Cliatto &Wind-a.e 3 ALL THINGS." sgard it a rare tribute to the SSAR OIL that it has stood nued demand, and still re- tent judges, the best known human hair." Le Pallet, IK cannot wear out night and morning with [has been renowned for Half fragrant, and non-gritty : any Chemist or Perfumer s PRIZE MEDAL, Sydney, 1879, "First Award. 1 Stapnitrtnwnt iardjables 3E PERFUMERY. KIMMEL'S NEW PERFUMES. PRINCE LEOPOLD, PRINCESS HELEN, WHITE HELIOTROPE, WHITE PINK, WHITE LILAC, MALVETTA, IHLANG-IHLANG, TILIA, JOCKEY CLXIB, and 100 other Scents, from as. 6d. RIMMEL'S CELEBRATED TOILET VINEGAR, is., 21 6d., and S s. RIMMEL'S STIMULUS, for Promoting the Growth of the Hair, as. 6d. RIMMEL'S TRANSPARENT COAL TAR SOAP, combining the Purifying action of tar, with emollientproperties of transparent Soap, is. 6d. per box of 3 Cakes. RIMMEL'S VELVETINE, a refined imperceptible and adherent Toilet Powder (Three Shades), in boxes, i. 6d. ; with puff, us. 6d. RIMMEL'S AQUADENTINE, a fragrant Floral Extract for cleansing and whitening the Teeth, refreshing the Mouth, and sweetening the Breath, as. 6d- RIMMEL'S AROMATIC OZONIZER, or NATUBAL AIR PURIFIER, a fragrant powder, producing in dwelling houses or places of public resort, by simple slow evaporation, the refreshing and healthy emanations of the Pine and Eucalyptus Forests. In 4 oz. tins, is. ; by post for 15 stamps. EUGENE RIMMEL, Perfumer by Appointment to H.R.H. the Princess of Wales, 96, Strand; 128, Regent St. ; & 24, Cornhill, London. 76, King's Rd., Brighton. 9, Boulevard den Capacities, Paris, [ Pipistrello, &c. ] Possessing all the Properties of the Finest Arrowroot, BROWN & POISON'S CORN FLOUR IS A HOUSEHOLD REQUISITE OF CONSTANT UTILITY For tJte Nursery, the Family Table, and the Sick-Room. WELDON'S POPULAR MAGAZINES FOR FAMILIES. WELDON'S LADIES' JOURNAL. Price 3d. Monthly. Contains every Month 32 pages of letterpress, upwards of 60 superb Illustrations of Seasonnble Fashions, Needlework, &c. Extra Gratis Coloured Supplement, and a host of useful reading for Families. Yearly Subscription, 4s., post free. WELDON'S PENNY DRESSMAKER for Families. Price Id. Monthly. Contains every month 24 pages of letterpress, 50 Illustrations and Diagrams, giving the complete Art of Cutting-out and Making-up every article of Clothing for Ladies and Children. Yearly Subscription, is. 6d., post free. WELDON'S PENNY BAZAAR: A Magazine of Children's Fashions. Price Id. Monthly. Contains every month 24 pages of letterpress, 40 Illustrations, a Gratis Cut-out Paper Pattern, &c. Yearly Subscription, Is. 6d. post free. 1ST A complete List of Weldori 's Publications for Ladies post free. WELDON & CO., Fashion Publishers. Offices and Show Rooms, 7, Southampton Street, Strand, and 23. Exeter Street, Strand. K EAT INGS POWDER BUGS - r i r . A- e : *S MOTHS- BtEETL&i HEATING'S COUGH LOZENGES. Absolutely the best-known remedy ever made for COUGHS, ASTHMA, BRONCHITIS Strongly recommended by the most eminent Doctors. TINS ONLY, l/lj and 2/9. Cadbury's Cocoa Essence. Cadbury's Cocoa Essence is threa. times the strength of the best Homoeo pathic Cocoas, which thicken in the cup. CAUTION. Beware of Imita tions, which are often pushed by Shopkeep ers for the sake of extra profit. FOR THE VASELINE SOAP TOILET: MANUFACTURED FROM PURE VASELINE (PETROLEUM JELLY). SIXPENNY AND SHILLING TABLETS. VASELINE is the most healing and soothing substance known to science, and is applied by medical men to the most inflamed and delicate surfaces. It cannot in any lettg-fh of time become rancid. It will be readily understood that Soap made of this material far surpasses any oiher for its beneficial action on the skin Vide Lancet, Daily Telegraph, &c. VASELINE SOAP is the most delicate and elegant Toilet Soap in the market. It retains all the virtues of the Vaseline itself, of which the following appears in the Appendix to Dr SCHLIEM ANN'S Ilios." The famous Dr. VlRCHOW, of Berlin, says: "Of the VASELINE I must make particular acknowledgment, not only against the effects of sunburning on the skin, but also in various excoria tions, especially from riding, it proved to be highly beneficial." VASELINE SOAP HAS BEEN AWARDED SIX PRIZE MEDALS. The Genuine Soap stamped ' ' CHESEBRO UGH" For Sale everywhere. For Pamphlets, address CHESEBROU By DUTTON COOK. Leo. | Paul Foster's Daughter. By WILLIAM CYPLES. Hearts of Gold. By ALPHONSE DAUDET. ' Ivangelisl By HENRY KINGSLEY. Oakshott Castle. | Number Sevei By E. LYNN LINTON. The Evangelist, By JAMES DE MILLE. A Castle in Spain. By J. LEITH DERWENT. Our Lady of Tears. | Circe's Lovers. By CHARLES DICKENS. Sketches by Boz. I Oliver Twist. The Pickwick Papers. | Nicholas Nickleby. CHATTO & WINDUS, Piccadilly, W. By Mrs. ANNIE EDWARDES. A Point of Honour. | Archie Lovell. By M. BETHAM-EDWARDS. Felicia. | Kitty. By EDWARD EGGLESTON. Roxy. By PERCY FITZGERALD. Bella Donna. ] Never Forgotten. Polly. | The Lady, o* Brantonie. The Second Mrs. Tillotson. Seventy-five Brooke Street. By ALBANY DE FONBLANQUE. Filthy Lucre. By R. E. FRANCILLON. Olympia. I One by One. Queen Cophetua. | A Real Queen. Prefaced by Sir H. BARTLE FRERE. Pandnrang Hari. By HAIN FRISWELL. One of Two. By EDWARD GARRETTi The Capel Girls. By JAMES GREENWOOD Dick Temple. By ANDREW HALLIDAY. Every-Day Papers. By Lady DUFFUS HARDY. Paul Wynter'a Sacrifice. By THOMAS HARDY. Under tha Greenwood Tree. By JULIAN HAWTHORNE. Garth. I Dust. Ellice Quentia. I Fortune's Fool. Sebastian Strome. I Beatrix Randolph. Prince Saroni's Wife. | By Sir ARTHUR HELPS. Ivan de Biron. By TOM HOOD. A Golden Heart. By Mrs. GEORGE HOOPER. The House of Ruby. By VICTOR HUGO. The Hunchback of Notre Dame. By Mrs. ALFRED HUNT. Thornlcroffs Model. | The Leaden Casket. Self-Condemned. By JEAN INGELOW. Fated to be Free. By HARRIETT JAY. The Dark Colleen. | Queen of Conuaught. venteen. Patricia Kemball. The Atonement of Learn Dundas. The World Well Lost. Under which Lord? With a Silken Thread. Rebel of the Family. "My Love I" lone. CHEAP EDITIONS OF POPULAR NOVELS. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. By HENRY Gideon By J. MAS Half-a-dozen By JUSTIN Me Dear Lady Disdain. Waterdale Neighbours. My Enemy's Daughter. Maid"; Athens. W. LUCY* Fleyce. TERMAN. Daughters. CARTHY, M.P. Linley Rochford. Miss Misanthrope. Donna Quixote. The Comet of a Season. By CHARL Never too Late toMend. Hard Ca8h. Peg Woffington. Christie Johnstone. Griffith Gaunt. [Place. Put Yourself In His Double Marriage. Love Little, Love Long. Foul Play. Cloister and Hearth. Course of True Love. ES READE. Autobiog. of a Thief. A Terrible Temptation. Wandering Heir. A Simpleton. A Woman-Hater. Singleheart & Double- face Good Stories of Men and other Animals. The Jilt. Beadiana. By GEORGE MACDONALD. Paul Faber. I Thomas Wingfold.1 By Mrs. MACDONELL. Quaker Cousins. By KATHARINE S. MACQUOID. The Evil Eye. | Lost Rose. By W. H. MALLOCK. The New Republic. By FLORENCE MARRYAT. Open I Sesame ! I Fighting the Air. Harvest of Wild Oats. Written In Fire. A Little Stepson. By JEAN MIDDLEMASS. Touch and Go. | Mr. Dorillion, By D. CHRISTIE MURRAY. A Life's Atonement. I By the Gate of the A Model Father. I Sea. Joseph's Coat. I Val Strange. Coals of Fire. | Hearts. By Mrs. OLIPHANT. Whiteladies. By Mrs. ROBERT O'REILLYT Phoebe's Fortune*. By OUIOA. field In Bondage. Pascarel. Strathmore. Signa. Chandos. Under Two Flags. In a Winter City. Ariadne. Idalia. Cecil Castlemaine. Friendship. Moths. T-ricotrin. | Puck. Pipistrello. Folio Farine. A Dog of Flanders. A Village Commune. Bimbi. Two Little Wooden In Maremma. Shoes. Wanda. | Frescoes. By MARGARET AGNES PAUL. Gentle and Simple. By JAMES PAYN. Lost Sir Massingberd. A Perfect Treasure* Bentinck's Tutor. Like Father, Like Son. A Marine Residence, Married Beneath Him. Murphy's Master. A County Family. Mirk Abbey. Not Wooed, but Won. At Her Mercy. 200 Reward. A Woman's Vengeance. Cecil's Tryst. Less Black than We're Painted. Clyffards of Clyffe. Family Scapegrace. Foster Brothers. By Proxy. Under One Roof. High Spirits. Found Dead. Carlyon's Year. Best of Husbands. Walter's Word. A Confidential Agent. Some Private Views. Halves. From Exile. Fallen Fortunes. What He Cost Her. Humorous Stories. A Grape from a Thorn. For Cash Only. Kit. Gwendoline's Harvest. The Canon's Ward. By EDGAR A. POE. The Mystery of Marie Roget. By E. C. PRICE. Valentina. The Foreigners. Mrs. Lancaster's RivalT By F. W. ROBINSON. Women are strange. | The Hands of Justice. By W. CLARK RUSSELL. Round the Galley Eire. By Mrs. J. H. RIDDELL. Her Mother's Darling. I Weird Stories. Uninhabited House | Fairy Water. The Prince of Wales's Garden Party. By BAYLE ST. JOHN. A Levantine Family. By G. A. SALA. Gaslight and Daylight. By JOHN SAUNDERS. Bound to the Wheel. I The Lion in the Path. One Against the World. The Two Dreamers. Guy Waterman. I By KATHARINE SAUNDERS. Joan Merryweather. I Gideon's Rock. Margaret & Elizabeth. | The High Mills. By ARTHUR SKETCH LEY. A Match in the Dark. By T. W. SPEIGHT. The Mysteries of Heron Dyke. By R. A. STERN DALE. The Afghan Knife. By R. LOUIS STEVENSON. New Arabian Nights. By BERTHA THOMAS. Cressida. I Proud Maisie. The Violin-Player. By W. MOY THOMAS. A Fight for Life. By WALTER THORNBURY. Tales for the Marines. By T. ADOLPHUS TROLLOPE. Diamond Cut Diamond. By ANTHONY TROLLOPE. Way We Live Now. (Mr. Scarborough's American Senator. I Family. Frau Frohmann. John Caldigate. Marion Fay. The Golden Lion of Kept in the Dark. Granpere. The Land Leaguers. I By FRANCES ELEANOR TROLLOPE, Anne Furness. | Mabel's Progress. Like Ships upon the Sea. By IVAN TURGENIEFF, &c. Stories from Foreign Novelists. By MARK TWAIN. Tom Sawyer. I An Idle Excursion. Tramp Abroad. | Stolen White Elephant, i A Pleasure Trip on the Continent of Europe. By SARAH TYTLER. What She Came Through. The Bride's Pass. By C. C. FRASER-TYTLER. Mistress Judith. By J. S. WINTER. Cavalry Life. | Regimental Legends. By Lady WOOD. Sabina. By EDMUND YATES. Castaway. | The Forlorn Hope. Land at Last. ANONYMOUS. Paul Ferroll. Why Paul Ferroll Killed his Wife. CHATTO & WINDUS, Piccadilly, W. MARUJA BY BRET HARTE AUTHOR OF 'THE LUCK OF ROARING CAM?," "GABRIEL CONROY," "FLIP," ETC CHATTO AND WINDUS, PICCADILLY 1885 [ The right of translation is reserved*] BRET HARTE. THE name of " Bret Harte " is a household word of delightful acceptance in England as well as in America, associated as it is with the authorship of many popular writings in prose and verse. Mr. Bret Harte's position as American Consul, man of letters, and man of the world is perhaps unique in this country, where he has made personally as many friends as he has found admirers of his talent and genius. Francis Bret Harte was born in Albany, in New York State, in the year 1839. From his father, a graduate of Union College and Professor of Greek at Albany, he received the classical education and teaching to which he is no doubt indebted for the purity and VI BEET EAETE. correctness of his style ; from his mother, a descendant of the old Knickerbocker families, he inherited the courtesy and elegance of his manner, which the rough, adventurous exis tence of his youth was unable to obliterate. That existence, with its varied experiences and picturesque hardships, is too well known and has been too accurately reflected in Bret Harte's literary work to require more than a passing mention ; nor is it necessary to dwell at any length on those first marvellous tales which revealed to the world at once a new country and a new celebrity. Bret Harte is known in all civilized countries as the author of the " Heathen Chinee," and " The Luck of Roaring Camp." He has been editor and founder of a suc cessful magazine, and has been Professor of Belles Lettres in the University of Cali fornia. He has served his country during the civil war, and in time of peace ; indeed, he had achieved fame and reputation at an age when the ordinary run of men have not BEET HARTE. Vil yet tried their power. It may be more in teresting to follow him in his later career, in the years which have been almost entirely passed in Europe. In 1878 Bret Harte was appointed Ameri can Consul at Crefeld, in Germany, and during a two-years' stay in that city he found time, while faithfully discharging duties new to his life and habits, to write the long poem of " A Legend of Cologne," and the tales of " The Twins of Table Mountain," " An Heiress of Eed Dog," "A German Spion," "Peter Schroeder," and " A Gentleman of Laporte." In recognition of his services, he was trans ferred- much to the regret of the German friends he had made to the more important Consular post of Glasgow. For a while he seemed to allow his pen to rest ; but before the world had had time to mourn over a too protracted silence, he once more brilliantly contributed to contemporary literature in the same vein of rich humour and deep pathos essentially his own, and some of those later Vlll BRET EARTE. stories have been universally acknowledged to be among the best and most powerful he ever wrote. Belgravia, Longmans Magazine, Macmillans Illustrated Magazine, have in turn and almost consecutively published " Found at Blazing Star," " Flip," " In the Carquinez Woods," " A Blue Grass Pen elope," " Left Out on Lone Star Mountain," "Sarah Walker," "A Ship of '49," "The Mission of San Carmel," and " An Apostle of the Tules." Bret Harte has made himself, in American literature, not the accomplished imitator of European types and styles, but the most original and effective truly American author ; he is not the less highly esteemed by readers in this country. MARUJA. CHAPTER I. MORNING- was breaking on the high-road to San Jose. The long lines of dusty, level track were beginning to extend their vanish ing point in the growing light ; on either side the awakening fields of wheat and oats were stretching out and broadening to the sky. In the east and south the stars were receding before the coming day ; in the west a few still glimmered, caught among the bosky hills of the Canada del Raimundo, where night seemed to linger. Thither some obscure, low-flying birds were slowly wing ing ; thither a grey coyote, overtaken by the morning, was awkwardly limping. And 2 MARUJA. thither a tramping wayfarer turned, plough ing /through the dust of the highway still unslaked by the dewless night, to climb the fence and likewise seek the distant cover. For some moments man and beast kept an equal pace and gait with a strange similarity of appearance and expression ; the coyote bearing that resemblance to his more civilized and harmless congener, the dog, which the tramp bore to the ordinary pedestrians, but both exhibiting the same characteristics of lazy vaganbondage and semi-lawlessness ; the coyote's slouching amble and uneasy steal thi- ness being repeated in the tramp's shuffling step and sidelong glances. Both were young, and physically vigorous, but both displayed the same vacillating and awkward disinclina tion to direct effort. They continued thus half a mile apart unconscious of eaclT other, until the superior faculties of the brute warned him of the contiguity of aggressive civilization, and he cantered off suddenly to the right, fully five minutes before the bark" MARUJA. 3 ing of dogs caused the man to make a detour to the left to avoid entrance upon a cultivated domain that lay before him. The trail he took led to one of the scant water-courses that issued, half spent, from the Canada, to fade out utterly on the hot June plain. It was thickly bordered with willows and alders, that made an arboured and feasible path through the dense woods and undergrowth. He continued along it as if aimlessly ; stopping from time to time to look at different objects in a dull, mechanical fashion, as if rather to prolong his useless hours, than from any curious instinct, and to occasionally dip in the unfrequent pools of water the few crusts of bread he had taken from his pocket. Even this appeared to be suggested more by a coincidence of material in the bread and water, than from the promptings of hunger. At last he reached a cup-like hollow in the hills liaed with wild clover and thick with resinous odours. Here he crept under a manzanita-bush and disposed 4 MARUJA. himself to sleep. The act showed he was already familiar with the local habits of his class, who used the unfailing dry starlit nights for their wanderings, and spent the hours of glaring sunshine asleep or resting in some wayside shadow. Meanwhile the light quickened, and gradually disclosed the form and outline of the adjacent domain. An avenue cut through a park-like wood, carefully cleared of the undergrowth of gigantic ferns peculiar to the locality, led to the entrance of the Canada. Here began a vast terrace of lawn, broken up by enormous bouquets of flower-beds bewildering in colour and profusion, from which again rose the flowering vines and trailing shrubs that hid pillars, verandah, and even the long fa9ade of a great and dominant mansion. But the delicacy of floral outlines running to the capitals of columns and at times mounting to the pediment of the roof, the opulence of flashing colour or the massing of tropical foliage, con Id not MARUJA. 5 deprive it of the imperious dignity of size and space. Much of this was due to the fact that the original casa an adobe house of no mean pretensions, dating back to the early Spanish occupation had been kept intact, sheathed in a shell of dark-red wood, and still retaining its patio, or inner courtyard, surrounded by low galleries, while additions, greater in extent than the main building, had been erected not as wings and projec tions, but massed upon it on either side, changing its rigid square outlines to a vague parallelogram. While the patio retained the Spanish conception of al fresco seclusion, a vast colonnade of verandah on the southern side was a concession to American taste, and its breadth gave that depth of shadow to the inner rooms which had been lost in the thinner shell of the new erection. Its cloistered gloom was lightened by the red fires of cardinal flowers dropping from the roof, by the yellow sunshine of the jessamine creeping up the columns, by billows of helio- 6 MAEUJA. tropes, breaking over its base as a purple sea. Nowhere else did the opulence of this climate of blossoms show itself as vividly. Even the Castilian roses, that grew as vines along the east front, the fuchsias, that attained the dignity of trees, in the patio, or the four or five monster passion-vines that bestarred the low western wall, and told over and over again their mystic story paled before the sensuous glory of the south verandah. As the sun arose, that part of the quiet house first touched by its light seemed to waken. A few lounging peons and servants made their appearance at the entrance of the patio, occasionally reinforced by an earlier life from the gardens and stables. But the south fa9ade of the building had not ap parently gone to bed at all : lights were still burning dimly in the large ball-room ; a tray with glasses stood upon the verandah near one of the open French windows, and further on, a half-shut yellow fan lay like a fallen leaf. The sound of carriage-wheels on the MARUJA. 7 gravel terrace brought with it voices and laughter and the swiftly passing vision of a char-a-bancs filled with muffled figures bending low to avoid the direct advances of the sun. As the carriage rolled away, four men lounged out of a window on the verandah, shadiDg their eyes against the level beams. One was still in evening dress, arid one in the uniform of a captain of artillery ; the others had already changed their gala attire ; the elder of the party having assumed those extravagant tweeds which the tourist from Great Britain usually offers as a gentle con cession to inferior yet more florid civilization. Nevertheless, he beamed back heartily on the sun, and remarked, in a pleasant Scotch accent, that : Did they know it was very extra ordinary how clear the morning was, so free from clouds and mist and fog ? The young- man in evening dress fluently agreed to the facts, and suggested, in idiomatic French- English, that one comprehended that the bed was an insult to one's higher nature and an 8 MABUJA. ingratitude to their gracious hostess, who had spread out this lovely garden and walks for their pleasure; that nothing was more beautiful than the dew sparkling on the rose, or the matin song of the little birds. The other young man here felt called upon to point out the fact that there was no dew in California, and that the birds did not sing in that part of the country. The foreign young gentleman received this statement with pain and astonishment as to the fact, with passionate remorse as to his own ignorance. But still, as it was a charming day, would not his gallant friend, the Captain here, accept the challenge of the brave Englishman, and " walk him " for the glory of his flag and a thousand pounds ? The gallant Captain, unfortunately, believed that if he walked out in his uniform he would suffer some delay from being intei rogated by wayfarers as to the locality of the circus he would be pleasantly supposed to represent, even if he escaped being shot as a rare Cali- MARUJA. 9 fornia bird by the foreign sporting contingent. In these circumstances, lie would simply lounge around the house until his carriage was ready. Much as it pained him to withdraw from such amusing companions, the foreign young gentleman here felt that he, too, would retire for the present to change his garments, and glided back through the window at the same moment that the young officer carelessly stepped from the verandah and lounged towards the shrubbery. " They've been watching each other for the last hour. I wonder what's up?" said the young man who remained. The remark, without being confidential, was so clearly the first sentence of natural conversation that the Scotchman, although relieved, said, " Eh, man ? " a little cautiously. " It's as clear as this sunshine that Captain Carroll and Gamier are each particularly anxious to know what the other is doing or intends to do this morning." 10 MAEUJA. " Why did they separate, then ? " asked the other. "That's a mere blind. Garnier's looking through his window now at Carroll, and Carroll is aware of it." " Eh ! " said the Scotchman, with good- humoured curiosity. " Is it a quarrel ? Nothing serious, I hope. No revolvers and bowie-knives, man, before breakfast, eh ? " " No," laughed the younger man. " No ! To do Maruja justice, she generally makes a fellow too preposterous to fight. I see, you don't understand. You're a stranger ; I'm an old habitue of the house let me explain. Both of these men are in love with Maruja ; or, worse than that, they firmly believe her to be in love with them" " But Miss Maruja is the eldest daughter of our hostess, is she not ? " said the Scotch man ; "and I understood from one of the young ladies that the Captain had come down from the Fort particularly to pay court to Miss Amita, the beauty." MAEUJA. 11 " Possibly. But that wouldn't prevent Maruja from flirting with him." "Eh! but are you not mistaken, Mr. Kay- mond ? Certainly a more quiet, modest, and demure young lassie I never met." " That's because she sat out two waltzes with you, and let you do the talking, while she simply listened." The elder man's fresh colour for an instant heightened, but he recovered himself with a good-humoured laugh. " Likely likely. She's a capital good listener." " You're not the first man that found her eloquent. Stanton, your banking friend, who never talks of anything but mines and stocks, says she's the only woman who has any con versation ; and we can all swear that she never said two words to him the whole time she sat next to him at dinner. But she looked at him as if she had. Why, man, woman, and child all give her credit for any grace that pleases themselves. And why ? Because she's clever enough not to practice 12 MAEUJA. any OILS of them as graces. I don't know the girl that claims less, and gets more. For instance, you don't call her pretty . . . ? " " Wait a bit. Ye'll not get on so fast, my young friend; I'm not prepared to say that she's not," returned the Scotchman, with good-humoured yet serious caution. " But you would have been prepared yester day, and have said it. She can produce the effect of the prettiest girl here, and without challenging comparison. Nobody thinks of her everybody experiences her." " You're an enthusiast, Mr. Eaymond. As an habitue of the house, of course, you " " Oh, my time came with the rest," laughed the young man, with unaffected frankness. " It's about two years ago now." " I see ; you were not a marrying man." " Pardon me ; it was because I was." The Scotchman looked at him curiously. " Maruja is an heiress. I am a mining engineer." "But, my dear fellow, I thought that in your country " MAEUJA. 13 " In my country, yes. But we are stand ing on a bit of old Spain. This land was given to Dona Maria SaltonstalFs ancestors by Charles Y. Look around you. This verandah, this larger shell of the ancient casa, is the work of the old Salem whaling captain that she married, and is all that is American here. But the heart of the house, as well as the life that circles around the old patio, is Spanish. The Dona's family, the Estudillos and Guitierrez, always looked down upon this alliance with the Yankee captain, though it brought improvement to the land, and increased its value forty-fold, and since his death ever opposed any further foreign intervention. Not that that would weigh much with Maruja if she took a fancy to any one ; Spanish as she is throughout, in thought and grace and feature, there is enough of the old Salem witches' blood in her to defy law and authority in following an unhallowed worship. There are no sons ; she is the sole heiress of the house and estate though. 14 MAEUJA. according to the native custom, her sisters will be separately portioned from the other property, which is very large." "Then the Captain might still make a pretty penny on Amita," said the Scotchman. "If he did not risk and lose it all on Maruja. There is enough of the old Spanish jealousy in the blood to make even the gentle Amita never forgive his momentary defection." Something in his manner made the Scotch man think that Raymond spoke from baleful experience. How else could this attractive young fellow, educated abroad, and a rising man in his profession, have failed to profit by his contiguity to such advantages, and the fact of his being an evident favourite ? " But with this opposition on the part of the relatives to any further alliances with your countrymen, why does our hostess expose her daughters to their fascinating influence ? " said the elder man, glancing at his com panion. " The girls seem to have the usual American freedom/' MARUJA. 15 " Perhaps they are therefore the less likely to give it up to the first man who asks them. But the Spanish duenna still survives in the family the more awful because invisible. It's a mysterious fact that as soon as a fellow becomes particularly attached to any one except Maruja he receives some intimation from Pereo." " What ! the butler ? That Indian-looking fellow ? A servant ? " "Pardon me the mayordomo. The old confidential servitor who stands in loco parentis. No one knows what he says. If the victim appeals to the mistress, she is indisposed ; you know she has such bad health. If in his madness he, makes a con fidante of Maruja, that finishes him." "How?" " Why, he ends by transferring his young affections to her with the usual result." " Then you don't think our friend the Captain has had this confidential butler ask his intentions yet ? " 16 MAEUJA, "I don't think it will be necessary," said the other, drily. " Umph ! Meantime the Captain has just vanished through yon shrubbery. I suppose that's the end of the mysterious espionage you have discovered. No ! De'il take it ! but there's that Frenchman popping out of the myrtle-bush. How did the fellow get there ? And, bless me ! here's our lassie too!" " Yes ! " said Raymond, in a changed voice, it's Marnja ! " She had approached so noiselessly along the bank that bordered the verandah, gliding from pillar to pillar as she paused before each to search fo&< some particular flower, that both men felt an uneasy consciousness. But she betrayed no indication of their presence by look or gesture. So absorbed and abstracted she seemed that, by a common instinct, they both drew nearer the window, and silently waited for her to pass or recognize them. MARUJA. 17 She halted a few paces off to fasten a flower in her girdle. A small youthful figure, in a pale yellow dress, lacking even the maturity of womanly outline. The full oval of her face, the straight line of her back, a slight boyishness in the contour of her hips, the infantine smallness of her sandalled feet and narrow hands, were all suggestive of fresh, innocent, amiable youth and nothing more. Forgetting himself, the elder man mis chievously crushed his companion against the wall in mock virtuous indignation. " Eh, sir," he whispered, with an accent that broadened with his feelings. " Eh, but look at the puir wee lassie ! Will ye no be ashamed o' yerself for putting the tricks of a Circe on sic a honest gentle bairn ? Why, man, you'll be seein' the sign of a limb of Satan in a bit thing with the mother's milk not yet out of her ! She a flirt, speerin' at men, with that modest downcast air? I'm ashamed of ye, Mister Raymond. She's only 18 MARUJA. thinking of her breakfast, puir thing, and not of yon callant. Another sacrilegious word and I'll expose you to her. Have ye no pity on youth and innocence ? " "Let me up," groaned Raymond, feebly, " and I'll tell you how old she is. Hush she's looking." The two men straightened themselves. She had, indeed, lifted her eyes towards the window. They were beautiful eyes, and charged with something more than their own beauty. With a deep brunette setting even to the darkened cornea, the pupils were blue as the sky above them. But they were lit with another intelligence. The soul of the Salem whaler looked out of the passion- darkened orbits of the mother, and was resistless. She smiled recognition of the two men with sedate girlishness, and a foreign incli nation of the head over the flowers she was holding. Her straight, curveless mouth became suddenly charming with the parting MAEUJA. 19 of her lips over her white teeth, and left the impress of the smile in a lighting of the whole face even after it had passed. Then she moved away. At the same moment Gamier approached her. " Come away, man, and have our walk," said the Scotchman, seizing Raymond's arm. " We'll not spoil that fellow's sport." " No ; but she will, I fear. Look, Mr. Buchanan, if she hasn't given him her flowers to carry to the house while she waits here for the Captain ! " " Come away, scoffer ! " said Buchanan, good-humouredly, locking his arm in the young man's and dragging him from the verandah towards the avenue, " and keep your observations for breakfast." 20 MAKUJA. CHAPTER II. IN the meantime the young officer who had disappeared in the shrubbery, whether he had or had not been a spectator of the scene, exhibited some signs of agitation. He walked rapidly on, occasionally switching the air with a wand of willow from which he had impatiently plucked the leaves, through an alley of ceanothus until he reached a little thicket of evergreens, which seemed to oppose his further progress. Turning to one side, however, he quickly found an entrance to a labyrinthine walk, which led him at last to an open space and a rustic summer-house that stood beneath a gnarled and venerable pear tree. The summer-house was a quaint stockade of dark madrono boughs thatched MAEUJA. 21 with red-wood bark, strongly suggestive of deeper woodland shadow. But in strange contrast, the floor, table, and benches were thickly strewn with faded rose-leaves, scattered as if in some riotous play of children. Captain Carroll brushed them aside hurriedly with his impatient foot, glanced around hastily, then threw himself on the rustic bench at full length, and twisted his moustache between his nervous fingers. Then he rose as sud denly, with a few white petals impaled on his gilded spurs, and stepped quickly into the open sunlight. He must have been mistaken ! Every thing was quiet around him ; the far-off sound of wheels in the avenue came faintly, but nothing more. His eye fell upon the pear tree, and even in his pre-occupation he was struck with the signs of its extraordinary age. Twisted out of all proportion, and knotted with excres cences, it was supported by iron bands and heavy stakes, as if to prop up its senile decay. 22 MARUJA. He tried to interest himself in the various initials and symbols deeply carved in bark, now swollen and half obliterated. As he turned back to the summer-house, he for the first time noticed that the ground rose behind it into a long undulation, on the crest of which the same singular profusion of rose- leaves were scattered. It struck him as being strangely like a gigantic grave, and that the same idea had occurred to the fantastic dispenser of the withered flowers. He was still looking at it, when a rustle in the undergrowth made his heart beat ex pectantly. A slinking grey shadow crossed the undulation and disappeared in the thicket. It was a coyote. At any other time the extraordinary appearance of this vivid imper sonation of the wilderness, so near a centre of human civilization and habitation, would have filled him with wonder. But he had room for only a single thought now. "Would she come ? Five minutes passed. He no longer waited MAEUJA. 23 in the summer-house, but paced impatiently before the entrance to the labyrinth. Another five minutes. He was deceived, undoubtedly. She and her sisters were probably waiting for him and laughing at him on the lawn. He ground his heel into the clover, and threw his switch into the thicket. Yet he would give her one only one moment more. " Captain Carroll ! " The voice had been and was to him the sweetest in the world ; but even a stranger could not have resisted the spell of its musical inflection. He turned quickly. She was advancing towards him from the summer- house. " Did you think I was coming that way where everybody could follow me ? " she laughed softly. " No ; I came through the thicket over there," indicating the direction with her flexible shoulder, " and nearly lost my slipper and my eyes look ! " She threw back the inseparable lace shawl from her blonde head, and showed a spray of myrtle 24 MARUJA. clinging like a broken wreath to her fore head. The young officer remained gazing at her silently. " I like to hear you speak my name," he said, with a slight hesitation in his breath. " Say it again." " Car-roll, Car-roll, Car-roll," she mur mured gently to herself two or three times, as if enjoying her own native trilling of the r's. " It's a pretty name. It sounds like a song. Don Carroll, eh ! El Capitan Don Carroll." " But my first name is Henry," he said faintly. " 'Enry that's not so good. Don Enrico will do. But El Capitan Carroll is best of all. I must have it always : El Capitan Carroll ! " " Always ? " He coloured like a boy. " Why not ? " He was confusedly trying to look through her brown lashes ; she was parrying him with the steel of her father's glance. " Come ! "Well, Captain Carroll ! MAEUJA. 25 It was not to tell me your name that I knew already was pretty Car-roll ! " she murmured again, caressing him with her lashes ; " it was not for this that you asked me to meet you face to face in this cold " she made a movement of drawing her lace over her shoulders " cold daylight. That belonged to the lights and the dance, and the music of last night. It is not for this you expect me to leave my guests, to run away from Monsieur Gamier, who pays compli ments, but whose name is not pretty from Mr. Eaymond, who talks of me when he can't talk to me. They will say, this Captain Carroll could say all that before them." " But if they knew," said the young officer, drawing closer to her with a paling face but brightening eyes, " if they knew I had anything else to say, Miss Saltonstall some thing pardon me did I hurt your hand ? something for her alone is there one of them that would have the right to object ? Do not think me foolish, Miss Saltonstall but I 26 MAEUJA. beg I implore you to tell me before I say more." " Who would have a right ? " said Maruja, withdrawing her hand but not her dangerous eyes. " Who would dare forbid you talking to me of my sister? I have told you that Amita is free as we all are." Captain Carroll fell back a few steps, and gazed at her with a troubled face. "Is it possible that you have misunderstood, Miss Saltonstall ? " he faltered. "Do you still think it is Amita that I " He stopped, and added passionately, " Do you remember what I told you? have you forgotten last night ? " " Last night was last night ! " said Maruja, slightly lifting her shoulders. " One makes love at night one marries in daylight. In the music, in the flowers, in the moonlight, one says everything ; in the morning one has breakfast when one is not asked to have councils of war with captains and comman- dantes. You would speak of my sister, Captain MARUJA. 27 Car-roll go on. Dona Amita Carroll sounds very, very pretty. I shall not object." She held out both her hands to him, threw her head back, and smiled. He seized her hands passionately. " No, no ! you shall hear me you shall understand me. I love you, Maruja you, and you alone. God knows I cannot help it God knows I would not help it if I could. Hear me. I will be calm. No one can hear us where we stand. I am not mad. I am not a traitor ! I frankly admired your sister. I came here to see her. Beyond that, I swear to you, I am guiltless to her to you. Even she knows no more of me than that. I saw you, Maruja. From that moment I have thought of nothing dreamed of nothing else." " That is three, four, five days and one afternoon ago ! You see, I remember. And now you. want what ? " " To let me love you, and you only. To let me be with you. To let me win you in time, as you should be won. I am not mad, 28 MARUJA. though I am desperate. I know what is due to your station and mine even while I dare to say I love you. Let me hope, Maruja, I only ask to hope." She looked at him until she had absorbed all the burning fever of his eyes, until her ears tingled with his passionate voice, and then she shook her head. " It cannot be, Carroll no ! never ! " He drew himself up under the blow with such simple and manly dignity that her eyes dropped for the moment. " There is another, then ? " he said sadly. " There is no one I care for better than you. No ! Do not be foolish. Let me go. I tell you that because you can be nothing to me you understand, to me. To rny sister Amita, yes." The young soldier raised his head coldly. " I have pressed you hard, Miss Saltonstall too hard, I know, for a man who has already had his answer ; but I did not deserve this. Good-bye." MARUJA. 29 " Stop," she said gently. " I meant not to hurt you, Captain Carroll. If I had, it is not thus I would have done. I need not have met you here. Would you have loved me the less if I had avoided this meeting ? " He could not reply. In the depths of his miserable heart, he knew that he would have loved her the same. " Come," she said, laying her hand softly on his arm, " do not be angry with me for putting you back only five days to where you were when you first entered our house. Five days is not much of happiness or sorrow to forget, is it, Carroll Captain Carroll ? " Her voice died away in a faint sigh. " Do not be angry with me, if knowing you could be nothing more I wanted you to love ray sister, and my sister to love you. We should have been good friends such good friends." " Why do you say, ' Knowing it could be nothing more ' ? " said Carroll, grasping her hand suddenly. " In the name of Heaven, tell me what vou mean ! " 30 MAEUJA. 66 1 mean I cannot marry unless I marry one of my mother's race. That is my mother's wish, and the will of her relations. You are an American, not of Spanish blood." u But surely this is not your determina tion ? " She shrugged her shoulders. " What would you ? It is the determination of my people." " But knowing this " He stopped ; the quick blood rose to his face. " Gro on, Captain Carroll. You would say, Knowing this, why did I not warn you ? Why did I not say to you when we first met, ' You have come to address my sister ; do not fall in love with me I cannot marry a foreigner ' ? " " You are cruel, Maruja. But, if that is all, surely this prejudice can be removed ? Why, your mother married a foreigner an American." a Perhaps that is why," said the girl quietly. She cast down her long lashes, and with the point of her satin slipper smoothed MARUJA. 31 out the soft leaves of the clover at her feet. " Listen; shall I tell you the story of our house ? Stop ! some one is coming. Don't move ; remain as you are. If you care for me, Carroll, collect yourself, and don't let that man think he has found us ridiculous." Her voice changed from its tone of slight caressing pleading to one of suppressed pride. "He will not laugh much, Captain Carroll ; truly, no." The figure of Gamier, bright, self-possessed, courteous, appeared at the opening of the labyrinth. Too well-bred to suggest, even in complimentary raillery, a possible sentimental situation, his politeness went further. It was so kind in them to guide an awkward stranger by their voices to the places where he could not stupidly intrude ! " You are just in time to interrupt or to hear a story that I have been threatening to tell," she said composedly ; " an old Spanish legend of this house. You are in the majority now, you two, and can stop me if you choose. 32 MAEUJA. Thank you. I warn you it is stupid ; it isn't new ; but it has the excuse of being suggested by this very spot." She cast a quick look of subtle meaning at Carroll, and throughout her recital appealed more directly to him, in a manner delicately yet sufficiently marked to partly soothe his troubled spirit. " Far back, in the very old times, Cabal- leros," said Maruja, standing by the table in mock solemnity, and rapping upon it with her fan, " this place was the home of the coyote. Big and little, father and mother, Senor and Senora Coyotes, and the little muchacho coyotes, had their home in the dark Canada, and came out over these fields, yellow with wild oats and red with poppies, to seek their prey. They were happy. For why ? They were the first ; they had no history, you com prehend, no tradition. They married as they liked " (with a glance at Carroll), " nobody objected ; they increased and multiplied. But the plains were fertile; the game was plenti ful; it was not fit that it should be for the MARUJA. 33 beasts alone. And so, in the course of time, an Indian chief, a heathen, Koorotora, built his wigwam here." " I beg your pardon," said G-arnier, in apparent distress, " but I caught the gentle man's name imperfectly." Fully aware that the questioner only wished to hear again her musical enunciation of the consonants, she repeated " Koorotora " with an apologetic glance at Carroll, and went on. " This gentleman had no history or tradition to bother him either ; whatever Sefior Coyote thought of the matter, he con tented himself with robbing Sefior Koorotora's wigwam when he could, and skulking around the Indian's camp at night. The old chief prospered, and made many journeys round the country, but always kept his camp here. This lasted until the time when the holy Fathers came from the South and Portala, as you have all read, uplifted the wooden Cross on the sea-coast over there, and left it for the heathens to wonder at. Koorotora 34 MAEUJA. saw it on one of his journeys, and came back to the Canada full of this wonder. Now, Koorotora had a wife." "Ah, we shall commence now. We are at the beginning. This is better than Senora Coyota," said Gamier cheerfully. " Naturally, she was anxious to see the wonderful object. She saw it, and she saw the holy Fathers, and they converted her against the superstitious heathenish wishes of her husband. And more than that, they came here " "And converted the land also. Is it not so ? It was a lovely site for a mission," interpolated G-arnier politely. " They built a mission and brought as many of Koorotora's people as they could into the sacred fold. They brought them in in a queer fashion sometimes, it is said; dragoons from the Presidio, Captain Carroll, lassooing them and bringing them in at the tails of their horses. All except Koorotora. He defied them ; he cursed them and his wife MAEUJA. 35 in his wicked heathenish fashion, and said that they too should lose the mission through the treachery of some woman, and that the coyote should yet prowl through the ruined walls of the church. The holy Fathers pitied the wicked man and huilt themselves a lovely garden. Look at that pear tree ! There is all that is, left of it ! " She turned with a mock heroic gesture, and pointed her fan to the pear tree. Gamier lifted his hands in equally simulated wonder. A sudden recollection of the coyote of the morning recurred to Carroll uneasily. " And the Indians," he said, with an effort to shake off the feeling ; " they too have vanished." " All that remained of them is in yonder mound. It is the grave of the chief and his people. He never lived to see the fulfilment of his prophecy. For it was a year after his death that our ancester, Manuel G-uitierrez, came from old Spain to the Presidio with a grant of twenty leagues to settle where he chose. Dona Maria Gruitierrez took a fancy 36 MABUJA. to the canada. But it was a site already in possession of the Holy Church. One night, through treachery, it was said, the guards were withdrawn, and the Indians entered the mission, slaughtered the lay brethren, and drove away the priests. The Commandant at the Presidio retook the place from the heathens, but on representation to the Governor that it was indefensible for the peaceful Fathers without a large military guard, the official ordered the removal of the mission to Santa Cruz, and Don Manuel settled his twenty leagues grant in the Canada. Whether he or Dona Maria had anything to do with the Indian uprising no one knows, but Father Pedro never forgave them. He is said to have declared at the foot of the altar that the curse of the Church was on the land, and that it should always pass into the hands of the stranger." " And that was long ago, and the property is still in the family," said Carroll hurriedly, answering Maruja's eyes. MABUJA. 