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The World's Greatest Books — Volume 05 — Fiction

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Title: The World's Greatest Books — Volume 05 — Fiction

Editor: Arthur Mee
        J. A. Hammerton


        
Release date: February 1, 2004 [eBook #10993]
                Most recently updated: October 28, 2024

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORLD'S GREATEST BOOKS — VOLUME 05 — FICTION ***

THE WORLD'S GREATEST BOOKS

JOINT EDITORS

ARTHUR MEE Editor and Founder of the Book of Knowledge

J.A. HAMMERTON Editor of Harmsworth's Universal Encyclopaedia

VOL. V FICTION

       *       *       *       *       *



    Acknowledgment

    Acknowledgment and thanks for permission
    to use "The Garden of Allah," by
    Mr. Robert Hichens, are herewith tendered
    to A.P. Watt & Son, London, England,
    for the author.

       *       *       *       *       *




_Table of Contents_


GRAY, MAXWELL
  Silence of Dean Maitland

GRIFFIN, GERALD
  The Collegians

HABBERTON, JOHN
  Helen's Babies

HALEVY, LUDOVIC
  Abbé Constantin

HAWTHORNE, NATHANIEL
  The Scarlet Letter
  House of the Seven Gables

HICHENS, ROBERT
  The Garden of Allah

HOLMES, OLIVER WENDELL
  Elsie Venner

HUGHES, THOMAS
  Tom Brown's Schooldays
  Tom Brown at Oxford

HUGO, VICTOR
  Les Misérables
  Notre Dame de Paris
  The Toilers of the Sea
  The Man Who Laughs

INCHBALD, ELIZABETH
  A Simple Story

JAMES, G.P.R.
  Henry Masterton

JOHNSON, SAMUEL
  Rasselas

JOKAI, MAURICE
  Timar's Two Worlds

KERNAHAN, COULSON
  A Dead Man's Diary

KINGSLEY, CHARLES
  Alton Locke
  Hereward the Wake
  Hypatia
  Two Years Ago
  Water-Babies
  Westward Ho!

KINGSLEY, HENRY
  Geoffry Hamlyn
  Ravenshoe


A Complete Index of THE WORLD'S GREATEST BOOKS will be found at the end
of Volume XX.

       *       *       *       *       *




MAXWELL GRAY


The Silence of Dean Maitland


     Mary Gleed Tuttiett, the gifted lady who writes under the
     pseudonym of "Maxwell Gray," was born at Newport, Isle of
     Wight. The daughter of Mr. F.B. Tuttiett, M.R.C.S., she began
     her literary career by contributing essays, poems, articles,
     and short stones to various periodicals. With the appearance
     of "The Silence of Dean Maitland," in 1886, Maxwell Gray's
     name was immediately and permanently established in the front
     rank of living novelists. The story and its problem,
     dramatically set forth, and with rare literary art, became one
     of the most discussed themes of the day. Since that time
     Maxwell Gray has produced a number of stories, among them
     being "The Reproach of Annesley" (1888), "The Last Sentence"
     (1893), "The House of Hidden Treasure" (1898), and "The Great
     Refusal" (1906), and also several volumes of poems. This
     little version of "The Silence of Dean Maitland" has been
     prepared by Miss Tuttiett herself.


_I.--Impending Tragedy_


The story opens on a grey October afternoon in the Isle of Wight, in the
'sixties. Alma Lee, the coachman's handsome young daughter, is toiling
up a steep hill overlooking Chalkburne, tired and laden with parcels
from the town. As she leans on a gate, Judkins, a fellow-servant of her
father's, drives up in a smart dog-cart, and offers her a lift home. She
refuses scornfully, to the young groom's mortification; he drives off,
hurt by her coquetry and prophesying that pride goes before a fall.

Then a sound of bells is heard--a waggon drawn by a fine bell-team
climbs the hill, and stops by Alma. She accepts the waggoner's offer of
a lift, and on reaching the gate of her home in the dusk, is distressed
by his insistence on a kiss in payment, when out of the tree-shadows
steps Cyril Maitland, the graceful and gifted son of the rector of
Malbourne, newly ordained deacon.

He rebukes the waggoner, rescues Alma, and escorts her across a field to
her father's cottage. There he is welcomed with respectful affection as
the rector's son and Alma's former playmate. Afterwards she lights him
to the gate, where a chance word of his evokes from her an innocent and
unconscious betrayal of her secret love, kindling such strong response
in him as he cannot conquer except by touching a letter in his breast-
pocket. This letter is from Marion Everard, to whom he has been a year
engaged.

He walks through the dark to Malbourne Rectory, where, by the fire, he
finds his invalid mother, his twin sister, Lilian, and two younger
children. Here he appears the idol of the hearth--genial, graceful,
gifted, beautiful, and warm-hearted. But he betrays ambition, sudden and
great haste to be married, and some selfishness. He walks to his lodging
in a neighbouring village, where trifling circumstances point to a
refined sensuousness, self-indulgence, and sophistry in his character,
leading to the neglect of serious duty. The shadow of impending tragedy
is hinted at from the first line of the book.

December in the following year. Cyril now an East End curate, and Henry
Everard, M.D., going by rail to Malbourne. Everard asleep; manly,
cheerful, intellectual, healthy in body and mind. Cyril awake; consumed
by unspeakable sorrow. Everard wakes; Cyril suddenly becomes gay in
response to his friend's high spirits. They chaff each other. Cyril
preaches to Everard, when Henry scolds him for fasting, and his laxity
of faith and practice. They pass Belminster, when Cyril betrays
unconscious ambition at Everard's jesting prophecy that he would preach
as bishop in the cathedral. Asceticism is defended by Cyril and
condemned by Everard. Cyril speaks of the discipline of sorrow, and
presses a spiked cross under his clothes into his side. Everard exalts
the discipline of joy. The friends have been privately educated
together, and were together at Cambridge. Henry admires Cyril's
character and mental brilliance; Cyril regards Henry with condescending
affection. Everard is silently in love with Lilian.

Cyril and Everard in the meantime have arrived at Malbourne Rectory.
Cyril and Marion, who have not met since a quarrel, are alone together.
She wonders that he makes so much of the little tiff. He talks of his
unworthiness, and makes her promise to cleave to him through good and
_evil_ report. At dinner, Everard asks for all the villagers, and
gathers that Alma Lee is disgraced. "Alma, little Alma, the child we
used to play with!" he cries afterwards to the men Maitlands. "Who is
the scoundrel?" Cyril grows impatient under the discussion that follows.
"After all, _she is not the first!_" he says at last, to Everard's
indignation.

Sunday. All classes meeting on the way to church, when Cyril preaches
for the first time to his friends and neighbours, who throng to hear
him. He preaches with passionate earnestness upon the beauty of
innocence and the agony of losing it. "That once lost," he says, "the
old careless joy of youth never returns."

The village parliament in the moonlit churchyard after service comment
with humour on the sermon, and on Cyril's eloquence, learning, and good
heart. Granfer, the village oracle, prophesies that the queen will make
a bishop of him. Ben Lee, talking with Judkins by the harness-room fire,
supposes that Cyril was thinking of Alma in his sermon. "He always had a
kind heart." But Judkins speaks of his suspicions of Everard as Alma's
betrayer, alludes to his frequent visits to Mrs.


Lee during her illness some months ago, and his constant meeting with
Alma. Lee is convinced of Everard's guilt. "I'll kill him!" he cries
furiously.


_II.--Sin-Engendered Sin_


It is a lovely winter's day, and Cyril, Lilian, and Everard are walking
through the woods at the back of Lee's cottage. Cyril puts something
into a hollow tree, and intimates a chaffinch's call. Another bird
replies. Cyril walks on to Oldport, leaving Everard and Lilian, between
whom there follows a warm love scene and betrothal. During this episode
Mrs. Lee, Alma's stepmother, tells her husband that Alma is gone to meet
her unknown lover in the wood at the signal of a chaffinch's call. Lee
follows, and finds Alma there _alone_. He picks up a paper she had torn
and dropped; it contains an assignation for that evening at dusk. Before
luncheon Everard changes the grey suit he was wearing, and had stained
in a muddy ditch. He goes to a lonely cottage on the downs in the
afternoon; returning in the evening, he gets a black eye while romping
with little Winnie Maitland. After bathing the eye, he sponges the
stained suit, and is surprised to find blood on it. Cyril has been
absent in Oldport all day, and on his return goes to bed with a
headache, speaking to nobody. A man in Henry's grey suit passes through
the hall at dusk, followed by the cat, who never runs after anyone but
Lilian and Cyril.

That evening, New Year's eve, there is a gay party of rustics at the
wheelwright's house. In the midst of Granfer's best story in rushes
Grove, the waggoner, crying that Ben Lee had just been found murdered in
the wood. The same night Alma gives birth to a son.

Next day, Cyril, in great mental anguish, goes to Admiral Everard's
house, and incidentally puts to a brother clergyman there a case of
conscience: Should a man who has acted unwisely, and is guilty of
unintentional homicide, imperil a useful and brilliant career by
confession? Not if he had such great gifts and opportunities of doing
good as Cyril has, he is told. By this pronouncement and a love scene
with Marion, Cyril is much comforted.

In the meantime, Ben Lee's death is by many being imputed to Everard,
who is quite unconscious of these suspicions. He is much surprised at
the appearance of policemen at the rectory that afternoon, and still
more so at being arrested on the charge of murdering Lee.

After due examination, Everard is committed for trial on the charge of
murder. His best witness, Granfer, who had seen and spoken with him in
the village at the moment of the alleged murder, greatly discredited his
evidence by his circumlocution and stupidity, purposely affected to set
the court in a roar. He admitted that Everard gave him money and
tobacco. Judkins swore that at three o'clock Lee told him Everard had
asked Alma to meet him at dusk that evening in the wood, and that
he--Lee--meant to follow Everard there and exact reparation from him;
that Alma and Everard were known to be together in the wood on the
morning of Lee's death (when Everard was with Lilian), and that he
himself had seen them meet often clandestinely in the spring during Mrs.
Lee's illness, when letters, books, and flowers had passed between them.
On the eve of Lee's death he had seen Everard go into the copse at dusk
carrying a heavy stick.

Ingram Swaynestone, Grove, the waggoner, and Stevens, the Sexton, all
saw Everard going on the upland path to Swaynestone. But the blacksmith
swore to seeing him in the village street at the same hour. A keeper saw
him going to the copse at the same time that a shepherd met him on the
down going in another direction. At five o'clock two rectory maids saw
Everard run in by the back door and upstairs, followed by the cat; he
made no reply when Miss Maitland spoke to him. An hour later, Everard
asked the cook for raw meat for a black eye, which he said he got by
running against a tree in the dark. Blood was found in a basin in his
room, and on the grey suit, which was much stained and torn, as if by a
struggle. A handkerchief of Everard's was found in the wood, also a
stick he had been seen with in the morning.

Everard's evidence at the inquest was that he left Malbourne Rectory
about four, wearing a black coat, met the blacksmith in the village, and
the shepherd on the down, and finding the cottage on the down empty,
returned, seeing no one till he met Granfer at Malbourne Cross, and
reached the rectory at six, where a romp with Winnie Maitland gave him
the black eye, that he promised her not to speak about. He could not
account for the blood found on his clothes.

Cyril is much shocked by the verdict and committal of Everard, but is
sure that he will be cleared. "He must be cleared," he says, "_at any
cost_." Pending the assize trial, he baptises three unknown babes in
Malbourne Church. When asking the name of one of the children in his
arms, he is told "Benjamin Lee." His evident deep emotion at this evokes
sympathy from all present. During the trial at Belminster he has a great
spiritual conflict in the cathedral while a fugue of Bach's is played on
the organ, suggesting a combat between the powers of evil and good. But
he feels that he _cannot_ renounce his brilliant prospects. Coming out,
he hears that Alma has declared Everard is the man who was with her
father when he met his death in the struggle she heard while outside the
copse.

Cyril at once rushes to the court, which he had only left for an hour,
just in time to hear the verdict, "Manslaughter."

"Stop!" he cries. "I have evidence--the prisoner is innocent!"

The judge, not understanding what he says, orders his removal; his
friends, thinking him distracted, persuade him to be quiet while the
utmost sentence--twenty years--is given. On hearing this, Cyril, with a
loud cry, falls senseless. He remains in delirium many weeks. A pathetic
farewell between Henry and Lilian, who is the only believer in his
innocence, and who renews her promise to him, closes the first part.

The tragedy, faintly foreshadowed from the first line, and gradually
developed from Cyril's self-righteousness and irrepressible joy in
Alma's unguarded betrayal of unconscious passion, has darkened the whole
story. Sin has engendered sin. Cyril's noble purpose to devote himself
entirely to his high calling, and be worthy of it, has become pitiless
ambition.

His self-respect, spiritual pride and egoism; his ready tact, social
charm, and power of psychological analysis, subtle sophistry and
self-deception; his warmest affection, disguised self-love; his finest
qualities perverted lead to his lowest fall.

His weak and belated attempt to right Alma's wrong has killed her
father. Alma's desecrated love has turned to fierce idolatry, laying
waste Lilian's happiness, and working Henry's complete ruin. Cyril's
cowardice has delayed clearing his friend till it is too late to save
him.

    Not poppy, not mandragora,
    Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world

will ever medicine again to him that sweet sleep he had before his
guilt.


_III.--The Darkness of a Prison_


A summer Sunday two years later. Alma and her child in a cornfield,
listening to bells ringing for Cyril's homecoming with his bride. All
the softness and youth gone from Alma's tragic face, and the last gleams
of penitence from her heart, since her perjury. Jealousy is prompting
her to go and tell Marion all. But Judkins comes and interrupts these
wild thoughts. He offers marriage, rehabilitation, and a home in
America. She hesitates. She is shunned by all, and can get no work in
Malbourne, but has not been destitute; money has found its way
mysteriously to her cottage. So for the child's sake she accepts.

Tea on the rectory lawn. Lilian is thinking of the prisoner, Lennie
wondering aloud, "How does Alma _like_ having to go to hell for lying
about Henry?" Cyril is terribly agitated at this. He has scarcely yet
recovered from his long mental illness after Henry's sentence. Marion is
_not happy_--she may never allude to Henry. The slightest reference to
him makes Cyril ill. Later, in the moonlight, Ingram Swaynestone asks
Lilian, whom he has always loved, to marry him. He cannot believe that
she is secretly engaged to Henry. She points towards Henry's prison. "I
am all that man has on earth, and I love him!" she says.

Nine years later. Convicts pulling down the old walls of Portsmouth. An
officer's funeral passes by. No. 62--Henry--overhears people speaking of
the manner of the officer's death, and his name, Major Everard. Tears
fall on the convict's hands as he works. No. 62's father is port
admiral. Alma's perjury in court had revealed all to Henry, and reduced
him to apathetic despair. "There is no God--no good anywhere!" he cried.
But in time Lilian's periodic letters gave him heart and hope, and he
had accepted his fate bravely, trying to lift up and cheer his fellow-
prisoners. In the darkness and uproar of a thunderstorm he escapes from
the guarded works. His adventures, during which he comes accidentally
and unrecognized in contact with his brother's widow, his sister, and
her children, who prattle of family matters in his hearing, and, after a
few weeks' wandering, by his being recaptured while lying on the
roadside unconscious from hunger and exhaustion. This part of the story
concludes with the reception of this news by Lilian and Cyril, whose
unintentional neglect has caused the miscarriage of a letter that would
have enabled Henry to escape.


_IV.--"I Will Confess my Wickedness"_


Everard is free, and, wearing the grey suit of a discharged prisoner, is
travelling from Dartmoor to London by train. Marion, his brother,
Leslie, Mrs. Maitland, and the admiral are all dead. Everything is
strange and changed to him. Liberty is sweet and bitter. He is
prematurely aged and broken down; the great future that had been before
him is now for ever impossible. His still undeveloped scientific
theories and discoveries have been anticipated by others. He feels the
prison taint upon him; he will not see Lilian until it is removed, and
he has become accustomed to the bewilderment of freedom.

After a few days' pause he starts from London for Malbourne, stopping at
Belminster, through which he had made his last free journey with Cyril,
when he told him that "an ascetic is a rake turned monk." Passing the
gaol in which he had suffered so much, he goes to the cathedral. He asks
who is now Dean of Belminster.

The verger is surprised. "Where have you been, sir, not to have heard of
the celebrated Dean Maitland?" The great dean! The books he has written,
the things he has done! All the world knows Dean Maitland, the greatest
preacher in the Church of England.

The deanery interior. Cyril, charming and adored as ever, is considering
whether he shall accept the historic bishopric of Warham. A strange
youth from America is announced, and asks the dean to give him a
university education--"because I am your son." "Since when," returns the
dean tranquilly, "have you been suffering from this distressing
illusion?" The youth bears a letter from Alma. She is dying in
Belminster, and implores him to come to her. She cannot die, she writes,
till she has cleared Everard. After this terrible scene Cyril is in
agony, and nearly commits suicide. "But one sin in a life so spotless!"
he moans. The same evening Everard, overwhelmed with accounts of Cyril's
good deeds and spiritual counsels, and examining with mingled awe and
pity the numerous books he has written, goes to hear one of the Anglican
Chrysostom's lectures to working men in the cathedral.

The music heard by Cyril during his mental conflict there years before
is being played. Cyril thinks Lee's death and Henry's suffering the work
of Fate, since in wearing Everard's clothes he had no thought of
impersonating him, but only of avoiding the publicity of clerical dress;
nor had he dreamed of meeting or of struggling with Ben Lee. Meaning to
go to Alma, who is already dead, later on that night, Cyril preaches
upon the sin of Judas, with great power and passion. "I charge you, my
brothers, beware of _self-deception!_" Everard pities him; he feels that
his own eighteen years' sufferings were nothing in comparison with
Cyril's secret tortures. Suddenly the preacher stops with a low cry of
agony. He has caught Everard's eye. He wishes the cathedral would fall
and crush him. "I am not well," he says, leaving the pulpit. Everard
writes him a letter that night, saying he has long known and forgiven
all; he asks Cyril to use his own secret repentance and unspoken agony
for the spiritual help of others.

The dean receives and reads the letter at breakfast next morning. He
then shuts himself alone in his study for several hours. Then he takes
leave of his blind son and only surviving daughter--all the other
children died in infancy--and sends them away to a relative. Everard,
after waiting vainly for Cyril's answer, goes to Malbourne. He travels
in the same carriage as the judge who had sentenced him, and tells him
that he was innocent, but is unable to clear himself. Nobody recognises
him at Malbourne. He hears his case discussed at the village inn, where
he stops an hour, too much agitated to go to the rectory. "He never done
it," is the general verdict.

Then follows the pathetic meeting of Henry and Lilian. Mr. Maitland had
gradually ceased to believe in his guilt. "But I could never forgive the
man who let you suffer in his stead," he says. Lilian shudders at this.
Cyril is discussed. "Our dear Chrysostom; our golden-mouth!"

Next day, Sunday, old friends welcome Everard. He has a great reception
from the villagers. Lilian presses him to say who was the guilty man.
Mark Antony, the cat, is still alive. "Only once did Mark make a
mistake," she says, "when he ran after _that grey figure in the dusk_.
Else he never ran after any but myself and Cyril. Henry, you _know_ who
killed Ben Lee. Tell me," she sobs, "oh, tell me it was not _he!_" Henry
cannot tell her. Lilian is deeply distressed. "His burden was heavier
than mine," Henry says. He comforts her.

The same day, at morning prayer, Cyril enters the cathedral. The organ
is playing Mendelssohn's "O Lord, have mercy upon me!" The cathedral is
packed with people of all degrees, known and unknown, friends and
strangers. The thought that all these will soon know his shame turns
Cyril sick. The faces of all those he has injured rise and reproach him.
He goes through another great spiritual conflict, but his soul emerges
at last, stripped of all pretence, in the awful presence of his Maker,
shuddering with the shame of its uncovered sin, and alone. He nerves
himself to an effort beyond his strength, as he stands in the pulpit
before the innumerable gaze of the vast congregation, by holding Henry's
letter as a talisman in his hand. Thus he preaches his last and greatest
sermon. "I will confess my wickedness, and be sorry for my sin." This he
does literally. He tells the whole story in detail, but without names,
sometimes unable to go on for agony and shame, sometimes with tears
streaming from his eyes. He tells it there that all may take warning
from him. He intends to give himself up to justice as soon as possible.
He does not spare himself. Since his first sin, he says, "I have not had
one happy hour." He never repented, though always consumed with remorse,
until his friend forgave him. "That broke my stony heart," he says. The
congregation are deeply moved and horrified. Many think he is under a
delusion caused by sorrow for his friend, and mental strain. Having
finished in the usual way, he sat down in the pulpit, and neither spoke
nor moved again. There he was found later, dead.

Next day Henry, who deeply moved, has watched by the dead body of the
dean in his library, has to break the news of Cyril's death to Mr.
Maitland, in the very room in which Mr. Maitland had accused him of
Cyril's crime and given him up to the police. The adoring father's mind
gives way under the blow, his memory is permanently confused, and he
lives tranquilly on for some years in the belief that Cyril has only
gone away for a few days.

The story ends with a family scene by Lake Leman, where Henry and
Lilian, happily married, are living for a time with Mr. Maitland and
Cyril's children, whom Henry has kept from knowing their father's guilt.

