 told the Duke's story of the picture to G . He exam- 
 ined the canvas, tested the layers of color, and pronounced 
 the work genuine and of immense value. We looked again 
 and again at the queer's head, viewing it in every light. 
 The resemblance to Honoria had disappeared ; nor was the 
 demon any longer a figure of the Duke's valet. 
 
 " One would think," said G , laughing, " that you had 
 
 been mesmerized. If you had been so deceived in a picture, 
 may you not be equally cheated in a man ? I am loath to 
 offend ; but, indeed, the person whom you call Rosecouleur 
 cannot be the Duke of that title, whom I saw in England. 
 I had leave to copy a picture in his gallery. He was often 
 present. His manners were mild and unassuming, not 
 at all like those of this man, to whom, I acknowledge, the 
 
The Dens low Palace. 359 
 
 personal resemblance is surprising. I am afraid our good 
 friends, the Denslows, and Mr. Dalton, whom I esteem 
 for their patronage of art, have been taken in by an ad- 
 venturer." 
 
 " But the valet, Reve de Noir ? " 
 
 " The Duke had a valet of that name who attended him, 
 and who may, for aught I know, have resembled this one ; 
 but probability is against concurrent resemblances. Ttiere 
 is also an original of the picture in the Duke's gallery ; in 
 fact, the artist, as was not unusual in those days, painted 
 two pictures of the same subject. Both, then, are genuine." 
 
 Returning my cordial thanks to the good painter for his 
 timely explanation, I hastened to find Dalton. Drawing 
 him from the midst of a group whom he was entertaining, 
 
 I communicated G 's account of the two pictures, and 
 
 his suspicions in regard to the Duke. 
 
 His perplexity was great. " Worse and worse, De Vere ! 
 To be ruined by a common adventurer is more disgraceful 
 even than the other misfortune. Besides, our guests are 
 leaving us. At least a hundred of them have gone away 
 with the first impression, and the whole city will have it. 
 The journal reporters have been here. Denslow's principal 
 creditors were among the guests to-night ; they went away 
 soon, just after the affair with the picture ; to-morrow will 
 be our dark day. If it had not been for this demon of a 
 duke and his familiar, whoever they are, all would have 
 gone well. Now we are distrusted, and they will crush us. 
 Let us fall facing the enemy. Within an hour I will have 
 the truth about the Duke. Did I ever tell you what a price 
 Denslow paid for that picture ? " 
 
 " No, I do not wish to hear." 
 
 " You are right. Come with me." 
 
 The novel disrespect excited by the scandal of Honoria 
 and the picture seemed to have inspired the two hundred 
 people who remained with a cheerful ease. Eating, drink- 
 ing excessively of Denslow's costly wines, dancing to music 
 which grew livelier and more boisterous as the musicians, 
 
360 The Dens low Palace. 
 
 imbibed more of the inspiriting juice, and, catching scraps 
 of the scandal, threw out significant airs, the company 
 of young persons, deserted by their scandalized seniors, 
 had converted the magnificent suite of drawing-rooms into 
 a carnival theatre. Parties of three and four were junk- 
 eting in corners ; laughing servants rushed to and fro as in 
 a cafe; the lounges were occupied by reclining beauties or 
 languid fops overpowered with wine, about whom lovely 
 young women, flushed with champagne and mischief, were 
 coquetting and frolicking. 
 
 " I warrant you, these people know it is our last night," 
 said Dalton ; " and see what a use they make of us ! Den- 
 low's rich wines poured away like water ; everything soiled, 
 smeared, and overturned ; our entertainment, at first stately 
 and gracious as a queen's drawing-room, ending with the 
 loss of prestige, in the riot of a bal masque. So fades am- 
 bition ! But to this duke." 
 
 Denslow, who had passed into the polite stage of inebria- 
 tion, evident to close observers, had arranged a little exclu- 
 sive circle, which included three women of fashionable 
 reputation, his wife, the Duke, Jeffrey Lethal, and Adonais. 
 Rve de Noir officiated as attendant. The faiiteuils and 
 couches were disposed around a pearl table, on which were 
 liquors, coffee, wines, and a few delicacies for Honoria, who 
 had not supped. They were in the purple recess adjoining 
 the third drawing-room. Adonais talked with the Duke 
 about Italy; Lethal criticised; while Honoria, in the full 
 splendor of her beauty, outshining and overpowering, 
 dropped here and there a few musical words, like service- 
 notes, to harmonize. 
 
 There is no beauty like the newly-enamored. Dalton 
 seemed to forget himself, as he contemplated her, for a 
 moment. Spaces had been left for us ; the valet placed 
 chairs. 
 
 "Dalton," cried Lethal, "you are in time to decide a 
 question of deep interest ; your friend, De Vere, will 
 assist you. His Highness has given preference to the wo- 
 
The Dens low Palace. 361 
 
 men of America over those of Italy. 'AdonaYs, the exqui- 
 site and mild, settles his neck-tie against the Duke, and 
 objects in that bland but firm manner which is his. I am 
 the Duke's bottle-holder; Denslow and wife accept that 
 function for the chivalrous AdonaYs." 
 
 " I am of the Duke's party," replied Dalton, in his most 
 agreeable manner. " To be in the daily converse and view 
 of the most beautiful women in America, as I have been 
 for years, is a privilege in the cultivation of a pure taste. I 
 saw nothing in Italy, except on canvas, comparable with 
 what I see at this moment. The Duke is right; but in 
 commending his judgment, I attribute to him also sagacity. 
 Beauty is like language ; its use is to conceal. One may, 
 under rose-colored commendations, a fine manner, and a 
 flowing style, conceal, as Nature does with personal advan- 
 tages in men, the gross tastes and vulgar cunning of a 
 charlatan." 
 
 Dalton, in saying this, with a manner free from suspicion 
 or excitement, fixed his eyes upon the Duke's. 
 
 " You seem to have no faith in either men or women," 
 responded the rich barytone voice of his Highness, the dark 
 upper lip disclosing, as before, the row of square, sharp, 
 ivory teeth. 
 
 " Little, very little," responded Dalton, with a sigh. 
 " Your Highness will understand me, or if not now, 
 presently." 
 
 Lethal trod upon Adonais's foot ; I saw him do it. 
 AdonaYs exchanged glances with a brilliant hawk-faced lady 
 who sat opposite. The lady smiled and touched her com- 
 panion. Honoria, who saw everything, opened her magnifi- 
 cent eyes to their full extent. Denslow was oblivious. 
 
 " In fact," continued Dalton, perceiving the electric flash 
 he had excited, " scepticism is a disease of my intellect. 
 Perhaps the most noticeable and palpable fact of the mo- 
 ment is the presence and identity of the Duke who is 
 opposite to me ; and yet, doubting as I sometimes do my 
 own existence, is it not natural, that, philosophically speak- 
 16 
 
362 The Dens low Palace. 
 
 ing, the presence and identity of your Highness are at mo- 
 ments a subject of philosophical doubt ? " 
 
 " In cases of this kind," replied the Duke, "we rest upon 
 circumstantial evidence." 
 
 So - saying, he drew from his finger a ring and handed it 
 to Dalton, who went to the light and examined it closely, 
 and passed it to me. It was a minute cameo, no larger than 
 a grain of wheat, in a ring of plain gold ; a rare and beauti- 
 ful work of microscopic art. 
 
 " I seem to remember presenting the Duke of Rosecou- 
 leur with a similar ring, in Italy," said Dalton, resuming 
 his seat ; " but the coincidence does not resolve my philo- 
 sophic doubt, excited by the affair of the picture. We all 
 supposed that we saw a portrait of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow 
 in yon picture ; and we seemed to discover, under the man- 
 agement of your valet, that Denslow's picture, a genuine 
 duplicate of the original by the author, was a modern copy. 
 Since your Highness quitted the gallery, those delusions 
 have ceased. The picture appears now to be genuine. 
 The likeness to Mrs. Denslow has vanished." 
 
 An exclamation of surprise from all present, except the 
 Duke, followed this announcement. 
 
 " And so," continued Dalton, " it may be with this ring, 
 which now seems to be the one I gave the Duke at Rome, 
 but to-morrow may be different." 
 
 As he spoke, Dalton gave back the ring to the Duke, who 
 received it with his usual grace. 
 
 "Who knows," said Lethal, with a deceptive innocence 
 of manner, " whether aristocracy itself be not founded in 
 mesmerical deceptions ? " 
 
 " I think, Lethal," observed Adonais, " you push the 
 matter. It would be impossible, for instance, even for 
 his Highness, to make Honoria Denslow appear ugly." 
 
 We all looked at Honoria, to whom the Duke leaned over 
 and said, 
 
 " Would you be willing for a moment to lose that exqui- 
 site beauty ? " 
 
The Denslow Palace. 363 
 
 " For my sake, Honoria," said Dalton " refuse him.' 
 
 The request, so simply made, was rewarded by a ravish- 
 ing smile. 
 
 " Edward, do you know that you have not spoken a kind 
 word to me to-night, until now ? " 
 
 Their eyes met, and I saw that Dalton trembled with a 
 deep emotion. " I will save you yet," he murmured. 
 
 A tall, black hound, of the slender breed, rose up near 
 Honoria, and placing his fore-paws upon the edge of the 
 pearl table, turned and licked her face and eyes. 
 
 It was the vision of a moment. The dog sprang up- 
 on the sofa by the Duke's side, growling and snap- 
 ping. 
 
 " Reve de Noir," cried Lethal and Adonai's, " drive the 
 dog away ! " 
 
 The valet had disappeared. 
 
 "I have no fear of him, gentlemen," said the Duke, pat- 
 ting the head of the hound ; " he is a faithful servant, and 
 has a faculty of reading thoughts. Go bring my servant, 
 Demon," said the Duke. 
 
 The hound sprang away with a great bound, and in an 
 instant Reve de Noir was standing behind us. The dog did 
 not appear again. 
 
 Honoria looked bewildered. "Of what dog were you 
 speaking, Edward ? " 
 
 " The hound that licked your face.' 
 
 " You are joking. I saw no hound." 
 
 " See, gentlemen," exclaimed Lethal, " his Highness 
 shows us tricks. He is a wizard." 
 
 The three women gave little shrieks, half pleasure, 
 half terror. 
 
 Denslow, who had fallen back in his chair asleep, awoke 
 and rubbed his eyes. 
 
 "What is all this, Honoria ? " 
 
 " That his Highness is a wizard," she said, with a forced 
 laugh, glancing at Dalton. 
 
 " Will his Highnes"s do us the honor to lay aside the mask, 
 
364 The Dens low Palace. 
 
 and appear in his true colors ? " said Dalton, returning 
 Honoria's glance with an encouraging look. 
 
 " Gentlemen," said the Duke, haughtily, " I am your guest, 
 and by hospitality protected from insult." 
 
 " Insult, most noble Duke ! " exclaimed Lethal, with a 
 sneer, " impossible, under the roof of our friend, the 
 Honorable Walter Denslow, in the small hours of the night, 
 and in the presence of the finest women in the world. 
 Dalton, pray, reassure his Highness ! " 
 
 " Edward ! Edward ! " murmured Honoria, " have a care, 
 even if it be as you think." 
 
 Dalton remained bland and collected. 
 
 " Pardon, my Lord, the effect of a little wine, and of those 
 wonderful fantasies you have shown us. Your dog, youi 
 servant, and yourself interest us equally ; the picture, the 
 ring, all are wonderful. In supposing that you had as- 
 sumed a mask, and one so noble, I was led into an error by 
 these miracles, expecting no less than a translation of your- 
 self into the person of some famous wonder-worker. It is, 
 you know, a day of miracles, and even kings have their sal- 
 aried seers, and take counsel of the spiritual world. More ! 
 let us have more ! " 
 
 The circle were amazed ; the spirit of superstitious curi- 
 osity seized upon them. 
 
 "Reve de Noir," said the Duke, "a carafe, and less 
 light." 
 
 The candelabra became dim. The Duke took the carafe 
 of water from the valet, and, standing up, poured it upon the 
 air ; it broke into flames, which mounted and floated away, 
 singly or in little crowds. Still the Duke poured, and dash- 
 ing up the water with his hand, by and by the ceiling was 
 illuminated with a thousand miniature tongues of violet-col- 
 ored fire. We clapped our hands, and applauded, " Beau- 
 tiful ! marvellous! wonderful, Duke! your Highness is 
 the only magician," when, on a sudden, the flames disap- 
 peared and the lights rose again. 
 
 " The world is weary of scepticism," remarked Lethal ; 
 
The Denslow Palace. 365 
 
 "there is no chemistry for that. It is the true magic, doubt- 
 less, recovered from antiquity by his Highness. Are the 
 wonders exhausted ? " 
 
 The Duke smiled again. He stretched out his hand 
 toward Honoria, and she slept. It was the. work of an in- 
 stant. 
 
 " I have seen that before," said Dalton. 
 
 " Not as we see it," responded his Highness. " Reve de 
 Noir, less light ! " 
 
 The room was dark in a moment. Over the head of Ho- 
 noria appeared a cloud, at first black, and soon in this a 
 nucleus of light, which expanded and shaped itself into an 
 image and took the form of the sleeper, nude and spiritual, 
 a belt of rosy mist enveloping and concealing all but 'a head 
 and bust of ravishing beauty. The vision gazed with lan- 
 guid and beseeching eyes upon Dalton, and a sigh seemed 
 to heave the bosom. In scarce a breathing-time, it was 
 gone. Honoria waked, unconscious of what had passed. 
 
 Deep terror and amazement fell upon us all. 
 
 "I have seen enough," said Dalton, rising slowly, and 
 drawing a small riding- whip, " to know now that this person 
 is no duke, but either a charlatan or a devil. In either case, 
 since he has intruded here, to desecrate and degrade, I find 
 it proper to apply a magic more material." 
 
 At the word, all rose exclaiming, " For God's sake, Dal- 
 ton ! " He pressed forward and laid his hand upon the 
 Duke. A cry burst from Reve de Noir which rent our very 
 souls ; and a flash followed, unspeakably bright, which re- 
 vealed the demoniacal features of the Duke, who sat motion- 
 less, regarding Dalton's uplifted arm. A darkness followed 
 profound and palpable. I listened in terror. There was no 
 sound. Were we transformed ? Silence, darkness, still. I 
 closed my eyes, and opened them again. A pale, cold light 
 became slowly perceptible, stealing through a crevice, and 
 revealing the walls and ceiling of my narrow room. The 
 dream still oppressed me. I went to the window, and let 
 in reality with the morning "light. Yet, for days after, the 
 
366 
 
 The Denslow Palace. 
 
 images of the real Honoria and Dalton, my friends, re- 
 mained separated from the creatures of the vision ; and the 
 Denslow palace of dream-land, the pictures, the revelry, and 
 the magic of the Demon Duke, haunted my memory, and 
 kept with them all their visionary splendors and regrets. 
 
FRIEND ELI'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 HE mild May afternoon was drawing to a close, as 
 Friend Eli Mitchenor reached the top of the long 
 hill, and halted a few minutes, to allow his horse 
 time to recover breath. He also heaved a sigh of satisfac- 
 tion, as he saw again the green, undulating valley of the 
 Neshaminy, with its dazzling squares of young wheat, its 
 brown patches of corn-land, its snowy masses of blooming 
 orchard, and the huge, fountain-like jets of weeping-willow, 
 half concealing the gray stone fronts of the farm-houses. 
 He had been absent from home only six days, but the time 
 seemed almost as long to him as a three-years' cruise to a 
 New-Bedford whaleman. The peaceful seclusion and pas- 
 toral beauty of the scene did not consciously appeal to his 
 senses ; but 'he quietly noted how much the wheat had 
 grown during his absence, that the oats were up and look- 
 ing well, that Friend Comly's meadow had been ploughed, 
 and Friend Martin had built his half of the line-fence along 
 the top of the hill-field. If any smothered delight in the 
 loveliness of the spring-time found a hiding-place anywhere 
 in the well-ordered chambers of his heart, it never relaxed 
 or softened the straight, inflexible lines of his face. As 
 easily could his collarless drab coat and waistcoat have 
 flushed with a sudden gleam of purple or crimson. 
 
 Eli Mitchenor was at peace with himself and the world, 
 that is, so much of the world as he acknowledged. Be- 
 
368 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 yond the community of his own sect, and a few personal 
 friends who were privileged to live on its borders, he neither 
 knew, nor cared to know, much more of the human race 
 than if it belonged to a planet farther from the sun. In the 
 discipline of the Friends 'he was perfect ; he was privileged 
 to sit on the high seats, with the elders of the Society ; and 
 the travelling brethren from other States, who visited Bucks 
 County, invariably blessed his house with a family-meeting. 
 His farm was one of the best on the banks of the Nesha- 
 miny, and he also enjoyed the annual interest of a few 
 thousand dollars, carefully secured by mortgages on real 
 estate. His wife, Abigail, kept even pace with him in the 
 consideration she enjoyed within the limits of the sect; 
 and his two children, Moses and Asenath, vindicated the 
 paternal training by the strictest sobriety of dress and 
 conduct. Moses wore the plain coat, even when his ways 
 led him among " the world's people " ; and Asenath had 
 never been known to wear, or to express a desire for, a 
 ribbon of a brighter tint than brown or fawn-color. Friend 
 Mitchenor had thus gradually ripened to his sixtieth year 
 in an atmosphere of life utterly placid and serene, and 
 looked forward with confidence to the final change, as a 
 translation into a deeper calm, a serener quiet, a prosperous 
 eternity of mild voices, subdued colors, and suppressed 
 emotions. 
 
 He was returning home, in his own old-fashioned "chair," 
 with its heavy square canopy and huge curved springs, 
 from the Yearly Meeting of the Hicksite Friends, in Phila- 
 delphia. The large bay farm-horse, slow and grave in his 
 demeanor, wore his plain harness with an a*r which made 
 him seem, among his fellow-horses, the counterpart of his 
 master among men. He would no more have thought of 
 kicking than the latter would of swearing a huge oath. 
 Even now, when the top of the hill was gained, and .he 
 knew that he was within a mile of the stable which had 
 been his* home since colthood, he showed no undue haste 
 or impatience, but waited quietly, until Friend Mitchenor, 
 
Friend Elis Daughter. 369 
 
 by a well-known jerk of the lines, gave him the signal to go 
 on. Obedient to the motion, he thereupon set forward 
 once more, jogging soberly down the eastern slope of the 
 hill, across the covered bridge, where, in spite of the 
 tempting level of the hollow-sounding floor, he was as 
 careful to abstain from trotting as if he had read the warn- 
 ing notice, along the wooded edge of the green meadow, 
 where several cows of his acquaintance were grazing, 
 and finally, wheeling around at the proper angle, halted 
 squarely in front of the gate which gave entrance to the 
 private lane. 
 
 The old stone house in front, the spring-house in a green 
 little hollow just below it, the walled garden, with its clumps 
 of box and lilac, and the vast barn oh the left, all joined in 
 expressing a silent welcome to their owner, as he drove up 
 the lane. Moses, a man of twenty-five, left his work in the 
 garden, and walked forward in his shirt-sleeves. 
 
 "Well, 'father, how does thee do? " was his quiet greet- 
 ing, as they shook hands. 
 
 " How 's mother, by this time ? " asked Eli. 
 
 "O, thee needn't have been concerned," said the son. 
 " There she is. Go in : I '11 'tend to the horse." 
 
 Abigail and her daughter appeared on the piazza. The 
 mother was a woman of. fifty, thin and delicate in frame, 
 but with a smooth, placid beauty of countenance which had 
 survived her youth. She was dressed in a simple dove- 
 colored gown, with book-muslin cap and handkerchief, so 
 scrupulously arranged that one might have associated with 
 her for six months without ever discovering a spot on the 
 former or an uneven fold in the latter. Asenath, who fol- 
 lowed, was almost as plainly attired, her dress being a 
 dark-blue calico, while a white pasteboard sun-bonnet, with 
 broad cape, covered her head. 
 
 " Well, Abigail, how art thou ? " said Eli, quietly giving 
 his hand to his wife. 
 
 " I 'm glad to see thee back," was her simple welcome. 
 
 No doubt they had kissed each other as lovers, but 
 16* x 
 
370 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 Asenath had witnessed this manifestation of affection but 
 once in her life, after the burial of a'younger sister. The 
 fact impressed her with a peculiar sense of sanctity and 
 solemnity: it was a caress wrung forth by a season of 
 tribulation, and therefore was too earnest to be profaned to 
 the uses of joy. So, far, therefore, from expecting a pater- 
 nal embrace, she would have felt, had it been given,, like 
 the doomed daughter of the Gileadite, consecrated to sacri- 
 fice. 
 
 Both she and her mother were anxious to hear the pro- 
 ceedings of the Meeting, and to receive personal news of 
 the many friends whom Eli had seen; but they asked 
 few questions until the supper-table was ready and Moses 
 had come in from the barn. The old man enjoyed talking, 
 but it must be in his own way and at his own good time. 
 They must wait until the communicative spirit should move 
 him. With the first cup of coffee the inspiration came. 
 Hovering, at first, over indifferent details, he gradually ap- 
 proached those of more importance, told of the addresses 
 which had been made, the points of discipline discussed, 
 the testimony borne, and the appearance and genealogy of 
 any new Friends who had taken a prominent part therein. 
 Finally, at the close of his relation, he said, 
 
 " Abigail, there is one thing I must talk to thee about. 
 Friend Speakman's partner perhaps thee's heard of him, 
 Richard Hilton has a son who is weakly. He's two or 
 three years younger than Moses. His mother was consump- 
 tive, and they 're afraid he takes after her. His father wants 
 to send him into the country for the summer, to some place 
 where he 'II have good air, and quiet, and moderate exercise, 
 and Friend Speakman spoke of us. I thought I 'd mention 
 it to thee, and if thee thinks well of -it, we can send word 
 down next week, when Josiah Comly goes." 
 
 "What does thee think ? " asked his wife, after a pause. 
 
 " He 's a very quiet, steady young man, Friend Speakman 
 says, and would be very little trouble to thee. I thought 
 perhaps his board would buy the new yoke of oxen we must 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 371 
 
 have in the fall, and the price of the fat ones might go to 
 help set up Moses. But it 's for thee to decide." 
 
 " I suppose we could take him," said Abigail, seeing that 
 the decision was virtually made already ; " there 's the cor- 
 ner-room, which we don't often use. Only, if he should get 
 worse on our hands " 
 
 " Friend Speakman says there 's no danger. He 's only 
 weak-breasted, as yet, and clerking is n't good for him. I 
 saw the young man at the store. If his looks don't belie 
 him, he 's well-behaved and orderly." 
 
 So it was settled that Richard Hilton the younger was 
 to be an inmate of Friend Mitchenor's house during the 
 summer. 
 
 II. 
 
 AT the end of ten days he came. 
 In the under-sized, earnest, dark-haired, and dark-eyed 
 young man of three-and-twenty Abigail Mitchenor at once 
 felt a motherly interest. Having received him as a tempo- 
 rary member of the family, she considered him entitled to the 
 same watchful care as if he were in reality an invalid son. 
 The ice over an hereditary Quaker nature is but a thin crust, 
 if one knows how to break it ; and'in Richard Hilton's case, 
 it was already broken before his arrival. His only embar- 
 rassment, in fact, arose from the difficulty which he natur- 
 ally experienced in adapting himself to the speech and 
 address of the Mitchenor family. The greetings of old Eli, 
 grave, yet kindly, of Abigail, quaintly familiar and tender, 
 of Moses, cordial and slightly condescending, and finally of 
 Asenath, simple and natural to a degree which impressed 
 him like a new revelation in woman, at once indicated to 
 him his- position among them. His city manners, he felt, 
 instinctively, must be unlearned, or at least laid aside for a 
 time. Yet it was not easy for him to assume, at such short 
 notice, those of his hosts. Happening to address Asenath 
 as " Miss Mitchenor," Eli turned to him with a rebuking 
 face. 
 
3/2 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 "We do not use compliments, Richard," said he; "my 
 daughter's name is Asenath." 
 
 " I beg pardon. I will try to accustom myself to your 
 ways, since you have been so kind as to take me for a 
 while," apologized Richard Hilton. 
 
 " Thee 's under no obligation to us," said Friend Mitche- 
 nor, in his strict sense of justice ; " thee pays for what thee 
 gets." 
 
 The finer feminine instinct of Abigail led her to inter- 
 pose. 
 
 " We '11 not expect too much of thee, at first, Richard," 
 she remarked, with a kind expression of face, which had 
 the effect of a smile ; " but our ways are plain and easily 
 learned. Thee knows, perhaps, that we 're no respecters 
 of persons." 
 
 It was some days, however, before the young man could 
 overcome his natural hesitation at the familiarity implied 
 by these new forms of speech. " Friend Mitchenor " and 
 " Moses " were not difficult to learn, but it seemed a want 
 of respect to address as " Abigail " a woman of such sweet 
 and serene dignity as the mother, and he was fain to avoid 
 either extreme by calling her, with her cheerful permission, 
 " Aunt Mitchenor." On the other hand, his own modest 
 and unobtrusive nature soon won the confidence and cordial 
 regard of the family. He occasionally busied himself in 
 the garden, by way of exercise, or accompanied Moses to 
 the cornfield or the woodland on the hill, but was careful 
 never to interfere at inopportune times, and willing to learn 
 silently, by the simple process of looking on. 
 
 One afternoon as he was idly sitting on the stone wall 
 which separated the garden from the lane, Asenath, attired in 
 a new gown of chocolate-colored calico, with a double-han- 
 dled willow work-basket on her arm, issued from the house. 
 As she approached him, she paused and said, 
 
 " The time seems to hang heavy on thy hands, Richard. 
 If thee 's strong enough to walk to the village and back, 
 it might do thee more good than sitting still." 
 
Friend EIVs Daughter. 373 
 
 Richard Hilton at once jumped down from the wall. 
 
 "Certainly I am able to go," said he, "if you will allow 
 it." 
 
 " Have n't I asked thee ? " was her quiet reply. 
 
 " Let me carry your basket," he said, suddenly, after they 
 had walked, side by side, some distance down the lane. 
 
 " Indeed, I shall not let thee do that. I 'm only going for 
 the mail, and some little things at the' store, that make no 
 weight at all. Thee must n't think I 'm like the young wo- 
 men in the city, who, I 'm told, if they buy a spool of 
 cotton, must have it sent home to them. Besides, thee 
 must n't over-exert thy strength." 
 
 Richard Hilton laughed merrily at the gravity with which 
 she uttered the last sentence. 
 
 " Why, Miss Asenath, I mean what am I good for, 
 if I have not strength enough to carry a basket ? " 
 
 " Thee 's a man, I know, and I think a man would almost 
 as lief be thought wicked as weak. Thee can't help being 
 weakly-inclined, and it's only right that thee should be 
 careful of thyself. There 's surely nothing in that that thee 
 need be ashamed of." 
 
 While thus speaking, Asenath moderated her walk, in 
 order, unconsciously to her companion, to restrain his steps. 
 
 " O, there are the dog's-tooth violets in blossom ! " she 
 exclaimed, pointing to . a shady spot beside the brook ; 
 "does thee know them ? " 
 
 Richard immediately gathered and brought to her a hand- 
 ful of the nodding yellow bells, trembling above their large, 
 cool, spotted leaves. 
 
 " How beautiful they are ! " said he ; " but I should never 
 have taken them for violets." 
 
 "They are misnamed," she answered. "The flower is 
 an Erythronium j but I am accustomed to the common 
 name, and like it. Did thee ever study botany ? " 
 
 Not at all. I can tell a geranium, when I see it, and I 
 know a heliotrope by the smell. I could never mistake a 
 red cabbage for a rose, and I can recognize a hollyhock 
 
374 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 or a sunflower at a considerable distance. The wild flowers 
 are all strangers to me ; I wish I knew something about 
 them." 
 
 " If thee 's fond of flowers, it would be very easy to learn. 
 I think a study of this kind would pleasantly occupy thy 
 mind. Why could n't thee try ? I would be very willing to 
 teach thee what little I know. It 's not much, indeed, but 
 all thee wants is a start. See, I will show thee how simple 
 the principles are." 
 