37 " In the last hundred years there have been no male heirs," continued Martija, still regarding Carroll. " When my mother, who was the eldest daughter, married Don Jose Saltonstall against the wishes of the family, it was said that the curse would fall. Sure enough, Caballeros, it was that year that the forged grants of Micheltorrena were dis covered; and in our lawsuit your Govern ment, Captain, handed over ten leagues of the llano land to the Doctor West, our neigh bour." "Ah, the grey-headed gentleman who lunched here the other day ? You are friends, then ? You bear no malice ? " said Garnier. " What would you ? " said Maruja, with a slight shrug of her shoulders. " He paid his money to the forger. Your corregidores up held him, and said it was no forgery," she continued, to Carroll. In spite of the implied reproach, Carroll felt relieved. He began to be impatient of Garnier's presence, and longed to renew his 38 MARUJA. suit. Perhaps his face showed something of this, for Maruja added, with mock demure- ness, " It's always dreadful to be the eldest sister ; but think what it is to be in the direct line of a curse ! Now, there's Amita she's free to do as she likes, with no family respon sibility ; while poor me ! " She dropped her eyes, but not until they had again sought and half-reproved the brightening eyes of Carroll. " But," said Gamier, with a sudden change from his easy security and courteous indiffer ence to an almost harsh impatience, " you do not mean to say, Mademoiselle, that you have the least belief in this rubbish, this ridiculous canard ? " Maruja's straight mouth quickly tightened over her teeth. She shot a significant glance at Carroll, but instantly resumed her former manner. " It matters little what a foolish girl like myself believes. The rest of the family, even the servants and children, all believe it. It MAEUJA. 39 is a part of their religion. Look at these flowers around the pear tree and scattered on that Indian mound. They regularly find their way there on saints' days and festas. They are not rubbish, Monsieur Gamier; they are propitiatory sacrifices. Pereo would believe that a temblor would swallow up the casa if we should ever forego these customary rites. Is it a mere absurdity that forced my father to build these modern additions around the heart of the old adobe house, leaving it untouched, so that the curse might not be fulfilled even by implication ? " She had assumed an air of such pretty earnestness and passion ; her satin face was illuminated as by some softly sensuous light within more bewildering than mere colour, that Gamier, all devoted eyes and courteous blandishment, broke out " But this curse must fall harmlessly before the incarnation of blessing ; Miss Saltonstall has no more to fear than the angels. She is the one predestined through her 40 MAEUJA. charm, through her goodness, to lift it for ever." Carroll could not have helped echoing the aspirations of his rival, had not the next words of his mistress thrilled him with super stitious terror. " A thousand thanks, Senor. Who knows ? But I shall have warning when it falls. A day or two before the awful invader arrives, a coyote suddenly appears in broad daylight, mysteriously, near the casa. This - midnight marauder, now banished to the thickest canon, cornes again to prowl around the home of his ancestors. Caramba! Senor Captain, what are you staring at? You frighten me ! Stop it, I say ! " She had turned upon him, stamping her little foot in quite a frightened, childlike way. "Nothing," laughed Carroll, the quick blood returning to his cheek. "But you must not be angry with one for being quite carried away with your dramatic intensity. MARUJA. 41 By Jove ! I thought I could see the whole thing while you were speaking ; the old Indian, the priest, and the coyote ! " His eyes sparkled. The wild thought had oc curred to him that perhaps, in spite of him self, he was the young woman's predestined fate, and in the very selfishness of his passion he smiled at the mere material loss of lands and prestige that would follow it. " Then the coyote has always preceded some change in the family fortunes ? " he asked boldly. " On my mother's wedding day," said Maruja in a lower voice, " after the party had come from church to supper in the old casa, my father asked, ' What dog is that under the table?' When they lifted the cloth to look, a coyote rushed from the very midst of the guests and dashed out across the patio. No one knew how or when he entered." " Heaven grant that we do not find he has eaten our breakfast ! " said Gamier gaily, "for I judge it is waiting us. I hear your 42 MARUJA. sister's voice among the others crossing the lawn. Shall we tear ourselves away from the tombs of our ancestors, and join them ? " " Not as I am looking now, thank you," said Maruja, throwing the lace over her head. " I shall not submit myself to a comparison of their fresher faces and toilettes by you two gentlemen. Go you both and join them. I shall wait and say an Ave for the soul of Koorotora and slip back alone the way I came." She had steadily evaded the pleading glance of Carroll; and though her bright face and unblemished toilette showed the in efficiency of her excuse, it was evident that her wish to be alone was genuine and without coquetry. They could only lift their hats and turn regretfully away. As the red cap of the young officer dis appeared amidst the evergreen foliage the young woman uttered a faint sigh, which she repeated a moment after as a slight nervous yawn. Then she opened and shut her fan MAEUJA. 43 once or twice, striking the sticks against her little pale palm, and then, gathering the lace under her oval chin with one hand and catching her fan and skirt with the other, bent her head and dipped into the bushes. She carne out on the other side near a low fence, that separated the park from a narrow lane which communicated with the high-road beyond. As she neared the fence, a slinking figure limped along the lane before her. It was the tramp of the early morning. They raised their heads at the same moment and their eyes met. The tramp, in that clearer light, showed a spare, but bent figure, roughly clad in a miner's shirt and canvas trousers, splashed and streaked with soil, and half hidden in a ragged blue cast- off army overcoat lazily hanging from one shoulder. His thin sunburnt face was not without a certain sullen suspicious intel ligence, and a look of half-sneering defiance. He stopped, as a startled, surly animal might have stopped at some unusual object, but did 44 MARUJA. not exhibit any other discomposure. Maruja stopped at the same moment on her side of the fence. The tramp looked at her deliberately, and then slowly lowered his eyes. " I'm looking for the San Jose road, hereabouts. Ye don't happen to know it ? " he said, addressing himself to the top of the fence. It had been said that it was not Maruja's way to encounter man, woman, or child, old or young, without an attempt at subjugation. Strong in her power and salient with fascina tion, she leaned gently over the fence, and with the fan raised to her delicate ear, made him repeat his question under the soft fire of her fringed eyes. He did so, but incom pletely, and with querulous laziness. "Lookin' for San Jose' road here- 'bouts." " The road to San Jose'," said Marnja, with gentle slowness, as if not unwilling to pro tract the conversation, " is about two miles from here. It is the high-road to the left MAEUJA. 45 fronting the plain. There is another way, if " " Don't want it ! MorninV He dropped his head suddenly forward, and limped away in the sunlight. 46 .MARUJA. CHAPTEK III. BREAKFAST, usually a movable feast at La Mision Perdida, had been prolonged until past midday; the last of the dance guests had flown, and the home party with the exception of Captain Carroll, who had re turned to duty at his distant post were dis persing ; some as riding cavalcades to neigh bouring points of interest ; some to visit certain remarkable mansions which the wealth of a rapid civilization had erected in that fertile valley. One of - these in par ticular, the work of a breathless millionaire, was famous for the spontaneity of its growth and the reckless extravagance of its appoint ments. " If you go to Aladdin's Palace," said MARUJA. 47 Manija, from the top step of the south porch, to a waggonette of guests, " after you've seen the stables with mahogany fittings for one hundred horses, ask Aladdin to show you the enchanted chamber, inlaid with California woods and paved with gold quartz." " We would have a better chance if the Princess of China would only go with us," pleaded Gamier gallantly. " The Princess will stay at home with her mother, like a good girl," returned Maruja demurely. "A bad shot of G-arnier's this time," whispered Eaymond to Buchanan, as the vehicle rolled away with them. " The Princess is not likely to visit Aladdin again." " Why ? " " The last time she was there, Aladdin was a little too Persian in his extravagance : offered her his house, stables, and him self." "Not a bad catch why, he's worth two millions, I hear." 48 MAEUJA. " Yes ; but his wife is as extravagant as himself." " His ivife, eh ? Ah, are you serious ; or must you say something derogatory of the lassie's admirers too ? " said Buchanan, playfully threatening him with his cane. "Another word, and I'll throw you from the waggon." After their departure, the outer shell of the great house fell into a profound silence, so hollow and deserted that one might have thought the curse of Koorotora had already descended upon it. Dead leaves of roses and fallen blossoms from the long line of vine- wreathed columns lay thick on the empty stretch of brown verandah, or rustled and crept against the sides of the house, where the regular breath of the afternoon " trades " began to arise. A few cardinal flowers fell like drops of blood before the open windows of the vacant ballroom, in which the step of a solitary servant echoed faintly. It was Maruja's maid, bringing a note to her young MARUJA. 49 mistress, who, in a flounced morning dress, leaned against the window. Maruja took it, glanced at it quietly, folded it in a long fold, and put it openly in her belt. Captain Carroll, from whom it came, might have carried one of his despatches as methodically. The waiting-woman noticed the act, and was moved to suggest some more exciting confidences. " The Dona Maruja has, without doubt, noticed the bouquet on her dressing-room table from the Senor Gamier ? " The Dona Maruja had. The Dona Maruja had also learned with pain that, bribed by Judas-like coin, Faquita had betrayed the secrets of her wardrobe to the extent of furnishing a ribbon from a certain yellow dress to the Senor Buchanan to match with a Chinese fan. This was intolerable ! Faquita writhed in remorse, and averred that through this solitary act she had dis honoured her family. The Dona Maruja, however, since it was 50 MARUJA. so, felt that the only thing left to do was to give her the polluted dress, and trust that the devil might not fly away with her. Leaving the perfectly consoled Faquita, Maruja crossed the large hall, and, opening a small door, entered a dark passage through the thick adobe- wall of the old casa, and apparently left the present century behind her. A peaceful atmosphere of the past sur rounded her not only in the low vaulted halls teminating in grilles or barred windows ; not only in the square chambers whose dark rich but scanty furniture was only a foil to the central elegance of the lace-bordered bed and pillows ; but in a certain mysterious odour of dried and dessicated religious respectability that penetrated everywhere, and made the grateful twilight redolent of the generations of forgotten Gruitierrez who had quietly exhaled in the old house. A mist as of incense and flowers that had lost their first bloom veiled the vista of the long corridor, and made the staring blue sky, seen through MAEUJA. 51 narrow windows and loopholes, glitter like mirrors let into the walls. The chamber assigned to the young ladies seemed half oratory and half sleeping-room, with a strange mingling of the convent in the bare white walls, hung only with crucifixes and religious emblems, and of the seraglio in the glimpses of lazy figures, reclining in the deshabille of short silken saya, low carnisa, and dropping slippers. In a broad angle of the corridor giving upon the patio, its balus trade hung with brightly coloured serapes and shawls, surrounded by voluble domestics and relations, the mistress of the casa half reclined in a hammock and gave her noonday audience. Maruja pushed her way through the clustered stools and cushions to her mother's side, kissed her on the forehead, and then lightly perched herself like a white dove on the railing. Mrs. Saltonstall, a dark, cor pulent woman, redeemed only from coarseness by a certain softness of expression and refine- 52 MAKUJA. ment of gesture, raised her heavy brown eyes to her daughter's face. " You have not been to bed, Mara ? " " No, dear. Do I look it ? " " You must lie down presently. They tell me that Captain Carroll returned suddenly this morning." " Do you care ? " " Who knows ? Amita does not seem to fancy Jose', Esteban, Jorge, or any of her cousins. She won't look at Juan Estudillo. The Captain is not bad. He is of the Government. He is " "Not more than ten leagues from here," said Maruja, playing with the Captain's note in her belt. "You can send for him, dear little mother. He will be glad." " You will ever talk lightly like your father ! She was not, then, grieved our Amita eh ? " " She and Dorotea and the two Wilsons went off with Raymond and your Scotch friend in the waggonette. She did not cry to Raymond." MARUJA. 53 " Good," said Mrs. Saltonstall, leaning back in her hammock. " Raymond is an old friend. You had better take your siesta now, child, to be bright for dinner, I expect a visitor this afternoon Dr. West." "Again! What will Pereo say, little mother ? " " Pereo," said the widow, sitting up again in her hammock, with impatience, " Pereo is becoming intolerable. The man is as mad as Don Quixote ; it is impossible to conceal his eccentric impertinence and interference from strangers, who cannot understand his confidential position in our house or his long service. There are no more mayordomos, child. The Vallejos, the Briones, the Castros, do without them now. Dr. West says, wisely, they are ridiculous survivals of the patriarchal system." " And can be replaced by intelligent strangers," interrupted Maruja, demurely. " The more easily if the patriarchal system has not been able to preserve the respect due 54 MARUJA. from children to parents. No, Maruja ! No ; I am offended. Do not touch me ! And your hair is coming down, and your eyes have rings like owls. You uphold this fanatical Pereo because he leaves you alone and stalks your poor sisters and their escorts like the Indian, whose blood is in his veins. The saints only can tell if he did not disgust this Captain Carroll into flight. He believes himself the sole custodian of the honour of our family that he has a sacred mission from this Don Fulano of Koorotora to avert its fate. Without doubt he keeps up his delusions with aguardiente, and passes for a prophet among the silly peons and servants. He frightens the children with his ridiculous stories, and teaches them to decorate that heathen mound as if it were a shrine of Our Lady of Sorrows. He was almost rude to Dr. West yesterday." " But you have encouraged him in his confidential position here," said Maruja. " You forget, my mother, how you got him MARUJA. 55 to * duena ' Enriquita with the Colonel Brown ; how you let him frighten the young Englishman who was too attentive to Dorotea ; how you set him even upon poor Raymond, and failed so dismally that I had to take him myself in hand." "But if I choose to charge him with explanations that I cannot make myself without derogating from the time-honoured hospitality of the casa, that is another thing. It is not," said Dona Maria, with a certain massive dignity that, inconsistent as it was with the weakness of her argument, was not without impressiveness, "It is not yet, Blessed Santa Maria, that we are obliged to take notice ourself of the pretensions of every guest beneath our roof like the match-making, daughter-selling English and Americans. And then Pereo had tact and discrimination. Now he is mad! There are strangers and strangers. The whole valley is full of them one can discriminate, since the old families year by year are growing less." 56 MARUJA. 61 Surely not," said Maruja, innocently. " There is the excellent Rarnierrez, who has lately almost taken him a wife from the singing-hall in San Francisco; he may yet be snatched from the fire. There is the youthful Jose Castro, the sole padrono of our national bull-fight at Soquel, the famous horsebreaker, and the winner of I know not how many races. And have we not Yincente Peralta, who will run, it is said, for the American Congress ? He can read and write truly I have a letter from him here." She turned back the folded slip of Captain Carroll's note and discovered another below. Mrs. Saltonstall tapped her daughter's hand with her fan. " You jest at them, yet you uphold Pereo ! Go, now, and sleep yourself into a better frame of mind. Stop ! I hear the Doctor's horse. Run and see that Pereo receives him properly." Maruja had barely entered the dark cor ridor when she came upon the visitor a grey, hard-featured man of sixty who had MARUJA. 57 evidently entered without ceremony. " I see you did not wait to be announced," she said sweetly. " My mother will be flattered by your impatience. You will find her in the patio." "Pereo did not announce me, as he was probably still under the effect of the aguar diente he swallowed yesterday," said the Doctor, drily. "I met him outside the Tienda on the highway the other night, talking to a pair of cut-throats that I would shoot on sight." " The mayordomo has many purchases to make, and must meet a great many people," said Maruja. " What would you ? We can not select his acquaintances ; we can hardly choose our own," she added sweetly. The Doctor hesitated, as if to reply, and then, with a grim " Good-morning," passed on towards the patio. Maruja did not follow him. Her attention was suddenly absorbed by a hitherto motionless figure, that seemed to be hiding in the shadow of an angle of the 58 MAEUJA. passage, as if waiting for her to pass. The keen eyes of the daughter of Joseph Salton- stall were not deceived. She walked directly towards the figure, and said, sharply, " Pereo ! " The figure came hesitatingly forward into the light of the grated window. It was that of an old man, still tall and erect, though the hair had disappeared from his temples, and hung in two or three straight, long dark elf- locks on his neck. His face, over which one of the bars threw a sinister shadow, was the yellow of a dried tobacco-leaf, and veined as strongly. His garb was a strange mingling of the vaquero and the ecclesiastic velvet trousers, open from the knee down, and fringed with bullion buttons ; a broad red sash around his waist, partly hidden by a long straight chaqueta ; with a circular sacerdotal cape of black broadcloth slipped over his head through a slit-like opening braided with gold. His restless yellow eyes fell before the young girl's ; and the stiff, MAEUJA. 59 varnislied, hard-brimmed sombrero he held in his wrinkled hands trembled. " You are spying again, Pereo," said Maruja, in another dialect than the one she had used to her mother. " It is unworthy of my father's trusted servant." " It is that man that coyote, Dona Maruja, that is unworthy of your father, of your mother, of you I " he gesticulated, in a fierce whisper. "I, Pereo, do not spy. I follow, follow the track of the prowling, stealing brute until I run him down. Yes, it was /, Pereo, who warned your father he would not be content with the half of the land he stole ! It was I, Pereo, who warned your mother that each time he trod the soil of La Mision Perdida he measured the land he could take away ! " He stopped pantingly, with the insane abstraction of a fixed idea glittering in his eyes. " And it was you, Pereo," she said, caress ingly, laying her soft hand on his heaving breast, "you who carried me in your arms 60 MARTHA. when I was a child. It was you, Pereo, who took me before you on your pinto horse to the rodeo, when no one knew it but ourselves, my Pereo, was it not ? " He nodded his head violently. " It was you who showed me the gallant caballeros, the Pachecos, the Castros, the Alvarados, the Estudillos, the Peraltas, the Vallejos." His head kept time with each name as the fire dimmed in his wet eyes. "You made me promise I would not forget them for the Americanos who were here. Grood ! That was years ago ! I am older now. I have seen many Americans. Well, I am still free ! " He caught her hand, and raised it to his lips with a gesture almost devotional. His eyes softened ; as the exaltation of passion passed, his voice dropped into the querulous- ness of privileged age. " Ah, yes ! you, the first-born, the heiress of a verity, yes! You were ever a Guitierrez. But the others ? Eh, where are they now ? And it was always, * Eh, Pereo, what shall we do to-day ? MARUJA. 61 Pereo, good Pereo, we are asked to ride here and there ; we are expected to visit the new people in the valley what say you, Pereo? Who shall we dine to-day?' Or, 'Enquire Hie of this or that strange caballero ; and if we may speak.' Ah, it is but yesterday that Amita would say, ' Lend me thine own horse, Pereo, that I may outstrip this swaggering Americano that clings ever to my side,' ha ! ha! Or the grave Dorotea would whisper, 4 Convey to this Senor Presumptuous Pomposo that the daughters of Guitierrez do not ride alone with strangers!' Or even the little Liseta would say, he! he! i Why does the stranger press my foot in his great hand when he helps me into the saddle ? Tell him that is not the way, Pereo.' Ha, ha ! " He laughed childishly, and stopped. " And why does Sefiorita Amita now look complain that Pereo, old Pereo, comes between her and this Sefior Eaymond the rnaquinista ? Eh, and why does she, the lady mother, the Cas- tellana, shut Pereo from her councils ? " he 62 MAEUJA. went on, with rising excitement. " What are these secret meetings, eh ? what these appointments, alone with this Judas without the family without me ! " " Hearken, Pereo," said the young girl, again laying her hand on the old man's shoulder ; " you have spoken truly hut you forget the years pass. These are no longer strangers ; old friends have gone these have taken their place. My father forgave the Doctor why cannot you ? For the rest, believe in me me Maruja " she dramatic ally touched her heart over the international complications of the letters of Captain Carroll and Peralta. " I will see that the family honour does not suffer. And now, good Pereo, calm thyself. Not with aguardiente, but with a bottle of old wine from the Mision refectory that I will send to thee. It was given to me by thy friend, Padre Miguel, and is from the old vines that were here. Courage, Pereo ! And thou sayest that Amita complains that thou comest between her and MAEUJA. 63 Kaymond. So ! What matter ? Let it cheer thy heart to know that I have summoned the Peraltas, the Pachecos, the Estudillos, all thy old friends, to dine here to-day. Thou wilt hear the old names, even if the faces are young to thee. Courage ! Do thy duty, old friend ; let them see that the hospitality of La Mision Perdida does not grow old, if its mayordomo does. Faquita will bring thee the wine. No, not that way; thou needest not pass the patio, nor meet that man again. Here, give me thy hand, I will lead thee. It trembles, Pereo ! These are not the sinews that only two years ago pulled down the bull at Soquel with thy single lasso ! Why, look ! I can drag thee ; see ! " and with a light laugh and a boyish gesture, she half pulled, half dragged him along, until their voices were lost in the dark corridor. Maruja kept her word. When the sun began to cast long shadows along the veran dah, not only the outer shell of La Mision Perdida, but the dark inner heart of the old 64 MARUJA. casa, stirred with awakened life. Single horsemen and carriages began to arrive ; and, mingled with the modern turn-outs of the home party and the neighbouring Americans, were a few of the cumbrous vehicles and chariots of fifty years ago, drawn by gaily trapped mules with bizarre postilions, and occasionally an outrider. Dark faces looked from the balcony of the patio, a light cloud of cigarette-smoke made the dark corridors the more obscure, and mingled with the forgotten incense. Bare-headed, pretty women, with roses starring their dark hair, wandered with childish curiosity along the broad verandah and in and out of the French windows that opened upon the grand saloon. Scrupulously shaved men with olive complexion, stout men with accurately curving whiskers meeting at their dimpled chins, lounged about with a certain unconscious dignity that made them contentedly indifferent to any novelty of their surroundings. For a while the two races kept mechanically apart; but, through the MAEUJA. 65 tactful gallantry of Grander, the cynical familiarity of Eaymond, and the impulsive recklessness of Aladdin, who had forsaken his enchanted Palace on the slightest of in vitations, and returned with the party in the hope of again seeing the Princess of China, an interchange of civilities, of gallantries, and even of confidences, at last took place. Jovita Castro had heard (who had not?) of the wonders of Aladdin's Palace, and was it of actual truth that the ladies had a bouquet and a fan to match their dress presented to them every morning, and that the gentlemen had a champagne cocktail sent to their rooms before breakfast ? " Just you come, miss, and bring your father and your brothers, and stay a week, and you'll see," responded Aladdin gallantly. "Hold on! What's your father's first name ? I'll send a team over there for you to-morrow." " And is it true that you frightened the handsome Cap tain Carroll away from Amita ? " said Dolores Briones, over the edge of her fan, to Eaymond. 66 MARUJA. "Perfectly," said Raymond, with ingenuous frankness. "I made it a matter of life or death. He was a soldier, and naturally preferred the former as giving him a better chance for promotion." " Ah ! we thought it was Maruja you liked best." " That was two years ago," said Raymond gravely. " And you Americanos can change in that time ? " "I have just experienced that it can be done in less," he responded, over the fan, with bewildering significance. Nor were these confidences confined to only one nationality. "I always thought you Spanish gentlemen were very dark, and wore long moustaches and a cloak," said pretty little Miss Walker, gazing frankly into the smooth round face of the eldest Pacheco " why, you are as fair as I am." "Eaf I tink that, I am for ever mizzarable," he replied, with grave melancholy. In the dead silence that followed he was enabled to make his decorous point. " Be cause I shall not ezcape ze fate of Narcissus." Mr. Buchanan, with the unrestrained and MAEUJA. 67 irresponsible enjoyment of a traveller, entered fully into the spirit of the scene. He even found words of praise for Aladdin, whose extravagance had at first seemed to him almost impious. " Eh, but I'm not prepared to say he is a fool, either," he remarked to his friend the San Francisco banker. " Those who try to pick him up for one," returned the banker, " will find themselves mistaken. His is the prodigality that loosens others' purse-strings besides his own. Everybody contents himself with criticising his way of spending money, but is ready to follow his way of making it." The dinner was more formal, and when the mistress of the house, massive in black silk, velvet, and gold embroidery, moved like a pageant to the head of her table, where she remained like a sacerdotal effigy, not even the presence of the practical Scotchman at her side could remove the prevailing sense of restraint. For a while the conversation of the relatives might have been brought with 68 MARUJA. them in their antique vehicles of fifty years ago, so faded, so worn, and so springless it was. General Pico related the festivities at Monterey, on the occasion of the visit of Sir George Simpson early in the present century, of which he was an eye-witness, with great precision of detail. Don Juan Estudillo was comparatively frivolous, with anecdotes of Louis Philippe, whom he had seen in Paris. Far-seeing Pedro Guitierrez was gloomily impressed with a Mongolian invasion of Cali fornia by the Chinese, in which the prevailing religion would be supplanted by heathen temples, and polygamy engrafted on the Constitution. Everybody agreed, however, that the vital question of the hour was the settlement of land titles Americans who claimed under pre-emption and the native holders of Spanish grants were equally of the opinion. In the midst of this the musical voice of Maruja was heard asking, " What is a tramp ? " Raymond, on her right, was ready but not MAEUJA. 69 conclusive. A tramp, if he could sing, would be a troubadour ; if he could pray, would be a pilgrim friar in either case a natural object of womanly solicitude. But as he could do neither, he was simply a curse. " And you think that is not an object of womanly solicitude ? But that does not tell me what he is." A dozen gentlemen, swept in the radius of those softly inquiring eyes, here started to explain. From them it appeared that there was no such thing in California as a tramp, and there were also a dozen varieties of tramp in California. "But is he always very uncivil?" asked Maruja. Again there were conflicting opinions. You might have to shoot him on sight, and you might have him invariably run from you. When the question was finally settled, Maruja was found to have become absorbed in conversation with some one else. Amita, a taller copy of Maruja, and more 70 MAEUJA. regularly beautiful, had built up a little pile of bread-crumbs between herself and Ray mond, and was listening to him with a certain shy, girlish interest that was as inconsistent with the serene regularity of her face as Maruja's self-possessed, subtle intelligence was incongruous to her youthful figure. Ray mond's voice, when he addressed Amita, was low and earnest; not from any significance of matter, but from its frank, confidential quality. "They are discussing the new railroad project, and your relations are all opposed to it ; to-morrow they will each apply privately to Aladdin for the privilege of subscribing." " I have never seen a railroad," said Amita, slightly colouring ; " but you are an engineer, and I know they must be something very clever." Notwithstanding the coolness of the night, a full moon drew the guests to the verandah, where coffee was served, and where, mys teriously muffled in cloaks and shawls, the party took upon itself the appearance of MARUJA. 71 groups of dominoed masqueraders, scattered along the verandah and on the broad steps of the porch in gipsy-like encampments, from whose cloaked shadow the moonlight occa sionally glittered upon a varnished boot or peeping satin slipper. Two or three of these groups had resolved themselves into detached couples, who wandered down the acacia walk to the sound of a harp in the grand saloon or the occasional uplifting of a thin Spanish tenor. Two of these couples were Maruja and Gamier followed by Amita and Kayrnond. "You are restless to-night, Maruja," said Amita, shyly endeavouring to make a show of keeping up with her sister's boyish stride, in spite of Eaymond's reluctance. " You are paying for your wakefulness to-day." The same idea passed through the minds of both men. She was missing the excitement of Captain Carroll's presence. "The air is so refreshing away from the house," responded Maruja, with a bright energy that belied any suggestion of fatigue 72 MARUJA. or moral disquietude. " I'm tired of running against those turtle-doves in the walks and bushes. Let us keep on to the lane. If you are tired, Mr. Baymond will give you his arm." They kept on, led by the indomitable little figure who, for once, did not seem to linger over the attentions, both piquant and tender, with which G-arnier improved his opportunity. Given a shadowy lane, a lovers' moon, a pair of bright and not unkindly eyes, a charming and not distant figure what more could he want ? Yet he wished she hadn't walked so fast. One might be vivacious, audacious, brilliant, at an Indian trot ; but impassioned never ! The pace increased ; they were actually hurrying. More than that, Maruja had struck into a little trot ; her lithe body swaying from side to side, her little feet straight as an arrow before her ; accompany ing herself with a quaint musical chant, which she obligingly explained had been taught her as a child by Pereo. They stopped MAEUJA. 73 only at the hedge, where she had that morning encountered the tramp. There is little doubt that the rest of the party was disconcerted : Amita, whose figure was not adapted to this Camilla-like exercise ; Raymond, who was annoyed at the poor girl's discomfiture ; and G-arnier, who had lost a golden opportunity, with the faint suspicion of having looked ridiculous. Only Maruja's eyes, or rather the eyes of her lamented father, seemed to enjoy it. " You are too effeminate," she said, leaning against the fence, and shading her eyes with her fan, as she glanced around in the staring moonlight. " Civilization has taken away your legs. A man ought to be able to trust to his feet all day, and to nothing else." " In fact a tramp," suggested Raymond. " Possibly. I think I should like to have been a gipsy, and to have wandered about, finding a new home every night." " And a change of linen on the early morning hedges," said Raymond. " But do 74 MAEUJA. you think seriously that you and your sister are suitably clad to commence to-night ? It is bitterly cold," he added, turning up his collar. " Could you begin by showing a pal the nearest haystack or hen-roost ? " " Sybarite ! " She cast a long look over the fields and down the lane. Suddenly she started. " What is that ? " She pointed to a tall, erect figure slowly disappearing on the other side of the hedge. " It's Pereo, only Pereo. I knew him by his long serape," said Grarnier, who was nearest the hedge, complacently. " But what is surprising, he was not there when we came, nor did he come out of that open field. He must have been walking behind us on the other side of the hedge." The eyes of the two girls sought each other simultaneously, but not without Eay- mond's observant glance. Amita's brow darkened as she moved to her sister's side, and took her arm with a confidential pressure that was returned. The two men, with a MAEUJA. 75 vague consciousness of some contretemps, dropped a pace behind, and began to talk to each other, leaving the sisters to exchange a few words in a low tone as they slowly returned to the house. Meanwhile, Pereo's tall figure had dis appeared in the shrubbery, to emerge again in the open area by the summer-house and the old pear tree. The red sparks of two or three cigarettes in the shadow of the summer- house, and the crouching forms of two shawled women, carne forward to greet him. " And what hast thou heard, Pereo ? " said one of the women. " Nothing," said Pereo, impatiently. " I told thee I would answer for this little primo- genita with my life. She is but leading this Frenchman a dance, as she has led the others, and the Dona Amita and her Raymond are but wax in her hands. Besides, I have spoken with the little 'Ruja to-day, and spoke my mind, Pepita, and she says there is nothing." 76 MAEUJA. " And whilst thou wert speaking to her, my poor Pereo, the devil of an American Doctor was speaking to her mother, thy mistress our mistress, Pereo ! Would'st thou know what he said? Oh, it was nothing." " Now, the curse of Koorotora on thee, Pepita ! " said Pereo, excitedly. " Speak, fool, if thou knowest anything ! " " Of a verity, no. Let Faquita, then, speak : she heard it." She reached out her hand, and dragged Maruja's maid, not un willing, before the old man. " G-ood ! 'Tis Faquita, daughter of Gomez, and a child of the land. Speak, little one. What said this coyote to the mother of thy mistress ? " "Truly, good Pereo, it was but accident that befriended me." " Truly, for thy mistress's sake, I hoped it had been more. But let that go. Come, what said he, child ? " "I was hanging up a robe behind the MARUJA. 77 curtain in the oratory when Pepita ushered in the Americano. I had no time to fly." "Why should'st thou fly from a dog like this ? " said one of the cigarette-smokers who had drawn near. " Peace ! " said the old man. " When the Dona Maria joined him they spoke of affairs. Yes, Pereo, she, thy mistress, spoke of affairs to this man ay, as she might have talked to thee. And could he advise this ? and could he counsel that ? and should the cattle be taken from the lower lands, and the fields turned to grain ? and had he a purchaser for Los Osos ? " " Los Osos ! It is the boundary land the frontier the line of the arroyo older than the Mision," muttered Pereo. " Ay, and he talked of the the I know not what it is ! the r-r-rail-r-road." " The railroad ! " gasped the old man. " I will tell thee what it is. It is the cut of a burning knife through La Mision Perdida as long as eternity, as dividing as death. On 78 MAEUJA. either side of that gash life is blasted ; wher ever that cruel steel is laid the track of it is livid and barren ; it cuts down all barriers ; leaps all boundaries, be they Canada or canon ; it is a torrent in the plain, a tornado in the forest; its very pathway is destruction to whoso crosses it man or beast ; it is the heathenish God of the Americanos ; they build temples for it, and flock there and worship it whenever it stops, breathing fire and flame like a very Moloch." " Eh ! St. Anthony preserve us ! " said Faquita, shuddering; "and yet they spoke of it as ' shares' and ' stocks,' and said it would double the price of corn." " Now, Judas pursue thee and thy railroad, Pereo," said Pepita impatiently. " It is not such bagatela that Faquita is here to relate. Gro on, child, and tell all that happened." "And then," continued Faquita, with a slight affectation of maiden bashfulness, in the closer-drawing circle of cigarettes, " and then they talked of other things and of themselves ; MARUJA. 79 and, of a verity, this grey-bearded Doctor will play the goat and utter gallant speeches, and speak of a life-long devotion and of the time he should have a right to protect " " The right, girl ! Didst thou say the right ? No, thou didst mistake. It was not that he meant ? " " Thy life to a quarter peso that the little Faquita does not mistake," said the evident satirist of the household. " Trust to Gromez' muchacha to understand a proposal." When the laugh was over, and the sparks of the cigaretto, cleverly whipped out of the speaker's lips by Faquita's fan, had disap peared in the darkness, she resumed, pettishly, " I know not what you call it when he kissed her hand and held it to his heart." " Judas ! " gasped Pereo. " But," he added feverishly, " she, the Dona Maria, thy mistress, she summoned thee at once to call me to cast out this dust into the open air ; thou didst fly to her assistance ? What ! thou sawest this, and did nothing eh?" He stopped, and 80 MAEUJA. tried to peer into the girl's face. " No ! Ah, I see ; I am an old fool. Yes ; it was Maruja's own mother that stood there. He ! he ! he ! " he laughed piteously ; " and she smiled and smiled and broke the coward's heart, as Maruja might. And when he was gone, she bade thee bring her water to wash the filthy Judas stain from her hand." " Santa Ana ! " said Faquita, shrugging her shoulders. " She did what the veriest rnuchacha would have done. When he had gone, she sat down and cried." The old man drew back a step, and steadied himself by the table. Then, with a certain tremulous audacity, he began : " So ! that is all you have to tell -nothing ! Bah ! A lazy slut sleeps at her duty, and dreams behind a cur tain ! Yes, dreams ! you understand dreams ! And for this she leaves her occupa tions, and comes to gossip here ! Come," he continued, steadily working himself into a passion, " come, enough of this ! Get you gone ! you, and Pepita, and Andreas, and MARUJA. 81 Victor all of you back to your duty. Away ! Am I not master here ? Off! I say! " There was no mistaking the rising anger of his voice. The cowed group rose in a frightened way and disappeared one by one silently through the labyrinth. Pereo waited until the last had vanished, and then, cram ming his stiff sombrero over his eyes with an ejaculation, brushed his way through the shrubbery in the direction of the stables. Later, when the full glory of the midnight moon had put out every straggling light in the great house, when the long verandah slept in massive bars of shadow, and even the trade winds were hushed to repose, Pereo silently issued from the stable-yard in vaquero's dress, mounted and caparisoned. Picking his way cautiously along the turf-bordered edge of the gravel path, he noiselessly reached a gate that led to the lane. Walking his spirited mustang with difficulty until the house had at last disappeared in the intervening foliage, he turned with an easy canter into a border G 82 MAEUJA. bridle-path that seemed to lead to the Canada. In a quarter of an hour he had reached a low amphitheatre of meadows, shut in a half-circle of grassy treeless hills. Here, putting spurs to his horse, he entered upon a singular exercise. Twice he made a circuit of the meadow at a wild gallop, with flying serape and loosened rein, and twice re turned. The third time his speed increased, the ground seemed to stream from under him ; in the distance the limbs of his steed became invisible in their furious action, and, lying- low forward on his mustang's neck, man and horse passed like an arrowy bolt around the circle. Then something like a light ring of smoke up-curved from the saddle before him, and, slowly uncoiling itself in mid air, dropped gently to the ground as he passed. Again, and once again, the shadowy coil sped upward and onward, slowly detaching its snaky rings with a weird deliberation that was in strange contrast to the impetuous onset of the rider, and yet seemed a part of his fury. And then MARUJA. 83 turning, Pereo trotted gently to the centre of the circle. Here he divested himself of his serape, and securing it in a cylindrical roll, placed it upright on the ground, and once more sped away on his furious circuit. But this time he wheeled suddenly before it was half completed, and bore down directly upon the unconscious object. Within a hundred feet he swerved slightly ; the long detaching rings again writhed in mid air, and softly descended as he thundered past. But when he had reached the line of circuit again he turned and made directly for the road he had entered. Fifty feet behind his horse's heels, at the end of a shadowy cord, the luckless serape was dragging and bounding after him ! " The old man is quiet enough this morning," said Andreas, as he groomed the sweat-dried skin of the mustang the next day. "It is easy to see, friend Pinto, that he has worked off his madness on thee." 84 MAHUJA. CHAPTER IV. THE Rancho of San Antonio might have been a characteristic asylum for its blessed patron, offering as it did a secure retreat from temptations for the carnal eye, and affording every facility for uninterrupted contemplation of the sky above, unbroken by tree or elevation. Unlike La Mision Perdida, of which it had been part, it was a level plain of rich adobe, half the year presenting a billowy sea of tossing verdure breaking on the far-off horizon line, half the year pre senting a dry and dusty shore, from which the vernal sea had ebbed, to the low sky that seemed to mock it with a visionary sea beyond. A row of rough, irregular, and severely practical sheds and buildings housed the machinery and the fifty or sixty men MARUJA. 85 employed in the cultivation of the soil, but neither residential mansion nor farmhouse offered any nucleus of rural comfort or civilization in the midst of this wild expanse of earth and sky. The simplest adjuncts of country life were unknown : milk and butter were brought from the nearest town ; weekly supplies of fresh meat and vegetables came from the same place ; in the harvest season, the labourers and harvesters lodged and boarded in the adjacent settlement, and walked to their work. No cultivated flower bloomed beside the unpainted tenement, though the fields were starred in early spring with poppies and daisies the humblest garden plant or herb had no place in that prolific soil. The serried ranks of wheat pressed closely round the straggling sheds and barns and hid the lower windows. But the sheds were fitted with the latest agri cultural machinery ; a telegraphic wire con nected the nearest town with an office in the wing of one of the buildings, where Dr. West 86 MARUJA. sat, and in the midst of the wilderness severely checked his accounts with nature. Whether this strict economy of domestic outlay arose from an ostentatious contempt of country life and the luxurious habits of the former landholders, or whether it was a purely business principle of Dr. West, did not appear. Those who knew him best declared that it was both. Certain it was that unqualified commercial success crowned and dignified his method. A few survivors of the old native families came to see his strange machinery that did the work of so many idle men and horses. It is said that he offered to " run " the distant estate of Joaquin Padilla from his little office amidst the grain of San Antonio. Some shook their heads, and declared that he only sucked the juices of the land for a few brief years to throw it away again ; that in his fierce haste he skimmed the fatness of ages of gentle cultivation on a soil that had been barely tickled with native oaken ploughshares. MABUJA. 