       *       *       *       *       *




GERALD GRIFFIN


The Collegians


     Gerald Griffin, born at Limerick on December 12, 1803, was one
     of the group of clever Irishmen who, in imitation of Tom
     Moore, sought literary fame in London in the first quarter of
     the nineteenth century. At the age of twenty he was writing
     tales of Munster life. In 1829 he became popular through the
     tale of "The Collegians," here epitomised--a tale that has
     held the stage to the present day under the title of "The
     Colleen Bawn." Nine years later, Griffin renounced literature,
     returned to Ireland, and entered the Church, and on June 12,
     1840, died in a monastery at Cork. A tragedy written in his
     early days was produced successfully by Macready after
     Griffin's death. His fame, however, depends on his pictures of
     Irish life, and they are concentrated best in the literary
     accessories of the present melodrama.


_I.--A Secret Wife_


At a pleasure garden on a hill near Limerick, Eily O'Connor, the
beautiful daughter of Mihil O'Connor, the rope-maker, first met Hardress
Cregan, a young gentleman fresh from college; and on the same night, as
she and her father were returning homeward, they were attacked by a
rabble of men and boys, and rescued by the stranger and his hunchbacked
companion, Danny Mann. A few days afterwards Danny Mann visited the
rope-walk, and had a long conversation with Eily, and from that time the
girl's character seemed to have undergone a change. Her recreations and
her attire became gayer; but her cheerfulness of mind was gone. Her
lover, Myles Murphy, a good-natured farmer from Killarney, gained over
her father to his interests, and the old man pressed her either to give
consent to the match or a good reason for her refusal. After a
distressing altercation, Eily left the house without a word of farewell.

She had married Hardress Cregan secretly, and the priest had died
immediately after the ceremony. The first time she was seen, but not
recognised, in her boyish husband's company was by the Dalys, to which
family his fellow-collegian and intimate friend, Kyrle Daly, belonged. A
boat passed along the river before their house containing a hooded girl,
the hunchback, and Hardress Cregan himself. After they had disappeared,
Kyrle Daly rode to pay court to Anne Chute, Hardress's cousin, and, to
his great distress, learned that she could never be his wife although
she had no other engagement. From her manner he realised that he had a
rival, and the knowledge plunged him into the deepest despair. After her
refusal he went to spend the night at one of his father's dairy farms, a
few miles down the river. Whilst supper was being prepared, word came
that Hardress's boat was being swamped, with every soul aboard.

The collegian, however, brought the boat safely to the shore, and
procured a room for his wife in the dairy-woman's cottage, passing her
off as a relative of Danny Mann's. She retired at once and Hardress and
Kyrle sat talking together of Anne Chute. The sight of his friend's
sufferings won Hardress's sympathies. He protested his disbelief in the
idea of another attachment, and recommended perseverance.

"Trust everything to me," he said. "For your sake I will take some pains
to become better known to this extraordinary girl, and you may depend on
it you shall not suffer in my good report."

When the household was asleep, Hardress went to his wife's room, and
found her troubled because of the strangeness of their circumstances.

"I was thinking," she said, "what a heart-break it would be to my father
if anyone put it into his head that the case was worse than it is. No
more would be wanting, but just a little word on a scrap of paper, to
let him know that he needn't be uneasy, and he'd know all in time."

The suggestion appeared to jar against the young husband's inclinations.
He replied that if she wished he would return with her to her home, and
declare the marriage.

"If you are determined on certainly destroying our happiness," he
continued, "your will shall be dearer to me than fortune or friends. If
you have a father to feel for you, you will not forget, my love, that I
have a mother whom I love as tenderly, and whose feelings deserve some
consideration."

He took her hand and pressed it in a soothing manner.

"Come, dry those sweet eyes, while I tell you shortly what my plans
shall be," he said.

"You have heard me speak of Danny Mann's sister, who lives on the side
of the Purple Mountain, in the Gap of Dunlough? I have had two neat
rooms fitted up for you in her cottage, and you can have books to read,
and a little garden to amuse you, and a Kerry pony to ride over the
mountains. In the meantimes I will steal a visit now and then to my
mother, who spends the autumn in the neighbourhood. I will gradually let
her into my secret, and obtain her forgiveness. I am certain she will
not withhold it. I shall then present you to her. She will commend your
modesty and gentleness; we will send for your father, and then where is
the tongue that shall venture to wag against the fame of Eily Cregan!"

The young man left her, a little chagrined at her apparent slowness in
appreciating his noble condescension. In his boyhood he had entertained
a passion for his cousin, Anne Chute; but after the long separation of
school and college, he had imagined that his early love was completely
forgotten. The feeling with which he regarded her now was rather of
resentment than indifference, and it had been with a secret creeping of
the heart that he had witnessed what he thought was the successful
progress of Kyrle Daly's attachment. It was under those circumstances
that he formed his present hasty union with Eily. His love for her was
deep, sincere, and tender. Her entire and unbounded confidence, her
extreme beauty, her simplicity and timid deference made a soothing
compensation to his heart for the coldness of the haughty, though
superior beauty, whose inconstancy had raised his indignation.

In the morning, accompanied by Eily and Danny Mann, he sailed for
Ballybunion, where they rested in a cavern while the hunchback sought an
eligible lodging for the night. During his absence Hardress told Eily
that Danny Mann was his foster-brother, and that he himself had been the
cause of the poor fellow's deformity.

"When we were children he was my constant companion," he said.
"Familiarity produced a feeling of equality, on which he presumed so far
as to offer rudeness to a little relative of mine, a Miss Chute, who was
on a visit to my mother. She complained to me, and my vengeance was
summary. I seized him by the collar, and hurled him with desperate force
to the bottom of a flight of stairs. An injury was done to his spine."

But Danny Mann had shown naught but good nature and kindly feeling ever
since. His attachment had become the attachment of a zealot. Hardress
was sometimes alarmed at the profane importance he attached to his
master's wishes; he seemed to care but little what laws he might
transgress when the gratification of Hardress's inclination was in
question.


_II.--Tempted_


A week afterwards Hardress visited his parents at their Killarney
residence, to find that his mother, with her niece, Anne Chute, had gone
to a grand ball in the neighbourhood. His father was spending the night
with his boon fellows, and a favourite old huntsman lay dying in a room
near by. This retainer told his young master that Anne Chute loved him
well, and that she deserved a better fortune than to love without
return. Hardress went to bed, and was awakened by his mother upon her
return. She reproved him for his long absence, and told him of the
sensation his beautiful cousin was making in society. In the morning he
met Anne with some consciousness and distress. A womanly reserve and
delicacy made the girl unwilling to affect an intimacy that might not be
graciously acknowledged. She treated him coldly, and began to read some
silly novel of the day.

"Ah, Eily, my own, own Eily!" he murmured to himself. "You are worth
this fine lady a hundred times over!"

His mother appeared; her raillery entrapped both him and Anne in a scene
of coquetry. No longer embarrassed by the feeling of strangeness and
apprehension which had depressed her spirits on their first meeting
after his return from college, Anne now assumed ease and liveliness of
manner. Every hour he spent in her society removed from his mind the
prejudice he had conceived against her, and supplied its place with a
feeling of strong kindness. When he left the merry circle to return to
Eily, blank regret fell suddenly upon his heart. But the sorrow which
Anne manifested at his departure, and the cordial pleasure with which
she heard of his intention to return soon, inspired him with the
strangest happiness. The next time he thought of Eily and his cousin,
the conjunction was less favourable to the former.

"My poor little love!" he thought. "How much she has to learn before she
can assume, with comfort to herself, the place for which I have designed
her!"

At the cottage Eily received him with rapture and affection, and every
other feeling was banished from his mind. But in the course of the
evening she remarked that he was more silent and abstracted than she had
ever seen him, and that he more frequently spoke in connection of some
little breach of etiquette, or inelegance of manner, than in those terms
of eloquent praise and fondness which he was accustomed to lavish upon
her. The next day he returned to his mother's house leaving her in
tears.

That night Mrs. Cregan gave a ball, at which he was one of the gayest
revellers. Soon afterwards his mother also told him that Anne was in
love, and with none other than himself. In great agitation he replied
that he had already pledged himself to another. She insisted that any
other engagement must be broken, since if there was to be a victim it
should not be Anne. The lady's violent maternal affection overruled him,
and in spite of the call of honour he dared not tell her that he was
already married.

During the ensuing weeks Eily perceived a rapid and fearful change in
his temper and appearance. His visits were fewer and shorter, and his
manner became extraordinarily restrained and conscious.

But when she told him that the loneliness was troubling her, he accused
her of jealousy.

"If I was jealous, and with reason," said Eily. smiling seriously,
"nobody would ever know it; for I wouldn't say a word, only stretch upon
my bed and die. I wouldn't be long in his way, I'll engage."

Hardress warned her never to inquire into his secrets, nor to effect an
influence which he would not admit. He bade her avoid suffering the
slightest suspicion to appear, since when suspicions are afloat men find
the temptation to furnish them with a cause almost irresistible. Eily
protested that she was joking, and his uneasy conscience threw him into
a paroxysm of fury.

"Curse on you!" he cried. "Curse on your beauty, curse on my own folly,
for I have been undone by both! I hate you! Take the truth; I'll not be
poisoned with it! I am sick of you; you have disgusted me! I will ease
my heart by telling you the whole. If I seek the society of other women,
it is because I find not among them your meanness and vulgarity!"

"Oh, Hardress," shrieked the affrighted girl, "you are not in earnest
now?"

"I do _not_ joke!" he exclaimed, with a hoarse vehemence.

"Oh, my dear Hardress, listen to me! Hear your poor Eily for one moment!
Oh, my poor father! Forgive me, Hardress. I left my home and all for
you. Oh, do not cast me off! I will do anything to please you. I will
never open my lips again. Only say you do not mean all that."

He tore himself away, leaving Eily unconscious on the ground. On the
summit of the Purple Mountain, which was all surrounded by mist, he met
Danny Mann, and confided to him that his love of Eily had turned to
hatred, asking his advice concerning what must be done.

"Sorrow trouble would I even give myself about her," said Danny, "only
send her home packin' to her father!"

"Should I send Eily home to earn for myself the reputation of a
faithless villain!" said Hardress.

"Why, then I'll tell you what I'd do," said Danny, nodding his head.
"Pay her passage out to Quaybec, an' put her aboard of a three-master.
Do by her as you'd do to dat glove you have on your hand. Make it come
off as well as it comes on, an' if it fits too tight, take the knife to
it. Only give me the word, an' I'll engage Eily O'Connor will never
trouble you any more. Don't ax me any questions; only, if you are
agreeable, take off that glove an' give it to me for a token. Lave the
rest to Danny."

Hardress gazed upon the face of the hunchback with an expression of
gaping terror, as if he stood in the presence of the Arch Tempter
himself. Then he caught him by the throat, and shook him with appalling
violence.

"If you ever dare again to utter a word or meditate a thought of evil
against that unhappy creature," he cried, "I will tear you limb from
limb between my hands!"


_III.--"Found Drowned"_


Hardress had left Eily almost unprovided with funds. After a few weeks
she was obliged to write for pecuniary assistance. The letter was
unheeded. She borrowed a pony, and went to ask advice from her father's
brother, Father O'Connor, of Castle Island. The priest received her very
coldly, but became deeply moved upon hearing that she was legally
married. She begged him to inform her father that she hoped soon to ask
his pardon for all the sorrow she had caused. He gave her all the money
he had, and she returned to the cottage.

Danny Mann delivered Eily's letter, and sat drinking with his master in
Mrs. Cregan's drawing-room. Anne Chute entered, and finding the man she
loved in an intoxicated condition she withdrew in sorrow and disgust.

He asked the girl's forgiveness when soberness returned, and she told
him that she was greatly distressed because of his changed manner. For a
long time past there had been a distressing series of misconceptions on
her part, and of inconsistencies on his. She could not explain how
deeply troubled she felt.

The intoxication of passion overcame Hardress, and he told her that the
key to everything was that he loved her. She forgave him, and he was
about to send a reassuring line to his mother, when he found in his
hands a portion of Eily's letter, in which she begged him to let her go
back to her father. He turned white with fear, but Mrs. Cregan entered,
and her strong will overbore his scruples. He declared himself ready to
marry his beautiful cousin. Then he sought Danny Mann, and reminded him
of his suggestion about hiring a passage for Eily in a North American
vessel.

"You bade me draw my glove from off my hand, and give it for a warrant,"
he said, plucking off the glove slowly finger by finger. "My mind is
altered. I married too young; I didn't know my own mind. I am burning
with this thralldom. Here is my glove."

Danny took it, whilst they exchanged a look of cold and fatal
intelligence. Hardress gave him a purse, and repeated that Eily must not
stay in Ireland, that three thousand miles of roaring ocean were a
security for silence. Not a hair of her head must be hurt, but he would
never see her more. Then he wrote on the back of Eily's letter
instructions for her to put herself under the bearer's care, and he
would restore her to her father. She determined to obey at once, and
without a murmur, and at nightfall left the cottage in Danny's company.
Two hours afterwards Hardress himself arrived in a fit of compunction.
On learning that they had departed, he swore to himself that if this his
servant exceeded his views, he would tear his flesh from his bones, and
gibbet him as a miscreant and a ruffian.

The night grew wild and stormy; a thunderstorm broke over the hill.
Hardress slumbered in his chair, crying out, "My glove, my glove! You
used it against my meaning! I meant but banishment. We shall be hanged
for this!"

He awoke from a fearsome nightmare, and, unable to remain longer in the
cottage, ran home with the speed of one distracted. There he rebuked his
mother wildly, telling her that she had forced him into madness, and
that he was free to execute her will--to marry or hang, whichever she
pleased. His love of Anne now became entirely dormant, and he was able
to estimate the greatness of his guilt without even the suggestion of a
palliative. Anne returned to Castle Chute, and preparations were soon
being made for the wedding. Hardress and his mother went to stay there,
and Kyrle Daly heard for the first time that he had won the girl's love,
instead of pleading his fellow-collegian's cause as he had promised. The
anger he felt was diverted by a family tragedy--the death of his mother.
At her wake Hardress appeared, and found himself face to face with old
Mihil O'Connor, his father-in-law. The ropemaker, who had only a faint
recollection of having met him before, told him of his heart-break
because of Eily's disappearance, and misread his agitation for sympathy.

Some while afterwards the gentry of the neighbourhood hunted the fox,
and the dogs found on the bank of the Shannon a body covered with a
large blue mantle that was drenched with wet and mire. A pair of small
feet in Spanish leather shoes appearing from below the end of the
garment showed that the body was that of a female, whilst a mass of
long, fair hair which escaped from the hood proved that death had found
the victim untimely in her youth.


_IV.--Exiled for Life_


Hardress confided the mournful story to his mother, assuring her that he
was Eily's murderer. After the first extreme agitation, the lady
declared that he overrated the measure of his guilt. She reproached him
for his lack of confidence, after all the love she had showered upon
him. He clenched his hand, and she affected to fear that he intended to
strike her. At her outcry of fear he sank to her feet, lowering his
forehead to the very dust.

"There is one way left for reparation," he said. "I will give myself up.
There is peace and comfort in the thought."

He was interrupted by the entrance of Anne. Mrs. Cregan accounted for
her son's excitement by saying that he was ill. Later in the evening
they heard that the coroner had not even found anyone to identify the
body, and that the jury had returned a verdict of "Found Drowned." Some
days afterwards Hardress went shooting to the creek, and, believing that
he had killed a serving-man, fled panic-stricken back to the house. The
fellow, however, was unhurt, but his cries attracted the attention of a
stranger who had lain concealed under a bank. A party of soldiers
appeared now and fired at this unknown man, and soon he staggered and
was taken prisoner.

Mrs. Cregan came to Hardress's room with fearful tidings. Eily's dress
had been recognised, and suspicion had fallen upon Danny Mann. Hardress
told her that his former servant had left the country, but soon the
soldiers arrived at the house with the hunchback in charge. Late that
night Hardress left his bed, and entered the stable where Danny was
confined. The hunchback advanced towards him slowly, his hands wreathed
together, his jaw dropped, and his eyes filled with tears. He offered
Hardress the glove.

"I had my token surely for what I done," he said. "'Here is your
warrant,' you says. Worn't them your words?"

"But not for death," replied Hardress. "I did not say for death."

"I own you didn't," said Danny Mann. "I felt for you, an' I wouldn't
wait for you to say it. Your eye looked murder; as sure as that moon is
shinin', so sure the sign of death was on your face that time, whatever
way your words went."

Hardress gave him money, and helped him to escape, bidding him leave the
country. "If ever we should meet again on Irish soil," he said, "it must
be the death of either."

The exertions for Danny Mann's recapture proved unavailing, and in a few
weeks the affair had begun to grow unfamiliar to the tongues and
recollections of the people. Hardress's depression reached an unbearable
degree, and Anne at last grew seriously uneasy. He assured her that if
she knew all she would pity and not blame. Then, one day when they were
walking together they came upon some countryfolk dancing in the road,
and amongst them Hardress recognised the hunchback. He caught him by the
throat and flung him violently against the wall.

Danny Mann was taken into custody again, and, before the magistrate,
told of Hardress's complicity in the crime. He declared that he had
always loved his master, but that from the moment of the assault a
change had come over his love.

"He had his revenge, an' I'll have mine," he said. "He doesn't feel for
me, an' I won't feel for him. Write down Danny Mann for the murderer of
Eily, an' write down Hardress Cregan for his adviser." He produced the
certificate of Eily's marriage. "I took it out of her bosom after--" He
shuddered with such violence that the door trembled. "She kep' her hand
in her bosom upon that paper to the last gasp, as if she thought it was
to rob her of that I wanted."

The magistrate, accompanied by a guard, rode to Castle Chute. It was the
wedding evening, and the house was filled with gay company. As all sat
at table together, Hardress heard a low voice whisper in his ear,
"Arise, and fly for your life!" The wineglass fell from his hand, and he
became filled with terror. Once again he heard the voice, "Arise, I tell
you! The army is abroad, and your life is in danger!"

As he was preparing to escape, his mother entered his presence.

"The doors are all defended!" she cried. "There is a soldier set on
every entrance! You are trapped and caught! The window--come this way,
quick--quick!"

She drew him passively into her own bed-chamber; some minutes later the
soldiers forced their way forward, and found him concealed in an inner
place. His mother sank at his feet, and cried out that the crime was
hers, since she had been the author of his first temptation, the
stumbling-block between him and repentance.

"I have tied the cord upon your throat!" she shrieked. "I have been your
fellest foe! You drank in pride with my milk, and passion under my
indulgence!"

Hardress took the wretched woman in his arms and kissed her forehead.

"I will pray for you at the moment of my death, as you will pray for
me," he said. Then he surrendered himself to the soldiers, and was taken
away. At the trial the mercy of the executive power was extended to his
life, and he was sentenced to perpetual exile. As the convict ship which
was to bear him from home waited in the river, he was brought from his
gaol and left for a short time on the quay, where he heard that Eily's
father had died, after praying for and forgiving his enemies. The boat
arrived to convey him to the ship, and whilst descending the steps he
was overcome by a seizure, and would have fallen but for the aid of his
escort. The dawn of the following morning beheld him tossed upon the
waves of the Atlantic, and looking back to the clifted heads of the
Shannon, that stood like a gigantic portal opening far behind. The land
of his nativity faded rapidly on his sight, but before the vessel came
in sight of that of his exile, he had rendered up the life which the law
forbore to take.

Danny Mann died amid all the agonies of a remorse which made even those
whose eyes had looked upon such cases shrink back with fear and wonder.
Mrs. Cregan lived many years after Hardress's departure, practising the
austere and humiliating works of piety which her Church prescribes for
the penitent.

Anne Chute, in the course of time, became Kyrle Daly's wife, and they
were as happy as earth could render hearts that looked to higher
destinies and a more lasting rest.

       *       *       *       *       *




JOHN HABBERTON


Helen's Babies


     John Habberton, the author of "Helen's Babies," was born in
     Brooklyn, New York, on February 24, 1842. He enlisted in the
     army in 1862, and served through the Civil War, at the close
     of which he adopted journalism as a profession, becoming, in
     due course, literary editor of the "Christian Union." His
     first and most popular story, "Helen's Babies," after being
     declined by various publishers, appeared in 1876, and more
     than a quarter of a million copies have been sold in America
     alone. According to Mr. Habberton himself, the story "grew out
     of an attempt to keep for a single day the record of the
     doings of a brace of boys of whom the author is half-owner."
     Apart from a number of novels, Mr. Habberton has also written
     a "Life of George Washington," and a play, "Deacon Cranket,"
     performed more than five hundred times.


_I.--The Imps_


The first cause of the existence of this book may be found in a letter,
written by my sister, and received by me, Harry Burton, salesman of
white goods, bachelor, aged twenty-eight, just as I was trying to decide
where I should spend a fortnight's vacation. She suggested, as I was
always complaining of never having time to read, I should stay at her
place, while she and her husband went on a fortnight's visit. She owned
she would feel easier if she knew there was a man in the house.

"Just the thing!" I ejaculated. Five minutes later I had telegraphed my
acceptance, and had mentally selected books enough for a dozen
vacations. I knew enough of Helen's boys to be sure they would give one
no annoyance. Budge, the elder, was five years of age, and had
generally, during my flying visits, worn a shy, serious, meditative,
noble face, and Toddie was a happy little know-nothing of three summers,
with tangled yellow hair.