 Taking one of the flowers from the bunch, Asenath, as 
 they slowly walked forward, proceeded to dissect it, explained 
 the mysteries of stamens and pistils, pollen, petals, and 
 calyx, and, by the time they had reached the village, had 
 succeeded in giving him a general idea of the Linnaean sys- 
 tem of classification. His mind took hold of the subject 
 with a prompt and profound interest. It was a new and 
 wonderful world which suddenly opened before him. How 
 surprised he was to learn that there were signs by which a 
 poisonous herb could be detected from a wholesome one, 
 that cedars and pine-trees blossomed, that the gray lichens 
 on the rocks belonged to the vegetable kingdom ! His re- 
 spect for Asenath' s knowledge thrust quite out of sight the 
 restraint which her youth and sex had imposed upon him. 
 She was teacher, equal, friend ; and the simple, candid 
 manner which was the natural expression of her dignity and 
 purity thoroughly harmonized with this relation. 
 
 Although, in reality, two or three years younger than he, 
 Asenath had a gravity of demeanor, a calm self-possession, 
 a deliberate balance of mind, and a repose of the emotional 
 nature, which he had never before observed, except in much 
 older women. She .had had, as he could well imagine, no 
 romping girlhood, no season of careless, light-hearted dalli- 
 ance with opening life, no violent alternation even of the 
 usual griefs and joys of youth. The social calm in which 
 she had expanded had developed her nature as gently and 
 securely as a sea-flower is unfolded below the reach of tides 
 and storms. 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 375 
 
 She would have been very much surprised, if any one had 
 called her handsome ; yet her face had a mild, unobtrusive 
 beauty, which seemed to grow and deepen from day to day. 
 Of a longer oval than the Greek standard, it was yet as 
 harmonious in outline ; the nose was fine and straight, the 
 dark-blue eyes steady and untroubled, and the lips calmly, 
 but not too firmly closed. Her brown hair, parted over a 
 high white forehead, was smoothly laid across the temples, 
 drawn behind the ears, and twisted into a simple knot. 
 The white cape and sun-bonnet gave her face a nun-like 
 character, which set her apart, in the thoughts of "the 
 world's people " whom she met, as one sanctified for some 
 holy work. She might have gone around the world, repel- 
 ling every rude word, every bold glance, by the protecting 
 atmosphere of purity and truth which inclosed her. 
 The days went by, each bringing some new blossom to 
 adorn and illustrate the joint studies of the young man and 
 maiden. For Richard Hilton had soon mastered the ele- 
 ments of botany, as taught by Priscilla Wakefield, the 
 only source of Asenath's knowledge, and entered, with 
 her, upon the text-book of Gray, a copy of which he pro- 
 cured from Philadelphia. Yet, though he had overtaken 
 her in his knowledge of the technicalities of the science, her 
 practical acquaintance with plants and their habits left her 
 still his superior. Day by day, exploring the meadows, the 
 woods, and the clearings, he brought home his discoveries 
 to enjoy her aid in classifying and assigning them to their 
 true places. Asenath had generally an hour or two of leis- 
 ure from domestic duties in the afternoons, or after the 
 early supper of summer was over; and sometimes, on 
 " Seventh-days," she would be his guide to some locality 
 where the rarer plants were known to exist. The parents 
 saw this community of interest and exploration without a 
 thought of misgiving. They trusted their daughter as 
 themselves ; or, if any possible fear had flitted across 
 their hearts, it was allayed by the absorbing delight with 
 which Richard Hilton pursued his study. An earnest dis- 
 
376 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 cussion as to whether a certain leaf was ovate or lanceolate, 
 whether a certain plant belonged to the species scandens or 
 canadensis, was, in their eyes, convincing proof that the 
 young brains were touched, and therefore not the young 
 hearts. 
 
 But love, symbolized by a rose-bud, is emphatically a 
 botanical emotion. A sweet, tender perception of beauty, 
 such as this study requires, or develops, is at once the most 
 subtile and certain chain of communication between im- 
 pressible natures. Richard Hilton, feeling that his years 
 were numbered, had given up, in despair, his boyish dreams, 
 even before he understood them : his fate seemed to pre- 
 clude the possibility of love. But, as he gained a little 
 strength from the genial season, the pure country air, and the 
 release from gloomy thoughts which his rambles afforded, the 
 end was farther removed, and a future though brief, per 1 
 haps, still a future began to glimmer before him. If this 
 could be his life, an endless summer, with a search for 
 new plants every morning, and their classification every 
 evening, with Asenath's help, on the shady portico of 
 Friend Mitchenor's house, he could forget his doom, and 
 enjoy the blessing of life unthinkingly. 
 
 The azaleas succeeded to the anemones, the orchis and 
 trillium followed, then the yellow gerardias and the feathery 
 purple pogonias, and finally the growing gleam of the gold- 
 en-rods along the wood-side and the red umbels of the tall 
 eupatoriums in the meadow announced the close of summer. 
 One evening, as Richard, in displaying his collection, 
 brought to view the blood-red leaf of a gum-tree, Asenath 
 exclaimed, 
 
 " Ah, there is the sign ! It is early, this year." 
 
 "What sign?" he asked. 
 
 " That the summer is over. We shall soon have frosty 
 nights, and then nothing will be left for us except the asters 
 and gentians and golden-rods." 
 
 Was the time indeed so near ? A few more weeks, and 
 this Arcadian life would close. He must go back to the 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 377 
 
 city, to its rectilinear streets, its close brick walls, its arti- 
 ficial, constrained existence. How could he give up the 
 peace, the contentment, the hope he had enjoyed through 
 the summer ? The question suddenly took a more definite 
 form in his mind : How could he give up Asenath ? Yes, 
 
 the quiet, unsuspecting girl, sitting beside him, with her 
 lap full of the September blooms he had gathered, was 
 thenceforth a part of his inmost life. Pure and beautiful as 
 she was, almost sacred in his regard, his heart dared to say, 
 
 "I need her and claim her ! " 
 
 "Thee looks pale to-night, Richard," said Abigail, as 
 they took their seats at the supper-table. "I hope thee 
 has not taken cold." 
 
 III. 
 
 " T "T 7 ILL thee go along, Richard ? I know where the 
 \ V rudbeckias grow," said Asenath, on the following 
 " Seventh-day " afternoon. 
 
 They crossed the meadows, and followed the course of 
 the stream, under its canopy of magnificent ash and plane- 
 trees, into a brake between the hills. It was an almost im- 
 penetrable thicket, spangled with tall autumnal flowers. 
 The eupatoriums, with their purple crowns, stood like 
 young trees, with an undergrowth of aster and blue spikes 
 of lobelia, tangled in a golden mesh of dodder. A strong, 
 mature odor, mixed alike of leaves and flowers, and very 
 different from the faint, elusive sweetness of spring, filled 
 the air. The creek, with a few faded leaves dropped upon 
 its bosom, and films of gossamer streaming from its bushy 
 fringe, gurgled over the pebbles in its bed. Here and there, 
 on its banks, shone the deep yellow stars of the flower they 
 sought. 
 
 Richard Hilton walked as in a dream, mechanically 
 plucking a stem of rudbeckia, only to toss it, presently, into 
 the water. 
 
378 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 "Why, Richard! what's thee doing?" cried Asenath ; 
 "thee has thrown away the very best specimen." 
 
 " Let it go," he answered, sadly. " I am afraid every- 
 thing else is thrown away." 
 
 "What does thee mean?" she asked, with a look of 
 surprised and anxious inquiry. 
 
 "Don't ask me, Asenath. Or yes, I will tell you. I 
 must say it to you now, or never afterwards. Do you know 
 what a happy life I Ve been leading since I came here ? 
 that I Ve learned what life is, as if I 'd never known it 
 before ? I want to live, Asenath, and do you know 
 why?" 
 
 "I hope thee will live, Richard," she said, gently and 
 tenderly, her deep-blue eyes dim with the mist of unshed 
 tears. 
 
 " But, Asenath, how am I to live without you ? But you 
 can't understand that, because you do not know what you 
 are to me. No, you never guessed that all this while I 've 
 been loving you more and more, until now I have no other 
 idea of death than not to see you, not to love you, not to 
 share your life ! " 
 
 "O, Richard!" 
 
 " I knew you would be shocked, Asenath. I meant to 
 have kept this to myself. You never dreamed of it, and I 
 had no right to disturb the peace of your heart. The truth 
 is told now, and I cannot -take it back, if I wished. But 
 if you cannot love, you can forgive me for loving you, 
 forgive me now, and every day of my life." 
 
 He uttered these words with a passionate tenderness, 
 standing on the edge of the stream, and gazing into its 
 waters. His slight frame trembled with the violence of his 
 emotion. Asenath, who had become very pale as he com- 
 menced to speak, gradually flushed over neck and brow as 
 she listened. Her head drooped, the gathered flowers fell 
 from her hands, and she hid her face. For a few minutes 
 no sound was heard but the liquid gurgling of the water, 
 and the whistle of a bird in the thicket beside them. 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 379 
 
 Richard Hilton at last turned, and, in a voice of hesitating 
 entreaty, pronounced her name, 
 
 " Asenath ! " 
 
 She took away her hands and slowly lifted her face. She 
 was pale, but her eyes met his with a frank, appealing, 
 tender expression, which caused his heart to stand still a 
 moment. He read no reproach, no faintest thought of 
 blame ; but was -it pity ? was it pardon ? or 
 
 "We stand before God, Richard," said she, in a low, 
 sweet, solemn tone. "He knows that I do not need to 
 forgive thee. If thee requires it, I also require His for- 
 giveness for myself." 
 
 Though a deeper blush now came to cheek and brow, she 
 met his gaze with the bravery of a pure and innocent heart. 
 Richard, stunned with the sudden and unexpected bliss, 
 strove to take the fuU consciousness of it into a being 
 which seemed too narrow to contain it. His first impulse 
 was to rush forward, clasp her passionately in his arms, 
 and hold her in the embrace which encircled, for him, the 
 boundless promise of life ; but she stood there, defenceless, 
 save in her holy truth and trust, and his heart bowed down 
 and gave her reverence. 
 
 " Asenath," said he, at last, " I never dared to hope for 
 this. God bless you for those words ! Can you trust me ? 
 can you indeed love me?" 
 
 " I can trust thee, I do love thee ! " 
 
 They clasped each other's hands in one long, clinging 
 pressure. No kiss was given, but side by side they walked 
 slowly up the dewy meadows, in happy and hallowed silence. 
 Asenath's face became troubled as the old farm-house ap- 
 peared through the trees. 
 
 " Father and mother must know of this, Richard," said 
 she. " I am afraid it may be a cross to them." 
 
 The same fear had already visited his own mind, but he 
 answered, cheerfully, 
 
 " I hope not I think I have taken a new lease of life, 
 and shall soon be strong enough to satisfy them. Besides, 
 my father is in prosperous business." 
 
380 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 "It is not that," she answered; "but thee is not one 
 of us." 
 
 It was growing dusk when they reached the house. In 
 the dim candle-light Asenath's paleness was not remarked ; 
 and Richard's silence was attributed to fatigue. 
 
 The next morning the whole family attended meeting at 
 the neighboring Quaker meeting-house, in the preparation 
 for which, and the various special occupations of their 
 " First-day " mornings, the unsuspecting parents overlooked 
 that inevitable change in the faces of the lovers which they 
 must otherwise have observed. After dinner, as Eli was 
 taking a quiet walk in the garden, Richard Hilton ap- 
 proached him. 
 
 " Friend Mitchenor," said he, " I should like to have 
 some talk with thee." 
 
 " What is it, Richard ? " asked the old man, breaking off 
 some pods from a seedling radish, and rubbing them in the 
 palm of his hand. 
 
 " I hope, Friend Mitchenor," said the young man, scarce- 
 ly knowing how to approach so important a crisis in his life, 
 "I hope thee has been satisfied with my conduct since I 
 came to live with thee, and has no fault to find with me as a 
 man." 
 
 "Well," exclaimed Eli, turning around and looking up, 
 sharply, " does thee want a testimony from me ? I Ve 
 nothing, that I know of, to say against thee." 
 
 "If I were sincerely attached to thy daughter, Friend 
 Mitchenor, and she returned the attachment, co'uld thee 
 trust her happiness in my hands ? " 
 
 "What?" cried Eli, straightening himself and glaring 
 upon the speaker, with a face too amazed to express any 
 other feeling. 
 
 " Can you confide Asenath's happiness to my care? I 
 love her with my whole heart and soul, and the fortune of 
 my life depends on your answer." 
 
 The straight lines in the old man's face seemed to grow 
 deeper and more rigid, and his eyes shone with the chill 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 381 
 
 glitter of steel. Richard, not daring to say a word more, 
 awaited his reply in intense agitation. 
 
 " So ! " he exclaimed at last, this is the way thee 's re- 
 paid me! I didn't expect this from thee! Has thee 
 spoken to her?" 
 
 "I have." 
 
 " Thee has, has thee ? And I suppose thee 's persuaded 
 her to think as thee does. Thee 'd better never have come 
 here. When I want to lose my daughter, and can't find 
 anybody else for her, I '11 let thee know." 
 
 " What have you against me, Friend Mitchenor ? " 
 Richard sadly asked, forgetting, in his excitement, the 
 Quaker speech he had learned. 
 
 " Thee need n't use compliments now ! Asenath shall 
 be a Friend while / live ; thy fine clothes and merry-mak- 
 ings and vanities are not for her. Thee belongs to the 
 world, and thee may choose one of the world's women." 
 
 " Never ! " protested Richard ; but Friend Mitchenor was 
 already ascending the garden-steps on his way to the house. 
 
 The young man, utterly .overwhelmed, wandered to the 
 nearest grove and threw himself on the ground. Thus, in 
 a miserable chaos of emotion, unable to grasp any fixed 
 thought, the hours passed away. Towards evening, he heard 
 a footstep approaching, and sprang up. It was Moses. 
 
 The latter was engaged, with the consent of his parents, 
 and expected to " pass meeting " in a few weeks. He knew 
 what had happened, and felt a sincere sympathy for Richard, 
 for whom he had a cordial regard. His face was very grave, 
 but kind. 
 
 " Thee 'd better come in, Richard," said he ; " the even- 
 ings are damp, and I 've brought thy overcoat. I know 
 everything, and I feel that it must be a great cross for thee. 
 But thee won't be alone in bearing it." 
 
 " Do you think there is no hope of your father relent- 
 ing ? " he asked, in a tone of despondency which anticipated 
 the answer. 
 
 " Father's very hard to move," said Moses; "and when 
 
382 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 mother and Asenath can't prevail on him, nobody else need 
 try. I 'm afraid thee must make up thymind to the trial. 
 I 'm sorry to say it, Richard, but I think thee 'd better go 
 back to town." 
 
 " I '11 go to-morrow, go and die ! " he muttered hoarsely, 
 as he followed Moses to the house. 
 
 Abigail, as she saw his haggard face, wept quietly. She 
 pressed his hand tenderly, but said nothing. Eli was stern 
 and cold as an Iceland rock. Asenath did not make her ap- 
 pearance. At supper, the old man and his son exchanged 
 a few words about the farm-work to be done on the morrow, 
 but nothing else was said. Richard soon left the room and 
 went up to his chamber to spend his last, his only unhappy 
 night at the farm. A yearning, pitying look from Abigail 
 accompanied him. 
 
 " Try and not think hard of us ! " was he'- farewell the 
 next morning, as he stepped into the old chair, in which 
 Moses was to convey him to the village where he should 
 meet the Doylestown stage.. So without a word of comfort 
 from Asenath's lips, without even a' last look at her beloved 
 face, he was taken away. 
 
 IV. 
 
 TRUE and firm and self-reliant as was the nature of 
 Asenath Mitchenor, the thought of resistance to her 
 father's will never crossed her mind. It was fixed, that she 
 must renounce all intercourse with Richard Hilton ; it was 
 even sternly forbidden her to see him again during the few 
 hours he remained in the house ; but the sacred love, thus 
 rudely dragged to the light and outraged, was still her own. 
 She would take it back into the keeping of her heart, and 
 if a day should ever come when he would be free to return 
 and demand it of her, he would find it there, unwithered, 
 with all the unbreathed perfume hoarded in its folded leaves. 
 If that day came not, she would at the last give it back to 
 God, saying, " Father, here is Thy most precious gift : be- 
 stow it as Thou wilt." 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 383 
 
 As her life had never before been agitated by any strong . 
 emotion, so it was not outwardly agitated now. The placid 
 waters of her soul did not heave and toss before those winds 
 of passion and sorrow; they lay in dull, leaden calm, 
 under a cold and sunless sky. What struggles with her- 
 self she underwent no one ever knew. After Richard 
 Hilton's departure, she never mentioned his name, or re- 
 ferred, in any way, to the summer's companionship with 
 him. She performed her household duties, if not cheerfully, 
 at least as punctually and carefully as before ; and her father 
 congratulated himself that the unfortunate attachment had 
 struck no deeper root. Abigail's finer sight, however, was 
 not deceived by this external resignation. She noted the 
 faint shadows under the eyes, the increased whiteness 
 of the temples, the unconscious traces of pain which some- 
 times played r >out the dimpled corners of the mouth, and 
 watched her c lughter with a silent, tender solicitude. 
 
 The wedding of Moses was a severe test of Asenath's 
 stfength, but she stood tb*\ trial nobly, performing all the 
 duties required by her petition with such sweet composure 
 that many of the older female Friends remarked to Abigail, 
 " How womanly Asenath has grown ! " Eli Mitchenor 
 noted, with peculiar satisfaction, that the eyes of the young 
 Friends some of them of great promise in the sect, and 
 well endowed with worldly goods followed her admiringly. 
 "It will not be long," he thought, "before she is con- 
 soled." 
 
 Fortune seemed to favor his plans, and justify his harsh 
 treatment of Richard Hilton. There were unfavorable 
 accounts of the young man's conduct. His father had died 
 during the winter, and he was represented as having become 
 very reckless and dissipated. These reports at last as- 
 sumed such a definite form that Friend Mitchenor brought 
 them to the notice of his family. 
 
 " I met Josiah Comly in the road," said he one day at din- 
 ner. " He 's just come from Philadelphia, and brings bad 
 news of Richard Hilton. He's taken to drink, and is 
 
3 84 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 spending in wickedness the money his father left him. 
 His friends have a great concern about him, but it seems 
 he 's not to be reclaimed." 
 
 Abigail looked imploringly at her husband, but he either 
 disregarded or failed to understand her look. Asenath, who 
 had grown very pale, steadily met her father's gaze, and 
 said, in a tone which he had never yet heard from her 
 lips, 
 
 " Father, will thee please never mention Richard Hilton's 
 name when I am by ? " 
 
 The words were those of entreaty, but the voice was that 
 of authority. The old man was silenced by a new and 
 unexpected power in his daughter's heart ; he suddenly felt 
 that she was not a girl, as heretofore, but a woman, whom 
 he might persuade, but could no longer compel. 
 
 " It shall be as thee wishes, Asenath," he said ; "we had 
 best forget him." 
 
 Of their friends, however, she could not expect this re- 
 serve, and she was doomed to hear stories of Richard which 
 clouded and embittered her thoughts of him. And a still 
 severer trial was in store. She accompanied her father, in 
 obedience to his wish, and against her own desire, to the 
 Yearly Meeting in Philadelphia. It has passed into a pro- 
 verb, that the Friends on these occasions, always bring rain 
 with them ; and the period of her visit was no exception to 
 the rule. The showery days of " Yearly Meeting Week " 
 glided by, until the last, and she looked forward with relief 
 to the morrow's return to Buck's County, glad to. have es- 
 caped a meeting with Richard Hilton, which might have 
 confirmed her fears, and could but have given her pain in 
 any case. 
 
 As she and her father joined each other, outside the meet- 
 ing-house, at the close of the afternoon meeting, a light rain 
 was falling. She took his arm, under the capacious um- 
 brella, and they were soon alone in the wet streets, on their 
 way to the house of the Friends who entertained them. 
 At a crossing, where the water, pouring down the gutter 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 385 
 
 towards the Delaware, caused them to halt, a man, plashing 
 through the flood, staggered towards them. Without an 
 umbrella, with dripping, disordered clothes, yet with a hot, 
 flushed face, around which the long black hair hung wildly, 
 he approached, singing to himself, with maudlin voice, a 
 song which would have been sweet and tender in a lover's 
 mouth. Friend Mitchenor drew to one side, lest his spot- 
 less drab should be brushed by the unclean reveller ; but 
 the latter, looking up, stopped suddenly, face to face with 
 them. 
 
 " Asenath ! " he cried, in a voice whose anguish pierced 
 through the confusion of his senses, and struck down into 
 the sober quick of his soul. 
 
 "Richard!" she breathed, rather than spoke, in a low, 
 terrified voice. 
 
 It was indeed Richard Hilton who stood before her, or rath- 
 er as she afterwards thought, in recalling the interview 
 the body of Richard Hilton, possessed by an evil spirit. 
 His cheeks burned with a more than hectic red, his eyes 
 were wild and bloodshot, and though the recognition had 
 suddenly sobered him, an impatient, reckless devil seemed to 
 lurk under the set mask of his features. 
 
 " Here I am, Asenath," he said at length, hoarsely. " I 
 said it was death, did n't I ? Well, it 's worse than death, I 
 suppose ; but what matter ? You can 't be more lost to me 
 now than you were already. This is thy doing, Friend Eli ! " 
 he continued, turning to the old man, with a sneering em- 
 phasis on the " thy" " I hope thee 's satisfied with thy 
 work?" 
 
 Here he burst into a bitter, mocking laugh, which it chilled 
 Asenath's blood to hear. 
 
 The old man turned pale. " Come away, child ! " said he, 
 tugging at her arm. But she stood firm, strengthened for 
 the moment by a solemn feeling of duty which trampled 
 down her pain. 
 
 " Richard," she said, with the music of an immeasurable 
 sorrow in her voice, "O Richard, what has thee done? 
 17 Y 
 
386 Friend Elis Daughter. 
 
 Where the Lord commands resignation, thee has been re- 
 bellious ; where he chasteneth to purify, thee turns blindly 
 to sin. I had not expected this. of thee, Richard ; I thought 
 thy regard for me was of the kind which would have helped 
 and uplifted thee, not- through me, as an unworthy object, 
 but through the hopes and the pure desires of thy own heart. 
 I expected that thee would so act as to justify what I felt 
 towards thee, not to make my affection a reproach, O 
 Richard, not to cast over my heart the shadow of thy 
 sin ! " 
 
 The wretched young man supported himself against the 
 post of an awning, buried his face in his hands, and wept 
 passionately. Once or twice he essayed to speak, but his 
 voice was choked by sobs, and, after a look from the stream- 
 ing eyes which Asenath could scarcely bear to meet, he 
 again covered his face. A stranger, coming down the street, 
 paused out of curiosity. " Come, come ! " cried Eli, once 
 more, eager to escape from the scene. His daughter stood 
 still, and the man slowly passed on. 
 
 Asenath could not thus leave her lost lover, in his de- 
 spairing grief. She again turned to him, her own tears 
 flowing fast and free. 
 
 " I do not judge thee, Richard, but the words that passed 
 between us give me a right to speak to thee. It was hard 
 to lose sight of thee then, but it is still harder for me to see 
 thee now. If the sorrow and pity I feel could save thee, I 
 would be willing never to know any other feelings. I would 
 still do anything for thee except that which thee cannot ask, 
 as thee now is, and I could not give. Thee has made the 
 gulf between us so wide that it cannot be crossed. But I 
 can now weep for thee and pray for thee as a fellow-crea- 
 ture whose soul is' still precious in the sight of the Lord. 
 Fare thee well!" 
 
 He seized the hand she extended, bowed down, and 
 showered mingled tears and kisses upon it. Then, with a 
 wild sob in his throat, he started up and rushed down the 
 street, through the fast-falling rain. The father and daugh- 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 387 
 
 ter walked home in silence. Eli had heard every word that 
 was spoken, and felt that a spirit whose utterances he dared 
 not question had visited Asenath's tongue. 
 
 She, as year after year went by, regained the peace and 
 patience which give a sober cheerfulness to life. The pangs 
 of her heart grew dull and transient ; but there were two 
 pictures in her memory which never blurred in outline or 
 faded in color : one, the break of autumn flowers, under the 
 bright autumnal sky, with bird and stream making accordant 
 music to the new voice of love ; the other, a rainy street, 
 with a lost, reckless man leaning against an awning-post, 
 and staring in her face with eyes whose unutterable woe, 
 when she dared to recall it, darkened the beauty of the 
 earth, and almost shook her trust in the providence of God. 
 
 V. 
 
 YEAR after year passed by, but not without bringing 
 change to the Mitchenor family. Moses had moved 
 to Chester County soon after his marriage, and had a good 
 farm of his own. At the end of ten years Abigail died ; 
 and the old man, who had not only lost his savings by an 
 unlucky investment, but was obliged to mortgage his farm, 
 finally determined to sell it and join his son. He was get- 
 ting too old to manage it properly, impatient under the 
 unaccustomed pressure of debt, and depressed by the loss 
 of the wife to whom, without any outward show of tender- 
 ness, he was, in truth, tenderly attached. He missed her 
 more keenly in the places where she had lived and moved 
 than in a neighborhood without the memory of her presence. 
 The pang with which he parted from his home was weak- 
 ened by the greater pang which had preceded it. 
 
 It was a harder trial to Asenath. She shrank from the 
 encounter with new faces, and the necessity of creating 
 new associations. There was a quiet satisfaction in the 
 ordered, monotonous round of her life, which might be the 
 
388 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 same elsewhere, but here alone was the nook which held all 
 the morning sunshine she had ever known. Here still 
 lingered the halo of the sweet departed summer, here 
 still grew the familiar wild-flowers which the first Richard 
 Hilton had gathered. This was the Paradise in which the 
 Adam of her heart had dwelt, before his fall. Her resigna- 
 tion and submission entitled her to keep those pure and 
 perfect memories, though she was scarcely conscious of 
 their true charm. She did not dare to express to herself, in 
 words, that one everlasting joy of woman's heart, through all 
 trials and sorrows, "I have loved, I have been beloved." 
 
 On the last " First-day " before their departure, she walked 
 down the meadows to the lonely brake between the hills. 
 It was the early spring, and the black buds of the ash had 
 just begun to swell. The maples were dusted with crimson 
 bloom, and the downy catkins of the swamp-willow dropped 
 upon the stream and floated past her, as once the autumn 
 leaves. In the edges of the thickets peeped forth the blue, 
 scentless violet, the fairy cups of the anemone, and the 
 pink-veined bells of the miskodeed. The tall blooms 
 through which the lovers walked still slept in the chilly 
 earth ; but the sky above her was mild and blue, and the 
 remembrance of the day came back to her with a delicate, 
 pungent sweetness, like the perfume of the trailing arbutus 
 in the air around her. In a sheltered, sunny nook, she 
 found a single erythronium, lured forth in advance of its 
 proper season, and gathered it as a relic of the spot, which 
 she might keep without blame. As she stooped to pluck it, 
 her own face looked up at her out of a little pool filled by 
 the spring rains. Seen against the reflected sky, it shone 
 with a soft radiance, and the earnest eyes met hers, as if it 
 were her young self, evoked from the past, to bid her fare- 
 well. ' Farewell ! " she whispered, taking leave at once, as 
 she believed, of youth and the memory of love. 
 
 During those years she had more than once been sought 
 in marriage, but had steadily, though kindly, refused. Once, 
 when the suitor was a man whose character and position 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 389 
 
 made the union very desirable in Eli Mitchenor's eyes, he 
 ventured to use his paternal influence. Asenath's gentle 
 resistance was overborne by his arbitrary force of will, and 
 her protestations were of no avail. 
 
 " Father," she finally said, in the tone which he had once 
 heard and still remembered) " thee can take away, but thee 
 cannot give." 
 
 He never mentioned the subject again. 
 