87 His own personal tastes and habits were as severe and practical as his business ; the little wing he inhabited contained only his office, his living room or library, his bed room, and a bath-room. This last incon sistent luxury was due to a certain cat-like cleanliness which was part of his nature. His iron-grey hair a novelty in this country of young Americans was always scrupu lously brushed, and his linen spotless. A slightly professional and somewhat old- fashioned respectability in his black clothes was also characteristic. His one concession to the customs of his neighbours was the possession of two or three of the half-broken and spirited mustangs of the country, which he rode with the fearlessness, if not the perfect security and ease, of a native. Whether the subjection of this lawless and powerful survival of a wild and unfettered nature around him was part of his plan, or whether it was only a lingering trait of some younger prowess, no one knew ; but his grim 88 MARUJA. and decorous figure, contrasting with the picturesque and flowing freedom of the horse he bestrode, was a frequent spectacle in road and field. It was the second day after his visit to La Mision Perdida. He was sitting by his desk at sunset in the faint afterglow of the western sky, which flooded the floor through the open door. He was writing, but presently lifted his head with an impatient air, and called out, " Harrison ! " The shadow of Dr. West's foreman appeared at the door. " Who's that you're talking to ? " " Tramp, sir." " Hire him, or send him about his business. Don't stand gabbling there."^ " That's just it, sir. He won't hire for a week or a day. He says he'll do an odd job for his supper and a shakedown, but no more." "Pack him off! ... Stay. . . . What's he like?" MAEUJA. 89 " Like the rest of 'em ; only a little lazier, I reckon." " Umph ! Fetch him in." The foreman disappeared, and returned with the tramp already known to the reader. He was a little dirtier and grimier than on the morning he had addressed Maruja at La Mision Perdida ; but he wore the same air of sullen indifference, occasionally broken by furtive observation. His laziness or weari ness, if the term could describe the lassitude of perfect physical condition seemed to have increased ; and he leaned against the door as the Doctor regarded him with slow contempt. The silence continuing, he deliberately allowed himself to slip down into a sitting position in the doorway, where he remained. " You seem to have been born tired," said the Doctor grimly. " Yes." "What have you got to say for your self?" " I told him" said the tramp, nodding his 90 MARUJA. head towards the foreman, " what I'd do for a supper and a bed. I don't want anything but that." " And if you don't get what you want on your own conditions, what'll you do ? " asked the Doctor drily. "Go." " Where did you come from ? " " States." " Where are you going ? " " On." " Leave him to me," said Dr. West to his foreman. The man smiled, and withdrew. The Doctor bent his head again over his accounts. The tramp, sitting in the doorway, reached out his hand, pulled a young wheat- stalk that had sprung up near the doorstep, and slowly nibbled it. He did not raise his eyes to the Doctor, but sat, a familiar culprit awaiting sentence, without fear, without hope, yet not without a certain philosophical en durance of the situation. " Gro into that passage," said the Doctor, MAEUJA. 91 lifting his head as he turned a page of his ledger, "and on the shelf you'll find some clothing stores for the men. Pick out some thing to fit you." The tramp arose, moved towards the passage, and stopped. " It's for the job only, you understand ? " he said. " For the job," answered the Doctor. The tramp returned in a few moments with overalls and woollen shirt hanging on his arm and a pair of boots and socks in his hand. The Doctor had put aside his pen. " Now go into that room and change. Stop ! First wash the dust from your feet in that bath-room." The tramp obeyed, and entered the room. The Doctor walked to the door, and looked out reflectively on the paling sky. When he turned again he noticed that the door of the bath-room was opened, and the tramp, who had changed his clothes by the fading light, was drying his feet. The Doctor approached, and stood for a moment watching him. 92 MAEUJA. " What's the matter with your foot ? " * he asked, after a pause. "Born so." The first and second toe were joined by a thin membrane. " Both alike ? " asked the Doctor. " Yes," said the young man, exhibiting the other foot. " What did you say your name was ? " " I didn't say it. It's Henry G-uest, same as my father's." " Where were you born ? " "JDentville, Pike County, Missouri." " What was your mother's name ? " " Spalding, I reckon." " Where are your parents now ? " " Mother got divorced from father, and married again down South, somewhere. Father * This apparent classical plagiarism is actually a fact of identification on record in the California Law Reports. It is therefore unnecessary for me to add that the attendant circumstances and characters are purely fictitious. B. H. MARUJA. 93 left home twenty years ago. He's somewhere in California if he ain't dead." " He isn't dead." " How do you know ? " " Because I am Henry Guest, of Dentville : and" he stopped, and shading his eyes with his hand as he deliberately examined the tramp, added coldly " your father, I reckon." There was a slight pause. The young man put down the boot he had taken up. " Then I'm to stay here ? " " Certainly not. Here my name is only West, and I have no son. You'll go on to San Jose', and stay there until I look into this thing. You haven't got any money, of course ? " he asked, with a scarcely suppressed sneer. " I've got a little," returned the young man. " How much ? " The tramp put his hand into his breast, and drew out a piece of folded paper contain ing a single gold coin. 94 MABUJA. " Five dollars. I've kept it a month ; it doesn't cost much to live as I do," he added drily. " There's fifty more. Go to some hotel in San Jose, and ]et me know where you are. You've got to live, and you don't want to work. Well, you don't seem to be a fool ; so I needn't tell you that if you expect anything from me, you must leave this matter in my hands. I have chosen to acknowledge you to-day of my own free will I can as easily denounce you as an impostor to-morrow, if I choose. Have you told your story to any one in the valley ? " "No."" " See that you don't, then. Before you go, you must answer me a few more questions." He drew a chair to his table, and dipped a pen in the ink, as if to take down the answers. The young man, finding the only chair thus occupied, moved the Doctor's books aside, and sat down on the table beside him. The questions were repetitions of those MARUJA. 95 already asked, but more in detail, and thoroughly practical in their nature. The answers were given straightforwardly and unconcernedly, as if the subject was not worth the trouble of invention or evasion, It was difficult to say whether questioner or answerer took least pleasure in the interroga tion, which might have referred to the con cerns of a third party. Both, however, spoke disrespectfully of their conmon family with almost an approach to sympathetic interest. " You might as well be going now," said the Doctor, finally rising. " You can stop at the fonda, about two miles further on, and get your supper and bed, if you like." The young man slipped from the table, and lounged .to the door. The Doctor put his hands in his pockets and followed him. The young man, as if in unconscious imitation, had put his hands in his pockets also, and looked at him. i " I'll hear from you, then, when you are in San Jose ? " said Dr. West, looking past him 96 MAEUJA. into the grain with a slight approach to con straint in his indifference. " Yes if that's agreed upon," returned the young man, pausing on the threshold. A faint sense of some purely conventional re sponsibility in their position affected them both. They would have shaken hands if either had offered the initiative. A sullen consciousness of gratuitous rectitude in the selfish mind of the father ; an equally sullen conviction of twenty years of wrong in the son, withheld them both. Unpleasantly observant of each other's awkwardness, they parted with a feeling of relief. Dr. "West closed the door, lit his lamp, and, going to his desk, folded the paper containing the memoranda he had just written and placed it in his pocket. Then he summoned his foreman. The man entered, and glanced around the room as if expecting to see the Doctor's guest still there. "Tell one of the men to bring round Buckeye." MAEUJA. 97 The foreman hesitated. "Going to ride to-night, sir ? " " Certainly ; I may go as far as Saltonstall's. If I do, you needn't expect me back till morning." "Buckeye's mighty fresh to-night, boss. Regularly bucked his saddle clean off an hour ago, and there ain't a man dare exercise him." " I'll bet he don't buck his saddle off with me on it," said the Doctor grimly. " Bring him along." The man turned to go. "You found the tramp pow'ful lazy, didn't ye ? " " I found a heap more in him than in some that call themselves smart," said Dr. West, unconsciously setting up an irritable defence of the absent one. " Hurry up that horse ! " The foreman vanished. The Doctor put on a pair of leather leggings, large silver spurs, and a broad soft-brimmed hat, but made no other change in his usual half-pro fessional conventional garb. He then went to the window and glanced in the direction of H 98 MAEUJA. the highway. Now that his son was gone, he felt a faint regret that he had not prolonged the interview. Certain peculiarities in his manner, certain suggestions of expression in his face, speech, and gesture, came back to him now with unsatisfied curiosity. " No matter," he said to himself ; " he'll turn up soon again as soon as I want him, if not sooner. He thinks he's got a mighty soft thing here, and he isn't going to let it go. And there's that same d d sullen dirty pride of his mother, for all he doesn't cotton to her. Wonder I didn't recognize it at first. And hoarding up that five dollars ! That's Jane's brat, all over ! And, of course," he added bitterly, " nothing of me in him. No ; nothing ! Well, well, what's the difference ? " He turned towards the door with a certain sullen defiance in his face, so like the man he believed he did not resemble that his foreman coming upon him suddenly might have been startled at the likeness. Fortunately, how ever, Harrison was too much engrossed with MAEUJA. 99 the antics of the irrepressible Buckeye, which the ostler had just brought to the door, to notice anything else. The arrival of the horse changed the Doctor's expression to one of more practical and significant resistance. "With -the assistance of two men at the head of the restive brute he managed to vault into the saddle. A few wild plunges only seemed to settle him the firmer in his seat each plunge leaving its record in a thin red line on the animal's flanks, made by the cruel spurs of its rider. Any lingering desire of following his son's footsteps was quickly dis sipated by Buckeye, who promptly bolted in the opposite direction, and before Dr. West could gain active control over him they were half a mile on their way to La Mision Perdida. Dr. West did not regret it. Twenty years ago he had voluntarily abandoned a legal union of mutual unfaithfulness and miscon duct, and allowed his wife to get the divorce he might have obtained for equal cause. He 100 MARUJA. had abandoned to her the issue of that union an infant son. Whatever he chose to do now was purely gratuitous ; the only hold which this young stranger had on his respect was that he also recognized that fact with a cold indifference equal to his own. At present the half-savage brute he bestrode occupied all his attention. Yet he could not help feeling his advancing years tell upon him more heavily that evening ; fearless as he was, his strength was no longer equal when measured with the untiring youthful malevolence of his unbroken mustang : for a moment he dwelt regretfully on the lazy half-developed sinews of his son ; for a briefer instant there flashed across him the thought that those sinews ought to replace his own ; ought to be his to lean upon that thus, and thus only, could he achieve the old miracle of restoring his lost youth by perpetuating his own power in his own blood, and he, whose profound belief in personality had re jected all hereditary principle, felt this with MABUJA 101 a sudden exquisite pain. But bis horse, per haps recognizing a relaxing grip, took that opportunity to " buck." Curving bis back like a cat and throwing himself into the air with an unexpected bound, he came down with four stiff, inflexible legs, and a shock that might have burst the saddle-girths, had not the wily old man as quickly brought the long rowels of his spurs together, and fairly locked his heels under Buckeye's collapsing barrel. It was the mustang's last rebellious struggle. The discomfited brute gave in, and darted meekly and apologetically for ward, and, as it were, left all its rider's doubts and fears far behind in the vanishing distance. 102 MARUJA. CHAPTER V. MEANWHILE the subject of Dr. West's medita tions was slowly making his way along the high-road towards the fonda. He walked more erect and with less of a shuffle in his gait; but whether this was owing to his having cast the old skin of garments adapted to his slouch, and because he was more securely shod, or whether it was from the sudden straightening of some warped moral quality, it would have been difficult to say. The expression of his face certainly gave no evidence of actual and prospective good fortune ; if anything, the lines of discontent around his brow and mouth were more strongly drawn. Apparently, his interview with his father had only the effect of reviving MARUJA. 103 and stirring into greater activity a certain dogged sentiment 'that, through long years, had become languidly mechanical. He was no longer a beaten animal, but one roused by a chance success into a dangerous know ledge of his power. In his honest workman's dress he was infinitely more to be feared than in his rags ; in the lifting of his down cast eye there was the revelation of a bale ful intelligence. In his changed condition civilization only seemed to have armed him against itself. The fonda, a long low building, with a red-tiled roof extending over a porch or whitewashed verandah, in which drunken vaqueros had been known to occasionally dis port their mustangs, did not offer a very reputable appearance to the eye of young Guest as he approached it in the gathering shadows. One or two half-broken horses were securely fastened to the stout cross beams of some heavy posts driven in the roadway before it, and a primitive trough 104 MAKUJA. of roughly excavated stone stood near it. Through a broken gate at the side there was a glimpse of a grass -grown and deserted courtyard, piled with the disused packing- cases and barrels of the tienda, or general country shop, which huddled under the same roof at the other end of the building. The opened door of the fonda showed a low studded room fitted up with a rude imitation of an American bar on one side, ard con taining a few small tables, at which half a dozen men were smoking, drinking, and playing cards. The faded pictorial poster of the last bull-fight at Monterey, and an American " Sheriff's notice," were hung on the wall and in the doorway. A thick yellow atmosphere of cigaretto smoke, through which the inmates appeared like brown shadows, pervaded the room. The young man hesitated before this pesti lential interior, and took a seat on a bench on the verandah. After a moment's interval, the yellow landlord came to the door with MAEUJA. 105 a look of inquiry, which Guest answered by a demand for lodging and supper. When the landlord had vanished again in the cigaretto fog, the several other guests, one after the other, appeared at the doorway, with their cigarettes in their mouths and their cards still in their hands, and gazed upon him. There may have been some excuse for their curiosity. As before hinted, Guest's appear ance in his overalls and woollen shirt was somewhat incongruous, and, for some in explicable reason, the same face and figure which did not look inconsistent in rags and extreme poverty now at once suggested a higher social rank both of intellect and re finement than his workman's dress indicated. This,, added to his surliness of manner and expression, strengthened a growing suspicion in the mind of the party that he was a fugitive from justice a forger, a derelict banker, or possibly a murderer. It is only fair to say that the moral sense of the spec- 106 MAEUJA. tators was not shocked at the suspicion, and . that a more active sympathy was only with held by his reticence. An unfortunate in cident seemed to complete the evidence against him. In impatiently responding to the landlord's curt demand for prepayment of his supper, he allowed three or four pieces of gold to escape from his pocket on the verandah. In the quick glances of the party, as he stooped to pick them up, he read the danger of his carelessness. His sullen self-possession did not seem to be shaken. Calling to the keeper of the tienda, who had appeared at his door in time to witness the Danae-like shower, he bade him approach, in English. " What sort of knives have you got ? " " Knives, senor ? " " Yes ; bowie-knives or dirks. Knives like that," he said, making an imaginary down ward stroke at the table before him. The shopkeeper entered the tienda y and presently reappeared with three or four dirks MAEUJA. 107 in red leather sheaths. Guest selected the heaviest, and tried its point on the table. " How much ? " " Tres pesos." The young man threw him one of his gold pieces, and slipped the knife and its sheath in his boot. When he had received his change from the shopkeeper, he folded his arms and leaned back against the wall in quiet indifference. The simple act seemed to check aggressive, but not insinuating, interference. In a few moments one of the men appeared at the doorway. "It is fine weather for the road, little comrade ! " Guest did not reply. " Ah ! the night, it ess splendid," he re peated, in broken English, rubbing his hands, as if washing in the air. Still no reply. " You shall come from Sank Hosay ? " " I sha'ant." 108 MAEUJA. The stranger muttered something in Spanish, but the landlord, who reappeared to place Guest's supper on a table on the verandah, here felt the obligation of inter fering to protect a customer apparently so aggressive and so opulent. He pushed the inquisitor aside with a few hasty words, and, after Guest had finished his meal, offered to show him his room. It was a dark vaulted closet on the ground-floor, gaining light from the stable-yard through a barred iron grating. At the first glimpse it looked like a prison cell ; looking more deliberately at the black tresselled bed, and the votive images hanging on the wall, it might have been a tomb. " It is the best," said the landlord. " The Padre Vincento will have none other on his journey." " I suppose God protects him," said Guest ; " that door don't." He pointed to the worm- eaten door, without bolt or fastening. " Ah, what matter ? Are we not all friends ? " MAEUJA. 109 " Certainly," responded Guest, with his surliest manner, as he returned to the ve randah. Nevertheless, he resolved not to occupy the cell of the reverend Padre ; not from any personal fear of his disreputable neighbours, though he was fully alive to their peculiarities, but from the nomadic instinct which was still strong in his blood. He felt he could not yet bear the confinement of a close room or the propinquity of his fellow-man. He would rest on the verandah until the moon was fairly up, and then he would again take to the road. He was half reclining on the bench, with the slowly closing and opening lids of some tired but watchful animal, when the sound of wheels, voices, and clatter of hoofs on the highway arrested his attention, and he sat upright. The moon was slowly lifting itself over the limitless stretch of grain-fields before him on the other side of the road, and dazzling him with its level lustre. He could barely discern a cavalcade of dark 110 MARUJA. figures and a large vehicle rapidly approach ing, before it drew up tumultuously in front of the fonda. It was a pleasure-party of ladies and gentlemen on horseback and in a four-horsed char-a-bancs returning to La Mision Perdida. Buchanan, Raymond, and Gamier were there ; Amita and Dorotea in the body of the char-a-bancs, and Maruja seated on the box. Much to his own as tonishment and that of some others of the party, Captain Carroll was among the riders. Only Maruja and her mother knew that he was recalled to refute a repetition of the gossip already circulated regarding his sudden withdrawal ; only Maruja alone knew the subtle words which made that recall so potent yet so hopeless. Maruja's quick eyes, observant of every thing, even under the double fire of Captain Carroll and Grarnier, instantly caught those of the erect figure on the bench in the verandah. Surely that was the face of the tramp she had spoken to ! and yet there was MAEUJA. Ill a change, not only in the dress but in the general resemblance. After the first glance, Guest withdrew his eyes and gazed at the other figures in the char-a-bancs without moving a muscle. Maruja's whims and caprices were many and original, and when, after a sudden little cry and a declaration that she could stand her cramped position no longer, she leaped from the box into the road, no one was surprised. Grarnier and Captain Carroll quickly followed. " I should like to look into the fonda while the horses are being watered," she said laughingly, "just to see what it is that attracts Pereo there so often." Before any one could restrain this new caprice, she was already upon the verandah. To reach the open door, she had to pass so near Guest that her soft white flounces brushed his knees, and the flowers in her girdle left their perfume in his face. But he neither moved nor raised his eyes. When 112 MAEUJA. she had passed, he rose quietly and stepped into the road. On her nearer survey, Maruja was con vinced it was the same man. She remained for an instant with a little hand on the door post. " What a horrid place, and what dreadful people ! " she said in audible English as she glanced quickly after Guest. " Eeally, Pereo ought to be warned against keeping such company. Corne, let us go." She contrived to pass Guest again in re gaining the carriage; but in the few moments' further delay he walked on down the road before them, and by the time they were ready to start he was slowly sauntering some hundred yards ahead. They passed him at a rapid trot, but the next moment the char-a- bancs was suddenly pulled up. " My fan ! " cried Maruja. " Blessed Santa Maria ! my fan ! " A small black object, seen distinctly in the moonlight, was lying on the road, directly in the track of the sauntering stranger. Grarnier MAEUJA. 113 attempted to alight ; Carroll reined in liis horse. " Stop, all of you ! " said Maruja ; that man will bring it to me." It seemed as if he would. He stopped and picked it up, and approached the carriage. Maruja stood up in her seat with her veil thrown back, her graceful hand extended, her eyes and mouth tremulous with an irresistible smile. The stranger came nearer, singled out Captain Carroll, tossed the fan to him with a slight nod, and passed on the other side. " One moment," said Maruja, almost harshly, to the driver. " One moment," she continued, drawing her purse from her pocket brusquely. " Let me reward this civil gentle man of the road ! Here, sir ; " but, before she could continue, Carroll wheeled to her side, and interposed. " Pray collect yourself, Miss Saltonstall," he said hurriedly ; " you cannot tell who this man may be. He does not seem to be one who would insult you, or whom you would insult gratuitously." 114 MAEUJA. " Give me the fan, Captain Carroll," she said, with a soft and caressing smile. " Thank yon." She took it, and, breaking it through the middle between her gloved hands, tossed it into the highway. " You are right it smells of the fonda and the road. Thank you, again. You are so thoughtful for me, Captain Carroll," she murmured, raising her eyes gently to his, and then suddenly with drawing them with a half-sigh. " But I am keeping you all. Go on." The carriage rolled away and Guest re turned from the hedge to the middle of the road. San Jose lay in the opposite direction from the disappearing cavalcade ; but on leaving the fonda he had determined to lead his inquisitors astray by doubling and making a circuit of the hostelry through the fields hidden in the tall grain. This he did, securely passing them within sound of their voices, and was soon well on his way again. He avoided the highway, and striking a trail through the meadows, diverged to the right, MAEUJA. 115 where the low towers and brown walls of a ruined mission church rose above the plain. This would enable him to escape any direct pursuit on the high-road, besides, from its slight elevation, giving him a more extended view of the plain. As he neared it, he was surprised to see that, although it was partly dismantled, and the roof had fallen in the central aisle, a part of it was still used as a chapel, and a light was burning behind a narrow opening, partly window and partly shrine. He was almost upon it, when the figure of a man who had been kneeling beneath, with his back towards him, rose, crossed himself devoutly, and stood upright. Before he could turn, Guest disappeared round the angle of the wall, and the tall, erect figure of the solitary worshipper passed on without heeding him. But if Guest had been successful in evading the observation of the man he had come so suddenly upon, he was utterly unconscious of another figure that had been tracking him for 116 MARUJA. the last ten minutes through the tall grain, and had even succeeded in gaining the shadow of the wall behind him; and it was this figure, and not his own, that eventually attracted the attention of the tall stranger. The pursuing figure was rapidly approaching the unconscious Guest : in another moment it would have been upon him, when it was suddenly seized from behind by the tall devotee. There was a momentary struggle, and then it freed itself, with the exclamation, " Pereo ! " " Yes Pereo ! " said the old man, panting from his exertions. " And thou art Miguel. So thou wouldst murder a man for a few pesos ! " he said, pointing to the knife which the desperado had hurriedly hid in his jacket, " and callest thyself a Californian ! " u 'Tis only an Americano a runaway, with some ill-gotten gold," said Miguel sullenly, yet with unmistakable fear of the old man. "Besides, it was only to frighten him, the braggart. But since thou fearest to touch a hair of those interlopers " MARUJA. 117 " Fearest ! " said Pereo fiercely, clutching him by the throat, and forcing him against the wall. " Fearest ! sayest thou ? I, Pereo, fear? Dost thou think I would soil these hands, that might strike a higher quarry, with blood of thy game ? " " Forgive me, padrono," gasped Miguel, now thoroughly alarmed at the old man's awakened passion ; " pardon ; I meant that, since thou knowest him " "I know him?" repeated Pereo scorn fully, contemptuously throwing Miguel aside, who at once took that opportunity to in crease his distance from the old man's arm. " I know him ? Thou shalt see. Come hither, child," he called, beckoning to Guest. " Come hither; thou hast nothing to fear now." Guest, who had been attracted by the sound of altercation behind him, but who was utterly unconscious of its origin or his own relation to it, came forward impatiently. As he did so, Miguel took to his heels. The act 118 MARUJA. did not tend to mollify Guest's surly sus picions, and pausing a few feet from the old man, he roughly demanded his business with him. Pereo raised his head with the dignity of years and habits of command. The face of the young man confronting him was clearly illuminated by the moonlight. Pereo's eyes suddenly dilated, his mouth stiffened, he staggered back against the wall. " Who are you ? " he gasped, in uncertain English. Believing himself the subject of some drunkard's pastime, Guest replied savagely, " One who has enough of this d d non sense, and will stand no more of it from any one, young or old," and turned abruptly on his heel. " Stay, one moment, senor, for the love of God!" Some keen accent of agony in the old man's voice touched even Guest's selfish nature. He halted. MARUJA. 119 "You are a stranger here?" faltered Pereo. "Yes?" " I am." " You do not live here ? you have no friends ? " " I told you I am a stranger. I never was here before in my life," said Guest im patiently. " True ; I am a fool," said the old man hurriedly to himself. " I am mad mad ! It is not his voice. No ! It is not his look, now that his face changes. I am crazy." He stopped, and passed his trembling hands across his eyes. " Pardon, seiior," he con tinued, recalling himself with a humility that was almost ironical in its extravagance. " Pardon, pardon ! Yet, perhaps, it is not too much to have wanted to know who was the man one has saved." " Saved ! " repeated Guest, with incredu lous contempt. " Ay ! " said Pereo, haughtily, drawing his figure erect ; " ay, saved ! senor." He 120 MAEUJA. stopped and shrugged his shoulders. " But let it pass I say let it pass. Take an old man's advice, friend ; show not your gold hereafter to strangers lightly, no matter how lightly you have come by it. Good-night ! " Guest for a moment hesitated whether to resent the old man's speech, or to let it pass as the incoherent fancy of a brain maddened by drink. Then he ended the discussion by turning his back abruptly and continuing his way to the high-road. " So ! " said Pereo, looking after him with abstracted eyes, " so ! it was only a fancy. And yet even now, as he turned away, I saw the same cold insolence in his eye. Caramba ! Am I mad mad that I must keep for ever before my eyes, night and day, the image of that dog in every outcast, every ruffian, every wayside bully that I meet ? No, no, good Pereo ! Softly ! this is mere madness, good Pereo," he murmured to him self; " thou wilt have none of it ; none, good Pereo. Come, come ! " He let his head fall MARTHA. 121 slowly forward on his breast, and in that action, seeming to take up again the burden of a score more years upon his shoulders, he moved slowly away. When he entered the fonda half an hour later, the awe in which he was held by the half-superstitious ruffians appeared to have increased. Whatever story the fugitive Miguel had told his companions regarding Pereo's protection of the young stranger, it was certain that it had its full effect. Obse quious to the last degree, the landlord was so profoundly touched, when Pereo, not dis pleased with this evidence of his power over his countrymen, condescendingly offered to click glasses with him, that he endeavoured to placate him still further. "It is a pity your worship was not here earlier," he began, with a significant glance at the others, " to have seen a gallant young- stranger that was here. A spice of wicked ness about him, truly a kind of Don Caesar but bearing himself like a very caballero 122 MARUJA. always. It would have pleased your worship, who likes not those canting Puritans such as our neighbour yonder." " Ah ! " said Pereo reflectively, warming under the potent fires of flattery and aguar diente, " possibly I have seen him. He was like " "Like none of the dogs thou hast seen about San Antonio," interrupted the landlord. " Scarcely did he seem Americano, though he spoke no Spanish," The old man chuckled to himself viciously. " And thou, thou old fool, Pereo, must needs see a likeness to thine enemy in this poor runaway child this fugitive Don Juan ! He ! he ! " Nevertheless, he still felt a vague terror of the condition of mind which had produced this fancy, and drank so deeply to dispel his nervousness that it was with diffi culty he could mount his horse again. The exaltation of liquor, however, appeared only to intensify his characteristics ; his face be came more lugubrious and melancholy, his MARUJA. 123 manner more ceremonious and dignified ; and, erect and stiff in his saddle from the waist upwards, but leaning from side to side with the motion of his horse, like the tall mast of some labouring sloop, he " loped " away to wards the House of the Lost Mission. Once or twice he broke into sentimental song. Strangely enough, his ditty was a popular Spanish refrain of some matador's aristocratic inamorata : " Do you see my black eyes ? I am Manuel's Duchess," sang Pereo, with infinite gravity. His horse's hoofs seemed to keep time with the refrain, and he occasionally waved in the air the long leather thong of his bridle-rein. 1 It was quite late when he reached La Mision Perdida. Turning into the little lane that led to the stable-yard, he dismounted at a gate in the hedge which led to the summer- house of the old Mision garden, and, throwing his reins on his mustang's neck, let the animal precede him to the stables. The 124 MARUJA. moon shone full on the inclosure as he emerged from the labyrinth. With un covered head he approached the Indian mound, and sank on his knees before it. The next moment he rose with an exclama tion of terror, and his hat dropped from his trembling hand. Directly before him, a small, grey, wolfish-looking animal had stopped half-way down the mound on en countering his motionless figure. Frightened by his outcry, and unable to retreat, the shadowy depredator had fallen back on his slinking haunches with a snar], and bared teeth that glittered in the moonlight. In an instant the expression of terror on the old man's ashen face turned into a fixed look of insane exaltation. His white lips moved ; he advanced a step further, and held out both hands towards the crouching animal. " So ! It is thou at last ! And comest thou here thy tardy Pereo to chide ? Comest thou, too, to tell the poor old man his heart is cold, his limbs are feeble, his brain weak MARUJA. 125 and dizzy? that he is no longer fit to do thy master's work ? Ay, gnash thy teeth at him ! Curse him ! curse him in thy throat ! But listen ! listen, good friend I will tell thee a secret ay, good grey friar, a secret such a secret ! A plan, all mine fresh from this old grey head ; ha ! ha ! all mine ! To be wrought By these poor old arms ; ha ! ha ! All mine ! Listen ! " He stealthily made a step nearer the af frighted animal. With a sudden sidelong snap, it swiftly bounded by his side, and vanished in the thicket ; and Pereo, turning wildly, with a moan sank down helplessly on the grave of his forefathers. 126 MAEUJA. CHAPTER VI. To the open chagrin of most of the gentlemen and the unexpected relief of some of her own sex, Maruja, after an evening of more than usual caprice and wilful ness, retired early to her chamber. Here she beguiled Enri- quita, a younger sister, to share her soli tude for an hour, and with a new and charming melancholy presented her with mature counsel and some younger trinkets and adornments. " Thou wilt find them but folly, 'Riquita ; but thou art young, and wilt outgrow them as I have. I am sick of the Indian beads, everybody wears them ; but they seem to suit thy complexion. Thou are not yet quite old enough for jewellery ; but take thy choice of these." " 'Ruja," replied Enriquita MAEUJA. 127 eagerly, " surely thou wilt not give up this necklace of carved amber, that was brought thee from Manilla ? it becomes thee so ! Everybody says it. All the caballeros, Ray mond and Victor, swear that it sets off thy beauty like nothing else." " When thou knowest men better," responded Maruja in a deep voice, " thou wilt care less for what they say, and despise what they do. Be sides, I wore it to-day and I hate it." " But what fan wilt thou keep thyself? The one of sandal -wood thou hadst to-day?" continued Enriquita, timidly eyeing the pretty things upon the table. " None," re sponded Maruja didactically, " but the simplest, which I shall buy myself. Truly, it is time to set one's self against this'extrava- gance. Girls think nothing of spending as much upon a fan as would buy a horse and saddle for a poor man." " But why so serious to-night, my sister ? " said the little Enri quita, her eyes filling with ready tears. " It grieves me," responded Maruja promptly, 128 MAEUJA. " to find thee, like the rest, giving thy soul up to the mere glitter of the world. How ever, go, child, take the beads, but leave the amber; it would make thee yellower than thou art, which the blessed Virgin forbid ! Good-night." She kissed her affectionately, and pushed her from the room. Nevertheless, after a moment's survey of her lonely chamber, she hastily slipped on a pale satin dressing-gown, and, darting across the passage, dashed into the bedroom of the youngest Miss Wilson, haled that sentimental brunette from her night toilette, dragged her into her own chamber, and, enwrapping her in a huge mantle of silk and grey fur, fed her with chocolates and chestnuts, and, reclining on her sympathetic shoulder, continued her arraignment of the world and its follies until nearly daybreak. It was past noon when Maruja awoke, to find Faquita standing by her bedside with ill-concealed impatience. MARUJA. 129 " I ventured to awaken the Dona Maruja," she said, with vivacious alacrity, " for news terrible news ! The American, Dr. West, is found dead this morning in the San Jose road ! " " Dr. West dead ! " repeated Maruja thoughtfully, but without emotion. " Surely dead very dead. He was thrown from his horse and dragged by the stirrups how far, the blessed Virgin only knows. But he is found dead this Dr. West his foot in the broken stirrup, his hand holding a piece of the bridle ! I thought I would waken the Dona Maruja, that no one else should break it to the Dona Maria." " That no one else should break it to my mother ? " repeated Maruja coldly. " What mean you, girl ? " "I mean that no stranger should tell her," stammered Faquita, lowering her bold eyes. " You mean," said Maruja slowly, " that no silly, staring, tongue-wagging gossip K 130 MARUJA. should dare to break upon the morning devo tions of the lady mother with open-mouthed tales of horror ! You are wise, Faquita ! I will tell her myself. Help me to dress." But the news had already touched the outer shell of the great house, and little groups of the visitors were discussing it upon the verandah. For once, the idle badinage of a pleasure-seeking existence was sus pended ; stupid people with facts came to the fore; practical people with inquiring minds became interesting; servants were confiden tially appealed to; the local express man became a hero, and it was even noticed that he was intelligent and good-looking. " What makes it more distressing," said Raymond, joining one of the groups, " is, that it appears the Doctor visited Mrs. Saltonstall last evening, and left the casa at eleven. Sanchez, who was perhaps the last person who saw him alive, says that he noticed his horse was very violent, and the Doctor did not seem able to control him. The accident MAEUJA. 131 probably happened half an hour later, as he was picked up about three miles from here, and from appearances must have been dragged with his foot in the stirrup fully half a mile before the girth broke and freed the saddle and stirrup together. The mustang, with nothing on but his broken bridle, was found grazing at the rancho as early as four o'clock, an hour before the body of his master was discovered by the men sent from the rancho to look for him." "Eh, but the man must have been clean daft to have trusted himself to one of those savage beasts of the country," said Mr. Buchanan. "And he was no so young either about sixty, I should say. It didna look even respectable, I remember, when we met him the other day, careering over the country for all the world like one of those crazy Mexicans. And yet he seemed steady and sensible enough when he didna let his schemes of ' improvements ' run away with him like yon furious beastie. Eh well, puir 132 MAEUJA. man it was a sudden ending! And his family eh ? " " I don't think he has one at least here," said Raymond. " You can't always tell in California. I believe he was a widower." "Ay, man, but the heirs ; there must be considerable property?" said Buchanan im patiently. " Oh, the heirs. If he's made no will, which doesn't look like so prudent and prac tical a man as he was the heirs will probably crop up some day." " Probably ! crop up some day," repeated Buchanan aghast. " Yes. You must remember that we don't take heirs quite as much into account as you do in the old country. The loss of the man and how to replace him, is much more to us than the disposal of his property. Now, Doctor West was a power far beyond his actual possessions and we will know very soon how much those were dependent upon him." MARTHA. 133 " What do you mean ? " asked Buchanan anxiously. " I mean that five minutes after the news of the Doctor's death was confirmed, your friend Mr. Stanton sent a messenger with a despatch to the nearest telegraphic office, and that he himself drove over to catch Aladdin before the news could reach him." Buchanan looked uneasy; so did one or two of the native Californians who composed the group, and who had been listening atten tively. " And where is this same telegraphic office ? " asked Buchanan cautiously. " I'll drive you over there presently," re sponded Raymond grimly. " There'll be nothing doing here to-day. As Dr. West was a near neighbour of the family, his death suspends our pleasure-seeking Until after the funeral." Mr. Buchanan moved away. Captain Carroll and Garnier drew nearer the speaker. " I trust it will not withdraw from us the society of Miss Saltonstall," said Gamier 134 MABUJA. lightly ; "at least, that she will not be in consolable." "She did not seem to be particularly sympathetic with Dr. West the other day," said Captain Carroll, colouring slightly with the recollection of the morning in the summer-house, yet willing, in his hopeless passion, even to share that recollection with his rival. " Did you not think so, Monsieur Gamier?" " Very possibly ; and as Miss Saltonstall is quite artless and childlike in the expression of her likes and dislikes," said Raymond, with the faintest touch of irony, " you can judge as well as I can." Gamier parried the thrust lightly. " You are no kinder to our follies than you are to the grand passions of these gentlemen. Con fess, you frightened them horribly. You are what is called a bear eh ? You de preciate in the interests of business." Eaymond did not at first appear to notice the sarcasm. " I only stated," he said MAEUJA. 135 gravely, "that which these gentlemen will find out for themselves before they are many hours older. Dr. "West was the brain of the county, as Aladdin is its life-blood. It only remains to be seen how far the loss of that brain affects the county. The Stock Ex change market in San Francisco will indicate that to-day in the shares of the San Antonio and Soquel Eailroad, and the West Mills and Manufacturing Co. It is a matter that may affect even our friends here. Whatever West's social standing was in this house, lately he was in confidential business relations with Mrs. Saltonstall." He raised his eyes for the first time to Garnier as he added slowly, "It is to be hoped that if our hostess has no social reasons to deplore the loss of Dr. West, she at least will have no other." With a lover's instinct, conscious only of some annoyance to Maruja in all this, Carroll anxiously looked for her appearance among the others. He was doomed to disappoint ment, however. His half-timid inquiries only 136 MAEUJA. resulted in the information that Maruja was closeted with her mother. The penetralia of the casa was only accessible to the family ; yet, as he wandered uneasily about, he could not help passing once or twice before the quaint low archway with its grated door that opened from the central hall. His surprise may be imagined when he suddenly heard his name uttered in a low voice ; and, looking up, he beheld the soft eyes of Maruja at the grating. She held the door partly open with one little hand, and made a sign for him to enter with the other. When he had done so, she said, " Come with me," and preceded him down the dim corridor. His heart beat thickly ; the incense of this sacred inner life, with its faint suggestion of dead rose-leaves, filled him with a voluptuous languor; his breath was lost, as if a soft kiss had taken it away; his senses swam in the light mist that seemed to suffuse everything. His step trembled as she suddenly turned aside, and, MAEUJA. 137 opening a door, ushered him into a small vaulted chamber. In the first glance it seemed to be an oratory or chapel. A large gold and ebony crucifix hung on the wall. There was a prie-dieu of heavy dark mahogany in the centre of the tiled floor ; there was a low ottoman or couch, covered with a mantle of dark violet velvet, like a pall; there were two quaintly carved stiff chairs ; a religious, almost ascetic, air pervaded the apartment ; but no dreamy eastern seraglio could have affected him with an intoxication so pro foundly and mysteriously sensuous. Maruja pointed to a chair, and then, with a peculiarly feminine movement, placed her self sideways upon the ottoman, half reclining on her elbow on a high cushion, her deep, billowy flounces partly veiling the funereal velvet below. Her oval face was pale and melancholy, her eyes moist as if with recent tears ; an expression as of troubled passion lurked in their depths and in the corners of 138 MABUJA. her mouth. Scarcely knowing why, Carroll fancied that thus she might appear if she were in love, and the daring thought made him tremble. " I wanted to speak with you alone," she said gently, as if in explanation ; " but don't look at me so. I have had a bad night, and now this calamity " She stopped and then added softly, " I want you to do a favour for my mother." Captain Carroll with an effort at last found his voice. " But you are in trouble, you are suffering. I had no idea this unfortunate affair came so near to you." " Nor did I," said Maruja, closing her fan with a slight snap. " I knew nothing of it until my mother told me this morning. To be frank with you, it now appears that Dr. West was her most intimate business adviser. All her affairs were in his hands. I can not explain how, or why, or when ; but it is so." And is that all ? " said Carrol, with boyish MARUJA. 