Three days later I hired a hackman to drive me from Hillcrest Station.
Half a mile from my brother-in-law's residence the horses shied
violently, and the driver, after talking freely to them, remarked, "That
was one of the Imps!"

As he spoke the offending youth came panting beside our carriage, and in
a very dirty sailor-suit I recognised my nephew Budge. Then a smaller
boy emerged from the bushes at the side of the road, and I beheld the
unmistakable lineaments of Toddie.

"They're my nephews!" I gasped.

"Budge," I said, with all the sternness I could command; "do you know
me?"

"Yes; you're Uncle Harry. Did you bring us anything?"

"I wish I could have brought you some big whippings for behaving so
badly. Get into this carriage."

As they clambered up, I noticed that each one carried a very dirty
towel, knotted tightly in the centre. After some moments' disgusted
contemplation of these rags, I asked Budge what these towels were for.

"They're not towels, they're dollies," promptly answered my nephew.

"Goodness!" I exclaimed. "I should think your mother might buy you
respectable dolls, and not let you appear in public with these loathsome
rags."

"We don't like buyed dollies," said Budge. "These dollies is lovely.
Mine's got blue eyes and Toddie's has got brown eyes."

"I want to shee your watch," remarked Toddie, snatching the chain and
rolling into my lap.

"Oh-oo-ee! So do I!" shouted Budge, hastening to occupy one knee, and in
transit wiping his shoes on my trousers and the skirts of my coat.

A carriage containing a couple of ladies was rapidly approaching; I
dropped my head to avoid meeting their glance, for my few minutes of
contact with my dreadful nephews had made me feel inexpressibly un-neat.
The carriage stopped. I heard my own name spoken. There, erect, fresh,
neat, bright-eyed, fair-faced, smiling, and observant, sat Miss Alice
Mayton, a lady who for about a year I had been adoring from afar.

"When did you arrive, Mr. Burton?" she asked. "You're certainly a
happy-looking trio--so unconventional! You look as if you had been
having _such_ a good time."

"I--I assure you, Miss Mayton, that my experience has been the reverse
of a pleasant one. If King Herod were yet alive I'd volunteer as an
executioner."

"You dreadful wretch!" exclaimed the lady. "Mother, let me make you
acquainted with Mr. Burton, Helen Lawrence's brother. How is your
sister, Mr. Burton?"

"I don't know," I replied; "she's gone with her husband on a visit, and
I've been silly enough to promise to give an eye to the place while
they're away."

"Why, how delightful!" said Miss Mayton. "Such horses! Such flowers!
Such a cook!"

"And such children!" said I, glaring at the Imps, and rescuing my
handkerchief from Toddie.

"Why, they're the best children in the world! Helen told me so. Children
will be children, you know. I don't wish to give any hints, but at Mrs.
Clarkson's, where we're boarding, there's not a flower in the whole
garden. I break the Tenth Commandment every time I pass Colonel
Lawrence's. Good-bye."

"Of course you'll call," said Miss Mayton, as the carriage started;
"it's dreadfully stupid here. No men, except on Sundays."

I bowed assent. In the contemplation of all the shy possibilities my
short chat with Miss Mayton had suggested, I had quite forgotten my
dusty clothing and the two little living causes thereof.


_II.--The Fate of a Bouquet_


Next morning at breakfast Toddie remarked, "Ocken Hawwy, darsh an awfoo
funny chunt upstairs. I show it to you after brepspup."

"Toddie's a silly little boy," said Budge, "he always says brepspup for
brekbux."

"Oh, what does he mean by chunt, Budge?"

"I guess he means trunk," replied my elder nephew.

Recollections of my childish delight in rummaging an old trunk caused me
to smile sympathetically at Toddie, to his great delight.

A direful thought struck me. I dashed upstairs. Yes, he did mean my
trunk. While a campaigner, I had learned to reduce packing to an exact
science. Now, if I had an atom of pride in me, I might have glorified
myself, for it certainly seemed as if the heap upon the floor could
never have come out of one single trunk.

In the lid of my dressing-case lay my dress-coat, tightly rolled up.
Snatching it up, with a violent exclamation, there dropped from it--one
of these infernal dolls. A howl resounded from the doorway.

"You tookted my dolly out of her k'adle--want to wock my dolly oo-ee-
ee!"

I called the girl, and asked where the key was that locked the door
between my room and the children's.

"Please sir, Toddie threw it down the well."

I removed the lock and told the coachman to get ready at once to drive
to Paterson, where the nearest locksmith lived, by the hill road, one of
the most beautiful roads in America.

Away went the horses, and up rose a piercing shriek and a terrible roar.
I looked out hastily, only to see Budge and Toddie running after the
carriage and crying pitifully. The driver stopped of his own accord--he
seemed to know the children's ways and their results--and I helped them
in, meekly hoping the eye of Providence was upon me.

That afternoon I devoted myself to making a bouquet for Miss Mayton, and
a most delightful occupation I found it.

Not that I was in love with Miss Mayton. A man may honestly and strongly
admire a handsome, brilliant woman, and delight himself in trying to
give her pleasure without feeling it necessary she shall give him
herself in return.

My delight suddenly became clouded. What would folks say? Everybody knew
where Mike was employed--everybody knew I was the only gentleman at
present residing at Colonel Lawrence's. Ah, I had it.

I had seen in one of the library drawers a pasteboard box--just the
size. I dropped my card into the bottom, neatly fitted in the bouquet,
and went in search of Mike.

He winked cheeringly, and said he would do it "as clane as a whistle.
Divil a man can see, but the angels, and they won't tell."

"Very well, Mike. Here's a dollar for you. You'll find the box on the
hat-rack in the hall."

With a head full of pleasing fancies I went down to supper, and found my
new friends unusually good. Their ride seemed to have toned down their
boisterousness, and elevated their little souls. So when they invited me
to put them to bed I gladly accepted. Toddie disappeared somewhere, and
came back disconsolate.

"Can't find my doll's k'adle!" he whined.

"Never mind, old pet!" said I, soothingly, "uncle will ride you on his
foot."

"But I want my dolly's k'adle, tawse my dolly's in it, and I want to
shee her!"

"Don't you want me to tell you a story?"

For a moment Toddle's face indicated a terrible internal conflict
between old Adam and Mother Eve; finally curiosity overpowered natural
depravity, and Toddie muttered, "Yesh!"

Very soon a knock at the door interrupted me. "Come in!" I shouted.

In stepped Mike, with an air of the greatest secrecy, handed me a letter
and _the_ box. What could it mean? I hastily opened the envelope, while
Toddie shrieked, "Oh, darsh my dolly's k'adle--dare tizh!" snatched and
opened the box, and displayed--his doll!

My heart sickened as I read, "Miss Mayton herewith returns to Mr. Burton
the package which has just arrived, with his card. She recognises the
contents as a portion of the property of one of Mr. Burton's nephews,
but is unable to understand why it should have been sent to her."

"Toddie!" I roared, as my younger nephew caressed his loathsome doll,
"where did you get that box?"

"On the hat-wack," he replied, with perfect fearlessness. "I keeps it in
ze bookcase djawer, and somebody took it 'way an' put nasty ole flowers
in it."

"Where are those flowers?" I demanded.

Toddie looked up with considerable surprise, but promptly replied, "I
froed 'em away--don't want no ole flowers in my dolly's k'adle. That's
ze way she wocks--see?" And this horrible little destroyer of human
hopes rolled that box back and forth with the most utter unconcern.

Of language to express my feeling to Toddie, I could find absolutely
none. Within these few minutes I had discovered how very anxious I
really was to merit Miss Mayton's regard, and how very different was the
regard I wanted from that which I had previously hoped might be accorded
to me. Under my stern glance Toddie gradually lost interest in his doll,
and began to thrust forth his piteous lower lip, and to weep copiously.

"Dee Lord, not make me sho bad." He even retired to a corner and hid his
face in self-imposed penance.

"Never mind, Toddie," said I sadly; "you didn't mean to do it, I know."

"I wantsh to love you," sobbed Toddie.

"Well, come here, you poor little fellow."

Toddie came to my arms, shed tears freely upon my shirt-front, and
finally remarked, "Wantsh you to love me!"

I kissed Toddie, and petted him, and at length succeeded in quieting
him. He looked earnestly, confidingly, in my eyes, and then said, "Kish
my dolly, too!"

I obeyed. My forgiveness was complete, and so was my humiliation. I
withdrew abruptly to write an apology.


_III.--Budge, the Interpreter_


On Monday morning I devoted myself to Toddie's expiatory bouquet, in
which I had the benefit of my nephews' assistance and counsel, and took
enforced part in the conversation.

At two o'clock I instructed Maggie to dress my nephews, and at three we
started to make our call. As we approached, I saw Miss Mayton on the
piazza. Handing the bouquet to Toddie, we entered the garden, when he
shrieked, "Oh, there's a cutter-grass!" and with the carelessness born
of perfect ecstasy, dropped the bouquet.

I snatched it before it reached the ground, dragged him up to Miss
Mayton, and told him to give the bouquet to the lady. As she stooped to
kiss him, he wriggled off like a little eel, shouted "Tum on!" to his
brother, and a moment later both were following the lawn-mower at a
respectful distance.

"Bless the little darlings!" said Miss Mayton. "I do love to see
children enjoying themselves!"

We settled down to a pleasant chat about books, pictures, music, and the
gossip of our set. Handsome, intelligent, composed, tastefully dressed,
she awakened to the uttermost every admiring sentiment and every manly
feeling. When I began to take leave, Miss Mayton's mother insisted that
we should stay to dinner.

"For myself, I should be delighted, Mrs. Mayton," said I, "but my
nephews have hardly learned company manners yet."

"Oh, I'll take care of the little dears," said Miss Mayton. "They'll be
good with me, I know."

She insisted, and the pleasure of submitting to her will was so great
that I would have risked even greater mischief. The soup was served, and
Toddie immediately tilted his plate so that part of its contents sought
refuge in the folds of Miss Mayton's dainty, snowy dress. She treated
that wretched boy with the most Christian forbearance during the rest of
the meal.

When the dessert was finished, she quickly excused herself, and I
removed Toddie to a secluded corner, and favoured him with a lecture
which caused him to howl pitifully, and compelled me to caress him and
undo all the good I had done.

I awaited Miss Mayton's reappearance to offer an apology for Toddie, and
to make my adieus. The other ladies departed in twos and threes, and
left us without witnesses.

Suddenly she appeared, and, whatever was the cause, she looked queenly.
She dropped into a chair, and the boys retired to the end of the piazza
to make experiments on a large Newfoundland dog, while I, the happiest
man alive, talked to the glorious woman before me, and enjoyed her
radiant beauty. The twilight came and deepened, and our voices
unconsciously dropped to lower tones, and her voice seemed purest music.

Suddenly a small shadow came between, and the voice of Budge remarked,
"Uncle Harry 'spects you, Miss Mayton."

"Suspects me! Of what, pray?" exclaimed the lady, patting my nephew's
cheek.

"Budge," said I--I felt my voice rising nearly to a scream--"Budge, I
must beg you to respect the sanctity of confidential communications."

"What is it, Budge?" persisted Miss Mayton. "You know the old adage, Mr.
Burton, 'Children and fools speak the truth.' Of what does he suspect
me, Budge?"

"'Tain't _sus_pect at all," said Budge; "it's espect."

"Expect?" echoed Miss Mayton.

"Respect is what the boy is trying to say, Miss Mayton," I interrupted.
"Budge has a terrifying faculty for asking questions, and the result of
some of them this morning was my endeavour to explain the nature of the
respect in which gentlemen hold ladies."

"Yes," said Budge; "I know all about it. Only Uncle Harry don't say it
right. What he calls respect _I_ calls _love_."

"Miss Mayton," I said hastily, earnestly, "Budge is a marplot, but he is
a very truthful interpreter, for all that. Whatever my fate may be, do
not----"

"I want to talk some," observed Budge. "You talk all the whole time.
I--when I loves anybody I kisses them." Miss Mayton gave a little start,
and my thoughts followed each other with unimagined rapidity. She was
not angry, evidently. Could it be that----? I bent over her, and acted
on Budge's suggestion. She raised her head slightly, and I saw that
Alice Mayton had surrendered at discretion. Taking her hand, I offered
to the Lord more fervent thanks than He had ever heard from me in
church. Then Budge said, "I wants to kiss you, too." And I saw my
glorious Alice snatch the little scamp into her arms and treat him with
more affection than I had ever imagined was in her nature.

Suddenly two or three ladies came upon the piazza.

"Come, boys!" said I. "Then I'll call with the carriage to-morrow at
three, Miss Mayton. Good-evening."

That night I wrote to my sister to inform her that the scales had fallen
from my eyes--I saw clearly that my nephews were angels. And I begged to
refer her to Alice Mayton for collateral evidence.


_IV.--The Fruit of My Visit_


A few days later I had a letter from my sister to say she had been
recalling a fortnight's experience they once had of courtship in a
boarding-house, so had determined to cut short her visit and hurry home.
Friday morning they intended to arrive--blessings on their thoughtful
hearts! And this was Friday. I hurried into the boys' room and shouted,
"Toddie! Budge! Who do you think is coming to see you this morning?"

"Who?" asked Budge.

"Organ-grinder?" queried Toddie.

"No; your papa and mamma."

Budge looked like an angel at once, but Toddie murmured mournfully, "I
fought it wash an organ-grinder."

"Oh, Uncle Harry," said Budge, in a perfect delirium of delight, "I
believe if my papa and mamma had stayed away any longer I believe I
would _die_. I've been so lonesome for them that I haven't known what to
do. I've cried whole pillowsful about it, right here in the dark."

"Why, my poor old fellow," said I, picking him up and kissing him. "Why
didn't you come and tell Uncle Harry, and let him try to comfort you?"

"I couldn't," said Budge. "When I gets lonesome, it feels as if my mouth
was all tied up, and a big, great stone was right in here." And Budge
put his hand on his chest.

"If a big tone wash inshide of me," said Toddie, "I'd take it out and
frow it at the shickens."

"Toddie," I said, "aren't you glad papa and mamma are coming?"

"Yesh," said Toddie. "Mamma always bwings me candy fen she goes
anyfere."

During the hour which passed before it was time to start for the depot,
my sole attention was devoted to keeping the children from soiling their
clothes, but my success was so little, I lost my temper utterly.

"Harness the horse, Mike," I shouted.

"An' the goat, too," added Budge.

Five minutes later I was seated in the carriage.

"Are you all ready, boys?" I asked.

"In a minute," said Budge; "soon as I fix this. Now," he continued,
getting into his seat and seizing the reins and whip, "go ahead!"

"Wait a minute, Budge. Put down that whip, and don't touch the goat with
it once. I'm going to drive very slowly; all you need do is to hold the
reins."

"All right," said Budge; "but I like to look like mans when I drive."

The horses went at a gentle trot, and the goat followed very closely.
When within a minute of the depot the train swept in. I gave the horses
the whip, looked, and saw the boys close behind me. Nothing but the
sharpest of turns saved me from a severe accident. As it was, I heard
two hard thumps upon the wooden wall, and two frightful howls, and saw
both my nephews mixed up on the platform, while the driver of the stage
growled in my ear, "What in thunder did you let 'em hitch that goat to
your axletree for?"

How the goat's head and shoulders maintained their normal connection
during the last minute of my drive, I leave naturalists to explain.
Fortunately, the children had struck on their heads, and the Lawrence-
Burton skull is a marvel of solidity. I set them on their feet, promised
them all the candy they could eat for a week, and hurried them to the
other side of the depot. Budge rushed at Tom, exclaiming, "See my goat,
papa?"

Helen was somewhat concerned about the children, but found time to look
at me with so much of sympathy, humour, affection, and condescension
that I really felt relieved when we reached the house. And how
gloriously the rest of the day passed off! We had a delightful little
lunch, and Tom brought up a bottle of Roederer, and we drank to "her and
her mother." Then Helen proposed, "The makers of the match--Budge and
Toddie," which was honoured with bumpers. The gentlemen toasted did not
respond, but stared so curiously I sprang from my chair and kissed them
soundly, while Helen and Tom exchanged significant glances.

Young as they are, I find frequent reason to be jealous of them, but
artifice alone can prevent them monopolising the time of an adorable
being of whose society I cannot possibly have too much. She insists
that, when the ceremony takes place in December, they shall officiate as
groomsmen, and I have no doubt she will carry her point In fact, when I
retire for the night without first seeking their room, and putting a
grateful kiss on their unconscious lips, my conscience upbraids me with
base ingratitude. To think I might yet be a hopeless bachelor had it not
been for them, is to overflow with gratitude to the Giver of Helen's
Babies.

       *       *       *       *       *




LUDOVIC HALEVY


The Abbé Constantin


     Ludovic Halevy, born in Paris on January 1, 1834, was a nephew
     of Jacques François Halevy, the famous operatic composer.
     Beginning life in the Civil Service, he himself achieved
     considerable distinction as a dramatic author, "Frou-Frou,"
     written in collaboration with Meilhac, being one of the
     greatest theatrical successes of his century. He soon,
     however, forsook the drama for fiction. His first novel,
     "Monsieur and Madame Cardinal," published in 1873, gave ample
     promise of the inventive genius and gift of characterisation
     that were fully realised nine years later in "L'Abbé
     Constantin." The tale, an exquisite study of French provincial
     life, came as a distinct revelation of French life and
     character to English readers. It has reached 240 editions, and
     has been translated into all European languages. In 1886
     Halevy was elected to the French Academy. He died on May 8,
     1908.


_I.--"The Good Days Are Gone"_


With footstep firm and strong, despite his weight of years, an old
priest was walking along a dusty country road one sunny day in May 1881.
It was more than thirty years since the Abbé Constantin had first become
_curé_ of the little village sleeping there in the sunny plain of
France, beside a dainty stream called the Lizotte. He had been walking
for a quarter of an hour along the wall of the Château de Longueval. As
he reached the massive entrance gates he stopped and gazed sadly at two
immense bills pasted on the pillars. They announced the sale by auction
that day of the Longueval estate, divided into four lots: (1) The
castle, with all its grounds and parks; (2) the farm of
Blanche-Couronne, 700 acres; (3) the farm of Rozeraie, 500 acres; (4)
the forest and woods of Mionne, 900 acres. The reserve prices totalled
the respectable sum of 2,050,000 francs!

So that magnificent estate, which for two centuries had passed intact
from father to son in the Longueval family, was to be divided. The bills
announced, it was true, that after the preliminary sale of the four lots
the highest bidder might bid for the whole estate. But it was an
enormous sum, and no purchaser was likely to present himself.

The Marquise de Longueval, dying six months since, had left three heirs,
her grandchildren, two of whom were under age, so that the estate had to
be put up for sale. Pierre, the eldest, an extravagant young man of
twenty-three, had foolishly squandered half his money, and was quite
unable to re-purchase Longueval.

It was twelve o'clock. In an hour the château would have a new master.
Who would he be? Who could take the place of the marquise, the old
friend of the country curé, and the kindly friend of all the villagers.
The old priest walked on, thinking sadly of the habits of thirty years
suddenly interrupted. Every Thursday and every Sunday he had dined at
the château. How much had they made of him! Curé of Longueval! All his
life he had been that, had dreamed of nothing else. He loved his little
church, the little village, and his little vicarage.

Still in pensive mood, he was passing the park of Lavardens when he
heard some one calling him. Looking up, he saw the Countess of Lavardens
and her son Paul. She was a widow; her son a handsome young man, who had
made a bad start in the world and now contented himself by spending some
months in Paris every year, when he dissipated the annual allowance from
his mother, and returned home for the rest of the year to loaf about in
idleness or in pursuit of stupid sports.

"Where are you off to, Monsieur le Curé?" asked the countess.

"To Souvigny, to learn the result of the sale."

"Stay here with us. M. de Larnac is there, and will hasten back with the
news. But I can tell you who are the new owners of the castle."

At this the abbé turned into the gates of the countess's grounds, and
joined that lady and her son on the terrace of their house. The new
owners, it appeared, were to be M. de Larnac, M. Gallard, a rich Paris
banker, and the countess herself, for the three had agreed to purchase
it between them.

"It is all settled," the lady assured him. But presently M. de Larnac
arrived with the news that they had been unable to buy it, as some
American had paid an enormous sum for the entire estate. The person who
was now to be the great lady of Longueval was named Madame Scott.

M. de Larnac had some further particulars to add. He had heard that the
Scotts were great upstarts, and that the new owner of the castle had
actually been a beggar in New York. A great lawsuit had resulted in
favour of her and her husband, making them the owners of a silver-mine.

"And we are to have such people for neighbours!" exclaimed the countess.
"An adventuress, and no doubt a Protestant, Monsieur le Curé!"

The abbé was very sore at heart, and, never doubting but that the new
mistress of the castle would be no friend of his, he took his way
homeward. In his imagination he saw this Madame Scott settled at the
castle and despising his little Catholic church and all his simple
services to the quiet village folk.

He was still brooding over the unhappy fate of Longueval when his
godson, Jean Reynaud--son of his old friend Dr. Reynaud--to whom he had
been as good as a father, and who was worthy of the old priest's love,
dismounted at his door. For Jean was now a lieutenant in the artillery
stationed in the district, and much of his leisure was spent at the
abbé's house. Jean tried to console him by saying that even though this
American, Madame Scott, were not a Catholic, she was known to be
generous, and would no doubt give him money for the poor.