 Richard Hilton passed out of her knowledge shortly after 
 her meeting with him in Philadelphia. She heard, indeed, 
 that his headlong career of dissipation was not arrested, 
 that his friends had given him up as hopelessly ruined, 
 and, finally, that he had left the city. After that, all reports 
 ceased. He was either dead, or reclaimed and leading a 
 better life, somewhere far away. Dead, she believed, 
 almost hoped ; for in that case might he not now be enjoy- 
 ing the ineffable rest and peace which she trusted might be 
 her portion? It -was better to think of him as a purified 
 spirit, waiting to meet her in a holier communion, than to 
 know that he was still bearing the burden of a soiled and 
 blighted life. In any case, her own future was plain and 
 clear. It was simply a prolongation of the present, an 
 alternation of seed-time and harvest, filled with humble 
 duties and cares, until the Master should bid her lay down 
 her load and follow Him. 
 
 Friend Mitchenor bought a small cottage adjacent to 
 his son's farm, in a community which consisted mostly of 
 Friends, and not far from the large old meeting-house in 
 which the Quarterly Meetings were held. He at once took 
 his place on the upper seat, among the elders, most of 
 whom he knew already, from having met them, year after 
 year, in Philadelphia. The charge of a few acres of ground 
 gave him sufficient occupation ; the money left to him after 
 the sale of his farm was enough to support him comfortably ; 
 and a late Indian summer of contentment seemed now to 
 have come to the old man. He was done with the earnest 
 business of life. Moses was gradually taking his place, as 
 
390 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 father and Friend ; and Asenath would be reasonably pro- 
 vided for at his death. As his bodily energies decayed, his 
 imperious temper softened, his mind became more accessi- 
 ble to liberal influences, and he even cultivated a cordial 
 friendship with a neighboring farmer who was one of " the 
 world's people." Thus, at seventy-five, he was really young- 
 er, because tenderer of heart and more considerate than he 
 had been at sixty. 
 
 Asenath was now a woman of thirty-five, and suitors had 
 ceased to approach her. Much of her beauty still remained, 
 but her face had become thin and wasted, and the inevitable 
 lines were beginning to form around her eyes. Her dress 
 was plainer than ever, and she wore the scoop-bonnet of 
 drab silk, in which no woman can seem beautiful, unless 
 she be very old. She was calm and grave in her demeanor, 
 save that her perfect goodness and benevolence shone 
 through and warmed her presence ; but, when earnestly in- 
 terested, she had been known to speak her mind so clearly 
 and forcibly that it was generally surmised among the 
 Friends that she possessed '' a gift," which might, in time, 
 raise her to honor among them. To the children of Moses 
 she was a good genius, and a word from " Aunt 'Senath " 
 oftentimes prevailed when the authority of the parents was 
 disregarded. In them she found a new source of happi- 
 ness ; and when her old home on the Neshaminy had been 
 removed a little farther into the past, so that she no longer 
 looked, with every morning's sun, for some familiar feature 
 of its scenery, her submission brightened into a cheerful 
 content with life. 
 
 It was summer, and Quarterly-Meeting Day had arrived. 
 There had been rumors of the expected presence of" Friends 
 from a distance," and not only those of the district, but 
 most .of the neighbors who were not connected with the 
 sect, attended. By the by-road through the woods, it was 
 not more than half a mile from Friend Mitchenor's cottage 
 to the meeting-house, and Asenath, leaving her father to be 
 taken by Moses in his carriage, set out on foot. It was a 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. . 391 
 
 sparkling, breezy day, and the forest was full of life. Squir- 
 rels chased each other along the branches of the oaks, and 
 the air was filled with fragrant odors of hickory-leaves, 
 sweet-fern, and spice-wood. Picking up a flower here and 
 there, Asenath walked onward, rejoicing alike in shade and 
 sunshine, grateful for all the consoling beauty which the 
 earth offers to a lonely heart. That serene content which 
 she had learned to call happiness had filled her being until 
 the dark canopy was lifted and the waters took back their 
 transparency under a cloudless sky. 
 
 Passing around to the "women's side" of the meeting- 
 house, she mingled with her friends, who were exchanging 
 information concerning the expected visitors. Micajah 
 Morrill had not arrived, they said, but Ruth Baxter had 
 spent the last night at Friend Way's, and would certainly 
 be there. Besides, there were Friend Chandler, from Nine 
 Partners, and Friend Carter, from Maryland: they had 
 been seen on the ground. Friend Carter was said to have 
 a wonderful gi'ft, Mercy Jackson had heard him once, in 
 Baltimore. The Friends there had been a little exercised 
 about him, because they thought he was too much inclined 
 to "the newness," but it was known that the Spirit had 
 often manifestly led him. Friend Chandler had visited 
 Yearly Meeting once, they believed. He was an old man, 
 and had been a personal friend of Elias Hicks. 
 
 At the appointed hour they entered the house. After the 
 subdued rustling which ensued upon taking their seats, 
 there was an interval of silence, shorter than usual, because 
 it was evident that many persons would feel the promptings 
 of the Spirit. Friend Chandler spoke first, and was fol- 
 lowed by Ruth Baxter, a frail little woman, with a voice of 
 exceeding power. The not unmelodious chant in which she 
 delivered her admonitions rang out, at times, like the peal 
 of a trumpet. Fixing her eyes on vacancy, with her hands 
 on the wooden rail before her, and her body slightly sway- 
 ing to and fro, her voice soared far aloft at the commence- 
 ment of every sentence, gradually dropping, through a me- 
 
39 2 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 lodious scale of tone, to the close. She resembled an 
 inspired prophetess, an aged Deborah, crying aloud in the 
 valleys of Israel. 
 
 The last speaker was Friend Carter, a small man, not 
 more than forty years of age. His face was thin and in- 
 tense in its expression, his hair gray at the temples, and his 
 dark eye almost too restless for a child of " the stillness and 
 the quietness." His voice, though not loud, was clear and 
 penetrating, with an earnest, sympathetic quality, which 
 arrested, not the ear alone, but the serious attention of the 
 auditor. His delivery was but slightly marked by the pecu- 
 liar rhythm of the Quaker preachers ; and this fact, per- 
 haps, increased the effect of his words, through the contrast 
 with those who preceded him. 
 
 His discourse was an eloquent vindication of the law of 
 kindness, as the highest and purest manifestation of true 
 Christian doctrine. The paternal relation of God to man 
 was the basis of that religion which appealed directly to the 
 heart : so the fraternity of each man with his fellow was its 
 practical application. God pardons the repentant sinner: 
 we can also pardon, where we are offended ; we can pity, 
 where we cannot pardon. Both the good and the bad prin- 
 ciples generate their like in others. Force begets force ; 
 anger excites a corresponding anger ; but kindness awakens 
 the slumbering emotions even of an evil heart. Love may 
 not always be answered by an equal love, but it has never 
 yet created hatred. The testimony which Friends bear 
 against war, he said, is but a general assertion, which has 
 no value except in so far as they manifest the principle of 
 peace in their daily lives, in the exercise of pity, of charity, 
 of forbearance, and Christian love. 
 
 The words of the speaker sank deeply into the hearts of 
 his hearers. There was an intense hush, as if in truth the 
 Spirit had moved him to speak, and every sentence was 
 armed with a sacred authority. Asenath Mitchenor looked 
 at him, over the low partition which divided her and her 
 sisters from the men's side, absorbed in his rapt earnestness 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 393 
 
 and truth. She forgot that other hearers were present : 
 he spake to her alone. A strange spell seemed to seize 
 upon her faculties and chain them at his feet : had he beck- 
 oned to her, she would have arisen and walked to his side. 
 
 Friend Carter warmed and deepened as he went on. " I 
 feel moved to-day," he said, "moved, I know not why, but 
 I hope for some wise purpose, to relate to you an instance 
 of Divine and human kindness which has come directly to 
 my own knowledge. A young man of delicate constitution, 
 whose lungs were thought to be seriously affected, was sent 
 to the house of a Friend in the country, in order to try the 
 effect of air and exercise." 
 
 Asenath almost ceased to breathe, in the intensity with 
 which she gazed and listened. Clasping her hands tightly 
 in her lap to prevent them from trembling, and steadying 
 herself against the back of the seat, she heard the story of 
 her love for Richard Hilton told by the lips of a stranger ! 
 not merely of his dismissal from the house, but of that 
 meeting in the street, at which only she and her father were 
 present ! Nay, more, she heard her own words repeated, 
 she heard Richard's passionate outburst of remorse des- 
 cribed in language that brought his living face before her ! 
 She gasped for breath, his face was before her ! The 
 features, sharpened by despairing grief, which her memory 
 recalled, had almost anticipated the harder lines which fif- 
 teen years had made, and which now, with a terrible shock 
 and choking leap of the heart, she recognized. Her senses 
 faded, and she would have fallen from her seat but for the 
 support of the partition against which she leaned. Fortu- 
 nately, the women near her were too much occupied with 
 the narrative to notice her condition. Many of them wept 
 silently, with their handkerchiefs pressed over their mouths. 
 
 The first shock of death-like faintness passed away, and 
 she clung to the speaker's voice, as if its sound alone could 
 give her strength to sit still and listen further. 
 
 " Deserted by his friends, unable to stay his feet on the 
 evil path," he continued, " the young man left his home and 
 17* 
 
394 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 went to a city in another State. But here it was easier to 
 find associates in evil than tender hearts that might help 
 him back to good. He was tired of life, and the hope of 
 a speedier death hardened him in his courses. But, my 
 friends, Death never comes to those who wickedly seek 
 him. The Lord withholds destruction from the hands that 
 are madly outstretched to grasp it, and forces His pity and 
 forgiveness on the unwilling soul. Finding that it was the 
 principle of life which grew stronger within him, the young 
 man at last meditated an awful crime. The thought of 
 self-destruction haunted him day and night. He lingered 
 around the wharves, gazing into the deep waters, and was 
 restrained from the deed only by the memory of the last 
 loving voice he had heard. One gloomy evening, when 
 even this memory had faded, and he awaited the approach- 
 ing darkness to make his design secure, a hand was laid on 
 his arm. A man in the simple garb of the Friends stood 
 beside him, and a face which reflected the kindness of the 
 Divine Father looked upon him. ' My child,' said he, ' I 
 am drawn to thee by the great trouble of thy mind. Shall 
 I tell thee what it is thee meditates ? ' The young man 
 shook his head. ' I will be silent, then, but I will save 
 thee. I know the human heart, and its trials and weak- 
 nesses, and it may be put into my mouth to give thee 
 strength.' He took the young man's hand, as if he had 
 been a little child, and led him to his home. He heard the 
 sad story, from beginning to end ; and the young man wept 
 upon his breast, to hear no word of reproach, but only the 
 largest and tenderest pity bestowed upon him. They knelt 
 down, side by side, at midnight ; and the Friend's right 
 hand was upon his head while they prayed. 
 
 " The young man was rescued from his evil ways, to ac- 
 knowledge still further the boundless mercy of Providence. 
 The dissipation wherein he had recklessly sought death 
 was, for him, a marvellous restoration to life. His lungs 
 had become sound and free from the tendency to disease. 
 The measure of his forgiveness was almost more than he 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 395 
 
 could bear. He bore his cross thenceforward with a joyful 
 resignation, and was mercifully drawn nearer and nearer to 
 the Truth, until, in the fulness of his convictions, he entered 
 into the brotherhood of the Friends. 
 
 " I have been powerfully moved to tell you this story," 
 Friend Carter concluded, " from a feeling that it may be 
 needed, here, at this time, to influence some heart trem- 
 bling in the balance. Who is there among you, my friends, 
 that may not snatch a brand from the burning ? O, be- 
 lieve that pity and charity are the most effectual weapons 
 given into the hands of us imperfect mortals, and leave the 
 awful attribute of wrath in the hands of the Lord !." 
 
 He sat down, and dead silence ensued. Tears of emo- 
 tion stood in the eyes of the hearers, men as well as women, 
 and tears of gratitude and thanksgiving gushed warmly from 
 those of Asenath. An ineffable peace and joy descended 
 upon her heart. 
 
 When the meeting broke up, Friend Mitchenor, who had 
 not recognized Richard Hilton, but had heard the story with 
 feelings which he endeavored in vain to control, approached 
 the preacher. 
 
 " The Lord spoke to me this day through thy lips," said 
 he ; " will thee come to one side, and hear me a minute ? " 
 
 "Eli ^Mitchenor!" exclaimed Friend Carter; "Eli! I 
 knew not thee was here ! Does n't thee know me ? " 
 
 The old man stared in astonishment. " It seems like a 
 face I ought to know," he said, " but I can't place thee." 
 
 They withdrew to the shade of one of the poplars. Friend 
 Carter turned again, much moved, and, grasping the old 
 man's hands in his own, exclaimed, 
 
 "Friend Mitchenor, I was called upon to-day to speak 
 of myself. I am or, rather, I was the Richard Hilton 
 whom thee knew." 
 
 Friend Mitchenor's face flushed with mingled emotions 
 of shame and joy, and his grasp on the preacher's hands 
 tightened. 
 
 "But thee calls thyself Carfer ? " he finally said. 
 
396 Friend Eli's Daughter. 
 
 "Soon after I was saved," was the reply, "an aunt on 
 the mother's side died, and left her property to me, on con- 
 dition that I should take her name. I was tired of my own 
 then, and to give it up seemed only like losing my former 
 self; but I should like to have it back again now." 
 
 " Wonderful are the ways of the Lord, and past finding 
 out ! " said the old man. " Come home with me, Richard, 
 come for my sake, for there is a concern on my mind 
 until all is clear between us. Or, stay, will thee walk 
 home with Asenath, while I go with Moses ? " 
 
 " Asenath ? " 
 
 " Yes, .there she goes, through the gate. Thee can easily 
 overtake her. I 'm coming, Moses ! " and he hurried 
 away to his son's carriage, which was approaching. 
 
 Asenath felt that it would be impossible for her to meet 
 Richard Hilton there. She knew not why his name had 
 been changed ; he had not betrayed his identity with the 
 young man of his story ; he evidently did not wish it to be 
 known, and an unexpected meeting with her might sur- 
 prise him into an involuntary revelation of the fact. It was 
 enough for her that a saviour had arisen, and her lost Adam 
 was redeemed, that a holier light than the autumn sun's 
 now rested, and would forever rest, on the one landscape 
 of her youth. Her eyes shone with the pure brightness of 
 girlhood, a soft warmth colored her cheek and smoothed 
 away the coming lines of her brow, and her step was light 
 and elastic as in the old time. 
 
 Eager to escape from the crowd, she crossed the high- 
 way, dusty with its string of returning carriages, and en- 
 tered the secluded lane. The breeze had died away, the 
 air was full of insect-sounds, and the warm light of the sink- 
 ing sun fell upon the woods and meadows. Nature seemed 
 penetrated with a sympathy with her own inner peace. 
 
 But the crown of the benignant day was yet to come. A 
 quick footstep followed her, and erelong a voice, near at 
 hand, called her by name. 
 
 She stopped, turned, and for a moment they stood silent, 
 face to face. 
 
Friend Eli's Daughter. 397 
 
 " I knew thee, Richard ! " at last she said, in a trembling 
 voice ; "may the Lord bless thee ! " 
 
 Tears were in the eyes of both. 
 
 " He has blessed me," Richard answered, in a reverent 
 tone ; " and this is His last and sweetest mercy. Asenath, 
 let me hear that thee forgives me." 
 
 " I have forgiven thee long ago, Richard, forgiven, but 
 not forgotten." 
 
 The hush of sunset was on the forest, as they walked on- 
 ward, side by side, exchanging their mutual histories. Not 
 a leaf stirred in the crowns of the tall trees, and the dusk, 
 creeping along between their stems, brought with it a richer 
 woodland odor. Their voices were low and subdued, as if 
 an angel of God were hovering in the shadows, and listen- 
 ing, or God Himself looked down upon them from the violet 
 sky. 
 
 At last Richard stopped. 
 
 " Asenath," said he, " does thee remember that spot on 
 the banks of the creek, where the rudbeckias grew ? " 
 
 " I remember it," she answered, a girlish blush rising to 
 her face. 
 
 " If I were to say to thee now what I said to thee there, 
 what would be thy answer ? " 
 
 Her words came brokenly. 
 
 " I would say to thee, Richard, ' I can trust thee, I 
 do love thee ! ' " 
 
 " Look at me, Asenath." 
 
 Her eyes, beaming with a clearer light than even then 
 when she first confessed, were lifted to his. She placed 
 her hands gently upon his shoulders, and bent her head 
 upon his breast. He tenderly lifted it again, and, for the 
 first time, her virgin lips knew the kiss of man. 
 
A HALF-LIFE AND HALF A LIFE. 
 
 "On garde longtemps son premier amant, quand on n'en prend point de 
 second." Maximes Morales du Dttc de la Rochefoucauld. 
 
 T is not suffering alone that wears out our lives. 
 We sometimes are in a state when a sharp pang 
 would be hailed almost as a blessing, when, 
 rather than bear any longer this living death of calm stag- 
 nation, we would gladly rush into action, into suffering, to 
 feel again the warmth of life restored to our blood, to feel it 
 at least coursing through our veins with something like a 
 living swiftness. 
 
 This death-in-life comes sometimes to the most earnest 
 men, to those whose life is fullest of energy and excite- 
 ment. It is the reaction, the weariness which they name 
 Ennui, foul fiend that eats fastest into the heart's core, that 
 shakes with surest hand the sands of life, that makes the 
 deepest wrinkles on the cheeks and deadens most surely the 
 lustre of the eyes. 
 
 But what are the occasional visits of this life-consumer, 
 this vampire that sucks out the blood, to his constant, never- 
 failing presence ? There are those who feel within them- 
 selves the power of living fullest lives, of sounding every 
 chord of the full diapason of passion and feeling, yet who 
 have been so hemmed around, so shut in by adverse and 
 narrowing circumstances, that never, no, not once in their 
 half-century of years which stretch from childhood to old 
 age, have they been free to breath out, to speak aloud the 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 399 
 
 heart that was in them. Ever the same wasting indiffer- 
 ence to the things that are, the same ill-repressed longing 
 for the things that might be. Long days of wearisome rep- 
 etition of duties in which there is no life, followed by restless 
 nights, when Imagination seizes the reins in her own hands, 
 and paints the out-blossoming of those germs of happiness 
 and fulness of being of whose existence within us we carry 
 about always the aching consciousness. 
 
 And such things I have known from the moment when I 
 first stepped from babyhood into childhood, from the time 
 when life ceased to be a play and came to have its duties and 
 its sufferings. Always the haunting sense of a happiness 
 which I was capable of feeling, faint glimpses of a paradise 
 of which I was a born denizen, and always, too, the stern 
 knowledge of the restraints which held me prisoner, the idle 
 longings of an exile. But would no strong effort of will, no 
 energy of heart or mind, break the bonds that held me down, 
 no steady perseverance of purpose win me a way out 
 of darkness into light? No, for I was a woman, an ugly 
 woman, whose girlhood had gone by without affection, and 
 whose womanhood was passing without love, a woman, 
 poor and dependent on others for daily bread, and yet so 
 bound by conventional duties to those around her that to 
 break from them into independence would be to outrage all 
 the prejudices of those who made her world. 
 
 I could plan such escape from my daily and yearly narrow- 
 ing life, could dream of myself walking steadfast and unshaken 
 through labor to independence, could picture a life where, if 
 the heart were not fed, at least the tastes might be satisfied, 
 could strengthen myself through all the imaginary details of 
 my going forth from the narrow surroundings which made my 
 prison-walls ; but when the time came to take the first step, 
 my courage failed. I could not go out into that world which 
 looked to me so wide and lonely ; the necessity for love was 
 too strong for me, I must dwell among mine own people. 
 There, at least, was the bond of custom, there was the affec- 
 tion which grows out of habit ; but in the world what hope 
 
400 A Half-Life and Half a Life. 
 
 had I to win love from strangers, with my repellent looks, 
 awkward movements, and want of personal attractions ? 
 
 Few persons know that within one hundred and fifty 
 miles of the Queen City of the West, bounded on both sides 
 by highly cultivated tracts of country, looking out westward- 
 ly on the very garden of Kentucky, almost in the range of 
 railroad and telegraph, in the very geographical centre of 
 our most populous regions, there lie some thousand square 
 miles of superb woodland, rolling, hill above hill, in the 
 beautiful undulations which characterize the country border- 
 ing on the Ohio, watered by fair streams which need only 
 the clearing away of the few obstructions incident to a new 
 country to make them navigable, and yet a country where 
 the mail passes only once a week, where all communication 
 is by horse-paths or by the slow course of the flat-boat, 
 where schools are not known and churches are never seen, 
 where the Methodist itinerant preacher gives all the relig- 
 ious instruction, and a stray newspaper furnishes all the po- 
 litical information. Does any one doubt my statement? 
 Then let him ask a passage up-stream in one of the flat- 
 boats that supply the primitive necessities of the small farm- 
 ers who dwell on the banks of the Big Sandy, in that de- 
 batable border-land which lies between Kentucky and Vir- 
 ginia ; or let him, if he have a taste for adventure, hire his 
 horse at Catlettsburg, at the mouth of the river, and lose his 
 way among the blind bridle-paths that lead to Louisa and 
 to Prestonburg. If he stops to ask a night's lodging at one 
 of the farm-houses that are to be found at the junction of the 
 creeks with the rivers, log-houses with their primitive out- 
 buildings, their half-constructed rafts of lumber ready to 
 float down-stream with the next rise, their " dug-outs" for 
 the necessities of river-intercourse, and their rough ox- 
 carts for hauling to and from the mill, he will see before him 
 such a home as that in which I passed the first twenty 
 years of my life. 
 
 I had little claim on the farmer with whom I lived. 
 I was the child by a former marriage of his wife, who 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 401 
 
 had brought me with her* into this wilderness, a puny, 
 ailing creature of four years, and into the three years that 
 followed was compressed all the happiness I could remem- 
 ber. The free life in the open air, the nourishing influence 
 of the rich natural scenery by which I was surrounded, the 
 grand, silent trees with their luxuriant foliage, the fresh, 
 strong growth of the vegetation, all seemed to breathe 
 health into my frame, and with health came the capacity for 
 enjoyment. I was happy in the mere gift of existence, hap- 
 py in the fulness of content, with no playmate but the kind- 
 ly and lovely mother Earth from whose bosom I drew ful- 
 ness of life. 
 
 But in my seventh year my mother died, worn out by the 
 endless, unvarying round of labors which break down the 
 constitutions of our small farmers' wives. She grew sallow 
 and thin under repeated attacks of chills and fever, brought 
 into the world, one after another, three puny infants, only to 
 lay them away from her breast, side by side, under the syc- 
 amore that overshadowed our cornfield, and visibly wasted 
 away, growing more and more feeble, until, one winter 
 morning, we laid her, too, at rest by her babies. Before the 
 year was out, my father (so I called him) was married again. 
 
 My step-mother was a good woman, and meant to do her 
 duty by me. Nay, she was more than that : she was, as far 
 her poor light went, a Christian. She had experienced re- 
 ligion in the great revival of 18 , which was felt all through 
 Western Kentucky, under the preaching of the Reverend 
 Peleg Dawson, and when she married my father and went 
 to bury herself in the wilds of *' Up Sandy " was a shining 
 light in the Methodist Church, a class-leader who had had 
 and had told experiences. 
 
 But all that glory was over now ; it had flashed its little 
 day : for there is a glow in the excitement of our religious 
 revivals as potent in its effect on the imaginations of women 
 and young men as ever were the fastings and penances 
 which brought the dreams and reveries, the holy visions 
 and the glorious revealings, of the Catholic votaries. In 
 
 z 
 
402 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 this short, triumphant time of spiritual pride lay the whole 
 romance of my step-mother's life. Perhaps it was well for 
 her soul that she was taken from the scene of her triumphs 
 and brought again to the hard realities of life. The self-ex- 
 altation, the ;zgodly pride passed away ; but there was left 
 the earnest, prayerful desire to do her duty in her way and 
 calling, and the first path of duty which opened to her zeal 
 was that which led to the care of a motherless child, the 
 saving of an immortal soul. And in all sincerity and up- 
 rightness did she strive to walk in it. But what woman of 
 five -and- thirty, who has outlived her youth and womanly 
 tenderness in the loneliness and hardening influences of a 
 single life, and who marries at last for a shelter in old age, 
 knows the wants of a little child? Indeed, what but a 
 mother's love has the long-enduring patience to support the 
 never-ceasing calls for forbearance and perseverance which 
 a child makes upon a grown person ? Those little ones need 
 the nourishment of love and praise, but such milk for babes 
 can come only from a mother's breast. I got none of it. On 
 the contrary, my dearly loved independence, my wild-wood 
 life, where Nature had become to me my nursing-mother, 
 was exchanged for one of never-ceasing supervision. " Lit- 
 tle girls must learn to be useful," was the phrase that greet- 
 ed my unwilling ears fifty times a day, which pursued me 
 through my daily round of dish-washings, floor-sweepings, 
 bed-making and potato-peeling, to overtake, me at last in 
 the very moment when I hoped to reap the reward of my 
 diligence in a free afternoon by the river-side in the crotch 
 of the water-maple that hung over the stream, clutching me 
 and fastening me down to the hated square of patchwork, 
 which bore, in the spots of red that defaced its white purity 
 in following the line of my stitches, the marks of the wounds 
 that my awkward hands inflicted on themselves with their 
 tiny weapon. 
 
 And so the years went on. It was a pity that no babies 
 came to soften our hearts, my step-mother's and mine, and 
 to draw us nearer together as only the presence of children 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 403 
 
 can. A household without children is always hard and an- 
 gular, even when surrounded by all the softening influences 
 of refinement and education. What was ours with its poverty 
 and roughness, its every-day cares and its endless discom- 
 forts ? One day was like all the rest, and in their wearying 
 succession they rise up in my memory like* ghosts of the 
 past coming to lay their cold, death-like hands on the feebly 
 kindling hopes of the present. I see myself now, as I look 
 back, a tall, awkward girl of fifteen, with my long, straggling, 
 sunburnt hair, my sallow, yet pimply complexion, my small, 
 weak-looking blue eyes, that every exposure to the sun and 
 wind would redden, and my long, lean hands and arms, that 
 offended my sense of beauty constantly, as I dwelt on their 
 hopelessly angular turns. I had one beauty ; so my little 
 paper-framed glass, that rested on the rough rafter that 
 edged the sloping roof of my garret, told me, whenever I 
 took it down to gaze in it, which, but for that beauty, would 
 have been but seldom. It was a finely cut and firmly set 
 mouth and chin. There was, and I felt it, beauty and char- 
 acter in the curves of the lips, in the rounding of the chin ; 
 there was even a healthy ruddiness in the lips, and some- 
 thing of delicacy in the even, well-set teeth that showed 
 themselves when they parted. 
 
 The gazing at these beauties gave me great pleasure, not 
 for any effect they might ever produce in others, what did 
 I know of that ? but because I had in myself a strong love 
 of the beautiful, a passion for grace of form and brilliancy 
 of color which made doubly distasteful to me our bare, 
 uncouth walls, with their ugly straight-backed chairs, and 
 their frightfully painted yellow or red tables and chests of 
 drawers. 
 
 My step - mother's appearance, too, was a constant of- 
 fence to my beauty-loving eye, with her lank, tall figure, 
 round which clung those narrow skirts of " bit " calico, din- 
 gy red or dreary brown, her feet shod in the heavy store- 
 shoes which were brought us from Catlettsburg by the re- 
 turning flat-boat men, her sharp-featured face, the fore- 
 
404 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 head and cheeks covered with brown, mouldy-looking spots, 
 the eyes deep-set, with a livid dyspeptic ring around them, 
 and the lips thin and pinched, the whole face shaded by 
 the eternal sun-bonnet, which never left her head from early 
 sunrise till late bedtime (no Sandy woman is ever seen with- 
 out her sun-b*onnet). All these were pepetual annoyances 
 to me ; they made me discontented without knowing why ; 
 they filled me with disgust, a disgust which my respect for 
 her good qualities could not overcome. 
 
 And then our life, how dreary ! The rising in the cold, 
 gray dawn to prepare the breakfast of corn-dodgers and 
 bacon for my father and his men, the spreading the table- 
 cloth, stained with the soil-spots of yesterday's meal, the 
 putting upon it the ugly unmatched crockery, the strag- 
 gling in of the unwashed, uncombed men in their coarse 
 working-clothes, redolent of the week's unwholesome toil, 
 their washings, combings, and low talk close by my side, 
 the varied uses to which our household utensils were 
 put, the dipping of dirty knives into the salt and of dirty 
 fingers into the meat-dish, all filled me then, and fill me 
 now, with loathing. 
 