139 openness of relief. " And you have no other sorrow ? " In spite of herself, a tender smile, such as she might have bestowed on an impulsive boy, broke on her lips. "And is that not enough ? What would you ? No sit where you are ! We are here to talk seriously. And you do not ask what is this favour my mother wishes ? " " No matter what it is, it shall be done," said Carroll quickly. " I am your mother's slave if she will but let me serve at your side. Only," he paused, " I wish it was not business I know nothing of business." " If it were only business, Captain Carroll," said Maruja slowly, " I would have spoken to Raymond or the Senor Buchanan ; if it were only confidence, Pereo, our mayordomo, would have dragged himself from his sick-bed this morning to do my mother s bidding. But it is more than that it is the functions of a gentleman and my mother, Captain Carroll, would like to say of a friend." 140 MARUJA. He seized her hand and covered it with kisses. She withdrew it gently. " What have I to do ? " he asked eagerly. She drew a note from her belt. " It is very simple. You must ride over to Aladdin with that note. You must give it to him alone more than that, you must not let any one who may be there think you are making any but a social call. If he keeps you to dine you must stay you will bring back any thing he may give you and deliver it to me secretly for her." " Is that all ? " asked Carroll, with a slight touch of disappointment in his tone. " No," said Maruja, rising impulsively. "No, Captain Carroll it is not all! And you shall know all, if only to prove to you how we confide in you and to leave you free, after you have heard it, to do as you please." She stood before him, quite white, opening and shutting her fan quickly, and tapping the tiled floor with her little foot. " I have told you Dr. West was my mother's business MARUJA. 141 adviser. She looked upon him as more as a friend. Do you know what a dangerous thing it is for a woman who has lost one pro tector to begin to rely upon another ? Well, my mother is not yet old. Dr. West appre ciated her Dr. West did not depreciate him self two things, that go far with a woman, Captain Carroll, and my mother is a woman." She paused, and then, with a, light toss of her fan, said, " Well, to make an end, but for this excellent horse and this too ambitious rider, one knows not how far the old story of my mother's first choice would have been repeated, and the curse of Koorotora again fallen on the land." " And you tell me this you, Maruja you who warned nie against my hopeless passion for you?" " Could I foresee this ? " she said passion ately ; " and are you mad enough not to see that this very act would have made your suit intolerable to my relations ? " " Then you did think of my suit, Maruja ?" he said, grasping her hand. 142 MAEUJA. "Or any one's suit," she continued hur riedly, turning away with a slight increase of colour in her cheeks. After ji moment's pause she added, in a gentler and half-reproachful voice, " Do you think I have confided my mother's story to you for this purpose only ? Is this the help you proffer ? " " Forgive me, Maruja," said the young officer earnestly. " I am selfish, I know for I love you. But you have not told me yet how I could help your mother by delivering this letter, which any one could do." " Let me finish, then," said Muruja. " It is for you to judge what may be done. Letters have passed between my mother and Dr. West. My mother is imprudent; I know not what she may have written or what she might not write in confidence. But you understand, they are not letters to be made public nor to pass into any hands but hers. They are not to be left to be bandied about by his American friends ; to be com mented upon by strangers ; to reach the ears MAEUJA. 143 of the Griiitierrez. They belong to that grave which lies between the Past and my mother ; they must not rise from it to haunt her." "I understand," said the young officer quietly. " This letter, then, is my authority to recover them ? " " Partly, though it refers to other matters. This Mr. Prince, whom you Americans call Aladdin, was a friend of Dr. West ; they were associated in business, and he will probably have access to his papers. The rest we must leave to you." " I think you may," said Carroll simply. Maruja stretched out her hand. The young man bent over it respectfully and moved towards the door. She had expected him to make some protes tation perhaps even to claim some reward. But the instinct which made him forbear even in thought to take advantage of the duty laid upon him, which dominated even his miser able passion for her, and made it subservient to his exaltation of honour ; this epaulette of 144 MAEUJA. the officer, and blood of the gentleman, tins simple possession of knighthood not laid on by perfunctory steel, but springing from within all this, I grieve to say, was partly unintelligible to Maruja, and not entirely satisfactory. Since he had entered the room they seemed to have changed their situations ; he was no longer the pleading lover that trembled at her feet. For one base moment she thought it was the result of his know ledge of her mother's weakness ; but the next instant, meeting his clear glance, she coloured with shame. Yet she detained him vaguely a moment before the grated door in the secure shadow of the arch. He might have kissed her there ! He did not. In the gloomy stagnation of the great house, it was natural that he should escape from it for a while, and the saddling of his horse for a solitary ride attracted no attention. But it might have been noticed that his manner had lost much of that nervous susceptibility and anxiety which indicates a lover ; and it was MARUJA. 145 with a return of his professional coolness and precision that he rode out of the patio as if on parade. Erect, observant, and self-possessed, he felt himself " on duty," and, putting spurs to his horse, cantered along the high-road, finding an inexpressible relief in motion. He was doing something in the interest of help lessness and of her. He had no doubt of his right to interfere. He did not bother himself with the rights of others. Like all self-con tained men, he had no plan of action, except what the occasion might suggest. He was more than two miles from La Mision Perdida, when his quick eye was attracted by a saddle-blanket lying in the roadside ditch. A recollection of the calamity of the previous night made him rein in his horse and examine it. It was without doubt the saddle-blanket of Dr. West's horse, lost when the saddle came off, after the Doctor's body had been dragged by the runaway beast. But a second fact forced itself equally upon the young officer. It was lying nearly a L 146 MARUJA. mile from the spot where the body had been picked up. This certainly did not agree with the accepted theory that the accident had taken place further on, and that the body had been dragged until the saddle came off where it was found. His professional knowledge of equitation and the technique of accoutrements exploded the idea that the saddle could have slipped here, the saddle- blanket fallen, and the horse have run nearly a mile hampered by the saddle hanging under him. Consequently, the saddle, blanket, and unfortunate rider must have been precipitated together, and at the same moment, on or near this very spot. Captain Carroll was not a detective ; he had no theory to establish, no motive to discover, only, as an officer, he would have simply rejected any excuse offered on those terms by one of his troopers to account for a similar accident. He troubled himself with no further deduction. Without dismounting, he gave a closer at tention to the marks of struggling hoofs near MARUJA. 147 the edge of the ditch, which had not yet been obliterated by the daily travel. In doing so, his horse's hoof struck a small object partly hidden in the thick dust of the highway. It seemed to be a leather letter or memorandum case adapted for the breast pocket. Carroll instantly dismounted and picked it up. The name and address of Dr. West were legibly written on the inside. It contained a few papers and notes, but nothing more. The possibility that it might disclose the letters he was seeking was a hope quickly past. It was only a corro borative fact that the accident had taken place on the spot where he was standing. He was losing time ; he hurriedly put the book in his pocket, and once more spurred forward on his road. 148 MAEUJA. CHAPTER VII. THE exterior of Aladdin's Palace, familiar as it already was to Carroll, struck him that afternoon as looking more than usually un real, ephemeral, and unsubstantial. The Moorish arches, of the thinnest white pine, the arabesque screens and lattices that looked as if made of pierced cardboard, the golden minarets that seemed to be glued to the shell-like towers, and the hollow battlements that visibly warped and cracked in the fierce sunlight all appeared more than ever like a theatrical scene that might sink through the ground or vanish on either side to the sound of the prompter's whistle. Recalling Ray mond's cynical insinuations, he could not help fancying that the house had been built MAEUJA. 149 by a conscientious genie with a view to the possibility of the lamp and the ring passing, with other effects, into the hands of the sheriff. Nevertheless, the servant who took Captain Carroll's horse summoned another domestic, who preceded him into a small waiting-room off the gorgeous central hall, which looked not unlike the private bar-room of a first- class hotel, and presented him with a sherry cobbler. It was a peculiarity of Aladdin's Palace that the host seldom did the honours of his own house, but usually deputed the task to some friend, and generally the last new-comer. Carroll was consequently not surprised when he was presently joined by an utter stranger, who again pressed upon him the refreshment he had just declined. " You see," said the transitory host, " I'm a stranger myself here, and haven't got the ways of the regular customers ; but call for anything you like, and I'll see it got for you. Jirn " (the actual Christian name of Aladdin) 150 MAKUJA. "is headin* a party through the stables. Would you like to join 'em they ain't more than half through now or will you come right to the billiard-room the latest thing out in stained glass and iron ez pretty as fresh paint? or will you meander along to the bridal suite, and see the bamboo and silver dressing-room, and the white satin and crystal bed that cost fifteen thousand dollars as it stands ? Or," he added confidentially, " would you like to cut the whole cussed thing, and I'll get out Jim's 2.32 trotter and his spider-legged buggy, and we'll take a spin over to the Springs afore dinner ? " It was, however, more convenient to Carroll's purpose to conceal his familiarity with the Aladdin treasures, and to politely offer to follow his guide through the house. " I reckon Jim's pretty busy now," continued the stranger ; " what with old Doc West going under so suddent, just ez he'd got things boomin' with that railroad and his manu factory company. The stocks went down to MAEUJA. 151 nothing this morning; and, 'twixt you and me, the boys say," he added, mysteriously sinking his voice, " it was jest the tightest squeeze there whether there wouldn't be a general burst up all round. But Jim was over at San Antonio afore the Doctor's body was laid out, just ran that telegraph himself for about two hours ; had a meeting of trustees and directors afore the Coroner came; had the Doctor's books and papers brought over here in a buggy, and another meeting before luncheon. Why, by the time the other fellows began to drop in to know if the Doctor was really dead, Jim Prince had discounted the whole affair two years ahead. Why, bless you, nearly everybody is in it. That Spanish woman over there, with the pretty daughter that high-toned Greaser with the big house you know who I mean " " I don't think I do," said Carroll, coldly. " I know a lady named Saltonstall, with several daughters." 152 MARUJA. "That's her; thought I'd seen yon there once. Well, the Doctor's got her into it, up to the eyes. I reckon she's mortgaged every thing to him." It required all Carroll's trained self- possession to prevent his garrulous guide from reading his emotion in his face. This, then, was the secret of Maruja's melancholy. Poor child ! how bravely she had borne up under it ; and he, in his utter selfishness, had never suspected it. Perhaps that letter was her delicate way of breaking the news to him, for he should certainly now hear it all from Aladdin's lips. And this man, who evidently had succeeded to the control of Dr. West's property, doubtless had possession of the letters too ! Humph ! He shut his lips firmly together, and strode along by the side of his innocent guide, erect and defiant. He did not have long to wait. The sound of voices, the opening of doors, and the trampling of feet indicated that the other party were being " shown over " that part of MAEUJA. 153 the building Carroll and his companion were approaching. " There's Jim and his gang now," said his cicerone ; " I'll tell him you're here, and step out of this show business myself. So long ! I reckon I'll see you at dinner." At this moment Prince and a number of ladies and gentlemen appeared at the further end of the hall; his late guide joined them, and apparently indicated Carroll's presence, as, with a certain lounging, off- duty, officer-like way the young man saun tered on. Aladdin, like others of his class, objected to the military, theoretically and practically ; but he was not above recognizing their social importance in a country of no society, and of even being fascinated by Carroll's quiet and secure self-possession and self-contentment in a community of restless ambition an,d aggres sive assertion. He came forward to welcome him cordially ; he introduced him with an air of satisfaction; he would have preferred if he had been in uniform, but he contented 154 MAEUJA. himself with the fact that Carroll, like all men of disciplined limbs, carried himself equally well in mufti. "You have shown us everything," said Carroll, smiling, " except the secret chamber where you keep the magic lamp and ring. Are we not to see the spot where the incan tation that produces these marvels is held, even if we are forbidden to witness the ceremony ? The ladies are dying to see your sanctum your study your workshop where you really live." " You'll find it a mere den, as plain as my bedroom," said Prince, who prided himself on the Spartan simplicity of his own habits, and was not averse to the exhibition. " Come this way." He crossed the hall, and entered a small, plainly furnished room, containing a table piled with papers, some of which were dusty and worn-looking. Carroll instantly conceived the idea that these were Dr. West's property. He took his letter quietly from his pocket; and when the attention of the MARUJA. 155 others was diverted, laid it on the table, with the remark, in an undertone, audible only to Prince, " From Mrs. Saltonstall." Aladdin had that sublime audacity which so often fills the place of tact. Casting a rapid glance at Carroll, he cried, " Hallo ! " and wheeling suddenly round on his follow ing guests, with a bewildering extravagance of playful brusqueness, actually bundled them from the room. "The incantation is on!" he cried, waving his arms in the air ; " the geni is at work. No admittance except on business ! Follow Miss Wilson," he added, clapping both hands on the shoulders of the prettiest and shyest young lady of the party, with an irresistible paternal familiarity. " She's your hostess. I'll honour her drafts to any amount ; " and before they were aware of his purpose, or that Carroll was no longer among them, Aladdin had closed the door, that shut with a spring lock, and was alone with the young man. He walked quickly to his desk, took up the letter, and opened it. 156 MABUJA. His face of dominant, self-satisfied good- humour became set and stern. Without taking the least notice of Carroll, lie rose, and, stepping to a telegraphic instrument at a side table, manipulated half a dozen ivory knobs with a sudden energy. Then he returned to the table, and began hurriedly to glance over the memoranda and indorsements of the files of papers piled upon it. Carroll's quick eye caught sight of a small packet of letters in a writing of unmistakable feminine delicacy, and made certain they were the ones he was in quest of. Without raising his eyes, Mr. Prince asked, almost rudely " Who else has she told this to ? " " If you refer to the contents of that letter, it was written and handed to me about three hours ago. It has not been out of my posses sion since then." "Humph! Who's at the casa ? There's Buchanan, and Raymond, and Victor Guitier- rez, eh ? " " I think I can say almost positively that MAEUJA. 157 Mrs, Saltonstall has seen no one but her daughter since the news reached her, if that is what you wish to know," said Carroll, still following the particular package of letters with his eyes, as Mr. Prince continued his examination. Prince stopped. " Are you sure ? " " Almost sure." Prince rose, this time with a greater ease of manner, and, going to the table, ran his fingers over the knobs, as if mechanically. " One would like to know at once all there is to know about a transaction that changes the front of four millions of capital in about four hours, eh, captain ? " he said, for the first time really regarding his guest. " Just four hours ago, in this very room, we found out that the widow Saltonstall owed Dr. West about a million, tied up in investments, and we calculated to pull her through with per haps the loss of half. If she's got this assign ment of the Doctor's property that she speaks of in her letter, as collateral security, and it's 158 MAEUJA. all regular, and she so to speak steps into Dr. West's place, by Gr d, sir, we owe him about three millions, and we've got to settle with her and that's all about it. You've dropped a little bombshell in here, captain, and the splinters are flying round as far as San Francisco now. I confess it beats me regularly. I always thought the old man was a little keen over there at the casa but she was a woman, and he was a man for all his sixty years, and that combination I never thought of. I only wonder she hadn't gobbled him up before." Captain Carroll's face betrayed no trace of the bewilderment and satisfaction at this news of which he had been the unconscious bearer, nor of resentment at the coarseness of its translation. " There does not seem to be any memo randum of this assignment," continued Prince, turning over the papers. " Have you looked there ? " said Carroll, taking up the packet of letters, MARUJA. 159 " No they seem to me some private letter she refers to in this letter, and that she wants back again." " Let us see," said Carroll, untying the packet. There were three or four closely written notes in Spanish and English. "Love-letters, I reckon," said Prince "that's why the old girl wants 'em back. She don't care to have the wheedling that fetched the Doctor trotted out to the public." "Let us look more carefully," said Carroll pleasantly, opening each letter before Prince, yet so skilfully as to frustrate any attempt of the latter to read them. " There does not seem to be any memorandum here. They are evidently only private letters." " Quite so," said Prince. Captain Carroll retied the packet, and put it in his pocket. " Then I'll return them to her," he said quietly. " Hullo ! here I say," said Prince, start ing to his feet. 160 MAEUJA. " I said I would return them to her," repeated Carroll calmly. " But I never gave them to you ! I never consented to their withdrawal from the papers." "I'm sorry you did not," said Carroll coldly ; it would have been more polite." "Polite! D n it, sir! I call this stealing." "Stealing, Mr. Prince, is a word that might be used by the person who claims these letters to describe the act of any one who would keep them from her. It really cannot apply to you or me." " Once for all, do you refuse to return them to me ? " said Prince, pale with anger* " Decidedly." "Very well, sir! We shall see." He stepped to the corner and rang a bell. "I have summoned my manager, and will charge you with the theft in his presence." " I think not." " And why, sir ? " MARUJA. 161 "Because the presence of a third party would enable me to throw this glove in your face, which, as a gentleman, I couldn't do without witnesses." Steps were heard along the passage ; Prince was no coward in- a certain way; neither was he a fool. He knew that Carroll would keep his word; he knew that he should have to fight him ; that whatever the issue of the duel was, the cause of the quarrel would be known, and scarcely redound to his credit. At present there were no witnesses to the offered insult, and none would be wiser. The letters were not worth it. He stepped to the door, opened it, said, " No matter," and closed it again. He returned with' an affectation of care lessness. " You are right. I don't know that I'm called upon to make a scene here which the law can do for me as well elsewhere. It will settle pretty quick whether you've got the right to those letters, and whether you've taken the right way to get them, sir." 162 MAEUJA. " I have no desire to evade any respon sibility in this matter, legal or otherwise," said Carroll coldly, rising to his feet. " Look here," said Prince suddenly, with a return of his brusque frankness, "you might have asked me for those letters, you know." " And you wouldn't have given them to me," said Carroll. Prince laughed. " That's so ! I say, cap tain, did they teach you this sort of strategy at West Point ?" "They taught me that I could neither receive nor give an insult under a white flag," said Carroll pleasantly. "And they allowed me to make exchanges under the same rule. I picked up this pocket-book on the spot where the accident occurred to Dr. West. It is evidently his. I leave it with you, who are his executor." The instinct of reticence before a man with whom he could never be confidential kept him from alluding to his other discovery. MAEUJA. 163 Prince took the pocket-book, and opened it mechanically. After a moment's scrutiny of the memoranda it contained, his face assumed something of the same concentrated attention it wore at the beginning of the interview. Eaising his eyes suddenly to Carroll, he said quickly " You have examined it ? " % " Only so far as to see that it contained nothing of importance to the person I repre sent," returned Carroll simply. The capitalist looked at the young officer's clear eyes. Something of embarrassment came into his own as he turned them away, "Certainly. Only memorandums of the Doctor's business. Quite important to us, you know. But nothing referring to your principal." 'He laughed. "Thank you for the exchange. I say take a drink ! " " Thank you no ! " returned Carroll, going to the door. " Well, good-bye." He held out his hand. Carroll, with his 164 MAEUJA. clear eyes still regarding him, passed quietly by the outstretched hand, opened the door, bowed, and made his exit. A slight flush came into Prince's cheek. Then, as the door closed, he burst into a half- laugh. Had he been a dramatic villain, he would have added to it several lines of soliloquy, in which he would have rehearsed the fact that the opportunity for revenge had " come at last ; " that the " haughty victor who had just left with his ill-gotten spoil had put into his hands the weapon of his friend's destruction ; " that the " hour had come ; " and possibly he might have said, " Ha ! ha ! " But, being a practical, good-natured, selfish rascal, not much better or worse than his neighbours, he sat himself down at his desk, and began to carefully consider how he could best make use of this memoranda jotted down by Dr. West of the proofs of the existence of his son, and the consequent discovery of a legal heir to his property. MARUJA. 165 CHAPTER VIII. WHEN Faquita had made sure that her young mistress was so securely closeted with Dona Maria that morning as to be inaccessible to curious eyes and ears, she saw fit to bewail to her fellow-servants this further evidence of the decay of the old feudal and patriarchal mutual family confidences. " Time was, thou rememberest, Pepita, when an affair of this kind was openly discussed at chocolate with everybody present, and before us all. When Joaquin Padilla was shot at Monterey, it was the Dona herself who told us, who read aloud the] letters describing it and the bullet-holes in his clothes, and made it quite a gala-day and he was a first-cousin of Guitierrez. And now, when this American goat of a doctor is 166 MARUJA. kicked to death by a mule, the family must shut themselves up, that never a question is asked or answered." " Ay," responded Pepita ; " and as regards that, Sanchez there knows as much as they do, for it was he that almost saw the whole affair." " How ? sawest it ? " inquired Faquita eagerly. " Why, was it not he that was bringing home Pereo, who had been lying in one of his trances or visions blessed St. Antonio pre serve us ! " said Pepita, hastily crossing her self " on Koorotora's grave, when the Doctor's mustang charged down upon them like a wild bull, and the Doctor's foot half out of the stirrups, and he not yet fast in his seat? And Pereo laughs a wild laugh and says : i Watch if the coyote does not drag yet at his mustang's heels ; ' and Sanchez ran and watched the Doctor out of sight, careering and galloping to his death ! ay, as Pereo prophesied. For it was only half an hour afterwards that Sanchez again heard the MAMUJA. 167 tramp of his hoofs as if it were here and knowing it two miles away thou under- standest, he said to himself, ' It is over.' ' The two women shuddered and crossed themselves. " And what says Pereo of the fulfilment of his prophecy ? " asked Faquita, hugging her self in her shawl with a certain titillating shrug of fascinating horror. 4 ' It is even possible he understands it not. Thou knowest how dazed and dumb he ever is after these visions that he comes from them as one from the grave, remembering nothing. He has lain like a log all the morning." "Ay; but this news should awaken him, if aught can. He loved not this sneaking Doctor. Let us seek him ; mayhap Sanchez may be there. Come ! The mistress lacks us not just now ; the guests are provided for. Come!" She led the way to the eastern angle of the casa communicating by a low corridor with 168 MAEL'JA. the corral and stables. This was the old " gate-keep," or quarters of the mayordomo, who, among his functions, was supposed to exercise a supervision over the exits and entrances of the house. A large steward's room or office, beyond it a room of general assembly, half guard-room, half servants' hall, and Pereo's sleeping-room, constituted his domain. A few peons were gathered in the hall near the open door of the apartment where Pereo lay. Stretched on a low pallet, his face yellow as wax, a light burning under a crucifix near his head, and a spray of blessed palm, popu larly supposed to avert the attempts of evil spirits to gain possession of his suspended faculties, Pereo looked not unlike a corpse. Two muffled and shawled domestics, who sat by his side, might have been mourners, but for their voluble and incessant chattering. " So thou art here, Faquita ? " said a stout virago. " It is a wonder thou couldst spare time from prayers for the repose of the MARUJA. 169 American Doctor's soul to look after the health of thy superior, poor Pereo ! Is it, then, true that Dona Maria said she would have nought more to do with the drunken brute of her mayordomo ? " The awful fascination of Pereo's upturned face did not prevent Faquita from tossing her head as she replied, pertly, that she was not there to defend her mistress from lazy gossip. " Nay, but what said she ? " asked the other attendant. " She said Pereo was to want for nothing ; but at present she could not see him." A murmur of indignation and sympathy passed through the company. It was followed by a long sigh from the insensible man. " His lips move," said Faquita, still fascinated by curiosity. " Hush ! he would speak." " His lips move, but his soul is still asleep," said Sanchez oracularly. " Thus they have moved since early morning, when I came to speak with him, and found him lying here in a fit upon the floor. He was half dressed, 170 MAEUJA. thou seest, as if he had risen to go forth, and had been struck down so " " Hush ! I tell thee he speaks," said Faquita. The sick man was faintly articulating through a few tiny bubbles that broke upon his rigid lips. " He dared me! He said I was old too old." " Who dared thee ? Who said thou wast too old ? " asked the eager Faquita, bending over him. " He, Koorotora himself! in the shape of a coyote." Faquita fell back with a little giggle, half of shame, half of awe. "It is ever thus," said Sanchez senten- tiously ; "it is what he said last night, when I picked him up on the mound. He will sleep now thou shalt see. He will get no further than Koorotora and the coyote and then he will sleep." And to the awe of the group, and the increased respect for Sanchez's wisdom, Pereo MAEUJA. 171 seemed to fall again into a lethargic slumber. It was late in the evening when he appeared to regain perfect consciousness. " Ah what is this ? " he said roughly, sitting up in bed, and eyeing the watchers around him, some of whom had succumbed to sleep, and others were engaged in playing cards. " Caramba ! are ye mad ? Thou, Sanchez, here ; who shouldst be at thy work in the stables ? Thou, Pepita, is thy mistress asleep or dead, that thou sittest here ? Blessed San Antonio ! would ye drive me mad ? " He lifted his hand to his head with a dull movement of pain, and attempted to rise from the bed. " Softly, good Pereo ; lie still," said Sanchez, approaching him. " Thou has been ill so ill. These, thy friends, have been waiting only for this moment to be assured that thou art better. For this idleness there is no blame truly none. The Dona Maria has said that thou shouldst lack no care ; and truly, since the terrible news there has been little to do." 172 MAEUJA. " The terrible news ? " repeated Pereo. Sanchez cast a meaning glance upon the others, as if to indicate this confirmation of his diagnosis. "Ay, terrible news! The Doctor West was found this morning dead two miles from the casa." " Dr. West dead ! " repeated Pereo slowly, as if endeavouring to master the real meaning of the words. Then, seeing the vacuity of his question reflected on the faces of those around him, he added hurriedly, with a feeble smile, " ay dead ! Yes ! I re member. And he has been ill very ill, eh ? " " It was an accident. He was thrown from his horse, and so killed," returned Sanchez gravely. " Killed by his horse, sayest thou ? " saicl Pereo, with a sudden fixed look in his eye. " Ay, good Pereo. Dost thou not re member when the mustang bolted with him down upon us in the lane, and then thou didst say he would come to evil with the MAEUJA. 173 brute ? He did blessed San Antonio ! within half an hour ! " " How thou sawest it ? " " Nay; for the mustang was running away, and I did not follow. Bueno ! it happened all the same. The Alcalde, coroner, who knows all about it, has said so an hour ago ! Juan brought the news from the rancho where the inquest was. There will be a funeral the day after to-morrow ! and so it is that some of the family will go. Fancy, Pereo, a Guitierrez at the funeral of the Americano Doctor ! Nay, I doubt not that the Dona Maria will ask thee to say a prayer over his bier." " Peace, fool ! and speak not of thy lady mistress," thundered the old man, sitting upright. " Begone to the stables. Dost thou hear me ? Go ! " " Now, by the Mother of Miracles," said Sanchez, hastening from the room as the gaunt figure of the old man rose, like a sheeted spectre, from the bed, " that was his 174 MAEUJA. old self again ! Blessed San Antonio ! Pereo has recovered." The next day he was at his usual duties, with perhaps a slight increase of sternness in his manner. The fulfilment of his prophecy related by Sanchez, added to the superstitious reputation in which he was held, although Faquita voiced the opinions of a growing sceptical party in the statement that it was easy to prophesy the Doctor's accident, with the spectacle of the horse actually running away before the prophet's eyes. It was even said that Dona Maria's aversion to Pereo since the accident arose from a belief that some assistance might have been rendered by him. But it was pointed out by Sanchez that Pereo had, a few moments before, fallen under one of those singular epileptic-like strokes to which he was subject, and not only was unfit, but even required the entire care of Sanchez at the time. He did not attend the funeral, nor did Mrs. Saltonstall ; but the family was represented by Maroja and Amita, MARUJA. 175 accompanied by one or two dark-faced cousins, Captain Carroll, and Eaymond. A number of friends and business associates from the neighbouring towns, Aladdin and a party from his house, the farm labourers, and a crowd of working men from his mills in the foothills, swelled the assemblage, that met in and around the rude agricultural sheds and outhouses which formed the only pastoral habitation of the rancho of San Antonio. It had been a characteristic injunction of the deceased that he should be buried in the midst of one of his most prolific grain-fields, as a grim return to that nature he was im poverishing, with neither mark nor monu ment to indicate the spot, and that even the temporary mound above him should at the fitting season of the year be levelled with the rest of the field by the obliterating plough shares. A grave was accordingly dug about a quarter of a mile from his office amidst a " volunteer " crop so dense that the large space mown around the narrow opening to 176 MARUJA. admit of the presence of the multitude seemed like a golden amphitheatre. A distinguished clergyman from San Fran cisco officiated. A man of tact and politic adaptation, he dwelt upon the blameless life of the deceased, on his practical benefit for civilization in the county, and even treated his grim Pantheism in the selection of his grave as a formal recognition of the text " dust to dust." He paid a not ungrateful compliment to the business associates of the deceased, and without actually claiming in the usual terms " a continuance of past favours" for their successors, managed to interpolate so strong a recommendation of the late Doctor's commercial projects as to elicit from Aladdin the expressive commenda tion that his sermon was " as good as five per cent, in the stock." Maruja, who had been standing near the carriage, languidly silent and abstracted even under the tender attentions of Carroll, sud- i denly felt the consciousness of another pair MAEUJA. 177 of eyes fixed upon her. Looking up, she was surprised to find herself regarded by the man she had twice met, once as a tramp and once as a wayfarer at the fonda, who had quietly joined a group not far from her. At once impressed by the idea that this was the first time that he had really looked at her, she felt a singular shyness creeping over her, until, to her own astonishment and indigna tion, she was obliged to lower her eyes before his gaze. In vain she tried to lift them with her old supreme power of fascination. If she had ever blushed, she felt she would have done so now. She knew that her face must betray her consciousness ; and at last she Maruja, the self-poised and all-sufficient goddess actually turned in half-hysterical and girlish bashfulness to Carroll for relief in an affected and exaggerated absorption of his attentions. She scarcely knew that the clergyman had finished speaking, when Ray mond approached them softly from behind. " Pray don't believe," he said appealingly, H 178 MAEUJA. "that all the human virtues are about to be buried I should say sown in that wheat- field. A few will still survive, and creep about above the Doctor's grave. Listen to a story just told me, and disbelieve if you dare in human gratitude. Do you see that picturesque young ruffian over there ? " Maruja did not lift her eyes. She felt herself breathlessly hanging on the speaker's next words. " Why, that's the young man of the fonda, who picked up your fan," said Carroll, " isn't it?" " Perhaps," said Maruja indifferently. She would have given worlds to have been able to turn coldly and stare at him at that moment with the others, but she dared not. She contented herself with softly brushing some dust from Captain Carroll's arm with her fan, and a feminine suggestion of tender care which thrilled that gentleman. " Well," continued Raymond, " that Robert Macaire over yonder came here some three MAliUJA. 179 or four days ago as a tramp, in want of every tiling but honest labour. Our lamented friend consented to parley with him, which was something remarkable in the Doctor; still more remarkable, he gave him a suit of clothes and, it is said, some money, and sent him on his way. Now, more remarkable than all, our friend, on hearing of his bene factor's death, actually tramps back here to attend his funeral. The Doctor being dead, his executors not of a kind to emulate the Doctor's spasmodic generosity, and there being no chance of future favours, the act must be recorded as purely and simply gratitude. By Jove ! I don't know but that he is the only one here who can be called a real mourner. I'm here because your sister is here ; Carroll comes because you do, and you come because your mother cannot." " And who tells you these pretty stories ? " asked Maruja, with her face still turned towards Carroll. " The foreman, Harrison, who, with all 180 MABUJA. extensive practical experience of tramps, was struck with this exception to the general rule." " Poor man ! one ought to do something for him," said Amita compassionately. " What ! " said Raymond, with affected terror, " and spoil this perfect story ? Never ! If I should offer him ten dollars, I'd expect him to kick me ; if he took it, I'd expect to kick him." " He is not so bad-looking, is he, Maruja ? " asked Amita of her sister. But Maruja had already moved a few paces off with Carroll, and seemed to be listening to him only. Raymond smiled at the pretty perplexity of Amita's eyebrows over this pronounced in discretion. " Don't mind them," he whispered ; " you really cannot expect to duena your elder sister. Tell me, would you actually like me to see if I could assist the virtuous tramp ? You have only to speak." But Amita's interest appeared to be so completely appeased MAEUJA. 181 with. Raymond's simple offer that she only smiled, blushed, and said " No." Maruja's quick ears had taken in every word of these asides, and for an instant she hated her sister for her aimless declination of Raymond's proposal. But becoming con sciousunder her eyelids that the stranger was moving away with the dispersing crowd, she rejoined Amita with her usual manner. The others had re-entered the carriage, but Maruja took it into her head to proceed on foot to the rude building whence the mourners had issued. The foreman Harrison, flushed and startled by this apparition of inaccessible beauty at his threshold, came eagerly for ward. " I shall not trouble you now, Mr. Har-r-r-rison," she said, with a polite exagger ation of the consonants ; " but some day I shall ride over here, and ask you to show me your wonderful machines." She smiled, and turned back to seek her carriage. But before she had gone many yards she found that she had completely lost 182 MAEUJA. it in the intervening billows of grain. She stopped with an impatient little Spanish ejaculation. The next moment the stalks of wheat parted before her and a figure emerged. It was the stranger. She fell back a step in utter helplessness. He, on his side, retreated again into the wheat, holding it back with extended arms to let her pass. As she moved forward mechanically, without a word he moved back ward, making a path for her until she was able to discern the coachman's whip above the bending heads of the grain just beyond her. He stopped here and drew to one side, his arms still extended, to give her free passage. She tried to speak, but could only bow her head, and slipped by him with a strange feeling suggested by his attitude that she was evading his embrace. But the next moment his arms were lowered, the grain closed around him, and he was lost to her view. She reached the carriage almost unperceived by the inmates, and pounced upon her sister with a laugh. MAEUJA. 183 "Blessed Virgin!" said Amita, "where did you come from ? " " From there ! " said Maruja, with a slight nervous shiver, pointing to the clustering gram. " We were afraid you were lost." " So was I," said Maruja, raising her pretty lashes heavenwards, as she drew a shawl tightly round her shoulders. " Has anything happened ? You look strange," said Carroll, drawing closer to her. Her eyes were sparkling, but she was very pale. " Nothing, nothing ! " she said hastily, glancing at the grain again. " If it were not that the haste would have been absolutely indecent, I should say that the late Doctor had made you a ghostly visit," said Eaymond, looking at her curiously, " He would have been polite enough not to have commented on my looks," said Maruja. "Ami really such a fright ? " Carroll thought he had never seen her so 184 MAEUJA. beautiful. Her eyelids were quivering over their fires as if they had been brushed by the passing wing of a strong passion. " What are you thinking of ? " said Carroll, as they drove on. She was thinking that the stranger had looked at her admiringly, and that his eyes were blue. But she looked quietly into her lover's face, and said sweetly, " Nothing, I fear, that would interest you ! " MABUJA. 185 CHAPTER IX. THE news of the assignment of Dr. West's property to Mrs. Saltonstall was followed by the still more astonishing discovery that the Doctor's will further bequeathed to her his entire property, after payment of his debts and liabilities. It was given in recognition of her talents and business integrity during their late association, and as an evidence of the confidence and " undying affection " of the testator. Nevertheless, after the first surprise, the fact was accepted by the com munity as both natural and proper under that singular instinct of humanity which acquiesces without scruple in the union of two large fortunes, but sharply questions the conjunction of poverty and affluence, and 186 MARUJA. looks only for interested motives where there is disparity of wealth. Had Mrs. Saltonstall been a poor widow instead of a rich one ; had she been the Doc tor's housekeeper instead of his business friend, the bequest \vould have been strongly criticised if not legally tested. But this combination, which placed the entire valley of San Antonio in the control of a single individual, appeared to be perfectly legitimate. More than that, some vague rumour of the Doctor's past, and his early entanglements, only seemed to make this eminently practical disposition of his property the more respectable, and condoned for any moral irregularities of his youth. The effect upon the collateral branches of the Guitierrez family and the servants and retainers was even more impressive. For once it seemed that the fortunes and tradi tions of the family were changed ; the female Guitierrez, instead of impoverishing the pro perty, had augmented it ; the foreigner and intruder had been despoiled ; the fate of La MAEUJA. 187 Mision Perdida had been changed ; the curse of Koorotora had proved a blessing; his prophet and descendant, Pereo, the inayor- domo, moved in an atmosphere of super stitious adulation and respect among the domestics and common people. This recog nition of his power he received at times with a certain exaltation of grandiloquent pride beyond the conception of any but a Spanish servant, and at times with a certain dull, pained vacancy of perception and an expres sion of frightened bewilderment which also went far to establish his reputation as an unconscious seer and thaumaturgist. " Thou seest," said Sanchez to the partly sceptical Faquita, " he does not know more than an infant what is his power. That is the proof of it." The Dona Maria alone did not parti cipate in this appreciation of Pereo, and when it was proposed that a feast or celebra tion of rejoicing should be given under the old pear tree by the Indian's mound, her indignation was long remembered by those 188 MAfiUJA. that witnessed it. " It is not enough that we have been made ridiculous in the past," she said to Maruja, " by the interference of this solemn fool, but that the memory of our friend is to be insulted by his generosity being made into a triumph of Pereo's idiotic ancestor. One would have thought those coyotes and Koorotora's bones had been buried with the cruel gossip of your rela tions" (it had been the recent habit of Dona Maria to allude to "the family" as being particularly related to Maruja alone) " over my poor friend. Let him beware that his ancestor's mound is not uprooted with the pear tree and his heathenish temple destroyed. If, as the engineer says, a branch of the new railroad can be established for La Mision Perdida, I agree with him that it can better pass at that point with less sacrifice to the domain. It is the one uncultivated part of the park, and lies at the proper angle." " You surely would not consent to this, my mother ? " said Maruja, with a sudden impres- MAEUJA. 