_II.--The New Parishioners_


The abbé and his godson were in the garden next day, when they heard a
carriage stop at the gate. Two ladies alighted, dressed in simple
travelling costumes. They came into the garden, and the elder of the
two, who seemed to be no more than twenty-five, came up to the Abbé
Constantin saying, with only the slightest foreign accent, "I am obliged
to introduce myself, M. le Curé. I am Madame Scott, in whose name
yesterday the castle and estate were bought, and if it is no
inconvenience I should be glad to take five minutes of your time." Then,
turning to her companion, she said, "This is my sister, Miss Bettina
Percival, as you may have guessed."

Greatly agitated, the abbé bowed his respects, and led into his little
vicarage the new mistress of Longueval and her sister. The cloth had
been laid for the simple meal of the old priest and the lieutenant, and
the ladies seemed charmed with the humble comfort of the place.

"Look now, Susie," said Miss Bettina, "isn't this just the sort of
vicarage you hoped it would be?"

"And the abbé also, if he will allow me to say so," said Madame Scott.
"For what did I say in the train this morning, Bettina, and only a
little while ago in the carriage?"

"My sister said to me, M. le Curé," said Miss Percival, "that she
desired, above all things, that the abbé should not be young, nor
melancholy, nor severe, but that he should be white-haired and gentle
and good."

"And that is you exactly, M. le Curé," said Madame Scott brightly. "I
find you just as I had hoped, and I trust you may be as well pleased
with your new parishioners."

"Parishioners!" exclaimed the abbé. "But then you are Catholics?"

"Certainly we are Catholics!" And noting the surprise of the old abbé,
she went on to say, "Ah, I understand! Our name and our country made you
expect we should be Protestants and unfriendly to you and your people.
But our mother was a Canadian and a Catholic, of French origin, and that
is why my sister and I speak French with just a little foreign accent.
My husband is a Protestant, but he leaves me full liberty, and so my two
children are being educated in my own faith. And that is why we have
come to see you the first day we have arrived."

The good old priest was overwhelmed by the news, but his joy almost
brought tears to his eyes when the ladies each presented him with a
thousand francs, and promised five hundred francs a month for the poor.
He had never handled so much money in all his life before.

"Why, there will be no poor left in all the district!" he stammered.

"And we should be glad if that were so," said Madame Scott, "for we have
plenty, and we could not do better with it."

Then followed the happiest little dinner party that had ever taken place
beneath the abbé's roof. Madame Scott explained how her husband had
bought the château as a surprise for her, and that neither she nor her
sister had seen it until that morning.

"Now, tell me," she suggested, "what they said about the new owner." The
old priest blushed, and was at a loss to answer. "Well, you are a
soldier," she continued, turning to Lieutenant Reynaud, "and you will
tell me. Did they say that I had been a beggar?"

"Yes, I heard that said."

"And that I had been a performer in a travelling circus?"

"That also I heard said," he admitted.

"I thank you for your frankness; and now let me tell you that, while I
can see nothing in either case that would be any disgrace to me, the
story does not happen to be true. I have known what it is to be poor,
for my parents died eight years ago, leaving us only a great lawsuit,
but my father's last wish was that we should fight it to the end. With
the aid of the son of one of his old friends, now my husband, we fought
and won. That is how I came into my fortune. The stories you have heard
were invented by spiteful Paris journalists."

After the ladies had taken their departure for Paris, the Abbé
Constantin was as happy as he had so lately been miserable. And as for
Lieutenant Reynaud, the vision of their fresh and charming faces was
with him all through the military manoeuvres in which he was now
engaged. But as both of them were equally charming in his mind, he
concluded he could not have fallen in love, or he would have known which
he admired the more.

He did not know how many were the suitors in Paris for Miss Bettina, and
possibly if he had seen the sisters among the fashionable people of that
gay city he would never have given them a second thought, for he was a
true son of the country, this healthy and manly young officer, whose
tastes were as simple as the surroundings in which he had grown up
demanded.

Miss Bettina, indeed, had only to say the word, and she might have been
the Princess Romanelli. "And I should like to be a princess, for the
name sounds well," she said to herself. "Oh, if I only loved him!" There
were many men of rank and title who would have been glad to have married
the wealthy young American lady, but she found herself in love with none
of them, and now she was looking forward to the fourteenth of June, when
she and her sister were to leave Paris for Longueval. During their stay
at the castle they were to entertain many friends, but for ten days they
were to be free to roam the woods and fields, and forget the
distractions of their fashionable life in the capital.

"But you forget," said Madame Scott, on their way to Longueval, "that we
are to have two people to dinner to-night."

"Ah, but I shall be glad to welcome both of them--particularly the young
lieutenant," Bettina confessed, with a touch of shyness.


_III.--Friendship Grows_


Great alterations had been made at the castle during the month that had
elapsed. The rooms had been refurnished, the stables and coach-houses
were stocked, the pleasure-grounds made trim and beautiful, and servants
were busy everywhere. When the abbé and Jean arrived, they were ushered
in by two tall and dignified footmen, but Madame Scott received them
with all the frankness she had shown at the vicarage, and presented her
son Harry and her daughter Bella, who were six and five years old. Then
Miss Percival joined them, and presently they were all talking together
like old friends. But the happiest of all was Abbé Constantin. He felt
at home again--too much at home--and when coffee was served on the
terrace in front of the château after dinner, he lost himself in an
agreeable reverie. Then--terrible catastrophe!--he fell into his old
habit, and sank into an after dinner doze, as he had so often done in
the days of the marquise.

Jean and Bettina found much to say to each other, and as the ladies were
looking forward to riding round the estates, Jean, who rode every day
for exercise, promised to join them. It was quite clear that Miss
Bettina was glad to see them both--"particularly the young lieutenant!"
And when Madame Scott and her sister walked up the avenue, after having
accompanied Jean and the abbé to the gate, Bettina confessed that she
expected to be scolded for being so friendly with Jean.

"But I shall not scold you," Madame Scott said, "for he has made a
favourable impression on me from the first. He inspires me with
confidence."

"That is just how I feel towards him," said Bettina quietly.

As for Jean, he talked so much to Paul about his visit that that gay
young man accused him of having fallen in love, but, of course, that was
mere nonsense! There was no fear of Jean falling in love! For a poor
lieutenant could never dream of winning an heiress for his wife. When
next he met Bettina they had a very long talk about their people, and it
appeared that they were both descendants of French peasants. That was
why Jean loved the country folk around Longueval. And when he had served
his time in the army, he thought he would retire on half-pay--an old
colonel, perhaps--and come back to live there.

"Always quite alone?" asked Bettina.

"Why, I hope not."

"Oh, then you intend to marry!"

"Well, one may think of that, though one need not always be seeking to
marry."

"Yet there are some who look for it, I know, and I have heard that you
might have married more than one girl with a handsome fortune if you had
wished."

"And how do you know that?" asked Jean.

"Monsieur le Curé told me. I soon found that nothing makes your
godfather happier than to talk of you, and in our morning walks he tells
me your history. Tell me why you refused these good marriages."

"Simply because I thought it better not to marry at all than to marry
without love," was Jean's frank avowal.

"I think so, too," said Bettina.

She looked at him. He looked at her, and suddenly, to the great surprise
of both, they found nothing more to say. Fortunately, at this moment
Harry and Bella burst into the room with an invitation to see their
ponies.


_IV.--Bettina's Confession_


Three weeks, during which Longueval has been crowded with visitors, have
passed, and the time has come for Jean to take the road for the annual
artillery practice. He will be away for twenty days, and, while he
wishes to be off, he wonders how those twenty days will pass without a
sight of Bettina, for now he frankly adores her. He is happy and he is
miserable. He knows by every action and every word that she loves him as
truly as he loves her. But he feels it his duty to fight against his own
heart's wish, lest the penniless lieutenant might be thought to covet
the riches of the young heiress.

But he could not drag himself away without one last meeting. Yet when he
saw how anxious Bettina was to please him and make him happy with her
friendship, he was afraid to hold her in his arms lest he might be
tempted to tell her how full his heart was with love for her. She
excused herself to Paul de Lavardens so that she might give his dance to
Jean, but Jean declined the favour on the plea that he was not feeling
well, and, to save himself, he hastened off without even shaking her
hand.

But all this only told his secret the more clearly to the heart that
loved him.

"I love him, dear Susie," said Bettina that night, "and I know that he
loves me for myself; not for the money I possess."

"You are sure, my dear?"

"Yes; for he will not speak; he tries to avoid me. My horrid money,
which attracts others to me, is the thing that keeps him from declaring
his love."

"Be very sure, my dear, for you know you might have been a marchioness
or a princess if you had wished. You are sure you will not mind being
plain Madame Reynaud?"

"Absolutely; for I love him!"

"Now let me make a proposal," Bettina went on. "Jean is going away
to-morrow; I shall not see him for three weeks, and that will be time to
know my own mind. In three weeks may I go and ask him myself if he will
have me for his wife? Tell me, Susie, may I?"

Of course her sister could but consent, and Bettina was happy.

Next morning she had a wild desire to wave Jean a good-bye. In the
pouring rain she made her way through the woods to the terrace by the
road, her dress torn by the thorns, and her umbrella lost, to wave to
him as he passed, saying to herself that this would show him how dear he
was in her thoughts.

Mr. Scott had come from Paris before Jean was back, and he, too,
approved of Bettina's plan, for they wished her to marry only one she
truly loved. But when the lieutenant came back with his regiment, he had
made up his mind to avoid meeting Bettina, and had even decided to
exchange into another regiment. He refused an invitation to the château,
but the good abbé begged of him not to leave the district.

"Wait a little, until the good God calls me. Do not go now."

Jean urged that honour made it clear to him he should go away. The abbé
told him that he was quite sure Bettina's heart was all for him as truly
as he believed Jean's love was all for her. Her money, Jean confessed,
was the great drawback, as it might make others think lightly of his
love for her. Besides, he was a soldier, and he could not condemn her to
the life of a soldier's wife.

The abbé was still trying to convince his godson, when there came a
knock at the door, and the old man, opening the door, admitted--Bettina!

She went straight to Jean and took him by both hands, saying, "I must go
to him first, for less than three weeks ago he was suffering!" The young
lieutenant stood speechless. "And now to you, M. le Curé, let me
confess. But do not go away, Jean, for it is a public confession. What I
have to say I would have said to-night at the château, but Jean has
declined our invitation, and So I come here to say it to M. le Curé."

"I am listening, mademoiselle," stammered the curé.

"I am rich, M. le Curé, and, to speak the truth, I like my money very
much. I like it selfishly, so to say, for the joy and pleasure I have in
giving. I have always said to myself, 'My husband must be worthy of
sharing this fortune,' and I have also said, 'I want to love the man who
will be my husband!' And now I am coming to my confession.... Here is a
man who for two months has done all he could to hide from me that he
loves me.... Jean, do you love me?"

"Yes," murmured Jean, his eyes cast down like a criminal, "I love you."

"I knew it." Bettina lost a little of her assurance; her voice trembled
slightly. She continued, however, with an effort. "M. le Curé, I do not
blame you entirely for what has happened, but certainly it is partly
your fault."

"My fault?"

"Yes, your fault. I am certain you have spoken to Jean too much of me,
much too much. And then you have told me too much of him. No, not too
much, but quite enough! I had so much confidence in you that I began to
consider him a little more closely. I began to compare him with those
who, for more than a year, have sought my hand. It seemed to me that he
was their superior in every way. Then, there came a day... an evening...
three weeks ago, the eve of your departure, Jean, and I found I loved
you. Yes, Jean, I love you!... I beg you, Jean, be still; do not come
near me.... I have still something to say, more important than all. I
know that you love me, but if you are to marry me I want your reason to
sanction it. Jean, I know you, and I know to what I should bind myself
in becoming your wife. I know what duties, what sacrifices, you have to
meet in your calling. Jean, do not doubt it, I would not turn you from
any one of these duties, these sacrifices. Never! Never would I ask you
to give up your career.

"And now, M. le Curé, it is not to him but to you that I speak. Tell me,
should he not agree to be my husband?"

"Jean," said the old priest gravely, "marry her. It is your duty, and it
will be your happiness."

Jean took Bettina in his arms, but she gently freed herself, and said to
the abbé, "I wish--I wish your blessing." And the old priest replied by
kissing her paternally.

One month later the abbé had the happiness of performing the marriage
ceremony in his little church, where he had consecrated all the
happiness and goodness of his life.

       *       *       *       *       *




NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE


The Scarlet Letter


     Nathaniel Hawthorne, American novelist and essayist, was born
     on July 4, 1804, at Salem, Massachusetts. His father, a master
     mariner, died early, and the boy grew up in a lonely country
     life with his mother. He graduated at Bowdoin College, but his
     literary impulse had already declared itself, and he retired
     to Salem to write, unsuccessfully for many years. Later he
     held subordinate official positions in the custom-house at
     Salem, and lived for a few months in the Brook Farm
     socialistic community. Severing his connection with the Civil
     Service in 1841, it was Nathaniel Hawthorne's intention to
     devote himself entirely to literature. In this he was
     unsuccessful, and in a short while was forced to accept a
     position in the custom-house again, this time as surveyor in
     his native town of Salem. It was during this period he wrote
     "The Scarlet Letter," published in 1850, which immediately
     brought him fame, and still remains the most popular of his
     novels. Hawthorne himself has described how the story came to
     be written. The discovery of an old manuscript by a former
     surveyor, and a rag of scarlet cloth, which, on careful
     examination, assumed the shape of a letter--the capital
     A--gave a reasonably complete explanation of the whole affair
     of "one Hester Prynne, who appeared to have been rather a
     noteworthy personage in the view of our ancestors." Nathaniel
     Hawthorne died on May 18, 1864.


_I.--The Pedestal of Shame_


The grass-plot before the jail in Prison Lane, on a certain summer
morning, not less than two centuries ago, was occupied by a pretty large
number of the inhabitants of Boston, all with their eyes intently
fastened on the iron-clamped oaken door.

The door of the jail being flung open from within, there appeared, in
the first place, the grim presence of the town-beadle, and following him
a young woman who bore in her arms a baby of some three months old.

The young woman was tall, and those who had known Hester Prynne before
were astonished to perceive how her beauty shone out. On the breast of
her gown, in fine red cloth, surrounded with an elaborate embroidery and
fantastic flourishes of gold thread, appeared the letter A, and it was
that scarlet letter which drew all eyes, and, as it were, transfigured
the wearer.

A lane was forthwith opened through the crowd of spectators. Preceded by
the beadle, and attended by an irregular procession of stern-browed men
and unkindly visaged women, Hester Prynne set forth towards the place
appointed for her punishment. It was no great distance from the prison
door to the market-place, and in spite of the agony of her heart, Hester
passed with almost a serene deportment to the scaffold where the pillory
was set up.

The crowd was sombre and grave, and the unhappy prisoner sustained
herself as best a woman might, under the heavy weight of a thousand
unrelenting eyes.

One man, small in stature, and of a remarkable intelligence in his
features, who stood on the outskirts of the crowd, attracted the notice
of Hester Prynne, and he in his turn bent his eyes on the prisoner till,
seeing she appeared to recognise him, he slowly raised his finger and
laid it on his lips.

Then, touching the shoulder of a townsman who stood next to him, he
said, "I pray you, good sir, who is this woman, and wherefore is she
here set up to public shame?"

"You must needs be a stranger, friend," said the townsman, "else you
would surely have heard of Mistress Hester Prynne, and her evil doings.
She hath raised a great scandal in godly Master Dimmesdale's church. The
penalty thereof is death. But the magistracy, in their great mercy and
tenderness of heart, have doomed Mistress Prynne to stand only a space
of three hours on the platform of the pillory, and for the remainder of
her natural life to wear a mark of shame upon her bosom."

"A wise sentence!" remarked the stranger gravely. "It irks me,
nevertheless, that the partner of her iniquity should not at least stand
on the scaffold by her side. But he will be known--he will be known!"

Directly over the platform on which Hester Prynne stood was a kind of
balcony, and here sat Governor Bellingham, with four sergeants about his
chair, and ministers of religion.

Mr. John Wilson, the eldest of these clergymen, first spake, and then
urged a younger minister, Mr. Dimmesdale, to exhort the prisoner to
repentance and to confession. "Speak to the woman, my brother," said Mr.
Wilson.

The Rev. Mr. Dimmesdale was a man of high native gifts, whose eloquence
and religious fervour had already wide eminence in his profession. He
bent his head, in silent prayer, as it seemed, and then came forward.

"Hester Prynne," said he, "if thou feelest it to be for thy soul's
peace, I charge thee to speak out the name of thy fellow-sinner and
fellow-sufferer. Be not silent from any mistaken pity and tenderness for
him, for, believe me, though he were to step down from a high place, and
stand there beside thee, on thy pedestal of shame, yet better were it so
than to hide a guilty heart through life."

Hester only shook her head.

"She will not speak," murmured Mr. Dimmesdale. "Wondrous strength and
generosity of a woman's heart!"

Hester Prynne kept her place upon the pedestal of shame with an air of
weary indifference. With the same hard demeanour she was led back to
prison.

That night the child at her boson writhed in convulsions of pain, and
the jailer brought in a physician, whom he announced as Mr. Roger
Chillingworth, and who was none other than the stranger whom Hester had
noticed in the crowd.

He took the infant in his arms and administered a draught, and its moans
and convulsive tossings gradually ceased.

"Hester," said he, when the jailer had withdrawn, "I ask not wherefore
thou hast fallen into the pit. It was my folly and thy weakness. What
had I--a man of thought, the bookworm of great libraries--to do with
youth and beauty like thine own? I might have known that in my long
absence this would happen."

"I have greatly wronged thee," murmured Hester.

"We have wronged each other," he answered. "But I shall seek this man
whose name thou wilt not reveal, as I seek truth in books, and sooner or
later he must needs be mine. I shall contrive naught against his life.
Let him live! Not the less shall he be mine. One thing, thou that wast
my wife, I ask. Thou hast kept his name secret. Keep, likewise, mine.
Let thy husband be to the world as one already dead, and breathe not the
secret, above all, to the man thou wottest of?"

"I will keep thy secret, as I have his."


_II.--A Pearl of Great Price_


When her prison-door was thrown open, and she came forth into the
sunshine, Hester Prynne did not flee.

On the outskirts of the town was a small thatched cottage, and there, in
this lonesome dwelling, Hester established herself with her infant
child. Without a friend on earth who dared to show himself, she,
however, incurred no risk of want. She possessed an art that sufficed to
supply food for her thriving infant and herself--the art of needlework.

By degrees her handiwork became what would now be termed the fashion.
She bore on her breast, in the curiously embroidered letter, a specimen
of her skill, and her needlework was seen on the ruff of the governor;
military men wore it on their scarfs, and the minister on his bands.

As time went on, the public attitude to Hester changed. Human nature, to
its credit, loves more readily than it hates. Hester never battled with
the public, but submitted uncomplainingly to its worst usage, and so a
species of general regard had ultimately grown up in reference to her.

Hester had named the infant "Pearl," as being of great price, and little
Pearl grew up a wondrously lovely child, with a strange, lawless
character. At times she seemed rather an airy sprite than human, and
never did she seek to make acquaintance with other children, but was
always Hester's companion in her walks about the town.

At one time some of the leading inhabitants of the place sought to
deprive Hester of her child; and at the governor's mansion, whither
Hester had repaired, with some gloves which she had embroidered at his
order, the matter was discussed in the mother's presence by the governor
and his guests--Mr. John Wilson, Mr. Arthur Dimmesdale, and old Roger
Chillingworth, now established as a physician of great skill in the
town.

"God gave me the child!" cried Hester. "He gave her in requital of all
things else which ye have taken from me. Ye shall not take her! I will
die first! Speak thou for me," she cried turning to the young clergyman,
Mr. Dimmesdale. "Thou wast my pastor. Thou knowest what is in my heart,
and what are a mother's rights, and how much the stronger they are when
that mother has but her child and the scarlet letter! I will not lose
the child! Look to it!"

"There is truth in what she says," began the minister. "God gave her the
child, and there is a quality of awful sacredness between this mother
and this child. It is good for this poor, sinful woman that she hath an
infant confided to her care--to be trained up by her to righteousness,
to remind her and to teach her that, if she bring the child to heaven,
the child also will bring its parent thither. Let us then leave them as
Providence hath seen fit to place them!"

"You speak, my friend, with a strange earnestness," said old Roger
Chillingworth, smiling at him.

"He hath adduced such arguments that we will even leave the matter as it
now stands," said the governor. "So long, at least, as there shall be no
further scandal in the woman."

The affair being so satisfactorily concluded, Hester Prynne, with Pearl,
departed.


_III.--The Leach and his Patient_


It was at the solemn request of the deacons and elders of the church in
Boston that the Rev. Mr. Dimmesdale went to Roger Chillingworth for
professional advice. The young minister's health was failing, his cheek
was paler and thinner, and his voice more tremulous with every
successive Sabbath.

Roger Chillingworth scrutinised his patient carefully, and, accepted as
the medical adviser, determined to know the man before attempting to do
him good. He strove to go deep into his patient's bosom, delving among
his principles, and prying into his recollections.

After a time, at a hint from old Roger Chillingworth, the friends of Mr.
Dimmesdale effected an arrangement by which the two men were lodged in
the same house; so that every ebb and flow of the minister's life-tide
might pass under the watchful eye of his anxious physician.