 There was a relief when the men left the house ; but 
 then came the dreary "slicking-up," almost more disgust- 
 ing, in its false, superficial show of cleanliness, than had 
 been the open carelessness of the workmen. 
 
 But there was no time for rest ; my step-mother's sharp, 
 high-pitched voice was heard calling, " Janet ! " and I fol- 
 lowed her to the garden to dig the potatoes from the hills 
 or to the cornfield to pull and husk the three dozen ears of 
 corn which made our chief dish at dinner. Then came the 
 week's washing, the apple-peeling, the pork-salting, work 
 varied only with the varying season, until the blowing of 
 the horn at twelve brought back the men to dinner, after 
 which came again the clearing up, again the day's task, and 
 again the supper/ 
 
 I often thought that the men around us were always more 
 cheerful and merry than the women. They worked as hard, 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 405 
 
 they endured as many hardships, but they had, certainly, 
 more pleasures. There was the evening lounge by the 
 fire in winter, the sitting on the fence or at the door-step 
 in summer, when, pipe or cigar in mouth, knife and whit- 
 tling-stick in hand, jest and gibe would pass round among 
 them, and the boisterous laugh would go up, reaching me, 
 as I lay, tired out, on my little cot, or leaned disconsolate 
 at my garret-window, looking with longing eyes far out into 
 the darkness of the woods. No such gatherings-together of 
 the women did I ever see. If one of our neighbors dragged 
 her weary steps to our kitchen, and sat herself down, baby 
 in lap, on the upturned tub or flag-bottomed chair that I 
 dusted off with my apron, it was to commence the querulous 
 complaint of the last week's chill or the heavy washing of the 
 day before, the ailing baby, or the troublesome child, all told 
 in the same whining voice. Even the choice bit of gossip 
 which roused us at rare intervals always had its dark side, 
 on which these poor women dwelt with a perverse pleasure. 
 
 In short, life was too hard for them ; it brought its con- 
 stant cares without any alleviating pleasures. Their homes 
 were only places of monotonous labor, their husbands 
 so many hard taskmasters, who exacted from them more 
 than their strength could give, their children, who should 
 have been the delight of their mothers' hearts, so many 
 additional burdens, the bearing and nursing of which broke 
 down their poor remaining health ; the glorious and lavish 
 Nature in which they lived only brought to them added 
 labor, and shut them out from the few social enjoyments 
 that they knew of. 
 
 I was old enough to feel all this, not to reason on it as 
 I can now, but to rebel against it with all the violence of a 
 vehement nature which feels its strength only in the injuries 
 it inflicts upon itself in its useless struggles for freedom. 
 Bitter tears did I shed sometimes, as I lay with my head 
 on my arms, leaning on that narrow window-sill, tears of 
 passionate regret that I was not a boy, a man, that I might, 
 by the very force of my right arm, hew my way out of that 
 
406 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 encircling forest into the world of which I dreamed, .tears, 
 too, that, being as I was, only an ugly, ignorant girl, I could 
 not be allowed to care only for myself, and dream away my 
 life in this same forest, which charmed me while it hemmed 
 me in. My rude, chaotic nature had something of force in 
 it, strength which I knew would stand me in good stead, 
 could I ever find an outlet for it ; it had also a power of 
 enjoyment, keen, vivid, could I ever get leave to enjoy. 
 
 At length came the opening, the glimpse of sunlight. I 
 remember, as if it were but yesterday, that afternoon which 
 first showed to my physical sight something of that full life 
 of which my imagination had framed a rude, faint sketch. 
 I was standing at the end of the meadow, just where the 
 rails had been thrown down for the cows, when, looking up 
 the path that led through the wood by the river, I saw, almost 
 at my side, a man on horseback. He stopped, and, half rais- 
 ing his hat, a motion I had never seen before, said, 
 
 u Is this Squire Boarders 's place ? " 
 
 I pushed back my sun-bonnet, and looked up at him. I 
 see . him now as I saw him then ; for my quick, startled 
 glance took in the whole face and figure, which daguerro- 
 typed themselves on my memory. A frank, open face, with 
 well-cut and well-defined features and large hazel eyes, set 
 off by curling brown hair, was smiling down upon me, and, 
 throwing himself from his horse, a young man of about 
 five-and-twenty stood beside me. He had to repeat his 
 question before I gained presence of mind enough to an- 
 swer him. 
 
 " Is this Squire Boarders's house, and do you think I 
 could get a night's lodging here ? " 
 
 It was no unusual thing for us to give a night's lodging to 
 the boatmen from the river, or to the farmers from the back- 
 country, as they passed to or from Catlettsburg ; but what 
 accommodation had we for such a guest as here presented ? 
 I walked before him up the path to the house, and, shyly 
 pointing to my step-mother, who stood on the porch, said, 
 
 " That 's Mass Boarders ; you can ask her." 
 
A Half-Life and Half a Life. 407 
 
 And then, before he had time to answer, I fled in an 
 agony of bashfulness to my refuge under the water-maple 
 behind the house. I lingered there as long as I dared, 
 longer, indeed, than I had any right to linger, for I heard 
 my mother's voice crying, "Janet! "and I well knew that 
 there was nobody but myself to mix the corn-cake, spread 
 the table, or run the dozen errands that would be needed. I 
 slipped in by the back-door, and, escaping my step-mother's 
 peevish complaints, passed into the little closet which served 
 us for pantry, and, scooping up the meal, began diligently 
 to mix it. 
 
 The window by which I stood opened on the porch. My 
 father and his men had come in, and, tipping their chairs 
 against the wall, or mounted on the porch-railing, were 
 smoking their cigars, laughing, joking, talking, and there 
 in the midst of them sat the stranger, smoking too, and 
 joining in their talk with an easy earnestness that seemed 
 to win them at once. Our country-people do not spare their 
 questions. My father took the lead, the men throwing in a 
 remark now and then. 
 
 " I calculate you have never been in these parts before ? " 
 
 " No, never. You have a beautiful country here." 
 
 " The country 's well enough, if we could clear off some 
 of them trees that stop a man every way he turns. Did 
 you come up from Lowiza to-day?" 
 
 " No ; I have only ridden from the mouth of Blackberry, 
 I believe you call it. I have left a boat and crew there, 
 who will be up in the morning." 
 
 " What truck have you got on your boat ? " 
 
 " Lumber and so forth, and plenty of tools of one sort or 
 other." 
 
 " Damn me if I don't believe you 're the man who is 
 coming up here to open the coal mines on Burgess's land ! " 
 And the whole crowd gathered round him. 
 
 He laughed good-naturedly. 
 
 " Yes, I am coming to live among you. I hope you '11 
 give me a welcome." 
 
408 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 There was a cheery sound of welcome from the men, but 
 my father shook his head. 
 
 " We don't like no new-fangled notions, noways, up here, 
 and I '11 not say that I 'm glad you 're bringing them in ; 
 but, at any rate, you 're welcome here to-night" 
 
 The young man held out his hand. 
 
 " We are to be close neighbors, Squire Boarders, and I 
 hope we shall be good friends ; b'ut I ought to tell you all 
 about myself. Mr. Burgess's land has been bought by a 
 company, who intend to open the coal mines, as you know 
 and I am sent up here as their agent, to make ready for the 
 miners and the workmen. We shall clear away a little, and 
 put up some rough shanties, to make our men comfortable 
 before we go to work. We shall bring a new set of people 
 among you, those Scotch and Welsh miners ; but I believe 
 they are a peaceable set, and we '11 try to be friendly with 
 each other." 
 
 The frank speech and the free, open face seemed to mol- 
 lify my father. 
 
 " And how do you call yourself, stranger, when you are 
 at home ? " 
 
 " My name is George Hammond." 
 
 " Well, as I was telling you, you 're welcome here to- 
 night, and I don't know as I 've anything against your set- 
 tling over the river on Burgess's land. The people round 
 here have been telling me yonr coming will be a good thing 
 for us farmers, because you '11 bring us a market for our 
 corn and potatoes ; but I don't see no use of raising more 
 corn than we want for ourselves. We have enough selling 
 to do with our lumber, and you '11 be thinning out the trees. 
 But there 's my old woman 's got her supper ready." 
 
 I listened as I waited on the table. The talk varied from 
 farming to mining and the state of the river, merging at last 
 into the politics of the country, and through the whole of it 
 I watched the stranger : noticed how different was his lan- 
 guage from anything I had ever heard before ; marked the 
 clear tones of his voice, and the distinctness of his utter- 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 409 
 
 ance, contrasting with the heavy, thick gutturals, the run- 
 ning of words into each other, the slovenly drawl of my 
 father and his men ; watched his manner of eating, his neat 
 disposition of his food on his plate ; saw him move his chair 
 back with a slight expression of annoyance, unmarked by 
 any one else, as Will Foushee spit on the floor beside him. 
 All this I observed, in a mood half envious, half sullen, 
 a mood which pursued me that night into my little attic, as 
 I peevishly questioned with myself wherein lay the differ- 
 ence between us. 
 
 " Why is this man any better than Will Foushee or Ned 
 Burgess ? He is no stronger nor better able to do a day's 
 work. Why am I afraid of him, when I don't care an acorn 
 for the others ? Why do my father and the men listen to 
 him and crowd round him ? What makes him stand among 
 them as if he did not belong to them, even when he talks of 
 what they know better than he ? There is not a man round 
 Sandy that could make me feel as ashamed as that gentleman 
 did when he spoke to me this afternoon. Is it because he 
 is a gentleman ? And sullenly I resolved that I would be 
 put down by no airs. I was as good as he, and would show 
 him to-morrow morning that I felt so. Then came the bit- 
 ter acknowledgment. " I am not as good as he is. I am 
 a stupid, ugly girl, who knows nothing but hateful house- 
 work and a little of the fields and trees ; and he, I sup- 
 pose he has been to school, and read plenty of books, and 
 lived among quality." And I cried myself to sleep before 
 I had made up my mind fully to acknowledge his supe- 
 riority. 
 
 It was one of my greatest pleasures to get up early. Our 
 people were not early risers, except when work pressed 
 upon them, and I often secured my only leisure hour for 
 the day by stealing down the staircase, out into the woods, 
 by early sunrise, when, wrapped in an old shawl, and shel- 
 tered from the dew by climbing into the lower branches of 
 my pet maple, I would watch the fog reaching up the oppo- 
 site hills, putting forth as it were an arm, by which, stretched 
 18 
 
410 A Half-Life and Half a Life. 
 
 far out over the trees, it seemed to lift itself from the valley, 
 or, perhaps carrying with me one of the few books which 
 made my library, I would spell out the sentences and at- 
 tempt to extract their meaning. 
 
 They were a strange medley, my books ; sonle belonging 
 to my step-mother, and others borrowed or begged from the 
 neighbors, or brought to me by the men, with whom I was 
 a favorite, and who knew my passion for reading. My 
 mother's books were mostly religious : a life of Brainerd, 
 the missionary, whose adventures roused within me a gleam 
 of religious enthusiasm ; some sermons of the leading Meth- 
 odist clergy, which, to her horror, I pronounced stupid ; and 
 a torn copy of the " Imitation of Christ," a book which she 
 threatened to take from me, because she believed it had 
 something to do with the Papists, but to which, for that 
 very reason, I clung with a tenacity and read with an ear- 
 nestness which brought at last its own beautiful fruits. 
 Then, there was the " Scottish Chiefs," a treasure-house 
 of delight to me, two or three trashy novels, given me by 
 Tom Salyers, of which my mother knew nothing, and 
 (the only poetry I had ever seen) a song-book, which had, 
 scattered among its vulgarisms and puerilities, some gems 
 of Burns and Moore. These, my natural, unvitiated taste 
 had singled out, and I would croon them over to myself, set 
 them to a tune of my own composing, and half sing, half 
 chant them, when at work out-of-doors, till my mother de- 
 clared I was going crazy. 
 
 This morning I did not read. I sat looking down into 
 the water from my perch, carrying on the inward discussion 
 of the night before, and wishing that breakfast-time were 
 come, that I might try my strength and show that I was 
 not to be put down by any assumption of superiority, when 
 suddenly a voice near me made me start so that I almost 
 lost my balance. Mr. Hammond was standing beneath. 
 He laughed, and held out his hand to help me down ; but 
 I sprang past him and was on my way to the house, when 
 suddenly my brave -resolutions came back to my mind, and 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 411 
 
 I stood still with a feeling of defiance. I wondered what 
 he would dare to say. Would he tell me how stupid he 
 thought us all, how like the very pigs we lived ? or would 
 he describe his own grand house and the great places he 
 had seen ? I scowled up sullenly. 
 
 " Will you tell me where to find a towel, that I may wash 
 my face here by the river-side ? " 
 
 I laughed aloud, and with that laugh fled my sullenness. 
 He looked a little puzzled, but went on, 
 
 " I went to bed so early that I cannot sleep any longer ; 
 and if I could only find some way of getting across the 
 river, I could get things under way a little before my men 
 come up." 
 
 There were ways, then, in which I could help him, he 
 was not so immeasurably above me, and down went my 
 defiant spirit. The towel, a crash roller, luckily clean, was 
 brought at once, and gathering courage as I stood by and 
 saw him finish his washing, I said, 
 
 " I can scull you over the river in a few minutes, if you 
 will go in our skiff." 
 
 " You ? can you manage that shell of a thing ? will youi 
 father let you take it, Miss Boarders ? " 
 
 " My name is Janet Rainsford, and Squire Boarders is 
 not my father," said I, some of my sullenness returning. 
 
 " If you will take me, Janet," said he, with the frank, 
 open-hearted tone which had won my step-father the night 
 before, a tone before which my sullenness melted. 
 
 I jumped in, and, letting him pass me before I threw off 
 the rope, sculled the little dug-out into the middle of the 
 river. No boatman on the Sandy was more skilful than I 
 in the management of the little vessel, for in it most of my 
 leisure time had been passed for the last year or two. My 
 step-mother had scolded, my father grumbled, and the farm- 
 ers' wives and daughters had shaken their heads and " al- 
 lowed that Janet Rainsford would come to no good, if she 
 was let fool about here and there, like a boy." But on that 
 point I was incorrigible ; the boat was my one escape from 
 
412 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 my daily drudgery, and late at night and early in the morn- 
 ing I went up and down among the shoals and bars, under 
 the trees and over the ripples, till every turn of the current 
 was familiar to me. I knew all the boatmen, too, up and 
 down the river, would pull along-side their rafts or pushing- 
 boats, and get from them a slice of their corn-bread or a 
 cup of coffee, or at least a pleasant word or jest. And none 
 but pleasant words did I ever receive from the rough, but 
 honorable men whom I met. They respected, as the rough- 
 est men will always do, my lonely girlhood, and felt a sort 
 of pride in the daring, adventurous spirit that I showed. 
 
 My knowledge of the river stood Mr. Hammond in good 
 stead that morning, as soon as I understood that he was 
 looking for a place where his men could land easily. It was 
 only to sweep round a small bluff that jutted into the river, 
 and carry the skiff into the mouth of Nat's Creek, where 
 the bank sloped gradually down to the water from a level 
 bit of meadow-land that extended back some rods before 
 the hills began to rise. Mr. Hammond leaped out 
 
 " The very place, and here, on this point shall be my 
 saw-mill. I '11 run the road through here and up the creek 
 to the mining-ground, and build my store under the ledge 
 there, and my shanties on each side of the road." 
 
 I caught his enthusiasm, and my shyness all gone, I 
 found myself listening and suggesting ; more than that, I 
 found my suggestions attended to. I knew the river well ; 
 I knew what points of land would be overflowed in the 
 June rise ; I knew how far the backwater would reach up 
 the creek ; I knew the least obstructed paths through the 
 woods ; I could even tell where the most available timber 
 was to be found. I felt, too, that my knowledge was appre- 
 ciated. George Hammond had that one best gift that be- 
 longs to all successful leaders, whether of armies, colonies, 
 or bands of miners ; he recognized merit when he saw it. 
 From that morning a feeling of self-respect dawned upon 
 me, I was not so altogether ignorant as I had thought my- 
 self, I had some available knowledge ; and with that feeling 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 413 
 
 came the determination to raise myself out. of that slough 
 of despond into which I had fallen the night before. 
 
 From that time a sort of friendship sprang up between 
 George Hammond and myself. Every morning I rowed 
 him across the river, and, in the early morning light, before 
 the workmen were out of bed, he talked over, partly to him- 
 self and partly to me, his plans for the day and his vexations 
 of the day before, until I began to offer advice and make 
 suggestions, which made him laughingly call me his little 
 counsellor. 
 
 Then in the evenings (he slept at my father's) he would 
 pick up my books and amuse himself with talking to me 
 about them, laugh at my crude enthusiasms, clear up some 
 difficult passage, prune away remorselessly the trash that 
 had crept into my little collection, until, one day, returning, 
 from Cincinnati, where business had called him, he brought 
 with him a store of books inexhaustible to my inexperi- 
 enced eyes, and declared himself my teacher for the winter. 
 
 " Never mind Janet's knitting and mending, Mrs. Board- 
 ers," said he, in reply to my mother's complaints ; " she is a 
 smart girl, and may be a schoolmistress yet, and earn more 
 money than any women on Sandy." 
 
 " But I am afraid," my step-mother answered, "-that the 
 books she reads are not godly, and have no grace in them. 
 They look to me like players' trash. I 've tried to do my 
 duty to Janet," she continued, plaintively; "but -I hope the 
 Lord won't hold me accountable for her headstrong ways." 
 
 Meantime, as I read in one of my books, and repeated to 
 myself over and over again in my fulness of content, 
 
 " How happily the days 
 Of Thalaba went by I " 
 
 How rapidly fled that winter, and how soon came the spring, 
 that would bring me, I thought, new hopes, new interests, 
 new companions ! 
 
 How changed a scene did I look upon, that bright April 
 morning, when I went over the river to see that all was in 
 
414 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 readiness for the boats from below which were to bring 
 Esther Hammond to her new home ! She was to keep her 
 brother's house ; and furniture, books, and pictures, such as 
 I had never dreamed of, had been sent up by the last-re- 
 turning boatmen, all of which I had helped Mr. Hammond 
 to arrange in the little two-story cottage which stood on the 
 first rise of the hill behind the store. 
 
 A little plat of ground was hedged jn with young Osage- 
 orange shrubs, and within it one of the miners, who had 
 formerly been an under-gardener in a great house in Scot- 
 land, had already prepared some flower-beds and sodded 
 carefully the little lawn, laying down the walks with bright- 
 colored tan, which contrasted pleasantly with the lively 
 green of the grass. From the gate one might look up and 
 . down the road, bordered on one side by the trees that hung 
 over the river, and on the other by the miners' houses, one- 
 story cottages, each with its small enclosure, and showing 
 every degree of cultivation, from the neat vegetable-patch 
 and whitewashed porch of the Scotch families to the neg- 
 lected waste ground and slovenly potato-patch of the Irish- 
 men. There were some Sandians among the hands, but 
 they never could be made to take one of the houses pre- 
 pared for the miners. They lived back on the creek, gen- 
 erally on their own lands, raised their corn and tobacco, cut 
 their lumber, and hunted or rode the country, taking jobs 
 only when they felt so inclined, but showing themselves 
 fully able to compete with the best hands both in skill and 
 in endurance, when they were willing to work. 
 
 On the side of the hill across the creek could be seen the 
 entrance to the mines, and down that hill were passing con- 
 stantly the cars, loaded with earth and stone taken from the 
 tunnel, which fell with a thundering sound into the valley 
 beneath. Below me was the store, gay with its multifarious 
 goods, which supplied all the needs of the miners and their 
 wives, from the garden-tools and seeds for the afternoon- 
 work to the gay-colored dresses for the Sunday leisure, 
 where, too, on Saturday night, whiskey was to be had in 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 415 
 
 exchange for the scrip in which their wages were paid, and 
 where, sometimes, the noise waxed fast and furious, till Mr. 
 Hammond would cut off the supply of liquor, as the readi- 
 est means of stilling the tumult 
 
 On this side the river all was changed. But as I looked 
 that morning across the stream towards my step-father's 
 farm, my own home, everything there lay as wild and unim- 
 proved as I had known it since the first day my mother 
 brought me there, comfortless and disorderly as it was when, 
 child as I was, I could remember the tears of fatigue and 
 discouragement which she dropped upon my face as she 
 put me for the first time into my little crib ; but there, too, 
 were still (and my heart exulted as I saw them) the glorious 
 water-maples, the giant sycamores, and the bright-colored 
 chestnut-trees, which I had known and loved so long. 
 Would Miss Hammond see how beautiful they were ? would 
 she praise them as her brother had done ? would she listen 
 as kindly to my rhapsodies about them ? and would she say, 
 as he had said, that I was a poet by nature, with a poet's 
 quick appreciation of beauty and the poet's gift of enthusias- 
 tic expression ? I could not tell whether Esther Hammond 
 would be to me the friend her brother had been, with the 
 added blessing, that, being a woman, I could go freely to 
 her with my deficiencies in sure dependence upon her aid 
 and sympathy, or if she would come to stand between me 
 and him, to take away from me my friend and teacher. Time 
 alone would show ; and meanwhile I must be busy with my 
 preparations, for the boats were expected at noon, and Mr. 
 Hammond, who had ridden down to Louisa to meet them, 
 had said that he depended upon me to have things cheerful 
 and in order when they arrived. 
 
 Two hours' hard work saw everything in its place, the 
 furniture arranged to the best of my ability, but wanting, as 
 I sorely felt, the touch of a mistress's hand to give it a 
 home-like look. I had done my best, but what did I know 
 of the arrangement of a lady's house ? I hardly knew the 
 use of half the things I touched. But I woiild not let my 
 
416 A Half-Life and Half a Life. 
 
 old spirit of discontent creep over me now ; so, betaking 
 myself to the woods, which were full of the loveliest spring 
 flowers, I brought back such a profusion of violets, spring- 
 beauties, and white bloodroot-blossoms, that the whole room 
 was brightened with their beauty, while their faint, delicate 
 perfume filled the air. 
 
 *' Surely these must please her," I said to myself, as I put 
 the last saucerful on the table, and stepped back to see the 
 result of my work. 
 
 "They certainly will, Janet," said George Hammond, who 
 had entered behind me. " How well you have worked, and 
 how pleasant everything looks ! Esther will be so much 
 obliged to you. She is just below, in the boat. Will you 
 not come with me and help her up the bank ? " 
 
 But I hung back, bashful and frightened, while he called 
 some of the men to his assistance, and, hurrying down to 
 the river, landed the boat, and was presently seen walking 
 toward the house with a lady leaning upon his arm. I saw 
 her from the window. A tall, dignified woman, with a face, 
 yes, beautiful, certainly, for there were the regular feat- 
 ures, the dark eyes, with their straight brows, the heavy, 
 dark hair, parted over the fair, smooth forehead, but so 
 quiet, so cold, so almost haughty, that my heart stood still 
 with an undefined alarm. 
 
 She came in and sat down in one of the chairs without 
 taking the least notice of me. Mr. Hammond spoke, 
 
 " This is Janet Rainsford, my little friend that I told you 
 of, Esther. I hope you will be as good friends as we have 
 been. She will show you every beautiful place around the 
 country, and make you acquainted with the people, too." 
 
 Miss Hammond looked at me with a steadiness of gaze 
 under which my eyes sank. 
 
 " I shall not trouble the young person much, since I shall 
 only walk when you can go with me ; and as for the people, 
 it is not necessary for me to know them, I suppose." 
 
 George Hammond bit his lip. 
 
 " Janet has taken great pains to put everything in order 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 417 
 
 for us here. I should hardly know the room, it is so im- 
 proved since I left it this morning." 
 
 "She is very kind," said his sister, languidly; "but, 
 George, how horribly this furniture is arranged, the sofa 
 across the window, the centre-table in the corner ! " 
 
 " O, you will have plenty of time to arrange it, Esther. 
 Come, let me show you your own room ; you will want to 
 rest while your Dutch girl what 's her name ? Catrine ? 
 gets us something to eat." 
 
 Miss Hammond followed her brother to her room, while, 
 mortified and angry with her, with myself, I escaped from 
 the house, jumped into my skiff, and hardly stopped to 
 breathe till I had reached my own little garret. I flung my- 
 self on my bed, and burst into bitter tears of resentment 
 and despair. So, after all my pains, after my endeavors to 
 improve myself, after all I had done, I was not worth the 
 notice of a real lady. I supposed I was an uncouth, awk- 
 ward girl, disagreeable enough to her ; she would not want 
 to see me ne^r her. Alltl had done was miserable ; it 
 would have been better to let things alone. I never would 
 go near her again, that was certain, she should not be 
 troubled by me ; and my tears fell hot and fast upon my 
 pillow. Then came my old sullenness. Why was she any 
 better than I ? Her brother thought me worth talking to ; 
 could she not find me worthy of at least a kind look ? Per- 
 haps she knew more than I did of books : but what of that ? 
 She had not half the useful knowledge wherewith to make 
 her way here in the wood's. And what right had she to 
 bring her haughty looks and proud ways here among our 
 people ? My sullenness gave way before my bitter disap- 
 pointment and my offended pride. I was only a child of 
 sixteen, sensitive and distrustful of myself, and her cold 
 looks and colder words had keenly wounded me. 
 
 A week passed, in which I gave myself most earnestly to 
 the household tasks, going through them with dogged per- 
 tinacity, arid accomplishing an amount of work which made 
 my step-mother declare that Janet was coming back to her 
 18* AA 
 
41 8 A Half-Life and Half a Life. 
 
 senses after all. It was only my effort to forget my disap- 
 pointment. 
 
 On the Saturday evening when I sat tired out with my 
 exertions, Mr. Hammond came up the path. How my 
 heart leaped at seeing him ! How good he was to come ! 
 His sister had not taught him to despise me. But when 
 he asked me to come over the next day, and see what he 
 had done to his house and garden, the demon of sullen 
 pride took possession of me again. I would not go. I had 
 too much to do ; my mother would want me to get the din- 
 ner. In short, I could not go. He bore it good-naturedly, 
 though I think he understood it, and, leaving with me a 
 package of books which he had promised me, said he must 
 go, as Esther would be waiting tea for him. 
 
 Many another endeavor did George Hammond make to 
 bring his sister and myself together, but the first impres- 
 sion had been too strong for me, and Miss Hammond made 
 no effort to 'remove it. I do not believe it ever crossed her 
 mind to try to do so. Little \vfes it to her, whether or no 
 she made herself pleasant to a stupid, ugly girl. She had 
 her books, her light household cares, her letter-writing, her 
 gardening, her walks and drives with her brother, and she 
 felt and showed little interest in anything else. Very fin- 
 popular she was among the people around her, who con- 
 trasted her cold reserve with her brother's frank cordiality ; 
 but she troubled herself not at all about her unpopularity. 
 For me, I kept shyly out of her way, and fell back into my 
 old habits. 
 
 I had not lost my friend, Mr. Hammond. He did not read 
 with me regularly as before, but he kept me supplied with 
 books, and the very infrequency of his lessons stimulated 
 me to redoubled effort, that I might surprise him by my 
 progress when we met again. Then there was scarcely a 
 day that some business did not take him past our house, or 
 that I did not meet him by the river-bank or at the store. 
 Sometimes he would ask me to row him down the stream 
 on some errand, sometimes he would take me with him in 
 
A Half-Life and Half a Life. 419 
 
 his rides. I was a fearless horsewoman, and Miss Ham- 
 mond did not ride. In all those meetings he was frank and 
 kind as ever ; he told me of his plans, his annoyances, his 
 projects. No, I had not lost my friend, as I had feared, 
 and when assured of this, I could do without Miss Ham- 
 mond. 
 