189 sion of a newly found force in her mother's character. " Why not, child ? " said the relict of Mr. Saltonstall and the mourner of Dr. West coldly. " I admit it was discreet of thee in old times to have thy sentimental passages there with caballeros who, like the guests of the hidalgo that kept a skeleton at his feast, were reminded of the mutability of their hopes by Koorotora's bones and the legend. But with the explosion of this idea of a primal curse, like Eve's, on the property," added the Doiia Maria, with a slight bitter ness, " thou mayest have thy citas else where. Thou canst scarcely keep this Captain Carroll any longer at a distance by rattling those bones of Koorotora in his face. And of a truth, child, since the affair of the letters, and his discreet and honourable con duct since, I see not why thou shouldst. He has thy mother's reputation in his hands." " He is a gentleman > my mother," said Maruja quietly. 190 MAIWJA. " And they are scarce, child, and should be rewarded and preserved. That is what I meant, silly one ; this Captain is not rich but then, thou hast enough for both." " But it was Amita that first brought him here," said Maruja, looking down with an air of embarrassed thoughtfulness, which Dona Maria chose to instantly accept as exaggerated coyness. " Do not think to deceive me or thyself, child, with this folly. Thou art old enough to know a man's mind, if not thine own. Besides, I do not know that I shall object to her liking for Kaymond, He is very clever, and would be a relief to some of thy rela tives. He would be invaluable to us in the emergencies that may grow out of these mechanical affairs that I do not understand such as the mill and- the railroad." " And you propose to take a few husbands as partners in the business ? " said Maruja, who had recovered her spirits. " I warn you that Captain Carroll is as stupid as a gentle- MAEUJA. 191 man could be. I wonder that lie has not blundered in other things as badly as he has in preferring me to Amita. He confided to me only last night that he had picked up a pocket-book belonging to the Doctor and given it to Aladdin without a witness or receipt, and evidently of his own accord." " A pocket-book of the Doctor's ? " repeated Dona Maria. "Ay; but it contained nothing of thine," said Maruja. " The poor child had sense enough to think of that. But I am in no hurry to ask your consent and your blessing yet, little mother. I could even bear that Amita should precede me to the altar, if the exigencies of thy ' business ' require it. It might also secure Captain Carroll for me. Nay, look not at me in that cheapening, commerical way with compound interest in thine eyes. I am not so poor an investment, truly, of thy original capital." "Thou art thy father's child," said her mother, suddenly kissing her ; " and that is 192 MAIWJA. saying enough, the blessed Virgin knows. Go now," she continued, gently pushing her from the room, " and send Amita hither." She watched the disappearance of Maruja's slightly "rebellious shoulders, and added to herself, "And this is the child that Amita really believes is pining with love-sickness for Carroll, so that she can neither sleep nor eat. This is the girl that Faquita would have me think hath no longer any heart in her dress or in her finery ! Soul of Joseph Salton- stall ! " ejaculated the widow, lifting her shoulders and her eyes together, " thou hast much to account for." Two weeks later she again astonished her daughter. " Why dost thou not join the party that drives over to see the wonders of Aladdin's Palace to-day ? It would seem more proper that thou shouldst accompany thy guests than Raymond and Amita." " I have never entered his doors since the day lie was disrespectful to my mother's daughter," said Maruja, in surprise. MARUJA. 193 " Disrespectful ! " repeated Dona Maria impatiently. " Thy father's daughter ought to know that such as he may be ignorant and vulgar, but cannot be disrespectful to her. And there are offences, child, it is much more crushing to forget than to re member. As long as he has not the pre sumption to apologize, I see no reason why thou mayst not go. He has not been here since that affair of the letters. I shall not permit him to be uncivil over that dost thou understand ? He is of use to me in business. Thou mayst take Carroll with thee ; he will understand that." "But Carroll will not go," said Maruja, " He will not say what passed between them, but I suspect they quarrelled." " All the better, then, that thou goest alone. He need not be reminded of it. Fear not but that he will be only too proud of thy visit to think of aught else." Maruja, who seemed relieved at this pros pect of being unaccompanied by Cap- o 194 MAEUJA. tain Carroll, shrugged her shoulders and assented. When the party that afternoon drove into the courtyard of Aladdin's Palace, the an nouncement that its hospitable proprietor was absent and would not return until dinner did not abate either their pleasure or their curiosity* As already intimated to the reader, Mr. Prince's functions as host were charac teristically irregular, and the servant's sug gestion that Mr. Prince's private secretary would attend to do the honours created little interest, and was laughingly waived by Maruja. " There really is not the slightest necessity to trouble the gentleman," she said politely. "I know the house thoroughly, and I think I have shown it once or twice before for your master. Indeed," she added, turning to her party, " I have been already complimented on my skill as a cicerone." After a pause, she continued, with a slight exaggeration of action and in her deepest contralto, " Ahem, ladies and gentlemen, the MARUJA. 195 hall and court in which, we are now standing- is a perfect copy of the Court of Lions at the Alhambra, and was finished in fourteen days in white pine, gold, and plaster at a cost of ten thousand dollars. A photograph of the original structure hangs on the wall : you will observe, ladies and gentlemen, that the reproduction is perfect. The Alhambra is in Granada, a province of Spain, which is said in some respects to resemble California, where you have probably observed the Spanish language is still spoken by the old settlers. We now cross the stable-yard on a bridge which is a facsimile in appearance and dimen sions of the Bridge of Sighs at Yenice con necting the Doge's Palace with the State Prison. Here, on the contrary, instead of being ushered into a dreary dungeon, as in the great original, a fresh surprise awaits us. Allow me, ladies and gentlemen, to precede you for the surprise. We open a door thus and presto ! " She stopped* speechless, on the threshold ; the fan fell from her gesticulating hand. 196 MAEUJA. In the centre of a brilliantly-lit conser vatory, with golden columns, a young man was standing. As her fan dropped on the tessellated pavement, he came forward, picked it up, and put it in her rigid and mechanical fingers. The party, who had applauded her apparently artistic climax, laughingly pushed by her into the conservatory, without noticing her agitation. It was the same face and figure she remembered as last standing before her, hold ing back the crowding grain in the San Antonio field. But here he was apparelled and appointed like a gentleman, and even seemed to be superior to the garish glitter of his new surroundings. " I believe I have the pleasure of speaking to Miss Saltonstall," he said, with the faintest suggestion of his former manner in his half- resentful sidelong glance. " I hear that you offered to dispense with my services, but I knew that Mr. Prince would scarcely be satisfied if I did not urge .it once more MABUJA. 197 upon you in person. I am his private secre tary." At the same moment, Amita and Eaymond, attracted by the conversation, turned towards him. Their recognition of the man they had seen at Dr. West's was equally distinct. The silence became embarrassing. Two pretty girls of the party pressed to Amita's side, with half-audible whispers. " What is it ? " " Who's your handsome and wicked-looking friend ? " "Is this the surprise ? " At the sound of their voices Maruja re covered herself coldly. "Ladies," she said, with a slight wave of her fan, " this is Mr. Prince's private secretary. I believe it is hardly fair to take up his valuable time. Allow me to thank you, sir, FOR PICKING UP MY FAN ! " With a single subtle flash of the eye she swept by him, taking her companions to the other end of the conservatory. When she turned, he was gone. " This was certainly an unexpected climax," 198 MAEUJA. said Raymond mischievously. " Did you really arrange it beforehand ? We leave a picturesque tramp at the edge of a grave ; we pass over six weeks and a Bridge of Sighs, and hey, presto ! we find a private secretary in a conservatory ! This is quite the regular Aladdin business." " You may laugh," said Maruja, who had recovered her spirits, " but if you were really clever you'd find out what it all means. Don't you see that Amita is dying of curiosity ? " " Let us fly at once and discover the secret, then," said Raymond, slipping Amita's arm through his. " We will consult the oracle in the stables. Come." The others followed, leaving Maruja for an instant alone. She was about to rejoin them when she heard footsteps in the passage they had just crossed, and then perceived that the young stranger had merely withdrawn to allow the party to precede him before he returned to the other building through the MARUJA. 199 conservatory, which he was just entering. In turning quickly to escape, the black lace of her over-skirt caught in the spines of a snaky-looking cactus. She stopped to dis engage herself with feverish haste in vain. She was ahout to sacrifice the delicate material in her impatience, when the young man stepped quietly to her side. " Allow me. Perhaps I have more patience, even if I have less time," he said, stooping down. Their ungloved hands touched. Maruja stopped in her efforts and stood up. He continued until he had freed the luckless flounce, conscious of the soft fire of her eyes on his head and neck. " There," he said, rising, and encountering her glance. As she did not speak, he con tinued, " You are thinking, Miss Saltonstall, that you have seen me before, are you not? Well you have ; I asked you the road to San Jose one morning when I was tramping by your hedge." 200 MAEUJA, "And as you probably were looking for something better which yon seem to have found you didn't care to listen to my direc tions," said Maruja quickly. " I found a man almost the only one who ever offered me a gratuitous kindness at whose grave I afterwards met you. I found another man who befriended me here where I meet you again." She was beginning to be hysterically nervous lest any one should return and find them together. She was conscious of a tingling of vague shame. Yet she lingered. The strange fascination of his half-savage melancholy, and a reproachfulness that seemed to arraign her, with the rest of the world, at the bar of his vague resentment, held the delicate fibres of her sensitive being as cruelly and relentlessly as the thorns of the cactus had gripped her silken lace. Without know ing what she was saying, she stammered that she " was glad he connected her with his better fortune," and began to move away. MABUJA. 201 He noticed it with his sidelong lids, and added, with a slight bitterness " I don't think I should have intruded here again, but I thought you had gone. But I I am afraid you have not seen the last of me. It was the intention of my employer, Mr. Prince, to introduce me to you and your mother. I suppose he considers it part of my duties here. I must warn you that, if you are here when he returns, he will insist upon it, and upon your meeting me with these ladies at dinner." " Perhaps so he is my mother's friend," said Maruja ; " but you have the advantage of us you can always take to the road, you know." The smile with which she had intended to accompany this speech did not come as readily in execution as it had in conception, and she would have given worlds to have recalled her words. But he said, "That's so," quietly, and turned away, as if to give her an oppor tunity to escape. She moved hesitatingly 202 MAEUJA. towards the passage and stopped. The sound of the returning voices gave her a sudden courage. "Mr. " " Guest," said the young man. " If we do conclude to stay to dinner, as Mr. Prince has said nothing of introducing you to my sister, you must let me have that pleasure." He lifted his eyes to hers with a sudden flush. But she had fled. She reached her party, displaying her torn flounce as the cause of her delay, and there was a slight quickness in her breathing and her speech which was attributed to the same grave reason. " But, only listen," said Amita, " we've got it all out of the butler and the grooms. It's such a romantic story ! " " What is ? " said Maruja suddenly. " Why, the private tramp's." " The peripatetic secretary," suggested Raymond, MARUJA. 203 " Yes," continued Amita, " Mr. Prince was so struck with his gratitude to the old Doctor, that he hunted him up in San Jose, and brought him here. Since then Prince has been so interested in him it appears he was somebody in the States, or has rich rela tions that he has been telegraphing and making all sorts of inquiries about him, and has even sent out his own lawyer to hunt up everything about him. Are you listening ? " "Yes." " You seem abstracted." " I am hungry." " Why not dine here ? it's an hour earlier than at home. Aladdin would fall at your feet for the honour. Do ! " Maruja looked at them with innocent vagueness, as if the possibility were just beginning to dawn upon her. " And Clara Wilson is just dying to see the mysterious unknown again. Say yes, little Maruja." 204 MAEUJA. Little Maruja glanced at them with a large maternal compassion. " We shall see." Mr. Prince, on his return an hour later, was unexpectedly delighted with Maruja's gracious acceptance of his invitation to dinner. He was thoroughly sensible of the significance which his neighbours had attached to the avoidance by the Saltonstall heiress of his various parties and gorgeous festivities ever since a certain act of indiscretion now alleged to have been produced by the exalta tion of wine had placed him under ban. Whatever his feelings were towards her mother, he could not fail to appreciate fully this act of the daughter, which rehabilitated him. It was with more than his usual ex travagance shown even in a certain ex aggeration of respect towards Maruja that he welcomed the party, and made preparations for the dinner. The telegraph and mounted messengers were put into rapid requisition. The bridal suite was placed at the disposal of the young ladies for a dressing-room. The MARUJA. 205 attendant genii surpassed themselves. The evening dresses of Maruja, Amita, and the Misses Wilson, summoned by electricity from La Mision Perdida, and dispatched by the fleetest conveyances, were placed in the arms of their maids, smothered with bouquets, an hour before dinner. An operatic concert troupe, passing through the nearest town, were diverted from their course by the slaves of the ring to discourse hidden music in the music-room during dinner. " Bite my finger, Sweetlips," said Miss Clara Wilson, who had a neat taste for apt quotation, to Maruja, " that I may see if I am awake. It's the Arabian Nights all over again ! " The dinner was a marvel, even in a land of gastronomic marvels ; the dessert a miracle of fruits, even in a climate that bore the products of two zones. Maruja, from her seat beside her satisfied host, looked across a bank of yellow roses at her sister and Eay- inond, and was timidly conscious of the eyes of young Guest, who was seated at the other 206 MA1WJA. end of the table, between the two Misses Wilson. With a strange haunting of his appearance on the day she first met him, she stole glances of half-frightened curiosity at him while he was eating, and was relieved to find that he used his knife and fork like the others, and that his appetite was far from voracious. It was his employer who was the first to recall the experiences of his past life, with a certain enthusiasm and the air of a host anxious to contribute to the entertain ment of his guests. " You'd hardly believe, Miss Saltonstall, that that young gentleman over there walked across the Continent and two thousand odd miles, wasn't it ? all alone, and with not much more in the way of traps than he's got on now. Tell 'em, Harry, how the Apaches nearly gobbled you up, and then let you go because they thought you as good an Injun as any one of them, and how you lived a week in the desert on two biscuits as big as that." A chorus of entreaty and delighted anticipation followed the suggestion. MAEUJA. 207 The old expression of being at bay returned for an instant to Guest's face, but, lifting his eyes, he caught a look of almost sympathetic anxiety from Maruja's, who had not spoken. " It became necessary for me, some time ago," said Guest, half explanatorily, to Maruja, " to be rather explicit in the details of my journey here, and I told Mr. Prince some things which he seems to think interest ing to others. That is all. To save my life on one occasion, I was obliged to show myself as good as an Indian, in his own way, and I lived among them and travelled with them for two weeks. I have been hungry, as I suppose others have on like occasions, but nothing more." Nevertheless, in spite of his evident reticence, he was obliged to give way to their entreaties, and, with a certain grim and uncompromising truthfulness of statement, recounted some episodes of his journey. It was none the less thrilling that he did it reluctantly, and in much the same manner 208 MAEUJA. as he had answered his father's questions, and as he had probably responded to the later cross-examination of Mr. Prince. He did not tell it emotionally, but rather with the dogged air of one who had been subjected to a personal grievance for which he neither asked nor expected sympathy. When he did not raise his eyes to Maruja's he kept them fixed on his plate. " Well," said Prince, when a long-drawn sigh of suspended emotion among the guests testified to his powers as a caterer to their amusement, " what do you say to some music with our coffee to follow the story ? " " It's more like a play," said Amita to Raymond. " What a pity Captain Carroll, who knows all about Indians, isn't here to have enjoyed it. But I suppose Maruja, who hasn't lost a word, will tell it to him." "I don't think she will," said Raymond, drily, glancing at Maruja, who, lost in some intricate pattern of her Chinese plate, was apparently unconscious that her host was MARUJA. 209 waiting her signal to withdraw. At last she raised her head, and said gently but audibly to the waiting Prince " It is positively a newer pattern ; the old one had not that delicate straw line in the arabesque. You must have had it made for you." " I did," said the gratified Prince, taking up the plate. " What eyes you have, Miss Saltonstall. They see everything." " Except that I'm keeping you all waiting," she returned with a smile, letting the eyes in question fall with a half-parting salutation on Guest as she rose. It was the first exchange of a common instinct between them, and left them as conscious as if they had pressed hands. The music gave an opportunity for some desultory conversation, in which Mr. Prince and his young friend received an invitation from Maruja to visit La Mision, and the party, by a common consent, turned into the conservatory, where the genial host begged 210 MAEUJA. them each to select a flower from a few especially rare exotics. When Maruja received hers, she said laughingly to Prince, " Will you think me very importunate if I ask for another ? " " Take what you like you have only to name it," he replied gallantly. "But that's just what I can't do," re sponded the young girl, " unless,' 1 she added, turning to Guest, " unless you can assist me. It was the plant I was examining to-day." " I think I can show it to you," said Guest, with a slight increase of colour, as he pre ceded her towards the memorable cactus near the door ; " but I doubt if it has any flower." Nevertheless, it had. A bright red blossom, like a spot of blood drawn by one of its thorns. He plucked it for her, and she placed it in her belt. " You are forgiving," he said admiringly. " You ought to know that," she returned, looking down. I? why?" MARUJA. 211 " You were rude to me twice." " Twice ! " " Yes once at the Mision of La Perdida ; once in the road at San Antonio." His eyes became downcast and gloomy. " At the Mision that morning, I, a wretched outcast, only saw in you a beautiful girl intent on overriding me with her merci less beauty. At San Antonio, I handed the fan I picked up to the man whose eyes told me he loved you." . She started impatiently. "You might have been more gallant, and found more difficulty in the selection," she said pertly. " But since when have you gentlemen become so observant and so punctilious ? Would you expect him to be as considerate, of others ? " " I have few claims that any one seems bound to respect," he returned brusquely. Then, in a softer voice, he added, looking at her, gently, " You were in mourning when you came here this afternoon, Miss Sal ton- stall" 212 MABUJA. "Was I? It was for Dr. West my mother's friend." " It was very becoming to you." " You are complimenting me. But I warn you that Captain Carroll said something better than that ; he said mourning was not necessary for me. I had only to ' put my eye-lashes at half-mast.' He is a soldier, you know." " He seems to be as witty as he is fortu nate," said Guest bitterly. " Do you think he is fortunate ? " said Maruja, raising her eyes to his. There was so much in this apparently simple question that Guest looked in her eyes for a sug gestion. What he saw there for an instant made his heart stop beating. She apparently did not know it, for she began to tremble too. " Is he not ? " said Guest, in a low voice. " Do you think he ought to be ? " she found herself whispering. A sudden silence fell upon them. The voices of their companions seemed very far in MAEUJA. 213 the distance ; the warm breath of the flowers appeared to be drowning their senses; they tried to speak, but could not ; they were so near to each other that the two long blades of a palm served to hide them. In the midst of this profound silence a voice that was like and yet unlike Maruja's said twice, " Go ! go ! " but each time seemed hushed in the stifling silence. The next moment the palms were pushed aside, the dark figure of a young man slipped like some lithe animal through the shrubbery, and Maruja found herself standing, pale and rigid, in the middle of the walk in the full glare of the light, and looking down the corridor toward her approaching companions. She was furious and frightened ; she was triumphant and trembling ; without thought, sense, or reason, she had been kissed by Henry Guest, and had returned it. The fleetest horses of Aladdin's stud that night could not carry her far enough or fast enough to take her away from that moment, that scene, and that sensation. Wise and 214 MAEUJA. experienced, confident in her beauty, secure in her* selfishness, strong over others' weak nesses, weighing accurately the deeds and words of men and women, recognizing all there was in position and tradition, seeing with her father's clear eyes the practical meaning of any divergence from that con ventionality which, as a woman of the world, she valued, she returned again and again to the trembling joy of that intoxicating moment. She thought of her mother and sisters, of Eaymond and Gamier, of Aladdin she even forced herself to think of Carroll only to shut her eyes with a faint smile, and dream again the brief but thrilling dream of Guest that began and ended in their joined and parted lips. Small wonder that, hidden and silent in her enwrappings, as she lay back in the carriage with her pale face against the cold, starry sky, two other stars came out and glistened and trembled on her passion-fringed lashes. MAEUJA. 215 CHAPTER X. THE rainy season had set in early. The last three weeks of summer drought had drained the great valley of its life-blood; the dead stalks of grain rustled like dry bones over Dr. West's grave. The dessicating wind and sun had wrought some disenchanting cracks and fissures in Aladdin's Palace, and other wise disjoined it, so that it not only looked as if it were ready to be packed away, but had become finally untenable in the furious onset of the south-westerly rains. The gorgeous furniture of the reception-rooms was wrapped in macintoshes, the conservatory was changed into an aquarium, the Bridge of Sighs crossed an actual canal in the stable- yard. Only the billiard-room and Mr. 216 MAEUJA. Prince's bed-room and office remained intact, and in the latter, one stormy afternoon, Mr. Prince himself sat busy over his books and papers. His station-waggon, splashed and streaked with mud, stood in the courtyard, just as, it had been driven from the station, and the smell of the smoke of newly-lit fires showed that the house had been opened only for this hurried visit of its owner. The tramping of horse hoofs in the court yard was soon followed by steps along the corridor, and the servant ushered Captain Carroll into the presence of his master. The Captain did not remove his military overcoat, but remained standing erect in the centre of the room, with his forage cap in his hand. " I could have given you a lift from the station," said Prince, " if you had come that way. I've only just got in myself." " I preferred to ride/' said Carroll drily. " Sit down by tha fire," said Prince, motioning to a chair, " and dry yourself." " I must ask you first the purport of this MAEUJA. 217 interview," said Carroll, curtly, "before I prolong it further* You have asked me to come here in reference to certain letters I returned to their rightful owner some months ago. If you seek to reclaim them again, or to refer to a subject which must remain forgotten, I decline to proceed further." "It does refer to the letters, and it rests with you whether they shall be forgotten or not. It is not my fault if the subject has been dropped. You must remember that until yesterday you have been absent on a tour of inspection and could not be applied to before." Carroll cast a cold glance at Prince, and then threw himself into a chair, with his overcoat still on and his long military boots crossed before the fire. Sitting there in pro file, Prince could not but notice that he looked older and sterner than at their last interview, and his cheeks were thinned as if by something more than active service. " When you were here last summer," began 2 18 MARUJA. Prince, leaning forward over his desk, " you brought me a piece of news that astounded me, as it did many others. It was the as signment of Dr. West's property to Mrs. Saltonstall. That was something there was no gainsaying ; it was a purely business affair, and involved nobody's rights but the assignor. But this was followed a day or two after by the announcement of the Doctor's will, making the same lady the absolute and sole inheritor of the same property. That seemed all right too ; for there were, apparently, no legal heirs. Since then, however, it has been discovered that there is a legal heir none other than the Doctor's only son. Now, as no allusion to the son's existence was made in that will which was a great over sight of the Doctor's it is a fiction of the law that such an omission is an act of forget- fulness, and therefore leaves the son the same rights as if there had been no will at all. In other words, if the Doctor had seen fit to throw his scapegrace son a hundred dollar MAEUJA. 219 bill, it would have been legal evidence that he remembered him. As he did not, it's a fair legal presumption that he forgot him, or that the will is incomplete." " This seems to be a question for Mrs. Saltonstall's lawyers not for her friends," said Carroll coldly. "Excuse me; that remains for you to decide when you hear all. You understand at present, then, that Dr. West's property, both by assignment and will, was made over in the event of his death not to his legal heirs, but to a comparative stranger. It looked queer to a good many people, but the only explanation was, that the Doctor had fallen very much in love with the widow that he would have probably married her, had he lived." With an unpleasant recollection that this was almost exactly Maruja's explanation of her mother's relations to Dr. West, Carroll returned impatiently, " If you mean that their private relations may be made the sub- 220 MAEUJA. ject of legal discussion in the event of litiga tion in regard to the property, that again is a matter for Mrs. Saltonstall to decide and not her friends. It is purely a matter of taste." " It may be a matter of discretion, Captain Carroll." " Of discretion ! " repeated Carroll super ciliously. " Well," said Prince, leaving his desk and coming to the fireplace with his hands in his pockets, " what would you call it, if it could be found that Dr. West, on leaving Mrs. Saltonstall's that night, did not meet with an accident, was not thrown from his horse, but was coolly and deliberately murdered ! " Captain Carroll's swift recollection of the discovery he himself had made in the road, and its inconsistency with the accepted theory of the accident, unmistakably showed itself in his face. It was a moment before he re covered himself. " But even if it can be proved to have been MAfiUJA. 221 a murder and not an accident, what has that to do with Mrs. Saltonstall or her claim to the property ? " " Only that she was the one person directly benefited by his death." Captain Carroll looked at him steadily, and then rose to his feet. " Do I understand that you have called me here to listen to this infamous aspersion of a lady ? " "I have called you here, Captain Carroll, to listen to the arguments that may be used to set aside Dr. West's will, and return the property to the legal heir. You are to listen to them or not, as you choose ; but I warn you that your opportunity to hear them in confidence and convey them to your friend will end here. / have no opinion in the case. / only tell you that it will be argued that Dr. West was unduly influenced to make a will in Mrs. Saltons tail's favour ; that, after having done so, it will be shown that just before his death he became aware of the existence of his son and heir, and actually 222 MARUJA. had an interview with him ; that he visited Mrs. Saltonstall that evening with the records of his son's identity and a memorandum of his interview in his pocket-book ; and that an hour after leaving the house he was foully murdered. That is the theory which Mrs. Saltonstall has to consider, I told you I have no opinion. I only know that there are witnesses to the interview of the Doctor and his son ; there is evidence of murder, and the murderer is suspected ; there is the evidence of the pocket-book, with the memorandum picked up on the spot, which you handed me yourself." "Do you mean to say that you will permit this pocket-book, handed you in confidence, to be used for such an infamous purpose?" said Carroll. u I think you offered it to me in exchange for Dr. West's letters to Mrs. Saltonstall," returned Prince drily. " The less said about that, the less is likely to be said about com promising letters written by the widow to MAEUJA. 223 the Doctor, which she got you to recover letters which they may claim had a bearing on the case, and even lured him to his fate." For an instant Captain Carroll recoiled before the gulf which seemed to open at the feet of the unhappy family. For an instant a terrible doubt possessed him, and in that doubt he found a new reason for a certain changed and altered tone in Maruja's later correspondence with him, and the vague hints she had thrown out of the impossibility of their union. "I beg you will not press me to greater candour," she had written, " and try to forget me before you learn to hate me." For an instant he believed and even took a miserable comfort in the belief that it was this hideous secret, and not some coquettish caprice, to which she vaguely alluded. But it was only for a moment, the next instant the monstrous doubt passed from the mind of the simple gentleman, with only a slight flush of shame at his momen tary disloyalty. 224 MARUJA. Prince, however, had noticed it, not with out a faint sense of sympathy. " Look here ! " he said, with a certain brusqueness, which in a man of his character was less dangerous than his smoothness. " I know your feelings to that family at least to one of them and if I've been playing it pretty rough on you, it's only because you played it rather rough on me the last time you were here. Let's understand each other. I'll go so far as to say / don't believe that Mrs. Saltonstall had anything to do with that murder, but, as a business man, I'm bound to say that these circumstances and her own indiscretion are quite enough to bring the biggest pressure down on her. I wouldn't want any better ' bear' on the market value of her rights than this. Take it at its best. Say that the Coroner's verdict is set aside, and a charge of murder against unknown parties is made " " One moment, Mr. Prince," said Carroll. " I shall be one of the first to insist that this MAEUJA. 225 is done, and I have confidence enough in Mrs. SaltonstalFs honest friendship for the Doctor to know that she will lose no time in pursuing his murderers." Prince looked at Carroll with a feeling of half envy and half pity. " I think not," he said drily ; "for all suspicion points to one man as the perpetrator, and that man was Mrs. Saltonstall's confidential servant the mayordomo Pereo." He waited for a moment for the effect of this announcement on Carroll, and then went on, "You now understand that even if Mrs. Salton stall is acquitted of any connivance with or even knowledge of the deed, she will hardly enjoy the prosecution of her confidential servant for murder." " But how can this be prevented ? If, as you say, there are actual proofs, why have they not been acted upon before ? What can keep them from being acted upon now ? " " The proofs have been collected by one man, have been in possession of one man, and will only pass out of his possession when it is Q 226 MARUJA. for the benefit of the legal heir who does not yet even know of their existence." " And who is this one man ? " "Myself." "You? You?" said Carroll, advancing towards him. " Then this is your work ! " " Captain Carroll," said Prince, without moving, but drawing his lips tightly together and putting his head on one side, " I don't propose to have another scene like the one we had at our last meeting. If you try on any thing of that kind, I shall put the whole matter into a lawyer's hands. I don't say that you won't regret it ; I don't say that / shan't be disappointed too, for I have been managing this thing purely as a matter of business with a view to profiting by it. It so happens that we can both work to the same end, even if our motives are not the same. I don't call myself an officer and a gentleman, but I reckon I've run this affair about as delicately as the best of them, and with a d il sight more horse sense. I want MARUJA. 227 this thing hushed up and compromised to get some control of the property again, and to prevent it depreciating, as it would, in litiga tion ; you want it hushed up for the sake of the girl and your future mother-in-law. I don't know anything about your laws of honour, but I've laid my cards on the table for you to see, without asking what you've got in your hand. You can play the game or leave the board, as you choose." He turned and walked to the window not with out leaving on Carroll's mind a certain sense of firmness, truthfulness, and sincerity which commanded his respect. " I withdraw any remark that might have seemed to reflect on your business integrity, Mr. Prince," said Carroll quietly. "I am willing to admit that you have managed this thing better than I could, and if I join you in an act to suppress these revelations, I have no right to judge of your intentions. "What do you propose to have me do ? " " To state the whole case to Mrs. Salton- 228 MARUJA. stall, and to ask her to acknowledge the young man's legal claim without litigation." " But how do you know that she would not do this without excuse me without intimidation ? " " I only reckon that a woman clever enough to get hold of a million, would be clever enough to keep it against others." "I hope to show you are mistaken. But where is this heir ? " "Here." "Here?" "Yes. For the last six months he has been my private secretary. I know what you are thinking of, Captain Carroll. You would consider it indelicate eh? Well, that's just where we differ. By this means I have kept everything in my own hands prevented him from getting into the hands of outsiders and I intend to dispose of just as much of the facts to him as may be neces sary for him to prove his title. What bargain I may make with him is my affair." MAEUJA. 229 " Does he suspect the murder ? " " No. I did not think it necessary for his good or mine. He can be an ugly devil if he likes, and although there wasn't much love lost between him and the old man, it wouldn't pay to have any revenge mixed up with business. He knows nothing of it. It was only by accident that, looking after his move ments while he was here, I ran across the tracks of the murderer." " But what has kept him from making known his claim to the Saltonstalls ? Are you sure he has not?" said Carroll, with a sudden thought that it might account for Maruja's strangeness. "Positive. He's too proud to make a claim unless he could thoroughly prove it, and only a month ago he made me promise to keep it dark. He's too lazy to trouble himself about it much anyway as far as I can see. D d if I don't think his being a tramp has made him lose his taste for everything ! Don't worry yourself about him. He isn't 230 MAEUJA. likely to make confidences with the Salton- stalls, for he don't like 'em, and never went there but once. Instinctively or not, the widow didn't cotton to him ; and I fancy Miss Maruja has some old grudge against him for that fan business on the road. She isn't a girl to forgive or forget anything, as I happen to know," he added, with an uneasy laugh. Carroll was too preoccupied with the danger that seemed to threaten his friends from this surly pretender to resent Prince's tactless allusion. He was thinking of Maruja's ominous agitation at his presence at Dr. West's grave. " Do they suspect him at all ? " he asked hurriedly. " How should they ? He goes by the name of Guest which was his father's real name until changed by an act of legislation when he first came here. Nobody remembers it. We only found it out from his papers. It was quite legal, as all his property was acquired under the name of West." Carroll rose and buttoned his overcoat. " I MAEUJA. 231 presume you are able to offer conclusive proofs of everything you have asserted ? " " Perfectly." " I am going to the Mision Perdida now," said Captain Carroll quietly. " To-morrow I will bring you the answer Peace or War." He walked to the door, lifted his hand to his cap with a brief military salutation, nd dis appeared. 232 MAEUJA. CHAPTER XL As Captain Carroll urged his horse along the miry road to La Mision Perdida, he was struck with certain changes in the landscape before him other than those wrought by the winter rains. There were the usual deep gullies and trenches, half-filled with water, in the fields and along the road, but there were ominous embankments and ridges of freshly turned soil, and a scattered fringe of timbers following a cruel, undeviating furrow on the broad grazing lands of the Mision. But it was not until he had crossed the arroyo that he felt the full extent of the late improve ments. A quick rumbling in the distance, a light flash of steam above the willow copse, that drifted across the field on his right, and MABUJA. 233 he knew that the railroad was already in operation. Captain Carroll reined in his frightened charger, and passed his hand across his brow with a dazed sense of loss. He had been gone only four months yet he already felt strange and forgotten. It was with a feeling of relief that he at last turned from the high-road into the lane. Here everything was unchanged, except that the ditches were more thickly strewn with the sodden leaves of fringing oaks and syca mores. Giving his horse to a servant in the courtyard, he did not enter the patio, but, crossing the lawn, stepped upon the long verandah. The rain was dripping from its eaves and striking a minute spray from the vines that clung to its columns ; his footfall awoke a hollow echo as he passed, as if the outer shell of the house were deserted ; the formal yews and hemlocks that in summer had relieved the dazzling glare of six months' sunshine had now taken gloomy possession of the garden, and the evening shadows, 234 MAEUJA. thickened by rain, seemed to lie in wait at every corner. The servant, who had with old-fashioned courtesy placed the keys and the " disposition " of that wing of the house at his service, said that Dona Maria would wait upon him in the salon before dinner. Knowing the difficulty of breaking the usual rigid etiquette, and trusting to the happy intervention of Maruja though here, again, custom debarred him from asking for her he allowed the servant to remove his wet over coat, and followed him to the stately and solemn chamber prepared for him. The silence and gloom of the great house, so grateful and impressive in the ardent summer, began to weigh upon him under this shadow of an overcast sky. He walked to the window and gazed out on the cloister-like verandah. A melancholy willow at an angle of the stables seemed to be wringing its hands in the rising wind. He turned for relief to the dim fire that flickered like a votive taper in the vault-like hearth, and drew a chair towards MABUJA. 235 it. In spite of the impatience and preoccupa tion of a lover, he found himself again and again recurring to the story he had just heard, until the vengeful spirit of the mur dered Doctor seemed to darken and possess the house. He was striving to shake off the feeling, when his attention was attracted to stealthy footsteps in the passage. Could it be Maruja ? He rose to his feet with his eye upon the door. The footsteps ceased it re mained closed. But another door, which had escaped his attention in the darkened corner, slowly swung on its hinges, and, with a stealthy step, Pereo, the mayordomo, entered the room. Courageous and self-possessed as Captain Carroll was by nature and education, this malevolent vision and incarnation of the thought uppermost in his mind, turned him cold. He had half drawn a derringer from his breast, when his eye fell on the grizzled locks and wrinkled face of the old man, and his hand dropped to his side. But Pereo, 236 MABUJA. with the quick observation of insanity, had noticed the weapon, and rubbed his hands together with a malicious laugh. " Good ! good ! good ! " he whispered rapidly, in a strange bodiless voice, " 'twill serve ! 'twill serve ! And you are a soldier too and know how to use it ! Grood, it is a Providence ! " He lifted his hollow eyes to heaven, and then added, " Come ! come ! " Carroll stepped towards him. He was alone and in the presence of an undoubted madman one strong enough, in spite of his years, to inflict a deadly injury, and one whom he now began to realize might have done so once before. Nevertheless, he laid his hand on the old man's arm, and, looking him calmly in the eye, said quietly, " Come ? Where, Pereo ? I have only just arrived." " I know it," whispered the old man, nodding his head violently. " I was watch ing them, when you rode up. That is why I lost the scent; but together we can track them still we can track them. Eh, Captain, MAEUJA. 237 eh ! Come ! Come ! " and he moved slowly backward, waving his hand towards the door. " Track whom, Pereo ? " said Carroll sooth ingly. " Whom do you seek ? " " Whom ? " said the old man, startled for a moment and passing his hand over his wrinkled forehead. "Whom? Eh! Why, the Dona Maruja and the little black cat her maid Faquita ! " " Yes ; but why seek them ? Why track them ? " " Why ? " said the old man, with a sudden burst of impotent passion. " You ask me why ! Because they are going to the ren dezvous again. They are going to seek him. Do you understand to seek Mm the Coyote ! " Carroll smiled a faint smile of relief " So the Coyote ! " " Ay," said the old man in a confidential whisper ; " the Coyote ! But not the Ug one you understand the little one. The big one is dead dead dend ! But the little 238 MAEUJA. one lives yet. You shall do for him what I, Pereo listen " he glanced around the room furtively " what I, the good old Pereo, did for the big one ! Good, it is a Providence. Come ! " Of the terrible thoughts that crossed Carroll's mind at this unexpected climax one alone was uppermost. The trembling irre sponsible wretch before him meditated some vague crime and Maruja was in danger. He did not allow himself to dwell upon any other suspicion suggested by that speech ; he quickly conceived a plan of action. To have rung the bell and given Pereo into the hands of the servants would have only exposed to them the lunatic's secret if he had any and he might either escape in his fury or relapse into useless imbecility. To humour him and follow him, and trust afterwards to his own quickness and courage to avert any calamity, seemed to be the only plan. Captain Carroll turned his clear glance on the restless eyes of Pereo, and said, without emotion, " Let us MAEUJA. 