Old Roger Chillingworth, throughout life, had been calm in temperament,
of kindly affections, and ever in the world a pure and upright man. He
had begun an investigation, as he imagined, with the severe integrity of
a judge, desirous only of truth. But, as he proceeded, a terrible
fascination seized the old man within its grip, and never set him free
again until he had done all its bidding. He now dug into the poor
clergyman's heart, like a miner searching for gold. "This man," the
physician would say to himself at times, "pure as they deem him, hath
inherited a strong animal nature from his father or his mother. Let us
dig a little farther in the direction of this vein."

Henceforth Roger Chillingworth became not a spectator only, but a chief
actor in the poor minister's inner world. And Mr. Dimmesdale grew to
look with unaccountable horror and hatred at the old physician.

And still the minister's fame and reputation for holiness increased,
even while he was tortured by bodily disease and the black trouble of
his soul.

More than once Mr. Dimmesdale had gone into the pulpit, with a purpose
never to come down until he should have spoken the truth of his life.
And ever he put a cheat upon himself by confessing in general terms his
exceeding vileness and sinfulness. One night in early May, driven by
remorse, and still indulging in the mockery of repentance, the minister
sought the scaffold, where Hester Prynne had stood. The town was all
asleep. There was no peril of discovery. And yet his vigil was surprised
by Hester and her daughter, returning from a death-bed in the town, and
presently by Roger Chillingworth himself.

"Who is that man?" gasped Mr. Dimmesdale, in terror. "I shiver at him,
Hester. Canst thou do nothing for me? I have a nameless horror of the
man!"

Hester remembered her promise and was silent.

"Worthy sir," said the physician, when he had advanced to the foot of
the platform, "pious Master Dimmesdale! Can this be you? Come, good sir,
I pray you, let me lead you home! You should study less, or these
night-whimseys will grow upon you."

"I will go home with you," said Mr. Dimmesdale.

And now Hester Prynne resolved to do what might be in her power for the
victim whom she saw in her former husband's grip. An opportunity soon
occurred when she met the old physician stooping in quest of roots to
concoct his medicines.

"When we last spake together," said Hester, "you bound me to secrecy
touching our former relations. But now I must reveal the secret. He must
discern thee in thy true character. What may be the result I know not.
So far as concerns the overthrow or preservation of his fair fame and
his earthly state, and perchance his life, he is in thy hands. Nor do
I--whom the scarlet letter has disciplined to truth--nor do I perceive
such advantage in his living any longer a life of ghastly emptiness,
that I shall stoop to implore thy mercy. Do with him as thou wilt! There
is no good for him, no good for me, no good for thee! There is no good
for little Pearl!"

"Woman, I could well-nigh pity thee!" said Roger Chillingworth.
"Peradventure, hadst thou met earlier with a better love than mine, this
evil had not been. I pity thee, for the good that has been wasted in thy
nature!"

"And I thee," answered Hester Prynne, "for the hatred that has
transformed a wise and just man to a fiend! Forgive, if not for his
sake, then doubly for thine own!"

"Peace, Hester, peace!" replied the old man with gloom. "It is not
granted me to pardon. It is our fate. Now go thy ways, and deal as thou
wilt with yonder man."


_IV.--Revelation_


A week later Hester Prynne waited in the forest for the minister as he
returned from a visit to his Indian converts. He walked slowly, and, as
he walked, kept his hand over his heart.

"Arthur Dimmesdale! Arthur Dimmesdale!" she cried out.

"Who speaks?" answered the minister. "Hester! Hester Prynne! Is it
thou?" He fixed his eyes upon her and added, "Hester, hast thou found
peace?"

"Hast thou?" she asked.

"None! Nothing but despair! What else could I look for, being what I am,
and leading such a life as mine?"

"You wrong yourself in this," said Hester gently. "Your sin is left
behind you, in the days long past. But Arthur, an enemy dwellest with
thee, under the same roof. That old man--the physician, whom they call
Roger Chillingworth--he was my husband! Forgive me. Let God punish!"

"I do forgive you, Hester," replied the minister. "May God forgive us
both!"

They sat down, hand clasped in hand, on the mossy trunk of a fallen
tree.

It was Hester who bade him hope, and spoke of seeking a new life beyond
the seas, in some rural village in Europe.

"Oh, Hester," cried Arthur Dimmesdale, "I lack the strength and courage
to venture out into the wide, strange world alone."

"Thou shalt not go alone!" she whispered. Before Mr. Dimmesdale reached
home he was conscious of a change of thought and feeling; Roger
Chillingworth observed the change, and knew that now in the minister's
regard he was no longer a trusted friend, but his bitterest enemy.

A New England holiday was at hand, the public celebration of the
election of a new governor, and the Rev. Arthur Dimmesdale was to preach
the election sermon.

Hester had taken berths in a vessel that was about to sail; and then, on
the very day of holiday, the shipmaster told her that Roger
Chillingworth had also taken a berth in the same vessel.

Hester said nothing, but turned away, and waited in the crowded
market-place beside the pillory with Pearl, while the procession
re-formed after public worship. The street and the market-place
absolutely bubbled with applause of the minister, whose sermon had
surpassed all previous utterances.

At that moment Arthur Dimmesdale stood on the proudest eminence to which
a New England clergyman could be exalted. The minister, surrounded by
the leading men of the town, halted at the scaffold, and, turning
towards it, cried, "Hester, come hither! Come, my little Pearl!"

Leaning on Hester's shoulder, the minister, with the child's hand in
his, slowly ascended the scaffold steps.

"Is not this better," he murmured, "than what we dreamed of in the
forest? For, Hester, I am a dying man. So let me make haste to take my
shame upon me."

"I know not. I know not."

"Better? Yea; so we may both die, and little Pearl die with us."

He turned to the market-place and spoke with a voice that all could
hear.

"People of New England! At last, at last I stand where seven years since
I should have stood. Lo, the scarlet letter which Hester wears! Ye have
all shuddered at it! But there stood one in the midst of you, at whose
hand of sin and infamy ye have not shuddered! Stand any here that
question God's judgement on a sinner? Behold a dreadful witness of it!"

With a convulsive motion he tore away the ministerial gown from before
his breast. It was revealed! For an instant the multitude gazed with
horror on the ghastly miracle, while the minister stood with a flush of
triumph in his face. Then, down he sank upon the scaffold. Hester partly
raised him, and supported his head against her bosom. Old Roger
Chillingworth knelt beside him.

"Thou hast escaped me!" he repeated more than once.

"May God forgive thee!" said the minister. "Thou, too, hast deeply
sinned!"

He fixed his dying eyes on the woman and the child.

"My little Pearl," he said feebly, "thou wilt kiss me. Hester, farewell.
God knows, and He is merciful! His will be done! Farewell."

That final word came forth with the minister's expiring breath. The
multitude, silent till then, broke out in a strange, deep voice of awe
and wonder.

       *       *       *       *       *

After many days there was more than one account of what had been
witnessed on the scaffold. Most of the spectators testified to having
seen, on the breast of the unhappy minister, a scarlet letter imprinted
in the flesh. Others denied that there was any mark whatever on his
breast, more than on a new-born infant's. According to these highly
respectable witnesses the minister's confession implied no part of the
guilt of Hester Prynne, but was to teach us that we were all sinners
alike. Old Roger Chillingworth died and bequeathed his property to
little Pearl.

For years the mother and child lived in England, and then Pearl married,
and Hester returned alone to the little cottage by the forest.

       *       *       *       *       *




The House of the Seven Gables


     "The House of the Seven Gables," published in 1851, was
     written by Nathaniel Hawthorne directly after "The Scarlet
     Letter," and though not equal to that remarkable book, was
     full worthy of its author's reputation, and brought no
     disappointment to those who looked for great things from his
     pen. It seemed to James Russell Lowell "the highest art" to
     typify, "in the revived likeness of Judge Pyncheon to his
     ancestor the colonel, that intimate relationship between the
     present and the past in the way of ancestry and descent, which
     historians so carefully overlook." Here, as in "The Scarlet
     Letter," Hawthorne is unsparing in his analysis of the meaning
     of early American Puritanism--its intolerance and its
     strength.


_I.--The Old Pyncheon Family_


Half-way down a by-street of one of our New England towns stands a rusty
wooden house, with seven acutely-peaked gables, and a huge clustered
chimney in the midst. The street is Pyncheon Street; the house is the
old Pyncheon House; and an elm tree before the door is known as the
Pyncheon elm.

Pyncheon Street formerly bore the humbler appellation of Maule's Lane,
from the name of the original occupant of the soil, before whose cottage
door it was a cow-path. In the growth of the town, however, after some
thirty or forty years, the site covered by the rude hovel of Matthew
Maule (originally remote from the centre of the earlier village) had
become exceedingly desirable in the eyes of a prominent personage, who
asserted claims to the land on the strength of a grant from the
Legislature. Colonel Pyncheon, the claimant, was a man of iron energy of
purpose. Matthew Maule, though an obscure man, was stubborn in the
defense of what he considered his right. The dispute remained for years
undecided, and came to a close only with the death of old Matthew Maule,
who was executed for the crime of witchcraft.

It was remembered afterwards how loudly Colonel Pyncheon had joined in
the general cry to purge the land from witchcraft, and had sought
zealously the condemnation of Matthew Maule. At the moment of
execution--with the halter about his neck, and while Colonel Pyncheon
sat on horseback grimly gazing at the scene--Maule had addressed him
from the scaffold, and uttered a prophecy. "God," said the dying man,
pointing his finger at the countenance of his enemy, "God will give him
blood to drink!"

When it was understood that Colonel Pyncheon intended to erect a
spacious family mansion on the spot first covered by the log-built hut
of Matthew Maule the village gossips shook their heads, and hinted that
he was about to build his house over an unquiet grave.

But the Puritan soldier and magistrate was not a man to be turned aside
from his scheme by dread of the reputed wizzard's ghost. He dug his
cellar, and laid deep the foundations of his mansion; and the
head-carpenter of the House of the Seven Gables was no other than Thomas
Maule, the son of the dead man from whom the right to the soil had been
wrested.

On the day the house was finished Colonel Pyncheon bade all the town to
be his guests, and Maude's Lane--or Pyncheon Street, as it was now
called--was thronged at the appointed hour as with a congregation on its
way to church.

But the founder of the stately mansion did not stand in his own hall to
welcome the eminent persons who presented themselves in honour of the
solemn festival, and the principal domestic had to explain that his
master still remained in his study, which he had entered an hour before.

The lieutenant-governor took the matter into his hands, and knocked
boldly at the door of the colonel's private apartment, and, getting no
answer, he tried the door, which yielded to his hand, and was flung wide
open by a sudden gust of wind.

The company thronged to the now open door, pressing the
lieutenant-governor into the room before them.

A large map and a portrait of Colonel Pyncheon were conspicuous on the
walls, and beneath the portrait sat the colonel himself in an elbow
chair, with a pen in his hand.

A little boy, the colonel's grandchild, now made his way among the
guests, and ran towards the seated figure; then, pausing halfway, he
began to shriek with terror. The company drew nearer, and perceived that
there was blood on the colonel's cuff and on his beard, and an unnatural
distortion in his fixed stare. It was too late to render assistance. The
iron-hearted Puritan, the relentless persecutor, the grasping and
strong-willed man, was dead! Dead in his new house!

Colonel Pyncheon's sudden and mysterious end made a vast deal of noise
in its day. There were many rumours, and a great dispute of doctors over
the dead body. But the coroner's jury sat upon the corpse, and, like
sensible men, returned an unassailable verdict of "Sudden Death."

The son and heir came into immediate enjoyment of a considerable estate,
but a claim to a large tract of country in Waldo County, Maine, which
the colonel, had he lived, would undoubtedly have made good, was lost by
his decease. Some connecting link had slipped out of the evidence, and
could not be found. Still, from generation to generation, the Pyncheons
cherished an absurd delusion of family importance on the strength of
this impalpable claim; and from father to son they clung with tenacity
to the ancestral house for the better part of two centuries.

The most noted event in the Pyncheon annals in the last fifty years had
been the violent death of the chief member of the family--an old and
wealthy bachelor. One of his nephews, Clifford, was found guilty of the
murder, and was sentenced to perpetual imprisonment. This had happened
thirty years ago, and there were now rumours that the long-buried
criminal was about to be released. Another nephew had become the heir,
and was now a judge in an inferior court. The only members of the family
known to be extant, besides the judge and the thirty years' prisoner,
were a sister of the latter, wretchedly poor, who lived in the House of
the Seven Gables by the will of the old bachelor, and the judge's single
surviving son, now travelling in Europe. The last and youngest Pyncheon
was a little country girl of seventeen, whose father--another of the
judge's cousins--was dead, and whose mother had taken another husband.


_II.--The House without Sunshine_


Miss Hepzibah Pyncheon was reduced to the business of setting up a
pretty shop, and that in the Pyncheon house where she had spent all her
days. After sixty years of idleness and seclusion, she must earn her
bread or starve, and to keep shop was the only resource open to her.

The first customer to cross the threshold was a young man to whom old
Hepzibah let certain remote rooms in the House of the Seven Gables. He
explained that he had looked in to offer his best wishes, and to see if
he could give any assistance.

Poor Hepzibah, when she heard the kindly tone of his voice, began to
sob.

"Ah, Mr. Holgrave," she cried, "I never can go through with it! Never,
never, never! I wish I were dead in the old family tomb with all my
forefathers--yes, and with my brother, who had far better find me there
than here! I am too old, too feeble, and too hopeless! If old Maule's
ghost, or a descendant of his, could see me behind the counter to-day,
he would call it the fulfilment of his worst wishes. But I thank you for
your kindness, Mr. Holgrave, and will do my utmost to be a good
shopkeeper."

On Holgrave asking for half a dozen biscuits, Hepzibah put them into his
hand, but rejected the compensation.

"Let me be a lady a moment longer," she said, with a manner of antique
stateliness. "A Pyncheon must not--at all events, under her forefathers'
roof--receive money for a morsel of bread from her only friend."

As the day went on the poor lady blundered hopelessly with her
customers, and committed the most unheard-of errors, so that the whole
proceeds of her painful traffic amounted, at the close, to half a dozen
coppers.

That night the little country cousin, Phoebe Pyncheon, arrived at the
gloomy old house. Hepzibah knew that circumstances made it desirable for
the girl to establish herself in another home, but she was reluctant to
bid her stay.

"Phoebe," she said, on the following morning, "this house of mine is but
a melancholy place for a young person to be in. It lets in the wind and
rain, and the snow, too, in the winter time; but it never lets in the
sunshine! And as for myself, you see what I am--a dismal and lonesome
old woman, whose temper is none of the best, and whose spirits are as
bad as can be. I cannot make your life pleasant, Cousin Phoebe; neither
can I so much as give you bread to eat."

"You will find me a cheerful little body," answered Phoebe, smiling,
"and I mean to earn my bread. You know I have not been brought up a
Pyncheon. A girl learns many things in a New England village."

"Ah, Phoebe," said Hepzibah, sighing, "it is a wretched thought that you
should fling away your young days in a place like this. And, after all,
it is not even for me to say who shall be a guest or inhabitant of the
old Pyncheon house. Its master is coming."

"Do you mean Judge Pyncheon?" asked Phoebe, in surprise.

"Judge Pyncheon!" answered her cousin angrily. "He will hardly cross the
threshold while I live. You shall see the face of him I speak of."

She went in quest of a miniature, and returned and placed it in Phoebe's
hand.

"How do you like the face?" asked Hepzibah.

"It is handsome; it is very beautiful!" said Phoebe admiringly. "It is
as sweet a face as a man's can be or ought to be. Who is it, Cousin
Hepzibah?"

"Did you never hear of Clifford Pyncheon?"

"Never. I thought there were no Pyncheons left, except yourself and our
Cousin Jaffrey, the judge. And yet I seem to have heard the name of
Clifford Pyncheon. Yes, from my father, or my mother. But hasn't he been
dead a long while?"

"Well, well, child, perhaps he has," said Hepzibah, with a sad, hollow
laugh; "but in old houses like this, you know, dead people are very apt
to come back again. And, Cousin Phoebe, if your courage does not fail
you, we will not part soon. You are welcome to such a home as I can
offer you."


_III.--Miss Hepzibah's Guests_


The day after Phoebe's arrival there was a constant tremor in Hepzibah's
frame. With all her affection for a young cousin there was a recurring
irritability.

"Bear with me, my dear child!" she cried; "bear with me, for I love you,
Phoebe; and truly my heart is full to the brim! By-and-by I shall be
kind, and only kind."

"What has happened?" asked Phoebe. "What is it that moves you so?"

"Hush! He is coming!" whispered Hepzibah. "Let him see you first,
Phoebe; for you are young and rosy, and cannot help letting a smile
break out. He always liked bright faces. And mine is old now, and the
tears are hardly dry on it. Draw the curtain a little, but let there be
a good deal of sunshine, too. He has had but little sunshine in his
life, poor Clifford; and, oh, what a black shadow! Poor--poor Clifford!"

There was a step in the passage-way, above stairs. It seemed to Phoebe
the same that she had heard in the night, as in a dream. Very slowly the
steps came downstairs, and paused for a long time at the door.

Hepzibah, unable to endure the suspense, rushed forward, threw open the
door, and led in the stranger by the hand. At the first glance Phoebe
saw an elderly man, in an old-fashioned dressing gown, with grey hair,
almost white, of an unusual length. The expression of his countenance
seemed to waver, glimmer, and nearly to die away, and feebly to recover
itself again.

"Dear Clifford," said Hepzibah, "this is our Cousin Phoebe, Arthur's
only child, you know. She has come from the country to stay with us a
while, for our old house has grown to be very lonely now."

"Phoebe? Arthur's child?" repeated the guest. "Ah, I forget! No matter.
She is very welcome." He seated himself in the place assigned him, and
looked strangely around. His eyes met Hepzibah's, and he seemed
bewildered and disgusted. "Is this you, Hepzibah?" he murmured sadly.
"How changed! how changed!"

"There is nothing but love here, Clifford," Hepzibah said
softly--"nothing but love. You are at home."

The guest responded to her tone by a smile, which but half lit up his
face. It was followed by a coarser expression, and he ate his food with
fierce voracity and asked for "more--more!"

That day Phoebe attended to the shop, and the second person to enter it
was a gentleman of portly figure and high respectability.

"I was not aware that Miss Hepzibah Pyncheon had commenced business
under such favourable auspices," he said, in a deep voice, "You are her
assistant, I suppose?"

"I certainly am," answered Phoebe. "I am a cousin of Miss Hepzibah, on a
visit to her."

"Her cousin, and from the country?" said the gentleman, bowing and
smiling. "In that case we must be better acquainted, for you are my own
little kinswoman likewise. Let me see, you must be Phoebe, the only
child of my dear Cousin Arthur. I am your kinsman, my dear. Surely you
must have heard of Judge Pyncheon?"

Phoebe curtsied, and the judge bent forward to bestow a kiss on his
young relative. But Phoebe drew back; there was something repulsive to
her in the judge's demonstration, and on raising her eyes she was
startled by the change in Judge Pyncheon's face. It had become cold,
hard, and immitigable.

"Dear me! What is to be done now?" thought the country girl to herself.
"He looks as if there were nothing softer in him than a rock, nor milder
than the east wind."

Then all at once it struck Phoebe that this very Judge Pyncheon was the
original of a miniature which Mr. Holgrave--who took portraits, and
whose acquaintance she had made within a few hours of her arrival--had
shown her yesterday. There was the same hard, stern, relentless look on
the face. In reality, the miniature was copied from an old portrait of
Colonel Pyncheon which hung within the house. Was it that the expression
had been transmitted down as a precious heirloom, from that Puritan
ancestor, in whose picture both the expression, and, to a singular
degree, the features, of the modern judge were shown as by a kind of
prophecy?

But as it happened, scarcely had Phoebe's eyes rested again on the
judge's countenance than all its ugly sternness vanished, and she found
herself almost overpowered by the warm benevolence of his look. But the
fantasy would not quit her that the original Puritan, of whom she had
heard so many sombre traditions, had now stepped into the shop.

"You seem to be a little nervous this morning," said the judge. "Has
anything happened to disturb you--anything remarkable in Cousin
Hepzibah's family--an arrival, eh? I thought so! To be an inmate with
such a guest may well startle an innocent young girl!"

"You quite puzzle me, sir!" replied Phoebe. "There is no frightful guest
in the house, but only a poor, gentle, child-like man, whom I believe to
be Cousin Hepzibah's brother. I am afraid that he is not quite in his
sound senses; but so mild he seems to be that a mother might trust her
baby with him. He startle me? Oh, no, indeed!"

"I rejoice to hear so favourable and so ingenious an account of my
Cousin Clifford," said the benevolent judge. "It is possible that you
have never heard of Clifford Pyncheon, and know nothing of his history.
But is Clifford in the parlour? I will just step in and see him. There
is no need to announce me. I know the house, and know my Cousin
Hepzibah, and her brother Clifford likewise. Ah, there is Hepzibah
herself!"

Such was the case. The vibrations of the judge's voice had reached the
old gentlewoman in the parlour, where Clifford sat slumbering in his
chair.

"He cannot see you," said Hepzibah, with quivering voice. "He cannot see
visitors."

"A visitor--do you call me so?" cried the judge. "Then let me be
Clifford's host, and your own likewise. Come at once to my house. I have
often invited you before. Come, and we will labour together to make
Clifford happy."