 And so the weeks glided into months, and the months 
 into years, and I was nineteen years old. Four years had 
 passed since the morning when George Hammond first 
 awakened my self-esteem, first gave me the impulse to raise 
 myself out of my awkwardness and ignorance, to make of 
 myself something better than one of the worn, depressed, 
 dispirited women I saw around me. Had I done anything 
 for myself ? I asked. I was not educated, I had no acquire- 
 ments, so-called ; but I had read, and read well, some good 
 and famous books, and I knew that I had made their con- 
 tents my own. I was richer for their beauties and excel- 
 lencies. With my self-respect had come, too, a desire to 
 improve my surroundings,. and, as far as they lay under my 
 control, they had been improved. Our household was more 
 orderly ; some little attempt at neatness and decoration was 
 to be seen around and in the house, and my own room, 
 where I had full sway, was beautiful in its rustic adornment. 
 
 My glass, too, the poor little three-cornered, paper-framed 
 companion of my girlhood, showed me some change. The 
 complexion had cleared, the hair had taken a decided brown, 
 and the angular figure had rounded and filled. It was hardly 
 a week since, standing in -Miss Hammond's kitchen count- 
 ing over with her servant-girl the basketful of fresh eggs 
 which were sent from our house every week, I had over- 
 heard Mr. Hammond say to his sister, 
 
 " Really, Janet Rainsford has improved so much that she 
 . is almost pretty. Her brown hair tones so well with her 
 quiet eyes ; and as to her mouth, it is really lovely, so finely 
 cut, and with so much character in it." 
 
 What was it to me that Miss Hammond's cold voice an- 
 swered, 
 
420 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 " I think you make a fool of yourself, George, and of that 
 girl, too, going on as you do about her. She will be entirely 
 unfitted for her state of life, and for the people she must 
 live with." 
 
 Her words had hardly time to chill my heart when it 
 bounded again, as I turned hurriedly away and passed 
 under the window on my way out, at hearing her brother's 
 answer : 
 
 " There is too much in her to be spoiled. I like her. 
 She has talent and character, and I cannot understand, 
 Esther, why you are so prejudiced against her." 
 
 There were others besides Mr. Hammond who thought 
 me improved and who liked me. Tom Salyers never let an 
 evening pass without dropping into our house on his way 
 home from the store, where he was a sort of overseer or 
 salesman, never failed to bring in its season the earliest 
 wild-flower or the freshest fruit, had thoroughly searched 
 Catlettsburg for books to please me, nay, had once sent 
 an indefinite order to a . Cincinnati bookseller to put up 
 twenty dollars' worth of the best books for a lady, which 
 order was filled by a collection of the Annuals of six years 
 back and a few unsalable modern novels. I read them all 
 most conscientiously and gratefully, and would not listen 
 for a moment to Mr. Hammond's jests about them : but, a 
 few weeks afterwards, I almost repented of my complai- 
 sance, when Tom Salyers took me at an advantage while 
 rowing me down to Louisa one afternoon, and, seeing a 
 long stretch of river before him without shoal or sand-bar, 
 leisurely laid up his oars, and, letting the boat float with 
 the stream, asked me, abruptly, to marry him, and go with 
 him up into the country to a new place which he meant to 
 clear an4 farm. 
 
 I laughed at him at first, but he persisted till I was forced 
 to believe him in earnest ; and then I told him how foolish 
 he was to fancy an ugly, sallow-looking girl like me, who 
 had no father nor mother^ when he might take one of John 
 Mills's rosy daughters, or go down to Catlettsburg and get 
 
A Half-Life and Half a Life. 421 
 
 somebody whose father would give him a farm already 
 cleared. 
 
 " You are laughing at me, Janet," he said. " I know I 
 am not smart enough for you, nor hardly fit to keep com- 
 pany with you, now that Hammond has taught you so many 
 things that are proper for a lady to know ; but I love you 
 true, and if you can only fancy me,, I '11 work so hard that 
 you '11 be able to keep a hired girl and have all your time 
 for reading and going about the woods as you like to do. 
 And you '11 be in your own house, instead of under Squire 
 Boarders and his sharp-spoken wife. Could n't you fancy 
 me after a while ? I 'd do anything you said to make 
 myself agreeable and fit company for you." 
 
 "You are very fit company for me now, Tom," I said, 
 " and you are of a great deal more use in the world than I 
 am; you know more that is worth knowing than I do. 
 Only let us be good friends, as we have always been, and 
 do not talk about anything else." 
 
 " I will not talk any more of i^now," said he, "if so be 
 it don't please you, and if you '11 promise never to say any 
 more to me about the Mills gals, or any of them critters 
 down in Catlettsburg, I can't abide the sight of them, 
 and if you '11 let me come and see you all the same, and row 
 you about and take you to the mill when you want flour." 
 
 I held out my hand to Tom with the earnest assurance 
 that I always liked to see him and talk to him, and that there 
 was nobody whom I would sooner ask to do me a kindness. 
 
 The poor fellow choked a little as he thanked me, and 
 then, recovering himself, rowed a few strokes in silence, 
 when, looking round as if to assure himself that there was 
 nothing near us but the quiet trees, he said suddenly, 
 
 " I '11 tell you what, Janet, I 've a great mind to tell you 
 something, seeing how you 're not a woman that can't hold 
 her tongue, and then you think so much of Hammond." 
 
 I started with a quick sense of alarm, but Tom went 
 doggedly on. 
 
 " You know what a hard winter we 've had, with this low 
 
422 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 water and no January rise, and all that ice in the Ohio. 
 They say they 're starving for coal down in Cincinnati, and 
 here we 've no end of it stacked up. Well, Hammond, 
 he 's had hard work enough to keep the men along through 
 the winter. Many another man would have turned them 
 off, but he would n't do it ; so he 's shinned here and 
 shinned there to get money to pay them their wages, and 
 they Ve had scrip, and we 've fairly brought goods up to 
 the store overland, on horseback and every kind of way, 
 just for their convenience ; and now the damned Irish 
 rascals, with some of the Sandy boys for leaders, have 
 made up their minds to strike for higher wages the minute 
 we have a rise, just when we '11 need all hands to get the 
 coal off, and all those boats laying at the mouth, too. I 
 heard it day before yesterday, by chance like, when Jim 
 Foushee and the two O'Learys were sitting smoking on 
 the fence behind the store. The O'Learys were tight with 
 the Redeye they had aboard, and let it out in their stupid 
 ' colloguing,' as they call it ; but Jim Foushee saw me 
 standing at the window, and right away called in two or 
 three of the Sandy men and threatened my life if I told 
 Hammond. They have watched me like a cat ever since, 
 and never left me and Hammond alone together. They 
 are with Hammond now, launching a coal-boat, or I 'd 
 never have got off with you." 
 
 I sat breathless. I knew it was ruin to let the expected 
 rise pass without getting the coal-boats down; but what 
 could be done ? 
 
 " Don't look so pale, Janet. You can tell Hammond, you 
 know, and he '11 find a way to circumvent them. And it 
 was to tell you all this that I brought you out here this 
 afternoon, only my unlucky tongue would talk of what I 
 see it 's too soon to talk of yet. But here 's Louisa, right 
 ahead. Make haste and get your traps, while I settle my 
 business, and we '11 be back, perhaps, -in ' time for you to 
 manage some way to see Hammond to-night. Nobody 
 knows you went with me, and you '11 never be suspected." 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 423 
 
 Not Tom Salyers's most rapid and vigorous rowing could 
 make our little skiff keep pace with my impatience ; but, 
 thanks to his efforts, the sun was still high when he landed 
 me in the little cove behind our house, where I could run 
 up through the woods to our back-door., while he pulled 
 boldly up to the store-landing and called some of the men 
 to help him carry his purchases up the bank. I did not 
 stop for a. word with my step-mother, but passing rapidly 
 through the house, threw my parcels on the bed in the 
 sitting-room, and, running down the walk to the maple-tree 
 under which my dug-out was always tied, jumped into it 
 and sculled out into the river. The coal-boat had just been 
 launched, and George Hammond was standing on the bank 
 superintending the calking of the seams which the water 
 made visible. I pushed up to the bank, and called to him 
 as I neared, 
 
 " Can you not come, Mr. Hammond, a little way up- 
 stream with me ? I have found those young tulip-trees that 
 you want for your garden ; they are just round the bend 
 above Nat's Creek. Jim Foushee will see to that work, 
 and I have just time to show them to you before supper." 
 
 I was a favorite with Jim Foushee. He laughed a joking 
 welcome to me, as he said, 
 
 " I '11 see to this, sir, if you want to go with Janet Rains- 
 ford. She 's the gal that knows the woods. A splendid 
 Sandy wife you '11 make some young fellow, Janet, if you 
 don't get too book-learned." 
 
 In five minutes we were off and had rounded the point 
 out of sight and hearing. In a few hurried words I told 
 my story, but at first Mr. Hammond would not believe it. 
 
 " Those rrien that I 've done so much for and worked so 
 hard for this winter ! " 
 
 At last, convinced, his face set with the determined look 
 that I had seen on it once or twice before. 
 
 " I '11 not raise the wages of a single man, and, what 's 
 more, I } d turn them all off the place, if only I could find 
 others. But those boats at Catlettsburg, they are the most 
 
424 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 important. The company would send me up men from 
 Cincinnati, if only I could get word to them ; but these 
 rascals will stop any letter I send. Those Sandians are 
 capable of it, or rather they are capable of putting the 
 Irishmen up to doing their dirty work for them." 
 
 " A letter would be safe, if it once reached Catlettsburg ? " 
 I asked. 
 
 Certainly. But how' to get it there ? " 
 
 "I can take it. Nobody will suspect me. Give me the 
 letter to-night, and I will go to-morrow." 
 
 " You, Janet ? you are crazy ! " 
 
 " No, indeed. I often ride to Louisa ; what is to hinder 
 me from having errands to Catlettsburg. I could go down 
 there in one day, and take two days back, if my father 
 thinks it is too much for old Bill to take it through in one." 
 
 " O, you could borrow Swiftfoot I have often lent him 
 to you, and he would carry you safely and surely. I don't 
 believe any harm would come to you, and so much depends 
 upon it." 
 
 I turned the skiff decidedly. 
 
 " You have only to get your letter ready and give it to me 
 when I come over in the morning to borrow Swiftfoot. I 
 will take care of all the rest" 
 
 And, sculling rapidly, we were at the wharf again before 
 he had time to raise objections. I knew that I could per- 
 suade my mother into letting me go to Louisa again the 
 next day, for we needed all our spring purchases, and 
 once there it was easy to find it necessary to go to the mouth. 
 I had never been alone, but often with my father or some of 
 our hands ; besides, I was too well able to take care of my- 
 self, too accustomed to have my own way, to anticipate any 
 anxiety about my not returning. 
 
 And so it proved. The next morning saw me mounted 
 on Swiftfoot, the letter safe in my bosom, and a long list of 
 articles wanted in my pocket. What a lovely ride that was, 
 with the gentle, spirited horse of which I was so fond" for a 
 companion, and my own beautiful forests in all their loveli- 
 
A Half-Life and Half a Life. 425 
 
 est spring green around me, with just enough of mystery 
 and danger in the expedition to add an exhilarating excite- 
 ment, and with the happy consciousness that I was doing 
 something for Mr. Hammond, who had done so much for 
 me, to urge me on ! I cantered merrily past Jim Foushee's 
 cornfield, and, nodding to him, as he stood in the door of his 
 log-house, I enjoyed telling him that I was going to Louisa 
 on a shopping expedition. " Should I get anything for 
 him ? He could see that Mr. Hammond had lent me Swift- 
 foot, so that I should soon be back, if I could buy all I 
 wanted in Louisa ; if not, I did believe I should go on to 
 Catlettsburg : the ride would be so glorious ! " 
 
 And glorious it was. I was happy in myself, happy in my 
 thoughts of my friend, happy in the physical enjoyment of 
 the air, the woods, the sun, the shade. Let me dwell on 
 that ride. I have not had many happy days, but that was 
 one which had its fulness of content. And I succeeded in 
 putting Mr. Hammond's letter into the Catlettsburg post- 
 office, made my little purchases, and turned my horse's head 
 homeward, reaching the end of my journey before my father 
 or step-mother had time to be anxious for me, and having a 
 chance to whisper, " All right," to Tom Salyers, as he took 
 my horse from me at the door of the store. 
 
 The long-expected rise came, and the strike came, Jim 
 Foushee heading it, and standing sullen and determined in 
 the midst of his party. Mr. Hammond was prepared for 
 them. The malcontents came to him in the store, where he 
 was filling Tom's place ; for he had sent Tom to Catletts- 
 burg, avowedly to prepare the boats there to meet the rise, 
 really to have him out of the way. Their first word was 
 met coolly enough. 
 
 "You will not work another stroke, unless I give you 
 higher wages, I understand, Foushee ? And these men say 
 the same thing ? You are their spokesman ? Very well, I 
 am satisfied ; you can quit work to-morrow. I have other 
 hands at the mouth for the boats there, and there is no hur- 
 ry about the coal that lies here." 
 
426 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 Foushee burst out with an oath, 
 
 "That damned Salyers is the traitor! mean, cowardly 
 rascal ! " 
 
 But Mr. Hammond would not tell me more of what 
 passed ; perhaps he was afraid of frightening me. This on- 
 ly he told me that night, when thanking me with glance, 
 voice, and pressure of the hand for all I had done for him. 
 The blood rushed quick and hot through my veins, I was 
 delirious with an undreamed-of happiness, which took away 
 from me all power of answering, of even raising my eyes to 
 his face, and the same delirium followed me to my pillow. 
 He had called me his friend, his little Janet, who was so 
 quick and ready, so fertile in invention, so brave in execu- 
 tion : what should he have done without me ? I repeated 
 his words to myself till they lost all their meaning ; they 
 were only replete with blissful content, and filled me with 
 their music till I dropped asleep for very weariness in say- 
 ing them over. 
 
 The next morning, before I waked, George Hammond 
 had gone. He had left for Catlettsburg to direct the new 
 hands. The works lay idle, the men (those who had been 
 dismissed) lounged around gloomy and sullen, and so passed 
 the week. Then came the news that Mr. Hammond and 
 Tom Salyers had gone to Cincinnati, and would not return 
 for the present, and that such men as were satisfied with 
 the former wages were to be put to work again. Readily 
 did the miners come back to their duty, all but a few of the 
 Sandy men, who returned to their own homes, and all fell 
 into the usual train. 
 
 And I ? There was first the calm sense of happy securi- 
 ty, then the impatience to test again its reality, then the 
 longing homesickness of the heart. As weeks passed on 
 and I saw nothing of him, as I heard of his protracted stay, 
 as I saw Miss Hammond make her preparations to join 
 him, as I watched the boat which carried her away, my sense 
 of loneliness became too heavy for me, and the same pil- 
 low on which I had known those happy slumbers was wet 
 with tears of bitter despondency. 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 427 
 
 And yet I understood neither the happiness nor the tears. 
 I did not know (how should I ?) what were the new feelings 
 which made my heart beat at George Hammond's name. I 
 did not know why I yearned towards his sister with a 
 warmth of love that would fain show itself in kindly word 
 or deed. I did not know why the news that he was coming 
 again, which greeted me after long weeks of weariness, 
 brightened with joyful radiance everything that I saw, and 
 glorified the aspect of my little garret, as I had seen a bril- 
 liant bunch of flowers glorify and refine with a light of 
 beauty the every-day ugliness of our sitting-room. 
 
 I sang my merriest songs that night, and my feet kept 
 time to their music in almost dancing measures. The next 
 day, yes, by noon he would be at home. I could see his 
 boat land from my little window, and then, giving Miss 
 Hammond time to be safely housed, I would row myself 
 over to the store and meet him there. How much I should 
 have to tell him, how much to hear ! 
 
 The morning came, and with it came a nervous bashful- 
 ness. I should never dare to go over to see him. No, I 
 would wait quietly until night, when he would surely come 
 himself to see me. Still I could watch his boat. And ner- 
 vously did I stand, my face pressed against the window- 
 pane, through the long morning hours, my sewing dropped 
 neglected in my lap at the risk of a scolding from my moth- 
 er, watching the slow-passing river, and the leaves hanging 
 motionless over it in the stillness of the summer noon. At 
 last there was a stir on the opposite shore. Yes, the boat 
 must be in sight ; I could even hear the shouts of the boat- 
 men ; and there, rounding the bluff, she was ; there, too, 
 was Mr. Hammond in the stern, with the rudder in his 
 hand ; there sat Miss Hammond, book in hand, with her 
 usual look of listless disdain. But whose was that girlish 
 face raised towards Mr. Hammond, while he pointed out so 
 eagerly the surrounding objects ? whose that slight, girlish 
 figure, crowned with the light garden-hat, with its wealth of 
 golden hair escaping from under it ? 
 
428 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 A sharp pang shot through me. Some one was coming 
 to disturb my happy hours with my teacher and friend ; and 
 the chill of disappointment was on me already. I saw the 
 boat land, saw George Hammond assist carefully every step 
 of the strange girl, saw an elderly gentleman step also upon 
 the bank and give his hand to Miss Hammond, and in two 
 minutes the trees of the landing hid them from my sight. 
 
 And how slowly went the hours of that afternoon ! how 
 nervously I listened to every tread, to every click of the 
 gate ! nay, my sharpened hearing took note of every sway 
 of the branches. But the day passed, the night, and no one 
 came. The next morning brought with it an impatience 
 which mastered me. I must go, I must see him, and in 
 five minutes I was pushing my boat from its cove under the 
 water-maple. 
 
 But I needed not to have left my room ; my visit would 
 be useless ; for, lifting my eyes, as my boat came out from 
 under the leaves, there, on the path by the river-side oppo- 
 site, I saw the strange lady mounted on Swiftfoot, her light 
 figure set off by a cloth riding-habit such as I had never 
 seen before, the graceful folds of which struck me even then 
 with a sense of beauty and fitness. I could even distinguish 
 the golden curls again, which fell close on George Ham- 
 mond's face, as he stood by her side arranging her stirrup, 
 his own horse's bridle over his arm. A backward motion 
 of the oar sent my boat under the branches again, and I sat 
 motionless, watching them as they rode away. 
 
 Two hours afterward they stopped at our gate, and I 
 heard George Hammond's voice calling me. The blood 
 rushed to my forehead. Had I been alone,.! would not have 
 heard ; but my mother was in the room, and I had no ex- 
 cuse for not going forward. He leaned from his horse and 
 shook hands cordially, while, at the same time, he said, 
 
 "I have brought Miss Worthington to see you, Janet. 
 She has heard so much of your kindness to me, and of your 
 courage last spring, that she was anxious to know you. 
 
 " This is Janet Rainsford, Amy," he continued, turning to 
 her. 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 429 
 
 The lovely, bright young face was bent towards me, the 
 tiny hand stretched out to mine, and I heard a gentle voice 
 say, 
 
 " Mr. Hammond has told me so much of you, Janet, (I 
 may call you Janet, may I not ?) that I was determined to 
 come and see you. I hope we shall know each other." 
 
 A great fear seized me then, a fear which seemed to 
 clutch my heart and stop its beatings, leaving me without 
 any power of reply. I only stammered a few words, and 
 Mr. Hammond, pitying what he thought my bashfulness, 
 rode on with a nod of farewell and some words, I could not 
 take in their sense, which seemed to be requests that I 
 would teach Miss Worthington all that I knew of the woods 
 and the country. 
 
 I sat down with a stunned feeling, dizzied with the knowl- 
 edge that seemed to blaze upon me with that horrid fear. 
 Yes, I knew now what it all meant, the happiness, the 
 loneliness of the past weeks, the shrinking bashfulness of 
 yesterday morning, and the chill that fell upon me when I 
 first saw the stranger in the boat. 
 
 I loved George Hammond, I, the country-girl, without 
 one beauty, one accomplishment, so ignorant, so beneath 
 him. I had been fool enough to fling away my heart, and 
 now, now that it was gone from me, there came this terrible 
 fear. What was this young girl to him ? Were my intui- 
 tions right ? Did he love her ? Would she take him away 
 from me ? take away even that poor friendship which was all 
 I asked ? 
 
 That night, I cannot tell of it, the rapid, wearying 
 walk from side to side of my little garret, the despairing 
 flinging myself on the bed, the restlessness that would 
 bring me to my feet again, the pressing my hot face against 
 the cool window-pane, the convulsive sobs with which the 
 struggle ended, the heavy, unrefreshing sleep that came at 
 last, and the dull wakening in the morning, when nothing 
 seemed left abo*ut my heart but a dead weight of insensi- 
 bility. But with the brightening hours came again the 
 
430 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 restlessness. I would at least know the worst ; let me face 
 all my wretchedness ; it could not be but strength would 
 come to me when the worst was over. 
 
 And so I went doggedly through my morning tasks, and 
 the early afternoon saw me at the store. I would not go to 
 Miss Hammond's house, but I was sure to hear something 
 of the new-comers among the gossiping miners and work- 
 men, or, if not there, I had only to drop into some of the 
 cottages to learn from their wives all that they knew or im- 
 agined. How little I learned, how little compared to 
 what my fierce, craving heart asked ! 
 
 " Miss Worthington was here with her father ; they had 
 come to see the mines, so they said ; but who knows the 
 truth ? More like it was to be a wedding between the 
 young folks, and the father wanted to see the Sandy country 
 before he let his daughter come into it She was a sweet- 
 spoken young thing, not like Miss Hammond, with her 
 proud, quality airs." 
 
 But all this was only conjecture, and I must have cer- 
 tainty. The certainty came that evening. Mr. Hammond 
 passed the store as I was standing by the counter, and in- 
 sisted that I should go home to tea with him. I had often 
 done so before, and had no excuse, even when he said, 
 
 "I want so much to make Miss Worthington like our 
 Sandy people, Janet. I want her father to see that there are 
 people worth knowing even here. You will tell her of all the 
 pleasures we have, our walks, our rides. You cannot be 
 afraid of her, dear Janet, she is so gentle, so lovely." 
 
 A strange feeling seized me, one mingled of gentleness 
 and bitterness. Yes, for his sake, I would help him. I 
 would do all I could to welcome to his home her who was 
 to be its blessing, and (here my good angel left me and some 
 evil one whispered) I would show her, .too, that I was not 
 so altogether to be contemned ; she should see that I was 
 not merely the poor country-girl she thought me. 'And all 
 I had of thought or feeling, all that George 'Hammond had 
 called my inborn poetry, came out that evening. I talked, I 
 
A Half-L ife and^ Half a L ife. 43 1 
 
 talked well, for I was talking of what I understood, of my 
 own forests and streams, of the flowers whose haunts I 
 knew so well, of the changing seasons in their varying 
 beauty, nay, as I gained courage, as I saw that I com- 
 manded attention, the books that I had read so well, the 
 thoughts of those great writers that I had made my Own, 
 came to my aid, and quotation and allusion pressed readily 
 to my lips. 
 
 I saw Esther Hammond's cold look fixed upon my face, 
 but I dared it back again, and my color rose and my eye 
 sparkled from the excitement. I felt my triumph when I 
 saw the surprise on Mr. Hammond's face, when I heard the 
 patronizing tone of Mr. Worthington's voice changed to 
 one of equality, as he said, 
 
 " You are a worthy champion of Sandy life, Miss Janet. 
 I believe Amy will be tempted to try it." 
 
 There was a quick blush on Amy's face as I turned to 
 look at it, and a glance of proud affection towards her from 
 George Hammond, which took away my false strength as I 
 stood, leaving me, weak and trembling, to seek my home in 
 the evening twilight. 
 
 That evening's short-lived triumph cost me dear. It 
 betrayed my scarcely self-acknowledged secret to another. 
 Miss Hammond's woman's-eye had read the poor fool who 
 laid her heart open before her. I was made to feel my weak- 
 ness before her the next morning, when, walking into our 
 kitchen, she asked, with her hard, yet dignified calmness, 
 that I should gather for her some of the Summer Sweetings 
 that hung so thick on the tree behind our house. 
 
 She followed me to the orchard. I gathered the apples 
 diligently and spoke no word, but not for that did I escape. 
 She stood calmly looking on till I had finished, then began 
 with that terrible opening from which we all shrink. 
 
 " I should like to speak to you a few moments, Janet." 
 
 I quailed before her, for I had somehow a perception of 
 what she was going to say, though I scarcely dreamed of the 
 hardness with which it would be said. The blow came, 
 however. 
 
432 A Half-Life and Half a Life. 
 
 " My brother has been in the habit of taking notice of 
 you ever since he has been on the Sandy, and he has been 
 of great advantage to you ; but you must be aware that such 
 notice as he gave you when you were a mere child cannot 
 be continued now that you are a woman." 
 
 I bowed my head, and my lips formed something like a 
 "Yes." 
 
 She went on. 
 
 " I say this to you because I was surprised to find by your 
 behavior last night that you had allowed yourself to presume 
 upon that notice, and I do not suppose you know how unbe- 
 coming this is, from a person in your position, especially 
 before Miss Worthington." 
 
 I was stung into a reply. 
 
 " What is Miss Worthington to me ? " came out sullenly 
 from my lips. 
 
 " Nothing to you, certainly, nor can she ever be : but as 
 the future wife of my brother, she is something to me." 
 
 It was true, then ; but so fully had I felt the truth before 
 that this certainty gave me no added pang. From its very 
 depths of despair I drew strength, and, my courage rising, 
 I had power even to look full at Miss Hammond, and 
 say, 
 
 " You may be sure I shall never intrude myself on Mr. 
 Hammond's wife or sister, nor upon him, unless he desires 
 it, except, indeed, to wish him happiness." 
 
 My unexpected calmness roused her worst feelings, her 
 pride, her jealousy, and, with a woman's keen aim, she sent 
 the next dart home. So calmly she spoke, too, with such 
 command of herself, with a lady-like self-control that I, 
 alas ! knew not how to reach. 
 
 " I am happy to hear you say so, for there have been times 
 when your singular manner has made me fear that you 
 nourished some very false and idle dreams, follies that I 
 have sometimes thought it my duty as a woman to warn 
 you against " ; and with one keen look at my burning face, 
 she took up the basket and walked away. 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 433 
 
 I think at that moment I could have killed her, so bitter 
 was the hatred which I felt towards her ; but the next 
 brought its crushing shame, taking away from me all but 
 the desire to hide myself from every eye. Where should I 
 go ? Somewhere where nobody could find me, where I 
 could be insured perfect solitude. It was not difficult to 
 bury myself in the forest that pressed around me on every 
 side, and a few minutes saw me struggling with the embar- 
 rassments of the tangled vines which obstructed the path up 
 our steepest hill. There was in the very difficulties to be 
 overcome something that seemed to bring me relief; they 
 forced my mind from myself. On, on I went, as if my life 
 depended upon my struggles, till, breathless and utterly ex- 
 hausted, I had reached the top of the hill, the highest point 
 for miles around. 
 
 I sank down on the cool grass, the fresh wind blowing on 
 my face, and, too wearied to think, shut my eyes against the 
 beautiful Nature around me, alive only to my own over- 
 powering misery. How long I lay there I never knew. I 
 was safe and alone. I could be wretched as I pleased, away 
 from Miss Hammond's mocking eye, away from the sight 
 of George Hammond's happiness. But, strangely enough, 
 out of the very freedom to be miserable came at last a sense 
 of relief. I looked my wretchedness full in the face. Could 
 I not bear it ? And there rose within me a strength I had 
 not known before. I was young, I had a long life before 
 me ; it could not be but that this great sorrow would pass 
 away. At least I would not nourish it. I would do what I 
 could to help myself. Help myself! For the first time in 
 my life I put up an earnest prayer for help out of myself. 
 The words, coming as such words come but few times in 
 life, out from the very depths of the heart, brought with 
 them their softening influence. The tears sprung forth, 
 those tears which I thought I should never shed again, and 
 I burst into a passionate fit of crying, the passionate crying 
 of a child. It shook me from head to foot with its hysteri- 
 cal convulsions, but it left me at last calmer, soothed into 
 19 BB 
 
434 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 stillness, with only now and then those choking after-sobs 
 which I, child-like, sent forth there on the bosom of the 
 only mother I had ever known, our kindly mother Earth. 
 