239 go, then, and quickly. You shall track them for me ; but remember, good Pereo, you must leave the rest to me." In spite of himself, some accidental signi ficance in this ostentatious adjuration to lull Pereo's suspicions struck him with pain. But the old man's eyes glittered with gratified passion as he said, " Ay, good ! I will keep my word. Thou shalt work thy will on the little one as I have said. Truly it is a Pro vidence ! Come ! " Seeing Captain Carroll glance round for his overcoat, he seized a poncho from the wall, wrapped it round him, and grasped his hand. Carroll, who would have evaded this semblance of disguise, had no time to parley, and they turned together through the door by which Pereo had entered into a long dark passage, which seemed to be made through the outer shell of the building that flanked the park. Following his guide in the profound obscurity, perfectly conscious that any change in his madness might be followed by a struggle in the dark, where no 240 MAEUJA. help could reach them, they presently came to a door that opened upon the fresh smell of rain and leaves. They were standing at the bottom of a secluded alley, between two high hedges that hid it from the end of the garden. Its grass-grown waffi and un- trimraed hedges showed that it was seldom used. Carroll, still keeping close to Pereo's side, felt him suddenly stop and tremble. " Look ! " he said, pointing to a shadowy figure some distance before them, " look, 'tis Maruja, and alone ! " With a dexterous movement, Carroll managed to slip his arm securely through the old man's, and even to throw himself before him, as if in his eagerness to discern the figure. " 'Tis Maruja and alone ! " said Pereo, trembling. " Alone ! Eh ! And the Coyote is not here ! " He passed his hand over his staring eyes. " So." Suddenly he turned upon Carroll. " Ah, do you not see, it is a trick ! The Coyote is escaping with MARUJA. 241 Faquita ! Come ! Nay ; thou wilt not ? Then will I ! " With an unexpected strength born of his madness he freed his arm from Carroll and darted down the alley. The figure of Maruja, evidently alarmed at his approach, glided into the hedge, as Pereo passed swiftly by, intent only on his one wild fancy. Without a further thought of his companion or even the luckless Faquita, Carroll also plunged through the hedge, to intercept Maruja. But by that time she was already crossing the upper end of the lawn, hurrying towards the entrance to the patio. Carroll did not hesitate to follow. Keeping in view the lithe, dark, active little figure, now hidden by an intervening cluster of bushes, now fading in the gathering evening shadows, he nevertheless did not succeed in gaining upon her until she had nearly reached the patio. Here he lost ground, as, turning to the right instead of entering the courtyard, she kept her way toward the jstables. He was near enough, however, to R 242 MAEUJA. speak. "One moment, Miss Saltonstall," he said hurriedly ; " there is no danger. I am alone. But I must speak with you." The young girl seemed only to redouble her exertions. At last she stopped before a narrow door hidden in the wall, and fumbled in her pocket for a key. That moment Carroll was upon her. " Forgive me, Miss Saltonstall Maruja ; but you must hear me! You are safe, but I fear for your maid, Faquita ! " A little laugh followed his speech ; the door yielded and opened to her vanishing figure. For an instant the lace shawl muffling her face was lifted, as the door closed and locked behind her. Carroll drew back in consternation. It was the laughing eyes and saucy face of Faquita ! MAUUJA. 243 CHAPTER XII. WHEN Captain Carroll turned from the high road into the lane, an hour before, Maruja and Faquita had already left the house by the same secret passage and garden door that opened afterwards upon himself and Pereo. The young women had evidently changed dresses ; Maruja was wearing the costume of her maid ; Faquita was closely veiled and habited like her mistress ; but it was charac teristic that, while Faquita appeared awkward and over-dressed in her borrowed plumes, Maruja's short saya and trim bodice, with the striped shawl that hid her fair head, looked infinitely more coquettish and be witching than on its legitimate owner. They passed hurriedly down the long alley, 244 MABUJA. and at its further end turned at right angles to a small gate half hidden in the shrubbery. It opened upon a venerable vineyard, that dated back to the occupation of the padres, but was now given over to the chance culti vation of peons and domestics. Its long, broken rows of low vines, knotted and over grown with age, reached to the thicketed hillside of buckeye that marked the begin ning of the canada. Here Maruja parted from her maid, and, muffling the shawl more closely round her head, hastily passed be tween the vine rows to a ruined adobe building near the hillside. It was originally part of the refectory of the old Mision, but had been more recently used as a viiiadero's cottage. As she neared it, her steps grew slower, until, reaching its door, she hesitated, with her hand timidly on the latch. The next moment she opened it gently; it was closed quickly behind her, and with a little stifled cry she found herself in the arms of Henry Guest. MARUJA. 245 It was only for an instant ; the pleading of her white hands disengaged from his neck, where at first they had found themselves, and uplifted before her face, touched him more than the petitioning eyes or the sweet voiceless mouth, whose breath even was for gotten. Letting her sink into the chair from which he had just risen, he drew back a step with his hands clasped before him, and his dark half-savage eyes bent earnestly upon her. Well might he have gazed. It was no longer the conscious beauty, proud and regnant, seated before him ; but a timid, frightened girl, struggling with her first deep passion. All that was wise and gentle that she had intended to say, all that her clear intellect and experience had taught her, died upon her lips with that kiss. And all that she could do of womanly dignity and high-bred decorum was to tuck her small feet under her chair in the desperate attempt to lengthen her short skirt, and beg him not to look at her. 24-6 MARUJA. " I have had to change dresses with Faquita, because we were watched," she said, leaning forward in her chair and drawing the striped shawl around her shoulders. " I have had to steal out of my mother's house and through the fields, as if I was a gipsy. If I only were a gipsy, Harry, and not " " And not the proudest heiress in the land," he interrupted, with something of his old bitterness. " True, I had forgot." " But I never reminded you of it," she said, lifting her eyes to his. " I did not remind you of it on that day in in in the con servatory, nor at the time you first spoke of of love to me nor from the time I first consented to meet you here. It is you, Harry, who have spoken of the difference of our condition, you who have talked of my wealth, my family, my position until I would gladly have changed places with Faquita as I have garments, if I had thought it would make you happier." " Forgive me, darling ! " he said, dropping MAEUJA. 247 on one knee before her and bending over the cold little hand he had taken, until his dark head almost rested in her lap. " Forgive me ! You are too proud, Maruja> to admit, even to yourself, that you have given your heart where your hand and fortune could not follow. But others may not think so. I am proud, too, and will not have it said that I have won you before I was worthy of you." " You have no right to be more proud than I, sir," she said, rising to her feet, with a touch of her old supreme assertion. "No don't, Harry please, Harry there ! " Nevertheless, she succumbed ; and when she went on, it was with her head resting on his shoulder. '"It's this deceit and secrecy that is so shameful, Harry. I think I could bear everything with you, if it were all known if you came to woo me like like the others. Even if they abused you if they spoke of your doubtful origin of your poverty of your hardships ! When they aspersed you, I could fight them ; when they 248 MARUJA. spoke of your having no father that you could claim, I could even lie for you, I think, Harry, and say that you had ; if they spoke of your poverty, I would speak of my wealth ; if they talked of your hardships, I should only be proud of your endurance if I could only keep the tears from my eyes ! " They were there now. He kissed them away. "But if they threatened you? If they drove me from the house ? " " I should fly with you," she said, hiding her head in his breast. "What if I were to ask you to fly with me now ? " he said gloomily. " Now!" she repeated, lifting her frightened eyes to his. His face darkened with its old look of savage resentment. " Hear me, Maruja," he said, taking her hands tightly in his own. "When I forgot myself when I was mad that day in the conservatory, the only expia tion I could think of was to swear in my inmost soul that I would never take advantage MAEUJA. 249 of your forgiveness, that I would never tempt you to forget yourself, your friends, your family, for me, an unknown outcast. When I found you pitied me, and listened to my love I was too weak to forego the one ray of sunshine in my wretched life and thinking that I had a prospect before me in an idea I promised to reveal to you later, I swore never to beguile you or myself in that hope by any act that might bring you to repent it or myself to dishonour. But I taxed myself too much, Maruja. I have asked too much of you. You are right, darling ; this secrecy this deceit is unworthy of us ! Every hour of it blest as it has been to me every moment sweet as it is blackens the purity of our only defence, makes you false and me a coward ! It must end here to-day! Maruja, darling, my precious one ! Grod knows what may be the success of my plans. We have but one chance now. I must leave here to-day, never to return, or I must take you with me. Do not start, Maruja but hear 250 MAEUJA. me out. Dare you risk all ? Dare you fly with me now, to-night, to the old Padre at the ruined Mission, and let him bind us in those bonds that none dare break ? We can take Faquita with us it is but a few miles and we can return and throw ourselves at your mother's feet. She can only drive us forth together. Or we can fly from this cursed wealth, and all the misery it has entailed for ever ! " She raised her head, and with her two hands on his shoulders, gazed at him with her father's searching eyes, as if to read his very soul. " Are you mad, Harry ? Think what you propose ! Is this not tempting me ? Think again, dearest," she said, half convulsively seizing his arm when her grasp had slipped from his shoulder. There was a momentary silence as she stood with her eyes fixed almost wildly on his set face. But a sudden shock against the bolted door and an inarticulate outcry startled MAKUJA. 251 them. With an instinctive movement, Guest threw his arm round her. " It's Pereo," she said, in a hurried whisper, but once more mistress of her strength and resolution. " He is seeking you ! Fly at once. He is mad, Harry ; a raving lunatic. He watched us the last time. He has tracked us here. He suspects you. You must not meet him. You can escape through the other door that opens upon the Canada. If you love me fly ! " " And leave you exposed to his fury ? Are you mad ? No. Fly yourself by the other door, lock it behind you, and alarm the servants. I will open this door to him, secure him here, and then be gone. Do not fear for me. There is no danger ; and if I mistake not," he added, with a strange significance, " he will hardly attack me ! " "But he may have already alarmed the household. Hark ! " There was the noise of a struggle outside the door, and then the voice of Captain 252 MARUJA. Carroll, calm and collected, rose clearly for an instant. " You are quite safe, Miss Saltonstall. I think I have him secure, but perhaps you had better not open the door until assistance comes." They gazed at each other without a word. A grim challenge played on Guest's lips. Maruja lifted her little hands deliberately, and clasped them round his defiant neck. " Listen, darling," she said, softly and quietly, as if only the security of silence and darkness encompassed them. " You asked me just now if I would fly with you if I would marry you without the consent of my family against the protest of my friends - and at once ! I hesitated, Harry, for I was frightened and foolish. But I say to you now that I will marry you when and where you like; for I love you, Harry, and you alone." " Then let us go at once," he said, passion ately seizing her. " We can reach the road by the caiiada before assistance comes before we are discovered. Come ! " MARUJA. 253 " And you will remember in the years to come, Harry," she said, still composedly, and with her arms still around his neck, " that I never loved any but you that I never knew what love was before, and that since I have loved you ; I have never thought of any other. Will you not ? " " I will ; and now " "And now," she said, with a superb gesture towards the barrier which separated them from Carroll, " OPEN THE DOOR ! " 254 MAEUJA. CHAPTER XIII. WITH a swift glance of admiration at Maruja, Guest flung open the door. The hastily- summoned servants were already bearing away the madman, exhausted by his efforts. Captain Carroll alone remained there, erect and motionless, before the threshold. At a sign from Maruja, he entered the room. In the flash of light made by the opening door, he had been perfectly conscious of her companion, but not a motion of his eye or the movement of a muscle of his face betrayed it. The trained discipline of his youth stood him in good service, and for the moment left him master of the situation. "I think no apology is needed for this intrusion," he said with cool composure. MAEUJA. 255 " Pereo seemed intent on murdering some body or something, and I followed him here. I suppose I might have got him away more quietly, but I was afraid you might have thoughtlessly opened the door." He stopped, and added, " I see now how unfounded was the supposition." It was a fatal addition. In the next instant, the Maruja who had been standing beside Guest, conscious-stricken and remorse ful in the presence of the man she had deceived, and calmly awaiting her punish ment, changed at this luckless exhibition of her own peculiar womanly weapons. The old Maruja, supreme, ready, undaunted, and passionless, returned to the fray. " You were wrong, Captain," she said, sweetly; "fortunately, Mr. Guest whom I see you have forgotten in your absence was with me, and I think would have felt it his duty to have protected me. But I thank you all the same, and I think even Mr. Guest will not allow his envy of your good fortune 256 MARUJA. in coming so gallantly to my rescue to prevent his appreciating its full value. I am only sorry that on your return to La Mision Perdida you should have fallen into the arms of a madman before extending your hands to your friends." Their eyes met. She saw that he hated her, and felt relieved. " It may not have been so entirely un fortunate," he said, with a coldness strongly in contrast with his gradually blazing eyes, "for I was charged with a message to you, in which this madman is supposed by some to play an important part." " Is it a matter of business ? " said Maruja lightly, yet with a sudden instinctive pre monition of coming evil in the relentless tones of his voice. " It is business, Miss Saltonstall purely and simply business," said Carroll drily, "under whatever other name it may have been since presented to you." " Perhaps you have no objection to tell it MABUJA. 257 before Mr. Guest/' said Maruja, with an in spiration of audacity ; " it sounds so mys terious that it must be interesting. Other wise, Captain Carroll, who abhors business, would not have undertaken it with more than his usual enthusiasm." " As the business does interest Mr. Guest, or Mr. West, or whatever name he may have decided upon since I had the pleasure of meeting him," said Carroll for the first time striking fire from the eyes of his rival " I see no reason why I should not, even at the risk of telling you what you already know. Briefly, then, Mr. Prince charged me to advise you and your mother to avoid litigation with this gentleman, and admit his claim, as the son of Dr. West, to his share of the property." The utter consternation and bewilderment shown in the face of Maruja convinced Carroll of his fatal error. She had received the ad dresses of this man without knowing his real position ! The wild theory that had seemed to justify his resentment that she had sold s 258 MABUJA. i herself to Guest to possess the property now recoiled upon him in its utter baseness. She had loved Guest for himself alone ; by this base revelation he had helped to throw her into his arms. But he did not even yet know Maruja. Turning to Guest, with flashing eyes, she said, "Is it true are you the son of Dr. West, and " she hesitated " kept out of your inheritance by us f " " I am the son of Dr. West," he said earnestly, " though I alone had the right to tell you that at the proper time and occasion. Believe me that I have given no one the right least of all any tool of Prince to trade upon it." " Then," said Carroll fiercely, forgetting everything in his anger, " perhaps you will disclaim before this young lady the charge made by your employer that Pereo was in stigated to Dr. West's murder by her mother?" Again he had overshot the mark. The horror and indignation depicted in Guest's MARUJA. 259 face was too plainly visible to Maruja as well as himself to permit a doubt that the idea was as new as the accusation. Forgetting her bewilderment at these revelations, her wounded pride, a torturing doubt suggested by Guest's want of confidence in her indeed, everything but the outraged feelings of her lover, she flew to his side. "Not a word," she said proudly, lifting her little hand before his darkening face. "Do not insult me by replying to such an accusation in my presence. Captain Carroll," she continued, turning towards him, " I cannot forget that you were introduced into my mother's house as an officer and a gentleman. When you return to it as such, and not as a man of business, you will be welcome. Until then, farewell ! " She remained standing, erect and passion less, as Carroll, with a cold salutation, stepped back and disappeared in the darkness ; and then she turned, and, with tottering step and a little cry, fell upon Guest's breast. " 260 MARUJA. Harry Harry ! Why have you deceived me?" "I thought it for the best, darling," he said, lifting her face to his. " You know now the prospect I spoke of the hope that buoyed me up ! I wanted to win you myself alone, without appealing to your sense of justice or even your sympathies ! I did win you. God knows, if I had not, you would never have learned through me that a son of Dr. West had ever lived. But that was not enough. When I found that I could establish my right to my father's property, I wanted you to marry me before you knew it ; so that it never could be said that you were influenced by anything but love for me. That was why I came here to-day. That was why I pressed you to fly with me!" He ceased. She was fumbling with the buttons of his waistcoat. " Harry," she said softly, " did you think of the property when when you kissed ine in the conservatory?" MARUJA. 261 " I thought of nothing but you" he an swered tenderly. Suddenly she started from his embrace. " But Pereo ! Harry tell me quick no one nobody can think that this poor demented old man could that Dr. West was that It's all a trick, isn't it ? Harry, speak ! " He was silent for a moment, and then said gravely, "There were strange men at the fonda that night, and my father was sup posed to carry money with him. My own life was attempted at the Mision the same evening for the sake of some paltry gold pieces that I had imprudently shown. I was saved solely by the interference of one man. That man was Pereo, your mayordomo ! " She seized his hand and raised it joyfully to her lips. " Thank you for those words ! And you will come to him with me at once ; and he will recognize you ; and we will laugh at those lies ; won't we, Harry ? " He did not reply. Perhaps he was listen ing to a confused sound of voices rapidly s.3 262 MARUJA. approaching the cottage. Together they stepped out into the gathering night. A number of figures were coming towards them, among them Faquita, who ran a little ahead to meet her mistress. " Oh, Dona Maruja, he has escaped ! " " Who ? Not Pereo ! " "Truly. And on his horse. It was saddled and bridled in the stable all day. One knew it not. He was walking like a cat, when suddenly he parted the peons around him, like grain before a mad bull and behold ! he was on the pinto's back and away. And, alas ! there is no horse that can keep up with the pinto. Grod grant that he may not get in the way of the r-r-railroad ; that, in his very madness, he will even despise." " My own horse is in the thicket," whispered Guest hurriedly, in Maruja's ear. " I have measured him with the pinto before now. Grive me your blessing, and I will bring him back if he be alive." MAEUJA. 263 She pressed his hand and said, " Go." Before the astonished servants could identify the strange escort of their mistress, he was gone. It was already quite dark. To any but Guesfc, who had made the topography of La Mision Perdida a practical study, and who had known the habitual circuit of the mayor- domo in his efforts to avoid him, the search would have been hopeless. But rightly con jecturing that he would in his demented condition follow the force of habit, he spurred his horse along the high-road until he reached the lane leading to the grassy amphitheatre already described, which was once his favourite resort. Since then it had participated in the terrible transformation already wrought in the valley by the railroad. A deep cutting through one of the grassy hills had been i made for the line that now crossed the lower arc of the amphitheatre. His conjecture was justified on entering it by the appearance of a shadowy horseman in 264 MABUJA. full career round the circle, and lie had no difficulty in recognizing Pereo. As there was no other exit than the one by which he came, the other being inaccessible by reason of the railroad track, he calmly watched him twice make the circuit of the arena, ready to ride towards him when he showed symptoms of slackening his speed. Suddenly he became aware of some strange exercise on the part of the mysterious rider, and as he swept by on the nearer side of the circle, he saw that he was throwing a lasso ! A horrible thought that he was witnessing an insane rehearsal of the murder of his father flashed across his mind. A far-off whistle from the distant woods recalled him to his calmer senses at the same moment that it seemed also to check the evolutions of the furious rider. Guest felt confident that the wretched man could not escape him now. It was the approaching train, whose appearance would undoubtedly frighten Pereo toward the entrance of the little valley MARTHA. 265 guarded by him. The hillside was already alive with the clattering echoes of the oncoming monster, when, to his horror, he saw the madman advancing rapidly towards the cutting. He put spurs to L his horse, and started in pursuit ; but the train was already emerging from the narrow passage, followed by the furious rider, who had wheeled abreast of the engine, and was, for a moment or two, madly keeping up with it. Guest shouted to him, but his voice was lost in the roar of the rushing caravan. Something seemed to fly from Pereo's hand. The next moment the train had passed ; rider and horse, crushed and battered out of all life, were rolling in the ditch, while the murderer's empty saddle dangled at the end of a lasso, caught on the smoke-stack of one of the murdered man's avenging improvements ! * * * * * The marriage of Maruja and the son of the late Dr. West was received in the valley of San Antonio as one of the most admirably 266 MABUJA. conceived and skilfully matured plans of that lamented genius. There were many who were ready to state that the Doctor had con fided it to them years before ; and it was generally accepted that the widow Saltonstall had been simply made a trustee for the benefit of the prospective young couple. Only one person, perhaps, did not entirely accept these views ; it was Mr. James Prince, otherwise known as Aladdin. In later years he is said to have stated authoritatively " that the only combination in business that was uncertain was man and woman." THE END. PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES. [July, 1885. CHATTO & WINDUS'S LIST OF BOOKS. About. The Fellah : An Egyp. tian Novel. By EDMOND ABOUT. Translated by Sir RANDAL ROBERTS. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. ; cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Adams (W. Davenport), Works by: A Dictionary of the Drama. Being a comprehensive Guide to the Plays, Playwrights, Players, and Play houses of the United Kingdom and America, from the Earliest to the Present Times. Crown 8vo, half- bound, 12s. 6d. [Preparing. Latter-Day Lyrics. Edited by W. DAVENPORT ADAMS. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Quips and Quiddities. Selected by W. DAVENPORT ADAMS. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Advertising, A History of, from the Earliest Times. Illustrated by Anecdotes, Curious Specimens, and Notices of Successful Advertisers. By HENRY SAMPSON. Crown 8vo, with Coloured Frontispiece and Illustra tions, cloth gilt, 7s. 6d. Agony Column (The) of "The Times," from 1800 to 1870. Edited, with an Introduction, by ALICE CLAY. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Aide (Hamilton), Works by: Carp pf Carrlyon. Post 8vo, illus trated boards, 2s. Confidences. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Alexander (Mrs.), NOVELS by: Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each ; crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. Maid, Wife, or Widow ? A Romance. Valerie's Fate. Allen (Grant), Works by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. each. The Evolutionist at Large. Second Edition, revised. Vignettes from Nature. Colin Clout's Calendar. Strange Stories. With a Frontis piece by GEORGE Du MAURIER. Philistia: A Novel. By CECIL POWER (GRANT ALLEN). New and Cheaper Edition. Crown 8vo, cloth, 3s. 6d. Architectural Styles, A Hand book of. Translated from the German Of A. ROSENGARTEN, by W. COLLETT- SANDARS. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with 639 Illustrations, 7s. 6d. Artemus Ward : Artemus Ward's Works: The Works of CHARLES FARRER BROWNE, better known as ARTEMUS WARD. With Portrait and Facsimile. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Artemus Ward's Lecture on the Mormons. With 32 Illustrations Edited, with Preface, by EDWARD P. HINGSTON. Crown 8vo, 6d. The Genial Showman: Life and Ad- ventures of Artemus Ward. By EDWARD P. KINGSTON. With a Frontispiece. Cr. 8vo, cl. extra, 3s. 6d. BOOKS PUBLISHED BY Art (The) of Amusing : A Col lection of Graceful Arts, Games, Tricks, Puzzles, and Charades. By FRANK BELLEW. With 300 Illustrations. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 4s. 6d. Ashton (John), Works by: A History of the Chap-Books of the Eighteenth Century. With nearly 400 Illusts., engraved in facsimile of the originals. Cr. 8vo, cl. ex., 7s. 6d. Social Life in the Reign of Queen Anne. From Original Sources. With nearly 100 Illusts. Cr.8vo,cl.ex.,7s.6d. Humour, Wit, and Satire of the Seventeenth Century. With nearly 100 Illusts Cr. 8vo, cl. extra, 7s. 6d. English Caricature and Satire on Nappleon the First. 120 Illusts. from Originals. Two Vols., demy 8vo, 28s. Bacteria. A Synopsis of the Bacteria and Yeast Fungi and Allied Species. By W. B. GROVE, B.A. With 87 Illusts. Crown 8vo, cl. extra, 3s^6d. Balzac's " Comedie Humaine " and its Author. With Translations by H.H.WALKER. Post 8vo, cl.limp,2s. 6d. Bankers, A Handbook of Lon don ; together with Lists of Bankers from 1677. By F. G. HILTON PRICE. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Bardsley (Rev. C.W.),Works by : English Surnames: Their Sources and Significations. Third Ed., revised. Cr. 8vo, cl. extra, 7s. 6d. Curiosities of Puritan Nomencla ture. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Bartholomew Fair, Memoirs of. By HENRY MORLEY. With TOO Illusts. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Basil, Novels by: A Drawn Game. Cr. 8vo., cl. ex., 3s. 6d. The Wearing of the Green. Three Vols., crown 8vo, 315. 6d. Beaconsfield, Lord : A Biogra phy. By T. P. O'CONNOR, M.P. Sixth Edit., New Preface. Cr.Svo, cl.ex.7s.6d. Beauchamp. Grantley Grange : A Novel. By SHELSLEY BEAUCHAMP. Post 8vo, illust. bds., 2s. Beautiful Pictures by British Artists: A Gathering of Favourites from bur Picture Galleries. In Two Series. All engraved on Steel in the highest style of Art. Edited, with Notices of the Artists, by SYDNEY ARMYTAGE, M.A. Imperial 4to, cloth extra, gilt and gilt edges, 21s. per Vol. Bechstein. As Pretty as Seven, and other German Stories. Collected by LUDWIG BECHSTEIN. With Additional Tales by the Brothers GRIMM, and 100 Illusts. by RICHTER. Small 4to, green and gold, 6s. 6d. ; gilt edges, 7s. 6d. Beerbohm. Wanderings in Patagonia ; or, Life among the Ostrich Hunters. By JULIUS BEERBOHM. With Illusts. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Belgravia for 1885. One Shilling Monthly, Illustrated by P. MACNAB. A Strange Voyage, by W. CLARK RUSSELL, is begun in the JANUARY Number, and will be con tinued throughout the year. This Number contains also the Opening Chapters of a New Story by CECIL POWER, Author of" Philistia," entitled Babylon. *** Now ready, the Volume for MARCH to JUNE, 1885, cloth extra, gilt edges, 7s. 6d.; Cases for binding Vols., 2s. each. Belgravia Holiday Number. With Stories by F. W. ROBINSON, JUSTIN H. MCCARTHY, B. MONT- GOMERIE RANKING, and others. Demy 8vo, with Illusts., Is. Bennett (W.C.,LL.D.),Works by: A Ballad History of England. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. Songs for Sailors. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. Besant (Walter) and James Rice, Novels by. Post 8vo, illust. boards, 2s. each; cloth limp, 2s. 6d. each; or cr. 8vo, cl. extra,3s. 6d. each. Ready-Money Mortiboy. With Harp and Crown. This Son of Vulcan. My Little Girl. The Case of Mr. Lucraft. The Golden Butterfly. By Celia's Arbour. The Monks of Thelema. 'Twas in Trafalgar's Bay. The Seamy Side. The Ten Years' Tenant. The Chaplain of the Fleet. Besant (Walter), Novels by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. eaeh ; post 8yo, illust. boards, 2s. each; cloth limp, 2s. 6d. each. All Sorts and Conditions of Men: An Impossible Story. With Illustra tions by FRED. BARNARD. The Captains' Room, &c. With Frontispiece by E. J. WHEELER. All in a Garden Fair. With 6 Illusts. by H. FURNISS. CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY. BESANT (WALTER), continued Dorothy Forster. New and Cheaper Edition. With Frontispiece by CHAS. GREEN. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Uncle Jack, and other Stories. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. The Art of Fiction. Demy 8vo, Is. Bet ham -Ed wards (M.), Novels by. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. ; post 8vo, illust. bds., 2s. each. Felicia. | Kitty. Bewick (Thos.) and his Pupils. By AUSTIN DOBSON. With 95 Illustra tions Square 8vo, cloth extra, 10s. 6d. Birthday Books: The Starry Heavens: A Poetical Birthday Book. Square 8vo, hand somely bound in cloth, 2s. 6d. Birthday Flowers: Their Language and Legends. By W. J. GORDON. Beautifully Illustrated in Colours by VIOLA BOUGKTON. In illuminated cover, crown 4to, 6s. The Lowell Birthday Book. With Illusts., small 8vo, cloth extra, 4s. Gd. Blackburn's (Henry) Art Hand books. Demy 8vo, Illustrated, uni form in size for binding. Academy Notes, separate years, from 1875 to 1884, each Is. Academy Notes, 1885. With 142 Illustrations. Is. Academy Notes, 1875-79. Complete in One Vol., with nearly 600 Illusts. in Facsimile. Demy 8vo, cloth limp, 6s. Academy Notes, 1880-84. Complete in One Volume, with about 700 Fac simile Illustrations. Cloth limp, 6s. Grosvenor Notes, 1877. 6d. Grosvenor Notes, separate years, from 1878 to 1884, each Is. Grosvenor Notes, 1885. With 75 Illustrations. Is. Grosvenor Notes, 1877-82. With upwards of 300 Illustrations. Demy 8vo, cloth limp, 6s. Pictures at South Kensington. With 70 Illustrations. Is. TheEnglishPicturesatthe National Gallery. 114 Illustrations. Is. The Old Masters at the National Gallery. 128 Illustrations. Is. 6d. A Complete Illustrated Catalogue to the National Gallery. With Notes by H. BLACKBURN, and 242 Illusts. Demy 8vo, cloth limp, 3s. Illustrated Catalogue of the Luxem bourg Gallery. Containing about 250 Reproductions after the Original Drawings of the Artists. Edited by F. G. DUMAS. Demy 8vo, 3s. 6d. ART HANDBOOKS, continued The Paris Salon, 1884. With over 300 Illusts. Edited by F. G. DUMAS. Demy 8vo, 3s. The Paris Salon, 1885. With about 300 Facsimile Sketches. Edited by F. G. DUMAS. Demy 8vo, 3s. The Art Annual, 1883-4. Edited by F. G. DUMAS. With 300 full-page Illustrations. Demy 8vo, 5s. Boccaccio's Decameron ; or, Ten Days' Entertainment. Translated into English, with an Introduction by THOMAS WRIGHT, F.S.A. With Portrait, and STOTHARD'S beautiful Copper plates. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, gilt, 7s. 6d. Blake (William): Etchings from his Works. By W. B. SCOTT. With descriptive Text. Folio, half-bound boards, India Proofs, 21s. Bowers'(G.) Hunting Sketches: Canters in Crampshire. Oblong 4to, half-bound boards, 21s. Leaves from a Hunting Journal. Coloured in facsimile of the originals. Oblong 4to, half-bound, 21s. Boyle (Frederick), Works by: Camp Notes: Stories of Sport and Adventure in Asia, Africa, and America. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated bds., 2s. Savage Life. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated bds., 2s. Chronicles of No-Man's Land. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s.; post8vo, illust. boards, 2s. Brand's Observations on Pop ular Antiquities, chiefly Illustrating the Origin of our Vulgar Customs, Ceremonies, and Superstitions. With the Additions of Sir HENRY ELLIS. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, gilt, with numerous Illustrations, 7s. 6d. Bret Harte, Works by : Bret Harte's Col|ected Works. Ar ranged and Revised by the Author. Complete in Five Vols., crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. each. Vol. I. COMPLETE POETICAL AND DRAMATIC WORKS. With Steel Por trait, and Introduction by Author. Vol. II. EARLIER PAPERS LUCK OF ROARING CAMP, and other Sketches BOHEMIAN PAPERS SPANISH AND AMERICAN LEGENDS. Vol. III. TALES OF THE ARGONAUTS EASTERN SKETCHES. Vol. IV. GABRIEL CONROY. Vol. V. STORIES CONDENSED NOVELS, &c. BOOKS PUBLISHED BY BRET HARTE'S WORKS, continued The Select Works of Bret Harte, in Prose and Poetry. With Introduc tory Essay by J. M. BELLEW, Portrait of the Author, and 50 Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Gabriel Conroy: A Novel. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. An Heiress of Red Dog, and other Stories. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. ; cloth limp, 2s. 6d. The Twins of Table Mountain. Fcap. 8vo, picture cover, Is. ; crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Luck of Roaring Camp, and other Sketches. Post 8vo, illust. bds., 2s. Jeff Briggs's Love Story. Fcap. 8vo, picture cover, Is. ; cloth extra, 2s. 6d. Flip. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. ; cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Californian Stories (including THE TWINS OF TABLE MOUNTAIN, JEFF BRIGGS'S LOVE STORY, &c.) Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Maruja: A Novel. Post 8vo, illust. bds., 2s. ; cloth limp, 2s. 6d. [Sept. Brewer (Rev. Dr.), Works by : The Reader's Handbookof Allusions, References, Plots, and Stories. Fourth Edition, revised throughout, with a New Appendix, containing a COMPLETE ENGLISH BIBLIOGRAPHY. Cr. 8vo, 1,400 pp., cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Authors and their Works, with the Dates : Being the Appendices to "The Reader's Handbook," separ ately printed. Cr. 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. A Dictjonary of Miracles: Imitative, Realistic, and Dogmatic. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. ; half-bound, 9s. Brewster(SirDavid), Works by: More Worlds than One: The Creed of the Philosopher and the Hope of the Christian. With Plates. Post 8vo, cloth extra, 4s. 6d. The Martyrs of Science: Lives of GALILEO, TYCHO BRAKE, and KEP LER. With Portraits. Post 8vo, cloth extra, 4s. 6d. Letters on Natural Magic. A New Edition, with numerous Illustrations, and Chapters on the Being and Faculties of Man, and Additional Phenomena of Natural Magic, by J. A. SMITH. Post 8vo, cloth extra, 4s. 6d. Briggs, Memoir of Gen. John. By Major EVANS BELL. With a Por- trait. Royal 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Brillat-Savarin. Gastronomy as a Fine Art. By BRILLAT-SAVARIN. Translated by R. E. ANDERSON, M.A. Post 8vo, cloth liinp, 2s. 6d. Burnett (Mrs.), Novels by: Surly Tim, and other Stories. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Kathleen Mavournecn. Fcap. 8vo, picture cover, Is. Lindsay's Luck. Fcap. 8vo, picture cover, Is. Pretty Polly Pemberton. Fcap. 8vo, picture cover, Is. Buchanan's (Robert) Works : Ballads of Life, Love, and Humour. With a Frontispiece by ARTHUR HUGHES. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Selected Poems of Robert Buchanan. With Frontispiece by T. DALZIEL. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Undertones. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. London Poems. Cr. 8vo, cl. extra, 6s. The Book of Orm. Cr. 8vo, cl. ex., 6s. White Rose and Red: A Love Story. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Idylls and Legends of Inverburn. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. St. Abe and his Seven Wives : A Tale of Salt Lake City. With a Frontis piece by A. B. HOUGHTON. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 5s. Robert Buchanan'sComplete Poeti cal Works. With Steel-plate Por trait. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. The Hebrid Isles: Wanderings in the Land of Lome and the Outer He- brides. With Frontispiece by W. SMALL. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. A Poet's Sketch-Book: Selections from the Prose Writings of ROBERT BUCHANAN. Crown 8vo, cl. extra, 6s. The Shadow of the Sword : A Ro mance. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illust. boards, 2s. A Child of Nature : A Romance. With a Frontispiece. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d.; post 8vo, illust. bds., 2s. God and the Man : A Romance. With Illustrations by FRED. BARNARD. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. The Martyrdom of Madeline: A Romance. WithFrontispiecebyA.W. COOPER. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d.; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Love Me for Ever. With a Frontis piece by P. MACNAB. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illus trated boards, 2s. Annan Water: A Romance. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illust. boards, 2s. The New Abelard : A Romance. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 33. 6d. ; post 8vo, illust. boards, 2s. Foxglove Manor: A Novel. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Matt : A Story of a Caravan. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. CHATTO &> WINDUS, PICCADILLY. Burton (Robert): The Anatomy of Melancholy. A New Edition, complete, corrected and enriched by Translations of the Classical Extracts. Demy 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Melancholy Anatomised : Being an Abridgment, for popular use, of BUR TON'S ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Burton (Captain), Works by: To the Gold Coast for Gold : A Per sonal Narrative. By RICHARD F. BUR TON and VERNEY LOVETT CAMERON. With Maps and Frontispiece. Two Vols., crown 8vo, cloth extra, 21s. The Book of the Sword: Being a History of the Sword and its Use in all Countries, from the Earliest Times. By RICHARD F. BURTON. With over 400 Illustrations. Square 8vo, cloth extra, 32s. Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. Edited by Rev. T. SCOTT. With 17 Steel Plates by STOTHARD, engraved by GOODALL, and numerous Woodcuts. Crown 8vo. cloth extra, gilt, 7s. 6d. Byron (Lord) : Byron's Letters and Journals. With Notices of his Life. By THOMAS MOORE. A Reprint of the Original Edition, newly revised, with Twelve full-page Plates. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, gilt, 7s. 6d. Byron's Don Juan. Complete in One Vol., post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. Cameron (Commander) and Captain Burton. To the Gold Coast for Gold : A Personal Narrative. By RICHARD F. BURTON and VERNEY LOVETT CAMERON. Frontispiece and Maps. Two Vols., cr. 8vo, cl. ex., 21s. Cameron (Mrs. H. Lovett), Novels by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Juliet's Guardian, j Deceivers Ever. Campbe 1 1 . W h i te and"! Black^ Travels in the United States. By Sir GEORGE CAMPBELL, M.P. Demy 8vo, cloth extra, 14s. CarlyTe (Thomas) : Thomas Carlyle : Letters and Re collections. By MONCURE D. CON- WAY, M.A. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with Illustrations, 6s. On the Choice of Books. By THOMAS CARLYLE. With a Life of the Author by R. H. SHEPHERD. New and Re vised Edition, post 8vo, cloth extra, Illustrated, Is. Gd. CARLYLE (THOMAS), continued The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyleand Ralph Waldo Emerson. 1634 to 1872. Edited by CHARLES ELIOT NORTON. With Portraits. Two Vols., crown 8vo, cloth extra, 24s. Chapman's (George) Works: Vol. I. contains the Plays complete, including the doubtful ones. Vol. II., the Poems and Minor Translations, with an Introductory Essay by ALGER NON CHARLES SWINBURNE. Vol. III., the Translations of the Iliad and Odys sey. Three Vols., crown 8vo, cloth extra, 18s. ; or separately, 6s. each. Chatfo & Jackson. ATreatise on Wood Engraving, Historical and Practical. By WM. ANDREW CHATTO and JOHN JACKSON. With an Addi tional Chapter by HENRY G. BOHN ; and 450 fine Illustrations. A Reprint of the last Revised Edition. Large 4to, half-bound, 28s. Chaucer: Chaucer for Children: A Golden Key. By Mrs. H. R. HAWEIS. With Eight Coloured Pictures and nu merous Woodcuts by the Author. New Ed., small 410, cloth extra, 6s. Chaucer for Schools. By Mrs. H. R. HAWEIS. Demy 8vo, cloth limp, 2s.6d. Clodd. Myths and Dreams. By EDWARD CLODD, F.R.A.S., Author of " The Childhood of Religions," &c. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 5s. City (The) of Dream : A Poem. Fcap. Svo. cloth extra, 6s. [In the press. Cobban. The Cure of Souls : A Story. By J. MACLAREN COBBAN. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Coleman. Curly : A Novelette. By JOHN COLEMAN. Illustrated by J. C. DOLLMAN. Cr. 8vo, Is.; cloth, Is. 6d. Collins (C. Allston)T^The Bar Sinister: A Story. By C. ALLSTON COLLINS. PostSvo, illustrated bds.,2s. Collins (Mortimer & Frances), Novels by : Sweet and Twenty. Post 8vo, illus trated boards, 2s. Frances. Post 8vo, illust. bds., 2s. Blacksmith and Scholar. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. ; crown Svo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. The Village Comedy. Post Svo, illust. boards, 2s. ; cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. You Play Me False. Post Svo, illust. boards, 2s.; cr. Svo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. BOOKS PUBLISHED BY Collins (Mortimer 1 ), Novels by : Sweet Anne Page. Post 8vo, illus trated boards, 2s. ; crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Transmigration. Post8vo.illust.bds., 2s. ; crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. From Midnight to Midnight. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. ; crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. A Fight with Fortune. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Collins (Wilkie), Novels by. Each post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s; cloth limp, 2s. 6d. ; or crown 8vo, cloth extra, Illustrated, 3s. 6d. Antonina. Illust. by SirJoHNGiLBERT. Basil. Illustrated by Sir JOHN GIL BERT and J. MAHONEY. Hide and Seek. Illustrated by Sir JOHN GILBERT and J. MAHONEY. The Dead Secret. Illustrated by Sir JOHN GILBERT. Queen of Hearts. Illustrated by Sir JOHN GILBERT. My Miscellanies. With a Steel-plate Portrait of WILKIE COLLINS. The Woman in White. With Illus trations by Sir JOHN GILBERT and F. A. FRASER. The Moonstone. With Illustrations by G. Du MAURIER and F. A. FRASER. Man and Wife. Illust. by W. SMALL. Poor Miss Finch. Illustrated by G. Du MAURIER and EDWARD HUGHES. Miss or Mrs.? With Illustrations by S. L. FILDES and HENRY WOODS. The New Magdalen. Illustrated by G. Du MAURIER and C. S. RANDS. The Frozen Deep. Illustrated by G. Du MAURIER and J. MAHONEY. The Law and the Lady. Illustrated by S. L. FILDES and SYDNEY HALL. The Two Destinies. The Haunted Hotel. Illustrated by ARTHUR HOPKINS. The Fallen Leaves. Jezebel's Daughter. The Black Robe. Heart and Science : A Story of the Present Time. " I Say No." Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Colman's Humorous Works: " Broad Grins," " My Nightgown and Slippers," and other Humorous Works, Prose and Poetical, of GEORGE COL- MAN. With Life by G. B. BUCKSTONE, and Frontispiece by HOGARTH. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, gilt, 7s. 6d. Convalescent Cookery : A Family Handbook. By CATHERINE RYAN. Crown 8vo, Is. ; cloth, Is. 6d. Conway (Moncure D.), Works by: Demonology and Devil-Lore. Two Vols., royal 8vo, with 65 Illusts., 28s. A Necklace of Stories. Illustrated by W. J. HENNESSY. Square 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. The Wandering Jew. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Thomas Carlyle: Letters and Re collections. With Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Cook (Dutton), Works by : Hours with the Players. With a Steel Plate Frontispiece. New and Cheaper Edit., cr. 8vo, cloth extra,6s. Nights at the Play : A View of the English Stage. New and Cheaper Edition. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Leo: A Novel. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Paul Foster's Daughter. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. ; crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Copyright. A Handbook of English and Foreign Copyright in Literary and Dramatic Works. By SIDNEY JERROLD, of the Middle Temple, Esq., Barrister-at-Law. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Cornwall. Popular Romances of the West of England; or, The Drolls, Traditions, and Superstitions of Old Cornwall. Collected and Edited by ROBERT HUNT, F.R.S. New and Revised Edition, with Additions, and Two Steel-plate Illustrations by GEORGE CRUIKSHANK. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Creasy. Memoirs of Eminent Etonians : with Notices of the Early History of Eton College. By Sir EDWARD CREASY, Author of " The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World." Crown 8vo, cloth extra, gilt, with 13 Portraits, la. 6d. Cruikshank (George) : The Comic Almanack. Complete in Two SERIES : The FIRST from 1835 to 1843 ; the SECOND from 1844 to 1853. A Gathering of the BEST HUMOUR of THACKERAY, HOOD, MAY- HEW, ALBERT SMITH, A'BECKETT, ROBERT BROUGH, &c. With 2,000 Woodcuts and Steel Engravings by CRUIKSHANK, HIKE, LANDELLS, &c. Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, two very thick volumes, 7s. 6d, each. CHATTO 6- W INDUS, PICCADILLY. CRUIKSHANK (G.), continued The Life of George Cruikshank. By BLANCHARD JERROLD, Author of "The Life of Napoleon III.," &c. With 84 Illustrations. New and Cheaper Edition, enlarged, with Ad ditional Plates, and a very carefully compiled Bibliography. Crown 8vo, eloth extra, 7s. 6d. Robinson Crusoe. A beautiful re production of Major's Edition, with 37 Woodcuts and Two Steel Plates by GEORGE CRUIKSHANK, choicely printed. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. A few Large-Paper copies, printed on hand-made paper, with India proofs of the Illustrations, 36s. Cussans. Handbook of Her aldry; with Instructions for Tracing Pedigrees and Deciphering Ancient MSS., &c. By JOHN E. CUSSANS. Entirely New and Revised Edition, illustrated with over 400 Woodcuts and Coloured Plates. Crown 8vo, loth extra, 7s. 6d. Cyples. -Hearts of Gold: A Novel. By WILLIAM CYPLES. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. Daniel. Merrie England in the Olden Time. By GEORGE DANIEL. With Illustrations by ROBT. CRUIK SHANK. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Daudet. Port Salvation ; or, The Evangelist. By ALPHONSE DAUDET. Translated by C. HARRY MELTZER. With Portrait of the Author. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post Svo, illust. boards, 2s. Davenant. What shall my Son be ? Hints for Parents on the Choice of a Profession or Trade for their Sons. By FRANCIS DAVENANT, M.A. Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Davies (Dr. N. E.), Works by: One Thousand Medical Maxims. Crown Svo, Is. ; cloth, Is. 6d. Nursery Hints: A Mother's Guide. Crown Svo, Is. ; cloth, Is. 6d. Aids to Long Life. Crown Svo, 2s. ; cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Davies' (Sir John) Complete Poetical Works, including Psalms I. to L. in Verse, and other hitherto Un published MSS., for the first time Collected and Edited, with Memorial- Introduction and Notes, by the Rev. A. B. GROSART, D.D. Two Vols., crown Svo, cloth boards 12s. De Maistre. A Journey Round My Room. By XAVIER DE MAISTRE. Translated by HENRY ATTWELL. Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. (3d. De Mi lie. A~Castle in Spain. A Novel. By JAMES DE MILLE. With a . Frontispiece. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post Svo, illust. bds., 2s. Derwent (Leith), Novels by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Our Lady of Tears. Circe's Lovers. _ Dickens (Charles), Novels by : Post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Sketches by Boz. 1 NicholasNickleby. Pickwick Papers. | Oliver Twist. The Speeches of Charles Dickens. (May/air Library.) Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. The Speeches of Charles Dickens, 1841-1870. With a New Bibliography, revised and enlarged. Edited and Prefaced by RICHARD HERNE SHEP HERD. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 6s. About England with Dickens. By ALFRED RIMMER. With 57 Illustra tions by C. A. VANDERHOOF, ALFRED RIMMER, and others. Sq. Svo, cloth extra, 10s. 6d. Dictionaries: A Dictionary of Miracles: Imitative, Realistic, and Dogmatic. By the Rev. E. C. BREWER, LL.D. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d.; hf.-bound, 93. The Reader's Handbook of Allu sions, References, Plots, and Stories. By the Rev. E. C. BREWER, LL.D. Fourth Edition, revised throughout, with a New Appendix, containing a Complete English Bib liography. Crown Svo, 1,400 pages, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Authors and their Works, with the Dates. Being the Appendices to "The Reader's Handbook," sepa rately printed. By the Rev. Dr BREWER. Crown Svo, cloth limp, 2s. Familiar 1 Allusions: A Handbook of Miscellaneous Information ; in cluding the Names of Celebrated Statues, Paintings, Palaces, Country Seats, Ruins, Churches, Ships, Streets, Clubs, Natural Curiosities, and the like. By WM. A: WHEELER and CHARLES G. WHEELER. Demy Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Short Sayings of Ctoeat Men. Witt Historical and Explanatory Notes* By SAMUEL A. BENT, M.A. Demy 8vo, cloth extra 7s. 6d. 8 BOOKS PUBLISPIED BY DICTIONARIES, continued A Dictionary of the Drama: Being a comprehensive Guide to the Plays, Playwrights.Players, and Playhouses of the United Kingdom and America, from the Earliest to the Present Times. By W. DAVENPORT ADAMS. A thick volume, crown 8vo, half- bound, 12s. 6d. [In preparation. The Slang Dictionary: Etymological, Historical, and Anecdotal. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. 6d. Women of the Day : A Biographical Dictionary. By FRANCES HAYS. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 5s. Words, Facts, and Phrases: A Dic tionary of Curious, Quaint, and Out- of-the-Way Matters. By EUEZER EDWARDS. New and Cheaper Issue. Cr. 8vo, cl. ex., 7s. 6d. ; hf.-bd., 9s. Diderot. The Paradox of Act ing. Translated, with Annotations, from Diderot's " Le Farad oxe sur le Com6dien," by WALTER HERRIES POLLOCK. With a Preface by HENRY IRVING. Cr. 8vo, in parchment, 4s. 6d. Dobson (wTf.), Works by : ~ Literary Frivolities, Fancies, Follies, and Frolics. Post 8vo, cl. lp., 2s. 6d. Poetical Ingenuities and Eccentri cities. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Doran. Memories of our Great Towns ; with Anecdotic Glean ings concerning their Worthies and their Oddities. By Dr. JOHN DORAN, F.S.A. With 38 Illustrations. New and Cheaper Ed., cr. 8vo, cl. ex., 7s. 6d. Drama, A Dictionary of the. Being a comprehensive Guide to the Plays, Playwrights, Players, and Play houses of the United Kingdom and America, from the Earliest to the Pre sent Times. By W. DAVENPORT ADAMS. (Uniform with BREWER'S " Reader's Handbook.") Crown gyo, half-bound, 12s. 6d. [In preparation. Dramatists, The Old. Cr. 8vo, cl. ex., Vignette Portraits, 6s. per Vol. Ben Jonson's Works. With Notes Critical and Explanatory, and a Bio- graphical Memoir by WM. GIFFOUD. Edit, by Col. CUNNINGHAM. 3 Vols. Chapman's Works. Complete in Three Vols. Vol. I. contains the Plays complete, including doubtful ones; Vol. II., Poems and Minor Translations, with IntroductoryEssay by A. C.SWINBURNE; Vol. III. .Trans lations of the Iliad and Odysaey. Marlowe's Works. Including his Translations. Edited, with Notes and Introduction, by Col. CUNNING HAM. One Vol. DRAMATISTS, THE OLD, continued Massinger's Plays. From the Text of WILLIAM GIFFORD. Edited by Col. CUNNINGHAM. One Val. Dyer. The Folk -Lore of Plants. By T. F. THISELTON DYER, M.A., &c. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. [In preparation. Early English Poets. Edited, with Introductions and Annotations, by Rev. A. B.GROSART, D.D. Crown 8vo, cloth boards, 6s. per Volume. Fletcher's (Giles, B.D.) Complete Poems. One Vol. Davies' (Sir John) Complete Poetical Works. Two Vols. Herrick's (Robert) Complete Col lected Poems. Three Vols. Sidney's (Sir Philip) Complete Poetical Works. Three Vols. Herbert (Lord) of Cherbury's Poems. Edited, with Introduction, by J. CHURTON COLLINS. Crown 8vo, parchment, 8s. Edwardes(Mrs.A.), Novels by: A Point of Honour. Post 8vo, illus trated boards, 2s. Archie Lovell. Post 8vo, illust. bds., 2s. ; crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Eggleston. Roxy: A Novel. By EDWARD EGGLESTON. Post 8vo, illust. boards, 2s. Emanuel. On Diamonds and Precious Stones: their History.Value, and Properties ; with Simple Tests for ascertaining their Reality. By HARRY EMANUEL, F.R.G.S. With numerous Illustrations, tinted and plain. Crown 8 vo , cloth extra, gilt, 6s. Englishman's House, The : A Practical Guide to all interested in Selecting or Building a House, with full Estimates of Cost, Quantities, &c. By C. J. RICHARDSON. Third Edition. Nearly 600 Illusts. Cr. 8vo,cl.ex.,7s.6d. Ewald (Alex. Charles, F.S.A.), Works by: Stories from the State Papers. With an Autotype Facsimile. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. The Life and Times of Prince Charles Stuart, Count of Albany, commonly called the Young Pre tender. From the State Papers and other Sources. New and Cheaper Edition, with a Portrait, crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Studies Re-studied: Historical Sketches from Original Sources. Demy 8vo, cloth extra, 12s. CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY. Eyes, The. How to Use our Eyes, and How to Preserve Them. By JOHN BROWNING, F.R.A.S., &c. With 52 Illustrations. Is.; cloth, Is. 6d. Fairholt. Tobacco: Its His tory and Associations ; with an Ac count of the Plant and its Manu facture, and its. Modes of Use in all Ages and Countries. By F. W. FAIR- HOLT, F.S.A. With upwards of 100 Illustrations by the Author. Crown 8vo. cloth extra, 6s. Familiar Allusions: A Hand book of Miscellaneous Information ; including the Names of Celebrated Statues, Paintings, Palaces, Country Seats, Ruins, Churches, Ships, Streets, Clubs, Natural Curiosities, and the like. By WILLIAM A. WHEELER, Author of " Noted Names of Fiction ; " and CHARLES G. WHEELER. Demy 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Faraday (Michael), Works by : The Chemical History of a Candle : Lectures delivered before a Juvenile Audience at the Royal Institution. Edited by WILLIAM CR9OKES, F.C.S. Post 8vo, cloth extra, with numerous Illustrations, 4s. 6d. On the Various Forces of Nature, and their Relations to each other : Lectures delivered before a Juvenile Audience at the Royal Institution. Edited by WILLIAM CROOKES, F.C.S. Post 8vo, cloth extra, with numerous Illustrations. 4s. 6d. Farrer. Military Manners and Customs. By J. A. FARRER, Author of "Primitive Manners and Customs." &c. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Fin-Bee. The Cupboard Papers : Observations on the Art of Living and Dining. By FIN-BEC. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Fitzgerald (Percy), Works by : The Recreations of a Literary Man ; or, Does Writing Pay? With Re collections of some Literary Men, and a View of a Literary Man's Working Life. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. The World Behind the Scenes. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Little Essays: Passages from the Letters of CHARLES LAMB. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Bella Donna. | Never Forgotten. The Second Mrs. Tillotson. Polly. Seventy-five Brooke Street, The Lady of Brantome, Fletcher's (Giles, B.D.) Com plete Poems: Christ's Victoria in Heaven, Christ's Victorie on Earth, Christ's Triumph over Death, and Minor Poems. With Memorial-Intro duction and Notes by the Rev. A. B. GROSART, P.P. Cr. 8vo, cloth bds., 6s. Fonblanque. Filthy Lucre: A Novel. By ALBANY DE FONBLANQUE. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Francillon (R. E.y, Novels by: Crown 8vp, cloth extra, 3s. Gd.each ; post 8vo, illust. boards, 2s. each. Olympia. I Queen Cophetua. One by One. | A Real Queen. Esther's Glove. Fcap. 8vo, picture cover, Is. French Literature, History of. By HENRY VAN LAUN. Complete in 3 Vols., demy 8vo, el. bds., 7s. 6d. each. Frere. Pandurang Hari ; or, Memoirs of a Hindoo. With a Preface by Sir H. BARTLE FRERE, G.C.S.I., &c. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Friswell. Oneof Two: ANoveT By HAIN FRISWELL. Post 8vo, illus- trated boards, 2s . Frost (Thomas), Works by : Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. Circus Life and Circus Celebrities. The Lives of the Conjurers, The Old Showmen and the Old London Fairs. Fry. Royal Guide to London Charities. 1885-6. By HERBERT FRY. Showing their Name, Date of Founda- tion,Objects,Income,Omcials,&c. Pub- lished Annually. Cr. 8vo, cloth, Is. 6d. Gardening Books: A Year's Work in Garden and Green house : Practical Advice to Amateur Gardeners as to the Management of the Flower,Fruit, and Frame Garden. By GEORGE GLENNY. Post 8vo, Is. : cloth, Is. 6d. Our Kitchen Garden : The Plants we Grow, and How we Cook Them. By TOM JERROLD. Post 8vo, Is. ; cloth limp, Is. 6d. Household Horticulture: A Gossip about Flowers. By TOM and JANE JERROLD. Illustrated. PostSvo, Is. : cloth limp, Is. 6d. The Garden that Paid the Rent. By TOM JERROLD. Fcap. 8vo, illus trated cover, Is.; cloth limp, Is. 6d. My Garden Wild, and What I Grew there. By F. G. HEATH. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 5s. ; gilt edges, 6s. 12 BOOKS PUBLISHED BY Hawthorne(Julian), Novels by. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Garth. 1 Sebastian Strome. Ellice Quentin. I Dust. Prince Saroni's Wife. Fortune's Fool. Beatrix Randolph. Mrs. Gainsborough's Diamonds. Fcap. 8vo, illustrated cover, Is. ; cloth extra, 2s. 6d. Miss Cadogna. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. IMPORTANT NEW BIOGRAPHY. Hawthorne (Nathaniel) and his Wife. By JULIAN HAWTHORNE. With 6 Steel-plate Portraits. Two Vols., crown 8vo, cloth extra, 24s. [Twenty-five copies of an Edition de Luxe, printed on the best hand-made paper, large 8vo size, and with India proofs of the Illustrations, are reserved for sale in England, price 48s. per set. Immediate application should be made by anyone desiring a copy of this special and Very limited Edition.] Hays. Women of the Day: A Biographical Dictionary of Notable Contemporaries. By FRANCES HAYS. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 5s. Heath (F. G.). My Garden Wild, and What I Grew There. By FRANCIS GEORGE HEATH, Author of " The Fern World," &c. Crown 8vo, cl. ex., 5s. ; cl. gilt, gilt edges, 6s. Helps (Sir Arthur), Works by : Animals and their Masters. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Social Pressure. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Ivan de Biron : A Novel. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d.; post 8vo, illus- trated boards, 2s. HeptaTogia (The); or, The Seven against Sense. A Cap with Seven Bells. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Herbert. The Poems of Lord Herbert of Cherbury. Edited, with Introduction, by J. CHURTON COLLINS. Crown 8vo, bound in parchment, S3. Herrick's (Robert) Hesperides, Noble Numbers, and Complete Col lected Poems. With Memorial-Intro duction and Notes by the Rev. A. B. GROSART, D.D., Steel Portrait, Index of First Lines, and Glossarial Index, &c. Three Vols., crown 8vo, cloth, 18s. Hesse -Wartegg (Chevalier* Ernst von), Works by : Tunis: The Land and the People. With 22 Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. The New South-West: Travelling Sketches from Kansas, New Mexico, Arizona, and Northern Mexico. With 100 fine Illustrations and Three Maps. Demy 8vo, cloth extra, 14.S. [In preparation. Hindley (Charles), Works by : Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. Tavern Anecdotes and Sayings : In cluding the Origin ot Signs, and Reminiscences connected with Taverns, Coffee Houses, Clubs, &c. With Illustrations. The Life and Adventures of a Cheap Jack. By One of the Fraternity. Edited by CHARLES HINDLEY. Hoey. The Lover's Creed. By Mrs. CASHEL HOEY. With 12 Illus trations by P. MACNAB. Three Vols., crown 8vo, 315. 6d. Holmes (O.Wendell), Works by : The Autocrat of the Breakfast- Table. Illustrated by J. GORDON THOMSON. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. ; another Edition in smaller type, with an Introduction by G. A. SALA. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. The Professor at the Breakfast- Table ; with the Story of Iris. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. Holmes. The Science of Voice Production and Voice Preser vation : A Popular Manual for the Use of Speakers and Singers. By GORDON HOLMES, M.D. With Illus trations. Crown 8vo, Is. ; cloth, Is. 6d. Hood (Thomas): Hood's Choice Works, in Prose and Verse. Including the Cream of the Comic Annuals. With Life of the Author, Portrait, and 200 Illustra tions. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Hood's Whims and Oddities. Com plete. With all the original Illus trations. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. Hood (Tom), Works by: From Nowhere to the North Pole: A Noah's Arkaeological Narrative. With 25 Illustrations by W. BRUN- TON and E. C. BARNES. Square crown 8vo, cloth extra, gilt edges, 6s. A Golden Heart: A Novel. PostSvo, illustrated boards, 2s. CHATTO & WIND US, PICCADILLY. Hook's (Theodore) Choice Hu- morous Works, including his Ludi crous Adventures, Bons Mots, Puns and Hoaxes. With a New Life of the Author, Portraits, Facsimiles, and Illusts. Cr. 8vo, cl. extra, gilt, Is. 6d. Hooper. The House of Raby : A Novel. By Mrs. GEORGE HOOPER. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Home. Orion : An Epic Poem, in Three Books. By RICHARD HEN- GIST HORNE. With Photographic Portrait from a Medallion by SUM MERS. Tenth Edition, crown 8vo, cloth extra, Is. Howe 1 1. Conflicts of Capital and Labour, Historically and Eco nomically considered : Being a His tory and Review of the Trade Unions of Great Britain, showing their Origin, Progress, Constitution, and Objects, in their Political, Social, Economical, and Industrial Aspects. By GEORGE HOWELL. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Hugo. The Hunchback of Notre Dame. By VICTOR HUGO. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2a. Hunt. Essays by Leigh Hunt. A Tale for a Chimney Corner, and other Pieces. With Portrait and In troduction by EDMUND OLLIER. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. Hunt (Mrs. Alfred), Novels by : Crown 8yo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Thornicroft's Model. The Leaden Casket. Self-Condemned. Ingelow. Fated to be Free : A Novel. By JEAN INGELOW. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Irish Wit and Humour, Songs of. Collected and Edited by A. PERCE- VAL GRAVES. Post 8vo, cl. limp, 2s. 6d. Irving (Washington),Works by: Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. each. Tales of a Traveller. Tales of the Am am b> ra^ Janvier. Practical Keramics for Students. By CATHERINE A. JANVIER. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Jay (Harriett), Novels by. Each crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; or post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. The Dark Colleen. The Queen of Connaught. Jefferies (Richard), Works by: Nature near London. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. The Life of the Fields. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. ' Jennings (H. J.), Works by: Curiosities of Criticism. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Lord Tennyson: A Biographical Sketch. With a Photograph-Por- trait. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Jennings (Hargrave). The Rosicrucians: Their Rites and Mys teries. With Chapters on the Ancient Fire and Serpent Worshippers. By HARGRAVE JENNINGS. With Five full- page Plates and upwards of 300 Illus trations. A New Edition, crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Jerrold (Tom), Works by: The Garden that Paid the Rent. By TOM JERROLD. Fcap. 8vo, illus trated cover, Is. ; cloth limp, Is. 6d. Household Horticulture: A Gossip about Flowers. By TOM and JANB JERROLD. Illustrated. Post 8vo, Is. ; cloth, is. 6d. Our Kitchen Garden: The Plants we Grow, and How we Cook Them. By TOM JERROLD. Post 8vo, Is. ; cloth^limp, IsJJd. . Jesse. Scenes and Occupa tions of a Country Life. By EDWARD JESSE. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. Jones (Wm., F.S.A.), Works by: Finger-Ring Lore: Historical, Le gendary, and Anecdotal. With over 200 Illusts. Cr. 8vo, cl. extra, 7s. 6d. Credulities, Past and Present; in cluding the Sea and Seamen, Miners, Talismans, Word and Letter Divina tion, Exorcising and Blessing of Animals, Birds, Eggs, Luck, &c. With an Etched Frontispiece. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Crowns and Coronations : A History of Regalia in all Times and Coun tries. With One Hundred Illus trations. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, la. 6d. Jonson's (Ben) Works. With Notes Critical and Explanatory, and a Biographical Memoir by WILLIAM GIFFORD. Edited by Colonel CUN NINGHAM. Three Vols., crown 8vo, cloth extra, 18s. ; or separately, 6s. each. Josephus,TheCompleteWorks of. Translated by WHISTON. Con taining both " The Antiquities of the Jews " and " The Wars of the Jews." Two Vols., 8vo, with 52 Illustrations and Maps, cloth extra, gilt, 14s. BOOKS PUBLISHED BY Kavanagh. The Pearl Foun tain, and other Fairy Stories. By BRIDGET and JULIA KAVANAGH. With /Thirty Illustrations by J. MOYR SMITH. Small 8vo, cloth gilt, 6s. Kempt. Pencil and Palette: Chapters on Art and Artists. By ROBERT KEMPT. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Kingsley (Henry), Novels by: Each crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; or post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Oakshott Castle. | Number Seventeen Knight. The Patient's Vade Mecum : How to get most Benefit from Medical Advice. By WILLIAM KNIGHT, M.R.C.S., and EDWARD KNIGHT, L.R.C.P. Crown 8vo, Is. ; cloth, Is. 6d. Lamb (Charles): Mary and Charles Lamb : Their Poems, Letters, and Remains. With Reminiscences and Notes by W. CAREW HAZLITT. With HANCOCK'S Portrait of the Essayist, Facsimiles of the Title-pages of the rare First Editions of Lamb's and Coleridge's Works, and numerous Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 10s. 6d. Lamb's Complete Works, in Prose and Verse, reprinted from the Ori ginal Editions, with many Pieces hitherto unpublished. Edited, with Notes and Introduction, by R. H. SHEPHERD. With Two Portraits and Facsimile of Page of the " Essay on Roast Pig." Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. The Essays of Elia. Complete Edi tion. Post 8vo, cloth extra, 2s. Poetry for Children, and Prince Dorus. By CHARLES LAMB. Care fully reprinted from unique copies. Small Svo, cloth extra, 5s. Little Essays : Sketches and Charac ters. By CHARLES LAMB. Selected from his Letters by PERCY FITZ GERALD. Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Lane's Arabian Nights, Sec. : The Thousand and One Nights: commonly called, in England, " THE ARABIAN NIGHTS' ENTERTAIN MENTS." A New Translation from the Arabic, with copious Notes, by EDWARD WILLIAM LANE. Illustrated by many hundred Engravings on Wood, from Original Designs by WM. HARVEY. A New Edition, from a Copy annotated by the Translator, edited by his Nephew, P^UWARD STANLEY POOLE. With a Preface by STANLEY LANE-POOLE. Three Vols., demy 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6cl. each. LANE'S ARABIAN NIGHTS, continued Arabian Society in the Middle Ages: Studies from "The Thousand and One Nights." By EDWARD WILLIAM LANE, Author of "The Modern Egyptians," &c. Edited by STANLEY LANE-POOLE. Cr. Svo, cloth extra, 6s. Lares and Penates ; or, The Background of Life. By FLORENCE CADDY. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 6s. Larwood (Jacob), Works by: The Story of the London Parks. With Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Clerical Anecdotes. Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Forensic Anecdotes Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Theatrical Anecdotes. Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Leigh (Henry S.), Works by: Carols of Cockayne. With numerous Illustrations. Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Jeux d'Esprit. Collected and Edited by HENRY S.LEIGH. Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Life in London ; or, The History of Jerry Hawthorn and Corinthian Tom. With the whole of CRUIK- SHANK'S Illustrations, in Colours, after the Originals. Crown 8vo. cloth extra. 7s. 6d. Linton (E. Lynn), Works by : Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. each. Witch Stories. The True Story of Joshua Davidson. Ourselves: Essays on Women. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each ; post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Patricia Kemball. The Atonement of Learn Dundas. The World Well Lost. Under which Lord ? With a Silken Thread. The Rebel of the Family. " My Love ! " lone. Locks and Keys. On the De velopment and Distribution of Primi tive Locks and Keys. By Lieut.-Gen. PITT-RIVERS, F.R.S. With numerous Illustrations. Demy 4to, half Rox- burghe, 16s. CHATTO S- W1NDUS, PICCADILLY. Longfellow: Longfellow's Complete Prose Works. Including " Outre Mer," " Hyper ion," "Kavanagh," "The Poets and Poetry of Europe, "and " Driftwood. '' With Portrait and Illustrations by VALENTINE BROMLEY. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Longfellow's Poetical Works. Care fully Reprinted from the Original Editions. With numerous fine Illus trations on Steel and Wood. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Long Life, Aids to: A Medical, Dietetic, and General Guide in Health and Disease. By N. E. DAVIES, L.R.C.P. Crown 8vo, 2s ; cloth Hmp, 2s. 6d. Lucy. Gideon Fleyce: A Novel. By HENRY W. LUCY. Crown 8vo, cl. extra, 3s. 6d.; post 8vo, ill ast. bds. ,2s. Lusiad (The) of Camoens. Translated into English Spenserian Verse by ROBERT FFRENCH DUFF. Demy 8vo, with Fourteen full-page Plates, cloth boards, 18s. McCarthy^) ustin, M.P.),Works by: A History of Our Own Times, from the Accession of Queen Victoria to the General Election of 1880. Four Vols. demy 8vo, cloth extra, 12s. each. Also a POPULAR EDITION, in Four Vols. cr. 8vo, cl. extra, 6s. each. A Short History of Our Own Times. One Vol., crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. History of the Four Georges. Four Vols. demy 8vo, cloth extra, 12s. each. [Vol. I. now ready. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Dear Lady Disdain. The Waterdale Neighbours. My Enemy's Daughter. A Fair Saxon. Linley Rochford Miss Misanthrope. Donna Quixote. The Comet of a Season. Maid of Athens. McCarthy (Justin H., M.P.), Works by: , An Outline of the History of Ireland, from the Earliest Times to the Pre sent Day. Cr. 8vo, Is. ; cloth, Is. 6d. England under Gladstone. SECOND EDITION, revised and brought down to date. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. MacDonald (George, LL.D.), Works by : The Princess and Curdie. With n Illustrations by JAMES ALLEN. Small crown 8vo, cloth extra, 5s. Gutta-Percha Willie, the Working Genius. With 9 Illustrations by ARTHUR HUGHES. Square 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Paul Faber, Surgeon. With a Fron tispiece by J. E. MILLAIS. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d.; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Thomas Wingfold, Curate. With a Frontispiece by C. J. STANILAND. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Macdonell. Quaker Cousins: A Novel. By AGNES MACDONELL. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Macgregor. Pastimes and Players. Notes on Popular Games. By ROBERT MACGREGOR. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Maclise Portrait-Gallery (The) of Illustrious Literary Characters; with Memoirs Biographical, Critical, Bibliographical, and Anecdotal illus trative of the Literature of the former half of the Present Century. By WILLIAM BATES, B.A. With 85 Por traits printed on an India Tint. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Macquoid (Mrs.), Works by: In the Ardennes. With 50 fine Illus trations by THOMAS R. MACQUOID. Square 8vo, cloth extra, 10s. 6d. Pictures and Legends from Nor mandy and Brittany. With numer ous Illustrations by THOMAS R. MACQUOID. Square 8vo, cloth gilt, 10s. 6d. Through Normandy. With go Illus trations by T. R. MACQUOID. Square 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Through Brittany. With numerous Illustrations by T. R. MACQUOID. Square 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. About Yorkshire. With 67 Illustra tions by T. R. MACQUOID, Engraved by SWAIN. Square Svo, cloth extra, 10s. 6d. The Evil Eye, and other Stories. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. Lost Rose, and other Stories. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. 16 BOOKS PUBLISHED BY Mackay. Interludes and Un dertones: or, Music at Twilight. By CHARLES MACKAY, LL.D. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Magic Lantern (The), and its Management: including Full Prac tical Directions for producing the Limelight, making Oxygen Gas, and preparing Lantern Slides. By T. C. HEPWORTH. With 10 Illustrations. Crown 8vo, Is. ; cloth, Is. 6d. Magician's Own Book (The) : Performances with Cups and Balls, Eggs, Hats, Handkerchiefs, &c. All from actual Experience. Edited by W. H. CREMER. With 200 Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 4s. 6d. Magic No Mystery: Tricks with Cards, Dice, Balls, &c., with fully descriptive Directions; the Art of Secret Writing ; Training of Perform ing Animals, &c. With Coloured Frontispiece and many Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 4s. 6d. Magna Charta. An exact Fac simile of the Original in the British Museum, printed on fine plate paper, 3 feet by 2 feet, with Arms and Seals emblazoned in Gold and Colours. Price 5s. Mallock (W. H.), Works by : The New Republic; or, Culture, Faith and Philosophy in an English Country House. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. ; Cheap Edition, illustrated boards, 2s. The New Paul and Virginia ; or, Posi tivism on an Island. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Poems. Small 4to, bound in parch ment, 8s. Is Life worth Living? Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Mallory's (Sir Thomas) Mort d'Arthur : The Stories of King Arthur and of the Knights of the Round Table. Edited by B. MONTGOMERIE RANKING. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. Marlowe's Works. Including his Translations. Edited, with Notes and Introduction, by Col. CUNNING HAM. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Marryat (Florence), Novels by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each ; or, post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Open! Sesame! Written in Fire. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s, each. A Harvest of Wild Oats. A Little Stepson. Fighting the Air. Masterman. Half a Dozen Daughters: A Novel. By J. MASTER- MAN. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Mark Twain, Works by: The Choice Works of Mark Twain. Revised and Corrected throughout by the Author. With Life, Portrait, and numerous Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. With in Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. *** Also a Cheap Edition, post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. An Idle Excursion. and other Sketches. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. The Prince and the Pauper. With nearly 200 Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. The Innocents Abroad ; or, The New Pilgrim's Progress : Being some Ac count of the Steamship " Quaker City's " Pleasure Excursion to Europe and the Holy Land. With 234 Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. CHEAP EDITION (under the title of " MARK TWAIN'S PLEASURE TRIP "), post 8vo, illust. boards, 2s. Roughing It, and The Innocents at Home. With 200 Illustrations by F. A. FRASER. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. The Gilded Age. By MARK TWAIN and CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER. With 212 Illustrations by T. COFFIN. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. A Tramp Abroad. With 314 Illustra tions. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. ; Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. The Stolen White Elephant, &c. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Life on the Mississippi. With about 300 Original Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. With 174 Illustrations by E. W. KEMBLE. Crown 8vo, cloth ____ M ass i nger's~Plays. From the Text of WILLIAM GIFFORD. Edited by Col. CUNNINGHAM. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. M ay hew. London Characters and the Humorous Side of London Life. By HENRY MAYHEW. With numerous Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Mayfair Library, The: Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. per Volume. A Journey Round My Room. By XAVIER DE MAISTRE. Translated by HENRY ATTWELL. Latter-Day Lyrics. Edited by W DAVENPORT ADAMS. CHATTO & W INDUS, PICCADILLY. MAYFAIR LIBRARY, continued Quips and Quiddities. Selected by W. DAVENPORT ADAMS. The Agony Column of "The Times," from 1800 to 1870. Edited, with an Introduction, by ALICE CLAY. Balzac's "Comedie Humaine" and its Author. With Translations by H. H. WALKER. Melancholy Anatomised: A Popular Abridgment of "Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy." Gastronomy as a Fine Art. By BRILLAT-SAVARIN . The Speeches of Charles Dickens. Literary Frivolities, Fancies, Follies, and Frolics. By W. T. DOBSON. Poetical Ingenuities and Eccentrici ties. Selected and Edited by W. T. DOBSON. The Cupboard Papers. By FIN-BEC. Original Plays by W. S. GILBERT. FIRST SERIES. Containing: The Wicked World Pygmalion and Galatea Charity The Princess The Palace of Truth Trial by Jury. Original Plays by W. S. GILBERT. SECOND SERIES. Containing : Broken Hearts Engaged Sweethearts Gretchen Dan'l Druce Tom Cobb H.M.S. Pinafore The Sorcerer The Pirates of Penzance. Songs of Irish Wit and Humour. Collected and Edited by A. PERCEVAL GRAVES. Animals and their Masters. By Sir ARTHUR HELPS. Social Pressure. By Sir A. HELPS. Curiosities of Criticism. By HENRY J. JENNINGS. The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table. By OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. Il lustrated by J. GORDON THOMSON. Pencil and Palette. By ROBERT KEMPT. Little Essays : Sketches and Charac ters. By CHAS. LAMB. Selected from his Letters by PERCY FITZGERALD. Clerical Anecdotes. By JACOB LAR- WOOD. Forensic Anecdotes; or, Humour and Curiosities of the Law and Men of Law. By JACOB LARWOOD. Theatrical Anecdotes. By JACOB LARWOOD. Carols of Cockayne. By HENRY S. LEIGH. Jeux d'Esprit. Edited by HENRY S. LEIGH. True History of Joshua Davidson. By E. LYNN LINTON. Witch Stories. By E. LYNN LINTON. Ourselves: Essays on Women. By E. LYNN LINTON. Pastimes and Players. By ROBERT MACGREGOR. MAYFAIR LIBRARY, continued The New Paul and Virginia. By W. H. MALLOCK. The New Republic. By MALLOCK. Puck on Pegasus. By H.CHOLMONDE- LEY-PENNELL. Pegasus Re-Saddled. By H. CHOL- MONDELEY-PENNELL. Illustrated by GEORGE Du MAURIER. Muses of Mayfair. Edited by H. CHOLMONDELEY-PENNELL. Thoreau : His Life and Aims. By H. A. PAGE. Puniana. By the Hon. HUGH RQWLEY. More Puniana. By the Hon. HUGH ROWLEY. The Philosophy of Handwriting. By DON FELIX DE SALAMANCA. By Stream and Sea. By WILLIAM SENIOR. [THORNBURY. Old Stories Re-told. By WALTER Leaves from a Naturalist's Note- Book. By Dr. ANDREW WILSON. Medicine, Family. One Thou sand Medical Maxims and Surgical Hints, for Infancy, Adult Life, Middle Age, and Old Age. By N. E. DAVIES, L.R.C.P. Lond. Cr. 8vo, Is. ; cl., Is. 6d. Merry Circle (The) : A Book of New Intellectual Games and Amuse ments. By CLARA BELLEW. With numerous Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 4s. 6d. Mexican Mustang (On a). Through Texas, from the Gulf to the Rio Grande. A New Book of Ameri can Humour. By ALEX. E. SWEET and J. ARMOY KNOX, Editors of " Texas Siftings." 265 Illusts. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Middlemass (Jean), Novels by: Touch and Go. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s.6d.; post 8vo, illust. bds., 2s. Mr.Dorllllon. Post 8vo, illust. bds., 2s. Miller. Physiology for the Young; or, The House of Life: Hu man Physiology, with its application to the Preservation of Health. For Classes and Popular Reading. With numerous Illusts. By Mrs. F. FENWICK _ MiLLER._SjnaU8vo,j2lothJimp^2s. 6d. Milton (J. L.), Works by. The Hygiene of the Skin. A Concis : Set of Rules for the Management o the Skin ; with Directions for Diet, Wines. Soaps, Baths, &c. Small 8vo, Is, ; cloth extra, Is. 6d. The Bath in Diseases of the Skin. Small 8vo, Is. ; cloth extra, Is. 6d. The Laws of Life, and their Relation to Diseases of the Skin. Small 8vo, Is, ; cloth extra, Is. Gd. 18 BOOKS PUBLISHED BY Moncrieff. The Abdication ; or, Time Tries All. An Historical Drama. By W. D. SCOTT-MONCRIEFF. With Seven Etchings by JOHN PETTIE, R.A., W. Q. ORCHARDSON, R.A., J. MACWHIRTER, A.R.A., COLIN HUNTER, R. MACBETH, and TOM GRAHAM. Large 4to, bound in buckram, 21s. Murray (D. Christie), Novels by. Crown Svo.cloth extra, 8s.6d. each ; post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. A Life's Atonement. A Model Father. Joseph's Coat. Coals of Fire. By the Gate of the Sea. Val Strange. Hearts. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. The Way of the World. A Bit of Human Nature. North Italian Folk. By Mrs. COMYNS CARR. Illust. by RANDOLPH CALDECOTT. Square Svo, cloth sxtra, 7s. 6d. Number Nip (Stories about), the Spirit of the Giant Mountains. Retold for Children by WALTER GRAHAME. With Illustrations by J. MOYR SMITH. Post Svo, cloth extra, 6s. Nursery Hints: A Mother's Guide in Health and Disease. By N. E. DAVIES, L.R.C.P. Crown Svo, Is. ; cloth, Is. 6d. Oliphant. Whiteladies : A Novel. With Illustrations by ARTHUR HOPKINS and HENRY WOODS. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. O'Connor. Lord Beaconsfleld A Biography. By T. P. O'CONNOR, M. P. Sixth Edition, with a New Preface, bringing the work down to the Death of Lord Beaconsfield. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 7s.J3d. O'Reilly. Phoebe's Fortunes : A Novel. With Illustrations by HENRY TUCK. Post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. O'Shaughnessy (Arth.), Works by: Songs of a Worker. Fcap. Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Music and Moonlight. Fcap. Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d Lays of France. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 10s. 6d. Ouida, Novels by. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 6s. each ; post Svo, illus trated boards, 2s. each. Held in Bondage. Strath more. Chandos. Under Two Flags. Cecil Castle- maine's Gage. Idalia. Tricotrln. Puck. Foile Farlne. TwoLlttleWooden Shoes. A Dog of Flanders. Pascarel. Signa. In a Winter City Ariadne. Friendship. Moths. Pipistrello. A Village Com mune Blmbl In Maremma Wanda. Frescoes. Bimbi : PRESENTATION EDITION. Sq. Svo, cloth gilt, cinnamon edges, 7s. 6d. Princess Napraxine. New and Cheaper Edition. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 5s. Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos. Selected from the Works of OUIDA by F. SYDNEY MORRIS. Small crown Svo, cloth extra, 6s. Page (H. A.), Works by : Thoreau : His Life and Aims : A Study. With a Portrait. Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Lights on the Way : Some Tales with in a Tale. By the late J. H. ALEX ANDER, B.A. Edited by H. A. PAGE Crown Svo, cloth extra, 6s. Pascal's Provincial Letters. A New Translation, with Historical In troduction and Notes, by T. M'CRiE, D.D. Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. Patient's (The) Vade Mecum: How to get most Benefit from Medi cal Advice. By WILLIAM KNIGHT, M.R.C.S., and EDWARD KNIGHT, L.R.C.P. Crown Svo, Is.; cloth, Is. 6d. Paul Ferroll : Post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Paul Ferroll : A Novel. Why Paul Ferroll Killed his Wife. Paul. Gentle and Simple. By MARGARET AGNES PAUL. With a Frontispiece by HELEN PATERSON. Cr. Svo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post Svo. illustrated boards, 2s. CHATTO 6- WINDUS, PICCADILLY. 19 Payn (James), Novels by. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Lost Sir Massingberd. The Best of Husbands. Walter's Word. Halves. | Fallen Fortunes. What He Cost Her. Less Black than we're Painted. By Proxy. i High Spirits. Under One Roof. | Carlyon's Year. A Confidential Agent. Some Private Views. A Grape from a Thorn. For Cash Only. | From Exile. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. A Perfect Treasure. Bentinck's Tutor. Murphy's Master. A County Family. At Her Mercy. A Woman's Vengeance Cecil's Tryst. The Clyffards of Clyffe. The Family Scapegrace The Foster Brothers. Found Dead. Gwendoline's Harvest. Humorous Stories. Like Father, Like Son. A Marine Residence. Married Beneath Him. Mirk Abbey. Not Wooed, but Won. Two Hundred Pounds Reward. Kit: A Memory. The Canon's Ward. In Peril and Privation: Stories of Marine Adventure Re-told. A Book for Boys. With numerous Illustra tions. Crown 8vo, 6s. [Sept. Pennell (H. Cholmondeley), Works by: Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. each. Puck on Pegasus. With Illustrations. The Muses of Mayfair. Vers de Sooiete, Selected and Edited by H. C. PENNELL. Pegasus Re-Saddled. With Ten full- page Illusts. by G. Du MAURIER. Phelps. Beyond the By ELIZABETH STUART PHELPS. Author of "The Gates Ajar." Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 2s. Gd. Pirkis (Mrs. C. L.) Novels by: Trooping with Crows. Fcap. 8vo, picture cover, Is. Lady Lovelace. Three Vols., cr. 8vo, Planche (J. R.), Works by: The Cyclopaedia of Costume; or, A Dictionary of Dress Regal, Ec clesiastical, Civil, and Military from the Earliest Period in England to the Reign of George the Third. Includ ing Notices of Contemporaneous Fashions on the Continent, and a General History of the Costumes of the Principal Countries of Europe. Two Vols., demy 410, half morocco profusely Illustrated with Coloured and Plain Plates and Woodcuts, 7 7s. The Vols. may also be had separately (each complete in itself) at 3 13s. 6d. each : Vol. I. THE DICTIONARY. Vol. II. A GENERAL HISTORY OF COSTUME IN EUROPE. The Pursuivant of Arms ; or, Her aldry Founded upon Facts. With Coloured Frontispiece and 200 Illus trations. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Songs and Poems, from 1819 to 1879. Edited, with an Introduction, by his Daughter, Mrs. MACKARNESS. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Play-time: Sayings and Doings of Baby-land. By E.STANFORD. Large 4to, handsomely printed in Colours, 5s. Plutarch's Lives of Illustrious Men. Translated from the Greek, with Notes Critical and Historical, and a Life of Plutarch, by JOHN and WILLIAM LANGHORNE. Two Vols., 8vo, cloth extra, with Portraits, 10s. 6d. Poe (Edgar Allan): The Choice Works, in Prose and Poetry, of EDGAR ALLAN POE. With an Introductory Essay by CHARLES BAUDELAIRE, Portrait and Fac similes. Crown 8vo, cl. extra, 7s. 6d. The Mystery of Marie Roget. and other Stories. Post 8vo, illust.bds.,2s. Pope's Poetical Works. Com- pLete in One Vol. Post 8vo, cl. limp, 2s. Price (E. C.), Novels by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Valentina. | The Foreigners. Mrs. Lancaster's Rival. Gerald. Three Vols., cr. 8vo, 315. 6c/. 20 BOOKS PUBLISHED BY Proctor (Richd. A.), Works by : Flowers of the Sky. With 55 Illusts. Small crown 8vo, cloth extra, 4s. 6d. Easy Star 1 Lessons. With Star Maps for Every Night in the Year, Draw ings of the Constellations, &c. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Familiar Science Studies. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Rough Ways made Smooth : A Series of Familiar Essays on Scien tific Subjects. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra,6s. Our Place among Infinities : A Series of Essays contrasting our Little Abode in Space and Time with the Infinities Around us. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. The Expanse of Heaven : A Series of Essays en the Wonders of the Firmament. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Saturn and its System. New and Revised Edition.with 13 Steel Plates. Demy 8vo, cloth extra, 10s. 6d. The Great Pyramid : Observatory, Tomb, and Temple. With Illus trations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Mysteries of Time and Space. With Illusts. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. The Universe of Suns, and other Science Gleanings. With numerous Illusts. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Wages and Wants of Science Workers. Crown 8vo, Is. 6d. Pyrotechnist'sTreasury(The); or, Complete Art of Making Fireworks. By THOMAS KENTISH. With numerous Illustrations. Cr. 8vo, cl. extra, 4s. 6d. Rabelais' Works. Faithfully Translated from the French, with variorum Notes, and numerous charac teristic Illustrations by GUSTAVE DORE. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Rambosson. Popular Astro nomy. By J. RAMBOSSON, Laureate of the Institute of France. Trans lated by C. B. PITMAN. Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, with numerous Illustrations, and a beautifully executed Chart of Spectra, 7s. 6d. Reader's Handbook (The) of Allusions, References, Plots, and Stories. By the Rev. Dr. BREWER. Fourth Edition, revised throughout, with a New Appendix, containing a COMPLETE ENGLISH BIBLIOGRAPHY. Cr. 8vo, 1,400 P a ,g es ; ^^h^^t^i^-Mi Richardson. A Ministry of Health, and other Papers. By BEN JAMIN WARD RICHARDSON, M.D., &c. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Reade (Charles, D.C.L), Novels by. Post 8vo, illust., bds., 2s. each ; or cr. 8vo, cl. ex., illust. .3s. 6d. each. Peg Wofflngton. Illustrated by S. L. FILDES, A.R.A. Christie Johnstone. Illustrated by WILLIAM SMALL. It is Never Too Late to Mend. Il lustrated by G. J. PINWELL. The Course of True Love Never did run Smooth. Illustrated by HELEN PATERSON. The Autobiography of a Thief; Jack of all Trades; and James Lambert. Illustrated by MATT STRETCH. Love me Little, Love me Long. Il lustrated by M. ELLEN EDWARDS. The Double Marriage. Illust. by Sir JOHN GILBERT, R.A., and C. KEENE. The Cloister and the Hearth. Il lustrated by CHARLES KEENE. Hard Cash. Illust. by F. W. LAWSON. Griffith Gaunt. Illustrated by S. L. FILDES, A.R.A., and WM. SMALL. Foul Play. Illust. by Du MAURIER. Put Yourself in His Place. Illus trated by ROBERT BARNES. A Terrible Temptation. Illustrated byEow. HUGHES and A. W. COOPER. The Wandering Heir. Illustrated by H. PATERSON, S. L. FILDES, A.R.A. , C. GREEN, and H. WOODS, A.R.A. A Simpleton. Illustrated by KATE CRAUFORD. A Woman-Hater. Illustrated by THOS, COULDERY. Readiana. With a Steel-plate Portrait of CHARLES READE. Singleheart and Doubleface: A Matter-of-fact Romance. Illustrated by P. MACNAB. Good Stories of Men and other Animals. Illustrated by E. A. ABBEY, PERCY MACQUOID, and JOSEPH NASH. The Jilt, and other Stories. Illustrated by JOSEPH NASH. Riddell (Mrs. J. H.), Novels by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. eacli ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Her Mother's Darling. The Prince of Wales's Garden Party. Weird Stories. The Uninhabited House. Fairy Water. Rimmer (Alfred), Works by : Our Old Country Towns. With over 50 Illusts. Sq. 8vo, cloth gilt, 10s. Gd. Rambles Round Eton and Harrow. 50 Illusts. Sq. 8vo T cloth gilt, 10s. 6d. About England with Dickens. With 58Illusts.byALFREDRiMMERandC. A. VANDERHOOF. Sq. 8vo, cl.gilt, 10s,6d CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY. Robinson (F. W.), Novels by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Women are Strange. The Hands of Justice. Robinson (Phi!), Works by: The Poets' Birds. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. The Poets' Beasts. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. [In the press. Robinson Crusoe: A beautiful reproduction of Major's Edition, with 37 Woodcuts and Two Steel Plates by GEORGE CRUIKSHANK, choicely printed. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. A few Large- Paper copies, printed on hand made paper, with India proofs of the Illustrations, price 36s. Rochefoucauld's Maxims and Moral Reflections. With Notes, and an Introductory Essay by SAINTE- BEUVE. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. Roll of Battle Abbey, The ; or, A List of the Principal Warriors who came over from Normandy with Wil liam the Conqueror, and Settled in th\s Country, A.D. 1066-7. With the principal Arms emblazoned in Gold and Colours. Handsomely printed, 58. Rowley (Hon. Hugh), Works by: Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. each. Puniana: Riddles and Jokes. With numerous Illustrations. More Puniana. Profusely Illustrated. RusseTT(W7ciark), Works by : Round the Galley-Fire. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. On the Fo'k'sle Head : A Collection of Yarns and Sea Descriptions. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 68. Sala. Gaslight and Daylight. By GEORGE AUGUSTUS SALA. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Sanson. Seven Generations of Executioners: Memoirs of the Sanson Family (1688 to 1847). Edited byHENRvSANsoN. Cr.8vo,cl.ex.3s.6d. Saunders (John), Novels by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Bound to the Wheel. One Against the World. Guy Waterman. The Lion in the Path. The Two Dreamers Saunders (Katharine), Novels by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Joan Merryweather. Margaret and Elizabeth. The High Mills. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. Heart Salvage. | Sebastian. Gideon's Rock. Science Gossip: An Illustrated Medium of Interchange for Students and Lovers of Nature. Edited by J. E. TAYLOR, F.L.S., &c. Devoted to Geo logy, Botany, Physiology, Chemistry, Zoology, Microscopy, Telescopy, Phy siography, &e. Price 4d. Monthly ; or 5s. per year, post free. Each Number contains a Coloured Plate and numer ous Woodcuts. Vols. I . to XIV. may be had at 7s. 6d. each ; and Vols. XV. to XX. (1884), at 5s. each. Cases for Binding, Is. 6d. each. Scott's (Sir Walter) Marmion. An entirely New Edition of this famous and popular Poem, with over 100 new Illustrations by leading Artists. Ele gantly and appropriately bound, small 4to, cloth extra, 16s. [The immediate success of "The Lady of the Lake," published in 1882, has encouraged Messrs. CHATTO and WINDUS to bring out a Companion Edition of this not less popular and famous poem. Produced in the same form, and with the same careful and elaborate style of illustration, regard less of cost, Mr. Anthony's skilful supervision is sufficient guarantee that the work is elegant and tasteful as well as correct.] _ "Secret Out" Series, The: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, profusely Illus trated, 4s. 6d. each. The Secret Out: One Thousand Tricks with Cards, and other Re creations ; with Entertaining Experi ments in Drawing-room or " White Magic." By W. H. CREMER. 300 Engravings. The Pyrotechnist's Treasury; or, Complete Art of Making Fireworks. By THOMAS KENTISH. With numer ous Illustrations. The Art of Amusing : A Collection of Graceful Arts,Games,Tricks,Puzzles, and Charades. By FRANK BELLEW. With 300 Illustrations. Hanky-Panky: Very Easy Tricks, Very Difficult Tricks, White Magic, Sleight of Hand. Edited by W. H. CREMER. With 200 Illustrations. 22 BOOKS PUBLISHED BY SECRET OUT " SERIES, continued The Merry Circle: A Book of New Intellectual Games and Amusements. By CLARA BELLEW. With many Illustrations. Magician's Own Book: Performances with Cups and Balls, Eggs, Hats, Handkerchiefs, &c. All from actual Experience. Edited by W. H. CRE- MER. 200 Illustrations. Magic No Mystery: Tricks with Cards, Dice, Balls, &c., with fully descriptive Directions; the Art of Secret Writing; Training of Per forming Animals, &c. With Co loured Frontis. and many Illusts. Senior (William), Works by : Travel and Trout in the Antipodes. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. By Stream and Sea. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Seven Sagas (The) of Prehis toric Man. By JAMES H. STODDART, Author of " The Village Life." Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Shakespeare : The First Folio Shakespeare. MR. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE'S Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies. Published according to the true Originall Copies. London, Printed by ISAAC IAGGARD and ED. BLOUNT. 1623. A Repro duction of the extremely rare original, in reduced facsimile, by a photogra phic process ensuring the strictest accuracy in every detail. Small 8vo, half-Roxburghe, 73. 6d. The Lansdowne Shakespeare. Beau tifully printed in red and black, in small but very clear type. With engraved facsimile of DROESHOUT'S Portrait. Post 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Shakespeare for Children: Tales from Shakespeare. By CHARLES and MARY LAMB. With numerous Illustrations, coloured and plain, by J. MOYR SMITH. Cr. 4to, cl. gilt, 6s. The Handbook of Shakespeare Music. Being an Account of 350 Pieces of Music, set to Words taken from the Plays and Poems of Shake speare, the compositions ranging from the Elizabethan Age to the Present Time. By ALFRED ROFFE. 4to, half-Roxburghe, 7s. A Study of Shakespeare. By ALGER NON CHARLES SWINBURNE. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 8s. The Dramatic Works of Shake speare : The Text of the First Edition, carefully reprinted. Eight Vols., demy 8vo, cloth boards. 40s. *** Only 250 Sets have been printed, each one numbered. The volumes will not be sold separately. Shelley's Complete Works, in Four Vols., post 8vo, cloth limp, 8s. ; or separately, 2s. each. Vol. I. con tains his Early Poems, Queen Mab, &c., with an Introduction by LEIGH HUNT; Vol. II., his Later Poems, Laon and Cythna, &c. ; Vol. III., Posthumous Poems, the Shelley Papers, &c. ; Vol. IV., his Prose Works, in cluding A Refutation of Deism, Zas- trozzi, St. Irvyne, &c. Sheridan: Sheridan's Complete Works, with Life and Anecdotes. Including his Dramatic Writings, printed from the Original Editions, his Works in Prose and Poetry, Translations, Speeches, Jokes, Puns, &c. With a Collection of Sheridaniana. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, gilt, with 10 full- page Tinted Illustrations, 7s. 6d. Sheridan's Comedies: The Rivals, and The School for Scandal. Edited, with an Introduction and Notes to each Play, and a Bio graphical Sketch of Sheridan, by BRANDER MATTHEWS. With Decora tive Vignettes and 10 full-page Illusts. Demy 8vo, half-parchment, 12s. 6d. Short Sayings of Great Men. With Historical and Explanatory Notes by SAMUEL A. BENT, M.A. D einy 8vo, cloth extra, 7s._6d. Sidney's (Sir Philip) Complete Poetical Works, including all those in " Arcadia." With Portrait, Memorial- Introduction, Notes, &c., by the Rev. A. B. GROSART, D.D. Three Vols., crown JSvo, cloth boards, 18s. Signboards : Their History. With Anecdotes of Famous Taverns and Remarkable Characters. By JACOB LARWOOD and JOHN CAMDEN HOTTEN. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with 100 Illustrations, 7s. 6d. Sims (George R.), Works by : How the Poor Live. With 60 Illusts. by FRED. BARNARD. Large 4to, Is. Rogues and Vagabonds. Post 8vo, illust. boards, 2s. ; cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Skefchfey. A Match~in~the Dark. By ARTHUR SKETCHLEY. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Slang Dictionary, The: Ety mological, Historical, and Anecdotal. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, gilt, 6s. 6d. Smith (J. Moyr), Works by : The Prince of Argolis: A Story of the Old Greek Fairy Time. By J. MOYR SMITH. Small 8vo, cloth extra, with 130 Illustrations, 3s. 6d. CHATTO 6- W INDUS, PICCADILLY SMITH'S (J. MOYR) WORKS, continued Tales of Old Thule. Collected and Illustrated by J. MOYR SMITH. Cr. 8vo, cloth gilt, profusely Illust., 6s. The Wooing of the Water Witch : A Northern Oddity. By EVAN DAL- DORNE. Illustrated by J. MOYR SMITH. Small 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Society in London. By a FOREIGN RESIDENT. Eighth Edition. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Spalding.-Elizabethan Demon- ology : An Essay in Illustration of the Belief in the Existence of Devils, and the Powers possessed by Them. By T. ALFRED SPALDING, LL.B. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 5s. Spanish Legendary Tales. By Mrs. S. G. C. MIDDLEMORE, Author of " Round a Posada Fire." Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Speight. The Mysteries of Heron Dyke. By T. W. SPEIGHT. With a Frontispiece by M. ELLEN EDWARDS. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6(L ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Spenser for Children. By M. H. TOWRY. With Illustrations by WALTER J. MORGAN. Crown 4to, with Coloured Illustrations, cloth gilt, 6s. Staunton. Laws and Practice of Chess; Together with an Analysis of the Openings, and a Treatise on End Games. By HOWARD STAUNTON. Editedby ROBERT B.WORMALD. New Edition, small cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 5s. Sterndale. The Afghan Knife: A Novel. By ROBERT ARMITAGE STERN- DALE. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d.; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Stevenson (R.Louis), Works by : Travels with a Dpnkey in the Cevennes. Frontispiece by WALTER CRANE. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. An Inland Voyage. With Front, by W. CRANE. Post 8vo, cl. lp., 2s. 6d. Virginibus Puerisque, and other Papers. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Familiar Studies of Men and Books. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. New Arabian Nights. Crown Svo, cl. extra, 6s. ; post Svo, illust. bds., 2s. The Silverado Squatters. With Frontispiece. Cr. 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Prince Otto: A Romance. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 6s. [In preparation. St. John. A Levantine Family. By BAYLE ST. JOHN. Post 8vo, illus trated boards, 2s. Stoddard. Summer Cruising In the South Seas. By CHARLES WARREN STODDARD. Illust. by WALLIS MACKAY. Crown 8vo, cl. extra, 3s. 6d. St. Pierre. Paul and Virginia, and The Indian Cottage. By BER- NARDIN ST. PIERRE. Edited, with Life, by Rev. E. CLARKE. Post Svo, cl. lp., 2s. Stories from Foreign Novel ists. With Notices of their Lives and Writings. By HELEN and ALICE ZIM- MERN ; and a Frontispiece. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Strutt's Sports and Pastimes of the People of England; including the Rural and Domestic Recreations, May Games, Mummeries, Shows, Pro cessions, Pageants, and Pompous Spectacles, from the Earliest Period to the Present Time. With 140 Illus trations. Edited by WILLIAM HONE. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Suburban Homes (The) of London: A Residential Guide to Favourite London Localities, their Society, Celebrities, and Associations. With Notes on their Rental, Rates, and House Accommodation. With Map of Suburban London. Cr.8vo,cl.ex.,7s.6d. Swift's Choice Works, in Prose and Verse. With Memoir, Portrait, and Facsimiles of the Maps in the Original Edition of " Gulliver's Travels." Cr. Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Swinburne (Algernon C.) f Works by: The Queen Mother and Rosamond. Fcap. Svo, 5s. AtalantainCalydon. Crown Svo, 6s. Chastelard. A Tragedy. Cr. Svo, 7s. Poems and Ballads. FIRST SERIES. Fcap. Svo, 9s. Cr. Svo, same price. Poems and Ballads. SECOND SERIES. Fcap. Svo, 9s. Cr. Svo, same price. Noteson Poems and Reviews. 8vo,ls. William Blake: A Critical Essay. With Facsimile Paintings. Demy 8vo, 16s. Songs before Sunrise. Cr. 8vo, 10s.6d. Bothwell: A Tragedy. Cr.Svo,12s.6d. George Chapman : An Essay. Crown Svo, 7s. Songs of Two Nations. Cr. Svo, 6s. Essays and Studies. Crown Svo, 12s. Erechtheus: A Tragedy. Cr. Svo, 6s. Note of an English Republican on the Muscovite Crusade. Svo, Is. A Note on Charlotte Bronte. Crown 8vo, 6s. A Study of Shakespeare. Cr. Svo, 8s. Songs of the Springtides. Cr.8vo,6s. Studies in Song. Crown 8vo, 7s. BOOKS PUBLISHED BY SWINBURNE (ALGERNON C.) WORKS, con. Mary Stuart : A Tragedy. Cr. 8vo, 8s. Tristram of Lyonesse, and other Poems. Crown 8vo, 8s. A Century of Roundels. Small 4to, cloth extra, 8s. A Midsummer Holiday, and other Poems. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. Marino Faliero: A Tragedy. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Symonds. Wine, Women and Song: Mediasval Latin Students' Songs. Now first translated into Eng lish Verse, with Essay by J. ADDINGTON SYMONDS. Small 8vo, parchment, 6s. Syntax's (Dr.) Three Tours: In Search of the Picturesque, in Search of Consolation, and in Search of a Wife. With the whole of ROWLAND- SON'S droll page Illustrations in Colours and a Life of the Author by J. C. HOTTEN. Med. 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Taine's History of English Literature. Translated by HENRY VAN LAUN. Four Vols., small 8vo, cloth boards, 30s. POPULAR EDITION, Two Vols., crown Svo, cloth extra, 15s. Taylor (Dr. J. E., F.L.S.), Works by: The Sagacity and Morality of Plants: A Sketch of the Life and Conduct of the Vegetable Kingdom. With Coloured Frontispiece and 100 Illusts. Crown Svo, cl. extra, 7s. 6d. Our Common British Fossils, and Where to Find Them. With nu merous Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Taylor's (Bayard) Diversions of the Echo Club: Burlesques of Modern Writers. Post Svo, cl. limp, 2s. Taylor's (Tom) Historical Dramas: "Clancarty," "Jeanne Dare," " 'Twixt Axe and Crown/' " The Fool's Revenge," " Arkwright's Wife," "Anne Boleyn, 1 ' " Plot and Passion. 1 ' One Vol., cr. Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. *** The Plays may also be had sepa rately, at Is. each. Tennyson (Lord): A Biogra phical Sketch. By H. J. JENNINGS. With a Photograph-Portrait. Crown Svo, cloth extra. 6s. Thackerayana: Notes and Anec dotes. Illustrated by Hundreds of Sketches by WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY, depicting Humorous Incidents' in his School-life, and Favourite Characters in the books of his everyday reading. With Coloured Frontispiece. Cr. Svo, cl. extra, 7s. 6d. Thomas (Bertha), Novels by. Crown Syo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Cressida. Proud Maisie The Violin-Player. Thomas (M.). A Fight for Life: A Novel. By W. MOY THOMAS. Post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. Thomson's Seasons and Castle of Indolence. With a Biographical and Critical Introduction by ALLAN CUNNINGHAM, and over 50 fine Illustra tions on Steel and Wood. Crown Svo, cloth extra, gilt edges, 7s. 6d. Thornbury (Walter), Works by Haunted London. Edited by ED WARD WALFORD, M.A. With Illus trations by F. W. FAIRHOLT, F.S.A. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. The Life and Correspondence of J. M. W. Turner. Founded upon Letters and Papers furnished by his Friends and fellow Academicians. With numerous Illusts. in Colours, facsimiled from Turner's Original Drawings. Cr. Svo, cl. extra, 7s. 6d. Old Stories Re-told. Post Svo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Tales for the Marines. Post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. Timbs (John), Works by: The History of Clubs and Club Life in London. With Anecdotes of its Famous Coffee-houses, Hostelries, and Taverns. With numerous Illus trations. Cr. Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. English Eccentrics and Eccen tricities: Stories of Wealth and Fashion, Delusions, Impostures, and Fanatic Missions, Strange Sights and Sporting Scenes, Eccentric Artists, Theatrical Folks, Men of Letters, &c. With nearly 50 Illusts. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Torrens. The Marquess Wellesley, Architect of Empire. An Historic Portrait. By W. M. TOR- RENS, M.P. Demy Svo.'cloth extra, 14s. Trollope (Anthony), Novels by: Crown 8yo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. each The Way We Live Now. The American Senator. Kept in the Dark. Frau Frohmann. | Marion Fay. Mr. Scarborough's Family. The Land-Leaguers. Post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. each, The Golden Lion of Granpere. John Caldigate. CHATTO & W INDUS, PICCADILLY. 25 Tro!lope(FrancesE.),Novelsby Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. Like Ships upon the Sea. Mabel's Progress. Anne Furness. Trollope(T A.). Diamond Cut Diamond, and other Stories. By T. ADOLPHUS TROLLOPE. Cr. 8vo, cl. ex.. 3s. 6d.; post 8vo, illust. boards. 2s. Trowbridge. Farnell's Folly: A Novel. By J. T. TROWBRIDGE. Two Vols., crown 8vo, 12s. Turgenief? (Ivan), Sec. Stories from Foreign Novelists. Post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. Tytler (Sarah), Novels by: Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each ; post Svo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. What She Came Through. The Bride's Pass. Saint Mungo's City. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. Beauty and the Beast. Three Vols., crown Svo, 31s. 6d. Tytler (C. C. Fraser-). Mis tress Judith: A Novel. By C. C. FRASER-TYTLER. Cr. Svo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. ; post Svo, illust. boards, 2s. Van Laun. History of French Literature. By HENRY VAN LAUN. Complete in Three Vols., demy Svo, cloth boards, 7s. 6d. each. Villari. A Double Bond : A Story. By LINDA VILLARI. Fcap. Svo, picture cover, Is. Wai cott Church Work and Life in English Minsters; and the English Student's Monasticon. By the Rev. MACKENZIE E. C. WALCOTT, B.D. Two Vols., crowu Svo, cloth extra, with Map and Ground-Plans, 14s. Walford (Edw.,M.A.),Worksby": The County Families of the United Kingdom. Containing Notices of the Descent, Birth, Marriage, Educa tion, &c., of more than 12,000 dis tinguished Heads of Families, their Heirs Apparent or Presumptive, the Offices they hold or have held, their Town and Country Addresses, Clubs, &c. Twenty-fifth Annual Edition, for 1885, cloth, full gilt, 60s. The Shilling Peerage (1885). Con taining an Alphabetical List of the House of Lords, Dates of Creation, Lists of Scotch and Irish Peers, Addresses, &c. 32mo, cloth, Is. Published annually. WALFORD'S (Enw., M.A.) WORKS, con. The Shilling Baronetage (1885). Containing an Alphabetical List ot the Baronets of the United Kingdom, short Biographical Notices, Dates of Creation, Addresses, &c. 32010, cloth, Is. Published annually. The Shilling Knightage (1885). Con taining an Alphabetical List of the Knights of the United Kingdom, short Biographical Notices, Dates of Creation, Addresses, &c. 32010. cloth, Is. Published annually. The Shilling House of Commons (1885). Containing a List of all the Members of Parliament, their Town and Country Addresses, &c. 32010, cloth, Is. Published annually. The Complete Peerage, Baronet age, Knightage, and House of Commons (1885). In One Volume, royal 32mo, cloth extra, gilt edges, 5s. Published annually. Haunted London. By WALTER THORNBURY. Edited by EDWARD WALFORD, M.A. With Illustrations by F. W. FAIRHOLT, F.S.A. Crown Svo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. Walton andCotton'sComplete Angler ; or, The Contemplative Man's Recreation; being a Discourse of Rivers, Fishponds, Fish and Fishing, written by IZAAK WALTON ; and In structions how to Angle for a Trout or Grayling in a clear Stream, by CHARLES COTTON. With Original Memoirs and Notes by Sir HARRIS NICOLAS, anc" 61 Copperplate Illustrations. Large crown Svo, cloth antique, 7s. 6d. Wanderer's Library, The: Crown Svo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. Wanderings In Patagonia; or, Life among the Ostrich Hunters. By JULIUS BEERBOHM. Illustrated. Camp Notes: Stories of Sport and Adventure in Asia, Africa, and America. By FREDERICK BOYLE. Savage Life. By FREDERICK BOYLE. Merrie England in the Olden Time, f By GEORGE DANIEL. With Illustra tions by ROBT. CRUIKSHANK. Circus Life and Circus Celebrities. By THOMAS FROST. The Lives of the Conjurers. By THOMAS FROST. The Old Showmen and the Old London Fairs. By THOMAS FROST. Low-Life Deeps. An Account of tke Strange Fish to be found there. By JAMES GREENWOOD. The Wilds of London. By JAMES GREENWOOD. Tunis: The Land and th'3 People. By the Chevalier de HESSE- WAR- TEGG. With 22 Illustrations. 26 BOOKS PUBLISHED BY WANDERER'S LIBRARY, THE, continued The Life and Adventures of a Cheap Jack. By One of the Fraternity. Edited by CHARLES HINDLEY. The World Behind the Scenes. By PERCY FITZGERALD. Tavern Anecdotes and Sayings: Including the Origin of Signs, and Reminiscences connected with Ta verns, Coffee Houses, Clubs, &c. By CHARLES HINDLEY. With Illusts. The Genial Showman: Life and Ad ventures of Artemus Ward. By E. P. KINGSTON. With a Frontispiece. The Story of the London Parks. By JACOB LARWOOD. With Illusts. London Characters. By HENRY MAY- HEW. Illustrated. Seven Generations of Executioners : Memoirs of the Sanson Family (1688 to 1847). Edited by HENRY SANSON. Summer Cruising in the South Seas. By C. WARREN STODDARD. Illustrated by WALLIS MACKAY. Warner. A Roundabout Jour ney. By CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER, Author of " My Summer in a Garden." Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Warrants, &c. : Warrant to Execute Charles I. An exact Facsimile, with the Fifty-nine Signatures, and corresponding Seals. Carefully printed on paper to imitate the Original, 22 in. by 14 in. Price 2s. Warrant to Execute Mary Queen of Scots. An exact Facsimile, includ ing the Signature of Queen Eliza beth, and a Facsimile of the Great Seal. Beautifully printed on paper to imitate the Original MS. Price 2s. Magna Charta. An exact Facsimile of the Original Document in the British Museum, printed on fine plate paper, nearly 3 feet long by 2 feet wide, with the Arms and Seals emblazoned in Gold and Colours. Price 5s. The Roll of Battle Abbey; or, A List of the Principal Warriors who came over from Normandy with William the Conqueror, and Settled in this Country, A.D. 1066-7. With the principal Arms emblazoned in Gold and Colours. Price 5s. Weather, How to Foretell the, with the Pocket Spectroscope. By F. W. CORY, M.R.C.S. Eng., F.R.Met. Soc., &c. With 10 Illustrations. Crown 8vo, Is. ; cloth, Is. 6d. Westropp. Handbook of Pot tery and Porcelain; or, History of those Arts from the Earliest Period. By HODDKR M. WESTROPP. With nu merous Illustrations, and a List of Marks. Crown 8vo cloth limp, 4s. 6d. Whistler v. Ruskin : Art and Art Critics. By J. A. MACNEILL WHISTLER. 7th Edition, sq. 8vo, Is. White's~Natu raTl^isto ry~of Seiborne. Edited, with Additions, by THOMAS BROWN, F.L.S. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. Williams (W. Mattieu, F.R.A.S.), Works by: Science Notes. See the GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE. Is. Monthly. Science In Short Chapters. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. A Simple Treatise on Heat. Crown 8vo, cloth limp, with Illusts., 2s. 6d. The Chemistry of Cookery. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6s. Wilson (Dr. Andrew, F.R.S.E.), Works by: Chapters on Evolution: A Popular History of the Darwinian and Allied Theories of Development. Second Edition. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with 259 Illustrations, 7s. 6d. Leaves from a Naturalist's Note book. Post 8vo, cloth limp, 2s. 6d. Leisure-Time Studies, chiefly Bio logical. Third Edition, with a New Preface. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with Illustrations, 6s. Wi nte r^J. S.), Stories by : Crown 8vp, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Cavalry Life. I Regimental Legends. Women of the Day : A Biogra phical Dictionary of Notable Contem poraries. By FRANCES HAYS. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 5s. Wood. Sabina: A Novel. By Lady WOOD. Post 8vo, illust. bds., 2s. Words, Facts, and Phrases: A Dictionary of Curious, Quaint, and Out-of-the-Way Matters. By ELIEZER EDWARDS. New and cheaper issue, cr. 8vo,cl. ex., 7s. 6d. ; half-bound, 9s. Wright (Thomas), Works by: Caricature History of the Georges. (The House of Hanover.) With 400 Pictures, Caricatures, Squibs, Broad sides, Window Pictures, &c. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 7s. 6d. History of Caricature and of the Grotesque in Art, Literature, Sculpture, and Painting. Profusely Illustrated by F. W. FAIRHOLT, F.S.A. Large post 8vo, cl. ex., 7s.6d. Yates (Edmund), Novels by : Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. Castaway. | The Forlorn Hope. Land at Last. CHATTO & W INDUS, PICCADILLY. NOVELS BY THE Mrs.CA SHEL HOE Y'S NEW NO VEL . The Lover's Creed. By Mrs. CASHEL HOEY, Author of " The Blossoming of an Aloe," &c. With 12 Illustrations by P. MACNAB. Three Vols., crown 8vo. SARAH TYTLER'S NEW NOVEL. Beauty and the Beast. By SARAH TYTLER, Author of " The Bride's Pass," "Saint Mungo's City," " Citoyenne Jacqueline," &c. Three Vols., crown 8vo. NEW NOVELS BY CHAS. GIBBON. By Mead and Stream. By CHARLES GIBBON, Author of "Robin Gray," "The Golden Shaft," " Queen of the Meadow," &c. Three Vols., cr. 8vo. A Hard Knot. By CHARLES GIBBON. Three Vols., crown 8vo. Heart's Delight. By CHARLES GIBBON. Three Vols., crown 8vo. BEST AUTHORS. NEW NOVEL BY CECIL POWER. Philistia. By CECIL POWER. Three Vols., crown 8vo. NEW NOVEL BY THE AUTHOR OF "VALENTINA." Gerald. By ELEANOR C. PRICE. Three Vols., crown 8vo. BASIL'S NEW NOVEL. "The Wearing of the Green." By BASIL, Author of " Love the Debt," "A Drawn Game," &c. Three Vols., crown 8vo. NEW NOVEL BY J. T. TROW- BRIDGE. Farnell's Folly. Two Vols., crown 8vo, 12s. Mrs. PIRKIS'S NEW NOVEL. Lady Lovelace. ByC.L. PIRKIS, Author of " A Very Opal. 1 ' Three Vols., crown 8vo. THE PICCADILLY NOVELS. Popular Stories by the Best Authors. LIBRARY EDITIONS, many Illustrated, crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3s. 6d. each. BY MRS. ALEXANDER. Maid, Wife, or Widow? BY BASIL. A Drawn Game. BY W. BESANT & JAMES RICE. Ready-Money Mortiboy. My Little Girl. The Case of Mr. Lucraft. This Son of Vulcan. With Harp and Crown. The Golden Butterfly. By Celia's Arbour. The Monks of Thelema. 'Twas in Trafalgar's Bay. The Seamy Side. The Ten Years' Tenant. The Chaplain of the Fleet. Dorothy Forster. BY WALTER BESANT. All Sorts and Conditions of Men. The Captains' Room. All in a Garden Fair. Dorothy Forster. BY ROBERT: 'BUCHANAN. A Child of Nature. God and the Man. The Shadow of the Sword. The Martyrdom of Madeline. Love Me for Ever. Annan Water. I The New Abelard. Matt. I Foxglove Manor. BY MRS. H. LOVETT CAMERON. Deceivers Ever. | Juliet's Guardian. BY MORTIMER COLLINS. Sweet Anne Page. Transmigration. From Midnight to Midnight. MORTIMER & FRANCES COLLINS. Blacksmith and Scholar. The Village Comedy. You Play me False. BY WILKIE COLLINS. Antonina. Basil. Hide and Seek. The Dead Secret. Queen of Hearts. My Miscellanies. Woman in White. The Moonstone. Man and Wife. Poor Miss Finch. Miss or Mrs. ? BY DUTTON COOK. Paul Foster's Daughter. BY WILLIAM CYPLES. Hearts of Gold. BY ALPHONSE DAUDET. Port Salvation. BY JAMES DE MILLE. A Castle in Spain. New Magdalen. The Frozen Deep. The Law and the Lady. TheTwo Destinies Haunted Hotel. The Fallen Leaves Jezebel'sDaughter The Black Robe. Heart and Science I Say No. 28 BOOKS PUBLISHED BY PICCADILLY NOVELS, continued BY J. LEITH DERWENT. Our Lady of Tears. | Circe's Lovers. BY M. BETHAM-EDWARDS. Felicia. | Kitty. BY MRS. ANNIE EDWARDES. Archie Lovell. BY R. E. FRANCILLON. Olympia. I One by One. Queen Cophetua. I A Real Queen. Prefaced by Sir BARTLE FRERE. Pandurang Hari. BY EDWARD GARRETT. The Capel Girls. BY CHARLES GIBBON. Robin Gray. | For Lack of Gold. In Love and War. What will the World Say? For the King. | In Honour Bound. Queen of the Meadow. In Pastures Green. The Flower of the Forest. A Heart's Problem. The Braes of Yarrow. The Golden Shaft. | Of High Degree. Fancy Free. | Loving a Dream. BY HALL CAINE. The Shadow of a Crime. BY THOMAS HARDY. Under the Greenwood Tree. BY JULIAN HAWTHORNE. Garth. | Ellice Quentin. Sebastian Strome. Prince Saroni's Wife. Dust. | Fortune's Fool. Beatrix Randolph. Miss Cadogna. BY SIR A. HELPS. Ivan de Biron. BY MRS. ALFRED HUNT. Thornicroft's Model. The Leaden Casket. Self-Condemned. BY JEAN INGE LOW, Fated to be Free. 73 Y HARRIETT JAY. The Queen of Connaught The Dark Colleen. BY HENRY KINGSLEY. Number Seventeen. Oakshott Castle. PICCADILLY NOVELS, centinued BY E. LYNN LINTON. Patricia Kemball, Atonement of Learn Dundas. The World Well Lost. Under which Lord? With a Silken Thread. The Rebel of the Family "My Love !" | lone. BY HENRY W. LUCY. Gideon Fleyce. BY JUSTIN MCCARTHY, M.P. The Waterdale Neighbours. My Enemy's Daughter. Linley Rochford. | A Fair Saxon. Dear Lady Disdain. Miss Misanthrope. | Donna Quixote. The Comet of a Season. Maid of Athens. BY GEORGE MAC DONALD, LL.D. Paul Faber, Surgeon. Thomas Wingfold, Curate. BY MRS. MAC DO NELL. Quaker Cousins. BY KATHARINE S. MACQUOID. Lost Rose | The Evil Eye. BY FLORENCE MARRY AT. Open ! Sesame ! | Written in Fire. BY JEAN MIDDLEMASS. Touch and Go. BY D. CHRISTIE MURRAY. Life's Atonement, j Coals of Fire. Joseph's Coat. j Val Strange. A Model Father. \ Hearts. By the Gate of the Sea The Way of the World. A Bit of Human Nature. BY MRS. OLIPHANT. Whiteladles. BY MARGARET A. PAUL. Gentle and Simple. BY JAMES PAYN. Lost Sir Massing berd. Best of Husbands Fallen Fortunes. Halves. Walter's Word. What He Cost Hen Less Black than We're Painted. By Proxy. High Spirits. Under One Roof. Carlyon's Year. A Confidential Agent. From Exile. A Grape from a Thorn. For Cash Only. Some Private Views. Kit: A Memory. The Canon's Ward. BY E. C. PRICE. Valentina. ( The Foreigners, Mrs. Lancaster's Rival. CHATTO 6- W 'INDUS, PICCADILLY. PICCADILLY NOVELS, continued BY CHARLES READE, D.C.L. It is Never Too Late to Mend. Hard Cash. | Peg Wofflngton. Christie Johnstone. Griffith Gaunt. | Foul Play. The Double Marriage. Love Me Little, Love Me Long. The Cloister and the Hearth. The Course of True Love. The Autobiography of a Thief. Put Yourself in His Place. A Terrible Temptation. The Wandering Heir. I A Simpleton. A Woman Hater. I Readiana. Singleheart and Doubleface. The Jilt. [mals. Good Stories of Men and other Ani- BY MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. Her Mother's Darling. Prince of Wales's Garden-Party. Weird Stories. BY F. W. ROBINSON. Women are Strange. The Hands of Justice. BY JOHN SAUNDERS. Bound to the Wheel. Guy Waterman. | Two Dreamers. One Against the World. The Lion in the Path. BY KATHARINE SAUNDERS. Joan Merryweather. Margaret and Elizabeth. Gideon's Rock. I Heart Salvage. The High Mills. I Sebastian. PICCADILLY NOVELS, continued BY T. W. SPEIGHT. The Mysteries of Heron Dyke. BY R. A. STERNDALE. The Afghan Knife. BY BERTHA THOMAS. Proud Maisie. | Cressida. The Violin-Player BY ANTHONY TROLLOPE. The Way we Live Now. The American Senator Frau Frohmann. | Marion Fay. Kept In the Dark. Mr. Scarborough's Family. The Land-Leaguers. BY FRANCES E. TROLLOPE. Like Ships upon the Sea. Anne Furness. Mabel's Progress. BY T. A. TROLLOPE. Diamond Cut Diamond By IVAN TURGENIEFF and Others. Stories from Foreign Novelists. BY SARAH TYTLER. What She Came Through. The Bride's Pass. Saint Mungo's City. BY C. C. FRASER-TYTLER. Mistress Judith. BY J. S. WINTER. Cavalry Life. Regimental Legends. CHEAP EDITIONS OF POPULAR NOVELS. Post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2s. each. BY EDMOND ABOUT. The Fellah. BY HAMILTON AIDE. Carr of Carrlyon. | Confidences. BY MRS. ALEXANDER. Maid, Wife, or Widow ? Valerie's Fate. BY SHELSLEY BEAU CHAM P. Grantley Grange. BY W. BESANT & JAMES RICE. Ready-Money Mortiboy. With Harp and Crown. This Son of Vulcan. | My Little Girl. The Case of Mr. Lucraft. The Golden Butterfly. By Celia's Arbour. The Monks of Thelema. BY BESANT AND RICE, continued 'Twas in Trafalgar's Bay. The Seamy Side. The Ten Years' Tenant. The Chaplain of the Fleet. BY WALTER BESANT. All Sorts and Conditions of Men. The Captains' Room. All in a Garden Fair. BY FREDERICK BOYLE. Camp Notes. | Savage Life. Chronicles of No-man's Land BY BRET HARTE. An Heiress of Red Dog. The Luck of Roaring Camp. Californian Stories. Gabriel Conroy. j Flip. Maruja. BOOKS PUBLISHED BY CHEAP POPULAR NOVELS, continued BY ROBERT BUCHANAN. of TheMartyrdomof Madeline. Annan Water. The New Abelard. The Shadow the Sword. A Child of Nature. God and the Man. Love Me for Ever. BY MRS. BURNETT. Surly Tim. BY MRS. LOVETT CAMERON. Deceivers Ever. | Juliet's Guardian. BY M ACL A REN COBBAN. The Cure of Souls. BY C. ALLSTON COLLINS. The Bar Sinister. BY WILKIE COLLINS. Antonina. | Miss or Mrs.? Basil. ! New Magdalen. Hide and Seek. jThe Frozen Deep. The Dead Secret. | Law and the Lady. Queen of Hea'rts. | TheTwo Destinies My Miscellanies. Woman in White. The Moonstone. Man and Wife. Poor Miss Finch. Haunted Hotel. The Fallen Leaves. Jezebel'sDaughter The Black Robe. Heart and Science BY MORTIMER COLLINS. Sweet Anne Page. I From Midnight to Transmigration. | Midnight. A Fight with Fortune. MORTIMER & FRANCES COLLINS. Sweet and Twenty. | Frances. Blacksmith and Scholar. The Village Comedy. You Play me False. BY BUTTON COOK. Leo. | Paul Foster's Daughter. BY WILLIAM CYPLES. Hearts of Gold. BY ALPHONSE DAUDET. The Evangelist; or, Port Salvation. BY DE MILLS. A Castle in Spain. BY J. LEITH DERWENT. Our Lady of Tears. | Circe's Lovers. BY CHARLES DICKENS. Sketches by Boz. I Oliver Twist. Pickwick Papers. | Nicholas Nickleby BY MRS. ANNIE EDWARDES. A Point of Honour. | Archie Lovell. BY M. BETHAM-EDWARDS. Felicia. | Kitty. BY EDWARD EGGLESTON. Roxy. CHEAP POPULAR NOVELS, continued BY PERCY FITZGERALD. Bella Donna. | Never Forgotten. The Second Mrs. Tillotson. Polly. Seventy-five Brooke Street. The Lady of Brantome. BY ALBANY DE FONBLANQUE. Filthy Lucre. BY R. E. FRANCILLON. Olympia. I Queen Cophetua. One by One. | A Real Queen. Prefaced by Sir H. BARTLE FRERE. Pandurang Hari. BY HAIN FRISWELL. One of Two. BY EDWARD GARRETT The Capel Girls. BY CHARLES GIBBON. Queen of the Mea dow. The Flower of the Forest. A Heart's Problem The Braes of Yar row. The Golden Shaft Of High Degree. Robin Gray. For Lack of Gold. What will the World Say? In Honour Bound. The Dead Heart. In Love and War. For the King. In Pastures Green BY WILLIAM GILBERT. Dr. Austin's Guests. The Wizard of the Mountain. James Duke. BY JAMES GREENWOOD. Dick Temple. BY ANDREW HALLIDAY. Every-Day Papers. BY LADY DUFFUS HARDY. Paul Wynter's Sacrifice. BY THOMAS HARDY. Under the Greenwood Tree. BY JULIAN HAWTHORNE. Garth. I Sebastian Strome Ellice Quentin. | Dust. Prince Saroni's Wife. Fortune's Fool. | Beatrix Randolph. BY SIR ARTHUR HELPS. Ivan de Biron. BY TOM HOOD. A Golden Heart. BY MRS. GEORGE HOOPER. The House of Raby. BY VICTOR HUGO. The Hunchback of Notre Dame. CHATTO & W INDUS, PICCADILLY. CHEAP POPULAR NOVELS, continued BY MRS. ALFRED HUNT. Thorn icroft's Model. The Leaden Casket. Self-Condemned. BY JEAN INGELOW. Fated to be Free. BY HARRIETT JAY. The Dark Colleen. The Queen of Connaught. BY HENRY KINGSLEY. Cakshott Castle. I Number Seventeen BY E. LYNN LINTON. Patricia Kemball. The Atonement of Learn Dundas. The World Weil Lost. Under which Lord ? With a Silken Thread. The Rebel of the Family. "My Love!" | lone. BY HENRY W. LUCY. Gideon Fleyce. BY JUSTIN MCCARTHY, M.P. Dear LadyDisdain Linley Rochford. The Waterdale MissMisanthrope Neighbours. Donna Quixote. My Enemy's The Comet of a Daughter. Season. A Fair Saxon. Maid of Athens. BY GEORGE MAC DONALD. Paul Faber, Surgeon. Thomas Wingfold, Curate. BY MRS. MACDONELL. Quaker Cousins. BY KATHARINE S. MACQUOID. The Evil Eye. | Lost Rose. BY W. H. MALLOCK. The New Republic. BY FLORENCE MARRY AT. Open ! Sesame ! I A Little Stepson. A Harvest of Wild | Fighting the Air. Oats. I Written in Fire. BY J. MASTERMAN. Half-a-dozen Daughters. BY JEAN MIDDLEMASS. Touch and Go. | Mr. Dorillion. BY D. CHRISTIE MURRAY. ALife'sAtonement A Model Father. Joseph's Coat. Coals of Fire. By the Gate of the Sea. Val Strange. Hearts. B7 MRS. OLIPHANT. Whiteladies. CHEAP POPULAR NOVELS, continued BY MRS. ROBERT O'REILLY. Phoebe's Fortunes. BY QUID A. Held in Bondage. Strathmore. Chandos. Under Two Flags. Idalia. Cecil Castle- maine. Tricotrin. Puck. Folle Farine. A Dog of Flanders. Pascarel. Signa. BY MARGARET AGNES PAUL. Gentle and Simple. TwoLittleWooden Shoes. In a Winter City. Ariadne. Friendship. Moths. Pipistrello. A Village Com mune. Bimbi. In Maremma. Wanda. Frescoes. BY JAMES PAYN. Lost Sir Massing berd. A Perfect Trea sure. Bentinck's Tutor. Murphy's Master. A County Family. At Her Mercy. A Woman's Ven geance. Cecil's Tryst. dyffards of Clyffe The FamilyScape- grace. Foster Brothers. Found Dead. Best of Husbands Walter's Word. Halves. Fallen Fortunes. What He Cost Her Humorous Stories Gwendoline's Har vest. 200 Reward Like Father, Like Son. A Marine Resi dence. Married Beneath Him. Mirk Abbey. Not Wooed, but Won. Less Black than We're Painted. By Proxy. Under One Roof. High Spirits. Carlyon's Year. A Confidential Agent. Some Private Views. From Exile. A Grape from a Thorn. For Cash Only. Kit: A Memory. The Canon sWard BY EDGAR A. POE. The Mystery of Marie Roget. BY E. C. PRICE. Valentina. | The Foreigners. Mrs. Lancaster's Rival. BY CHARLES READE. It Is Never Too Late to Mend Hard Cash. | Peg Wofflngton. Christie Johnstone, BOOKS PUBLISHED BY CHATTO 6< WIN BUS. CHEAP POPULAR NOVELS, continued By CHARLES READE, continued. Griffith Gaunt. Put Yourself in His Place. The Double Marriage. Love Me Little, Love Me Long. Foul Play. The Cloister and the Hearth. The Course of True Love. Autobiography of a Thief. A Terrible Temptation. The Wandering Heir. A Simpleton. I A Woman-Hater. Readiana. The Jilt. Singleheart and Doubleface. Good Stories of Men and other Animals. BY MRS. J. H. RIDDELL. Her Mother's Darling. Prince of Wales's Garden Party. Weird Stories. The Uninhabited House. Fairy Water. BY F. W. ROBINSON. Women are Strange. The Hands of Justice. BY W. CLARK RUSSELL. Round the Galley Fire. BY BAYLE ST. JOHN. A Levantine Family. BY GEORGE AUGUSTUS SALA. Gaslight and Daylight. BY JOHN SA UNDERS. Bound to the Wheel. One Against the World. Guy Waterman. The Lion in the Path. Two Dreamers. BY KATHARINE S A UNDERS. Joan Merryweather. Margaret and Elizabeth. The High Mills. BY GEORGE R. SIMS. Rogues and Vagabonds. BY ARTHUR SKETCHLEY. A Match in the Dark. BY T. W. SPEIGHT. The Mysteries of Heron Dyke. BY R. A. STERN DALE. The Afghan Knife. BY R. LOUIS STEVENSON. New Arabian Nights. BY BERTHA THOMAS. Cressida. | Proud Maisle. The Violin-Player. BY W. MOY THOMAS. A Fight for Life. BY WALTER THORNBURY. Tales for the Marines. BY T. ADOLPHUS TROLLOPS. Diamond Cut Diamond. CHEAP POPULAR NOVELS, continued'-* BY ANTHONY TROLLOPE. The Way We Live Now. The American Senator. Frau Frohmann. Marion Fay. Kept in the Dark. Mr. Scarborough's Family. The Land-Leaguers. The Golden Lion of Granpero. John Caldigate. By FRA NOES ELEA NOR TROLLOPE Like Ships upon the Sea. Anne Furness. Mabel's Progress. BY IVAN TURGENIEFF, frc. Stories from Foreign Novelists. BY MARK TWAIN. Tom Sawyer. An Idle Excursion. A Pleasure Trip on the Continent of Europe. A Tramp Abroad. The Stolen White Elephant. BY C. C. FRASER-TYTLER. Mistress Judith. BY SARAH TYTLER. What She Came Through. The Bride's Pass. BY J. S. WINTER. Cavalry Life. | Regimental Legends. BY LADY WOOD. Sabina. BY EDMUND YATES. Castaway. | The Forlorn Hope. Land at Last. ANONYMOUS. Paul Ferroll. Why Paul Ferroll Killed his Wife. Fcap. 8vo, picture covers, Is. each. Jeff Briggs's Love Story. By BRET HARTE. The Twins of Table Mountain. By BRET HARTE, Mrs. Gainsborough's Diamonds. By JULIAN HAWTHORNE. Kathleen Mavourneen. By Author of " That Lass o' Lowrie's." Lindsay's Luck. By the Author of " That Lass o' Lowrie's." Pretty Polly Pemberton. By the Author of "That Lass o' Lowrie's." Trooping with Crows. By Mrs. PlRKIS. The Professor's Wife. By LEONARD GRAHAM. A Double Bond. By LINDA VILLARI. Esther's Glove. ByR.E. FRANCILLON. The Garden that Paid the Rent. By TOM JERROLD. Curly. By JOHN COLEMAN. Illus trated by J. C. DOLLMAN. J. OGDEN AND CO., PRINTERS, 172, ST, JOHN STREET, E.G. ROBINSON & CLEAVER'S (BELFAST). ALL PURB FLAX. per doz. /sinannin Children's... 2 6 CAMBRO Ladies'.. 3 3 Gentlemen's. 4 10 HEMSTITCHED. DflPtfCT Ladies' 4 9 rUUlVLl Gentlemen's. 8 4 " The Irish Cambrics of Messrs. Robinson and Cleaver have a world-wide fame." The Queen. HANDKERCHIEFS. Direct from the Manufacturers Samples post free Manufacturers to the QUEEN. iniOJI lltirtl "Their Irish Linen 1 n 1 o H 1 N L N Collars - Cufrs - Shirts - II IV || kill 111 etc> haye themeritsof excellence and cheapness." Court Circular, Ladies' and Children's PHI 1 ADO 3- fold 3/ 11 P er dozen. LULL A HO Gent's, 4 -fold, 4 /" to 5/11 per dozen. t*m t mmwf* For Ladies, Gentlemen, IJFFS and Children, 5/11 to 10/9 1 per dozen. WHELPTON'S PILLS Are one of those rare Medicines which, for their extraordinary properties, have gained an almost UNIVERSAL REPUTATION. During a period of more than FORTY- SIX YEARS they have been used most extensively as a Family Medicine, thousands having found them a simple and safe remedy, and one needful to be kept .always at hand. These Pills are purely Vegetable, being entirely free from Mercury or any other Mineral, and those who may not hitherto have proved their efficacy, will do well to give them a trial. Recommended for Disorders of the Head, Chest, Bowels, Liver, and Kidneys ; also in Rheumatism, Ulcers, Sores, and all Skin Diseases these Pills being a direct Purifier of the Blood. "n Boxes, price T l /d., is. i%d., and 2S. gd., by G. WHELPTON & SON, 3, Crane Court, Fleet Street, London. And sent free to any part of the United Kingdom on receipt of 8, 14, or 33 Stamps. Sold by all Chemists at Home and Abroad. BROWNING'S NEW BINOCULARS. THE " PANERGETIC " OPERA, FIELD, AND RACE GLASS For general use. Brilliant Light, extensive Field of View, and Sharp Definition. THE "EURYSCOPIC" OPERA, 2 2s. For the Theatre, Largest Field of View, giving delightfully easy Vision. ACHROMATIC OPERA GLASS IN CASE, from 10s. 63. BROWNING'S ANEROIDS. Watch-form ANEROID, in Gilt or Neckelised Case, 2. Best Watch-form ANEROIDS, compensated for Temperature, and constructed expressly for Measuring Heights, with .->cale of Altitudes, i* ii or 2 Inches in diameter, 4 4s. and 5 6s. ANEROID BAROMETER, on Carved Oak Stand, from 12s. 6d. Best ANEROID, in Carved Oak Frame, with Thermometer, various patterns, Chased Dial, 5 inches diameter, from 4 to 4 16. JOHN BROWNING, 63, Strand. Full Illustrated Cata 'agues upon a ppl cation. - - Mantles, Jackets, Dolmans, and Ulsters. A. STEDALL. ESTABLISHED OVER A QUARTER OF A CENTURY. ONE OF THE LARGEST MANUFACTURERS, IMPORTERS, AND RETAILERS OF MANTIES,JMETS,DOLIMNS&ULSTERS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM. The latest Novelties of French, German, & English Production, at Moderate Prices, always on view at A, BTEQAU/B ESTA8UBHMEHTB- 11, 13, & 15, Brompton Road, LONDON. 162, Edgware Road, LONDON. 184a, Edgware Road, LONDON. 123 & 124, Tottenham Court Road, LONDON. 21 & 23, Newington Causeway, LONDON. 91 & 93, High Street, Shoreditch, LONDON. 87, The Promenade, Cam- berwell Road, LONDON. 21, Oldham Street, MANCHESTER. 63, Deansgate, MANCHESTER. 69, High St., & 1, Union St., BIRMINGHAM. 74, Bull Street, BIRMINGHAM. 149, High Street, SOUTHAMPTON. ALL GOODS ARE SOLD AT MODERATE PRICES, AND EXCHANGED IF NOT APPROVED. SOAP ! A SPECIALTY FOR THE COMPLEXION Recommended by SIR ERASMUS WlLSON, F.R.S., late President of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, as "The most refreshing and agreeable of balms for the skin." MDME. ADELINA PATTI writes : " I have found PEARS' SOAP matchless for the- hands and complexion" MRS. LANGTRY writes: "Since using PEARS' SOAP for the hands and complexion, / have discarded, all others" MDME. MARIE ROZE (Pnma Donna, Her Majesty's Theatre) writes : " For preserving the complexion, keeping the skin soft, free from redness and roughness, and the hands in nice condition, PEAKS' SOAP is the finest preparation in the world'' MISS MARY ANDERSON writes :-! have used PEAKS' SOAP for two years with the greatest satisfaction, for / find it the very best" PEARS' SOAP SOLD EVERYWHERE