"Clifford has a home here," she answered.

"Woman," broke out the judge, "what is the meaning of all this? Have you
other resources? Take care, Hepzibah, take care! Clifford is on the
brink of as black a ruin as ever befel him yet!"

From within the parlour sounded a tremulous, wailing voice, indicating
helpless alarm.

"Hepzibah!" cried the voice. "Entreat him not to come in. Go down on
your knees to him. Oh, let him have mercy on me! Mercy!"

The judge withdrew, and Hepzibah, deathly white, staggered towards
Phoebe.

"That man has been the horror of my life," she murmured. "Shall I never
have courage enough to tell him what he is?"


_IV.--The Spell is Broken_


The shop thrived under Phoebe's management, and the acquaintance with
Mr. Holgrave ripened into friendship.

Then, after some weeks, Phoebe went away on a temporary visit to her
mother, and the old house, which had been brightened by her presence,
was once more dark and gloomy.

It was during this absence of Phoebe's that Judge Pyncheon once more
called and demanded to see Clifford.

"You cannot see him," answered Hepzibah. "Clifford has kept his bed
since yesterday."

"What! Clifford ill!" said the judge, starting. "Then I must, and will
see him!"

The judge explained the reason for his urgency. He believed that
Clifford could give the clue to the dead uncle's wealth, of which not
more than a half had been mentioned in his will. If Clifford refused to
reveal where the missing documents were placed, the judge declared he
would have him confined in a public asylum as a lunatic, for there were
many witnesses of Clifford's simple childlike ways.

"You are stronger than I," said Hepzibah, "and you have no pity in your
strength. Clifford is not now insane; but the interview which you insist
upon may go far to make him so. Nevertheless, I will call Clifford!"

Hepzibah went in search of her brother, and Judge Pyncheon flung himself
down in an old chair in the parlour. He took his watch from his pocket
and held it in his hand. But Clifford was not in his room, nor could
Hepzibah find him. She returned to the parlour, calling out to the judge
as she came, to rise and help find Clifford.

But the judge never moved, and Clifford appeared at the door, pointing
his finger at the judge, and laughing with strange excitement.

"Hepzibah," he said, "we can dance now! We can sing, laugh, play, do
what we will! The weight is gone, Hepzibah--gone off this weary old
world, and we may be as lighthearted as little Phoebe herself! What an
absurd figure the old fellow cuts now, just when he fancied he had me
completely under his thumb!"

Then the brother and sister departed hastily from the house, and left
Judge Pyncheon sitting in the old house of his forefathers.

Phoebe and Holgrave were in the house together when the brother and
sister returned, and Holgrave had told her of the judge's sudden death.
Then, in that hour so full of doubt and awe, the one miracle was
wrought, without which every human existence is a blank, and the bliss
which makes all things true, beautiful, and holy shone around this youth
and maiden. They were conscious of nothing sad or old.

Presently the voices of Clifford and Hepzibah were heard at the door,
and when they entered Clifford appeared the stronger of the two.

"It is our own little Phoebe! Ah! And Holgrave with her!" he exclaimed.
"I thought of you both as we came down the street. And so the flower of
Eden has bloomed even in this old, darksome house to-day."

A week after the judge's death news came of the death of his son, and so
Hepzibah became rich, and so did Clifford, and so did Phoebe, and,
through her, Holgrave.

It was far too late for the formal vindication of Clifford's character
to be worth the trouble and anguish involved. For the truth was that the
uncle had died by a sudden stroke, and the judge, knowing this, had let
suspicion and condemnation fall on Clifford, only because he had himself
been busy among the dead man's papers, destroying a later will made out
in Clifford's favour, and because it was found the papers had been
disturbed, to avert suspicion from the real offender he had let the
blame fall on his cousin.

Clifford was content with the love of his sister and Phoebe and
Holgrave. The good opinion of society was not worth publicly reclaiming.

It was Holgrave who discovered the missing document the judge had set
his heart on obtaining.

"And now, my dearest Phoebe," said Holgrave, "how will it please you to
assume the name of Maule? In this long drama of wrong and retribution I
represent the old wizzard, and am probably as much of a wizzard as ever
my ancestor was."

Then, with Hepzibah and Clifford, Phoebe and Holgrave left the old house
for ever.

       *       *       *       *       *




ROBERT HICHENS


The Garden of Allah


     The son of a clergyman, Mr. Robert Smythe Hichens, born at
     Speldhurst, Kent, England, on November 14, 1864, was
     originally intended to follow a musical career, but after some
     years abandoned music for journalism. His first long novel was
     written and published at the age of seventeen. It attracted
     little or no attention, and has long been out of print. A trip
     to Egypt in 1893 resulted in a burning desire to become a
     novelist, and his brilliant satire, "The Green Carnation,"
     followed. The book was written in a month, and at once
     established its author's name and fame. "The Garden of Allah,"
     of all Mr. Hichens' works the most typical of his genius,
     appeared in 1905. "The intellectual grip of the story," says
     one critic, "cannot be denied, for it completely conquers the
     critical sense, and the ideas of the author insinuate
     themselves, as it were, among one's inmost thoughts." Yet Mr.
     Hichens' stories are popular, not only with literary
     connoisseurs, but also with the general public, inasmuch as
     they owe their fascination not so much to an extreme
     refinement of art as to their freshness of imagination and
     dramatic intensity. This epitome of the "Garden of Allah" has
     been prepared by Mr. Hichens himself.


_I.--The Home of Peace_


On an autumn evening, Domini Enfilden leaned on the parapet of a
verandah of the Hotel du Désert at Beni-Mora, in Southern Algeria,
gazing towards the great Sahara, which was lit up by the glory of
sunset. The bell of the Catholic Church chimed. She heard the throbbing
of native drums in the village near by. Tired with her long journey from
England, she watched and listened while the twilight crept among the
palms, and the sandy alleys grew dark.

Thirty-two, an orphan, unmarried, strong, fearless, ardent, but a deeply
religious woman and a Catholic, Domini had passed through much mental
agony. Her mother, Lady Rens, a member of one of England's oldest
Catholic families, but half Hungarian on the mother's side, had run away
when Domini was nineteen with a Hungarian musician, leaving her only
child with her despairing and abandoned husband. Lord Rens had become a
Catholic out of love for his wife. When he was deserted by her, he
furiously renounced his faith, and eventually died blaspheming. In vain
through many years he had tried to detach his daughter from the religion
of her guilty mother, now long since dead. Domini had known how to
resist; but the cruel contest had shaken her body and soul.

Now free, alone, she had left England to begin a new life far away from
the scene of her misery. Vaguely she had thought of the great desert,
called by the Arabs "The Garden of Allah," as the home of peace. She had
travelled there to find peace. That day, at the gate of the desert, she
had met a traveller, Doris Androvsky, a man of about thirty-six,
powerfully built, tanned by the sun. When she was about to get into the
train at the station of El Akbara this man had rudely sprung in before
her. The train had begun to move, and Domini had sprung into it almost
at the risk of her life. Androvsky had not offered to help her, had not
said a word of apology. His _gaucherie_ had almost revolted Domini.
Nevertheless, something powerful, mournful, passionate, and sincere in
his personality had affected her, roused her interest.

Silently they had come into the desert together, strangers, almost at
enmity the one with the other. They were now staying in the same hotel
in this oasis in the desert of Sahara.

In coming to the hotel, Domini had seen a curious incident. Androvsky,
with a guide who carried his bag, was walking before her down the long
public garden, when in the distance there appeared the black figure of
the priest of Beni-Mora advancing slowly towards them. When Androvsky
saw the priest he had stopped short, hesitated, then, despite the
protests of his guide, had abruptly turned down a side path and hurried
away. He had fled from the man of prayer.

Now, as the twilight fell, Domini thought of this incident, and when she
heard Androvsky's heavy tread upon the stairs of the verandah, the sharp
closing of the French window of his room, she was filled with a vague
uneasiness.

Next day she visited a wonderful garden on the edge of the desert
belonging to a Count Anteoni, a recluse who loved the Arabs and spent
much of his time among them. There, standing with the count by the
garden wall at the hour of the Mohammedan's prayer, she had seen
Androvsky again. He was in the desert with a Nomad. The cry of the
_muezzin_ went up to the brazen sky. The Nomad fell on his knees and
prayed. Androvsky started, gazed, shrank back, then turned and strode
away like one horrified by some grievous vision. Domini said to the
count, "I have just seen a man flee from prayer; it was horrible."

He answered her, very gravely, "The man who is afraid of prayer is
unwise to set foot beyond the palm-trees, for the desert is the garden
of Allah."

That evening Domini and Androvsky spoke to each other for the first
time, on the top of a tower where they had come to see the sunset.
Domini spoke first, moved by a strange look of loneliness, of
desolation, in Androvsky's eyes. He replied in a low voice, and asked
her pardon for his rude conduct at the station. Then, abruptly, he
descended the tower and disappeared.

At night she visited a dancing house to see the strange dances of the
desert. She found Androvsky there, watching the painted women as if half
fascinated, half horrified by them. Irena, a girl who had been banished
from Beni-Mora for threatening to murder an Arab of whom she was
jealous, but had been permitted to return, discovering him among the
audience, stabbed him. There was a violent scene, during which
Androvsky, forcing his way through the desert men, protected Domini from
the crush. The crowd rushed out, leaving them alone together. Androvsky
insisted on escorting Domini back to the hotel.


_II.--Defying Allah in Allah's Garden_


The acquaintance thus unconventionally began between them continued, and
ripened into a strange friendship. Domini was a magnificent horsewoman.
Finding that Androvsky did not know how to ride, she gave him lessons.
Together they galloped over the desert sands; together they visited the
Saharan villages, hidden in the groves of date palms behind the brown
earthen walls of the oasis; together watched the burning sunsets of
Africa; at meal-times they met in the hotel; in the evenings they sat
upon the verandah, and heard the Zouaves singing in chorus, the distant
murmur of the tom-toms.

Domini became profoundly interested in Androvsky, but her interest was
complicated by wonder at his peculiarities, at his uncouth manners, his
strange silences, his ignorance of life and of social matters, his
distrust of others, his desire to keep aloof from all human beings,
except herself. The good priest, now her intimate friend, Count Anteoni,
also her friend and respectful admirer, were ill at ease with him. He
had tried to avoid them, but Domini, anxious to bring some pleasure into
his life, had introduced him to them at a luncheon given by the count in
his garden, despite Androvsky's dogged assertion that he disliked
priests, and did not care for social intercourse.

At this lunch Androvsky had been brusque, on the defensive, almost
actively disagreeable. And when, after the priest's departure, he left
Domini alone with Count Anteoni, she felt almost relieved. Count Anteoni
summoned a sand-diviner to read Domini's fate in the sand. This man--a
thin, fanatical Eastern, with piercing and cruel eyes--spread out his
sand brought from the tomb of a Mohammedan saint, and prophesied. He
declared that he saw a great sand-storm, and in it a train of camels
waiting by a church. From the church came the sound of music, nearly
drowned by the roar of the wind. In the church the real life of Domini
was beginning. The music ceased; darkness fell. Then the diviner saw
Domini, with a companion, mounted on one of the camels, and disappearing
into the storm towards the south. The face of her companion was hidden.
Finally he saw Domini far out in the desert among great dunes of white
sand. In her heart there was joy. It was as if all the date palms bore
their fruit together, and in all the desert places water-springs burst
forth. But presently a figure came towards her, walking heavily; and all
the dates shrivelled upon the palms, and all the springs dried up.
Sorrow and terror were there beside her.

At this point in the diviner's prophecy Domini stopped him. Afterwards
she explained to Anteoni that she felt as if another's fate was being
read in it as well as her own, as if to listen any more might be to
intrude upon another's secret.

Upon the following day Anteoni left Beni-Mora to make a long desert
journey to a sacred city called Amara. Domini went to his garden at dawn
to see him off. Before departing he warned Domini to beware of
Androvsky. She asked him why. He answered that Androvsky seemed to him a
man who was at odds with life, with himself, with his Creator, a man who
was defying Allah in Allah's garden. When Anteoni had gone, Domini, in
some perplexity of spirit, and moved by a longing for sympathy and help,
visited the priest in his house near the church. The priest, indirectly,
also warned her against Androvsky, and a little later frankly, told her
that he felt an invincible dislike to him.

"I have no reason to give," said the priest. "My instinct is my reason.
I feel it my duty to say that I advise you most earnestly to break off
your acquaintance with Monsieur Androvsky."

Domini said, "It is strange; ever since I have been here I have felt as
if everything that has happened had been arranged beforehand, as if it
had to happen, and I feel that, too, about the future."

"Count Anteoni's fatalism!" exclaimed the priest. "It is the guiding
spirit of this land. And you, too, are going to be led by it. Take care!
You have come to a land of fire, and I think you are made of fire."

The warnings of Anteoni and the priest made an impression on Domini. She
was conscious of how the outside world would be likely to regard her
acquaintance with Androvsky. Suddenly she saw Androvsky as some strange
and ghastly figure of legend; as the wandering Jew met by a traveller at
cross roads, and distinguished for an instant by an oblique flash of
lightning; as the shrouded Arab of the Eastern tale, who announces
coming disaster to the wanderers in the desert by beating a death-roll
on a drum amid the sands.

And she felt upon her the heavy hand of some strange, perhaps terrible,
fate.


_III.--The Eternal Song of Love_


That same night, accompanied by Batouch, Domini rode out into the desert
to see the rising of the moon, and there met Androvsky. He had followed
them on horseback. Domini dismissed Batouch at Androvsky's reiterated
request. When they were alone in the sands, Androvsky told Domini that
he had needed to be with her as he had something to tell her. On the
morrow he was going away from Beni-Mora.

His face, while he said this, was turned from Domini, and his voice
sounded as if it spoke to some one at a distance, some one who can hear
as man cannot hear.

Domini said little. But at the sound of his words it seemed to her as if
all outside things she had ever known had foundered; as if with them had
foundered, too, all the bodily powers that were of the essence of her
life. And the desert, which she had so loved, was no longer to her the
desert, sand with a soul in it, blue distances full of a music of
summons, but only a barren waste of dried-up matter, featureless,
desolate, ghastly with the bones of things that had died.

She rode back with Androvsky to Beni-Mora in a silence like that of
death.

But this parting, decreed by the man, was not to be. In the desert these
two human beings had grown to love each other, with a love that had
become a burning passion. And next day when, in the garden of Count
Anteoni, Androvsky came to say farewell to Domini, his love broke all
barriers. He sank on the sand, letting his hands slip down till they
clasped Domini's knees.

"I love you!" he said. "I love you. But don't listen to me. You mustn't
hear it. You mustn't. But I must say it. I can't go till I say it. I
love you! I love you!"

"I am listening," she said. "I must hear it."

Androvsky rose up, put his hands behind Domini, held her, set his lips
on hers, pressing his whole body against hers.

"Hear it!" he said, muttering against her lips. "Hear it! I love you! I
love you!"

In the recesses of the garden Larbi, that idle gardener, played upon his
little flute his eternal song of love, and from the desert, beyond the
white wall, there rose an Arab's voice singing a song of the Sahara, "No
one but God and I knows what is in my heart!"


_IV.--A Nomad's Honeymoon_


As the sand-diviner had foretold, Domini and Androvsky were married in
the church of Beni-Mora, and by the priest who had warned Domini to have
nothing more to do with Androvsky. A terrible sand-storm was raging, and
the desert was blotted out. Nevertheless, when the ceremony was over,
the bride and bridegroom mounted upon a camel, and with their
attendants, set out for their desert honeymoon. Standing before the door
of the church, the good priest watched them go, with fear in his heart,
and that night in his humble home, kneeling before his crucifix, he
prayed long and earnestly for all wanderers in the desert.

Isolated from all who knew them, free from all social ties, nomads, as
are the Bedouins who make their dwelling for ever amid the vast and
burning sands, Domini and Androvsky entered upon their married life. And
at first one of them was happy as few are ever happy. Domini loved
completely, trusted completely, lived with a fulness, a completeness she
had never known till now. That Androvsky almost worshipped her, she
knew. His conduct to her was perfect. And yet there were times when
Domini felt as if a shadow rose between them, as if, even with her, in
some secret place of his soul Androvsky was ill at ease, as if sometimes
he suffered, and dared not tell his suffering.

One day, in their wanderings, they came to a desolate place called
Mogar, and camped on a sandhill looking over a vast stretch of dunes.
Towards evening Androvsky descended into the plain to shoot gazelle,
leaving Domini alone. While he was away a French officer, with two men
of the Zouaves, rode slowly up. They were nearly starving and terribly
exhausted, having been lost in a sand-storm for three days and nights.

Pitying their sufferings, Domini insisted on entertaining them. The men
must sup with the Arabs, the officer must dine with herself and
Androvsky. The officer accepted with gratitude, and went off to make his
toilet. When Androvsky returned, Domini told him of the officer's
arrival, and when he saw the three places laid for dinner in the tent,
he seemed profoundly disturbed. He asked the officer's name. Domini told
him Trevignac.

"Trevignac!" he exclaimed.

Then, hearing the soldiers coming, he turned away; abruptly and
disappeared into the bedroom tent.

Trevignac came up, and in a few minutes Androvsky reappeared. The two
men gazed at each other for an instant. Then Domini introduced them, and
they all sat down to dinner. Conversation was uneasy. Androvsky was
evidently ill at ease; Trevignac was distrait at moments, strangely
watchful of his host at other moments. Dinner over, Domini left the two
men together to smoke, and went out on to the sand. She met an Arab
carrying coffee and a liqueur to the tent.

"What's that, Ouardi?" she asked, touching the bottle.

He told her it was an African liqueur.

"Take it in," she said.

And she strolled away to the bonfire to listen to the fantasia the Arabs
were making in honour of the soldiers.

When she returned to the tent, she found her husband alone in it,
standing up, with a quantity of fragments of glass lying at his feet.
Near him was the coffee, untasted. Trevignac was gone. She asked for an
explanation. He gave her none. The fragments of glass were all that
remained of the bottle which had contained the liqueur.

At dawn Domini met Trevignac riding away with his soldiers. He saluted
her, bidding his men ride on. As he gazed at her, she seemed to see
horror in his eyes. Twice he tried to speak, but apparently could not
bring himself to do so. He looked towards the tent where Androvsky was
sleeping, then at Domini; then, as if moved by an irresistible impulse,
he leaned from his saddle, made over Domini the sign of the cross, and
rode away into the desert.


_V.--I Have Insulted God_


From that day Androvsky's strange misery of the soul, strange horror of
the world, increased. Domini felt that he was secretly tormented. She
tried to make him happier; she even told him that she believed he often
felt far away from God, and that she prayed each day for him.

"Boris," she said, "if it's that, don't be too sad. It may all come
right in the desert. For the desert is the garden of Allah."

He made her no answer.

At last in their journeying they came to the sacred city of Amara, and
camped in the white sands beyond it.

This was the place described by the sand-diviner, and here Domini knew
that her love was to be crowned, that she would become a mother. She
hesitated to tell her husband, for in this place his misery and fear of
men seemed mounting to a climax. Nevertheless, as if in a frantic
attempt to get the better of his mental torture, he had gone off, saying
he wanted to see the city.

While he was away, Domini was visited first by Count Anteoni, who told
her that he had joined the Mohammedan religion, and was at last happy
and at peace; secondly, when night had fallen, by the priest of Amara.
This man was talkative and genial, fond of the good things of life.
Domini offered him a cigar. He accepted it. An Arab brought coffee, and
the same African liqueur which had been taken to the tent on the night
when Trevignac had dined with Domini and Androvsky.

When the priest was about to drink some of it, he suddenly paused, and
put the glass down. Domini leant forward.

"Louarine," she said, reading the name on the bottle. "Won't you have
some?"

"The fact is, madame," began the priest, with hesitation, "this liqueur
comes from the Trappist monastery of El Largani."

"Yes?"

"It was made by a monk and priest to whom the secret of its manufacture
belonged. At his death he was to confide the secret to another whom he
had chosen. But the monks of El Largani will never earn another franc by
Louarine when what they have in stock is exhausted."

"The monk died suddenly?"

"Madame, he ran away from the monastery after being there in the eternal
silence for twenty years, after taking the final vows."

"How horrible!" said Domini. "That man must be in hell now, in the hell
a man can make for himself by his own act."

As she spoke, Androvsky appeared by the tent door. He was looking
frightfully ill, and like a desperate man. When the priest had gone,
Domini told Androvsky about the liqueur and the disappearance of the
Trappist monk. As she spoke, his face grew more ghastly. He stood rigid,
as if with horror.

"Poor, poor man!" she said, as she finished her story.

"You--you pity that man then?" murmured Androvsky.

"Yes," she replied. "I was thinking of the agony he must be enduring if
he is still alive."

Androvsky seemed painfully moved, and almost as if he were on the verge
of some passionate outburst of emotion; and something like a deep voice
far down in the loving heart of Domini said to her, "If you really love,
be fearless. Attack the sorrow which stands like a figure of death
between you and your husband. Drive it away. You have a weapon--faith--
use it!"

At last she summoned all her courage, all her faith, and she forced from
Androvsky the confession of what it was which held him in perpetual
misery, even in freedom, even with her, whom he loved beyond and above
all human beings.