 The sun was going down when I rose up, soothed and 
 comforted, and strengthened, too, for a time. I would do 
 what I could. I would live down this grief : how I knew 
 not, but the way would come to me. And gathering up my 
 hair, which had fallen around me, I stopped, on my way 
 home, by a running stream, and bathed my eyes and fore- 
 head until I was fit to appear before my step-mother. She 
 did not question me : she was too used to my unexplained 
 absences since I had grown out of her control. Sufficient 
 for her that my tasks were always performed ; sufficient for 
 her, that, that very evening, I threw myself with an appar- 
 ently untiring energy into the household work, that I 
 never rested a moment till she herself closed the house and 
 insisted that I should go to bed. I slept that night, after 
 such fatigue, it was impossible but that I should, and 
 woke in the morning with a renewed determination to strug- 
 gle against my sorrow. 
 
 Alas ! alas ! I thought I had only to resolve. I thought 
 the struggle would be but once. How little I knew of the 
 daily, almost hourly, changes of feeling, of the despond- 
 ency, the despair, that would come, I knew not why, 
 directly upon my most earnest resolves, my hardest strug- 
 gles, of the weakness that would make me at times give 
 up all struggling as useless, of the mad hope that would 
 sometimes arise that something, some outward change, I did 
 not dare to say what, would bring me some relief ! 
 
 I had at least the courage to keep away from the sight of 
 all that was so miserable to me. I did not see George Ham- 
 mond for weeks, and he, ah ! there was the bitterness, 
 he did not miss me. 
 
 And so the weary days went on. It is wonderful what 
 endurance there is in a young heart, for how long a time 
 it can beat off suffering all day by unceasing labor, and lie 
 awake all night with that same suffering for a bedfel- 
 
A Half-Life and Half a Life. 435 
 
 low, and still make no sign that a careless eye can see. I 
 look at that time now with wonder. How did I bear that 
 constant occupation by day, alternated only with those sleep- 
 less nights, without breaking down entirely ? The crisis 
 came at last, : a sort of stupor, a cessation of suffering 
 indeed, but a cessation, too, of all feeling. I was frightened 
 at myself. Alas ! I had no one to be frightened for me. 
 Could it be that I was going to lose my senses ? But no, I 
 passed through that too, and then came a more natural state 
 of mind than any I had known since the blow fell. 
 
 My suffering self seemed like something apart from me, 
 which I could pity and help, could counsel and act for, and 
 this one thing came clear to me. Some change of scene 
 was necessary to me. I could never go on so ; it was idle 
 to attempt it. I could not live any longer face to face with 
 my grief. There was the whole world before me. Was it 
 not possible to go out into it ? I had health, strength, abil- 
 ity, I was sure of it. How often before had I dreamed over 
 the seeking my fortune in that world which looked to me 
 then so full of excitement ? Nothing had held me back then 
 but the clinging to home-pleasures, to home-enjoyments, to 
 home-comforts, poor as they were, nothing but the sense 
 of safety, of protection. What were these to me now ? I 
 cared nothing for them. I only asked to be away from all that 
 reminded me of my suffering, to be so forced to struggle with 
 external difficulties as to have no thought for myself. I did 
 not want to love anybody ; I would rather have nobody care 
 for me. I would go. The only question was how. 
 
 A few days and nights of thought solved the problem for 
 me, and, once roused to action, I took my steps rapidly and 
 well. The first thing necessary was money, money enough 
 to take me away, and to support me until I could find em- 
 ployment ; and the means of attaining it were within my 
 reach. I owned a watch that had been my mother's, a 
 pretty trinket, though somewhat old-fashioned, and which 
 had often excited the envy of the young wife of one of the 
 head miners. I knew that her husband was flush of money 
 
436 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 just then, for he had drawn his wages only the week before, 
 and I knew, too, that he would give me a good price for 
 my watch, were it only to gratify the bride to whom he had 
 as yet denied nothing. 
 
 The sale was made at once. I do not know if I got 
 anything like the value of the watch, but the next day saw 
 me with fifty dollars in my pocket, a small bundle, made up 
 from the most available part of my wardrobe, under my 
 arm, prepared to walk to Louisa, avowedly to buy supplies, 
 but with the secret determination to meet there the coal- 
 boats which were bound for the mouth, ask a passage on 
 them as far as Catlettsburg, and there take the first steamer 
 that passed, and let it carry me whither it would. 
 
 There was no pause of regret, no delay for parting looks 
 or words ; from the moment that I had made up my mind to 
 go, I felt nothing but a desperate eagerness to be away, to 
 be in action. The few words necessary to prepare my step- 
 mother for my ostensible errand were soon said, the good- 
 morning calmly spoken, and I passed into the forest-path 
 leading to the town. A pang smote me as I remembered 
 her conscientious discharge of duty toward me for so many 
 years ; but it was duty, not love, that had urged her, and 
 while I said that to myself, I said, too, that time would bring 
 to me the opportunity of repaying her. 
 
 Toward the settlement on the opposite shore I turned no 
 look. I would not trust myself; I knew my own weakness 
 too well ; this desperate energy which was carrying me on 
 now would fail, if I allowed my heart one moment's indul- 
 gence. Steadily I walked on through the woods, my own 
 woods, which, perhaps, I should-never see again, till wearied 
 out by the exertion, which had precluded thought, I saw the 
 houses of Louisa rise before me. 
 
 The boats lay at the fork above the town. I had informed 
 myself of their movements, and knew they were to start at 
 noon. A few inquiries for groceries and so forth, where I 
 knew they could not be gotten, gave me an excuse for the 
 proposition to the captain of the boats to give me a passage 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 437 
 
 to Catlettsburg. It was readily granted, and the crew, most 
 of them Sandy men, put up a rough awning, and, spreading 
 under it some blankets, did their kind uttermost to make me 
 comfortable. 
 
 I remember now, as one looks back into a dream, the 
 afternoon and night that passed before we reached Catletts- 
 burg. I lay perfectly quiet, watching the shadowy trees as 
 we glided past them, noting their varied reflections in the 
 water, marking every peculiarity of shore and stream, hear- 
 ing the jests and laughter, the words of command and the 
 oaths, that went round among the boatmen ; but all passed 
 as something with which I had nothing to do. To me 
 there was the burning desire to put a great distance between 
 myself and my home, but with it, too, the consciousness, 
 that, as I could do nothing to expedite our slow progress, 
 so neither could I afford to waste upon it in impatient rest- 
 lessnes the strength which would be so much needed after- 
 wards. The men brought me a cup of coffee from their 
 supper, which gave me strength for the night. The biscuit 
 I could not taste. 
 
 But how long was that night ! how tedious the summer 
 dawn ! and how slowly went the hours till we brought up 
 our boats at the landing at Catlettsburg ! 
 
 I had formed my plans ; so, telling the captain that I 
 might perhaps want to go back with him, I hurried into the 
 town. A steamboat lay by the wharf-boat. " The Bostona, 
 for Cincinnati," said the board displayed over her upper 
 railing. She was to leave at eight o'clock. I walked about 
 the town till half-past seven ; then, returning to the coal- 
 boats, gave to the man left in charge a letter I had prepared 
 in which I told my step-mother, in as few words as possible, 
 that I wanted to see something of the world, and had deter- 
 mined to go for a time either to Cincinnati or to Pittsburg, 
 that I begged her not to be uneasy about me, I had sold 
 my watch, and had money enough for the present ; she 
 should hear from me in due time. The man took the letter, 
 with some remark on my not returning with them, and, with 
 
438 A Half-Life and Half a Life. 
 
 a quiet good-day, I left him and walked rapidly toward the 
 steamer. The plank was laid from the wharf-boat, and, 
 without daring to hesitate, I walked over it. 
 
 It was done. I was fairly separated from everything I 
 had ever known before ; everything now was new to me ; I 
 was ignorant of all around me ; each step might be a mis- 
 take. I felt this, when a porter, stepping forward and taking 
 my bundle, asked me if I would have a state-room. What 
 was a state-room ? I did not know, but saying " Yes," with 
 a desperate feeling that it might as well be "yes " as "no," 
 I was led back to the ladies' cabin, a key was turned in one 
 of an infinite number of little doors, and I was ushered into 
 what looked to me like a closet, with shelves made to take 
 the place of beds. Here at least I was alone, and here I 
 could be alone till dinner-time ; till then there was no call 
 for action on my part. 
 
 And how precious seemed to me every hour of rest I 
 Singularly enough, my great sorrow did not come back 
 to me in those pauses of action. I seemed then to be 
 entirely absorbed in gathering strength for the next occa- 
 sion ; my grief was put away for the future, when there 
 would come to me the time to indulge it. 
 
 So I lay quiet during that morning, looking sometimes 
 through my little window at the passing shore, listening 
 sometimes to the loud talking in the cabin, sometimes to the 
 noises on the boat, wondering if all those strange creakings 
 and shakings could be right, but finding a sense of security 
 in my very ignorance. Dinner came, and in the course of 
 it I found courage to ask the captain, at whose right hand I 
 was placed, what time we should reach Cincinnati. " Not 
 till after breakfast," was his welcome answer; for I had 
 been haunted by a dread of being set adrift in a great city 
 in the middle of the night, when I might perhaps fall into 
 some den of thieves. I had read of such things in my 
 books. This gave me still the afternoon before it would be 
 necessary to think, some hours more in which to rest mind 
 and body. 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 439 
 
 The night came at last, and I must decide what step to 
 take next, that, my mind made up, I might perhaps get 
 some sleep. I turned restlessly in my narrow bed, got up 
 and stood at the window, tried first the upper shelf, and 
 then the lower, but no possible plan presented itself. I still 
 saw before me that terrible city where I should be ten times 
 lonelier than in the midst of our forests, where I should 
 make mistakes at every turn, where I should not know one 
 face out of the many thousands that crowded upon my 
 nervous fancy. I seemed to be Afraid of nothing but human 
 beings, and, at the thought of encountering them, my wo- 
 man's heart gave way. In vain I reasoned with myself, " I 
 shall not see all Cincinnati at once, not more at one time, 
 perhaps, than I saw to-day at dinner." Still came up those 
 endless streets, all filled with strange faces ; still I saw my- 
 self pushed, jostled, by a succession of men and women 
 who cared nothing for me. Suddenly came the thought, 
 " Tom Salyers is in Cincinnati. There is one person there 
 that I know. If I could only find him, he would take care 
 of me till I knew how to take care of myself." 
 
 There came no remembrance of our last conversation to 
 check my eager joy. Indeed, it had never made much im- 
 pression upon me, followed as it had been by so much of 
 nearer interest I set myself to reflect on the means of 
 finding him. He had gone down in the employ of the coal 
 company. The captain could tell me where to look for him, 
 and, satisfied with that, I laid my weary head on my pillow. 
 
 The next morning at breakfast I gained the needed infor- 
 mation. " Did I want to find one of the men in Mr. Ham- 
 mond's employment ? I must go to the coal-yard " ; and 
 the direction was written out for me. 
 
 And now we neared the city. I stood on the guards and 
 looked, wondering at the steamboats that lined the river- 
 bank, at the long rows of houses that stretched before me, 
 the tall chimneys vomiting smoke which obscured the sur- 
 rounding hills, at the crowd of men and drays on the land- 
 ing through which I was to make my way ; but my courage 
 
440 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 rose with the occasion, and, stepping resolutely from the 
 plank, I walked up the hill and stood among the ware- 
 houses. I had been told to " turn to the right and take the 
 first street, I could not miss my way " ; but somehow I did 
 miss my way again and again, and wandered weary and be- 
 wildered, not daring at first to ask for directions, till, gath- 
 ering strength from my very weariness, I at last saw before 
 me the welcome sign. It was something like home to see 
 it ; the familiar names cheered me while they moved me. I 
 entered the office trembling with a wild dread lest I should 
 meet Mr. Hammond there, but the sight of a stranger's 
 face at- the desk gave me courage to ask for Tom Salyers. 
 
 " He is in the yard now. Here, Jim, tell Salyers there 's 
 a person " he hesitated "a lady wants to see him." 
 
 I sat down in a chair which was luckily near me, for my 
 knees trembled so that I could not stand, and as the door 
 opened and Tom's familiar face was before me, my whole 
 composure gave way and I burst into a violent fit of crying. 
 
 "Janet! is it you? For Heaven's sake, what is the 
 matter ? " 
 
 But I could only sob in answer. 
 
 " Has anything happened up Sandy ? Did you come for 
 me?" 
 
 The poor fellow leaned over me, his face pale with sur- 
 prise and agitation. 
 
 " Take me out of here ! " was all I could muster compo- 
 sure enough to say. 
 
 He opened the door, and I escaped into the open air. 
 We walked side by side through the streets, he silently re- 
 specting my agitation with a delicacy for which I had not 
 given him credit, and I struggling to grow calm. At last he 
 opened a little side-gate. 
 
 " Come in here, Janet ; we shall be quiet here." 
 
 And I entered a sort of garden ; the grounds belonging 
 to the city water-works I have since known them to be. 
 We sat down on a bench that overlooked the Kentucky hills. 
 I love the seat now. I think the sight of the familiar fields 
 
A Half-Life and Half a Life. 441 
 
 and trees calmed me, and I was able at last to answer 
 Tom's anxious questions. 
 
 " It is nothing ; indeed, it is nothing. I am a foolish 
 coward, and I was frightened walking through the city, and 
 then the sight of a home-face upset me." 
 
 " But, Janet, why are you here ? Is anything wrong 
 about the works, the men ? Did Mr. Hammond send you 
 down ? " 
 
 " No, indeed, no ! it was only a fancy of mine to see the 
 world. I am tired of that lonely life, and you know I am not 
 needed there. My mother can get along without me, and I 
 am only a burden to my father." 
 
 " Not needed ? Why, Janet, what will the Sandy country 
 be without you ? " 
 
 My eyes filled up with tears again. 
 
 " Don't ask me any more questions, dear Tom ; only 
 help me for a little while, till I can help myself. I want to 
 earn my living somehow, but I have money enough to live 
 upon till I can find something to do. Only find me a place 
 to stay quietly in while I am looking for work. You are the 
 only person I know in this great city ; and who will help 
 me, if you do not ? " 
 
 " You know I will help you with my whole heart and soul, 
 Janet," he said, his voice faltering. 
 
 I looked up, and in one moment rushed back upon me 
 the remembrance of his words that day in the boat, and I 
 stood aghast at the new trouble that seemed to rise before 
 me. My voice must have changed as I said, 
 
 " I only want you to find me a place to live in ; I can take 
 care of myself"; for his countenance fell, and he sat silent 
 for sqme moments. 
 
 At last he spoke : 
 
 " I know I cannot do much, Janet, but what I can, I will. 
 And, first, I will take you to the house of a widow-woman 
 who has a room to let ; one of our men wanted me to take 
 it, but it was too far from my work. I went to see the place, 
 though, and it is quiet and respectable ; the woman looks 
 19* 
 
442 A Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 kind, too. Would you walk slowly down the street, while I 
 go to the office and get my coat ? " he was in his working- 
 dress, " and then I '11 join you." 
 
 I got up, feeling that I had chilled him in some way, and 
 reproaching myself for it. When he rejoined me, we walked 
 silently on, till, after many a turning, we found ourselves in 
 a narrow, quiet street, before a small house, with a tiny yard 
 in front. I do not know how the matter was arranged ; he 
 did it all for me. There was the introducing me to a moth- 
 erly-looking person, as a friend of his from the country ; the 
 going up a narrow staircase to look at a small room of 
 which all that could be said was that it was neat and clean ; 
 the bargaining for my board, in which I was obliged to an- 
 swer " Yes " and " No " as I could best follow his lead ; 
 and then Tom left me with a shake of the hand, and the ad- 
 vice that I should lie down and rest after my tedious jour- 
 ney ; he would see me again in the evening. 
 
 The quiet dinner with my landlady, the afternoon rest, 
 the fresh toilet, the sort of home-feeling that my room al- 
 ready gave me, all did their part towards bringing back my 
 usual composure before Tom came in the evening; and 
 then, sitting by the window in the little parlor, I could talk 
 rationally of my plans for the future. 
 
 I had money enough for twelve weeks' board, even if I 
 reserved ten dollars for other expenses. Surely, in that 
 time I could find something to do. And as to what I should 
 do, I had thought that all over before I left home. I might 
 find some sewing, or tend in a store, or, perhaps, did he 
 think I could ? I might keep school. 
 
 Tom would not hear of my sewing. He knew poor girls 
 that worked their lives out at that. I might tend in a store, 
 if I pleased, but still he did not believe I would like to be 
 tied to one place for twelve hours in the day. Why should 
 n't I keep school ? he was sure I knew enough, I was so 
 smart, and had read so many books. 
 
 I shook my head. I did not believe the books I had read 
 were the kind that school-mistresses studied. Still, I could 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 443 
 
 learn, and certainly I might begin by teaching little children. 
 But where was I to begin ? 
 
 " If only we knew some gentleman, Janet, some city-man, 
 who knew what to do about such things." 
 
 Suddenly a thought struck me. 
 
 " Tom, do you remember those gentlemen who came up 
 to look at the coal mines when they were first opened ? 
 One of them stayed at our house two nights, and saw my 
 books, and talked to me about them. Mr. Kendall was his 
 name." 
 
 " That 's the very man ; and a kind-hearted gentleman 
 he seemed, not stuck up or proud. I '11. find him out for 
 you, Janet, to-morrow ; but there 's no need of your hurry- 
 ing yourself about going to work. You must see the city 
 and the sights." 
 
 And Tom grew enthusiastic in describing to me all that 
 was to be seen in this wonderful place. 
 
 Tom had altered, had improved in appearance and man- 
 ners, since he had known something of city-life. I could 
 not tell wherein the change lay, but I felt it. He told me 
 of himself, of his rising to be head-man, a sort of over- 
 seer, in the coal-yard, of his good wages, of some in- 
 vestments that he had made which had brought him in good 
 returns. 
 
 " So you see, Janet, that, even if you were not so rich 
 yourself, I have plenty of money at your service." 
 
 I thanked him most heartily, and roused myself to show 
 some interest in all that concerned him. 
 
 So passed the rest of the week, quiet days with my 
 landlady, or in my room, where I busied myself in putting 
 my wardrobe into better shape under the direction of Mrs. 
 Barnum, and quiet walks and talks in the evening with Tom 
 Salyers. It was evident that he was not satisfied with my 
 alleged motives for leaving home, but I so steadily avoided 
 all conversation on this point that he learned to respect my 
 silence. On Sunday he told me he had found out who Mr. 
 Kendall was. 
 
444 -d. Half -Life and Half a Life. 
 
 " One of the stockholders of the Company, and a good 
 man, they say. I '11 go to him to-morrow, if you say so, Ja- 
 net, and ask him anything you want to know." 
 
 " No, Tom, I shall go myself. It is my business, and I 
 must not let you do so much for me. If you will go with 
 me, though," I added. 
 
 And so the next morning saw us at Mr. Kendall's count- 
 ing-room. It was before business-hours : we had cared for 
 that. We found Mr. Kendall sitting leisurely over' his 
 papers, his feet up and his spectacles pushed back. I had 
 been nervous enough during the walk, but a glance at his 
 face reassured me. It was a good, a fatherly face, full of 
 bonhommie, but showing, withal, a spice of business-shrewd- 
 ness. I left Tom standing at the counting-room door, and, 
 taking my fate in my own hands, walked forward and made 
 myself known. 
 
 " O yes ! the little girl that Hammond thought so much 
 of, that he talks about so often when he is down here. He 
 thinks a school or two would bring the Sandy people out 
 and holds you up as an example ; but, for my part, I think 
 you are an exception. There are not many of them that 
 one could do much with." 
 
 I turned quickly. 
 
 "This is Tom Salyers, sir, head-workman, overseer, at 
 your coal-yard, and he is a Sandy man." 
 
 Mr. Kendall laughed. 
 
 " I see I must not say anything against the Sandy coun- 
 try ; nor need I just now. Walk in, Mr. Salyers. So, Miss 
 Janet, you have come down to seek your fortune, earn your 
 living, you say. I suppose Hammond sent you to me. Did 
 you bring me a letter from him ? " 
 
 I hesitated. 
 
 " No, sir. Mr. Hammond was so much occupied when I 
 came away that I had not seen him for a day or two. He 
 has friends staying with him." 
 
 " True enough. Mr. Worthington has gone up there with 
 his pretty daughter to see whether he can allow her to bury 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 445 
 
 herself in the country. You saw Miss Worthington ? Will 
 she be popular among your people when she is Mrs. Ham- 
 mond ? " 
 
 I caught a glimpse of Tom's face, and felt myself turning 
 pale as I answered, with a composure that did not seem to 
 come from my own strength, 
 
 " Miss Worthington is a very pleasant-spoken young lady. 
 The people will like her, because she seems to care for them, 
 just as Mr. Hammond does. But do you think, sir, that you 
 could put me in the way of teaching school ? Could I learn 
 how to do it?" 
 
 " Well, I am just the right person to come to, Miss Janet, 
 for the people have put me on the School Board, and yes, 
 we shall want some teachers next month in two of the pri- 
 mary departments. Could you wait a month ? You might 
 be studying up for your examination ; it's not much, but it 
 '11 not hurt you to go over their arithmetics and grammars. 
 And I must write to Hammond to-day about some business 
 of the Company. I '11 ask him about your qualifications, 
 and what he thinks, of it, and we '11 see what can be done. I 
 should not wonder if I could get you a place." 
 
 Mr. Kendall shook hands with us both ; and, bidding him 
 good-morning, with many thanks for his kindness, we went 
 out We walked a square silently. Suddenly Tom turned 
 to me : 
 
 " You did not tell me, Janet, of this young lady." 
 
 " No." 
 
 " And is Mr. Hammond going to marry her ? " 
 
 The blood rushed to my face till it was crimson to the 
 very hair, while I stammered, 
 
 " I do not know, you heard Mr. Kendall." 
 
 Tom's voice was as gentle as a mother's in answer, but 
 his words had little to do with the subject, they were almost 
 as incoherent as mine, something about his hoping I 
 would like living in Cincinnati, that teaching would not be 
 too tiresome for me. But from that moment George Ham- 
 mond's name was never mentioned between us. 
 
446 A Half-Life and Half a Life. 
 
 I wrote that day to my step-mother, telling her of my 
 plans and prospects, and that evening Tom brought me the 
 needed school-books. He had found them by asking some 
 of the men at the yard whose children went to the public 
 schools, and to the study of them I sat down with a deter- 
 mination that no slight difficulty could subdue. The next 
 week brought a long, kind letter from Mr. Hammond, scold- 
 ing me for going as I did, and declaring that he missed me 
 every day. 
 
 " But more than all shall I miss you, Janet, when I bring 
 Miss Worthington back as my wife ; I had depended so 
 upon you as a companion for her. But still it is a good 
 thing for you to see something of the world, and you are 
 bright enough to do anything you set out to do. I have 
 written to Mr. Kendall to do all he can for you, and with Tom 
 to take care of you I am sure you will get along. I begin 
 to suspect that your going away was a thing contrived be- 
 tween Tom and yourself. Who knows how soon he may 
 bring you back among us to show the Sandy farmers' wives 
 how to live more comfortably than some of them do ? Tom 
 has a very pretty place below the mouth of 'Blackberry, if 
 you would only show him how to take care of it." 
 
 There was comfort in this letter, in spite of the tears it 
 caused me. My secret was safe. Miss Hammond had not 
 been so cruel, so traitorous to her se*x, as to betray it. If 
 she had not told it now, she never would tell it, and Tom, if 
 he suspected it, was too good, too noble, to whisper it even 
 to himself. So I laid away my letter, and with a lighter 
 heart turned again to my tasks. 
 
 And now three months have passed, for two of which I 
 have been teaching. There are difficulties, yes, and there is 
 hard work; but I can manage the children. I have the 
 tact, the character, the gift, that nameless something which 
 gives one person control over others ; and for the studies, 
 they are as yet a pleasure to me. I see how they will lead me 
 on to other knowledge, how I may bring into form and make 
 available my desultory reading, and there is a great pleasure 
 
A Half -Life and Half a Life. 447 
 
 in the very study itself. And for the rest, if my great grief 
 is never out of mind, if it is always present to me, at least I 
 can put it back, behind my daily occupations and interests. 
 I begin, too, to see dimly that there are other things in life 
 for a woman to whom the light of life is denied. My heart 
 will always be lonely ; but how much there is to live for in my 
 mind, my tastes, my love for the beautiful ! My little room 
 has taken another aspect. I have so few wants that I can 
 readily devote part of my earnings to gratifying myself with 
 books, pictures. Such lovely prints as I find in the print- 
 shops ! and the flowers, Tom Salyers, who is as kind as a 
 brother, brings me them from the market. And then every- 
 thing is so new to me ; there is so much in life to see, to 
 know. No, I will not be unhappy ; happy I suppose I can 
 never be, but I have strength and courage, and a will to rise 
 above this sorrow which once crushed me to the ground. 
 When I wrote the bitter words with which this record be- 
 gins, I wronged the kind hearts that are around me, I 
 lacked faith in that world wherein I have found help and 
 comfort. 
 
THE MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY. 
 
 SUPPOSE that very few casual readers of the 
 New York Herald of August I3th observed, in 
 an obscure corner, among the " Deaths " the 
 announcement, 
 
 L" NOLAN. Died, on board U. S. Corvette Levant, Lat 2 u I 
 ., Long. 131 W., on the nth of May, PHILIP NOLAN." r * 
 
 I happened to observe it, because I was stranded at the 
 old Mission-House in Mackinaw, waiting for a Lake-Supe- 
 rior steamer which did not choose to come, and I was devour- 
 ing to the very stubble all the current literature I could get 
 hold of, even down to the deaths and marriages in the Her- 
 ald. My memory for names and people is good, and the 
 reader will see, as he goes on, that I had reason enough to 
 remember Philip Nolan. There are hundreds of readers 
 who would have paused at that announcement, if the officer 
 of the Levant who reported it had chosen to make it thus : 
 "Died, May nth, THE MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY." 
 For it was as " The Man without a Country " that poor 
 Philip Nolan had generally been known by the officers who 
 had him in charge during some fifty years, as, indeed, by all 
 the men who sailed under them. I dare say there is many 
 a man who -has taken wine with him once a fortnight, in a 
 three years' cruise, who never knew that his name was 
 " Nolan," or whether the poor wretch had any name at all. 
 
 There can now be no possible harm in telling this poor 
 creature's story. Reason enough there has been till now, 
 
The Man withoiit a Country. 449 
 
 ever since Madison's Administration went out in 1817, for 
 very strict secrecy, the secrecy of honor itself, among the 
 gentlemen of the navy who have had Nolan in successive 
 charge. And certainly it speaks well for the esprit de corps 
 of th profession and the personal honor of its members, that 
 to the press this man's story has been wholly unknown, 
 and, I think, to the country at large also. I have reason 
 to think, from some investigations I made in the Naval 
 Archives when I was attached to the Bureau of Construc- 
 tion, that every official report relating to him was burned 
 when Ross burned the public buildings at Washington. 
 One of the Tuckers, or possibly one of the Watsons, had 
 Nolan in charge at the end of the war; and when, on 
 returning from his cruise, he reported at Washington to one 
 of the Crowninshields, who was in the Navy Department 
 when he came home, he found that the Department 
 ignored the whole business. Whether they really knew 
 nothing about it, or whether it was " Ncni mi ricordo" 
 determined on as a piece of policy, I do not know. But 
 this I do know, that since 1817, and possibly before, no 
 naval officer has mentioned Nolan in his report of a 
 cruise. 
 