"Domini," he said, "you want to know what it is that makes me unhappy
even in our love--desperately unhappy. It is this. I believe in God, I
love God, I have insulted God. I have tried to forget God, to deny Him,
to put human love higher than love for Him. But always I am haunted by
the thought of God, and that thought makes me despair. Once, when I was
young, I gave myself to God solemnly. I have broken the vows I made! I
gave myself to God as a monk."

"You are the Trappist!" she whispered. "You are the monk from the
monastery of El Largani who disappeared after twenty years?"

"Yes," he said, "I am he."

Standing there in the sands, while the world was wrapped in sleep,
Androvsky told Domini the whole story of his life in the monastery, of
his innocent happiness there, and of the events which woke up within him
the mad longing to see life and the world, and to know the love of
woman. He told her of his secret departure by night from the monastery,
of his journey to the desert in search of complete and savage liberty.
He told her how he had fought against his growing love for her, how he
had tried to leave her; how, at the last moment in the garden by night,
his passion for her had conquered him and driven him to her feet. He
told her how the officer, Trevignac, had known him long ago in the
monastery, and had recognised him when the Arab brought in the liqueur
which he had made. He kept nothing from her.

"That last day in the garden," he said finally, "I thought I had
conquered myself, and it was in that moment that I fell for ever. When I
knew you loved me, I could fight no more. You have seen me, you have
lived with me, you have divined my misery. But don't think, Domini, that
it ever came from you. It was the consciousness of my lie to you, my lie
to God, that--that--I can't tell you--I can't tell you--you know."

He looked into her face, then turned to go away into the desert.

"I'll go! I'll go!" he muttered.

Then Domini spoke.

"Boris!" she said.

He stopped.

"Boris, now at last you can pray."

She went into the tent, and left him alone. He knew that in the tent she
was praying for him. He stood, trying to listen to her prayer, then,
with an uncertain hand, he felt in his breast. He drew out a wooden
cross, given to him by his mother when he entered the monastery. He bent
down his head, touched it with his lips, and fell upon his knees in the
desert.

From that night, Domini realised that her duty was plain before her.
Androvsky was still at heart a monk, and she was a fervently religious
woman. She put God above herself, above her poor, desperate, human love,
above Androvsky and his passionate love for her. She put the things of
eternity before the things of time. She never told Androvsky of the
child that was coming.

After he had made his confession to the priest of Beni-Mora who had
married them, she led him to the monastery door, and there they parted
for ever on earth, to be reunited, as both believed, in heaven.

And now, in the garden of Count Anteoni, which has passed into other
hands, a little boy may often be seen playing.

Sometimes, when twilight is falling over the Sahara, his mother calls
him to her, to the white wall from which she looks out over the desert.

"Listen, Boris," she whispers.

The little boy leans his face against her breast, and obeys.

An Arab is passing below on the desert track, singing to himself, as he
goes towards his home in the oasis, "No one but God and I knows what is
in my heart."

The mother whispers the words to herself. The cool wind of the night
blows over the vast spaces of the Sahara and touches her cheek,
reminding her of her glorious days of liberty, of the passion that came
to her soul like fire in the desert.

But she does not rebel, for always, when night falls, she sees the form
of a man praying, one who once fled from prayer in the desert; she sees
a wanderer who at last has reached his home.

       *       *       *       *       *




OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES


Elsie Venner


     Oliver Wendell Holmes, essayist, poet, scientist, and one of
     the most lovable men who have adorned the literature of the
     English tongue, was born at Cambridge, Massachusetts, Aug. 29,
     1809, of a New England family with a record in which he took
     great pride. After studying medicine at Harvard, he went to
     Europe on a prolonged tour, and, returning, took his M.D., and
     became a popular professor of anatomy. He had some repute as a
     graceful poet in his student days. "Elsie Venner," at first
     called "The Professor's Story," was published in 1861, and was
     the first sustained work of fiction that came from the pen of
     Oliver Wendell Holmes. Illumined by admirable pictures of life
     and character in a typical New England town, the book itself
     is a remarkable study of heredity--a study only relieved by
     the author's kindly humour. The unfortunate child, doomed
     before her birth to suffer from the fatal bite of a
     rattlesnake--an incident unduly extravagant in some critics'
     opinions--and only throwing off the evil influence on her
     death-bed, is one of the most pathetic figures in all American
     literature. It was not until seven years later that "Elsie
     Venner" was followed by another novel, "The Guardian Angel," a
     story which is worked out on the same lines of thought as the
     former. Holmes died on October 7, 1894.


_I.--The Eyes of Elsie Venner_


Mr. Bernard Langdon, duly certificated, had accepted the invitation from
the Board of Trustees of the Apollinean Female Institute, a school for
the education of young ladies, situated in the nourishing town of
Rockland.

Rockland is at the foot of a mountain, and a horrible feature of this
mountain was the region known as Rattlesnake Ledge, which was still
tenanted by those horrible reptiles in spite of many a foray by the
townspeople.

That the brood was not extirpated there was a melancholy proof in the
year 184--, when a young married woman, detained at home by the state of
her health, was bitten in the entry of her own house by a rattlesnake
which had found its way down from the mountain. Owing to the almost
instant employment of powerful remedies, the bite did not prove
immediately fatal, but she died within a few months of the time when she
was bitten.

It was on a fine morning that Mr. Langdon made his appearance, as master
for the English branches, in the great school-room of the Apollinean
Institute. The principal, Mr. Silas Peckham, carried him to the desk of
the young lady assistant, Miss Darley by name, and introduced him to
her. The young lady assistant had to point out to the new master the
whole routine of the classes, and Mr. Langdon had a great many questions
to ask relating to his new duties. The truth is, the general effect of
the school-room, with its scores of young girls, was enough to confuse a
young man like Mr. Langdon, and he may be pardoned for asking Miss
Darley questions about his scholars as well as about their lessons.

He asked who one or two girls were, and being answered, went on, "And
who and what is that sitting a little apart there--that strange,
wild-looking girl?"

The lady teacher's face changed; one would have said she was frightened
or troubled. The girl did not look up; she was winding a gold chain
about her wrist, and then uncoiling it as if in a kind of reverie. Miss
Darley drew close to the master, and placed her hand so as to hide her
lips.

"Don't look at her as if we were talking about her," she whispered
softly, "that is Elsie Venner."

A girl of about seventeen, tall, slender, was Elsie Venner. Black,
piercing eyes, black hair, twisted in heavy braids, a face that one
could not help looking at for its beauty, yet that one wanted to look
away from, and could not, for those diamond eyes.

Those eyes were fixed on the lady teacher one morning not long after
Langdon's arrival. Miss Darley turned her own away, and let them wander
over the other scholars. But the diamond eyes were on her still. She
turned the leaves of several of her books, and finally, following some
ill-defined impulse which she could not resist, left her place, and went
to the young girl's desk.

"What do you want of me, Elsie Venner?" It was a strange question to
put, for the girl had not signified that she wished the teacher to come
to her.

"Nothing," she cried. "I thought I could make you come." The girl spoke
in a low tone, a kind of half-whisper.

Bernard Langdon experienced the power of those diamond eyes one
particular day that summer.

He had made up his mind to explore the dreaded Rattlesnake Ledge of the
mountain, to examine the rocks, and perhaps to pick up an adventure in
the zoological line; for he had on a pair of high, stout boots, and he
carried a stick in his hand.

High up on one of the precipitous walls of rock he saw some tufts of
flowers, and knew them for flowers Elsie Venner had brought into the
school-room. Presently on a natural platform where he sat down to rest,
he found a hairpin.

He rose up from his seat to look round for other signs of a woman's
visits, and walked to the mouth of a cavern and looked into it. His look
was met by the glitter of two diamond eyes, shining out of the darkness,
but gliding with a smooth, steady motion towards the light, and himself.
He stood fixed, struck dumb, staring back into them with dilating pupils
and sudden numbness of fear that cannot move. The two sparks of light
came forward until they grew to circles of flame, and all at once lifted
themselves up as if in angry surprise.

Then, for the first time, thrilled in Mr. Bernard's ears the dreadful
sound that nothing which breathes can hear unmoved--the long, singing
whir, as the huge, thick-bodied reptile shook his many-jointed rattle.
He waited as in a trance; and while he looked straight into the flaming
eyes, it seemed to him that they were losing their light and terror,
that they were growing tame and dull. The charm was dissolving, the
numbness passing away, he could move once more. He heard a light
breathing close to his ear, and, half turning, saw the face of Elsie
Venner, looking motionless into the reptile's eyes, which had shrunk and
faded under the stronger enchantment of her own.

From that time Mr. Bernard was brought into new relations with Elsie. He
was grateful; she had led him out of danger, and perhaps saved him from
death, but he shuddered at the recollection of the whole scene. He made
up his mind that, come what might, he would solve the mystery of Elsie
Venner, sooner or later.


_II.--Cousin Richard Venner_


Richard Venner had passed several of his early years with his uncle
Dudley Venner at the Dudley mansion, the playmate of Elsie, being her
cousin, two or three years older than herself. His mother was a lady of
Buenos Ayres, of Spanish descent, and had died while he was in his
cradle. A self-willed, capricious boy, he was a rough playmate for
Elsie.

But Elsie was the wilder of these two motherless children. Old Sophy--
said to be the granddaughter of a cannibal chief--who watched them in
their play and their quarrels, always seemed to be more afraid for the
boy than the girl.

"Massa Dick, don' you be too rough wi' dat girl! She scratch you las'
week, 'n' some day she bite you; 'n' if she bite you, Massa Dick----"
Old Sophy nodded her head ominously, as if she could say a great deal
more.

Elsie's father, whose fault was to indulge her in everything, found that
it would never do to let these children grow up together. A sharper
quarrel than usual decided this point. Master Dick forgot old Sophy's
caution, and vexed the girl into a paroxysm of wrath, in which she
sprang at him, and bit his arm. Old Dr. Kettredge was sent for, and came
at once when he heard what had happened.

He had a good deal to say about the danger there was from the teeth of
animals or of human beings when enraged, and he emphasised his remarks
by the application of a pencil of lunar caustic to each of the marks
left by the sharp white teeth.

After this Master Dick went off on his travels, which led him into
strange places and stranger company; and so the boy grew up to youth and
early manhood.

There came a time when the young gentleman thought he would like to see
his cousin again, and wrote inviting himself to the Dudley mansion.

Doctor Kettredge could see no harm in the visit when Dudley Venner
consulted him. Her father was never easy about Elsie. He could not tell
the old doctor _all_ he knew. In God's good time he believed his only
daughter would come to her true nature; her eyes would lose that
frightful, cold glitter, and that faint birth-mark which encircled her
neck--her mother swooned when she first saw it--would fade wholly out.

"Let her go to the girls' school, by all means," the doctor had said,
when that was first talked about. "Anything to interest her. Friendship,
love, religion--whatever will set her nature to work."

When Dudley Venner mentioned his nephew's arrival, the doctor only said,
"Let him stay a while; it gives her something to think about." He
thought there was no danger of any sudden passion springing up between
two such young persons.

So Mr. Richard came, and the longer he stayed the more favourably the
idea of a permanent residence in the mansion-house seemed to impress
him. The estate was large and of great value, and there could not be a
doubt that the property had largely increased. It was evident there was
an abundant income, and Cousin Elsie was worth trying for. On the other
hand, what was the matter with her eyes, that they sucked your life out
of you in that strange way? And what did she always wear a necklace for?
Besides, her father might last for ever or take it into his head to
marry again.

He prolonged his visit until his presence became something like a matter
of habit. In the meantime he found that Elsie was getting more constant
in her attendance at school, and learned, on inquiry, that there was a
new master, a handsome young man. The handsome young man would not have
liked the look that came over Dick Venner's face when he heard this fact
mentioned.

For Mr. Richard had decided that he must have the property, that this
was his one great chance in life. The girl might not suit him as a wife.
Possibly. Time enough to find out after he had got her. That Elsie now
regarded him with indifference, if not aversion, he could not conceal
from himself. The young man at the school was probably at the bottom of
it. "Cousin Elsie in love with a Yankee schoolmaster!"

But for a long time Dick Venner could get no positive evidence of any
sentiment between Elsie and the schoolmaster. At one time he would be
devoured by suspicion, at another he would laugh himself out of them.

His jealousy at last broke out, when he and Elsie were alone, in a
questioning reference to Mr. Langdon.

Elsie coloured, and then answered, abruptly and scornfully, "Mr. Langdon
is a gentleman, and would not vex me as you do."

"A gentleman!" Dick answered, with the most insulting accent. "A
gentleman! Come, Elsie; you've got the Dudley blood in your veins, and
it doesn't do for you to call this poor sneaking schoolmaster a
gentleman!"

He stopped short. Elsie's bosom was heaving, the faint flush of her
cheek was becoming a vivid glow. There was no longer any doubt in his
mind. Elsie Venner loved Bernard Langdon. The sudden conviction,
absolute, overwhelming, rushed upon him.

Elsie made no answer, but glided out of the room and slid away to her
own apartment. She bolted the door, and drew her curtains close. Then
she threw herself on the floor, and fell into a dull, slow ache of
passion, without tears, almost without words.

Dick realised that he had reached a fearful point. He could not give up
the great Dudley property. Therefore, the school-master must be got rid
of, and by self-destruction.

Mr. Bernard Langdon must be found, suspended to the branch of a tree,
somewhat within a mile of the Apollinean Institute.


_III.--The Perilous Hour_


Old Doctor Kettredge had advised Bernard Langdon to go in for pistol-
shooting, and had even presented him with a small, beautifully finished
revolver. "I want you to carry this," he said, "and more than that, I
want you to practise with it often, so that it may be seen and
understood that you are apt to have a pistol about you."

This was at the conclusion of a conversation between the doctor and Mr.
Bernard concerning Elsie Venner.

"Elsie interests me," said the young man, "interests me strangely. I
would risk my life for her, but I do not love her. If her hand touches
mine, it is not a thrill of passion I feel running through me, but a
very different emotion."

"Mr. Langdon," said the doctor, "you have come to this country town
without suspicion, and you are moving in the midst of perils. Keep your
eyes open, and your heart shut. If, through pitying that girl, you ever
come to love her, you are lost. If you deal carelessly with her, beware!
This is not all. There are other eyes on you beside Elsie Venner's. Go
armed in future."

Mr. Bernard thought the advice very odd, but he followed it, and soon
became known as an expert at revolver-shooting. On the day when Dick
Venner had decided that the schoolmaster must be found hanged, Bernard
Langdon went out as usual for the evening walk. He thrust his pistol,
which he had put away loaded, into his pocket before starting.

The moon was shining at intervals, for the night was partially clouded.
There seemed to be nobody stirring, but presently he detected the sound
of hoofs, and, looking forward, saw a horseman coming in his direction.
When the horseman was within a hundred and fifty yards of him, the moon
shone out suddenly, and revealed each of them to the other. The rider
paused for a moment, then suddenly put his horse to the full gallop, and
dashed towards him, rising at the same instant in his stirrups and
swinging something round his head. It was a strange manoeuvre, so
strange and threatening that the young man cocked his pistol, and waited
to see what mischief all this meant. He did not wait long. As the rider
came rushing towards him he made a rapid motion, and something leaped
five-and-twenty feet through the air in Mr. Bernard's direction. In an
instant he felt a ring, as of a rope or thong, settle upon his
shoulders. There was no time to think, he would be lost in another
second. He raised his pistol and fired--not at the rider, but at the
horse. His aim was true; the horse gave one bound and fell lifeless,
shot through the head. The lasso was fastened to his saddle, and his
last bound threw Mr. Bernard violently to the earth, where he lay
motionless, as if stunned.

In the meantime, Dick Venner, who had been dashed down with his horse,
was trying to extricate himself; one of his legs was held fast under the
animal, the long spur on his boot having caught in the saddle-cloth. He
found, however, that he could do nothing with his right arm, his
shoulder having been in some way injured in his fall. But his Southern
blood was up, and, as he saw Mr. Bernard move as if he were coming to
his senses, he struggled violently to free himself.

"I'll have the dog yet!" he said; "only let me get at him with the
knife!"

He had just succeeded in extricating his imprisoned leg, and was ready
to spring to his feet, when he was caught firmly by the throat, and
looking up, saw a hayfork within an inch of his breast.

"Hold on there! What'n thunder 'r' y' abaout, y' darned Portagee?" said
a sharp, resolute voice.

Dick looked from the weapon to the person who held it, and saw Abel
Stebbins, the doctor's man, standing over him.

"Let me up! Let me up!" he cried in a low, hurried voice. "I'll give you
a hundred dollars in gold to let me go. The man a'n't hurt--don't you
see him stirring? He'll come to himself in two minutes. Let me up! I'll
give you a hundred and fifty dollars in gold, now, here on the spot, and
the watch out of my pocket; take it yourself, with your own hands!"

"Ketch me lett'n go!" was Abel's emphatic answer.

Mr. Bernard was now getting first his senses, and then some few of his
scattered wits together.

"Who's hurt? What's happened?" he asked, staring about him.

Then he felt something about his neck; and putting his hands up, found
the loop of the lasso. Abel quickly slipped the noose over Mr. Bernard's
head, and put it round the neck of the miserable Dick Venner, who, with
his disabled arm, felt resistance was hopeless.

The party now took up the line of march for old Dr. Kettredge's house,
Abel carrying Langdon's pistol, and leading Dick Venner, Bernard Langdon
holding the hayfork. He was still half-stunned, and felt it was all a
dream, when they reached the house.

"My mind is confused," he told the doctor. "I've had a fall."

"Sit down, sit down," the doctor said. "Abel will tell me about it.
Slight concussion of the brain. Can't remember very well for an hour or
two--will come right by to-morrow!"

Dick Venner's shoulder was out of joint, the doctor found; he replaced
it in a very few minutes. That night the doctor drove Dick forty miles
at a stretch, out of the limits of the state.

He had implored them to let him go, and Mr. Bernard was quite willing
that no further proceedings should be taken.


_IV.--The Secret is Whispered_


A week after Dick Venner's departure Elsie went off at the accustomed
hour to the school. She had none of the hard, wicked light in her eyes
that morning, and looked gentle, but dreamy.

At the end of the school hours, when the girls had all gone out, Elsie
came up to Mr. Bernard, and said, in a very low voice, "Will you walk
towards my home with me to-day?"

So they walked along together on their way towards the Dudley mansion.

"I have no friend," Elsie said all at once. "Nobody loves me but one old
woman--old Sophy!"

"I am your friend, Elsie. Tell me what I can do to render your life
happier."

_"Love me!"_ said Elsie Venner.

Mr. Bernard turned pale.

"Elsie," he said presently, "I do love you, as a sister with sorrows of
her own--as one whom I would save at the risk of my happiness and life.
Give me your hand, dear Elsie, and trust me that I will be as true a
friend to you as if we were children of the same mother!"

Elsie gave him her hand mechanically, and he pressed it gently. They
walked almost in silence the rest of the way.

It was all over with poor Elsie. She went at once to her own room when
they reached the mansion-house, and never left it.

They sent for the old doctor, and he ordered some remedies, saying he
would call the next day, hoping to find her better. But the next day
came, and the next, and still Elsie was on her bed--feverish, restless,
and silent.

"Send me Helen Darley," she said at last, on the fourth day.

And Helen came. Dudley Venner followed her into the room.

"She is your patient," he said, "except while the doctor is here."

Helen Darley often tried in those days and nights, when she sat by
Elsie's bed, to enter into the sick girl's confidence and affections,
but there was always something that seemed inexplicable in the changes
of mood. So Helen determined to ask old Sophy some questions.

"How old is Elsie?"

"Eighteen years this las' September."

"How long ago did her mother die?"

"Eighteen year ago this October."

Helen was silent for a moment. Then she whispered,

"What did her mother die of, Sophy?"

The old woman caught Helen by the hand and clung to it, as if in fear.

"Don't never speak in this house 'bout what Elsie's mother died of!" she
said. "God has made Ugly Things wi' death in their mouths, Miss Darlin',
an' He knows what they're for. But my poor Elsie! To have her blood
changed in her before--It was in July mistress got her death, but she
liv' till three week after my poor Elsie was born."

She could speak no more; she had said enough. Helen remembered the
stories she had heard on coming to the village. Now she knew the secret
of the fascination which looked out of the cold, glittering eyes.

A great change came over Elsie in the last few days. It seemed to her
father as if the malign influence which had pervaded her being had been
driven forth or exorcised.

"It's her mother's look!" said old Sophy. "It's her mother's own face
right over again. She never look' so before--the Lord's hand is on her!
His will be done!"

But Elsie's heart was beating more feebly every day. One night, with
sudden effort, she threw her arms round her father's neck, kissed him,
and said, "Good-night, my dear father!"

Then her head fell back upon her pillow, and a long sigh breathed
through her lips.

Elsie Venner was dead!

       *       *       *       *       *

In the following summer Mr. Dudley Venner married Miss Helen Darley. Mr.
Bernard Langdon returned to college, resumed his medical studies, took
his degree as Doctor of Medicine, and he now also is married.

       *       *       *       *       *




THOMAS HUGHES


Tom Brown's Schooldays


     "Tom Brown's Schooldays" has been called by more than one
     critic the best story of schoolboy life ever written, and
     three generations of readers have endorsed the opinion. Its
     author, Thomas Hughes, born at Uffington, Berkshire, England,
     Oct. 19, 1822, was himself, like his hero, both a Rugby boy
     under Dr. Arnold and the son of a Berkshire squire, but he
     denied that the story was in any real sense autobiographical.
     Matthew Arnold and Arthur H. Clough, the poet, were Hughes's
     friends at school, and in later life he became associated with
     Charles Kingsley and Frederick Denison Maurice on what was
     called the Christian Socialist movement. A barrister by
     profession, Thomas Hughes became a county court judge, and
     lived for many years in that capacity at Chester. Besides "Tom
     Brown's Schooldays," published in 1857, Hughes also wrote "Tom
     Brown at Oxford" (1861), biographies of Livingstone, Bishop
     Fraser, and Daniel Macmillan, and a number of political,
     religious and social pamphlets. He died on March 22, 1896.


_I.--Tom Goes to Rugby_


Squire Brown, J.P. for the county of Berks, dealt out justice and mercy,
in a thorough way, and begat sons and daughters, and hunted the fox, and
grumbled at the badness of the roads and the times. And his wife dealt
out stockings and shirts and smock frocks, and comforting drinks to the
old folks with the "rheumatiz," and good counsel to all.

Tom was their eldest child, a hearty, strong boy, from the first given
to fighting with and escaping from his nurse, and fraternising with all
the village boys, with whom he made expeditions all round the
neighbourhood.

Squire Brown was a Tory to the backbone; but, nevertheless, held divers
social principles not generally supposed to be true blue in colour; the
foremost of which was the belief that a man is to be valued wholly and
solely for that which he is himself, apart from all externals whatever.
Therefore, he held it didn't matter a straw whether his son associated
with lords' sons or ploughmen's sons, provided they were brave and
honest. So he encouraged Tom in his intimacy with the village boys, and
gave them the run of a close for a playground. Great was the grief among
them when Tom drove off with the squire one morning, to meet the coach,
on his way to Rugby, to school.

It had been resolved that Tom should travel down by the Tally-ho, which
passed through Rugby itself; and as it was an early coach, they drove
out to the Peacock Inn, at Islington, to be on the road. Towards nine
o'clock, the squire, observing that Tom was getting sleepy, sent the
little fellow off to bed, with a few parting words, the result of much
thought.

"And now, Tom, my boy," said the squire, "remember you are going, at
your own earnest request, to be chucked into this great school, like a
young bear, with all your troubles before you--earlier than we should
have sent you, perhaps. You'll see a great many cruel blackguard things
done, and hear a deal of foul, bad talk. But never fear. You tell the
truth, and keep a brave, kind heart, and never listen to or say anything
you wouldn't have your mother or sister hear, and you'll never feel
ashamed to come home, or we to see you."

The mention of his mother made Tom feel rather choky, and he would have
liked to hug his father well, if it hadn't been for his recent
stipulation that kissing should now cease between them, so he only
squeezed his father's hand, and looked up bravely, and said, "I'll try,
father!"

At ten minutes to three Tom was in the coffee-room in his stockings, and
there was his father nursing a bright fire; and a cup of coffee and a
hard biscuit on the table.

Just as he was swallowing the last mouthful, Boots looks in, and says,
"Tally-ho, sir!" And they hear the ring and rattle as it dashes up to
the Peacock.

"Good-bye, father; my love at home!" A last shake of the hand. Up goes
Tom, the guard holding on with one hand, while he claps the horn to his
mouth. Toot, toot, toot! Away goes the Tally-ho into the darkness.

Tom stands up, and looks back at his father's figure as long as you can
see it; and then comes to an anchor, and finishes his buttonings and
other preparations for facing the cold three hours before dawn. The
guard muffles Tom's feet up in straw, and puts an oat-sack over his
knees, but it is not until after breakfast that his tongue is unloosed,
and he rubs up his memory, and launches out into a graphic history of
all the performances of the Rugby boys on the roads for the last twenty
years.

"And so here's Rugby, sir, at last, and you'll be in plenty of time for
dinner at the schoolhouse, as I tell'd you," says the old guard.

Tom's heart beat quick, and he began to feel proud of being a Rugby boy
when he passed the school gates, and saw the boys standing there as if
the town belonged to them.

One of the young heroes ran out from the rest, and scrambled up behind,
where, having righted himself with, "How do, Jem?" to the guard, he
turned round short to Tom, and began, "I say, you fellow, is your name
Brown?"

"Yes," said Tom, in considerable astonishment.

"Ah, I thought so; my old aunt, Miss East, lives somewhere down your way
in Berkshire; she wrote that you were coming to-day and asked me to give
you a lift!"

Tom was somewhat inclined to resent the patronising air of his new
friend, a boy of just about his own age and height, but gifted with the
most transcendent coolness and assurance, which Tom felt to be
aggravating and hard to bear, but couldn't help admiring and envying,
especially when my young lord begins hectoring two or three long loafing
fellows, and arranges with one of them to carry up Tom's luggage.

"You see," said East, as they strolled up to the school gates, "a good
deal depends on how a fellow cuts up at first. You see I'm doing the
handsome thing by you, because my father knows yours; besides, I want to
please the old lady--she gave me half-a-sov. this half, and perhaps'll
double it next if I keep in her good books."

Tom was duly placed in the Third Form, and found his work very easy; and
as he had no intimate companion to make him idle (East being in the
Lower Fourth), soon gained golden opinions from his master, and all went
well with him in the school. As a new boy he was, of course, excused
fagging, but, in his enthusiasm, this hardly pleased him; and East and
others of his young friends kindly allowed him to indulge his fancy, and
take their turns at night, fagging and cleaning studies. So he soon
gained the character of a good-natured, willing fellow, ready to do a
turn for anyone.


_II.--The War of Independence_


The Lower Fourth was an overgrown Form, too large for any one man to
attend to properly, consequently the elysium of the young scamps who
formed the staple of it. Tom had come up from the Third with a good
character, but he rapidly fell away, and became as unmanageable as the
rest. By the time the second monthly examination came round, his
character for steadiness was gone, and for years after, he went up the
school without it, and regarded the masters, as a matter of course, as
his natural enemies. Matters were not so comfortable in the house,
either. The new praeposters of the Sixth Form were not strong, and the
big Fifth Form boys soon began to usurp power, and to fag and bully the
little boys.

One evening Tom and East were sitting in their study, Tom brooding over
the wrongs of fags in general and his own in particular.

"I say, Scud," said he at last, "what right have the Fifth Form boys to
fag us as they do?"

"No more right than you have to fag them," said East, without looking up
from an early number of "Pickwick." Tom relapsed into his brown study,
and East went on reading and chuckling.

"Do you know, old fellow, I've been thinking it over, and I've made up
my mind I won't fag except for the Sixth."

"Quite right, too, my boy," cried East. "I'm all for a strike myself;
it's getting too bad."

"I shouldn't mind if it were only young Brooke now," said Tom; "I'd do
anything for him. But that blackguard Flashman----"

"The cowardly brute!" broke in East.

"Fa-a-ag!" sounded along the passage from Flashman's study.

The two boys looked at one another.

"Fa-a-ag!" again. No answer.

"Here, Brown! East! You young skulks!" roared Flashman. "I know you're
in! No shirking!"

Tom bolted the door, and East blew out the candle.

"Now, Tom, no surrender!"

Then the assault commenced. One panel of the door gave way to repeated
kicks, and the besieged strengthened their defences with the sofa.
Flashman & Co. at last retired, vowing vengeance, and when the convivial
noises began again steadily, Tom and East rushed out. They were too
quick to be caught, but a pickle-jar, sent whizzing after them by
Flashman narrowly missed Tom's head. Their story was soon told to a knot
of small boys round the fire in the hall, who nearly all bound
themselves not to fag for the Fifth, encouraged and advised thereto by
Diggs--a queer, very clever fellow, nearly at the top of the Fifth
himself. He stood by them all through and seldom have small boys had
more need of a friend.

Flashman and his associates united in "bringing the young vagabonds to
their senses," and the whole house was filled with chasings, sieges, and
lickings of all sorts.

One evening, in forbidden hours, Brown and East were in the hall,
chatting by the light of the fire, when the door swung open, and in
walked Flashman. He didn't see Diggs, busy in front of the other fire;
and as the boys didn't move for him, struck one of them, and ordered
them all off to their study.

"I say, you two," said Diggs, rousing up, "you'll never get rid of that
fellow till you lick him. Go in at him, both of you! I'll see fair
play."

They were about up to Flashman's shoulder, but tough and in perfect
training; while he, seventeen years old, and big and strong of his age,
was in poor condition from his monstrous habits of stuffing and want of
exercise.

They rushed in on him, and he hit out wildly and savagely, and in
another minute Tom went spinning backwards over a form; and Flashman
turned to demolish East, with a savage grin. But Diggs jumped down from
the table on which he had seated himself.

"Stop there!" shouted he. "The round's over! Half minute time allowed!
I'm going to see fair. Are you ready, Brown? Time's up!"

The small boys rushed in again; Flashman was wilder and more flurried
than ever. In a few moments over all three went on the floor, Flashman
striking his head on a form. But his skull was not fractured, as the two
youngsters feared it was, and he never laid a finger on them again. But
whatever harm a spiteful tongue could do them, he took care should be
done. Only throw dirt enough, and some will stick. And so Tom and East,
and one or two more, became a sort of young Ishmaelites. They saw the
praeposters cowed by or joining with the Fifth and shirking their own
duties; and so they didn't respect them, and rendered no willing
obedience, and got the character of sulky, unwilling fags. At the end of
the term they are told the doctor wants to see them. He is not angry
only very grave. He explains that rules are made for the good of the
school and must and shall be obeyed! He should be sorry if they had to
leave, and wishes them to think very seriously in the holidays over what
he has said. Good-night!


_III.--The Turn of the Tide_


The turning point of our hero's school career had now come, and the
manner of it was as follows.

Tom and East and another Schoolhouse boy rushed into the matron's room
in high spirits when they got back on the first day of the next
half-year. She sent off the others, but kept Tom to tell him Mrs. Arnold
wished him to take a new boy to share the study he had hoped to share
with East. She had told Mrs. Arnold she thought Tom would be kind to
him, and see that he wasn't bullied.

In the far corner of the room he saw a slight, pale boy, who looked
ready to sink through the floor. The matron watched Tom for a minute,
and saw what was passing in his mind.

"Poor little fellow," she said, almost in a whisper. "His father's dead,
and his mamma--such a sweet, kind lady--almost broke her heart at
leaving him. She said one of his sisters was like to die of a decline----
"

"Well, well," burst in Tom, "I suppose I must give up East. Come along,
young 'un! What's your name? We'll go and have supper, and then I'll
show you our study."

"His name's George Arthur," said the matron. "I've had his books and
things put into the study, which his mamma has had new papered, and the
sofa covered, and new curtains. And Mrs. Arnold told me to say she'd
like you both to come up to tea with her."

Here was an announcement for Master Tom! He was to go up to tea the
first night, just as if he were of importance in the school world
instead of the most reckless young scapegrace among the fags. He felt
himself lifted on to a higher moral platform at once; and marched off
with his young charge in tow in monstrous good humour with himself and
all the world. His cup was full when Dr. Arnold, with a warm shake of
the hand, seemingly oblivious of all the scrapes he had been getting
into, said, "Ah, Brown, you here! I hope you left all well at home. And
this is the little fellow who is to share your study? Well, he doesn't
look as we should like to see him. You must take him some good long
walks, and show him what little pretty country we have about here."

The tea went merrily off, and everybody felt that he, young as he was,
was of some use in the school world, and had a work to do there. When
Tom was recognised coming out of the private door which led from the
doctor's house, there was a great shout of greeting, and Hall at once
began to question Arthur.

"What a queer chum for Tom Brown," was the general comment. And it must
be confessed that so thought Tom himself as he lighted the candle in
their study, and surveyed the new curtains with much satisfaction.

"I say, Arthur, what a brick your mother is to make us so cosy! But look
here now, you must answer straight up when the fellows speak to you. If
you're afraid, you'll get bullied. And don't you ever talk about home or
your mother or sisters."

Poor little Arthur looked ready to cry.

"But please, mayn't I talk about home to you?"

"Oh, yes, I like it. But not to boys you don't know. What a jolly desk!"

And soon Tom was deep in Arthur's goods and chattels, and hardly thought
of his friends outside till the prayer-bell rang.

He thought of his own first night there when he was leading poor little
Arthur up to No. 4, and showing him his bed. The idea of sleeping in a
room with strange boys had clearly never crossed his mind before. He
could hardly bare to take his jacket off. However, presently off it
came, and he paused and looked at Tom, who was sitting on his bed,
talking and laughing.

"Please, Brown," he whispered, "may I wash my face and hands?"

"Of course, if you like," said Tom, staring. "You'll have to go down for
more water if you use it all." On went the talk and laughter. Arthur
finished his undressing, and looked round more nervously than ever. The
light burned clear, the noise went on. This time, however, he did not
ask Tom what he might or might not do, but dropped on his knees by his
bedside to open his heart to Him who heareth the cry of the tender
child, or the strong man.

Tom was unlacing his boots with his back towards Arthur, and looked up
in wonder at the sudden silence. Then two or three boys laughed, and one
big, brutal fellow picked up a slipper and shied it at the kneeling boy.
The next moment the boot Tom had just taken off flew straight at the
head of the bully.

"If any other fellow wants the other boot," said Tom, stepping on to the
floor, "he knows how to get it!"

At this moment the Sixth Form boy came in, and not another word could be
said. Tom and the rest rushed into bed, and finished unrobing there.
Sleep seemed to have deserted the pillow of poor Tom. The thought of his
promise to his mother came over him, never to forget to kneel at his
bedside and give himself up to his Father before he laid his head on the
pillow from which it might never rise; and he lay down gently, and cried
as if his heart would break. He was only fourteen years old.

Next morning he was up and washed and dressed just as the ten-minutes
bell began, and then in the face of the whole room knelt down to pray.
Not five words could he say; he was listening for every whisper in the
room. What were they all thinking of him? At last, as it were from his
inmost heart, a still, small voice seemed to breathe: "God be merciful
to me, a sinner." He repeated the words over and over again, and rose
from his knees comforted and humbled, and ready to face the whole
school. It was not needed; two other boys had already followed his
example. Before either Tom or Arthur left the Schoolhouse there was no
room in which it had not become the regular custom.


_IV.--Tom Brown's Last Match_


The curtain now rises on the last act of our little drama. Eight years
have passed, and it is the end of the summer half-year at Rugby. The
boys have scattered to the four winds, except the Eleven, and a few
enthusiasts who are permitted to stay to see the result of the cricket
matches. For this year the return matches are being played at Rugby, and
to-day the great event of the year, the Marylebone match, is being
played. I wish I had space to describe the whole match; but I haven't,
so you must fancy it all, and let me beg to call your attention to a
group of three eagerly watching the match. The first, evidently a
clergyman, is carelessly dressed, and looks rather used up, but is bent
on enjoying life as he spreads himself out in the evening sun. By his
side, in white flannel shirt and trousers, and the captain's belt, sits
a strapping figure near six feet high, with ruddy, tanned face and a
laughing eye. He is leaning forward, dandling his favourite bat, with
which he has made thirty or forty runs to-day. It is Tom Brown, spending
his last day as a Rugby boy. And at their feet sits Arthur, with his bat
across his knees. He is less of a boy, in fact, than Tom, if one may
judge by the thoughtfulness of his face, which is somewhat paler than we
could wish, but his figure is well-knit and active, and all his old
timidity has disappeared, and is replaced by silent, quaint fun, as he
listens to the broken talk, and joins in every now and then. Presently
he goes off to the wicket, with a last exhortation from Tom to play
steady and keep his bat straight.

"I'm surprised to see Arthur in the Eleven," says the master.

"Well, I'm not sure he ought to be for his play," said Tom; "but I
couldn't help putting him in. It will do him so much good, and you can't
think what I owe him!"

The master smiled. Later he returned to the subject

"Nothing has given me greater pleasure," he said, "than your friendship
for him. It has been the making of you both."

"Of me, at any rate," answered Tom. "It was the luckiest chance in the
world that sent him to Rugby and made him my chum."

"There was neither luck nor chance in that matter," said the master. "Do
you remember when the Doctor lectured you and East when you had been
getting into all sorts of scrapes?"

"Yes; well enough," said Tom. "It was the half-year before Arthur came."

"Exactly so," said the master. "He was in great distress about you both,
and after some talk, we both agreed that you in particular wanted some
object in the school beyond games and mischief. So the Doctor looked out
the best of the new boys, and separated you and East in the hope that
when you had somebody to lean on you, you'd be steadier yourself, and
get manliness and thoughtfulness. He has watched the experiment ever
since with great satisfaction."

Up to this time Tom had never fully given in to, or understood, the
Doctor. He had learnt to regard him with love and respect, and to think
him a very great and wise and good man. But as regarded his own position
in the school, he had no idea of giving anyone credit but himself.

It was a new light to Tom to find that besides teaching the Sixth, and
governing and guiding the whole school, editing classics, and writing
histories, the great headmaster had found time to watch over the career
even of him, Tom Brown, and his particular friends. However, the
Doctor's victory was complete from that moment. It had taken eight long
years to do it, but now it was done thoroughly.

The match was over.

Tom said good-bye to his tutor, and marched down to the Schoolhouse.

Next morning he was in the train and away for London, no longer a
schoolboy.

       *       *       *       *       *




Tom Brown at Oxford


     "Tom Brown at Oxford," a continuation of "Tom Brown's
     Schooldays," was published in 1861, but, like most sequels, it
     failed to achieve the wide popularity of its famous
     predecessor. Although the story, perhaps, lacks much of the
     freshness of the "Schooldays," it nevertheless conveys an
     admirable picture of undergraduate life as it was in the
     middle of the nineteenth century. Notwithstanding the changes
     that have taken place since then, it is still remarkably full
     of vitality, and the description of the boat races, and the
     bumping of Exeter and Oriel by St. Ambrose's boat might well
     have been written to-day. In spite of its defects, the story,
     with its vigorous morals, is worthy to rank with anything that
     came from the pen of Tom Hughes, the great apostle of muscular
     Christianity.


_I.--St. Ambrose's College_


In the Michaelmas term, after leaving school, Tom went up to matriculate
at St. Ambrose's College, Oxford, but did not go up to reside till the
following January.

St. Ambrose's College was a moderate-sized one. There were some seventy
or eighty undergraduates in residence when our hero appeared there as a
freshman, of whom a large proportion were gentleman-commoners, enough,
in fact, to give the tone to the college, which was decidedly fast.

Fewer and fewer of the St. Ambrose men appeared in the class-lists or
among the prize men. They no longer led the debates in the Union; the
boat lost place after place on the river; the eleven got beaten in all
the matches. But now a reaction had begun. The fellows recently elected
were men of great attainments, chosen as the most likely persons to
restore, as tutors, the golden days of the college.

Our hero, on leaving school, had bound himself solemnly to write all his
doings to the friend he had left behind him, and extracts from his first
letter from college will give a better idea of the place than any
account by a third party.

"Well, first and foremost, it's an awfully idle place--at any rate, for
us freshmen. Fancy now, I am in twelve lectures a week of an hour each.
There's a treat! Two hours a day; and no extra work at all. Of course, I
never look at a lecture before I go in; I know it all nearly by heart,
and for the present the light work suits me, for there's plenty to see
in this place. We keep very gentlemanly hours. Chapel every morning at
eight, and evening at seven. You must attend once a day, and twice on
Sundays, and be in gates at twelve o'clock. And you ought to dine in
hall perhaps four days a week. All the rest of your time you do just
what you like with.

"My rooms are right up in the roof, with a commanding view of tiles and
chimney-pots. Pleasant enough, separated from all mankind by a great
iron-clamped outer door; sitting-room, eighteen by twelve; bedroom,
twelve by eight; and a little cupboard for the scout. Ah, Geordie, the
scout is an institution! Fancy me waited on and valeted by a stout party
in black, of quiet, gentlemanly planners. He takes the deepest interest
in my possessions and proceedings, and is evidently used to good
society, to judge by the amount of crockery and glass, wines, liquors,
and grocery which he thinks indispensable for my due establishment. He
waits on me in hall, where we go in full fig of cap and gown at five,
and get very good dinners, and cheap enough.

"But, after all, the river is the feature of Oxford, to my mind. I
expect I shall take to boating furiously. I have been down the river
three or four times already with some other freshmen, and it is glorious
exercise, that I can see, though we bungle and cut crabs desperately at
present."

Within a day or two of the penning of this epistle, Tom realised one of
the objects of his young Oxford ambition, and succeeded in embarking in
a skiff by himself. He had been such a proficient in all the Rugby games
that he started off in the full confidence that, if he could only have a
turn or two alone, he should satisfy not only himself but everybody else
that he was a heaven-born oar. But the truth soon began to dawn upon him
that pulling, especially sculling, does not, like reading and writing,
come by nature. However, he addressed himself manfully to his task;
savage, indeed, but resolved to get down to Sandford and back before
hall-time, or perish in the attempt. Fortunately, the prudent boatman
had embarked our hero in one of the safest of the tubs, and it was not
until he had zig-zagged down Kennington reach, slowly indeed, and with
much labour, that he heard energetic shouts behind him. The next minute
the bows of his boat whirled round, the old tub grounded, and then,
turning over, shot him out on to the planking of the steep descent into
the small lasher. The rush of water was too strong for him, and rolling
him over, plunged him into the pool below.

After the first moment of astonishment and fright, Tom left himself to
the stream, holding his breath hard, and, paddling gently with his
hands, soon came to the surface, and was about to strike out for the
shore when he caught sight of a s

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