 But, as I say, there* is no need for secrecy any longer.. 
 And now the poor creature is dead, it seems to me worth 
 while to tell a little of his story, by way of showing young 
 Americans of to-day what it is to be 
 
 A MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY. 
 / 
 
 Philip Nolan was as fine a young officer as there was in 
 
 the " Legion of the West," as the Western division of. 
 our army was then called. A When Aaron Burr made his 
 first dashing expedition down to New Orleans in 1805, at 
 Fort Massac, or somewhere above on the river, fhe met, 
 as the Devil would have it, this gay, dashing, bright young 
 fellow, at 9lAfce dinner-part)^ttMk> Burr marked him, 
 talked to him, walked with him, took him a day or two's 
 
 cc 
 
45 o The Man without a Country. 
 
 voyage in his flat-boat, and, in short, fascinated him. For 
 the next year, barrack-life was very tame to poor Nolani" 
 He occasionally availed of the permission the great man 
 had given him to write to him. Long, high-worded, stilted 
 letters the poor boy wrote and rewrote and copied. 9 But 
 never a line did he have in reply from the gay deceiverJ 
 The other boys in the garrison sneered at him, because he 
 sacrificed in this unrequited affection for a politician the 
 time which they devoted to Monongahela, sledge, and high- 
 low-jack. Bourbon, euchre, and poker were still unknown. 
 But one day Nolan had his revenge. This time Burr came 
 down the river, not as an attorney seeking a place for his 
 office, but as a disguised conqueror. He had defeated I 
 know not how many district-attorneys ; he had dined at I 
 know not how many public dinners ; he had been heralded 
 in I know not how many Weekly Arguses, and it was ru- 
 mored that hp had an^army behind him and an empire 
 before him^f|00<Juf l ^r great day^^Rifi n i-ruml to poor 
 Nolan. Burr had not been at the fort an hour before he 
 sent for him. f That evening he asked Nolan to take him 
 out in his skiff, to show him a canebrake or a cotton-wood 
 tree, as hersM, *HK% to pocUiM h ; and by the time 
 the sail was over, Nolan was enlisted body and soulJ^From 
 that time, though he did not yet know it, he lived as A MAN 
 
 WITHOUT A COUNTRY. 
 
 What Burr meant to do I know no more than you, dear 
 reader. It is none of our business just now. Only, when 
 the grand catastrophe came, and Jefferson and the House of 
 Virginia of that day undertook to break on the wheel all the 
 jxtssible Clarences of the then House of York, by the great 
 -^treason-trial at Richmond, some of the lesser fry in that 
 distant Mississippi Valleyjwhrcirwas iartnef from us than 
 Puget's Sound is to-day, introduced the like novelty on their 
 provincial stage, and, to while away the monotony of the 
 summer at Fort Adams, got up, for spectacles, a string of 
 court-rnartials on the 'flffi^S* there. I One and another of 
 the colonels and majors were tried, and, to fill out the list, 
 
The Man wit/tout a Country. 451 
 
 little Nolan, against whom, Heaven knows, there was evi- 
 dence enough, that he was sick of the service, had been 
 willing to be false to it, and would have obeyed any order 
 to march any-whither with any one who would follow him, 
 had the order only been signed, " By command of His Exc. 
 A. Burr. "2J The courts dragged on. The big flies escaped. 
 rightly for all I know. I^Nolan was proved guilty enough^ 
 
 as I say ; yet you and I would never have heard of him, 
 HMM!W% but that, when the president of the court asked him 
 at the close, whether he wished to say anything to show that 
 he had always been faithful to the United States, he cried 
 out, in a fit of frenzy, 
 
 " DH-mthe United States ! I wish I may never hear of 
 the United States again ! " 
 
 I suppose he did not know how the words shocked old 
 Colonel Morgan, who was holding the courlj Half the offi- 
 cers who sat in it had served through the Revolution, and 
 their lives, not to say their necks, had been risked for the 
 very idea which he so cavalierly cursed in his madness. 
 He, on his part, had grown up in the West of those days, in 
 the midst of " Spanish plot," " Orleans plot," and all the 
 rest. He had been educated on a plantation where the 
 finest company was a Spanish officer or a French merchant 
 from Orleans. His education, such as it was, had been per- 
 fected in commercial expeditions to Vera Cruz, and I think 
 he told me his father once hired an Englishman to be a pri- 
 vate tutor for a winter on the plantation. He had spent 
 half his youth with an older brother, hunting horses in Tex- 
 as ; and, in a word, to him " United States " was scarcely 
 a reality. Yet he had been fed by " United States " for all 
 the years since he had been in the army. He had sworn on 
 his faith as a Christian to be true to " United States." It 
 was " United States " which gave him the uniform he wore, 
 and the sword by his side. *ti|, ^|*Jffor Nolan, it was 
 only because " United States " had picftd you out first as 
 one of her own confidential men of honor that " A. Burr " 
 cared for you a straw more than for the flat-boat men who. 
 
452 The Man without a Country. 
 
 sailed his ark for him. I do not excuse Nolan ; I only ex- 
 plain to the reader why he damned his country, and wished 
 he might never hear her name againTJ 
 
 i He never did hear her name but once again. From that 
 
 /moment, September 23, 1807, till the day he died, May n, 
 
 ji863, he never heard her name again. For that half-century 
 
 , and more he was a man without a country.^ 
 
 r* Old Morgan, as I said, was terribly shocked. If Nolan 
 
 had compared George Washington to Benedict Arnold, or 
 
 had cried," God save King George," Morgan would not have 
 
 felt worse. He called the court into his private room, and 
 
 returned in fifteen minutes, with a face like a sheet, to 
 
 say, 
 
 " Prisoner, hear the sentence of the Court ! The Court 
 decides, subject to the approval of the President, that you 
 never hear the name of the United States again." 
 
 Nolan laughed. But nobody else laughed. Old Morgan 
 was too solemn, and the whole room was hushed dead as 
 night for a minute. Even Nolan lost his swagger in a mo- 
 ment. Then Morgan added, . 
 
 " Mr. Marshal, take the prisoner to Orleans in an armed 
 L boat, and deliver him to the naval commander there." 
 
 The Marshal gave his orders and the prisoner was taken 
 out of court. 
 
 " Mr. Marshal," continued old Morgan, " see that no one 
 mentions the United States to the prisoner. Mr. Marshal, 
 make my respects to Lieutenant Mitchell at Orleans, and 
 request him to order that no one shall mention the United 
 States to the prisoner while he is on board ship. You will 
 receive your written orders from the officer on duty here this 
 evening. The court is adjourned without day." 
 
 I have always supposed that Colonel Morgan himself took 
 the proceedings of the court to Washington City, and ex- 
 plained them to Mr. Jefferson. Certain it is that the Presi- 
 dent approved them, certain, that is, if I may believe the 
 men who say they have seen his signature. Before the 
 Nautilus got round from New Orleans to the Northern At- 
 
The Man without a Country. 453 
 
 lantic coast with the prisoner on board, the sentence had 
 been approved, and he was a man without a country. 
 
 The plan then adopted was substantially the same which 
 was necessarily followed ever after. Perhaps it was sug- 
 gested by the necessity of sending him by water from Fort 
 Adams and Orleans. The Secretary of the Navy it must 
 have been the first Crowninshield, though he is a man I do 
 not remember was requested to put Nolan on board a Gov- 
 ernment vessel bound on a long cruise, and to direct that he 
 should be only so far confined there as to make it certain 
 that he never saw or heard of the country. We had few 
 long cruises then, and the navy was very much out of fa- 
 vor ; and as almost all of this story is traditional, as I have 
 explained, I do not know certainly what his first cruise 
 was. But the commander to whom he was intrusted, 
 perhaps it was Tingey or Shaw, though I think it was one 
 of the younger men, we are all old enough now regu- 
 lated the etiquette and the precautions of the affair, and ac- 
 cording to his scheme they were carried out, I suppose, till 
 Nolan died. 
 
 When I was second officer of the Intrepid, some thirty 
 years after, I saw the original paper of instructions. I have 
 been sorry ever since that I did not copy the whole of it. 
 It ran, however, much in this way : 
 
 " Washington? (with the date, which 
 r must have been late in 1807.) 
 
 i "Sm, You will receive from Lieutenant Neale the per- 
 son of Philip Nolan, late a Lieutenant in the United States 
 Army. 
 
 " This person on his trial by court-martial expressed with 
 an oath the wish that he might ' never hear of the United 
 States again.' 
 
 " The Court sentenced him to have his wish fulfilled. 
 
 " For the present the execution of the order is intrusted 
 by the President to this department. 
 
 " You \Vill take the prisoner on board your ship, and keep 
 him there with such precautions as shall prevent his escape. 
 
454 The Man without a Country. 
 
 "You will provide him with such quarters, rations, and 
 clothing as would be proper for an officer of his late rank, 
 if he were a passenger on your vessel on the business of his 
 Government J jJG& 
 
 " The gentlemen on board will make any arrangements 
 agreeable to themselves regarding his society. He is to be 
 exposed to no indignity of any kind, nor is he ever unneces- 
 sarily to be reminded that he is a prisoner. 
 
 " But under no circumstances is he ever to hear of his 
 country or to see any information regarding it ; and you will 
 specially caution all the officers under your command to take 
 care, that, in the various indulgences which may be granted, 
 this rule, in which .his punishment is involved, shall not be 
 broken. 
 
 "It is the intention of the Government that he shall never 
 again see the country which he has disowned. Before the 
 end of your cruise you will receive orders which will give 
 effect to this intention. 
 
 /" Respectfully yours, 
 
 "W. SOUTHARD, for the 
 
 Secretary of the Navy."J 
 
 If I had only preserved the whole of this paper, there 
 would be no break in the beginning of my sketch of this 
 story. For Captain Shaw, if it was he, handed it to his suc- 
 cessor in the charge, and he to his, and I suppose the com- 
 mander of the Levant has it to-day as his authority for 
 keeping this man in this mild custody. 
 
 The rule adopted on board the ships on which I have met 
 "the man without a country" was, I think, transmitted 
 from the beginning. No mess liked to have him perma- 
 nently, because his presence cut off all talk of home or of 
 the prospect of return, of politics or letters, of peace or of 
 war, cut off more than half the talk men like to have at 
 sea. But it was always thought too hard that he should 
 never meet the rest of us, except to touch hats, and we 
 finally sank into one system. He was not permitted to 
 
The Man without a Country. 455 
 
 talk with the men, unless an officer was by. With officers 
 he had unrestrained intercourse, as far as they and he chose. 
 But he grew shy, though he had favorites : I was one. 
 Then the captain always asked him to dinner on Monday. 
 Every mess in succession took up the invitation in its turn. 
 According to the size of the ship, you had him at your mess 
 more or less often at dinner. His breakfast he ate in his 
 own state-room, he always had a state-room, which was 
 where a sentinel, or somebody on the watch, could see the 
 door. And whatever else he ate or drank he ate or drank 
 alone. Sometimes, when the marines or sailors had any 
 special jollification, they were permitted to invite " Plain- 
 Buttons," as they called him. Then Nolan was sent with 
 some officer, and the men were forbidden to speak of home 
 while he was there. I believe the theory was that the sight of 
 his punishment did them good. They called him " Plain-But- 
 tons," because, while he always chose to wear a regulation 
 army-uniform, he was not permitted to wear the army-but- 
 ton, for the reason that it bore either the initials or the in- 
 signia of the country he had disowned. 
 
 I remember, soon after I joined the navy, I was on shore 
 with some of the older officers from our ship and from the 
 Brandywine, which we had met at Alexandria. We had 
 leave to make a party and go up to Cairo and the Pyramids. 
 As we jogged along, (you went on donkeys then,) some of 
 the gentlemen (we boys called them " Dons," but the phrase 
 was long since changed) fell to talking about Nolan, and 
 some one told the system which was adopted from the first 
 about his books and other reading. As he was almost 
 never permitted to go on shore, even though the vessel lay 
 in port for months, his time, at the best, hung heavy ; and 
 everybody was permitted to lend him books, if they were 
 not published in America and made no allusion to it. These 
 were common enough in the old days, when people in the 
 other hemisphere talked of the United States as little as we 
 do of Paraguay. He had almost all the foreign papers that 
 came into the ship, sooner or later ; only somebody must go 
 
45 6 The Man without a Country. 
 
 over them first, and cut out any advertisement or stray 
 paragraph that alluded to America. This was a little cruel 
 sometimes, when the back of what was cut out might be as 
 innocent as Hesiod. Right in the midst of one of Napole- 
 on's battles, or one of Canning's speeches, poor Nolan would 
 find a great hole, because on the back of the page of that 
 paper there had been an advertisement of a packet for New 
 York, or a scrap from the President's message. I say this 
 was the first time I ever heard of this plan, which after- 
 wards I had enough, and more than enough, to do with. I 
 remember it, because poor Phillips, who was of the party, 
 as soon as the allusion to reading was made, told a story of 
 something which happened at the Cape of Good Hope on 
 
 plolan's first voyage ; and it is the only thing I ever knew 
 of that voyage. They had touched at the Cape, and had 
 done the civil thing with the English Admiral and the fleet, 
 and then, leaving for a long cruise up the Indian Ocean, 
 
 fPhillips had borrowed a lot of English books from an offi- 
 cer^Jvhich, in those days, as indeed in these, was quite a 
 windfall. Among them, as the Devil would order, was the 
 " Lay of the Last Minstrel," which they had all of them 
 heard of, but which most of them had never seen. I think 
 it could not have been published long. Well, nobody 
 thought there could be any risk of anything national in 
 that, though Phillips swore old Shaw had cut out the 
 " Tempest " from Shakespeare before he let Nolan have it, 
 because he said " the Bermudas ought to be ours, and, by 
 Jove, should be one day." So jjolan was permitted to join 
 the circle one afternoon when a lot of them sat on deck 
 smoking and reading aloud^j People do not do such things 
 so often now ; but when I was young we got rid of a great 
 deal of time so. Well, soffThappened that in his turn No- 
 lan took the book and reacrto the others ; and he read very 
 welf/las I know. Nobody in the circle knew a line of the 
 poem, only it was all magic and Border chivalry, and was 
 ten thousand years ago. Poor Nolan read steadily through 
 the fifth canto, stopped a minute and drank something, and 
 then began, without a thought of what was coming, 
 
The Man without a Country. 457 
 
 " Breathes there the man, with soul so dead, 
 Who never to himself hath said," 
 
 It seems impossible to us that anybody ever heard this for 
 the first time ; but all these fellows did then, and poor No- 
 lan himself went on, still unconsciously or mechanically, 
 
 " This is my own, my native land ! " 
 
 Then they all saw something was to pay ; but he expected 
 to get through, I suppose, turned a little pale, but plunged 
 on, 
 
 " Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned, 
 As home his footsteps he hath turned 
 
 From wandering on a foreign strand ? . 
 If such there breathe, go, mark him well." 
 
 By this time the men were all beside themselves, wishing 
 there was any way to make him turn over two pages ; but 
 he had not quite presence of mind for that ; he gagged a 
 little, colored crimson, and staggered on, 
 
 " For him no minstrel raptures swell ; 
 High though his titles, proud his name, 
 Boundless his wealth as wish can claim, 
 Despite these titles, power, and pelf, 
 The wretch, concentred all in self," 
 
 and here the poor fellow choked, could not go on, but 
 started up, swung the book into the sea, vanished into his 
 state -roomJU and by Jove,", said Phillips, "we did not see 
 him for two months again. And I had to make up some 
 beggarly story to that English surgeon why I did not return 
 his Walter Scott to him." 
 
 That story shows about the time when Nolan's bragga- 
 docio must have broken down. At first, they said, he took 
 a very high tone, considered his imprisonment a mere farce, 
 affected to enjoy the voyage, and all that ; but Phillips said 
 that after he came out of his state-room he never was the 
 same man again. jHe never read aloud again, unless it was 
 the Bible or Shakespeare, or something else he was sure of. 
 But it was not that merely. ^He never entered in with the 
 
458 The Man 'without a Country. 
 
 other young men exactly as a companion again. He was 
 always shy afterwards, when I knew him, very seldom 
 spoke, unless he was spoken to, except to a very few friends. 
 He lighted up occasionally,! I remember late in his life 
 hearing him fairly eloquentfon something which had been 
 suggested to him by one of Fldchier's sermons, but gen- 
 erally he had the nervous, tired look of a heart-wounded 
 man. 
 
 When Captain Shaw was coming home, if, as I ay, it 
 was Shaw, rather to the surprise of everybody they made 
 one of the Windward Islands, and lay off and on for nearly 
 a week. The boys said the officers were sick of salt-junk, 
 and meant to have turtle-soup before they came home. But 
 after several days the Warren came to the same rendezvous ; 
 they exchanged signals ; she sent to Phillips and these 
 homeward-bound men letters and papers, and told them she 
 was outward-bound, perhaps to the Mediterranean, and 
 took poor Nolan and his traps on the boat back to try his 
 second cruise. He looked very blank when he was told to 
 get ready to join her. He had known enough of the signs 
 of the sky to know that till that moment he was going 
 " home." But this was a distinct evidence of something he 
 had not thought of, perhaps, that there was no going 
 home for him, even to a prison. |And this was the first of 
 some twenty such transfers, ^vhich brought him sooner or 
 later into half our best vessels, l^ut which kept him all his life 
 at least some hundred miles from the country he had hoped 
 he might never hear of again/ 
 
 It may have been on that second cruise, it was once 
 when he was up the Mediterranean, that Mrs. Graff, the 
 celebrated Southern beauty of those days, danced with him. 
 They had been lying a long time in the Bay of Naples, and 
 the officers were very intimate in the English fleet, and 
 there had been great festivities, and our men thought they 
 must give a great ball on board the ship. How they ever 
 did it on board the Warren I am sure I do not know. Per- 
 haps it was not the Warren, or perhaps ladies did not take 
 
The Man without a Country. 459 
 
 up so much room as they do now. They wanted to use 
 Nolan's state-room for something, and they hated to do it 
 without asking him to the ball ; so the captain said they 
 might ask him, if they would be responsible that he did not 
 talk with the wrong people, "who would give him intelli- 
 gence." So the dance went on, the finest party that had 
 ever been known, I dare say ; for I never heard of a man- 
 of-war ball that was not. For ladies they had the family of 
 the 'American consul, one or two travellers who had adven- 
 tured so far, and a nice bevy of English girls and matrons, 
 perhaps Lady Hamilton herself. 
 
 Well, different officers relieved each other in standing and 
 talking with Nolan in a friendly way, so as to be sure that 
 nobody else spoke to him. The dancing went on with spirit, 
 and after a while even the fellows who took this honorary 
 guard of Nolan ceased to fear any contre-temps. Only when 
 some English lady Lady Hamilton, as I said, perhaps 
 called for a set of " American dances," an odd thing hap- 
 pened. Everybody then danced contra-dances. The black 
 band, nothing loath, conferred as to what "American 
 dances" were, and started off with "Virginia Reel," which 
 they followed with " Money-Musk," which, in its turn in 
 those days, should have been followed by " The Old Thir- 
 teen." But just as Dick, the leader, tapped for his fiddles 
 to begin, and bent forward, about to say, in true negro 
 state, "'The Old Thirteen,' gentlemen and ladies ! " as he 
 had said " ' Virginny Reel,' if you please ! " and " ' Money- 
 Musk,' if you please ! " the captain's boy tapped him on the 
 shoulder, whispered to him, and he did not announce the 
 name of the dance ; he merely bowed, began on the air, and 
 they all fell to, the officers teaching the English girls the 
 figure, but not telling them why it had no name. 
 
 But that is not the story I started to tell. As the dan- 
 cing went? on, Nolan and our fellows all got at ease, as I said, 
 so much so, that it seemed quite natural for him to bow to 
 that splendid Mrs. Graff, and say, 
 
 " I hope you have not forgotten me, Miss Rutledge. 
 Shall I have the honor of dancing ? " 
 
460 The Man without a Country. 
 
 He did it so quickly, that Fellows, who was by him, could 
 not hinder him. She laughed, and said, 
 
 " I am not Miss Rutledge any longer, Mr. Nolan ; but I 
 will dance all the same," just nodded to Fellows, as if to say 
 he must leave Mr. Nolan to her, and led him off to the place 
 where the dance was forming. 
 
 Nolan thought he had got his chance. He had known 
 her at Philadelphia, and at other places had met her, and 
 this was a Godsend. You could not talk in contra-darices, 
 as you do in cotillons, or even in the pauses of waltzing ; 
 but there were chances for tongues and sounds, as well as 
 for eyes and blushes. He began with her travels, and 
 Europe, and Vesuvius, and the French ; and then, when 
 they had worked down, and had that long talking-time at 
 the bottom of the set, he said, boldly, a little pale, she 
 said, as she told me the story, years after, 
 
 "And what do you hear from home, Mrs. Graff? " 
 
 And that splendid creature looked through him. Jove ! 
 how she must have looked through him ! 
 
 " Home ! ! Mr. Nolan ! ! ! I thought you were the man 
 who never wanted to hear of home again!" and she 
 walked directly up the deck to her husband, and left poor 
 Nolan alone, as he always was. He did not dance 
 again. 
 
 I cannot give any history of him in order ; nobody can 
 now : and, indeed, I am not trying to. These are the tra- 
 ditions, which I sort out, as I believe them, from the myths 
 which have been told about this man for forty years. The 
 lies that have been told about him are legion. The fellows 
 used to say he was the " Iron Mask " ; and poor George 
 Pons went to his grave in the belief that this was the author 
 of "Junius," who was being punished for his celebrated 
 libel on Thomas Jefferson. Pons was not very strong in the 
 historical line. A happier story than either of th|s| I have 
 told is of the War. That came along soon after. I have heard 
 this affair told in three or four ways, and, indeed, it may 
 have happened more than once. But which ship it was on I 
 
The Man without a Country. 461 
 
 cannot tell. However, in one, at least, of the great frigate- 
 duels with the English, in which the navy was really baptized, 
 it happened that a round-shot from the enemy entered one of 
 our ports square, and took right down the officer of the gun 
 himself, and almost every man of the gun's crew. Now you 
 may say what you choose about courage, but that is not a 
 nice thing to see. But, as the men who were not killed 
 picked themselves up, and as they and the surgeon's people 
 were carrying off the bodies, there appeared Nolan, in his 
 shirt-sleeves, with the rammer in his hand, and, just as if he 
 had been the officer, told them off with authority, who 
 should go to the cockpit with the wounded men, who should 
 stay with him, perfectly cheery, and with that way which 
 makes men feel sure all is right and is going to be right. 
 And he finished loading the gun with his own hands, aimed 
 it, and bade the men fire. And there he stayed, captain of 
 that gun, keeping those fellows in spirits, till the enemy 
 struck, sitting on the carriage while the gun was cooling, 
 though he was exposed all the time, showing them easier 
 ways to handle heavy shot, making the raw hands laugh 
 at their own blunders, and when the gun cooled again, 
 getting it loaded and fired twice as often as any other gun 
 on the ship. The captain walked forward by way of encour- 
 aging the men, and Nolan touched his hat and said, 
 
 " I am showing them how we do this in the artillery, 
 sir." 
 
 And this is the part of the story where all the legends 
 agree ; that the Commodore said, 
 
 "I see you do, and I thank you, sir; and I shall never- 
 forget this day, sir, and you never shall, sir." 
 
 And after the whole thing was over, and he had the 
 Englishman's sword, in the midst of the state and cere- 
 mony of the quarter-deck, he said, 
 
 " Where is Mr. Nolan ? Ask Mr. Nolan to come here." 
 
 And when Nolan came, the captain said, 
 
 " Mr. Nolan, we are all very grateful to you to-day ; you 
 are one of us to-day ; you will be named in the despatches." 
 
462 The Man without a Country. 
 
 Arid then the old man took off his own sword of ceremony, 
 and gave it to Nolan, and made him put it on. The man 
 told me this who saw it. Nolan cried like a baby, and well 
 he might. He had not worn a sword since that infernal day 
 at Fort Adams. But always afterwards, on occasions of 
 ceremony, he wore that quaint old French sword of the 
 Commodore's. ^ 
 
 The captain did mention him in the despatches.! It was 
 always said he asked that he might be pardoned. He 
 wrote a special letter to the Secretary of War. But nothing 
 ever came of it. As I said, that was about the time when 
 they began to ignore the whole transaction at Washington, 
 and when Nolan's imprisonment began to carry itself on 
 because there was nobody to stop it without any new orders 
 from home. 
 
 I have heard it said that he was with Porter when he took 
 possession of the Nukahiwa Islands. Not this Porter, you 
 know, but old Porter, his father, Essex Porter, that is, the 
 old Essex Porter, not this Essex. As an artillery officer, 
 who had seen service in the West, Nolan knew more about 
 fortifications, embrasures, ravelins, stockades, and all that, 
 than any of them did ; and he worked with a right good-will 
 in fixing that battery all right. I have always thought it 
 was a pity Porter did not leave him in command there with 
 Gamble. That would have settled all the question about 
 his punishment. We should have kept the islands, and at 
 this moment we should have one station in the Pacific 
 Ocean. Our French friends, too, when they wanted this lit- 
 tle watering-place, would have found it was preoccupied. 
 But Madison and the Virginians, of course, flung all that 
 
 All that was near fifty years ago. If Nolan was thirty 
 then, he must 'have been near eighty when he died. He 
 looked sixty when he was forty. t But he never seemed to 
 me to change a hair afterwards.^ As I imagine his life, from 
 what I have seen and heard 'of it, he must have been in 
 every sea, and yet almost never on land. He must have 
 
The Man without a Country. 463 
 
 known, in a formal way, more officers in our service than 
 any man living knows. He told me once, with a grave 
 smile, that no man in the world lived so methodical a life as he. 
 " You know the boys say I am the Iron Mask, and you know 
 how busy he was." He said it did not do for any one to try 
 to read all the time, more than to do anything else all the time ; 
 but that he read just five hours a day. " Then," he said, " I 
 keep up my note-books, writing in them at such and such 
 hours from what I have been reading ; and I include in 
 these my scrap-books." These were very curious indeed. 
 He had six or eight, of different subjects. There was one 
 of History, one of Natural Science, one which he called 
 " Odds and Ends." But they were not merely books of ex- 
 tracts from newspapers. They had bits of plants and rib- 
 bons, shells tied on, and carved scraps of bone and wood, 
 which he had taught the men to cut for him, and they were 
 beautifully illustrated. He drew admirably. He had some 
 of the funniest drawings there, and some of the most pa- 
 thetic, that I have ever seen in my life. I wonder who will 
 have Nolan's scrap-books. 
 
 Well, he said his reading and his notes were his profes- 
 sion, and that they took five hours and two hours respec- 
 tively of each day. " Then," said he, " every man should 
 have a diversion as well as a profession. My Natural His- 
 tory is my diversion." That took two hours a day more. 
 The men used to bring him birds and fish, but on a long 
 cruise he had to satisfy himself with centipedes and cock- 
 roaches and such small game. He was the only naturalist 
 I ever met who knew anything about the habits of the 
 house-fly and the mosquito. All those people can tell you 
 whether they are Lepidoptera or Steptopotera ; but as for 
 telling how you can get rid of them, or how they get away 
 from you when you strike them, why, Linnaeus knew as 
 little of that as John Foy the idiot did. These nine hours 
 made Nolan's regular daily "occupation." The rest of the 
 time he talked or walked. Till he grew very old, he went 
 aloft a great deal. He always kept up his exercise ; and I 
 
464 The Man without a Country. 
 
 never heard that he was ill. If any other man was ill, he 
 was the kindest nurse in the world ; and he knew more than 
 half the surgeons do. Then if anybody was sick or died, 
 or if the captain wanted him to on any other occasion, he 
 was always ready to read prayers. I have said that he 
 read beautifully. 
 
 My own acquaintance with Philip Nolan began six or 
 eight years after the War, on my first voyage after I was 
 appointed a midshipman. It was in the first days after 
 our Slave -Trade treaty, while the Reigning House, which 
 was still the House of Virginia, had still a sort of senti- 
 mentalism about the suppression of the horrors of the 
 Middle Passage, and something was sometimes done that 
 way. We were in the South Atlantic on that business. 
 From the time I joined, I believe I thought Nolan was 
 a sort of lay chaplain, a chaplain with a blue coat I 
 never asked about him. Everything in the ship was 
 strange to me. I knew it was green to ask questions, 
 and I suppose I thought there was a " Plain-Buttons " on 
 every ship. We had him to dine in our mess once a week, 
 and the caution was given that on that day nothing was to 
 be said about home. But if they had told us not to say any- 
 thing about the planet Mars or the Book of Deuteronomy, 
 I should not have asked why ; there were a great many 
 things which seemed to me to have as little reason. I first 
 came to understand anything about " the man without a 
 country" one day when we overhauled a dirty little schoon- 
 er which had slaves on board. An officer was sent to take 
 charge of her, and, after a few minutes, he sent back his 
 boat to ask that some one might be sent him who could 
 speak Portuguese. We were all looking over the rail when 
 the message came, and we all wished we could interpret, 
 when the captain asked who spoke Portuguese. But none 
 of the officers did ; and just as the captain was sending for- 
 ward to ask if any of the people could, Nolan stepped out 
 and said he should be glad to interpret, if the captain 
 wished, as he understood the language. The captain 
 
The Man without a Cotmtry. 465 
 
 thanked him, fitted out another boat with him, and in this 
 boat it was my luck to go. 
 
 When we got there, it was such a scene as you seldom 
 see, and never want to. Nastiness beyond account, and 
 chaos run loose in the midst of the nastiness. There were 
 not a great many of the negroes ; but by way of making 
 what there were understand that they were free, Vaughan 
 had had their hand-cuifs and ankle-cuffs knocked off, and, 
 for convenience' sake was putting them upon the rascals of 
 the schooner's crew. The negroes were, most of them, out 
 of the hold, and swarming all round the dirty deck, with a 
 central throng surrounding Vaughan and addressing him in 
 every dialect and patois of a dialect, from the Zulu click up 
 to the Parisian of Beledeljereed. 
 
 As we came on deck, Vaughan looked down from a hogs- 
 head, on which he had mounted in desperation, and 
 said, 
 
 " For God's love, is there anybody who can make these 
 wretches understand something ? The men gave them rum, 
 and that did not quiet them. I knocked that big fellow 
 down twice, and that did not soothe him. And then I 
 talked Choctaw to all of them together ; and I '11 be hanged 
 if they understood that as well as they understood the 
 English." 
 
 Nolan said he could speak Portuguese, and one or two 
 fine-looking Kroomen were dragged out, who, as it had been 
 found already, had worked for the Portuguese on the coast 
 at Fernando Po. 
 
 " Tell them they are free," said Vaughan ; " and tell them 
 that these rascals are to be hanged as soon as we can get 
 rope enough." 
 
 Nolan "put that into Spanish," that is, he explained it 
 in such Portuguese as the Kroomen could understand, and 
 they in turn to such of the negroes as could understand 
 them. Then there was such a yell of delight, clinching of 
 fists, leaping and dancing, kissing of Nolan's feet, and a 
 general rush made to the hogshead by way of spontaneous 
 20* DD 
 
466 The Mart without a Country. 
 
 worship of Vaughan, as the deus ex machina of the occa- 
 sion. 
 
 "Tell them," said Vaughan, well pleased, "that I will 
 take them all to Cape Palmas." 
 
 This did not answer so well. Cape Palmas was practi- 
 cally as far from the homes of most of them as New Or- 
 leans or Rio Janeiro was ; that is, they would be eternally 
 separated from home there. And their interpreters, as we 
 could understand, instantly said, " Ah, non Palmas" and 
 began to propose infinite other expedients in most voluble 
 language. Vaughan was rather disappointed at this result 
 of his liberality, and asked Nolan eagerly what they said. 
 The drops stood on poor Nolan's white, forehead, as he 
 hushed the men down, and said, 
 
 " He says, < Not Palmas.' He says, < Take us home, take 
 us to our own country, take us to our own house, take us 
 to our own pickaninnies and our own women.' He says he 
 has an old father and mother who will die if they do not see 
 him. And this one says he left his people all sick, and pad- 
 dled down to Fernando to beg the white doctor to come and 
 help them, and that these devils caught him in the bay just 
 in sight of home, and that he has never seen anybody 
 from home since then. And this one says," choked out 
 Nolan, "that he has not heard a word from his home in 
 six months, while he has been locked up in an infernal bar- 
 racoon." 
 
 Vaughan always said he grew gray himself while Nolan 
 struggled through this interpretation. I, who did not un- 
 derstand anything of the passion involved in it, saw that the 
 very elements were melting with fervent heat, and that 
 something was to pay somewhere. Even the negroes them- 
 selves stopped howling, as they saw Nolan's agony, and 
 Vaughan's almost equal agony of sympathy. As quick as 
 he could get words, he said, 
 
 " Tell them yes, yes, yes ; tell them they shall go to 
 the Mountains of the Moon, if they will. If I sail the 
 schooner through the Great White Desert, they shall go 
 home ! " 
 
The Man without a Country. 467 
 
 * 
 And after some fashion Nolan said so. And then they 
 
 all fell to kissing him again, and wanted to rub his nose 
 with theirs. 
 
 But he could not stand it long ; and getting Vaughan to say 
 he might go back, he beckoned me down into our boat. As 
 we lay back in the stern-sheets and the men gave way, he 
 said to me, " Youngs ter^et-Tii^ "show you what it is to be 
 without a family, without a home, and without a country. 
 And if you are ever tempted to say a word or to do a thing 
 that shall put a bar between you and your family, your home, 
 and your country, pray God in His mercy to take you that 
 instant home to His own heaven. Stick by your family, 
 boy; forget you have a self, while you do everything for 
 them. Think of your home, boy ; write and send, and talk 
 about it. Let it be nearer and nearer to your thought, the 
 farther you have to travel from it ; and rush back to it, when 
 you are free, as that poor black slave is doing now. And for 
 your country, boy," and the words rattled in his throat, "and 
 for that flag," and he pointed to the ship, "never dream 
 a dream but of serving her as she bids you, though the ser- 
 vice carry you through a thousand hells^ No matter what 
 happens to you, no matter who flatters you or who abuses 
 you, never look at another flag, never let a night pass but 
 you pray God to bless that flagJ Remember, boy, that be- 
 hind all these men you have to Qo with, behind officers, and 
 government, and people even, there is the Country Herself, 
 your Country, and that you belong to Her as you belong to 
 your own mother. Stand by Her, boy, as you would stand 
 by your mother, if those devils there had got hold of her 
 to-day ! " 
 
 I was frightened to death by his calm, hard passion ; but 
 I blundered out, that I would, by all that was holy, and that 
 I had never thought of doing anything else. He hardly 
 seemed to hear me ; but he did, almost in a whisper, say, 
 " Oh, if anybody had said so to me when I was of your 
 age!" 
 
 I think it was this half-confidence of his, which I never 
 
468 The Man without a Country. 
 
 abused, for I never told this story till now, which afterward 
 made us great friends. He was very kind to me. Often he 
 sat up, or even got up, at night to walk the deck with me, 
 when it was my watch. He explained to me a great deal 
 of my mathematics, and I owe to him my taste for mathe 
 matics. He lent me books, and helped me about my read- 
 ing. He never alluded 4i tkacaiy to his, story again ; but 
 from one and another officer I have learned, in thirty years, 
 what I am telling. When we parted from him in St. 
 Thomas harbor, at the end of our cruise, I was more sorry 
 than I can tell. I was very glad to meet him again in 1 830 ; 
 and later in life, when I thought I had some influence in 
 Washington, I moved heaven and earth to have him dis- 
 charged. But it was like getting a ghost out 6f prison. 
 They pretended there was no such man, and never was 
 such a man. They will say so at the Department now ! 
 Perhaps they do not know. It will not be the first thing in 
 the service of which the Department appears to know 
 nothing ! 
 
 There is a story that Nolan met Burr once on one of 
 our vessels, when a party of Americans came on board in 
 the Mediterranean. But this I believe to be a lie ; or, 
 rather, it is a myth, ben trovato, involving a tremendous 
 blowing-up with which he sjmk Burr, asking him how he 
 liked to be "without a country." But it is clear, from 
 Burr's life, that nothing of the sort could have happened ; 
 and I mention this only as an illustration of the stories 
 which get a-going where there is the least mystery at 
 bottom. 
 
 |J>o poor Philip Nolan had his wish fulfilled. I know but 
 one fate more dreadful : it is the fate reserved for those 
 men who shall have one day to exile themselves from their 
 country because they have attempted her ruin, and shall 
 have at the same time to see the prosperity and honor to 
 which she rises when she has rid herself of them and their 
 iniquities*?*} The wish of poor Nolan, as we all learned to 
 call him, not because his punishment was too great, but be- 
 
The Man without a Country. 469 
 
 cause his repentance was so clear, was precisely the wish 
 of every Bragg and Beauregard who broke a soldier's oath 
 two years ago, and of every Maury and Barren who broke 
 a sailor's. I do not know how often they have repented. I 
 do know that they have done all that in them lay that they 
 might have no country, that all the honors, associations, 
 memories, and -hopes which belong to "country" might be 
 broken up into little shreds and distributed to the winds. I 
 know, too, that their punishment, as they vegetate through 
 what is left of life to them in wretched Boulognes and Lei- 
 cester Squares, where they are destined to upbraid each 
 other till they die, will have all the agony of Nolan's, with 
 the added pang that every one who sees them will see them 
 to despise and to execrate them. They will have their wish, 
 like him. 
 
 For him, poor fellow, he repented of his folly, and then, 
 like a man, submitted to the fate he had asked for. He 
 never intentionally added to the difficulty or delicacy of the 
 charge of those who had him in hold. Accidents would hap- 
 pen ; but they never happened from his fault. Lieutenant 
 Truxton told me, that, when Texas was annexed, there was 
 a careful discussion among the officers, whether they should 
 get hold of Nolan's handsome set of maps, and cut Texas 
 out of it, from the map of the world and the map of 
 Mexico. The United States had been cut out when the 
 atlas was bought for him. But it was voted, rightly enough, 
 that to do this would be virtually to reveal to him what had 
 happened, or, as Harry Cole said, to make him think Old 
 Burr had succeeded. So it was from no fault of Nolan's 
 that a great botch happened at my own table, when, for a 
 short time, I was in command of the George Washington 
 corvette, on the South-American station. We were lying in 
 the La Plata, and some of the officers, who had been on 
 shore, and had just joined again, were entertaining us with 
 accounts of their misadventures in riding the half-wild 
 horses of Buenos Ayres. Nolan was at table, and was in 
 an unusually bright and talkative mood. Some story of a 
 
470 The Man without a Country. 
 
 tumble reminded him of an adventure of his own, when he 
 was catching wild horses in Texas with his brother Stephen, 
 at a time when he must have been quite a boy. He told the 
 story with a good deal of spirit, so much so, that the 
 silence which often follows a good story hung over the table 
 for an instant, to be broken by Nolan himself. For he 
 asked, perfectly unconsciously, 
 
 " Pray, what has become of Texas ? After the Mexicans 
 got their independence, I thought that province of Texas 
 would come forward very fast It is really one of the finest 
 regions on earth ; it is the Italy of this continent. But I 
 have not seen or heard a word of Texas for near twenty 
 years." 
 
 There were two Texan officers at the table. The reason 
 he had never heard of Texas was that Texas and her affairs 
 had been painfully cut out of his newspapers since Austin 
 began his settlements ; so that, while he read of Honduras 
 and Tamaulipas, and till, quite lately, of California, this 
 virgin province, in which his brother had travelled so far, 
 and, I believe, had died, had ceased to be to him. Waters 
 and Williams, the two Texas men, looked grimly at each 
 other, and tried not to laugh. Edward Morris had his 
 attention attracted by the third link in the chain of the cap- 
 tain's chandelier. Watrous was seized with a convulsion 
 of sneezing. Nolan himself saw that something was to pay, 
 he did not know what. And I, as master of the feast, had 
 to say, . 
 
 " Texas is out of the map, Mr. Nolan. Have you seen 
 Captain Back's curious account of Sir Thomas Roe's Wel- 
 come?" 
 
 After that cruise I never saw Nolan again. I wrote to 
 him at least twice a year, for in that voyage we became even 
 confidentially intimate ; but he never wrote to me. The 
 other men tell me that in those fifteen years he aged very 
 fast, as well he might indeed, but that he was still the same 
 gentle, uncomplaining, silent sufferer that he ever was, bear- 
 ing as best he could his self-appointed punishment, 
 
The Man without a Country. 471 
 
 rather less social, perhaps, with new men whom he did not 
 know, but more anxious, apparently, than ever to serve 
 and befriend and teach the boys, some of whom fairly 
 seemed to worship him. And now it seems the dear old 
 fellow is dead. He has found a home at last, and a 
 country. 
 
 Since writing this, and while considering whether or no 
 I would print it, as a warning to the young Nolans and 
 Vallandighams and Tatnals of to-day of what it is to 
 throw away a country, I have received from Danforth, who 
 is on board the Levant, a letter which gives an account 
 of Nolan's last hours. It removes all my doubts about 
 telling this story. 
 
 To understand the first words of the letter, the non-pro- 
 fessional reader should remember that after 1817, the posi- 
 tion of every officer who had Nolan in charge was one of 
 the greatest delicacy. The government had failed to renew 
 the order of 1807 regarding him. What was a man to do ? 
 Should he let him go ? What, then, if he were called to 
 account by the Department for violating the order of 1807 ? 
 Should he keep him ? What, then, if Nolan should be lib- 
 erated some day, and should bring an action for false impris- 
 onment or kidnapping against every man who had had him 
 in charge ? I urged and pressed this upon Southard, and I 
 have reason to think that other officers did the same thing. 
 But the Secretary always said, as they so often do at Wash- 
 ington, that there were no special orders to give, and that 
 we must act on our own judgment. That means, " If you 
 succeed, you will be sustained ; if you fail, you will be dis- 
 avowed." Well, as Danforth says, all that is over now, 
 though I do not know but I expose myself to a criminal pro- 
 secution on the evidence of the very revelation I am mak- 
 ing. 
 
 Here is the letter : 
 
47 2 The Man without a Country. 
 
 LEVANT, 2 2' S. @ 131 W. 
 
 " DEAR FRED, I try to find heart and life to tell you 
 that it is all over with dear old Nolan. I have been with 
 him on this voyage more than I ever was, and I can under- 
 stand wholly now the way in which you used to speak of the 
 dear old fellow. I could see that he was not strong, but I 
 had no idea the end was so near. The doctor has been 
 watching him very carefully, and yesterday morning came 
 to me and told me that Nolan was not so well, and had not 
 left his state-room, a thing I never remember before. He 
 had let the doctor come and see him as he lay there, the 
 first time the doctor had been in the state-room, and he 
 said he should like to see me. O dear ! do you remember 
 the mysteries we boys used to invent about his room, in 
 the old Intrepid days ? Well, I went in, and there, to be 
 sure, the poor fellow lay in his berth, smiling pleasantly as 
 he gave me his hand, but looking very frail. I could not 
 help a glance round, which showed me what a little shrine 
 he had made of the box he was lying in. The stars and 
 stripes were triced up above and around a picture of Wash- 
 ington, and he had painted a majestic eagle, with lightnings 
 blazing from his beak and his foot just clasping the whole 
 globe, which his wings overshadowed. The dear old boy 
 saw my glance, and said, with a sad smile, ' Here, you see, 
 I have a country ! ' And then he pointed to the foot of his 
 bed, where I had not seen before a great map of the United 
 States, as he had drawn it from memory, and which he had 
 there to look upon as he lay. Quaint, queer old names were 
 on it, in large letters : ' Indiana Territory,' ' Mississippi Ter- 
 ritory,' and ' Louisiana Territory,' as I suppose our fathers 
 learned such things : but the old fellow had patched in 
 Texas, too ; he had carried his western boundary all the 
 way to the Pacific, but on that shore he had denned noth- 
 ing. 
 
 " ' O Danforth,' he said, ' I know I am dying. I cannot 
 get home. Surely you will tell me something now ? Stop ! 
 stop ! Do not speak till I say what I am sure you know, 
 
The Man without a Country. 473 
 
 that there is not in this ship, that there is not in America, 
 God bless her ! a more loyal man than I. There can- 
 not be a man who loves the old flag as I do, or prays 
 for it as I do, or hopes for it as I do. There are thirty- 
 four stars in it now, Danforth. I thank God for that, 
 though I do not know what their names are. There has 
 never been one taken away : I thank God for that. I know 
 by that, that there has never been any successful Burr. O 
 Danforth, Danforth,' he sighed out, 'how like a wretched 
 night's dream a boy's idea of personal fame or of separate 
 sovereignty seems, when one looks back on it after such a 
 life as mine ? But tell me, tell me something, tell me 
 everything, Danforth, before I die ! ' 
 
 " Ingham, I swear to you that I felt like a monster that I had 
 not told him everything before. Danger or no danger, deli- 
 cacy or no delicacy, who was I, that I should have been act- 
 ing the tyrant all this time over this dear, sainted old man, 
 who had years ago expiated, in his whole manhood's life, 
 the madness of a boy's treason ? ' Mr. Nolan,' said I, ' I 
 will tell you everything you ask about. Only, where shall I 
 begin ? ' 
 
 " O the blessed smile that crept over his white face ! and 
 he pressed my hand and said, ' God bless you ! ' ' Tell 
 me their names,' he said, and he pointed to the stars on the 
 flag. * The last I know is Ohio. My father lived in Ken- 
 tucky. But I have guessed Michigan and Indiana and 
 Mississippi, that was where Fort Adams is, they make 
 twenty. But where are your other fourteen ? You have not 
 cut up any of the old ones, I hope ? ' 
 
 " Well, that was not a bad text, and I told him the names 
 in as good order as I could, and he bade me take down his 
 beautiful map and draw them in as I best could with my 
 pencil. He was wild with delight about Texas, told me how 
 his brother died there : he had marked a gold cross where 
 he supposed his brother's grave was ; and he had guessed 
 at Texas. Then he was delighted as he saw California 
 and Oregon ; that, he said, he had suspected partly, be- 
 
474 The Man without a Country. 
 
 cause he had never been permitted to land on that shore, 
 though the ships were there so much. * And the men,' said 
 he, laughing, * brought off a good deal besides furs.' Then 
 he went back heavens, how far ! to ask about the Chesa- 
 peake, and what was done to Barren for surrendering her to 
 the Leopard, and whether Burr ever tried again, and he 
 ground his teeth with the only passion he showed. But in 
 a moment that was over, and he said, ' God forgive me, for I 
 am sure I forgive him.' Then he asked about the old 
 war, told me the true story of his serving the gun the 
 day we took the Java, asked about dear old David Por- 
 ter, as he called him. Then he settled down more quietly, 
 and very happily, to hear me tell in an hour the history of 
 fifty years. 
 
 " How I wished it had been somebody who knew some- 
 thing ! But I did as well as I could. I told him of the 
 English war. I told him about Fulton and the steamboat 
 beginning. I told him about old Scott, and Jackson ; told 
 him all I could think about the Mississippi, and New Or- 
 leans, and Texas, and his own old Kentucky. And do you 
 think he asked who was in command of the * Legion of the 
 West.' I told him it was a very gallant officer named Grant, 
 and that, by our last news, he was about to establish his 
 head-quarters at Vicksburg. Then, 'Where was Vicks- 
 burg?' I worked that out on the map; it was about a 
 hundred miles, more or less, above his old Fort Adams ; 
 and I thought Fort Adams must be a ruin now. 'It must 
 be at old Vick's plantation,' said he ; 'well, that is a 
 change ! ' 
 
 " I tell you, Ingham, it was a hard thing to condense the 
 history of half a century into that talk with a sick man. 
 And I do not now know what I told him, of emigration, and 
 the means of it, of steamboats, and railroads, and tele- 
 graphs, of inventions, and books, and literature, of 
 the colleges, and West Point, and the Naval School, but 
 with the queerest interruptions that ever you heard. You 
 see it was Robinson Crusoe asking all the accumulated 
 questions of fifty-six years ! 
 
The Man without a Country. 475 
 
 " I remember he asked, all of a sudden, who was Presi- 
 dent now ; and when I told him, he asked if old Abe was 
 General Benjamin Lincoln's son. He said he met old Gen- 
 eral Lincoln, when he was quite a boy himself, at some In- 
 dian treaty. I said no, that old Abe was a Kentuckian like 
 himself, but I could not tell him of what family ; he had 
 worked up from the ranks. ' Good for him ! ' cried Nolan ; 
 ' I am glad of that. As I have brooded and wondered, I 
 have thought our danger was in keeping up those regular 
 successions in the first families.' Then I got talking about 
 my visit to Washington. I told him of meeting the Oregon 
 Congressman, Harding ; I told him about the Smithsonian, 
 and the Exploring Expedition ; I told him about the Capi- 
 tol, and the statues for the pediment, and Crawford's Liber- 
 ty, and Greenough's Washington : Ingham, I told him 
 everything I could think of that would show the grand- 
 eur of his country and its prosperity ; but I could not 
 make up my mouth to tell him a word about this infernal 
 Rebellion ! 
 
 " And he drank it in, and enjoyed it as I cannot tell you. 
 He grew more and more silent, yet I never thought he was 
 tired or faint. I gave him a glass of water, but he just wet 
 his lips, and told me not to go away. Then he asked me 
 to bring the Presbyterian ' Book of Public Prayer,' which 
 lay there, and said, with a smile", that it would open at the 
 right place, and so it did. There was his double red 
 mark down the page 5 and I knelt down and read, and he 
 repeated with me, ' For ourselves and our country, O gra- 
 cious God, we thank Thee, that, notwithstanding our mani*- 
 fold transgressions of Thy holy laws, Thou hast continued 
 to us Thy marvellous kindness,' and so to the end of that 
 thanksgiving. Then he turned to the end of the same book, 
 and I read the words more familiar to me, ' Most heartily 
 we beseech Thee with Thy favor to behold and bless Thy 
 servant, the President of the United States, and all others 
 in authority,' and the rest of the Episcopal collect. * Dan- 
 forth,' said he, I have repeated those prayers night and 
 
476 The Man without a Country. 
 
 morning, it is now fifty-five years.' And then he said he 
 would go to sleep. He bent me down over him and kissed 
 me ; and he said, ' Look in my Bible, Danforth, when I am 
 gone.' And I went away. 
 
 " But I had no thought it was the end. I thought he was 
 tired and would sleep. I knew he was happy and I want- 
 ed him to be alone. 
 
 " But in an hour, when the doctor went in gently, he 
 found Nolan had breathed his life away with a smile. He 
 had something pressed close to his lips. It was his father's 
 badge of the Order of Cincinnati. 
 
 " We looked in his Bible, and there was a slip of paper, 
 at the place where he had marked the text, 
 
 " ' They desire a country, even a heavenly : wherefore 
 God is not ashamed to be called their God : for he hath 
 prepared for them a city.' 
 
 " On this slip of paper he had written, 
 
 " ' Bury me in the sea ; it has been my home, and I love 
 it. But will not some one set up a stone for my memory at 
 Fort Adams or at Orleans, that my disgrace may not be 
 more than I ought to bear ? Say on it, 
 
 " ' In Memory of 
 
 '"PHILIP NOLAN, 
 
 "'Lieutenant hi the Army of the United States. 
 
 " ' He loved his country as no other man has loved her ; 
 but no man deserved less at her hands.' " 
 
 NOTE BY THE AUTHOR. 
 
 THIS story was written in the summer of 1863, as a contribu- 
 tion, however humble, towards the formation of a just and true 
 national sentiment, or sentiment of love to the nation. It was at 
 
The Man 'without a Country. 477 
 
 the time when Mr. Vallandigham had been sent across the border. 
 It was my wish, indeed, that the story might be printed before the 
 autumn elections of that year, as my " testimony" regarding the 
 principles involved in them, but circumstances delayed its publi- 
 cation till the December number of the Atlantic appeared. 
 
 It is wholly a fiction, "founded on fact." The facts on which 
 it is founded are these, that Aaron Burr sailed down the Missis- 
 sippi River in 1805, again in 1806, and was tried for treason in 
 1807. The rest, with one exception to be noticed, is all fictitious. . 
 
 It was my intention that the story should have been published 
 with no author's name, other than that of Captain Frederic Ing- 
 ham, U. S. N. Whether writing under his name or my own, I 
 have taken no liberties with history other than such as every writer 
 of fiction is privileged to take, indeed, must take, if fiction is to 
 be written at all. 
 
 The story having been once published, it passed out of my 
 hands. From that moment it has gradually acquired different 
 accessories, for which I am not responsible. Thus I have heard 
 it said, that at one bureau of the Navy Department they say that 
 Nolan was pardoned, in fact, and returned home to die. At 
 another bureau, I am told, the answer to questions is, that, though it 
 is true that an officer was kept abroad all his life, his name was not 
 Nolan. A venerable friend of mine in Boston, who discredits all 
 tradition, still recollects this "Nolan court-martial." One of the 
 most accurate of my younger friends had noticed Nolan's death in 
 the newspaper, but recollected " that it was in September, and not 
 in August." A lady in Baltimore writes me, I believe in good faith, 
 that Nolan has two widowed sisters residing in that neighborhood. 
 A correspondent of the Philadelphia Despatch believed "the arti- 
 cle untrue, as the United States corvette Levant was lost at sea 
 nearly three years since, between San Francisco and San Juan." 
 I may remark that this uncertainty as to the place of her loss rath- 
 er adds to the probability of her turning^up after three years in 
 Lat. 2 n' S., Long. 131 W. A writer in the New Orleans Pica- 
 yune, in a careful historical paper, explained at length that I had 
 been mistaken all through ; that Philip Nolan never went to sea, 
 but to Texas ; that there he was shot in battle, March 21, 1801, 
 and by orders from Spain every fifth man of his party was to be 
 shot, had they not died in prison*. Fortunately, however, he left. 
 
478 The Man without a Country. 
 
 his papers and maps, which fell into the hands of a friend of the 
 Picayune's correspondent. This friend proposes to publish them, 
 and the public will then have, it is to be hoped, the true history 
 of Philip Nolan, the man without a country. 
 
 With all these continuations, however, I have nothing to do. I 
 can only repeat that my Philip Nolan is pure fiction. I cannot 
 send his scrap-book to my friend who asks for it, because I have it 
 not to send. 
 
 I remembered when I was collecting material for my story, that 
 in General Wilkinson's galimatias, which he calls his " Memoirs," 
 is frequent reference to a Jorkins-like partner of his, of the name 
 of Nolan, who, at some time near the beginning of this century, 
 was killed in Texas. Whenever Wilkinson found himself in 
 rather a deeper bog than usual, he used to justify himself by 
 saying that he could not explain such or such a charge because 
 ' ' the papers referring to it were lost when Mr. Nolan was im- 
 prisoned in Texas. " Finding this mythical character in the myth- 
 ical legends of a mythical time, I took the liberty to give him 
 a brother, rather more mythical, whose adventures should be on 
 the seas. I had the impression that Wilkinson's friend was 
 named Stephen, and as such he is spoken of in this stoiy at 
 page 470. As this book goes to press, I find that the New Or- 
 leans paper is right in saying that the Texan hero was named 
 Philip. I am very sorry that I changed him inadvertently to 
 Stephen. It is too late for me to change him back again. I re- 
 member to have heard a distinguished divine preach on St. Phil- 
 ip's day, by accident, a discourse on the life of the Evangelist 
 Stephen. If such a mistake can happen in the best regulated 
 of pulpits, I must be pardoned for mistaking Philip for Stephen 
 Nolan. The reader will observe that he was dead some years be- 
 fore the action of this story begins. In the same connection I 
 must add that Mr. P. Nolan, teamster in Boston, whose horse and 
 cart I venture to recommend to an indulgent public, is no relation 
 of the hero of this tale. 
 
 If any reader considers the invention of a brother too great a lib- 
 erty to take in fiction, I venture to remind him that " 'T is sixty 
 years since " ; and that I should have the highest authority in lit- 
 erature even for much greater liberties taken with annals so far re- 
 moved from our time. 
 
The Man without a Country. 479 
 
 A Boston paper, in noticing the story of "My Double," con- 
 tained in another part of this collection, said it was highly improb- 
 able. I have always agreed with that critic. I confess I have the 
 same opinion of the story of Philip Nolan. It passes on ships 
 which had no existence, is vouched for by officers who never lived. 
 Its hero is in two or three places at the same time, under a pro- 
 cess wholly impossible under any conceivable administration of 
 affairs. In reply, therefore, to a kind adviser in Connecticut, who 
 told me that the story must be apologized for, because it was doing 
 great injury to the national cause by asserting such continued cru- 
 elty of the Federal Government through a half-century, I must be 
 permitted to say that the public, like the Supreme Court of the 
 United States, maybe supposed "to know something." 
 
 Cambridge : Stereotyped and Printed by Welch, Bigelow, & Co. 
 
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